Age of Adepts

The distant horizon hadn’t been silent ever since those two adepts had left in that direction.

Clouds of flame painted the sky red. Explosions were unceasing. The commotion made it hard for the merchants to fall asleep. They stood around the campsite as the ground trembled around them and the warm heat waves washed over them. Nervousness was the only thing they felt.

If it hadn’t been for apprentice Naia’s repeated warnings not to leave the camp, there would probably have been people who ran away from fear.

The leader of the merchants had consulted Naia countless of times and gotten the same answer every time. He could only forcefully suppress the fear within the group and get them to stay in the camp.

Naia was the most excited one out of the people present. She stood at the edge of the camp and sensed the dense, active elementium fire particles in the air, her heart beating rapidly.

She was the only one with elementium talent in the camp. Only she could clearly feel the intensity of the elementium flux in the distance. Even a proper witch wouldn’t be able to cause such a commotion. Only veteran or elite adepts could strengthen their elementium spells to this level!

Thus, unlike the others in the camp, she looked into the distance not with fear, but with a zealous fervor.

In truth, the battle hadn’t lasted long. At the very best, it was only thirty minutes. However, the fight in the distance felt like an eternity for these mortals with no comprehension of supernatural powers.

A green glow dashed across the skies above the camp towards the end of the battle. A slowly fading green light streaked through the night sky. The flames and explosions in the distance had also gradually stopped. The air had finally fallen silent once more.

Did the fight have anything to do with those two adepts? Who won the battle? Why did they come here to fight?

All sorts of questions rose in Naia’s heart. Sadly, she was fated never to find the answers to these questions!

The merchants waited silently. It had already been more than half an hour since there was any noise.

Should they send someone to check the battlefield?

More than one person asked, but Naia rejected all of their suggestions.

Matters between adepts were not something that mortals and inconsequential individuals like herself could interfere. If their actions angered the adepts, it would be a simple matter for the adepts to slaughter this camp of people.

Three bright lights appeared in the sky while everyone was anxiously waiting for a conclusion. Three witches flew towards them on their flying brooms and stopped in the air above the camp.

The old witch in the lead had sharp eyes. She detected the existence of the apprentice witch in an instant. She completely ignored the repeatedly bowing leader of the merchant group and directed her question at Naia.

”Which clan are you from? What happened here earlier?”

”My greetings, Lady Hakkar!” Naia bowed in respect and said, ”I am Apprentice Witch Naia of Black Crow Cottage. Earlier… ”

Naia was a reasonably good oratorical talent. She described everything that had happened in a mere matter of sentences.

The three witches nodded after hearing Naia’s explanation.

One of the younger middle-aged witches couldn’t help but speak, ”Sister Hakkar, let us go and check it out for ourselves!”

”Mm! Let’s go!” The leader, Hakkar, nodded in agreement before turning towards Naia and saying, ”Since you’ve seen those two, come with us!”

A strange black rope that was neither wood nor metal shot out from the end of the flying broom. The line tied itself around Naia and brought her along into the sky as the witches flew towards the battlefield.

They flew past a stretch of forest with an uneven sparsity of trees. The further they went, the hotter the temperature of the air. The looked to their feet and saw several massive trees had fallen in the same direction. Burn marks remained on their trunks.

A little further and they couldn’t see any shred of evidence that indicated a tree had existed in the place.

They had yet even to step foot on the actual battlefield, but already all sorts of scars and marks were scattered across the scorched earth beneath their feet. At the core of these burn marks was a one-meter-deep and two-meter wide crater. Liquid magma that had yet to solidify filled the crater. Spiderweb-like cracks had spread in every direction from these burn marks.

The witches looked across the field under the night sky and found hundreds of these terrifying craters. They were spread all across the five hundred kilometer battlefield.

The walked a little further and felt as if they had just stepped foot upon a world of magma and fire!

There was no longer any dirt beneath their feet, only black and red magma. Some of it had hardened, while other places were still glowing red hot. Some had solidified into black rocks of various shapes, while only the surface had set in the others. The insides of such stones still contained viscous lava.

A soft, gentle blue flame would erupt and burst into the air every time a layer of the magma broke apart to reveal the slowly flowing lava beneath it.

The air here already couldn’t be directly inhaled.

A pungent odor of sulfur and smoke filled the air. The temperature had also reached a thousand degrees.

The currents of cold and hot air at this temperature had utterly distorted their vision.

Another hundred meters and they were right in the heart of the battlefield.

Here, the roiling pools of magma and the slowly flowing lava were still very much active. It was almost as if a violent volcano had just erupted on the spot and ravaged the entire place.

