Age of Adepts

The rhythm of the battle had always been in the hands of the adepts.

Be it the poisoning or the radiation bomb from above, the strategies of the adepts had successfully weakened the power of the dragonborn. One-third of the dragonborn warriors had already been taken down before they could even enter the battle. The remaining dragonborn had been deeply provoked and had charged out of the camp with no regard for their own lives.

Unavoidably, they were greeted by the long-ranged firearms of the Archer magical machines during this process.

The dragon scales that had been polluted with radiation could no longer effectively neutralize the bullets as before. The dragonborn warriors were squeezed into the narrow mud road, enduring the storm of bullets as they swung their massive battleaxes and fought with the Loggers.

It didn’t matter who fell in the battle. Their remains would be shoved into the pool beside them to make the necessary space for the fight to continue.

The ear-piercing rumbling of chainsaws, the furious roars of dragonborn warriors, the dull thud of flesh against steel; all the strange sounds merged into an annoying noise that reverberated throughout the skies of the dark and murky Swamp of Sorrows, lingering in the air.

The mud road sealed off by the wall of metal had finally been opened up once more through the bravery of the dragonborn warriors and the desperate fighting of their superiors. As they disposed of the final row of Loggers, the magical machine army had no choice but to retreat into the distance. They formed a loose defensive line around the exit. All of the magical machines on the perimeter were Archer models.

The remaining two or three dozen Loggers moved into a formation near the exit of the mud road. They used their strong bodies to segment the dragonborn warriors into disconnected and disorderly groups.

The adepts hidden within the army took this opportunity to enter the battlefield. They quickly started to assassinate the stragglers amongst the dragonborn warriors.

Everyone from the Crimson Clan apart from Mary and Zacha had already entered the battle. Even the three experimental magical machine warriors had been thrown into the fray.

The Goblin Tinker was only three meters in height. It looked like a mix of various alchemical parts on the outside. One could see the spinning and interconnected gears and components on the surface of its body. The Tinker had no dome-shaped metal body. Its fragile internal constructions were exposed to the enemy.

A little fellow like this appeared to have no combat ability at all. It would probably fall apart the moment a dragonborn’s axe struck it. Yet, the Goblin Tinker’s performance was genuinely eye-catching once it had been put into the battle.

It usually shook as it moved around on its two robotic legs, puffing out smoke and not being all that fast. However, the moment a dragonborn charged at it with axe in hand, a robotic flying claw would shoot out of any position of the Tinker’s body. The claw would grapple onto a distant target and pull the Tinker away from danger with the rope attached to it.

It was this bizarre movement ability of the Tinker that gave it exceptional mobility and agility in constrained battlefields. The few dragonborn warriors that tried to pursue it could only eat dust. They were never able to catch up with the mysterious repositioning powers of the Tinker that made it fast as a mouse.

The Tinker’s offensive powers mainly came from the miniature magic energy cannon and the enhanced goblin rockets it possessed.

The miniature magic energy cannon installed within the Goblin Tinker could fire an Energy Laser with an energy rating of one hundred and thirty points. The laser could deal attributeless overload energy damage. However, due to the limitations of the energy source, the Tinker could only fire this attack once every one hundred and fifty seconds.

The enhanced goblin rockets were the improved versions of the conventional goblin rockets. The explosion of the missile no longer relied on shrapnel for damage, but the violent space energy contained within it. Multiple technicians had assessed the primary offensive power of the enhanced rocket. It was confirmed to be around eighty to one hundred and ten points.

It didn’t sound very high, but if anyone saw the mass of rocket launchers around the Tinker, they could easily foresee the fearsome outcome of going against it.

However, the Tinker could only simultaneously guide two of these enhanced goblin rockets at any one time with the intelligence module currently loaded into it. The destination of the other missiles was up to luck!

The Goblin Shredder was a five-meter giant. It had a robust and large metal body similar to the Loggers. Its lower body was composed of four spider-like robotic limbs, while its torso had two powerful and strong robotic arms. The ends of the arms were not humanoid hands, but two spinning discs that let out ear-piercing grinding sounds.

The two gigantic discs were one meter in diameter and could cut through almost anything when they started spinning rapidly. Anything that they cut would be split cleanly in half!

The Goblin Shredder relied upon these two giant disc-shaped saws to become an unstoppable force within the ranks of the dragonborn. It thrashed about with no contest whatsoever. The wildly spinning discs would badly slice all the dragonborn warriors that tried to face it head-on. Even their three-finger-thick metal armor couldn’t completely stop the spinning blades, let alone the light scales of the dragonborn themselves!

However, the lack of mobility was still the biggest flaw of the Goblin Shredder.

A dragonborn captain grabbed a thick tree trunk and used it to fend off the Goblin Shredder’s wild slashes. His two subordinate dragonborn warriors used all they had to smash their waraxes into the back of the Shredder. Finally, they were able to take out the Shredder before it managed to dissect their captain.

