Age of Adepts

Kerslin Castle was now a sea of celebration.

Though Greem was the only victor of the tournament, it didn’t stop the many adepts who had hurried here from all over the region from becoming exceptionally excited.

After all, given the prize announced by the Association, the victor was nearly certain to advance to Fourth Grade!

Thus, they were not celebrating Greem’s victory in the tournament, but congratulating the birth of a new Fourth Grade adept in Zhentarim. Moreover, this would be the birth of a powerful Fourth Grade adept whose very background was shrouded in a legendary mythos.

It meant that the Zhentarim’s power would increase yet again!

Disregarding the scheming between the higher-ups of the Association, the increase in Zhentarim’s power only meant more significant influence for the many adepts of the central region. It allowed them to be more confident and demanding when trading with the other three major adept organizations.

Otherwise, the Central adepts would always be regarded with slightly inferior status whenever dealing with adepts of the three major forces.

It was a common plight of all Central adepts!

Naturally, as Greem was the final victor of this tournament, his Crimson Clan became regarded as a mighty clan that would only grow stronger in the future. Many adepts fought to visit the representatives.

As Greem had been injured in the battle, he was hiding in his room and being carefully treated by Emelia.

The task of receiving his many visitors fell to Mary and Meryl.

Mary was handling the situation pretty well. She was a Third Grade adept, after all. She had the status and power to stand in front of the leaders and representatives of the various adept organizations and carry herself with the necessary grace and etiquette. Meanwhile, Meryl was only Second Grade. She had to steel herself and receive one adept after another, many of which were Third Grade themselves.

The two of them could only graciously refuse any requests for alliances or submission as a subordinate force, explaining that such matters could only be decided by the clan leader once he emerged from seclusion. It was only then that they sent away their guests. Of course, if there was anyone who offered gifts as a gesture of their goodwill, the two girls happily accepted them and made sure to take note of the guest’s clan and name.

Even though most adepts had odd and difficult personalities, and even though it was the Second Grade Meryl who received them, none of the Third Grade adepts dared to put on an attitude towards her.

Thus, for the next few days, Meryl had the time of her life!

In just these few days, she had practically become acquainted with all the Third Grade adepts of the Central Region. Moreover, every single one of these big shots had been amicable and polite while talking with her. Disregarding all that, she had also been gifted with all sorts of things. Small accessories of First or Second Grade, and even unusual items she had only ever seen in books, were given to her as gifts, almost filling her small storage ring to the brim.

While Meryl was enjoying herself, Greem was hiding in his room. He lay on a stone bed, silently enjoying the treatment of the green light waves emanating from Emelia’s hands.

Emelia had the plant attribute affinity. After assimilating the soul of that mysterious spore princess, her plant affinity had risen to a shocking degree. The plant attribute was acknowledged by everyone as the most gentle of all healing magic, with the most insignificant side-effects. As the waves of green light waves to heal Greem, the wound to his eyes stabilized.

As he lay on the bed, he could sense traces of cooling life particles seep into his eyes, soothing his nearly charred eyeballs. Greem could finally let go of all his concerns and slowly fall into a deep sleep. The bored Remi sat in the corner of the room, counting his fingers as he guarded the room with the elementium magical machine.

Emelia was not Mary or Meryl, after all. Even as loyal as she appeared to be, Greem still would not entrust her with his life.

This nap lasted for two entire days!

When Greem woke up from his sleep refreshed, his damaged eyes had already recovered completely. They didn’t seem to be injured in the slightest.

It couldn’t be helped. Origin Fire was a type of principle fire, after all. The fire principles contained with the flames might be faint and inferior, but they were still not a power that Greem’s frail eyeballs could bear.

Greem had used his eyes as a guide to ignite the Origin Fire within Gallow’s body remotely. At that moment, his eyes had become the bridge and nexus around which the Origin Fire revolved. A principle fire like this might inflict tremendous damage on the enemy, but it was also an enormous burden on Greem himself, who was not protected by any principle powers whatsoever.

His overburdened eyes had only lasted two seconds before being burned into scorched crystals by the principle fire. If it weren’t for his Body of Flames that made him immune to most fire damage, his body would have caught on fire at that moment.

Even though Greem had suffered such horrible backlash, he was still incredibly overjoyed.

