Age of Adepts

According to the strict power system of the World of Adepts, these believers did not even qualify for Fourth Grade. The bloodline aura radiating from their bodies was not only thin but extremely weak as well.

The three spiritualists themselves were barely at the level of First Grade adepts, while the other five templar knights were only comparable to Second Grade body-refining adepts. Coming to an otherworldly battlefield with such weak power was usually suicidal.

However, as these believers prayed devotedly, they somehow managed to summon several brilliant divine halos with the aid of the items in their hands. These halos stacked on their bodies, layer after layer, perfectly assimilating with their own power and causing their energy aura to increase, grade by grade.

Before receiving the effects of the divine halos, the believers had practically been chicken to the slaughter. However, when the divine halos appeared around them, each and every one of them became mighty and ferocious. They were fearless, even when surrounded by hundreds and thousands of high-grade undead.

Blinding light radiated from the five templar knights as they formed a loose perimeter and cut down the undead with their shining longswords.

Two spiritualists in ornate robes stood behind them, holding holy tomes in their hands and using their power to erect a Holy Ward that enveloped an area of several hundreds of meters. White light appeared on the bodies of all undead that entered the Holy Ward. The fearsome sizzling sound of corrosion could be heard from the skeletons, almost as if they were being soaked in pure holy water.

A so-called undead was the corpse of an intelligent creature brought to life once more through the use of magic. Most of them had already lost all their former intelligence. The only thing left was their instincts for murder and obedience to the spellcaster that raised them from the dead.

As such, most undead magic was created with negative energy at its core.

When the negative energy in the undead corpses was neutralized and purified by the holy energy in the Holy Ward, the evil cores naturally dispersed without any difficulty.

The low and intermediate-grade undead fell to the ground like rotten wood upon entering the Holy Ward. Their shriveled bodies quickly turned into puddles of black liquid, which was then purified by the Holy Ward as well. Only high-grade undead could endure the purification by the holy energy with their tough flesh and dense death energy.

Lich Kanganas was one of the seven kings of the Skeletal Plane; his undead army was not so easily beaten.

A massive skeletal creature stood at the back of the army. It seemed to have been a humanoid in life and stood at over twenty meters tall, its entire body made of dark, black bones.

A small platform pieced together with white bones could be seen on the giant’s back. A throne of bones sat atop the platform, made of countless skulls.

Kanganas sat upon this throne, tapping the armrest with one hand while resting his head on the other. He watched the blooding carnage before him with casual disinterest.

Meanwhile, five lesser liches stood around the skeleton giant. They wore human-skin robes and skeleton crowns while holding bone staffs in their hands. Each of them stood in a core node of the pentagon array beneath them, endlessly summoning even more undead subordinates of greater power from the Skeletal Plane.

In Kanganas’ eyes, the five templar knights and the two archbishops were not a threat at all. The only one he was wary of was the young man hiding behind all of them. He was the one who held the Libram of Wisdom in his hands and was reading through its contents.

The young man’s appearance was mundane, and his figure was just as frail as a mortal’s. However, a layer of golden light as thick as armor shimmered around him. All evil and corruption were purified when they came into contact with this golden light. It radiated a powerful, pure, and holy power.

As he quickly flipped through the pages of the Libram of Wisdom, the golden light around the believers grew thicker and thicker. It was almost as if countless tiny angels with wings on their backs were flying and circling in the air enveloped by the radiating light, singing praises to the gods with their cheerful voices.

All evil within the radius of the holy light melted like snow under the sun.

Even from several kilometers away, Greem’s eyes were fixed dead upon the Libram of Wisdom that the young man held in his hands. He could clearly see traces of unusual law powers foreign to Morrian Plane contained within the holy light of the Libram of Wisdom.

The ability to extend the law powers of a foreign plane despite the suppression of Morrian Plane’s planar consciousness! Nothing other than an artifact could accomplish such a feat!

[Beep. Detecting unusual power aura. After analysis, said power belongs to the faith system. Judging by the attribute and characteristics of the power, initial estimates suggest the item is a token of a God of Wisdom.

[Token Form: Libram.

Token Attribute: Knowledge.

Token Grade: Fifth Grade (Artifact).

Token Purpose: Enlightenment.

Token Description: This item contains a God of Wisdom’s views and opinions on planes, space, knowledge, and power.]

As the Libram of Wisdom was enveloped by tremendous holy power, the Chip could not obtain too much information from a long-range scan. However, judging from the aura radiating from the Libram, it was most certainly an incredibly powerful artifact of the knowledge attribute.

