Age of Adepts

The endless road of stars extended in front of his eyes.

Billis felt as if he had been turned into a clump of dirt; a clump that anyone could mold and press.

The strange and unpredictable spatial energies assaulted him from every direction. Hundreds and thousands of gravitational pulls acted upon Billis’ frail body of bugs, instantly tearing him into pieces. Billis’ body disintegrated into tens of millions of tiny black beetles and barely managed to gather together as black smoke, preventing him from being dragged away by the gravitational forces.

If it weren’t for the protection of the teleportation array, Billis would probably have been torn to pieces by the distortion in space. All those different parts of him would have been dragged into different shattered regions of space.

The reason Billis was under so much pressure was thanks to Alice, who had hosted the teleportation.

If Alice were at Fourth Grade, she would naturally have been able to handle spatial energy in a skilled fashion. The person being teleported would have been able to complete his interplanar teleportation while only needing to endure a fraction of the spatial energy.

Unfortunately, Alice was only First Grade. Moreover, she had intentionally weakened the defensive strength of the teleportation array to prevent severe spatial backlash. Billis, who had been sent out as a scout, had no choice but to frantically use his immortal body of bugs to negate the tremendous pressure he was dealing with.

His body was stretched thin, or crushed flat, or twisted into knots as he swam through the continuously extending path of stars. Billis was like an undying cockroach, enduring all sorts of terrifying torture on his arduous journey to another plane.

He had no means of resistance. Billis could only passively endure the pain.

However, even the longest of journeys had a day when it ended.

A small rift finally appeared on the path of stars as a strange rune exploded. Through the spatial membrane formed by the plane barrier, obscured by faint shimmering lights, Billis could vaguely see the scenery of the unknown continent on the other side of the rift.

Before Billis could hesitate, the power of the stars that enveloped his body dragged him towards the rift and sent him all the way through.

…………

Green fields and blue skies.

The skies of Karlmek were always that sunny.

The gentle spring breeze blew through the wild grass. Red, blue, purple, yellow; flowers of various colors mixed in with the green and grassy field, presenting an exceptionally charming and beautiful view from a distance.

A two-meter-long spatial rift had been torn open in the middle of this beautiful and moving painting. The grass seemed to have been cleaved by an invisible razor as spatial gusts blew out from the rift. Countless grasses, flowers, plants, and roots were diced into powder before being blown far away.

Some strange black creatures were crawling in the midst of the powder.

The spatial rift only lasted for approximately three seconds before returning to its original state under the powerful regeneration ability of the planar space. However, just these mere three seconds of time had released such powerful spatial gusts and distortions that irreparable damage had been done to the land.

The field had been ravaged, and the ground had split. The strange distortions of space had even left the spacetime in this location somewhat twisted and bizarre. The spatial distortions might assault any creature that accidentally came to this place, dragging them into an interdimensional space.

Ordinary creatures could not possibly endure the changes in space without protection from a strong force. The second they were dragged into those spatial distortions would be the moment their bodies disintegrated, as well as the moment their lives came to an end.

Two and a half kilometers away from the point of teleportation, Billis was piecing together his consciousness with great difficulty. He sent out screeching bug commands to gather.

Finally, after fifteen minutes, Billis climbed up from the bushes with only a small half of his body. Clouds of smoke gathered towards him from the dense greenery around him. The smoke was merging with his body.

An unspeakable pressure and suppression filled Billis’ heart. It made it hard for him to think. He could hardly use the magic within his body either. If it weren’t for his immortal body of bugs that allowed him to depend less on oxygen for survival, even taking deep breaths might have been a problem.

Planar Suppression!

Billis instantly understood what he was experiencing.

He had arrived on another plane. That meant what he was currently experiencing had to be the constant planar suppression from the plane consciousness. Billis had already predicted this happening before he set off.

He opened his hideous mouthpart and spat out an antique spatial ring. He then put it on his thick left pinky.

Billis chanted the magic password and took five whole seconds before finally taking out the Orb of Deception and the metal ball from the ring. The same action would have taken him a single thought in the World of Adepts. However, it had taken five seconds of his time here.

Moreover, at the instant the spell was completed, Billis could feel the magic in his body diminishing significantly.

Such an insignificant magical act consumed very little magic. In the World of Adepts, Billis would have been able to recover from this exhaustion in a minute amount of time by absorbing wandering elementium energy in the air.

However, here he could only feel the loss of magic. He didn’t sense any recovery of it.

Billis’ face dropped. He closed his eyes and sensed deeply.

