Age of Adepts

Note: As VeggieFly is leaving us, we have got ourself two new editors: FlashFly and KiwiFly. This chapter is edited by both of them.

The clay alligator charged forward, and, with the breeze it caused sweeping up dead leaves, it looked as if it were invincible.

It was worth mentioning that the build of the Demon Alligator Hunter had entered the scope of large creatures. In comparison, the ferocious Hooked Horror was only considered a medium size creature.

Fights between demon beasts always came down to strength, and no doubt, the size of their bodies was the most direct method of showing off their strength.

Facing the charging Demon Alligator Hunter, the Hooked Horrors, who even Mary couldn’t harm, had transformed into a group of terrified little bunnies putting up a deathbed struggle. One after another they were thrown to the ground by the Demon Alligator, who used his powerful jaw to shred them into little pieces. At the same time, the hunter, who sat up high, kept throwing spears down. Each spear pinned the Hooked Horrors, who tried to leap onto the Demon Alligator’s back, to the ground.

Although Hooked Horrors were also Earth Elemental creatures, which granted them immunity from the Earth Elemental damage brought by the Dirt Spear, they couldn’t escape from the brutal physical damage. Hence, while charging towards their enemy, many Hooked Horrors were nailed into the ground by the spear, putting up a useless struggle.

A few of the lucky Hooked Horrors managed to land beside the Demon Alligator. They vented their anger by using the most powerful attacks they could muster. They tirelessly hit the thick, tough clay armour covering the top of the Demon Alligator’s body. They attacked aggressively. Their scratching and biting caused dirt chunks to fall off continuously. But from time to time, an earthy yellow ring of light would burst out from the Demon Alligator’s body, bringing the Demon Alligator another layer of new clay armour.

The hunter who sat high up would never let the enemies who tried to destroy the body of the Demon Alligator go. The dirt spears, that were fired from close range,

penetrated the Hooked Horrors’ skulls instantly, making them fall to the ground while letting out miserably cries.

In just ten minutes, this group of Hooked Horrors had been wiped out completely by the Demon Alligator Hunter.

Once the battle was over, Greem started to clean up the battlefield. But the result, once again, made him scorn these Hook Horrors who died miserably. Even amongst this rather large group of wandering creatures, there wasn’t even a single demon core to be found. Greem hastily harvested some of the still intact razor sharp claws. After harvesting, Mary and Greem climbed back up onto the Demon Alligator and ventured deeper into the Underground World.

In around half day, the broken bodies of the Hooked Horrors they had left behind would be digested by other Underground creatures. The other creatures would be lured in by the smell of the dead bodies. Within the Underground world, there were plenty of ‘natural scavengers’, as food was extremely scarce, and anything that could be eaten would not go to waste. These ‘natural scavengers’ would wander around the dark and quiet Underground world all day looking for food that would cure their hunger.

However, something happened that Greem hadn’t considered. Not long after they left the battlefield, a short stalagmite in a corner of the cave suddenly trembled and transformed into a weird-looking human figure who had, what seemed to be rock-like skin. It was staring blankly in the direction in which Greem and Mary disappeared, seeming like a lifeless object. The creature then sent a strange wave forth and, by using a secret message, transmitted it far into the distance.

Only after transmitting all the information, did the stone figure difficulty and slowly merge back together with the short stalagmite, leaving no trace that it was ever there. It was such a strange life form, that, even if Greem had the intention to find it, he would find it really hard to differentiate it from other ordinary stalagmites.

　　…………

Deep down in the Underground world, within a secret cave.

A bonfire was brightly burning in the centre of the cave, spreading its toasty warmth throughout it. Four bizarre-looking figures, covered in black cloaks, were standing in a circle around the fire. They remained quiet, as if they were waiting for something.

In order to prevent their aura from leaking out, the placed a thick, transparent barrier at the entrance of the cave.

All of a sudden, a strange croaking sound was heard from one of the members.

Apparently, this figure was female, as her arm, that stretched out from underneath the black cloak, was very slim. An extremely ugly toad was squatting in the middle of her palm. It kept letting out jarring, croaking sounds by squeezing and expanding its huge yet half-transparent stomach.

“There is also activity detected in sector seven! Including sector four and five, which were triggered moments ago, this makes three sectors in total. We can be sure that they’re from the outside,” The lady finally spoke.

“Jajaja… We had just received the news that a group of delicious prey are coming from the outside, and now we’ve finally detected their whereabouts. What a bunch of fearless rookies! Since the triggering time of these few sites are so close to each other, they must have split up. Jajaja… this is the best news we’ve heard all day!” A sinister laugh came from another man in a black cloak.

“Can you find anything out about the overall strength of each small team? I heard that there are a few Pseudo-Adepts in this group? I just need one more Pseudo-Adept soul to complete my corpse puppet!” Another man in a black cloak spoke. From his lofty and domineering voice, it wasn’t hard to tell that this guy was the leader of this four-people group. This man also had the strongest treacherous undertone.

“It is really tough to tell! After all, any overly aggressive spying methods would be easily detected by them. Therefore, the message I received only tells me that some

creatures, who have fulfilled the preset requirements, passed by. However, we can’t confirm their actual strength and numbers,” The same lady replied.

“Hmm! Once they split up, they are not far from meeting their death. According to their tradition, most of them will probably form a two-person team, and, at most, a three people one. We have four people here and three of us are Pseudo-Adepts. Can’t we capture one of their small teams?” Grinning hideously, the black cloak leader continued saying, “Let’s go to site number four first, as that’s the closest site from here. If everything goes smoothly, we can visit a few more sites afterwards, and try our best to capture few more teams!”

“Let’s go!”

