Age of Adepts

The party of holy knights carefully approached Gangsas Volcano.

Though the height of the volcano’s eruption had passed, and the sky no longer appeared as if it was in the middle of an apocalypse, flaming boulders still occasionally burst out of the crater and crashed into the surroundings with a long, smoking tail.

These boulders exploded wherever they landed, sending towering plumes of dust into the air as they crumbled into pieces.

Since the holy knights were prepared, these boulders did not pose too much of a threat to them. If any of the stones got too close to the party, the Silver Knight would slash it to pieces with a Holy Light Strike. The shards of rock from the shattered boulder couldn’t threaten the holy knights yet.

However, the party still lost two members while climbing up towards the crater.

While traveling through an area of dense cracks and rifts, a sudden current of blistering fire engulfed two of the holy knights. By the time the flow of fire subsided, only two burnt corpses were left. They still had their armor, but their flesh and tendons had all been burned to pieces, reduced to ashes falling from the sky.

The party had no time to collect the remains of their companions. They could only offer silent prayers before continuing on their journey.

None of the holy knights knew what awaited them. They only knew that their party had to obtain information on those adepts. It was the only way to provide a reference for the higher-ups to make the right decisions.

Yet, just as they reached the waist of the volcano, the mountain itself started to tremble and shake intensely.

A loud rumbling sound came from within the belly of the volcano.

Amidst the deafening chaos, a violent aura that caused their very souls to cower descended. They felt their vision blur and their heartbeats quicken. Their legs trembled so much it was hard to remain standing.

Dragon aura! It was a dragon’s aura of might!

The expression of the Silver Knight changed drastically as he quickly identified the source of this berserk aura.

However, before he could turn to tell his companions anything, an earthshaking explosion rang out from within the volcano. The cone-shaped crater then started collapsing and falling downwards.

Tons of volcanic rock, sand, dirt, and rumbling lava came rushing down from above at breakneck speed, flooding the entirety of Gangsas Volcano’s surroundings.

This party of only seven holy knights did not even have time to scream before the unstoppable flood of blistering lava and dirt engulfed them. Three smoky figures came flying out of the crater during this apocalyptic scene, rushing into the distance without any hesitation.

Aooooo!

A long dragon’s roar abruptly rang out.

A bright blue dragon whose body flickered with blinding lightning rose from the crater, a majestic Flame Fiend of Terror standing upon his back. A ferocious flaming tiger of shocking size could also be faintly seen in the splashing pillar of lava beneath them.

The three silhouettes immediately switched trajectory and scattered in three separate directions as if they realized the pursuers were behind them.

“The thunder dragon and I will chase the serpentine adept. You go and chase the psionic.” Greem shouted out loud from above Arms’ back.

He had paid too heavy a price for this battle. He would be driven mad by his frustration if he let the enemy escape like this.

“You are willing to let the old witch leave?” Cindral replied with indifference. His flame-like body could freely travel through the fires. It was more convenient than Greem’s Fire Teleportation, so he didn’t quite care who it was that he had to chase.

“Hmph! She’s the unlucky one. Someone’s waiting for her where she’s running!”

After a simple explanation, Greem stepped onto the thunder dragon lightly. Arms let out a roar and beat his vast dragon wings wildly. A furious gust rose beneath him as he turned into a blue lightning bolt, hurtling through the air after the ugly serpent with Greem on his back.

“Hehehe, a Third Grade human psionic. Hmph!” Cindral let out a snort and walked through the empty air, his body quickly vanishing into the blazing flames.

He silently reappeared in a sea of fire several hundred meters away. He glanced up at the witch, still flying above the forest a kilometer away from him and vanished once again.

Benija hastily flew across the forest, furiously casting Spirit Wing, Fly, and Visual Avoidance upon herself as she did so. All of a sudden, she felt an unbearably savage heat swarm around her. Benija instantly knew she was in trouble.

She looked behind her but found no enemy chasing after her. Still, she couldn’t shake that feeling of danger. It only made her more fearful and cautious.

Without hesitation, Benija dove into the forest below. She took out a vial of purple potion and drank it, mysteriously causing her to transform into a small gray mouse. She stood up straight and looked at her surroundings before carefully diving into the bushes after seeing no enemies.

A short moment later, Cindral silently leaped down from a nearby tree. He lifted his nose and sniffed the air for the enemy’s remnant aura.

Psionics might not be great at much, but they were definitely one of the best at disguising and concealing themselves.

