Age of Adepts

The orc berserker was slaughtering in a frenzy.

His mouth widened to reveal a wicked and contorted smile, not unlike that of a beast. The arms waving his axes had become much thicker, and his swelling muscles continued to squirm as the thick blood vessels beneath the skin twisted and turned.

A brutal yet explosive power started to surge wildly through his body with the blessing of some divine power. His mind was quickly washed of all rationality. He only wished to slaughter his way into the crowd and destroy everything that he did not like.

The silhouette of an orc raising a warhammer and shouting at the sky could be seen on the orc berserker’s now enlarged back. It was just like the image on the tribal flag.

The already ferocious orc warrior became even more unstoppable after obtaining the blessing of divine power!

His bare feet thudded against the ground with every step, leaving cracks and craters in the earth. The axes in his hands moved with every step. Not a single magical machine could endure the attacks of the Third Grade orc berserker and the terrifying slicing ability of those odd ripples.

In all honesty, the ripples the orc berserker was sending out weren’t a strange magical ability. It wasn’t a knight battle technique created with the combination of life energy either. Instead, it was pure, violent strength!

The orc berserker’s Strength was now at thirty-seven points. That was already a great and unstoppable level of Strength. At the very least, Strength of equal level could hardly be found within the plane.

As such, with every wave of his axes, the orc’s violent power would wildly press against the air at the blade of the axes. The air would then be compressed into visible ripples before spreading outward toward the enemy. This way, the orc berserker managed to create an alternate form of long-ranged attack using his superior Herculean strength, despite having no such long-ranged abilities of his own.

These ripples might not be able to reach far, but they were unstoppable, violent, and easy to use within two to three dozen meters!

He pushed forward, wreaking destruction and havoc wherever he went!

The First Archers were like matchstick men before the Third Grade orc berserker. They were blown to bits with the slight contact. They couldn’t even delay his advance, let alone stop it.

In the past, the First Grade magical machines had always been the ones to crush the enemy with their powerful strength and indestructible bodies. Today, they had become the ones being crushed by the orc berserker.

The entire battlefield was brutal and terrible!

The orc berserker might be in a frenzied and irrational state, but he still knew that his greatest enemy right now was the human adept in red robes, with red hair and black eyes. As such, even as he slaughtered the enemies around him, his body, enlarged to the point of contortion, continued to charge toward Greem.

A hundred meters was no more than seven or eight seconds to a Third Grade orc berserker.

In a single instant, he cut his way through the formation of Archers and arrived in front of Greem.

Seventeen magical machines lay down behind him, either split apart from the waist, shoulder, or even crushed to pieces. Not a single one of them remained intact.

A series of explosions rang out!

Ugh!

An axe whistled through the air and shot toward Greem, carrying with it four waves of air ripples, one horizontal and three vertical.

An attack of this level couldn’t be defended against with magical defenses.

That was the main reason why most spellcasters did not enjoy engaging fighters in close combat!

Most of the spells that spellcasters used were only a result of concentrating elementium power. That was the case even for single-target spells. When the spell hit the target and exploded, it was still considered a divergent and scattered force.

However, all fighting professions were capable of condensing their strength again and again. Even when they lashed out with their attacks, the power would not be scattered, and all the force would be gathered at a single point. This skill gave fighters the unique ability to penetrate and break through defenses far more effectively than spellcasters!

As a Second Grade adept, Greem’s magma shields might be able to endure two to three magical attacks from an adept of the same grade. However, they could not block a close-range strike of a fighter of the same grade.

When faced with the reckless strike of a Third Grade orc berserker, he teleported away without any hesitation.

Boom! A fiery explosion rang out.

As the halo of fire erupted, Greem’s towering body appeared in an empty spot a hundred meters away.

Mary let out a battlecry and turned into a crimson shadow, fast as a phantom, and engaged the orc berserker.

It was an ‘engagement,’ but in truth, the orc berserker was the only one attacking wildly; Mary was putting her all into dodging.

After increasing her power to advanced Second Grade and experiencing repeated run-ins with powerful enemies, Mary had already accumulated some strategies and techniques to deal with high-grade enemies.

