Age of Adepts

“Secondly, we have an urgent lack of various gemstone resources here.”

“The Goblin Plane, as you know, produces very, very few magical gemstones. Even if we occasionally find some gemstones, the quality is often inferior. Therefore…”

Greem fell silent for a moment when he heard old Gonga’s complaints.

He knew of all these situations. Gargamel and Meryl had reported these things to him as well.

However, considering that the Goblin Plane had not been the primary concern of the Crimson Clan in the past, the portion of resources allocated to the City of Machines was the smallest of them all.

Right now, with the sudden supply of Queyras alloys he had obtained, the goblin faction would indisputably rise to the same level of the adept and vampire factions. An appropriate shift in resource allocation was necessary!

Now that he had made up his mind, Greem gave his promise without any hesitation.

“From now on, the City of Machines will do a count of all goblins who are advanced technicians or engineers. Their basic treatment will be the same as adept apprentices. Those who are individually chosen to join magic energy workgroups will be treated the same as official adepts. Go down and perfect the few main magical machine plans and give me a list of resources you need. I will inform Gargamel to prioritize the resource requirements here.”

“This…this…” Old Gonga couldn’t help but start choking up with tears as he mumbled.

In the past, the goblins had always been relegated to an inferior, subordinate position within the Crimson Clan. Apart from Duke Tigule and Sage Snorlax, they had no voice in most clan matters.

Now, the Crimson Clan leader had personally conferred high-grade goblins the same status as adepts and apprentices. How could that not cause the old goblin to break into tears of joy?

“Alright, don’t get so emotional yet,” Greem interrupted Gonga’s crying and frowned as he said, “You said you have three problems, what’s the last one?”

Gonga hastily wiped away his tears and pulled his green hair behind his ears before confidently speaking, “I shall venture to ask you, clan leader, for a bit of Queyras alloy. This special magical metal is a key material in our construction of space furnaces and magic generator furnaces. I wish to organize a group of goblins to do in-depth research on Queyras alloy and see if we can find a similar replacement! This way, your development will no longer be limited by the amount of Queyras alloy.”

Greem glanced at the old goblin and the other green goblins around him in shock.

They barely reached his waist in height, but their confidence and ‘wild’ tone forced Greem to assess them in a new light.

Greem had already analyzed the special effects of Queyras alloy thoroughly through the use of the Chip. Trying to create a similar magical alloy by modulating metal proportions was going to be very difficult.

However, the old goblin’s suggestion was truly one that favored the clan’s long term interests!

As such, after some slight thought, Greem opened his mouth and said, “Queyras metal is a magical metal. The goblin laboratories of your City of Machines lack the appropriate equipment to analyze and break down the metal. Since you lot intend to do this, then Iet the laboratory be at White Tower! You will select a group of experienced veteran engineers to stay at White Tower. I will especially provide you with an exclusive alchemy lab there.”

The goblins immediately broke out into cheers.

Only Wind Adept Deserra put on a faint smile. Clearly, he understood Greem’s intentions.

For a long time to come, Queyras alloy would become the essential adept resource of the Crimson Clan. Many core operations of the clan would have to revolve around Queyras alloy.

Under such circumstances, there was no way that Greem, as the leader of the clan, could hand over such an important strategic resource to a group of goblins whose loyalty and trustworthiness could not be guaranteed. The reason Greem set their lab in White Tower back in the World of Adepts was to keep these high-level goblins under the eyes of the clan.

This way, any results that they successfully obtained through their research would rapidly fall into the hands of the clan. That would keep them from making any demands from the clan higher-ups just by virtue of holding important research results in their hands.

That was why Greem seemed like he was thinking out of consideration for the goblins, but in truth, he was putting a nail into the board for the goblins’ future development.

Of course, this was no conspiracy of any sort. Rather, it was a bold and brazen open conspiracy!

Naturally, with the pure and straightforward minds of the goblins, there was no way they would understand the profound implications behind Greem’s plans. Instead, they were all moved beyond words by the bright future that Greem had promised them.

After solving the difficulties of the goblins, Greem prepared to leave the Goblin Plane. However, he received a request for an audience from Goblin Princess Vanessa.

It left him no choice but to stay for a while longer.

He met Vanessa in a hall on the upper levels of the adept’s tower.

It had been a while since they had met, and the princess’ appearance had changed tremendously. A strange mental flux had also appeared around her.

Judging from this trend, this development…

Greem was slightly stunned. Did she intend to walk the path of a mechanical adept?