That was because the successful activation of Origin Fire proved that the portion of fire principles that the Chip had generated was correct. As long as Greem continued walking down this right path, making that one critical step into Fourth Grade would no longer be a dream, but an achievable reality.

However, this battle had allowed Greem to recognize certain problems with himself: the inferiority of his bloodline, and the fragility of his body!

Frankly, without the Chip’s aid and all the fortunate encounters he had experienced, Third Grade would have been the limit of his potential. Even a step forward would have been nigh-impossible, given his talent and human bloodline.

Even with the Chip, and even with origin substances, he would only barely be able to advance to Fourth Grade before exhausting all the potential from his soul origin. He would then lose the drive required to continue improving. Principles. Even if the Chip deciphered all the principle powers of the World of Adepts and laid them bare before him, how was he supposed to become a host of even larger and even more terrifying power with such a frail soul and body?

What were principles?

At their core, the principles were a way of utilizing power. With the body as the fulcrum and one’s Spirit as the lever, one could move the principle powers that formed the world’s system with one’s own meager and weak abilities. It would allow a person to possess mysterious power ten times, even a hundred times, superior to before.

Such power was unattainable through rigorous meditation and cultivation alone!

Much like the human stomach, one could only take in so much food at any one time. It didn’t matter how delicious or nutritious the food was. If you were full, you would not be able to take another bite.

A human’s energy system was the same as the stomach. It had limited capacity, digested at a plodding speed, and extraordinarily low energy efficiency. Under such circumstances, humans would never be able to compare to wild, magical creatures in a fair competition.

One had to admit that humanity’s act of learning magical patterns and carvings from wild magical creatures was indeed a miracle. It was this miracle that allowed humans to take a shortcut and leap above the magical creatures, giving birth to the strange and wicked civilization of the adepts.

However, regardless of how they evolved and grew, human adepts were still constrained by their inferior bloodline and limited lifespan. They could only remain rulers within their own plane, never able to compete against those powerful races that transcended their planes.

Not until they mastered the principle powers.

Principle powers were like legendary weapons. In the hands of the human adepts, they allowed adepts to unleash surprising power despite their weak bodies and inferior bloodlines.

It was the appearance of principle powers that allowed the adepts to stand at the very top of the universal food chain, becoming powerful creatures equal in standing to Gods, Dragons, Titans, and the Scourge Lords.

However, what restrained the adepts’ ability to experience and master the principle powers was none other than their bloodline and talent.

Take the Titans for example. Almost every single one of them was a powerful creature born from the will of the multiverse.

The human adepts had to endure repeated selection and bloody elimination just to have a chance at advancing from human to adept through painful meditation and consistent diligence.

The Titans did not need such a process!

Even a newborn Titan would be able to breathe magical energy at birth. It was a racial talent etched into their very souls. While human adepts worked day and night at meditation to accumulate magical power, the Titans could already absorb magical energy as if they were breathing air.

While human adepts struggled up the advancement system one arduous step at a time, the Titans only needed to search for magical energy as their food, and they would be able to steadily grow in power, becoming powerful existences that human adepts could scarcely hope to equal.

The development of these two races was so utterly different simply because their bloodlines and racial talents were different.

At this stage of his development, Greem felt the difficulty of advancing as an adept more clearly than ever before.

Thus, Greem had the strange thought to improve or change his bloodline.

The starbeast bloodline he had obtained form Henvic Plane was undoubtedly one such opportunity!

Apart from bloodline improvement, Greem also realized that many parts of his body could be further improved.

Firstly, that Second Grade Flame Fiend’s Heart was utterly outdated!

Just like in the battle this time, not only had the Second Grade Flame Fiend’s heart been no help, but it had also severely affected the use of his powers.

Removing the heart and replacing it was one that was perfectly compatible with his fire powers was the right way to go.

Secondly, the magical equipment he currently used was the Second Grade Fire Throne set, along with a bunch of mixed items from other planes. Though they could help him unleash greater power in battle, they were incompatible with his innate talents, after all.

It was only transitional equipment that would be used for a brief while.

If he wanted to continue growing in power, finding some fire equipment that was compatible with his soul talents was what he should be aiming for.

After some thought, Greem started devoting time to planning the things he needed to do next and ran through them in his mind sequentially.

It wasn’t until he had a proper outline that he opened his eyes in relief!