The group put their words into action immediately. They were a group of people who handle things with resolute and cruel means. After a short discussion, they had given up this temporary camp and started squeezing their way out of the cave, relinquishing themselves to the eternal darkness outside.

　　…………

At the same time, Greem was enjoying a relaxed journey. He absolutely had no idea that great danger was approaching from a far distance.

He and Mary had become indifferent spectators who did nothing. The Demon Alligator Hunter alone was able to make a clean sweep of all Underground creatures who kept leaping out from the darkness. Marching and crushing all in their way, they had virtually turned this extremely dangerous mission into a relaxed and peaceful sightseeing trip.

But, a discovery had brought all sorts of feeling to his mind. The Underground world was a place where all dirty things hid, and a place where different species crossbred with each other. All sorts of messy bloodlines could be found here.

The aggressiveness and cruelty of these Underground creatures were stronger than those on the surface. Sometimes, even though they knew they were not the match of Greem and his minions, they still launched an attack on him. They

attacked in such a way that they seemed to not take their own safety into consideration. In fact, some hunters only needed to throw their spear at the weaker charging creatures in order to kill them. As for those stronger creatures, before they could break up Demon Alligator’s tough clay armour, it’s sharp and powerful front legs would have crushed them into meat paste.

Facing such an enormous creature, who could absorb Earth Elementium from the surrounding environment and continuously self-heal, these creatures’ attacks could never bring any threat. If they really wanted to defeat the Demon Alligator, they would have to use a devastating magic spell and crush the summoning core that was buried deep inside its body in one go. The only other option was to use a continuous amount of super energy to smash its tough shell. But, obviously, none of these small Underground creatures was capable of achieving either one of the options.

Actually, this was related to the environment they were living in.

The Underground world was full of long, narrow tunnels, caverns with protruding stalagmites on the ground, and countless stalactites that hung from the ceiling of caverns. Living in such environment, an overly grown body brought two major harms. Firstly, it was very hard to find sufficient food to sustain their life, and, secondly, it was very difficult to pass through all the narrow tunnels without getting stuck.

Therefore, in order to adapt to such an environment, the majority of the Underground creature had evolved. Although they became cruel and aggressive, their bodies were short and flat. This meant that they when faced with the Demon Alligator, who was clearly a massive monster in this Underground world, were suppressed in both Strength and Physique.

As the golem was moulded from Earth Elementium, the size of the Demon Alligator was controlled directly by the summoning core. When it was required to face battle, it would charge in with its biggest form. However, when it was required to travel underground, it would adjust its body shape according to the shape of the tunnel.

For example, when travelling in some really narrow and rough tunnels, it could even adjust itself into the shape of huge Rock Python, which allowed it to squeeze through the tight space more easily. The two ‘masters’ who owned this self-moving golem, who was capable of changing its shape, needed only to sit on its back and allow the golem to do all the work. Was there anything else that could be more relaxing than this?

In order to see throughout their long and boring journey in the dark, Greem and Mary even lit up their torches on the back of Demon Alligator. They tried to overcome their own boredom by studying their own magical topic. As for those Underground creatures, who had eyes but failed to see Mount Tai, they just let their dedicated Demon Alligator Hunter handle them!

Therefore, the mission which initially required them to embark on a tiring seventeen-hour long journey, only took seven hours before they arrived at their destination.

It was an enormous limestone cavern and was filled with all kinds of strangely shaped stalactites. In a lower region in a corner of the cave, water fell off the cavern wall and formed a small pond. The pond made this place become one where surrounding Underground creatures always visited.

The team stopped in this dark limestone cavern. Lit up by the dancing flame of the torch, the huge body of the Demon Alligator appeared even more frightening and ruthless. Frightened by it, most of the Underground creatures who came here for water immediately scurried away, and only a handful of creatures who didn’t possess sufficient intelligence initiated their attack. Of course, these poor fellows were all killed on the spot.

Greem’s soft, thick and waterproof black deerskin boots stepped onto the muddy and slippery stone path. As Greem climbed down from the Demon Alligator Hunter, he pushed back his hood. He quickly started scanning the mission site through his strange goggles.

It was unexpectedly calm, a mission like this was considered an Orange mission?

But, before he could continue pondering this strange occurrence, an extremely gentle and lovely female voice suddenly rang out from behind him.

“As an elegant gentleman, don’t you think you should help the beautiful lady get down from the vehicle?”

A cold shudder suddenly went down Greem’s back. He was taken aback by Mary’s ‘frightening’ voice. To be honest, Mary always showed him the brutal and aggressive side of hers during a fight. By suddenly portraying the look of a gentle lady, clearly, because of boredom, she was once again trying to fool him.

After knowing her for a long time, he now had a clearly understood Mary’s temper.

She was an extremely dangerous girl; she was a wounded girl who lacked trust in the outside world.

Greem had absolutely no idea how Mary endured all those frightening magical experiments done by Adept Anderson. However, Greem was sure of one thing: the current Mary was showing signs of having split personalities. One was the original Mary, who was a shy and introverted girl, while another was the cruel vampire Mary, whose mind was twisted. The two totally opposite personalities were placed in the same body, producing a Mary who always felt insecure.

She was like a mind twisted dowager. On one hand, she wanted to use her beautiful and sexy appearance to make everyone crazy about her. Whilst, on the other hand, she couldn’t restrain her desire for fresh blood and wished she could rip every single human into pieces, pouring their blood onto her beautiful body.

Therefore, her behaviour swung between seduction and cruelty. Even a slight mistake would trigger the pain hiding deep within her heart, causing her to transform into the ‘Bloody Queen’ that she always dreamed of!

In brief, it was extremely rare to see a perfect human being to walk on the path of Adept!