Age of Adepts

Greem.

Human (Elementiumized). Male.

First Grade Elementium Adept.

Bodily Attributes: Strength 9 | Agility 7 | Physique 11 | Spirit 20.

Condition: Healthy.

Note: Bodily attributes have reached genetic limits.

After the grueling toil of the past sixty-seven years, Greem had finally completed the elementiumization of his Spirit. Moreover, he had successfully allowed his Spirit to reach perfect compatibility with his elementiumized body. However, this had also caused his body’s potential to be completely excavated. Greem had to find a way to advance to the next Grade and create a qualitative change in himself. Otherwise, in one or two hundred years, he would probably find it virtually impossible to improve, even if he ate the liver of dragons and the marrow of phoenixes for every single meal.

The perfect compatibility between his body and mind had allowed him to reach a delicate balance. He had constructed a life energy circulation system within himself.

What made Greem even more relieved was the fact that he had managed to take advantage of the tempering of his body and Spirit, as well as include the Flame Fiend’s Heart in this circulation system. The Flame Fiend’s Heart had become the core of his body that continuously pushed him towards further evolution. This way, his body would become an eternal forge, even in areas lacking elementium energy. Greem would always be able to produce pure fire energy from within himself.

According to the Chip’s calculations, Greem’s fire core would be able to support magical attacks up to thirty points, even in areas utterly devoid of magic. Greem could continuously throw out fire spells of thirty points and below, even without absorbing energy from his surroundings or exhausting the elementium energy reserves he had within himself.

If Greem increased the strength of the attacks to seventy points, he could still sustain his offense for two hours. A seventy point attack was already the line that distinguished between apprentices and adepts. Moreover, this two hour referred to continuous attacks, with only a bit of delay between each spell.

If Greem switched to guerrilla tactics and moved around as he attacked, then it would provide the fire core with a buffer to regenerate. In doing so, Greem could even extend the duration of combat to one day and one night.

The ability to continuously fight was shocking. At least Greem himself hadn’t observed such stamina in other First Grade adepts.

Currently, in Fire Throne, the best at combat had to be Bloody Queen Mary. Her explosiveness in melee was shocking, not to mention her talent for sustained fights. However, her sustainability depended on the availability of large amounts of blood. If the enemy specifically targeted her blood treats, then her prolonged output in fights would fall tremendously.

However, the fire core that Greem had constructed himself resided inside his body. It was like a miniature fire altar, continuously drawing energy from the fire elementium plane. It was challenging to disrupt such a connection through ordinary sealing spells or magic-interference arrays. That almost made it impossible for Greem to run out of fire energy!

Apart from pushing his Spirit to its twenty-point limit, Greem’s Strength and Physique had also reached their limits. Nine points of Strength made him capable of flipping over an Iron Rhinoceros with his bare fists. Unfortunately, he had no talent in melee and close conflict. That was why further investing resources and efforts into close quarters combat would only result in an even greater waste.

It was the same for his eleven points of Physique.

A Physique of this level had made him as tough as a wild magical creature. The combination of his life energy and mental will had toughened his skin like the thick hide of a rhinoceros. His magic and physical resistances were just as exceptional. In particular, crossing over the ten point threshold of his Physique had allowed him to obtain the ability to regenerate limbs.

As long as he was alive and had sufficient energy, he would be able to regenerate any lost limbs by consuming energy. This regeneration was a basic ability that all high-grade body refining adepts possessed.

It was the same for his Spirit. When Greem’s Spirit passed eleven points, he obtained the ability of Rapid Regeneration. It allowed his Spirit to regenerate at twice the usual rate when over half of it had been exhausted.

After silently completing his self-assessment, Greem casually walked to his biology lab.

He had modified this place into a strange forest that resembled the Black Forest.

The moment he entered, a strange bug that looked remarkably similar to a Rock Scorpion emerged from the thick grass. It climbed up Greem’s shoulders and started to brush against his earlobe endearingly.

Greem extended a fiery hand and softly caressed the strange bug’s back. The skin was as durable as a cow’s hide, yet smooth and oily, making it hard for an ordinary person to exert any force even if they managed to grab the bug. Limbs as sharp as knives grew on each side of the bug’s body. There was a bony and segmented scorpion’s tail at the rear of its body. The poison stinger at the end of the tail dispersed a black mist that could be clearly seen.

It was the first juvenile bug that Greem had managed to cultivate after several decades. It could rob all 100% of a target lifeform’s genetic sequence that related to its innate ability. However, this bug’s individual strength was minimal. Even with Greem’s painstaking efforts to increase its powers, the bug’s combat ability was only barely equal to a beginner apprentice.

Relying on the bug alone to hunt down top-class magical creatures was no more than a childish thought. Its innate ability to rob that of others was exceptionally unfair and genuinely terrifying, but the world was fair in its own way!

