Age of Adepts

Essence of Fire!

It was a type of peculiar elementium essence born of the purest fire.

If absorbed into his body, it would increase Greem’s elementium affinity for magical flames.

That was why Greem immediately used Fire Teleportation and charged into the fire plains the instant he saw the Essence of Fire. He sprinted with all his strength toward the gemstone.

Three low-grade fire spirits were already fighting amongst each other for the gemstone over there.

Fire spirits were actually a type of low-grade fire creatures. They had not even managed to accumulate the energy required to solidify their forms, which caused them to appear like amorphous, shifting blobs of fire. One could only vaguely make out a humanoid face within all the flames.

Their primary mode of offense was the use of explosive fireballs, fire shockwave blasts, and Ignite.

If any of them were to be thrown into a material plane, they would pose an immense threat to unarmed mortals. A beginner First Grade fire spirit could easily use its pyromancy to burn down a human village.

However, in the Fire Elementium Plane, most of their attacks could hardly even threaten the other fire creatures. With their offensive options being so severely ineffective, their lack of defensive powers became all the more striking.

Greem looked on from afar. He could see the Essence of Fire–a crystalline elementium gemstone–silently lying on the edge of an underground fissure. The three low-grade fire spirits were ripping into each other around the Essence of Fire as if they were mad dogs, ferocious and intent of getting what they wanted.

For a moment, elementium fireballs and flame shockwaves ravaged through the sea of fire. Though the fire spirits blocked most of the fire damage coming their way, they still couldn’t avoid their bodies of fire slowly being damaged by the wild attacks of their foes.

Three beginner First Grade fire spirits who couldn’t even solidify their forms dared to set their sights on such a valuable and precious treasure; Greem roared internally and quickly closed in on the battlefield with multiple Fire Teleportations.

Perhaps because they sensed Greem approaching, the three First Grade fire spirits started to panic.

Even in the Fire Elementium Plane, where elementium creatures ran amok, beings that had evolved whole bodies were not easy opponents. That was why the three fire spirits immediately knew that a problematic enemy had arrived when they saw Greem’s fire-clad humanoid body.

If it weren’t for the Essence of Fire, they would have run with their tails between their legs the very moment they saw Greem. Sadly, their instincts and desire to evolve that came from the depths of their consciousness core controlled their bodies. They loitered around the battlefield, unwilling to leave empty-handed.

Greem managed to cross a distance of one and a half kilometers and appeared in the battle in a matter of seventeen seconds.

With a single Fire Teleportation, he appeared behind two fire spirits engaged in combat. The flames blazing in his hands instantly turned into a broad executioner’s blade with horrifying jagged teeth. With a single strike, he slashed apart the bodies of the two fire spirits.

The last surviving fire spirit finally turned to leave at the sight of this. Sadly, the moment it moved, a fire whip cut across the air and obliterated its unstable body of flames, leaving sparks falling to the ground.

After quickly clearing up the battlefield, Greem ran towards the Essence of Fire. Just as he was five steps away from the Essence of Fire, a strange flame rushed past his side and whisked away the gemstone moments before Greem could reach it.

Who?

Greem’s heart shook. His face formed from flames turned abruptly and looked at the towering humanoid that had majestically emerged from a pillar of fire.

A Second Grade fire elemental elder!

The Chip scanned the opponent’s data and compiled it in a single second. Greem’s face gradually darkened as he saw the information.

Fire Elemental Elder.

Second Grade elementium creature.

Bodily Attributes: Strength 14 | Physique 16 | Agility 8 | Spirit 2

One had to admit that fire elemental elders that had mastered most fire spells had achieved elementary fire immunity. When paired with their five-meter-tall bodies, the fire elementium within them became even more concentrated and compressed to the limits. Though they had no tough outer shell, their body of flames was already sufficiently sturdy when compared to other fire elementals.

The fire elemental elder absorbed the Essence of Fire into its palm. It then glared at Greem with its ferocious, burning eyes, towering over Greem with its superior stature as if ready to fight at any moment.

Both of them were Second Grade creatures, and their abilities were of almost the same level. If it weren’t for the irresistible temptation of the Essence of Fire, they would not cross swords so easily.

Greem hesitated for a moment and silently stepped back as if intimidated by the opponent’s fierce appearance. It seemed like he was giving up and retreating. The Second Grade fire elemental elder was extremely satisfied at the sight of this. It gripped the Essence of Fire tighter in its palm and turned to find a suitable place to absorb it as soon as possible.

As the fire elemental elder turned, Greem lifted his face as a cold light filled with killing intent burst forth from his blazing eyes.

