Age of Adepts

Gangsas Volcano, beneath the lava.

There was a lava cave deep within the volcano crater.

If one stood in front of the crimson barrier of light at the entrance to the cave, they would see the thick, heavy sea of magma rumble past their eyes. The volcanic rock that had yet to melt completely had wrapped around the lava, along with some unusual ores glinting with metal.

The elementium magical machine guarded the entrance like a loyal hound, its eyes occasionally gleaming with an odd light as it monitored all the movements in its surroundings. Various wavelengths of detection lights firmly protected this seemingly crude cave in layers, along with a variety of fire traps scattered across the pool of lava.

Greem was lying down upon a stone bed in the cave. The soul-gathering crystal was on his chest, and he was performing a strange breathing exercise.

The frequency of his breathing was unusually slow. He inhaled and exhaled an average of only five times a minute.

He would inhale with his nose then exhale with his mouth, continuing to breathe at this odd frequency. Every time he inhaled, all the air in the cave would be instantly drawn empty. One could even faintly hear the hissing sound of the air as it traveled into his lungs. Meanwhile, every time he breathed out, a small stream of fire would come surging out of his mouth, scorching the ceiling above until it was black.

It didn’t matter whether Greem inhaled or exhaled. It sounded like thunder in the cave, as if a fire dragon was crouching and sleeping in his den.

While Greem was engaged in his deep meditation state, his mind was faintly connecting to the soul-gathering crystal. A small and gentle stream flowed into his mind, nourishing and strengthening his mental world.

In all honesty, even Greem had never expected that devouring all the unowned holy light and pure power of faith within the crystal would have taken such a long time. Some completely unexpected changes even happened along the way.

After such a long time trapped in the soul-gathering crystal, the souls of the holy knights that rested within the clusters of holy light had already been worn down to pure and unconscious spirit energy. That was why Greem’s split soul could devour all of them to its liking, like a tiger among a herd of sheep.

However, its actions had unintentionally awakened the pure, holy light left behind by that Third Grade Gold Knight.

The Holy Light that the holy knights worshipped had one big feature- ‘inclusivity.’ This was also the ‘Purification’ that they so liked to talk about. Supposedly, when an ordinary holy knight died, their soul would find rest within the last cluster of pure holy light, where it would return to the origin and once again enter the system of the plane.

However, when Greem intercepted the holy light, all of these things became trapped in the soul-gathering crystal. The souls of the other holy knights had already been ‘Purified’ by the holy light they were resting within. However, the soul of the Third Grade Gold Knight lived up to its grade. It had managed to endure the Purification of the holy light and managed to preserve part of itd consciousness.

Without the stimulation from Greem’s split soul, this portion of his consciousness might never have awakened. It would have slowly exhausted its power over time until the holy light completely assimilated it. However, the appearance of the split soul activated the instinct for survival left in its remnant soul.

The awakened soul of the Gold Knight started to instinctively retaliate against Greem’s split soul, having lost most of its memories and consciousness.

Thus, an unusual battle broke out within the fist-sized crystal!

Given the resilience of the soul of a Third Grade Gold Knight, Greem’s split soul was not a match at all, even though the Gold Knight’s soul had lost most of its power. After all, Greem’s split soul had not grown to its fullest strength yet. Avoiding it and hiding became the only possible course of action for the divided soul.

Greem had no choice but to personally direct the split soul to aid it in its struggle against the Gold Knight’s soul. With the help of the Chip, he avoided the opponent’s pursuit while furiously devouring as much holy light and pure spirit energy as he could.

After five long years, he finally managed to beat the soul of the Gold Knight and convert it into part of his own Spirit energy. Today was the day Greem would harvest his rewards.

As he focused his Spirit and constructed a mental tunnel with his split soul, the split soul transmitted a stream of extremely pure Spirit back to Greem.

After five years of complete stagnation, Greem’s Spirit finally started to increase exponentially beneath the monitoring of the Chip.

32…33…34…35…

As his Spirit continued to grow in strength, an overwhelming surge of spiritual pressure started to rise from Greem’s body as well. Dense fire elementium automatically gathered around him, forming into invisible flames that burned wildly in the air.

The cave silently descended into a sea of invisible flames. All material substances slowly started to melt before the heat of the terrifying flames.

Even the Third Grade elementium magical machine had no choice but to erect an energy forcefield to keep these flames away from it. The transparent flames gently licked its energy forcefield, silently wearing away at its magical energy. Even the elementium magical machine could feel its power quickly drain away.