The world had given it an unfair ability, yet it had also cursed the bug with a weak body.

All top-class magical creatures would possess terrifying elementium auras. Meager beings like this bug would be crushed to bits by the frightening spiritual aura of intimidation or the elementium vibrations before even getting close.

That was why Greem would first have to capture a dragon and completely restrict its movement before bringing it to the bug if he wanted to obtain the bloodline of dragons. Moreover, he would have to be wary of the dragon sneezing during this process; it might just accidentally kill the bug.

Based on all these factors, the dream of having the bug extract powerful innate abilities was not going to be that easily realized, even if it could be mass-produced– which it currently couldn’t be!

The human body’s capacity for genetic sequences had a limit. Greem’s talents as a fire adept had already taken up most of his capacity. Only a limited amount remained for foreign genes. If he didn’t choose wisely, and randomly added lots of useless abilities to his genetic sequence, then it was very likely to cause adverse side-effects. At the very least, his innate abilities would be corrupted. At worst, it might even cause the disintegration of his genetic chain.

That was why he had to avoid ’trash’ abilities. Greem needed to choose carefully for himself the most appropriate and perfect innate ability. And this undoubtedly required time and luck!

Greem played with the bug for a little longer until it was feeding time.

Three holes the size of human heads suddenly opened in the ceiling above. A dozen snowrabbits unique to the Black Forest dropped from the openings.

These were wild rabbits with short snow-white fur. Their eyes were black, and their ability to escape with short-distance hops was great.

The previously gentle and peaceful bug suddenly turned savage and cruel. Its sharp limbs pushed against Greem’s body as it leaped into the air. Its body was still rolling in midair, but its stinger had already shot into the bushes, accurately hitting a snowrabbit that had just hit the ground.

The snowrabbit had just landed, and it had no time to adjust its position. Its body trembled and fell to the ground, wholly paralyzed and immobilized.

The strange pitter-pattering of bug limbs scratching against the ground rang out. A dozen fellows just like the first bug, but slightly smaller, emerged from the grass. They headed towards the paralyzed snowrabbit. However Bug One managed to reach the snowrabbit before the others. It quickly climbed atop the rabbit and straightened its body, revealing its terrifying claws for all to see.

The dozen other small bugs surrounded the snowrabbit and tried to probe forward. However, they were frightened away by Bug One’s ferocious claws each and every time. With no choice left to them, the bugs hesitated for a moment before quickly turning and plunging into the forest to chase after the other snowrabbits.

It was only now that Bug One started to feast in satisfaction!

Greem, who had been silently observing from a distance, was overjoyed to discover that Bug One’s strength and speed had increased slightly.

That made him extremely glad.

As all these bugs had been implanted with control runes when they hatched and had been branded with Greem’s consciousness, there was no need to worry about them biting back once they got stronger. This brand was the key reason why Greem dared to cultivate them with all he had!

Greem observed the bugs for a little while longer and made sure that no accidents occurred. He then left the biology lab and arrived at his alchemical lab.

Three golem cores and five blinding Second Grade elementium cores neatly laid upon the small platform in the middle of the lab. These were all the elementium cores that he had managed to keep for himself after such a hard and long time working for the Sarubo Clan.

The number of Second Grade elementium cores that Greem should have managed to keep should have been ten. Unfortunately, two of those had been destroyed when he attempted to turn them into golems. Thus, he only had three completed golem cores in his hand, all of which were peak elite-level golem cores!

The other five Second Grade elementium cores were all of the earth attribute. He had specially reserved them as materials for crafting a Second Grade golem.

Before he ascended to Second Grade, his power would limit the attack of his golems to a maximum of one hundred and eighty-five points. It might seem like a sliver away from the two hundred point threshold of Second Grade lifeforms, but it was worlds away.

That was because the two hundred point attack limit was virtually impossible for a First Grade lifeform to break through, be it a lifeform of blood and flesh or an elementium one. However, a two hundred point attack was only the fundamental attack power for a Second Grade lifeform. In layman’s terms, it would be the lower limit of their attacks.

If they didn’t intentionally weaken their attacks, any spell that a Second grade adept casually fired off would be above two hundred points! The legendary Third Grade adepts would easily be able to reach a thousand points, far above the level of a Second Grade adept.

The grade difference between the creatures of the World of Adepts might appear to be a small one; just a single grade’s difference. However, that single grade could mean a difference in power of five to ten times. That was why killing an individual beyond one’s own grade was something that could only happen under extreme circumstances. In a normal situation, a low-grade being would never be able to beat a high-grade one.

It was the real meaning in the way adept’s distinguished between the grades of each lifeform!

Consequently, the golems Greem created could never go beyond the threshold and become true Second Grade lifeforms, even with the help of the Chip. However, once Greem actually advanced, creating Second Grade golems would be something that he would definitely be able to do!