It was evident that no plant life could grow in this place anymore, even after the effects of the spells vanished entirely. The ferocious fire elementium had utterly changed the elementium balance of this place. It would probably take one or two months for nature to help this area recover.

The two middle-aged witches looked at the shocking sight before them. They started to calculate and deduce the possible amount of damage that the adept could have caused with his spells, and their faces began to turn green as they got their answers.

Witch Hakkar extended a black finger and drew a red rune in the air. A blinding light flashed in the night as the red rune disappeared. Instead, a semi-translucent wrinkled face appeared.

It was a simple spell of Spirit Assembly. It had extracted what traces of spirituality the earth had and temporarily concentrated and assembled it into intelligent life. The witches would be able to get some simple answers through interacting with this spirit.

”O respected Spirit of the Earth, I wish to know what transpired in this location.” Witch Hakkar took out a yellow crystal from her pouch and tossed it into the mouth of the old and wrinkled face.

Adepts. Battle. Death.

A mental flux utterly different from those of humans reverberated in the forest. Even Hakkar, with all her knowledge, could barely understand some of the more familiar syllables.

However, the crystal had done the job. A severely lacking and unstable image appeared in the air.

In the image was a scarlet and onyx world of magma. A towering man of flame gripped a black panther in its hand. The giant breathed out a trace of translucent fire, which instantly blew the panther’s head to pieces.

Hakkar summoned a flash of black light and paused the image at that moment. The Spirit of the Earth also dissipated then.

”How is it? Are you able to recognize anything?” Witch Hakkar asked.

”Yes! It is enough!” A middle-aged witch nodded and said, ”The black panther should be an adept known as Bill. He just arrived in the Northern Lands three days ago, after following the Dark Witches merchants here. A witch known as Amanda traveled with him. She has been confirmed as a candidate for the Witch of Fate.”

”Then the flame giant?” Hakkar stared at the mighty giant in the image.

”He should be a fire adept known as Greem. He came here with the same merchant group as Bill and Amanda. One of the favorite candidates, Alice, travels with him!”

”These damned outsiders! What do they take the Northern Lands for? How dare they do as they like in our lands! It seems it’s time for us to find the time to teach them a lesson,” Hakkar spat out curses and continued, ”Have Naia confirm their faces.”

”Understood!”

The middle-aged witch cast a spell, and a three-dimensional projection of two adepts appeared before Naia. It was Greem and Alice.

”That’s them. They were the ones who visited the camp,” Naia nodded in confirmation.

”Very well. It’s good that we got some confirmation,” A wicked smile appeared on Hakkar’s wrinkled old face, ”According to the instructions of the Witch Council, no outsiders are to intervene in the battles of the Witches of Fate. We can overlook Alice’s and Amanda’s actions. However, this Greem can’t be let off easy.”

”You mean... ”

”List him as wanted! Immediately put out warrants for arrests once we get back to the city! Make sure to send the message to all the witch cities!” Hakkar’s sharp voice rang out across the night sky, ”Let him taste a little pain! How dare he murder someone in the Northern Witches’ land!”

…………

Greem and Alice were already ten kilometers away when the witches sent out warrants for his arrest.

”What happened? Didn’t we agree not to expose the existence of the spider golem if possible? Why did you suddenly release it?” It appeared to be Greem’s thick and clear voice.

”You can’t blame me for that! You should know that Amanda purchased a sealing stone from god-knows-where and sealed the Infernal Tyrant. You can’t possibly expect me to expose the power of the spacestone, can you?” Alice defended herself resentfully.

”A sealing stone? Bastards! These guys have started to prepare measures against you! It seems it’s about time for us to prepare a couple more trump cards of our own!” Greem shook his head and sighed, ”Remember, do not ever expose the existence of the spacestone, regardless of what happens. Otherwise, you will have no secrets left. With the personalities of those candidates, they will probably be able to find some specialized and targeted measure against you if you even use it once.”

”Then what if I’m truly in danger?”

”Hmph! No such thing will happen. I will protect you!”

”Then you didn’t manage to protect me this time properly!”

”An accident. It was only an accident! If it weren’t for that annoying Doris, I would already have crushed that black panther. The battle wouldn’t possibly have lasted that long!”

”Fine, I’ll believe you for now. Oh right, where are we going next?”

”The apprentice witch gave us pretty detailed and complete information. Witch cottages, Spring of Fortune, obelisks; all these places seem to be quite interesting!”

”Witch cottages. We must visit the witch cottages! I have a feeling that the witch cottage in the northeast will greatly benefit us. Let’s go there!”

”Sure, as you say. We will head there.”