Age of Adepts

High-grade archers were the bane of all casters!

Many experienced adepts have repeatedly emphasized this point in their notes on magic, yet Greem had always treated these recorded cases as examples of ’once bitten, twice shy’ and had never taken the warnings seriously.

After all, a powerful high-grade archer had never appeared in the World of Adepts.

That was why Greem’s scalp buzzed as he was blasted all over when the six elven deadshots turned into ferocious cannons and rained down a storm of explosive magic arrows at him and the Flame Fiend.

The magical explosive arrows only had an average power of forty to fifty points, but with the aid of such impressive attack speed, their damage easily accumulated to two or three hundred points. Moreover, this kind of terrifying and continuous damage was all focused in a small area of no more than one square meter.

It caused the Lava Shield that Greem and the Flame Fiend were maintaining to be destroyed by the enemy in less than three seconds!

Fortunately, Greem had a powerful bodyguard at his side that didn’t fear low-intensity physical damage.

Seeing the danger of the situation, Tigule drove his Goblin Shredder in front of Greem with a Mechanical Charge and used his large, robust body to block the enemy’s attacks.

All of the Goblin Shredder’s attacks were instant-cast and wouldn’t be interrupted by the intense explosions. When the Goblin Shredder brandished its four metal mechanical arms and wildly fired energy shots at its surroundings, the rain of magical explosive arrows were all detonated by the energy shockwaves before they could land.

Meanwhile, the metal shell behind the Goblin Shredder’s back split apart. From within, as many as twelve goblin rockets took to the skies. Ci, ci, ci! These cigar-long goblin rockets shot out orange energy flames from their rear and lunged at the six elven deadshots like fish in water.

Long-ranged attacks like these were child’s play to elven deadshots. It wasn’t that much harder than shooting fixed targets at the range. The six elven deadshots waved their slender hands. Their bowstrings trembled, the explosive arrows shooting down all of the goblin rockets whistling toward them.

However, in doing so, their firepower suppression against the two Flame Fiends had become minimal.

Greem and the Flame Fiend were finally able to turn their efforts away from defense. They roared and once again worked in unison to summon a large-scale Firestorm to engulf the area where the elves were.

They had learned their lesson. They no longer cast those spells that required continuous channeling or that were easily intercepted, instead choosing to use fire spells that covered a large area. A Firestorm like this that only had one hundred and eighty points of power might not be sufficient to deal with the druids, but it was more than enough to deal with the frail and weak elven deadshots!

The elves couldn’t do anything about a massive fire spell like this that couldn’t be intercepted or destroyed. They had no choice but to dodge out of its way to avoid the area where the Firestorm’s power was most concentrated.

The formation of the elven deadshots had unknowingly become much looser.

Greem looked for the perfect opportunity and waved his large hand without hesitation. A dozen or so magma hounds with red flames spilling out of their bodies climbed out from the pool of lava below. They were all the size of lions and tigers, and their bodies were forged entirely of hardened magma and half-molten lava.

One couldn’t judge them for the fact that most of their body was made of sturdy and hard magma. They didn’t seem slow or clumsy at all. The magma hounds stepped upon the metal deck and rapidly pounced from the top of one cabin to another. They quickly closed in on the scattered elves.

Under ordinary circumstances, summoned magma hounds would only have the strength of pseudo-adepts. However, since Greem had opted for flame specialization, he possessed overwhelming power that far surpassed any ordinary adept when it came to fire spells.

These magma hounds, surprisingly, all had the power level of an adept!

Unfortunately, even adept-level creatures couldn’t change anything on the battlefield today. They could only be used as cannon fodder to restrain the enemy’s attack.

The fifteen magma hounds were cut to pieces and exterminated by the elves within a mere forty-nine seconds.

Yet, at this moment, the other large-scale fire spell that Greem and the Flame Fiend had been preparing had formed.

Flamegate!

As a Flamegate formed from pure blazing fires assembled in front of the two Flame Fiends, a horde of fire elementium creatures emerged from the scarlet door of light. These creatures then charged at the elves.

Fire boys, fire birds, fire crows, fire snakes, fire lizards, and fire spirits.

All sorts of strange fire creatures swarmed out of the gate with no end in sight. However, the most numerous of them all was the two-meter tall, vaguely humanoid low-grade fire elemental. Their numbers were plentiful, but their basic power was at or below intermediate apprentice level. Only a few of them were at the advanced apprentice level.

To stop the advance of the elves, Greem had used a fire talisman to open a small passage to the fire elementium plane directly. He then summoned a large number of fire elementium creatures from the plane.

After some rapid healing, the two Druid Masters had essentially regained their combat ability. Most of the wounds on their bodies had also healed. When they saw the swarm of attacking fire elementals, they let out a furious roar and once again transformed. They turned into terrifying and ferocious magical beasts, charging into the horde as they roared.

