Age of Adepts

Fire Throne.

Greem and Mary’s return did not attract anyone’s attention.

In fact, most adepts of the tower didn’t even know when they had left. Some of the people with more limited information even stubbornly believed that Greem had locked himself up in his room and was quietly settling down after the massive boost in Spirit from his advancement!

How could they ever suspect what Greem had done? Completing a planar invasion and then going on to battle with a vampire adept of the same grade.

Of course, the ramifications and impacts of this battle had yet to fade.

The consequences of that destructive battle between the two Second Grade adepts had only just started rippling outward. The severe outcomes resulting from their actions would only get increasingly worse over the next few months.

In the end, Rose Manor was still the personal property of the Vik Family. The place had now been razed to the ground, and the number of dead nobles and slaves added up to over four or five hundred people. Adepts might not care for the lives of their worldly proxies, but it was a different matter when the clan’s reputation and honor were involved.

Things would not be peaceful for Greem regardless of whether the Vik Family decided to exact their revenge personally or bring the matter to the Zhentarim Association. It was very likely that Greem was going to be subjected to criticism and pressure from various factions. Greem’s newly formed faction was very likely to fracture and collapse if he didn’t properly deal with the matter. He also might not be able to find a place within the Zhentarim area any longer.

Of course, how this issue would unfold still depended on the attitude of the Sarubo Clan.

If the Sarubo Clan was willing to step forth and take on the matter, then the Vik Family couldn’t go too far out of respect for the Sixth Grade Great Adept. When that happened, Greem would be able to safely tide over this crisis, be it by paying magical crystals or resources as compensation.

However, there was no possibility of the Sarubo Clan standing up for him with their current relationship. Greem even had to be cautious of the clan using this incident as an opportunity to strip him of his influence.

As such, the first thing on Greem’s mind upon returning to Fire Throne with Mary was how to strengthen his faction.

…………

The third level of Fire Throne.

The magical facilities here were complete after the many years of running this tower.

The sealing room, book storage, golem factory, alchemy lab, and the scroll crafting chamber; every facility that an adept might need was present here.

These magical facilities had initially been open to the public. Some of them were being managed and used by the stationed and staying adepts of the tower. However, for the past fifteen days the majordomo of Fire Throne, Adept Gargamel, had suddenly retracted all management rights over the sealing room. He had also rejected all requests from non-core adepts to use the room.

Fortunately, there were very few fields that required the use of the sealing room. It was rare to see an adept use the sealing room even once in a decade. This small inconvenience didn’t bring too much trouble for the staying adepts.

However, some adepts could still guess the reason behind the hasty retraction of the sealing room management rights. It was very likely that the authorities of Fire Throne were trying to seal and imprison some sensitive or powerful otherworldly creature. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have behaved with such a sense of urgency.

The higher-ups of Fire Throne behaved nonchalantly in the face of such rumors and gossip, choosing to ignore the opinions of the public.

No more than six core adepts knew what sort of otherworldly creature had been imprisoned in the sealing room on the third level of Fire Throne. Moreover, two of them were still in the Goblin Plane, while another two were far away in the Northern Lands. The only ones within Fire Throne who knew the truth were Greem and Gargamel.

The information had even been kept exclusive from Eva. Gargamel didn’t dare to inform her without Greem’s permission.

The first place Greem visited upon returning from Rose Manor with Mary was the sealing room on the third level of the tower.

Greem passed through multiple layers of strict magical doors and defenses. He even had to use his authority as the owner of the tower to fully open the doors to the sealing room. He then brought Mary with him and entered this mysterious place.

The sealing room was an extremely mysterious place. However, its true nature was no more than an ordinary room with walls of graphite lines etched with numerous defensive runes and protected by many mysterious barriers.

There were many different layers of seals in the sealing room. The price varied depending on the level of the seals.

The unique design of magical geometry allowed the sealing room to obstruct the scrying of any divination spells effectively. Any individual that tried to scry on this place through magic or magical items would have to possess the authority of the tower owner. Otherwise, they would first have to deal with the countless anti-scrying arrays in here.

Moreover, the inside of the sealing room was inlaid with complete sealing and binding arrays. The arrays could draw upon the strength of the tower to seal fearsome magical creatures or powerful otherworldly lifeforms that couldn’t yet be dealt with.

Thus, the sealing room became the prison that Grem temporarily used to lock up Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms and Second Grade Dragonborn Zacha.

