Age of Adepts

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Otherworld Summoning.

It was a type of powerful casting ability.

Many professional summoners would establish friendly relations or contracts with powerful otherworldly beings. This way, they could easily summon a familiar ally to their side with an Otherworld Summon just by following a fixed procedure.

Of course, this ’ease’ was only relative!

Take, for example, the Otherworld Summoning that Greem was currently attempting. Even though he already held a magical contract with the Thunder Dragon Arms as a medium of communication, it was still a complicated matter to break through the two planar barriers of Lance and Faen to summon the dragon to his side.

On the one hand, the difficulty was due to the thunder dragon’s immense power as a Third Grade. On the other, it was due to Faen’s acute rejection of alien creatures.

Fortunately, with Thunder Dragon Arm’s full cooperation and Alice’s own mysterious space powers, Greem finally managed to complete the summoning before the enemy broke through the defensive line.

The summoning wormhole was like a long and deep black hole, continually radiating intense spatial flux outward. Thunder Dragon Arms’ initially great body stretched and distorted within the black hole, occasionally stretching into all sorts of odd shapes.

When Greem’s chant finally concluded with the last magical rune, the summoning wormhole completely stabilized and its form settled. It was then that Arms struggled with all his strength and squeezed out of the continually shifting wormhole.

With the appearance of Arms in this world, the strange wormhole finally collapsed and crumbled, leaving only wandering singularities in the spot.

His body was massive and supple. His bones were angular and fearsome. Thunder Dragon Arms raised his head and released a long dragon’s roar at the sky. The overflowing dragon’s aura of might spread outward, instantly intimidating everyone upon the battlefield.

”Tell me, human adept, who is it that you intend to have me fight this time?” Thunder Dragon Arms lifted his large snout and took a deep sniff. His sleepy eyes instantly opened round and wide, ”Dammit, I smell the smell of divine magic here. Human adept, you couldn’t have started a fight against those religious hacks, could you?”

Having said that, Thunder Dragon Arms sneezed angrily. He then bent down and pressed his massive head toward Greem.

”I’ve already told you before; I hate fighting against religious hacks. Those fellows are too difficult to deal with. Not to mention an older one always pops up after beating the smaller guy. It’s too easy to provoke the shitty gods behind their backs into action.”

As if to let out all of his dissatisfaction for Greem, Arms continued to complain and grumble. Even though Arms himself felt as if he was softly ’gossiping’ with Greem, Greem’s ears were buzzing painfully. He felt as if he had almost lost his hearing.

Greem’s expression became very weird upon hearing Arms disrespectful words for the gods here. He didn’t answer his ally’s question, choosing instead to point at the skies.

The thunder dragon lifted his head as if he had suddenly been enlightened.

It was only now that he first discovered the god messenger, who was trembling in anger and betraying an agitated expression.

”A Third Grade god messenger? Oh, and a high-grade god messenger that receives attention from the gods!” Arms turned and looked at Greem, ”Human adept, I may have signed a contract of cooperation with you, but today’s enemy isn’t included in our agreement.”

Seeing that Arms was showing an inclination to avoid this battle with his sneaky words, Greem smiled, as he had already prepared, ”Arms, help me fight this battle. I won’t let you go unrewarded for your effort!”

Greem took out a strange seed cloaked in green light. He tossed it up and down in his palm.

”A moonwell seed?” The thunder dragon had a good eye and instantly recognized the item.

However, he promptly shot a look of disdain at Greem with his large and wicked dragon face.

”What use is there with just the moonwell seed alone? Only elves can cultivate them into true moonwells. Other races wouldn’t be able to grow moonwells even if they got the seed.”

Greem returned a disdainful expression of ’you’re the real idiot here’ to Arms.

”Lord Arms, could you please turn back and look before you reject this offer. There’s a whole group of high-grade forest elves behind you. If you catch a few of them, would you still need to worry about being unable to grow the moonwell?”

Arms brooded for a second. A thoughtful expression appeared on his large face.

”But moonwells require the combination of the power of faith to be able to produce the precious moonwater every so often. These elves couldn’t possibly worship me.”

This time, his tone was no longer as absolute as before!

”You are absolutely right. These elves couldn’t possibly ever worship you. However, don’t forget; you have a whole horde of dragonborn in your territory that fervently worships you.”

Arms’ expression seemed to loosen, but he was still a bit hesitant.

”The benefit you speak of has a possibility of existing, but it is only a possibility in the end. The one you want me to help you deal with is a high-grade god messenger that’s being closely watched over by her god. Yet what you are giving me in return is a benefit that I can’t immediately get my hands on. Hehehe…”

Greem rolled his eyes and immediately changed the topic of conversation.