The experimental Goblin Shredder had been knocked out by the dragonborn in less than seven minutes since the start of the battle.

If the Tinker was frustrating to deal with, and the Shredder was extraordinarily wild and reckless, then the remaining Goblin Bomberman was entirely and utterly despicable!

It had inherited the cowardly yet sinister nature of the goblins, bringing great trouble to the dragonborn at the very start of the battle.

The Goblin Bomberman was extremely small. It was only approximately one meter in size.

It had no obvious lower body either. It looked just like a round metal sphere torso with an equally round metal sphere for a head. It rolled on the ground with surprising speed.

Its only weapons were fist-sized alchemical bombs.

Two robotic arms extended out of its round body as it sped along the ground like a marble. It used its petite frame and rapid speed to dart beneath the dragonborn warriors and weave between their legs. It didn’t even need to be concerned about the heavy stomps of the dragonborn or the ferocious strikes of their axes.

It was way too small, while the dragonborn warriors were far too tall.

The dragonborn warriors had to bend down to attack the Bomberman. They would have to try and use their axes or their hands to grab at this annoying fellow rapidly winding around their legs.

It would have been fine if the Bomberman was only quick, but…but this jerk of a robot even stuck alchemical bombs where the dragonborn couldn’t reach. For instance, their crotch, their asses, or their heels.

What made things worse was that these places were often where they had minimal scales to protect them!

The dragonborn warriors were treated to one hell of a nightmare as these bombs went off one after another. Their lower bodies bled non-stop, and their agonized shrieks were so tragic that it would cause a bystander cry to hear them.

The divided dragonborn army fell into more chaos as the three magical machine warriors stirred trouble and roamed through their ranks. The Crimson adepts hidden in the mess were like terrifying alligators, occasionally emerging from beneath the water to drag a prey back into the swamp.

The most awkward fighters in the battlefield today had to be Mary’s three blood knights.

The power of the three blood knights had increased with Mary’s advancement to Second Grade. They could now unleash even more tremendous blood powers as compared to before. However, their limited primary power caused their attacks to be weak and their defenses to be negligible. Their only strength was their regenerative powers and superb mobility.

However, such a trait was not a useful or beneficial one in a violent battlefield such as this one!

To think a pseudo-Second Grade Blood Knight would have trouble dealing with even a single dragonborn warrior.

They had all been humans. Even though Mary had Embraced them and turned them into vampires, their basic Strength values still couldn’t compare to these First Grade dragonborn warriors. Add to the equation the armor and scales of the dragonborn, and anyone who lacked in Strength would have trouble wounding the dragonborn.

On the other hand, the fancy runic armors of the blood knight were invincible against the attacks of ordinary humans, but it was fantasy to expect them to endure the monster metal axes in the hands of the dragonborn. Those axes were seventy-two kilograms in weight, and the blades alone measured one-meter in length.

The blood knights would be in danger even if they were literal pillars of metal!

Any regeneration would be no more than a joke if such heavy axes hit them. Even the blood knights would have trouble completely recovering if they were turned to meat paste. Moreover, where were they to find cattle to act as ’food’ for them in this chaotic and brutal battlefield?

The three blood knights had no choice. They formed a group and circled the battlefield in their bat forms. They would instantly swarm any dragonborn warrior that got separated alone from its group.

They no longer had the bearings of Second Grade powerhouses. Instead, they were like a bunch of street thugs with an elegant appearance, catching an enemy in a disadvantageous position and beating them to death through such a dishonorable tactic. And who would have known? This tactic suited them exceptionally well. It allowed them to exterminate six dragonborn warriors and one dragonborn captain in the span of fifteen minutes.

Still, if one were to talk about battlefield dominance, they would have to mention the adepts!

As a First Grade wind adept, Deserra’s wind elementium attacks had trouble quickly killing these mighty dragonborn. However, that didn’t stop him from effectively dominating the battlefield with his magic.

Deserra flew high into the air and avoided the bloody battle on the ground.

Large Tornado Vortices surrounded his body, making him seem like a great deity surveying the ants beneath him with disdain as he strolled across the sky.

Deserra looked upon the battlefield from a distance.

Whenever he saw dragonborn possessing the upper hand and pushing back against his allies, he would drive his massive tornado and descend upon that battle.

Deserra would merely wave with his hand, and a massive Tornado Vortex would appear from above, enveloping the dominating dragonborn warriors. The wind couldn’t possibly blow the dragonborn into the air with their excessive weight, but the ravaging winds could still throw them into disarray and cause them to lose their sense of direction temporarily.

This short pause in the conflict could allow the magical machines to either escape or get back into formation. By the time the dragonborn escaped from the gale, the situation of the battle would have changed drastically.

It was through such amazing means that Adept Deserra effectively turned the winds to the side of the adepts without killing any dragonborn.