Badge in Azure

Saleen was merely thinking. He knew that he was no match for the Grandmaster if he was to return to the graveyard. In fact, any of the souls amongst the clusters of tombstones were more powerful than him.

In any case, the contracts stated that the earliest he would have to return was after a thousand years, which was equivalent to 100 years in the outside world. Saleen did not believe that after a hundred years, he would not possess powers that could defeat the Grandmaster. At the very least, his rule of lightning should have advanced to a very powerful level. On top of that, he would still have his clan badge. By then, he would only have to lock on to the Grandmaster’s tombstone. Once the lightning struck, he would turn to dust, no matter how powerful he was.

The souls wanted to leave because they knew that their powers would gradually decrease if they continued to stay in their soul forms. Not only that, they would not be able to advance, and that would be intolerable to anyone.

Saleen would become even more powerful after 100 years while the souls would only become weaker after 1,000 years. The longer the time, the more advantageous the situation would be for Saleen.

Therefore, Saleen would try his best to drag out the agreement on the contract. Perhaps he might not even have to return to the graveyard at all.

At that point in time, he desired the unique powers possessed by astrologers more than ever. With those powers, the souls would not be able to force him to return.

While Saleen’s grade did not advance, his mental strength did become more powerful. He could vaguely sense the mysterious power in his body that was left behind by the souls, but he had no idea where exactly it was. If not for the rule of lightning, which allowed him to detect energy differently from other mages, Saleen might even still be glad that he had entered the graveyard.

The ancient humans, who he had once admired, turned out to be just a bunch of greedy souls.

The Grandmaster might be annoying, but the other souls were extremely hypocritical too. Saleen’s admiration for them was completely erased. After removing the magic patterns in the Devil Ring, he threw the Star Gathering Needle into the devil mask.

The winged skeleton returned to the storage room after his search and Saleen also finished with his devil suit at the same time. Fortunately, other than the ring and the mask, the other equipment did not contain too many magic patterns, otherwise Saleen had no idea how long it would take. The Star Gathering Needle removed the magic patterns very efficiently so Saleen did not use up too much mental strength.

The elemental magic tower could not be taken out because it was more than 200 yards tall. Once it was taken out, all the star charts around the astrologer’s tower would be activated and would begin to attack the magic tower. Saleen did not want to take the risk. He had no idea how powerful the defenses of the astrologer tower were. The grade of the materials that made up his magic tower had dropped by two grades, so the tower could very well be destroyed by the power of constellations.

On the other hand, Nailisi’s Twelve Notes of Purgatory would not trigger the astrologer’s tower so Saleen entered the Purgatory of Ice to inspect his elemental magic tower.

He began inspecting the magic furnace and concluded nothing was wrong with it. The item was too exquisite, even the Grandmaster was unable to tinker with it.

Saleen inspected the core of Sky City. The item was clean too. Although the Grandmaster seemed to look down on Sky City, it was clear that the core was at a grade that not even the Grandmaster could tinker with.

Finally, Saleen began to inspect the elemental stones. The stones seemed pure but many miniature magic arrays were hidden within them. When the magic arrays were placed together, they formed a massive three-dimensional magic array. Saleen was very familiar with that and did not hesitate to throw the Star Gathering Needle in.

Within the elemental magic tower, the magic arrays and magic patterns left behind by the Grandmaster were tens of thousands of times more than those in the Devil Ring. Besides, the magic patterns and magic arrays were also part of the magic tower’s attack and defense. They would only reveal themselves if an extremely powerful enemy appeared.

Saleen guessed that the magic patterns and magic arrays would only reveal themselves if an enemy at least of the same grade as the Angel of Fear appeared.

When the Star Gathering Needle entered the magic tower, it went on a rampage. Saleen was not able to control it. Even Saleen was stunned by how many magic patterns and magic arrays were hidden in the elemental magic tower. It was as if the Grandmaster had refined the magic tower for himself. If Saleen was willing, the Grandmaster would take the magic tower back the moment Saleen left the territory of the astrologers.

“How can someone be so shameless?!” Saleen could not help but rant.

After six hours, the Star Gathering Needle finally removed all the magic arrays in the magic tower. Saleen was left with the empty shell of a magic tower. Fortunately, the elemental stones of the magic furnace and magic tower were unharmed.

“Damn it!” Saleen cursed at the Grandmaster in his heart. Strictly speaking, the Grandmaster had not gone against the contract, but Saleen had to remove the hidden dangers. Without them the elemental magic tower would not be able to fly.

There was no way Saleen could restore the magic arrays on his own. He was only a grade-8 sorcerer. How could he possibly replicate the magic arrays refined by a grade-17 Grandmaster?

The Grandmaster could make the magic tower fly easily but Saleen could not. Even if he used the magic furnace and the power core of Sky City, the magic tower could only float and not fly. In fact, just floating alone would require constant feeding off energy into the magic furnace. Even if the magic furnace did not require a lot of energy, Saleen could not afford to sacrifice magic nuclei constantly.

When the Star Gathering Needle left the elemental tower and entered the Twelve Notes of Purgatory, Saleen was shocked. As soon as a mysterious connection occurred between Saleen and the Needle, he sensed the faint power of constellations. Within the Twelve Notes of Purgatory, the balance that the Grandmaster had maintained with his magic was being penetrated and destroyed by the Star Gathering Needle.