The two Second Grade magical beasts went against a horde of fire elementals whose average power level didn’t even exceed intermediate level. It was like bulls charging into a field of watermelons. The reckless stomping, ferocious charges, and destructive and unstoppable momentum; low-grade fire elementals couldn’t pose any threat to them whatsoever. Instead, many elementals had been stomped to pieces by the magical beasts they had transformed into.

If it weren’t for the Flamegate swelling and spitting out a hundred more fire elementals as reinforcements every dozen seconds, these small fellows wouldn’t even be enough for the two magical beasts to crush.

Once the battle had completely blown up, the elves behind the druids also started stirring.

The two weapons masters laughed chillingly. They pulled out their elven sabers and charged into the ranks of the magical machines that had just gotten into formation once more. Their formerly amazingly sharp sabers became unstoppable under the support of their impressive inner power. Even the thick, pillar-like arms of the magical machines couldn’t take a single casual strike from the weapons masters.

It didn’t matter how hard the magical machines fought back. They simply couldn’t push back against the reckless slaughter of the two weapons masters.

Meanwhile, the Silver Pegasus Knight was even more terrifying. He turned into the incarnation of a swift god of death. He rode upon his silver pegasus and circled high above the deck. The moment any witch showed a sign of weakness, he would instantly turn into a beam of silver light and dive down from above.

Witches that had he had locked onto would not be able to escape the sword of the Silver Pegasus Knight if they didn’t have a powerful means of saving themselves. It hadn’t been thirty minutes since the start of the battle, yet already two Dark Witches had fallen at his hands; one was dead, and the other was badly injured. It angered the Second Grade Dark Witch hiding in the shadows.

The moonlight dimmed, and the whole flying deck turned dark and sinister.

When the Silver Pegasus Knight dove down once again to execute yet another Dark Witch, the shadow the pegasus projected upon the deck abruptly swelled in size. A dozen black tentacles the width of bowls reached out from within the shadow.

All of these black tentacles had terrifying suction cups on them. They easily swept around the silver pegasus’ hooves and wings and entangled the beast. They then tightened and shrunk, seemingly intending to drag the pegasus and its rider into the shadow.

For the Dark Witches, the Shadow World was their true home field!

Fortunately, the Shadow Plane was a planeworld utterly open to all creatures. It never denied foreign beings that sought to enter, and it didn’t reject most material planes. That was why the Dark Witches were able to open entrances to the Shadow Plane from Faen so easily.

However, the Second Grade Silver Pegasus Knight wasn’t a weakling either. He had been ambushed, but he showed no signs of panic. The elven longsword in his hand flashed brilliantly as it severed the tentacles binding the silver pegasus.

The severed tentacles fell to the deck and started to twist and contort like living creatures.

Without the support of shadow substance, they were soon incapable of maintaining their stable form. As the severed tentacles quickly dissolved, the dispersed, dense shadow substance corroded the alloy deck beneath it. A large crater appeared on the bridge.

Having broken free of the restraints of the black tentacles, the silver pegasus whinnied and beat its wings in an attempt to return to the skies.

The Dark Witch hiding in the shadows could no longer stand by. She revealed herself from within the shadows and gestured at the silver pegasus that was flapping its wings.

”Get down here.”

With her shout, a strange ebony chain clattered and once again wrapped around the silver pegasus. It tightened and started pulling it down from the skies, along with the elven knight on its back.

A large cluster of black mist spread out and engulfed the elven knight and silver pegasus within it. The next moment, the angered grunt of the elven knight rang out from within the mist, along with a loud explosion of inner power. Even though the mist still obscured the battle, there was no hiding the brilliant elementium light of exploding inner power.

Two silhouettes of different sizes revolved around within the darkness, charging left and right and often mixing into an indistinguishable mess as they tangled with each other.

Fearing something might befall the silver pegasus knight, a weapons master waved his saber and charged into the black mist.

The energy pulses in the depths of the black mist turned increasingly wild!

Second Grade powerhouses could be seen fighting everywhere at the center of the deck. The energy aftershocks that they released into the environment reached above one or two hundred points. It was already a hazardous level for those First Grade witches and elves!

If the energy aftershocks of the battle even scratched their shields or defenses, they would lose all of those defenses even if they managed to survive. If they also happened to be targeted by an opponent of the same grade at that moment, then they would most certainly face death.

That was why the First Grade witches and elves avoided the center of the deck, choosing to fight at the edges of the flying ship.

Poison, curses, arrows, longswords, sabers, nature magic, wind magic…

They utilized every skill that could be of use. Everything was for the sole purpose of rapid slaughter. Both sides had committed all their efforts, swearing to defeat and crush their opponent.

As all this unfolded within the chaotic tide of battle, Greem was putting his all into the struggle against his opponent while also silently observing the skies above.

After all, there were still two Third Grade powerhouses there.

Their victory or defeat was the real and only determining factor of this battle’s outcome of this battle!

As for the efforts and deaths on the deck? Those were no more than the irrelevant frills and background to the actual conflict.