Age of Adepts

The underground hall.

A terrifying battle had erupted between two Third Grade powerhouses!

On one side, there was the Third Grade monster floating above the space furnace, Giant Brain Gazlowe, along with an army of countless magical machines under his control. On the other, you had the Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms, expanding his broad wings and shrouded in a cloak of terrifying blinding thunderlight.

It was a fearsome battle that pitched one against a thousand. It was also a textbook example of brutal slaughter.

These magical machines that had just walked off the conveyor belt all possessed the strength of a First Grade creature. When they grouped up and formed a complete system of combat, they were capable of displaying surprising power.

There were no chaotic attacks or charges. There was no disorderly stampede and stepping out of line. All the magical machines were lined up into a regular army. They formed arrays based on their attack patterns and launched a relentless tide of offense against Thunder Dragon Arms.

The ones charging at the very front were naturally the specially modified meat shields– the Chain Hands.

They were a group of magical machines with reinforced metal plates and all of their ranged weapons removed. The only weapons they had were the grappling chain hooks fixed onto their thick cylindrical arms.

They braved the thunder dragon’s lightning storm and charged to his side.

Though one-third of the Chain Hand machines fell during the assault, the rest successfully reached the thunder dragon.

They formed a loose circle and raised their arms. A loud pop came from their arms as their big metal hands linked with fine metal chains launched towards the body of the dragon.

While most of these hands bounced off of the scales of the dragon, some of them succeeded in catching the spikes on his back or some other parts of his body.

These Chain Hands began frantically retracting their chains the moment they established a grip. They were struggling to drag the thunder dragon toward the ground.

The other Chain Hands that had failed also retracted their chains and prepared for the next shot.

It was through such crude and direct methods that Gazlowe kept Arms bound to the spot with only eighty machines. The Thunder Dragon couldn’t push any further forward.

The machines that had been specially modified with flamethrowers took this opportunity to step forward and attack. Several red pillars of fire crossed a distance of twenty meters and blasted against Thunder Dragon Arms’ body.

Even further away, the magical machines outfitted with several Goblin Shredders were slowly advancing. As they marched forward, a barrage of bullets fired from eight black gun barrels reaching out of their bodies. The flood of bullets clinked against the scales of the blue dragon before falling to the ground around the beast like a rain of metal.

Some spider-type machines also clung to the walls and shot goblin rockets at the thunder dragon.

Sadly, the suppression of the dragon by the machines was only an illusion!

Once all of their means of attacks had been revealed, Arms unleashed a resounding roar, and a violent storm of lightning engulfed the entire battlefield.

Intense powers of lightning ravaged the hall. Plasma even appeared in places with the most concentrated lightning. Beautiful blue arcs of electricity crackled between machines if they were even a little bit too close to each other.

The machines closest to the Thunder Dragon himself couldn’t defend against such fearsome and pervasive lightning, regardless of how tough their metal plates were or how many layers of magic resistant material they had painted on them. Moreover, most of the metal materials they were composed of were excellent conductors of electricity. That made it harder for the machines to endure the damage from the lightning storm.

All machines within a thirty-meter radius silently collapsed. Only half of the machines in the fifty to hundred meter radius survived. On the other hand, most of the magical machines that were a hundred meters away were still fully-functional and at full combat capacity. Only a select few machines were unfortunate enough to have been struck down.

Thus, a new wave of machines stepped upon their companion’s remains and surrounded Thunder Dragon Arms once more. And once more, a violent lightning storm engulfed the battlefield!

An energy explosion of this size could be utilized five more times with a Third Grade thunder dragon’s energy reserves. However, Arms stopped after three such eruptions of power. He was in the Goblin Plane after all, where it was hard to recover magic.

The rest of his lightning powers were required to defend himself; he couldn’t afford to use his lightning powers in such an extravagant manner anymore. At any rate, the Thunder Dragon still had his muscular body and overwhelming strength, even without his destructive lightning powers.

Thus, Arms folded his wings and dove down to the ground, engaging the machines in close combat.

It didn’t matter whether it was the sharp claws or fearsome fangs, the ferocious tackles, wing sweeps, tail swipes, or the dragon breaths. Any of the techniques that the Thunder Dragon used would cause tremendous damage to the magical machines.

