Age of Adepts

“Chip, have you not found that bastard yet?”

[Beep. Panoramic scan and topography comparison activated. No abnormalities discovered. Suggest that Host unleash Flame Lightwaves with the fire principles at the core to conduct a scan on the principle level.]

“Flame Lightwaves? That is an application of the fire principles you were able to come up with?”

[Affirmative! After crossing the Fourth Grade threshold and reaching Fifth Grade, adepts undergo a fundamental evolution. The methods and techniques of battle they always used in the past are no longer effective against enemies of Fifth Grade and beyond. Uncovering and finding advanced applications of the principle powers is of utmost urgency. Otherwise, Host would lack the means to deal with enemies of Great Adept level and beyond!]

Greem nodded silently.

This mysterious enemy was hiding very well and was enough of a threat for the planar consciousness to warn him of their existence. All of these signs pointed toward the fact that the enemy was incredibly powerful. They were likely a Fifth Grade opponent.

But who were they associated with?

Maysa? The Adept’s Association? Or the Silver Union?

If it was the Adept’s Association, shouldn’t they prioritize the reinforcement of Inkdeep Valley, provided that they had such a powerful ally on their side? Why would they ever send such a person to the Central Lands?

Meanwhile, he had established an agreement with the Silver Union before all this. They should have no reason to send such a terrifying individual as this opponent when he had not done anything to infringe on their benefits.

Therefore, it seemed most likely that this was an assassin sent by Great Witch Maysa!

Greem cursed in his mind at the thought of this.

His road to his current position had been an incredibly difficult and thorny one. It was almost entirely owing to Maysa’s schemes and plots. If he had the ability and opportunity in the future, he wanted nothing more than to drag that witch down from her lofty heights and throw her into the mud.

That would be the only way to vent all the boiling resentment he had been holding in him!

“Send the magical model of Flame Lightwaves to me!” Greem ordered in a soft voice.

The next second, an unusually massive stream of data surged through his mind, quickly forming into a complicated, three-dimensional mental model.

It had 1,027 magical circuits, 368 energy nodes, 13,119 runic lines, and 689 runes. It included the varying magical systems of arcane magic, adept magic, and magic energy.

This complicated array was only a simple detection spell. It wasn’t hard to imagine how complicated other Fifth Grade spells were!

More importantly, the driving force behind a Fifth Grade spell like this was no longer magical elementium, but principle power. A Fourth Grade adept would not be able to unleash this spell, even if they got their hands on the magical model.

Greem might have refined and created his principle fire, but his Spirit still had not reached the required threshold for Fifth Grade. He might be able to use Fifth Grade spells with the aid of the Orb of the Fire God, but he would have to wait until he advanced to truly bring out the might of Fifth Grade spells.

Since the Chip had already managed to calculate and create the Flame Lightwaves spell, Greem was able to obtain all the information on the spell the moment his mind received it.

That meant Greem was incredibly familiar with Flame Lightwaves, even though this was his first time casting it. There was no hesitation or delay when he cast the spell; it was as if he had done so a thousand times before.

Greem shut his eyes and thought silently for a moment. All of a sudden, he opened his eyes and gave out an order with his fearsome spiritual senses.

“All adepts present return to the adept tower immediately!”

There was no explanation nor any preparation at all. Greem’s orders were transmitted into the minds of every human adept working near the mega-rift.

The adepts were confused, but no one dared question the orders of an ultra-powerhouse!

In just five minutes, the mega-rift that had been buzzing with activity fell utterly silent. Not a single person could be seen around except for Greem’s gigantic silhouette.

“Kanganas, are you gonna go hide, or are you stay and watch? I have an uninvited guest around here, and I intend to make them show themselves!” Greem’s Spirit was able to connect with Demigod Lich Kanganas rapidly.

The lich was currently standing on a hill. He had taken out an intricate alchemical creation, which he tossed onto the ground. The box rapidly expanded into a hundred-meter-wide laboratory.

Upon hearing Greem’s questions, his body tensed up in surprise. The soulfire hiding behind the rubies of his empty eye sockets scanned the surrounding area repeatedly. However, he did not find anything out of the usual.

That couldn’t be. Greem was not only superior in firepower to him but also had superior means of detection?

Kanganas grumbled internally as he cackled, “Do what you wish! I won’t involve myself.”