”Lord Arms, have you managed to recruit some green dragon followers after obtaining that Dragon’s Pact?”

Arms furiously spat out a surge of wild electricity, causing the metal deck to crackle loudly.

”Hmph! Don’t talk to me about this matter anymore! I have looked into several places in Lance and still have yet to find a trace of those lordless green dragons. Aooo! It is so infuriating. What use have I for this damned Dragon’s Pact if I can’t even find where they live?”

Greem smiled.

”My lord, why fret over this issue?! There are green dragons in this very plane. In vast numbers as well, I might add.”

”What did you say?” Arms suddenly let out a loud roar.

He suddenly stood up upon his hind legs and lifted his snout to sniff for the smell of this strange world carefully.

It was a massive continent with nature creatures being its most dominant and populous creatures. The ones that held dominance over this continent were these forest elves before him. With Arms’ sensitive sense of smell, he could very clearly smell traces of a dragon’s scent on the leading group of elves.

These elves did not possess the bloodline of dragons. The only possible reason for them carrying the scent of dragons was them having come into contact with dragons. Moreover, it had to be close contact over a long period of time.

As a dragon himself, Arms knew very well that among the different types of dragons were a few branches that liked to maintain close ties with elves. That included the green dragons and their progenitors– the Emerald Dragons and the Golden Dragons.

Judging from this, Greem wasn’t exactly lying when he said that there were green dragons here.

An expression of hesitation and doubt appeared on Arms’ face.

Greem let out a silent sigh.

All dragons were immensely greedy. He had promised so many benefits, yet the dragon still refused to agree without first seeing actual material benefits.

”A hundred kilograms of magical gemstones and…fifty elven maids.”

Greem had no choice but to bite the bullet and lean into Arms preferences after taking into consideration the dragon’s usual personality.

”Deal!” The thunder dragon’s eyes lit up. He roared, ”Leave this god messenger to me. I guarantee I’ll chase her far, far away. She won’t ever appear upon this battlefield again.”

As he let out the roar, Arms beat his blue dragon wings flowing with blinding lightning and rose to the skies with his athletic body.

The two individuals involved might only have had a short and rapid conversation, but this had utterly stunned the elves and witches that were watching.

They…they were actually negotiating prices on the battlefield. This…was this still the mighty and noble dragon in their hearts?

The thunder dragon took to the sky. His large dragon eyes glared at all the terrified First and Second Grade elves below him. He opened his mouth and roared once more, ”Human adept, seeing how generous you are being, I will help you deal with these as well!”

Arms opened his mouth and spat out chain lightning as thick as a stone pillar. It was only then that he beat his wings and lunged at the elven God Messenger Xenia, who was proudly standing in the skies.

Dammit, this scary Third Grade dragon was truly an ally of those adepts.

Before this thought of theirs could even fully finish, that terrifying chain lightning had already reached the elves.

The first to be hit was naturally the weapons master that was too far ahead.

His body was swift and agile. His swordsmanship was truly legendary as well. Sadly, none of this was of any help before absolute power!

It didn’t matter how fast the weapons master was; he couldn’t possibly be faster than actual lightning!

The lightning blast instantly filled the vision of the weapons master at almost the same instant he thought of dodging.

The weapons master pointed his blades forward. Wild inner power erupted all around his body. A green ring of light just barely protected his body when the lightning struck the tip of his elven saber.

The next instant, the weapons master’s body was paralyzed and hurting tremendously. He had been wholly fried and scorched.

The wild and ferocious lightning chain traveled all over his body and quickly snapped toward the closest elf to him.

That was the Druid Master that had turned into a bear!

He ferociously stood upon his hind legs and roared. He intended to use his incomparably tough body to endure the lightning.

Sadly, when the wild flow of electricity surged through his muscular body, he crumbled to the ground before he could even finish his roar. His entire body started to release thick black smoke. One could vaguely smell the stinging and scorching burnt flesh.

The chain lightning still didn’t stop. It snapped once again and lunged at an elven deadshot that was drawing her bow.

The female deadshot did not have as robust a body as the previous two targets with which to endure the lightning. She frantically dodged, but, sadly, a small part of her body was still struck by the lightning chain.

Aaaaaah!

There was a painful cry as the female elven deadshot crashed upon the ground. The parts of her body that had not been hit by the electricity were still fine. However, the parts that had been hit were burnt to ashes and were on the brink of simply disintegrating.

The energy contained within the lightning chain had erupted three times in succession. Most of the lightning power within it had been exhausted. However, it didn’t disappear yet. It once again carved out a strange, winding path and turned toward another female elven deadshot.

The elven deadshots, which had previously grouped up, panicked and fled in every direction.

By the time the chain lightning exhausted its energy and dispersed into the air, five Second Grade elves had already fallen on the battlefield.