The Twelve Notes of Purgatory seemed to be trembling all at the same time and were on the brink of collapse.

In the Purgatory of Ice, the ground was trembling. Countless water elements were evaporated and absorbed into the Twelve Notes of Purgatory. Without the control of the weapon’s spirit, everything was collapsing very quickly. Saleen had no choice but to put the elemental magic tower in his Dimension Stone before fleeing the Twelve Notes of Purgatory.

Nailisi had no idea what had just happened. The spiritual imprint that she had left behind on the equipment has been removed. If she was not of the special Luoluokaluo bloodline, her soul would have been harmed.

One by one, the Twelve Purgatories were destroyed and turned into pure energy by the Star Gathering Needle. There were remnants of the power of constellations harnessed within the energy that fused into the equipment. The Purgatories were collapsing but were barely supported by the power of constellations.

After approximately 12 hours, the Purgatories finally stopped collapsing. The color of the Twelve Notes of Purgatory kept changing until it finally turned into a huge black book. On the cover of the book were silver star lights. The Star Gathering Needle flew out and landed in Saleen’s hands.

Saleen did not know whether to laugh or cry. This Needle’s ability to eliminate magic traps and hidden dangers was undeniably thorough, but at the same time, it had also destroyed the Twelve Notes of Purgatory. If not for the remnants of the power of constellations that was barely supporting it, the equipment would have been completely destroyed.

As a result, the Twelve Notes of Purgatory had become incredibly resilient, but each Purgatory became the size of only tens of square yards. For someone of the status of a grade-9 professional, like Nailisi, it could not even suffice as a spatial equipment, much less to be used in combat.

“Nailisi…”

“Master!” Nailisi had tears in her eyes. Her Twelve Notes of Purgatory had advanced and had absorbed all of the materials that the Grandmaster had thrown in, but the Purgatories were gone. She would have to start all over again.

Who knew how much time and effort Nailisi would have to invest in it to start all over again?

“Remove all the equipment. Everything that the Grandmaster has refined is problematic,” Saleen said helplessly. Before he clashed with the Grandmaster, he had already obtained the elemental magic tower, yet it was still full of hidden dangers. It was clear that the Grandmaster had already been plotting against him from the very beginning.

If not for the Star Gathering Needle, Saleen would never have found the hidden dangers as a mere grade-8 mage.

The problem was that once the hidden dangers of these equipment had been removed, the equipment also lost most of their functions. “What now?” Saleen did not wish to risk being forced to return to the Grandmaster if he was too far away from the astrologer tower.

The Grandmaster harbored only ill intentions towards Saleen. If he knew that he had inadvertently helped Saleen’s mental strength advance by transporting him to the back of the astrologer tower, he would have been full of regret. There was no way he would be able to take back all the materials and equipment.

Saleen did not expect the Grandmaster’s pain to be an act all along, aside from that golden giant dragon, there was no way he could have tinkered with that golden giant dragon that Nailisi devoured. Even if he did, Nailisi’s bloodline would have removed it.

Saleen forced Nailisi to hand over her long lance, her shield, her flying devil armor, and her dragon crystal needle.

All the equipment was destroyed by the Star Gathering Needle, one by one. In the end, Nailisi was only left with the Sword of Rules, Gray Memory, and the dragon crystal needle. There was not a single piece of armor left for her.

Even the mode of attack of Gray Memory has reverted back to that of the original long lance. Many of the spells had been removed, leaving behind only the original abilities of the silverline golden spearfish. The dragonshard in the crystal dragon would still be able to help replenish Nailisi’s mental strength though.

Saleen felt relieved that he had not requested for the Grandmaster to modify his War Drum of Fear. It was an exquisite equipment that, if destroyed, Saleen would not be able to repair. It was the same with his shards of Eternal Control. If they were destroyed by the Grandmaster, he would no longer be able to study them. It seemed that the Star Gathering Needle was about the same grade as Aragorn. Saleen had yet to be able to determine the grade of the broken jade. The reason why he did not request the Grandmaster’s help to process the soul of the Angel of Fear in the broken jade was because he was afraid that the latter might take it for himself.

“Soldier, your weapons.”

“What about the pan’s turtle alchemical boat?” The winged skeleton asked Saleen as he took out his battle axe and Meteor Hammer.

“Leave that alone for now, until we leave the Imperial City of the Abyss.” Saleen threw the winged skeleton’s weapons into the water flame and used the Star Gathering Needle to destroy the magic arrays in it.

“Master, actually things might not be as bad as it seems,” the winged skeleton said calmly.

“Not as bad?” Saleen destroyed the magic array in the winged skeleton’s battle axe, then refined two new magic arrays on it. The newly-refined magic arrays were tens of times weaker.

“Of course. There is a possibility that the astrologer’s contracts might be changed right? The equipment that the Grandmaster has given to us already spoiled so quickly. Who is to say that there will not be changes to the contracts? That will be advantageous to us.” The black-and-white soul flames in the winged skeleton’s eyes were dancing at the same rhythm as the beating of the golden heart.