Age of Adepts

There had never been such a thing as compassion or tolerance in a planar war!

On one side, you had unforgivable invaders. On the other, you had the defenders of their home. There was no possibility of reconciliation between these two parties.

Either the invaders would defeat the natives and become the world’s new rulers, or the native defenders would exterminate every last invader and defend their sovereignty. There were no other possibilities apart from these two!

That was why the Adept’s Association was forced to use its hidden aces in the face of these ferocious disaster creatures. It mobilized large armies of magical constructs and metal golems.

Of course, the Adept’s Association was not comparable to the Silver Union in this particular aspect.

The main reason why the Silver Union chose to plant its roots in the continent’s eastern area was that most of the Continent of Adepts’ rare ores could be found there. It was able to excavate the ores, refine them, and forge them onsite, giving rise to an awe-inspiring empire of golems.

In the face of the magic surge, all the major organizations were being extremely cautious. A single misstep on their part would cause hordes of magical creatures to swarm the human kingdoms under their management, thereby weakening the foundation and future of the organization.

Only the Silver Union was an exception. Its military forces were overwhelmingly powerful. It mobilized armies of golems to fight directly against the Black Forest rulers and kept the unending stampedes blockaded at the edges of the Black Forest.

If it weren’t for the fact that the golem armies could not fight away from the energy pools, the Silver Union would have stormed the Black Forest with their golems and exterminated every single one of those magical creature rulers.

The invasions in Silver Union territory were also quickly and effectively suppressed by the mighty golem armies. Only a few small waves had rippled throughout their lands. With the golem armies keeping guard, the otherworldy invaders could not gain any ground against the tide of animated constructs.

The might of the Silver Union couldn’t be more obvious!

However, while the magical golems made them powerful, the golems also held them back!

The golem armies were truly unstoppable and dominating. However, they were too big, too heavy, and too slow. As a defensive force, the golem armies were supported by an endless energy supply and proper transport lines. Thus, they were able to unleash devasting destruction on their enemies.

However, upon leaving Silver Union territory, they would lose the numerous skyships that transported them and the countless energy pools scattered across the land. They would become much, much weaker!

The Adept’s Association was the largest adept organization in the World of Adepts. In overall power, it was superior to the other two major organizations combined. However, their magical construct technology was inferior compared to the Silver Union.

They did not have the Silver Union’s outstanding magical-statue forging technology, nor the same abundance of ores. The Adept’s Association could not create their own army of magical statues. They could only use the more simple animated-armor warriors.

These constructs were called ‘warriors,’ but they were completely hollow inside. They were only metal armors that had undergone magical treatment and been animated. They could wage combat based on the will of the adepts.

These magical-armor warriors were loyal, fearless, and easy to use.

They had only one terrible weakness– insufficient defense!

The magical statues created by the Silver Union were all solid metal golems of exceptional weight. These statues had arms that were a full meter thick. Even without weapons, the fists of these statues were as destructive as siege hammers.

On the other hand, the animated armors were hollow. It saved on a lot of material costs, but it also made them exponentially weaker in defense.

Under ordinary circumstances, the Adept’s Association preferred to mobilize armies of voodoo beasts during planar wars. The animated armors served a better role as defenders of their adept towers.

However, voodoo beasts were extremely susceptible to the corruption of powerful Scourge Lords. The Association had no choice but to relegate the voodoo beasts to the sidelines and use these animated-armor warriors as their vanguard.

After the adepts’ devastating assault, the mutated beasts that appeared from the other side of the spatial rift stopped swarming out of the valley. The disaster creatures restrained them and kept waiting in the depths of the mist. They silently anticipated the moment the principle chains around the spatial rift broke.

The World of Adepts was a large world, after all. It contained a shocking number of powerful adepts. When all these adepts gathered together, the disaster creatures that had ravaged so many planar worlds were no match.

After all, they were the invaders here. The planar laws continually suppressed them, stopping them from utilizing their full power. Otherwise, a ridiculous incident like a Fourth Grade adept slaying a Fifth Grade minor Scourge Lord would never have happened.

The low-grade disaster creatures might not fear death, but the high-grade ones were just as smart and self-aware as any other intelligent race. They highly-valued their lives. They were eager to come when there were benefits to be gained. On the flip side of that coin, they became fearful the moment they discovered the presence of a powerful individual capable of killing them.