His adept-level Spirit still allowed him to sense the existence of ambient elementium energy in the air. However, his Spirit estimated that the concentration of elementium particles here was only sixteen percent that of the World of Adepts. In situations with such thin levels of elementium, an adept’s passive absorption was no longer able to sustain their recovery.

If Billis wanted to recover his magic powers, he would probably have to enter a deep meditation.

Goddamned low-magic world.

Billis cursed furiously and picked up the Orb of Deception. The moment he touched the Orb, he could feel the planar suppression reduce by nearly half. Even his breathing became much more comfortable.

Billis thought for a moment before opening his mouth and swallowing the Orb.

In any case, this thing needed to be in contact with his body to take effect. Swallowing it both ensured its safety and allowed it full contact. Of course, it was the best measure to take!

Billis also used his brown insect-like appendage to pick up and assess the metal ball. The five crystals embedded in it were all dull and without light. Only the first one was evenly blinking as if it was breathing like a human.

He couldn’t place this thing within the spatial ring. Otherwise, it would never be able to absorb the spatial energy that it needed to perform its function.

Billis hesitated for a moment. He then used his bug hands to tear apart the armor on his abdomen with much difficulty and buried the metal ball inside. Just then, the woods rustled with the strange sound of tunneling earth. Five sting scorpion, the size of mastiffs, broke out from the ground and crouched before Billis.

”I have you, and so, I have the entire world!”

Billis looked in satisfaction at this mighty army of bugs that belonged to him. He waved his arm and led them towards the depths of the forest.

…………

Half a day later.

The point of teleportation had just settled down when a strange noise broke the peace.

A strange black dot immediately flew towards this location, gliding right beneath the clouds.

It became increasingly clearer as the black dot got bigger. It was a strange flying device that was so crude and simple that it was almost terrifying.

It was a crude goblin helicopter made of light and sturdy wood, with core components made of mechanical gears.

The body of the helicopter was fashioned in the shape of a goblin’s head and had been dyed yellow on the outside, and a rotor made of metal plates spun above the body of the helicopter. The terrifying noise heard earlier was the sound of this massive rotor rotating wildly in the air.

The size of the helicopter wasn’t that large. Only a single human could fit in it.

However, when the helicopter landed on the ravaged land, two tiny goblins jumped out of the cockpit. They wore leather armor, pants, boots, and wore goggles on their heads.

Old Pa Tok lit up his pipe as he stepped upon the harsh, barren dirt. He took two rounds around the point of teleportation and cursed angrily, ”Dammit, my eyelid has been jumping all day since yesterday. I knew something bad was going to happen today. Dammit, dammit, dammit. Mosaldin, go back to the village and inform everyone that there might be some interdimensional monster nearby. Have everyone be on alert.”

The one speaking was an elderly goblin. Judging by his looks, Old Pa Tok was probably already forty years old. This age was about equal to an eighty-year-old human.

On the other hand, Mosaldin, who had accompanied him to this spot was only a young goblin seven to eight years of age. His face was full of youth and childishness, without a speck of fear on it.

”Old Pa Tok, how can you tell there’s a monster?”

Mosaldin had circled by Old Pa Tok’s side several times, but he didn’t find anything unusual. The fields in a quarter kilometer radius around the point of teleportation had been completely overturned. Fine debris had blown several kilometers away. Any evidence or proof would have been shredded to pieces by the violent spatial storms.

That was why Mosaldin was curious about Old Pa Tok’s judgment.

Old Pa Tok struck Mosaldin’s forehead with a big pipe.

”What other evidence do we need? Can’t you tell that someone from the outside shattered the plane barrier? This isn’t a weak space location. Natural spatial holes won’t appear here. If that’s the case, it has to be an intruder.” The more he spoke, the more Old Tok got angry. He waved his pipe to strike again, but Mosaldin had already run away ahead of time.

”Maybe that monster has already been destroyed by the spatial winds!” Mosaldin furiously rebutted as he climbed onto the goblin helicopter with some difficulty, ”Didn’t you say that very few creatures could survive through spatial storms?”

Old Pa Tok hesitated for a moment. He placed his hand on his eyebrows and looked at the distant forest. He couldn’t help but mumble, ”It would be best if they actually did die in the spatial storm. What I’m worried about is if they survived. Then what comes next might be a disaster for us. Anyone that can enter our world through space is not going to be an easy enemy to deal with.”

The two of them returned to the helicopter, which took off amid loud noises and flew back in the direction they came from.