That also meant that the young man with golden hair was most likely an important believer of a God of Wisdom from another plane. He might even be a son or avatar of the god himself. Otherwise, that god would never have entrusted him with such a precious and vital artifact, nor allow him to bring it to a foreign plane.

“A God of Wisdom?” Greem couldn’t help but mumble to himself.

Gods of Wisdom were often known as Gods of Knowledge as well. These gods did not have many combat skills and were not often favored by combatants and fighters. Consequently, it took an exceptional amount of time and effort for Gods of Wisdom to be born, compared to the average god.

In fact, many Gods of Wisdom became prey to other evil gods or demi-gods during the process of their growth, due to their lack of fighting skills.

It was all these factors that caused there to be very few known Gods of Wisdom in the World of Gods. Moreover, those that existed had very weak divinity, only limited to Fifth or Sixth Grade. There were hardly any Gods of Wisdom above Sixth Grade.

Greem licked his lips.

If it were any other artifact, he would have given up all thoughts of obtaining it, considering the difficulty of such a task!

After all, most artifacts had strict conditions for usage. It was difficult to command the artifacts even after getting your hands on them.

However, this was the artifact of s God of Wisdom. Objects of this sort were incredibly powerful and could be used by anyone who was a spellcaster themselves!

Lich Kanganas might look ugly, but he was still a true spellcaster.

No wonder he had given up on all other prey and focused entirely on devouring these bold believers of the God of Wisdom. He had even summoned the undead army of his Skeletal Plane for this very purpose.

However, Lich Kanganas’ battle against the believers wasn’t going very well either.

After all, Gods of Wisdom belonged to the pantheon of order. They possessed incredibly pure holy power. The attribute of their abilities was a good counter to undead magic.

Moreover, since the god was willing to bestow his artifact on his followers, he had most certainly left a divine brand on the artifact. Should its owner die and the object itself change hands, the divine brand would bring it back to the God of Wisdom. It didn’t matter where the artifact was located. The god would be able to open a channel of faith through the divine brand and guide the artifact and the believer’s soul back to him.

The only one that could break this process was another artifact or another god!

It was these harsh conditions of obtaining a god’s artifact and the threat of infuriating a god that kept many evildoers at bay.

However, Greem was not one to be intimidated.

He came up with a simple and feasible plan of action almost immediately and secretly contacted a few ‘old friends’!

…………

“Lord Mietzel, that evil lich is way too difficult to deal with! Don’t you think…we should head in a different direction and avoid him?”

After an hour of endless slaughter, plenty of undead had been purified, but the numbers of the undead around them did not seem to decrease. In fact, with the constant summoning of the lich’s array, more and more powerful undead were appearing among the ranks of the undead army.

First Grade black knights were hardly seen now. Even a high number of Second Grade vampires and Third Grade death knights had been purified. Apart from these, there was also an incredible number of ghouls, abominations, and wraiths.

These creatures were far weaker, but it was very exhausting to purify them in such high numbers.

As such, Antonio, one of the two archbishops responsible for Mietzel’s safety, couldn’t help but speak up at the sight of the endless undead.

The young man who was flipping through the Libram of Wisdom finally lifted his head.

“Everyone’s tired? Let’s turn around then! But be careful. That lich won’t let us leave so easily. Moreover, the Libram has just warned me that a new enemy has set their sights on us. Something unexpected might happen soon!”

The young man known as Mietzel had curly golden hair, and the calm light of wisdom glowed in his jade-green eyes. He might be surrounded by countless undead, but there was no fear nor worry on his face.

“A new enemy? My lord, did the Libram specify the identity of the new enemy?” The other archbishop, Rousseau, couldn’t help but interrupt.

The young man smiled.

“You two should know that it’s somewhat difficult for father to channel his divine power into this Morrian Plane. The Libram can only vaguely warn me of a new enemy. It’s hard to obtain any more specific information other than that. Haha! If the Libram could accomplish such a feat, then my father could probably switch to being a God of Divinations!”

The two archbishops didn’t find the young man’s joke all that funny. They quickly spoke up and warned him, “My lord, it’s best not to make such jokes again. You might think of them as jokes, but comments on the divinity of the gods involve the order amongst the gods. Should such words get to the ears of the corresponding gods, it would be—”

“Alright, alright. It is a foreign plane, after all. Do you really think those gods have nothing better to do than listen in on us while we are so far away?” Upon seeing the stubborn faces of his two ‘bodyguards,’ the young man could only shake his head and say, “Very well, I’ll listen to you. I won’t make jokes like that again!”