These minor Scourge Lords, who were all Fifth Grade creatures in actuality, were like gluttonous bears that lusted after the honey in the hive on a tree. If there were only bees up there, they would dive right in for a feast, even if it meant getting stung a little bit.

If there was a poisonous and potentially lethal snake lying in wait inside the hive, then it wasn’t quite worth it to lose their lives over a few handfuls of honey.

The four minor Scourge Lords who had returned to the bottom of the valley were now in an awkward position.

Continuing their invasion wasn’t a good choice. There were so many powerful adepts gathered up there. Even minor Scourge Lords like themselves couldn’t deal with the constant pressure of so many mighty individuals. Retreating wasn’t an option either. Their leader, the Sixth Grade Scourge Lord Dilmas, was waiting out there.

If they returned without results, Dilmas would almost certainly devour one of them alive to punish them for their cowardice and failure!

In a position like this one, the four minor Scourge Lords could only summon large numbers of mutated beasts from their own worlds. They hoped to defend the valley in this manner and wait until the principle chains around space finally loosened.

As for rushing into a fight with the adepts? As long as the legendary fire adept remained at the valley entrance, doing so would be no different than suicide.

That said, the fire adept was too massive. There was no chance of him squeezing his way into the valley. Without his overwhelming support, any of the other ultra-powerhouses that entered the valley would face the unified attacks of four minor Scourge Lords.

If the stalemate continued like this, they would continue to corrupt the spatial chains here and might be able to buy time until the spatial rift could tolerate the power of Fifth Grades.

When that moment arrived, the four minor Scourge Lords would be able to unleash all their power; they would certainly be able to ravage the World of Adepts uncontested. Those so-called adept powerhouses could only hide in their adept towers and tremble in fear.

When that happened, the major adept organizations could achieve little more than self-preservation. All their territories and resource sites would be lost to the disaster creatures.

If such a scenario occurred, the various major organizations would pull their final trumps cards and beg all the Great Adepts to return from the depths of space to aid them, no matter the cost.

It was an unknown if the Great Adepts who had left the World of Adepts and cut most connections would be willing to return and help, risking their lives in the process.

Even if the Great Adepts were willing to help, their powers would be limited to the same level as the Scourge Lords while they were inside the World of Adepts. It was another uncertainty if they would be able to repel the Scourge Lords’ invasion.

It was precisely because both sides had reasons that prevented them from stepping back that an unusually bloody battle broke out.

…………

The first army of a thousand animated armors was exterminated in just half a day after being sent into Inkdeep Valley.

Tens of thousands of mutated beasts swarmed the valley, all squeezed next to each other. It almost seemed like the valley had turned into a sea of monsters.

The animated-armor warriors were only able to advance five hundred meters before they were sealed above the slope by the mutated beasts. The two forces fought a violent battle there. In the end, the mutated beasts wiped out the armors after losing fifty thousand of their number.

However, just as the first magical armor unit was wiped out, the second magical armor unit stepped across the bloody and muddy ground. They rushed onto the slope of death, sweeping aside the tattered corpses of mutated beasts and fragments of armor in the way.

This time, they a squad of a hundred adepts followed them. All of them were elementium adepts.

When the second unit of a thousand animated-armors clashed with the mutated beasts, an intense and terrifying elementium fluctuation arose from behind. A storm of elementium magic then devastated the frontlines of the battle.

Lightning storms that seemed as if they would split the world apart, sharp earth spears that stabbed up from below, vortices with blades of wind, swords of snow and ice that descended from the skies, clouds of poison that filled the air.

The adepts did not avoid the animated armors with their attacks, but they did throw them where the mutated beasts were most concentrated.

Where the violent spells erupted, even the animated armors and their magically reinforced bodies of steels were torn apart, let alone the mutated beasts and their bodies of flesh and blood.

Hordes of mutated beasts fell on the frontlines. The violent magic ripped the corpses to shreds until they were reduced to unrecognizable slabs of meat and puddles of blood. The valley slope, having gorged on the blood and flesh of countless monsters, was then flattened by iron feet. It quickly became exceptionally slick and slippery.

However, none of this stopped the two different worlds’ cannon fodder from running fearlessly to their deaths!

The next wave of mutated beasts surged forward, trampling on countless corpses to tackle the animated armors. Waves of violent magic rained from the skies and turned the battlefield into a cruel slaughterhouse.

The adepts pushed down the slope with their magic, bit by bit, supported by the ever sturdy and reliable animated-armor warriors.