Heir of Synthesis: The World Mage

Priam took a deep breath when he saw the stone door open at the back of the chamber. This time, however, he didn’t advance immediately. He had already figured out how the temple worked: the trial only began the moment he stepped inside the next arena.

There was a window of free time between the trials, so it made no sense to ignore this opportunity to recover.

Although he hadn’t even spent half of his Ether, Priam refused to act recklessly.

He sat down on the cold floor, closed his eyes, and focused on drawing in the Qi around him, filtering it and methodically converting it through his meridians.

...

Hours passed in the silence of the room.

When Priam finally opened his eyes, his Ether reserves were back at their absolute peak.

*Pop!*

A soft crack and a faint shockwave echoed through the room.

Priam looked down and saw Mirra on his lap, where she had been quietly resting throughout his entire meditation. At that exact moment, the little girl’s aura fluctuated and expanded in a vibrant glow.

She gave an excited little hop, standing on his legs with flushed cheeks and eyes sparkling like two little stars.

”I advanced! I advanced!” she cheered, giggling sweetly and raising her little arms in victory.

Priam slowly exhaled, staring at her with a mixture of shock and fascination.

Mirra was only two years old... and she had already reached the Mage Disciple level. The genetic inheritance of the Primordial Chaos Beasts was genuinely terrifying.

While humanoid races took more than a decade just to mature their bodies and take their first steps into the study of magic, Primordial Chaos Beasts followed a completely insane evolutionary scale.

When supplied with high-level resources and proper nutrition, their physical and magical growth skyrocketed exponentially, turning them into devastating entities in record time.

The major problem, however, was their mental lag. Mirra was a good example. She had the mind of a complete child, and Priam had to encourage her to study while keeping an eye on her all the time.

The emotional and intellectual maturity of this race couldn’t keep up with the overwhelming pace of their power.

The result of placing the strength of a natural disaster into the hands of someone with a simplistic mentality inevitably led to absolute chaos. Since they became terrifyingly strong far too quickly, they absorbed concepts about life in a distorted way and without moral discernment, becoming increasingly dangerous as the years passed.

However... as he gazed at Mirra’s radiant and innocent smile, Priam sighed softly. Deep down, he felt that her path would be different.

Gently patting the little girl’s head, he tried to keep his voice firm and disciplinary:

”Good job. But don’t go getting full of yourself just because of that... you’re still far behind the others. No slacking off, understood?”

”Meh!” Mirra puffed out her cheeks with an adorably grumpy expression, crossing her little arms in a spoiled protest.

After a few seconds of congratulating her, Mirra finally calmed down.

Priam stood up and put Mirra into the inner space. He couldn’t spend too much time in this place alone: that world was an ocean of opportunities, and countless fortunes awaited him outside.

He advanced with firm steps toward the next chamber.

On the other side, everything seemed shrouded in a subtle dark mist. A bone-chilling cold could be felt.

At the center of the immense underground arena rested a single colossal figure.

It stood three meters tall, had a humanoid build, six arms, and a twisted horn emerging from its forehead. Sharp fangs protruded from its mouth, and its rigid muscles looked as if they had been carved from stone. Its presence radiated an abject and macabre ferocity—but there wasn’t a single trace of life within it. It was a perfectly preserved corpse, transformed into a puppet.

The giant remained motionless, its eyes closed like a dark statue.

Lights emerged from the void once again, shaping words in the air:

”This is a Primordial Demon, belonging to one of the strongest demonic races in the world. It was killed while still very young, but its overwhelming physical strength was sealed within this puppet, retaining eighty percent of its original capabilities.”

”This is the final stage of the *Common Challenge* of the God of Fists. Once initiated, there is no retreat. Victory grants life; defeat, death.”

”Your reward for victory will be the Immortal Martial Art of the God of Fists, along with the title of Official Disciple.”

Priam snorted. It was clear that this was only the end of the Common Challenge.

His main goal wasn’t even that Martial Art, but rather the Heroic Relic, which would probably only be available in the next secret challenge. In any case, to get there, he had to survive this monster.

He calmed his pulse and slowly moved forward.

Every fiber of his body went on high alert. The aura radiating from that creature carried a lethal threat. Its power was possibly equivalent to that of a ninth-level Physical Mage Master.