The orc berserker in front of her might have thirty-seven points of Strength, but his Agility was no more than eighteen points. Such attributes might allow the orc to decimate First Grade creatures, but his wild attacks could not catch up to Mary’s agile form, with her twenty-seven points of Agility.

However, Mary had also tried countless times to strike with her corrosive blood claws as she circled the orc. She had no way of penetrating that invisible life forcefield around him.

In high-magic worlds, invisible forces such as Spirit and life could also form a terrifying force when they reached a certain degree of density. In particular, when life energy was significant enough to distort space and magnetic fields, an invisible life forcefield would be formed.

Mary could rely on her high Agility to avoid the orc’s clumsy and violent attacks while she was outside of the forcefield. However, if she were to enter within range of the orc’s life forcefield, any moment of hesitation or mistake could spell disaster for her.

With the offensive power of this Third Grade orc berserker, a single hit landed on Mary would crush her to bits and pieces. An attack like that might not be able to kill her instantly, but she was not willing to taste such horrifying pain!

The battle between Mary and the orc berserker thrust the battlefield into chaos.

All the Crimson adepts and magical machines had to dodge the violent air ripples that were flying all over the place!

One hundred meters away, Greem roared as three six-meter-tall Flame Fiends of Terror rose from the ground, once again becoming the focus of all combatants.

“Kill.”

Greem let out a deep roar and gave his order. The army of Archers and Shield Defenders charged forward from every direction and launched a charge at the final remnants of the orcs.

The large and ferocious body of the Third Grade thunder dragon was particularly eye-catching amid the charging machines.

Upon seeing this high-grade magical creature that should only exist in legends, the orc berserker’s frenzied will paused for a moment. His irrational mind showed signs of turning back in the face of the oppressive dragon’s aura of might.

However, the effect of the orcs’ barbaric and violent soul origin caused the orc berserker to remain enraged.

He roared furiously at the Third Grade thunder dragon before commencing a death charge toward Arms.

The battle finally concluded after thirty minutes.

As expected, the orc remnants were beaten down by the magical machines with many, many casualties. Once the final orc warrior standing before the temple was defeated, the battle concluded.

When Greem’s blazing body appeared before the temple doors, three frail and skinny orc shamans stepped into his path, shivering in fright.

A 1.8-meter tall orc shaman might be reasonably tall for a human, but they were as small as dwarves before giants when facing off against a six-meter tall fire humanoid.

Greem lowered his head, his bright-yellow burning eyes staring at the orc shamans in front of him. He spoke sarcastically with a loud and prideful voice, “A Second Grade and two First Grades; what is it? Do you intend to stop me with your puny bodies?”

The one day and night of praying had exhausted all the stamina and Spirit of the three orc shamans, but what truly made them despair was their inability to contact the great Beast God. It was almost as if they had been interrupted by some potent interference. They had already lost the necessary connection with the main temple in Pompes, let alone communicating with the great Beast God Aruger.

Without the blessing of the Beast God, the orc warriors’ strength in battle had regressed immensely. If it weren’t for the Beast God temple having stored a bit of faith power before the fighting, it probably would have collapsed in the fierce bombardment earlier.

Now, the only Third Grade orc berserk in the city lay in a puddle of blood. The Third Grade thunder dragon that had fought with it was covered in wounds as well, but it was recovering quickly with the careful treatment of the adepts. The other orcs had either died in battle or were maimed beyond recovery; they could no longer help defend the temple.

At this moment, the three of these old and weakly orc shamans were the only ones in Makren City who could stop the enemy from advancing!

“Evil invaders. As long as you leave this place, we can choose not to pursue your past misdeeds.” An orc shaman, as skinny and frail as an elderly human, shouted with all his strength.

Purple and black spots that came from aging covered his bony body. Just these few words had left him gasping for breath. The noise from his chest was like a squeaking old bellow.

One could tell that he wasn’t far from death just by looking at him.

However, the pride and glory of the orcs that surged through his body kept him standing before the flame giant, stopping the monster from walking forward with his own frail body.

“Pursue? Hahaha,” Greem laughed out loud as if he had just heard the funniest joke in the world, “You might not have heard this clearly earlier, so I will tell you again. We aren’t here to invade your people.

“We are here to destroy this plane!”

As Greem’s loud voice rang in the hall, his blazing magma hand smashed downward.