The magical machine was fortunate to be sustained by a miniature magic generator furnace. Any other adept would have had difficulty surviving amid these transparent flames.

It was clearly one of the high-grade effects of elementium magic– Arcane Oblivion!

Arcane Oblivion was a unique effect that could rival the likes of Arcane Absorption and Magic-Breaking.

Arcane Oblivion was also known as neutralization. It allowed one to use magical energy of equal amount to neutralize or reduce the opposing magical energy to oblivion.

Arcane Absorption, on the other hand, was better described as an innate talent of certain races. It allowed those who possessed the ability to absorb part of the offensive magical energy and convert it into their own strength.

Magic-Breaking was used to pierce and penetrate an enemy’s magical defenses through specific techniques or magical effects. The reason the holy knight’s Holy Light Strike was so terrifying was that it possessed both Magic-Breaking and Exorcising effects.

Now, as Greem’s Spirit continued to increase, his creature grade also rose from beginner Third Grade to advanced Third Grade. In fact, it was still rising even after crossing the threshold of advanced Third Grade.

By the time the crystal shattered into countless pieces of glass shards, Greem’s Spirit finally stopped at thirty-seven points. This number was still at the level of an advanced Third Grade, but considering the Fire Throne set and Sodden’s Holy Ring’s bonuses to his Spirit, Greem’s Spirit was no less inferior to an adept at peak Third Grade.

While Greem savored the feeling of power and invincibility from his massive increase in Spirit, he picked up on the abnormality on the outskirts of the sea of lava.

The fire traps he had placed there had been triggered, one after another. An exceptionally slender and seductive figure charged at the very front, using her strange mental waves to detonate all the fire traps along the way.

Three extremely familiar silhouettes rushed behind her, quickly making their way toward the cave’s position.

Hm? Was the enemy taking the offensive?

Did something happen outside? Why else would these hunter adepts suddenly become so bold, after refusing to step into the pool despite him having tried to bait them in here hundreds of times?

Greem slowly opened his eyes, a trace of confusion still lingering in his mind.

However, when his eyes that were burning with golden flames opened, his muscular, glowing body instantly absorbed every trace of fire in the room, like a whale sucking in water.

For an instant, all the fire aura in the cave vanished, and the temperature fell slightly below average.

An unprecedented feeling of replenishment in Greem’s Spirit made him feel exceptionally active. His powerful Spirit merged with the dense fire elementium aura outside the cave, making him feel as if he was one with the world itself.

Very faintly, it seemed as if he could hear the shapeless sounds of the laws of the universe as the ground and moved. The laws of fire that he had always dreamt of appeared as if they were right in front of him. However, when he reached to grab them, he was obstructed by an unseen barrier, making him utterly incapable of touching them at all.

Just as rage boiled in Greem’s heart and he prepared to muster all his flames to burn through this damned barrier, the elementium magical machine sent him an urgent alert.

The enemies had arrived!

As Third Grade adepts, most natural environments in the plane could no longer be considered hazardous to them. Even without the ability to manipulate fire, their power allowed them to easily remain within this pool of lava for an entire day.

However, it was a completely different matter to fight a fire adept of the same grade under such conditions!

“We are almost at his base,” Benija sent a mental message to her companions, “The fire elementium here is too vicious and wild. It’s too much disruption for me. I can’t continue locking on to the fire adept. That said, his mental flux still appears to be chaotic and unorderly. It seems like he has yet to turn away from his magical experiment!”

“No more hesitation, then. Act according to the plan once we see that fire adept. We must capture him today!” Serpentine Adept Natagu encouraged his party as he prematurely started to transform into a fearsome Black Mamba, shaking his thick and long tail as he swam forward into the lava.

Dirt-yellow halos radiated from his thick scales, keeping the shockingly hot lava away from his body and preventing the heat and pressure from affecting him. The halos also occasionally spread out to protect the old witch and the Blade Princess as well.

They crossed three hundred meters in a matter of moments.

When Natagu saw the dark red fire barrier at the entrance of the cave, he immediately shook his tail and surged past Benija, charging headfirst at the elementium magical machine standing at the front.

Dong! Dong! Dong!

A storm of bullets came firing out of the magical machine’s hands, turning into a terrifying current of metal and fire. These projectiles shot through the viscous lava and crashed against the body of the serpentine adept.

A yellow Halo of Gravity wrapped around the barrage of bullets, causing them to swerve in a different direction and slide past his serpentine body harmlessly. Even the shots that found their mark were greatly weakened by the Halo of Gravity. They crackled against Natagu’s scales, but they could not pierce his defenses at all.