But Priam wasn’t afraid. After becoming a Mage Master, using his Power Runes, he could fight anyone head-on within the same Rank.

*Buzz!*

Three hundred meters away, the puppet’s eyes suddenly opened.

They were two pulsing black orbs, devoid of reason, driven solely by an insane desire to slaughter. Its killing intent poured out like an icy storm, crashing down on Priam like an iceberg.

*BOOM!*

The demon’s colossal legs flexed, shattering the bricks beneath its feet. It shot forward like a cannonball, tearing through the air at an incredible speed.

Two shield-sized fists whistled toward Priam’s chest, accompanied by a shockwave that made the air crack.

Hesitating there would mean instant death.

[Activate Power Rune?] [Yes / No]

Without a second thought, Priam burned a Berserker Power Rune, which would explosively increase his physical power. It was a basic rune he had learned to create a long time ago. But this time, he used materials he had gathered from the divine plane, giving it terrifying power.

At the same time, he channeled Blood-Feast Fists at maximum power.

*KBOOM!!!*

The cavern shook to its foundations. Priam felt the bones in his arms creak violently. The force he had blocked didn’t feel like the blow of a living being, but the collapse of an entire mountain!

”Not good!”

While Priam held back the first two fists, the demon launched a third attack from the side. The extra arm cut through the air from a blind angle, brutally colliding with Priam’s ribs.

*CRACK!*

The impact shattered his ribs and sent him flying like a comet into the stone wall.

He slammed into the rock, spitting out a stream of thick, hot blood.

If it weren’t for the sharp reflexes of his Transcendental Anima allowing him to adjust his guard at the last millisecond, that single punch would have split his torso in half.

The Demon roared, advancing without giving him any room to breathe. Six arms moved in a frenzied whirlwind of destruction.

Priam’s eyes widened, terrified by that macabre rhythm. Every fist was a warhammer; every attack carried the intent to grind his flesh to pieces.

Worse, even while using the Berserker Power Rune, his raw physical strength was still one step below that monstrosity.

”You fucking zombie!”

Priam roared and activated his Elemental Physique to its limit. Emerald wind runes erupted around his body, multiplying his acceleration. Only the supreme speed of the wind could save him from being crushed.

*BANG! BANG! CRASH!*

The underground arena turned into a meat grinder.

Even flowing like a shadow and relying on his control over the wind element, Priam couldn’t dodge everything. The residual shockwaves from the enemy’s punches tore through his skin, while stone fragments and shock blasts sliced into his body.

Meanwhile, even his full-powered attacks barely left marks on the demon’s corpse-like body.

The reason?

Blood-Feast Fists, a Magic Art he had learned in the mortal plane, no longer had enough power to keep up with his current level of strength. It had become obsolete far too quickly in the divine plane.

Even if Priam forced all his life energy out at once, his strength wouldn’t improve much.

*CRUNCH!*

A fraction of a second of carelessness, and four of the demon’s arms intercepted Priam’s attack in a brutal lock. A downward punch struck his left shoulder. Priam’s shoulder blade shattered into several pieces, and a sharp bone fragment tore through the flesh, jutting out through his skin in a grotesque display of blood.

”Aargh!”

Priam roared in pain, using the wind’s force to retreat desperately and create some distance while allowing Mirra to heal him.

The situation was terrible. In terms of power, this demon was definitely closer to a Sage than to a ninth-level Physical Mage Master.

The enemy possessed an impenetrable body, terrifying speed, and absolute destructive power. It was the combination of all three most important attributes for a fist fighter.

’I gained a Martial Art focused on speed, and then one focused on direct offensive power. Possibly, this trial requires me to use both together to completely surpass this demon in those two attributes. Only by being far superior in speed and power will I have a chance of breaking through its defenses with brute force.’

Priam snorted.

The logic behind everything was easy to see. By defeating this enemy, he would most likely gain a Martial Art focused on physical toughness. That way, the complete inheritance of the God of Fists would perfectly unite the three attributes: speed, attack, and endurance.

”COME!!”

Priam roared and charged forward.

Clenching his teeth, he continued the brutal fight while tirelessly searching for any weak point. However, this truly was a corpse. It felt no pain, never hesitated, and reacted completely automatically to everything he did.