The first thing Greem and Mary saw when they stepped into this mysterious sealing room was two beams of lights. They were of different colors, and one was big while the other was small. A seventeen-meter long thunder dragon with fine blue scales was sealed within the larger pillar of light. Several nearly tangible runic chains extended out of the air and wrapped around the body of the dragon, layer after layer.

The compounded suppression effect of the planar laws and runic chains made it virtually impossible for this Third Grade thunder dragon to make any movement at all. He could only close his eyes and rest, using his powerful will to resist the planar laws on this plane.

A glowing magical dagger was embedded right in between his chest and stomach. The thick dragon blood containing dense laws of electricity flowed down the blade, slowly dripping into a clay jar beneath the dragon.

Several of such clay jars were stacked outside the pillar of light, measuring up to two meters tall in total. About seven or eight of them had been filled with dragon blood and had been sealed.

Second Grade Dragonborn Zacha stood up straight at the other end of the sealing room, in the smaller pillar of light. He could hardly move either, with all the runic chains wrapped around his body. Zacha silently looked at Greem with a complicated expression.

Greem would never hand over his authority of entry to such an important place to anyone. Not even Majordomo Gargamel of Fire Throne could freely enter and exit this place. To ensure the thunder dragon was taken care of, Greem had transferred the construction support golem from his laboratory here. The golem was in charge of collecting the dragon’s blood.

Mary’s crimson eyes immediately locked onto Arm’s body, even without Greem’s introduction. No, more accurately, they latched onto the flowing dragon blood accumulating beneath the thunder dragon.

”Go, feast to your heart’s content! I’m sure this dragon blood feast will be more than enough to make up for the exhaustion of the last couple of days.”

Mary instantly transformed into a hungry ghost that had been starving for a thousand years upon obtaining Greem’s permission. She leaped into the pillar of light and simply crouch on the wound of the thunder dragon, gulping down the thick dragon blood directly flowing from the source.

Mary’s brash action incited the anger of Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms. However, many profound and strange runes instantly surfaced on those runic chains the moment he started mobilizing the powers of electricity within himself. The forces of electricity were immediately drained from his body, like a bottle of wine with a cracked bottom.

The runic chains guided all the electrical power into an unknown and mysterious space!

The Third Grade thunder dragon had wanted to let out a menacing roar. However, the emptying of his electricity powers sapped the energy out of his limbs, forcing him to his knees once more and reducing him to being incapable of any further resistance.

Still, though he was not able to resist directly, he still had some small, subtle tricks he could pull.

The viscous purple dragon blood exploded in Mary’s stomach the moment she devoured the liquid. She didn’t have time to digest the powerful life force contained within.

The electrical powers within the dragon blood might have left his body, but they still maintained a vague connection with the thunder dragon. The electric powers within the blood suddenly erupted under the orders of the thunder dragon. They instantly blew Mary’s internal organs into bits.

Many of her organs instantly turned into an unrecognizable mess of blood and flesh.

These would have been terrifying and lethal wounds on any other person. However, they were only mediocre wounds for vampires.

As Mary’s body absorbed the powerful life force of the dragon blood, her shattered organs started to regenerate under the effect of some strange laws. As the overbearing life force surged into her body, these newly grown organs became even stronger and more robust than before.

However, not long after, these organs were once again ravaged by the powers of electricity that had burst forth once more. This time, only a portion of the organs were destroyed. Organs at the edges of the explosion were spared.

Thus, flashes of lightning would occasionally ring within Mary’s body as she continued to devour the dragon blood. Each explosion would cause tremendous damage to her. However, Mary had already made up her mind to feast. She wouldn’t budge at all. She gritted her teeth and continued to drink the blood from the thunder dragon’s wounds with no regard for her life.

The organs within her body were shattered upon regenerating, before regenerating again and being shattered again.

It was an endless loop. The powers of electricity within the dragon blood that Mary couldn’t endure continued to be released and she used this process of constant destruction and regeneration to slowly transform the life force within the dragon blood into her own blood energy.

She had experienced a cruel torture like never before in Rose Manor. She might have reabsorbed most of her origin blood, but she had still lost a lot of her strength. Now that she had gotten her hands on potent Third Grade thunder dragon blood, Mary was like a mouse that had fallen into a larder. The only she could do was eat and eat and eat.

Eating until her stomach was round, eating until the bloodline powers within her body were brimming full, eating until the blood energy within her was close to blowing her body up. It was only then that Mary reluctantly loosened her bite and stopped her reckless meal.

An overwhelming sense of exhaustion washed over Mary before she knew it. Mary tilted her head and fell into a deep sleep before she could even speak another word.