Age of Adepts

The battle raged on.

Meanwhile, the mysterious girl continued to drift through the chaotic battlefield like an invisible god of death.

She wasn’t actually invisible. Nor did she have any defensive spells cast on herself. A misfired throwing spear would have killed her in an instant if it had struck her frail body. Even the apprentices frantically running around would have severely wounded her if they crashed into the girl.

However…

It was almost like everything was within her design, and that a spell of Mass Hypnotic Suggestion had been cast upon all the witches here. No one seemed to have noticed the strange irregularity that was this girl. It was like she was only the background; like she was just thin air that was not worth seeing.

And everywhere she went, there was a severely wounded apprentice hanging by a thread of their life.

A delicate body, plain robes, and an unenchanted dagger. Yet she still managed to steal away the lives of five apprentice witches. The other surviving witches and apprentices only thought of them as natural deaths from blood loss.

They were utterly unaware of the terrifying presence of a death god amongst them. She was an existence that silently paid a visit to all who were at the brink of death.

The steel statue army had the ability to crush the group of witches. However, they appeared to be a clumsy bunch of metal tin cans under the directed control of the mysterious girl. The statues either chose to throw spears across the stretch of swamp, or they formed groups and slowly walked around the swamp.

Their strategy might have seemed foolish, but it was, in fact, a fantastic maneuver. All the witches and apprentices that were hit by the spears or knocked away by the flanking statues were always wounded but never killed. This arrangement made it very convenient for the mysterious girl to go about on her harvest.

The mighty army of statues was like a noose around the necks of the witches. It slowly tightened and strangled the witches, but it wouldn’t kill them directly. After all, the steel statues were only obeying the mysterious girl’s orders due to the authority of the Tower. They weren’t contracted beings under her command. Thus, deaths at the hands of the statues were not considered kills of the mysterious girl.

The Tower absorbed the powers of Fate within the bodies of those who had died to the statues and gathered the energy at its core. The mysterious girl was not going to get even a sliver of fate from their deaths.

This was why she intentionally created such an odd situation, continuously bleeding out the witches and creating opportunities for her to slaughter them personally!

Sadly, the witches were much more powerful than the apprentices, and a great deal more powerful than she was. Consequently, not a single one of the eleven witches were critically wounded. Of course, this meant that the mysterious girl hadn’t been able to reap the life of even one witch. She also didn’t dare get too close to any one of the witches.

After all, if any of them had raised their power of Fate above ten points, they would be able to sense her existence. She was too frail and weak. There was no way she could endure even one magical attack.

Even if there was a dying witch on the battlefield, the mysterious girl wasn’t sure she could survive a spell cast by the witch before her death.

Thus, the girl could only choose to wander around the perimeter of the group of witches and subtly harvest the fruits of war!

The mysterious girl once again walked to the side of an exhausted apprentice cowering on the ground. However, this time, the girl stopped and turned to look somewhere in the distance.

A new enemy had arrived!

The strange girl turned and quickly left the arena without any hesitation. The exhausted and utterly inattentive apprentice that had just brushed past death suddenly turned and looked behind her in confusion.

Just then, she had felt a sinister aura around her, but that aura had suddenly vanished as quickly as it came. If it weren’t because of the immediate difference between the presence and absence of the uncomfortable feeling, she wouldn’t even have been able to sense the aura! Especially with the battle still raging around her!

Dammit! Could somebody have snuck beside her side earlier?

The apprentice witch felt a chill run down her spine when the thought popped up in her head. The terror and fear of realization were enough to petrify her completely.

…………

Inside a vast and magnificent hall.

Over fifty witches and apprentices were lying around or running around the center of the empty hall. There were no enemies or monsters around them, but they continued to attack and defend with all they had. It was as if they were fighting with an invisible creature.

Occasionally, there were even some apprentices who would fall to the ground.

There were no wounds on their bodies, but they continued to cry out in pain. Their mental flux and life force also continuously dropped.

That wasn’t the only thing odd about the whole situation!

There were absolutely no magical facilities or runic tools in this massive space. The only things here were the complex runic circuits and the profound magical symbols spread all over the walls, ceiling, and the floor.