Paired with their layers of mental magic, an enemy would have an incredibly challenging time tracking her. Without a visual or spiritual lock on her person, ordinary divination and tracking spells were easily misled by her mental suggestions.

However, a flaming tiger was not a beast that could be compared to ordinary creatures!

Cindral might not be able to smell the psionic nor the aura of her magic, but the fire energy that she had yet to dispel from her body did not escape his senses.

The flaming tiger followed the fire aura and wandered through the forest, intermittently sprinting for several kilometers at once. Finally, he stopped in front of a tall, ancient tree.

He stomped with his right foot, and a surge of bright yellow flames spread outward, burning all the dead and rotten leaves to ashes. There, beneath the roots of the tree, was a small hole the size of a fist.

Cindral let out a cold snort of disdain. He opened his maw and let out a stream of fire into the hole. The terrifying flames filled the winding tunnel, causing steam and hot air to rise from several different exits within a hundred meters of the tree.

He very clearly heard a pained scream come from somewhere underground!

A short moment later, the transformed Benija escaped from a hole covered in smoke. A massive fire claw pinned her to the earth before she could use her magic to disguise herself once again.

Benija lifted her head in terror, only to see the terrifying maw of tiger growing larger and larger.

…………

Remi, who was leading the plague army in their advance toward the volcano, suddenly patted the beast beneath him and halted its movements.

He paused for a moment to gather his senses as he quickly got a message from Greem.

Mm? That old poison hag is coming this way?

A cold smile full of malicious intent immediately appeared on Remi’s green face. He pouted slightly, and the plague army adjusted their trajectory, sprinting toward a specific spot in the forest.

Remi’s plague army just happened to run into the old poison hag by a small stream. She was quickly traveling through the forest on her flying broom.

To avoid being tracked by the enemy, Guinevere chose to fly as low as she could, traveling through the dense foliage of the forest. She might be slower this way, but she would be better hidden.

In truth, she had never stopped looking behind her as she flew. She had never expected anyone to intercept her from the front.

That was why her already ugly face turned even darker when she saw the strange creatures streaming toward her and Remi sitting upon the back of a giant Second Grade beast.

She tossed several vials of potions down on the ground. These potions turned into strange poison voodoo beasts upon landing. Most of them had the might of Second Grade creatures. One of them was even a Third Grade Toxic Swamp Lizard.

Remi paid no heed to these enemies. He snapped his fingers, and the hundreds and thousands of poison zombies lunged forward, instantly drowning the enemy with their fearsome numbers. Those Second and Third Grade poison creatures were soon covered in hordes of poison zombies, forcefully pinned to the ground by sheer numbers.

Meanwhile, the First Grade wights and Second Grade Plaguebringer struck at the old hag.

Plague Arrows, plague clouds, poison shockwaves; all sorts of attacks quickly surrounded the old poison witch from every direction.

The old witch waved her hand, and invisible poison scattered into the air. Even the wights could not endure the effects of the poison, despite being plague creatures themselves. When the toxin infected their scrawny bodies, they quickly rotted into slime and were reduced into a pool of noxious and pungent water.

Ordinary plague creatures could only pester the old witch. They had no chance of killing her!

Only a Third Grade could deal with a Third Grade.

Remin commanded the plague beast beneath him to charge forward. They quickly arrived within a hundred meters of the witch while she was busy dealing with the wights. He then blew an invisible gust of poison in her direction.

Even with her resistance to poison and toxins, Guinevere couldn’t help but shiver in terror when the poison reached her. A sharp, stinging pain immediately came from every one of her internal organs, as if extremely tiny poison insects were furiously eating away at her body.

“Damned brat! You’re digging your own grave.” The old witch screeched wildly as purple blood came streaking out from her eyes, ears, mouth, and nose. With the temporary increase in Spirit from her shout, a surge of invisible poison also started to spread throughout Remi’s body.

When it came to poison magic alone, Remi was most assuredly inferior to the witch, having only advanced a while ago.

However, Remi also let out a berserk howl in the face of the old witch’s self-destructive attacks.

As he screamed, many of the poison zombies rushing onto the battlefield collapsed on the spot. Remi had mercilessly taken away the trace of plague essence in their cores.

With the replenishment of these plague essences, Remi barely managed to endure Guinevere’s unusual poison spell. He then furiously injected even more plague seeds into the witch’s body.

The two masters of poison screamed at each other and began to tear away at their opponents viciously!