As expected, some of the books that Greem had people send over to the Goblin Plane had indeed attracted the interest of Princess Vanessa. In her current condition, it seemed like going down the path of a mechanical adept was her only choice.

There were no issues with having a person’s soul injected into an alchemical golem. However, if this were to remain the case for extended periods, problems would arise.

Without the nourishment of blood, flesh, and the aura of life, Princess Vanessa’s soul would only grow weaker and weaker, less and less active. If she refused to be turned into an undead creature and remained in her artificial body, the wilting of her soul was an inevitability!

If she could successfully advance through the path of a mechanical adept, she could at least retain the condition of her soul, ensuring that it was nourished by magical energy. That would help her break free of her current awkward state of being neither goblin nor golem.

However, it was apparent that the weak-magic environment of the Goblin Plane was ill-suited for a goblin who intended to walk the path of a mechanical adept. Thus, Vanessa requested that Greem allow her to enter the White Tower for studies.

Greem gave the request some thought and secretly asked Deserra some questions, before finally agreeing to Vanessa’s request.

The White Tower of the present now had two goblins who had advanced past the threshold of adept and had become official adepts registered under the Crimson Clan. As long as they were prevented from assembling and forming a faction of their own, they were no big threat.

Meryl managed the White Tower. She was more than capable of keeping a few goblin adepts under her thumb. As such, Greem wasn’t particularly concerned about the matter.

After watching Princess Vanessa leave in high spirits, Greem had a simple conversation with Deserra, who was stationed in the Goblin Plane, and confirmed that the rule over the Goblin Plane was still stable and facing no problems.

With this in mind, Greem finally prepared to leave for the Tower of Fate in the World of Adepts.

The war between the Fate and Coldwinter Witches had just concluded there. Alice had already asked for him to attend the celebratory banquet of the Fate Witches several times.

However, just as he arrived in the upper level of the tower and was about to use the teleportation array there to return to the World of Adepts, white light shimmered around the array. A short moment later, a dense and massive body appeared before him.

It was Gru– Gazlowe’s Split-Off Brain Gru!

Greem couldn’t help but be momentarily stunned when he saw the squirming squid-like brain inside Gru’s five-meter tall metal body.

“What are you here in the Goblin Plane for?”

Of course, Greem was curious. After all, Gru was the only clone of Gazlowe; he could almost fully represent the brain monster. The expansion in Lance meant that this period should be when Gru was the busiest. Why would he have the time to come over to the Goblin Plane?

Gru’s squid-like brain immediately squeezed out a humanoid smile when he saw Greem.

“My Lord, I specially came here to the Goblin Plane to invite you.”

“Invite me?” Greem was even more confused now.

“Yes! We heard that you have been busy working over here in the Goblin Plane. My original self has a lot of things he wishes to talk about with you! That’s why he had me specially make the trip to bring you over!”

Greem vaguely understood what was happening when he saw the squid brain’s fawning smile.

Another trouble brought about by the Queyras alloy.

That brain monster had fairly sharp ears and nose didn’t he?!

Greem hadn’t even told Gargamel about the newly acquired Queyras alloy. He had only revealed a little about the new supply, yet Gazlowe had already heard of it in Lance.

Not a bad job of gathering information!

Greem smiled and casually said, “Let’s go then. I was just wondering how the development of Lance was going!”

The two of them did not stay for much longer. They teleported directly into the Capital of Eternity in Lance.

…………

Lance, the Capital of Eternity.

Once again emerging from the array, Gru led Greem through a series of suspended corridors, steel towers, and winding stairs. It took them an hour of walking to reach the core hall of the steel tower where Gazlowe resided.

It had only been a short while since Greem had seen this place, but a few more Second Grade magical machine warriors could be seen near the hall.

However, compared to an official Second Grade like Tigule, the magical machine warriors created by Gazlowe could only demonstrate power comparable to Second Grade within the range of his control. If they were to leave the steel tower and lose the endless magic energy supply from Gazlowe, their power would drop below Second Grade.

It couldn’t be helped! The brain monster did not have that much Queyras alloy to forge magic energy cores for every one of them!

As such, they could only reside in the steel tower, serving as Gru and Gazlowe’s guards and keeping the Lance natives living in the Capital of Eternity in check.

Gazlowe’s vast and massive spiritual will immediately fell upon Greem the moment he stepped into the hall.

However, unlike the tension from last time, Gazlowe appeared to be very careful and gentle this time, like an obedient little child!