The intelligent assistance module and control modules inside the chests of the machines were destroyed with lightning under the Thunder Dragon’s voluntary control. These machines turned into lumps of metal that had lost their soul.

The Thunder Dragon committed a massacre in the midst of these magical machines, wrecking these frail constructs with various means of attack. However, it wasn’t as if these machines were harmless rabbits. They used their durable bodies and frightening weapons of war, always managing to tear off a small scale from Arm’s muscular body with each of their attacks.

Even Arms started panting from exhaustion once these tiny wounds accumulated.

However, at this moment, Second Grade Zaca led the eleven dragonborn warriors into the underground hall.

Arms finally had a sliver of a chance to recover from his wounds with these subordinates as a shield.

Destroying this endless horde of magical machines was only a matter of space and time with his power.

Yet , at the moment where the battle had reached its peak intensity, both Third Grade creatures stopped all of their actions. They couldn’t help but turn to look at the towering space furnace.

Even they didn’t dare to extend their mental consciousness into the space furnace with all the chaotic magic energy roiling within. However, for a moment back there, they seemed to have very vaguely sensed a strange explosion of energy inside the space furnace unlike the others before.

This isn’t good. The space furnace is about to go out of control.

…………

Greem pressed Alice against his chest as he quickly traveled through the flood of magic energy.

The chaotic and disorderly magic energy was eroding the elementium flames that shrouded them with every passing second. Both of them would probably have been riddled with holes and turned into chaotic particles with no consciousness to speak of if Greem hadn’t maintained a thin yet resilient layer of an energy barrier around them.

Only Greem could have covered such a far distance and closed in on the space furnace while protecting another person. He was not just a Second Grade adept. He also possessed the support of endless energy from his Heart of Flames.

When he sensed the spatial blackhole rumbling in the center of the space furnace, he immediately gritted his teeth and projected the last surge of fire energy in his body toward the black hole.

Alice immediately wrapped her arms and legs around him when Greem’s energy was exhausted. A profound and subtle surge of spatial energy enveloped the two of them.

A silver flash of light appeared in the space furnace, and they disappeared from the spot.

At the same time, the black hole inside the space furnace let out a belch, as if it had swallowed something it couldn’t digest. The space inside the furnace started to turn chaotic and violent, even more than before.

The energy in the space furnace might have always been in a chaotic state, but there was an order to that chaos.

Total Chaos only existed within a ten-meter radius around the black hole. The strong spatial energies would suddenly become a great deal ’gentler’ once they had made it past this area. Once the energy had left the core area and arrived at the edge of the space furnace, the initially violent space energy would have turned into the less intense magic energy.

Magic energy was still too chaotic and violent for magical creatures or adepts to absorb. However, it was the most suitable source of energy for the magical machines, which had no affinity to any specific element.

At this moment, the space furnace’s internal system of energy circulation had been severely damaged when a foreign elementium energy was introduced to the black hole.

The space energy that had gone out of control rushed out of the core and crashed against the metal walls of the space furnace. The metal walls were sheared off, little by little.

As the destructive space energies thrashed about in the furnace and repeatedly crashed against the metal interior of the furnace, a terrifying disaster descended upon the Steel Capital.

Gazlowe, who had assimilated over ninety percent of the space furnace, became the first victim!

The out-of-control space energy ravaged the space furnace. However, this felt as if someone was stabbing Gazlowe’s brain with a knife and wickedly twisting the embedded blade.

Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms also sensed something wrong with the situation. He immediately unfurled his wings and roared. He turned into a flash of lightning that bolted into the tunnels without even caring for the lives of his servants. He might not know what was in the furnace, but that didn’t stop him from sensing the impending danger.

That feeling of death was so clear in his mind that he was almost incapable of telling the difference between reality and illusion.

Their master had suddenly run despite the fight leaning in their favor.

Dragonborn Zacha might not have the same sense for danger as a Third Grade thunder dragon, but he had still sensed peril descending upon them. He also turned and ran without hesitation. He strode with all four of his muscular limbs, rapidly chasing after his master and heading away from the underground hall.

An earthshaking rumble rang out from behind them not long after they started running.

Then, a pulsing surge of spatial energy that struck fear into everyone’s hearts spread out from the underground hall. It poured into the labyrinth of tunnels like a flood of energy.

The entire Steel Capital was quaking at this moment!