Greem lifted his right arm and pointed at the fire elemental elder. A Fire Prison forged from flames rose from the ground and caged the elemental.

A First Grade binding spell like this couldn’t possibly restrain the movements of someone with the power of the fire elemental elder. It punched furiously, and its flaming fists reduced the prison into sparks.

As fast it escaped its constraints, the fire prison had forced the elemental elder to remain in the same spot for one second.

One second’s time was more than enough for an evil adept who knew how to take advantage of opportunities in battle.

First, Greem hurled three magma fireballs at the elemental elder. While it was busy dodging and defending itself, Greem disappeared with a Fire Teleportation and appeared behind the enemy. The flames in his hands formed into the shape of a giant sword and stabbed toward the location of the fire core in the elemental’s body.

The fire elemental elder roared in anger. With an instance of Fire Blast, it knocked away the three magma fireballs and proceeded to use a Flame Halo of Repulsion to push away Greem.

As Greem stumbled away, the fire elemental elder motioned with its arm, and a meteor fireball crashed from above, smashing into the afterimage that Greem had left behind.

Boom!

The meteor landed, and the ground quaked.

The afterimages shattered into pieces and turned into sparks, while a meter-deep crater had been carved into the burning land beneath their feet. The bottom of the hole was filled with web-like cracks, while the splashing sparks had burnt everything nearby, turning them a bright red.

However, Greem’s towering and blazing body was the only thing that could not be found in the roiling flames!

The fire elemental elder was surprised. It gripped the Essence of Fire in its left hand and rapidly drew a rune in the air with its right. A short moment later, the rune vanished as a strange flame ripple rippled outward with the elder at its center.

All the burning flames around the fire elemental elder were extinguished when they came into contact with this flame ripple; a clean space had been created on the battlefield.

When the fire ripple expanded ten meters away from the elemental elder, a distortion suddenly appeared in the empty air. Greem’s body stumbled out of the spot and was knocked away.

Kehkehkeh…dumb brat! To think you would try and use such a way of hiding yourself in the flames to ambush me. Prepare to suffer the consequences!

The fire elemental elder roared arrogantly and waved its arms. A meteor fireball was quickly formed and crashed toward the other fire humanoid.

The fire elemental elder was still a bit confused, even as it hurled the fireball at the enemy.

Hasn’t it just been a moment? Why’s the fire humanoid’s size a bit different from before?

However, before the fire elemental elder could finish its thought, the fires behind it split. Another blazing giant emerged from the flames, and the fire sword in his hand stabbed toward the fire elemental elder.

Dammit! Why is there two of them?

For a moment, the fire elemental elder thought that the enemy had used a fire projection to create a false clone to distract it. However, when the elemental elder’s Spirit swept across the two fire giants, its body trembled in fear. It was so scared that it almost threw away the Essence of Fire in its hand.

To think…to think that both of the giants were real and that both of them were Second Grade!

This moment of shock caused the elemental elder to lose its chance to escape.

The two Second Grade fire humanoids closed it on the elemental elder, using their instant-cast fireballs to bombard its body. Regardless of how resilient and sturdy the elemental elder’s body was, it had to break beneath the repeated attacks of two opponents of the same grade. It was starting to fall apart.

The fire elemental elder roared furiously and started to concentrate all of its attacks on one of the fire humanoids. It could clearly sense that this fire humanoid was its real enemy. The other one was only a fire puppet that the former had summoned!

Seeing that the elemental elder had seen through his tricks, Greem promptly turned to run.

It was two against one. It was a certain victory, and Greem didn’t need to risk his life because of an idiot’s momentary impulse.

Thus, Greem turned to run and used guerrilla tactics to stall the fire elemental elder, allowing the Flame Fiend of Terror to chase after the elder and bombard it with attacks.

The three of them chased after each other on the burning plains, just like that.

Greem quickly ran while pursued by the elemental elder. An eye-catching Burning Path silently burned where he set foot upon.

The fire elemental elder ignored the path after looking down for a brief moment.

A Burning Path that only dealt sixty points of fire damage per second was nothing to it with its elementary fire immunity. As such, it never gave much thought about the Burning Path and simply stood in it as it chased after Greem.

Greem chuckled when he saw the enemy falling into his trap. He yelled, ”Coldflame!”

As the magical flames rapidly turned into coldflames with freezing effects, the elemental elder slowed down as it bathed in the green-white fires.

Strike while it was down!

Greem and the Flame Fiend immediately went all out, and a storm of magma fireballs consumed the enemy’s form.