Strange blue light filled the entire room, showering the witches in a sea of blue radiance. Everyone was fighting with all their might in the illusion. In reality, not a single one of them was casting a spell. In fact, not one of them was moving. They just stood still on the spot.

As for the army of steel statues?

After a thousand years of aging, only about three dozen golem guards remained functional. The steel statues might have been animated lifeforms and didn’t possess the limitations of life that humans had. However, thousands of years of corrosion was more than enough to immobilize them.

Their steel bodies might not decay, but the runic circuits and energy centers in their bodies couldn’t possibly remain undamaged after so many years! The animating souls within their control centers had already vanished and dispersed without proper treatment and maintenance over the past thousand years.

The construct golems might have been claimed to be undying, but they did indeed still have a lifespan of their own!

The mysterious girl quickly left the illusion and turned to leave the hall.

The moment she appeared at the stone door and entered the corridor, she heard a massive rumbling coming from the distance.

Judging by the commotion, it seemed like a strong group of individuals were rushing to this place, disassembling everything in their way as they hurried over!

I can’t let those powerful competitors interrupt my harvesting. Mm, let’s find them some enemies to deal with!

The mysterious girl mused and drew out a card from the stack of exquisite tarot cards floating beside her.

The other tarot cards suddenly dimmed and faded away as this card activated.

The tarot card that the girl had chosen slowly flipped over before the girl’s eyes. Its picture was revealed.

It was a Minor Arcana. The picture drawn on the card was that of a hideous dark skeleton construct. Two small runes glowed in the corner of the card. The mysterious girl recognized these two magical runes that contained profound arcane knowledge. The runes meant ’Shadesteel.’

The mysterious girl chanted the name of the card under her breath. The card then lit up when she touched with her fingers. This special tarot card disappeared without a trace.

The next second, four strange black silhouettes emerged from the shadows beneath the mysterious girl.

Shadesteel animated statues. These were a type of powerful construct creatures with power rivaling that of an elite adept. They were made of a metal that could only be found and forged in shadow planes, and were sturdy and stealthy guards.

Shadesteel statues were easily mistaken for undead creatures. They had the appearance of skeletons and moved about silently like ghosts and spirits. Unlike other constructs, shadesteel statues were extremely good at concealing themselves. They could freely blend into the shadows.

A Shadesteel statue was approximately two meters in height. Despite their appearance of hovering in the air, they were seven hundred kilograms in weight.

Judging from their looks, the metal used to create the Shadesteel statues seemed to absorb almost all light. They appeared to be completely and utterly black. Mist filled the insides of their skeletal ribs, while sharp metal claws hung at the ends of their arms. A sinister skull-like head was fixed right above their bodies. These constructs didn’t seem to possess necks. They moved slowly but silently, circling above the ground without making a sound.

”Go! Stop them and kill them all!” The mysterious girl spoke for the first time.

Her voice was chilly, exquisite, and even ethereal. However, there was an odd trace of depth and maturity to it. There was a sense of time that didn’t fit her young age.

The four Shadesteel statues calmly blended into their surroundings after receiving their orders. They vanished without a trace.

…………

Alice frowned at the same time the girl had summoned one of the rare few trump cards left in the tower. She stopped moving.

Snowlotus, who had been traveling with her but keeping a certain distance, also stopped. She asked coldly, ”Why are you stopping? I can sense that place. It isn’t far away!”

Sofia, who had been leading the way, smashed apart the stone wall in front of them and turned back in disdain, ”Why else? She must be afraid! Of the five of us, she’s the one with the weakest body. Who else would be afraid if it wasn’t her.”

Two other witches followed behind the three favored candidates. They appeared to be Amanda and Doris, the two witches that had clashed with Alice earlier.

The five of them had formed a temporary team and seemed like they wouldn’t stop before they managed to split the mastermind into pieces. However, their faces betrayed their wandering thoughts. All of them had sinister plans of their own.

The muscular and unrefined Sofia was about to insult Alice further. However, just then, some of the more sensitive witches put on an expression of surprise and fear. Someone yelled, ”Watch out…”

Four strange shadows emerged from the darkness around Sofia as she tensed her muscles in preparation.

Eight dark claws stabbed towards her body from every direction.