In all honesty, he also wanted to see how Greem would force out an enemy that even he couldn’t detect. If he could learn some applications of higher powers through watching this process, it would be worth taking on some risk.

Greem no longer held back after obtaining Kanganas’ reply.

He bent over with his giant body, staring at the empty battlefield with blazing eyes as he said, “Esteemed guest, do you intend to show yourself? Or would you prefer I beat you into existence? Hm?”

The ground remained desolate and empty. Only the scorched, exposed bedrock revealed the horrors of the battle not long ago.

“Hmph! Very well, then. Show yourself!”

Greem shouted and raised both his arms. A vast magical array appeared around him. An unbelievable amount of flames surged from his palms, turning into strange waves that resembled pulses of light or fire. These waves then extended in every direction at rapid speed.

The flames did not have the horrifying aura of the Undying Flames, but they carried a strange principle fluctuation with them. Nothing changed when the waves rippled past. The sky remained the sky, and the earth remained as the earth. It was almost as if these waves of principles had no offensive power at all.

Strangely enough, when the waves reached the mysterious elderly adept, the fire principles contained within them clashed with his magical defenses. A strange principle reaction occurred.

Almost as if a Potion of Revelation had been used, the elderly adept appeared within Greem and Kanganas’ spiritual senses out of thin air.

So somebody was here; that was Kanganas’ first reaction!

What strange flames! To think they were able to replicate the characteristics of light! Could Greem have mastered the use of his fire principle already? That was Kanganas’ genuine reaction!

The elderly adept was just as surprised as Kanganas.

His mouth was agape, and his eyes were round with shock. He almost looked like he had just seen a ghost when he saw Greem raise his arms as the magical array appeared around him.

In truth, even ghosts would be terrified of this elderly adept instead of the other way around. A specter would have to be at least Fourth Grade or above to make this elderly adept pay any attention to them at all.

Greem once again felt the pain of being such a colossal size.

Having a thousand-meter-tall body might look overbearing as if he could simply pluck a cloud from the skies just by raising his hand. However, it made it incredibly troublesome to bend over and talk with this elderly adept.

Still, he bent over and stared at this mysterious adept with cold and stern eyes.

When those lightwaves came into contact with this adept, they were repelled by another principle power. This meant this inconspicuous adept was a bonafide principle adept.

He seemed to be Greem’s superior in both age and prowess as well!

It made Greem become exceptionally cautious.

He quickly scanned the adept’s appearance and compared it to all the known adepts in the Chip’s database, but he found no match.

Greem stared at the opponent for a while. Finally, he put on a warm smile.

“And who might you be, sir? Why are you keeping an eye on me?”

Greem might have suppressed his voice, but his massive size still caused his words to boom like thunder.

As his voice rolled across the earth, the rocks around the elderly adept shook.

“It seems like he was right, after all. I should not have come back!” The elderly adept shook his head and sighed, not actually answering the question.

He then lifted his head and stared at Greem. He asked with an odd expression, “Kid, how exactly did you master that spell? If my estimations are not wrong, it has barely been thirty days since you obtained the fire principles. Thirty days should not be enough for you to master a Fifth Grade spell, should it?”

Others might not know the difficulty behind such a feat. But as a Great Adept who had lived for thousands of years, the elderly adept knew it better than anyone else.

It would have taken a dozen years for anyone to get used to the sudden qualitative change that occurred to their soul origin, let alone being able to cast aside the low-level means of energy application they had been using for hundreds of years. They would have to recreate a whole new system of magic revolving around the principle powers.

Even the elderly adept had used a hundred years of hard work to finally discover his first Fifth Grade spell. The difficulty involved in the process was something only he could understand.

It was no wonder he was looking at Greem like a monster! Greem had just cast a Fifth Grade spell with such ease and grace!

Could there be such a prodigy in this world?

However, even a prodigy wouldn’t be capable of such a ridiculous display, would they?

This…completely upended the elderly adept’s understanding of the world.

Curiosity got the better of him. The elderly adept put on a ‘compassionate’ smile and said in a gentle voice, “Kid. If you tell me honestly how you learned this Fifth Grade spell, I promise not to make trouble with you today. How about that?”

So he was here to make trouble.

Greem sighed. His expression turned solemn as he said, “And if I refuse?”

“Hehe! Then you will regret your choice.” The adept chuckled coldly.

For some reason, it seemed as if the entire world was rising and falling with the changes in his expression.

Principle power……fearsome principle power!