Age of Adepts

The dragonborn army wasn’t composed of only warriors. There were some ’spellcasters’ with relatively more powerful elementium powers hidden among them!

They were just as physically capable as ordinary dragonborn warriors, but their elementium powers were even stronger than their physical prowess, though there were very few of them. Only one out of twenty or thirty dragonborn was one such spellcaster.

Moreover, cultivating and equipping them also cost a lot of money. Ordinary dragon lords were incapable of raising such soldiers. That was why even Fire Dragon Philippa had no more than seventeen dragonborn spellcasters serving under her.

Six of those spellcasters had accompanied this dragonborn army.

These six talented dragonborn spellcasters charged to the front and waved the flame staffs in their hands. Several massive fireballs crashed into the ranks of the magical machines like meteors from the sky.

The successive explosions of the elementium fireballs blasted five or six of the magical machines into pieces. Sparks flew everywhere. Over a dozen magical machines were also blown away by the ensuing flame shockwaves.

The dragonborn spellcasters frowned at the mediocre results.

However, something even more troublesome happened next.

The dozen magical machines that had been sent flying back by the explosive shockwave quickly got onto their feet. They shook off the dirt on their bodies and started to fire bullets again as they moved back to their previous positions. Two of the six magical machines that had been caught in the center of the explosion also stood up with much difficulty.

Most of the gun barrels on their bodies had been melted or snapped by the fireballs, and thick black smoke came from within their tattered bodies. Electric sparks flashed every so often. Yet they continued to fire a barrage of bullets at the dragonborn with what weapons they had left.

That one wave of fireballs had only managed to destroy four of the metal lumps. This...this was clearly far below the bottom line of the dragonborn spellcasters.

In every past battle, their fireballs would have reaped the lives of countless creatures each time they exploded. Moreover, the loud explosion of the fireball, the cluster of fire, and the fearsome shockwaves had always intimidated the enemy. They were far more fearsome to behold than the warriors cutting down enemies with their axes.

Sadly, this was meaningless before the cold and unfeeling machines.

The six dragonborn spellcasters bombarded the magical machines with fireballs from a distance of two hundred meters away. They had no idea that right above them, a terrifying and wickedly grinning God of Death was lunging toward them.

The magic energy flying ship hurriedly increased its altitude after dropping the Destroyer. It frantically fled toward the distance.

The cigar-shaped bomb that was three meters long and one meter in diameter cut through the mist and the fog, whistling as it dove toward the ground.

All the dragonborn in the battle couldn’t help but raise their head when they heard the sound. They looked on fearfully as a strange and tiny object descended from the skies and landed in their camp.

A massive fireball ten meters in diameter rose in the center of the camp the very next second. It exploded and blasted outward, sending out scalding heat waves and hot air currents.

A dragonborn warrior happened to be caught within the blast wave and was thrown twenty meters away. He was bruised and scratched all over when he finally stopped. However, he was only relieved upon getting up from the ground. He patted himself all over and realized that he hadn’t lost any limbs or body parts.

The dragonborn who watched the whole scene unfold were shocked!

That was all?

That was all that thing that made them feel dread was capable of?

The power of that weapon was truly seven or eight times that of the fireballs of the dragonborn spellcasters, but these things were still too weak to be used against the dragonborn. It couldn’t even kill an ordinary dragonborn warrior.

However, something started to happen to that lucky dragonborn before the others could even cast that thought away from their minds.

The dragonborn abruptly started to scream and yell. His voice was hoarse and pained.

Warts and blisters of all sizes started to swell upon his rough and slightly reddened skin. The surface of his skin began to swell, and burn marks began to appear. Large patches of the warrior’s scales started to shed, almost as if an invisible fire had scorched him. The bloody blisters beneath were revealed for all to see.

The dragonborn didn’t have much hair to speak of, but they still had tough, dark red hairs growing on their heads. At this moment, these hairs started to fall off in patches, as if the scalp had been burned with boiling water. The red, new flesh beneath was now exposed.

However, soon, even the skin there started to rot and turn bad, as if it had caught necrosis. The dragonborn was also constantly coughing and spitting out black blood and shattered organs. It was apparent that the inside of his body was also undergoing the same rotting process as the outside.

The intense pain felt as if tens of thousands of bugs were eating the dragonborn from within. He couldn’t help but start scratching at his own body. Scales began to fall as he scratched with all he had. His skin continued to rot as his flesh withered and shrunk. The claw marks he inflicted upon himself were so deep that one could even see the bone underneath.

This dragonborn was dissolving!

Indeed, all the dragonborn could see what was happening. The dragonborn was dissolving, both from the inside and outside. All of his flesh was disintegrating from the effects of that strange ’dirty bomb.’ Skin, veins, blood, muscles; everything and absolutely everything was dissolving and melting into each other, turning into a disgusting pool of liquid.

When everything on the dragonborn that could be dissolved had liquified into a puddle of pungent fluid, the remaining insolubles fell to the ground with a clatter. That included a perfectly clean skeleton, dark red dragon scales, some hair, and a few short, curved horns.

That was all that remained of the mighty and towering dragonborn warrior in a mere blink of an eye!

Waves of intense coughing starting to appear in the camp while the dragonborn watched this horrifying scene play out before their terrified gazes.

It was almost as if a plague god had silently passed through the camp. Nearly one-third of the dragonborn started to cough and throw up for no reason. The blood they coughed up was also black in color. Organ bits and crawling bugs floated inside their blood.

It instantly threw the dragonborn into chaos.

They ignored orders, regardless of how much their captains shouted and roared at them. They ran about in a panic avoiding those ’companions’ of theirs that were spitting up blood.

The dragonborn camp had utterly fallen into disorder!

............

The adepts were clearly prepared for this chaotic scene.

However, the unexpected effectiveness of the magic still surprised them.

The effect of the magic was way too good, wasn’t it?!

Was it Endor’s poison being too powerful, or was it the Destroyer being too terrifying? For a moment, even Mary couldn’t be sure which it was.

Mary had an excellent idea of Endor’s power.

If she had sufficient time to plant her poisons, they could achieve horrifying effects. Killing multiple adepts of the same grade wouldn’t be out of the question. But being able to so severely poison these dragonborn, whose Physique could compare to those of Second Grade body refining adepts; it seemed as if she shouldn’t be able to do that, should she?

Then was it the work of that Destroyer?

Mary knew nothing of the effects of the Destroyer. Greem had only faintly mentioned something about ’intense radiation’ when he passed the bomb to her. It appeared to be some new experimental weapon he had concocted in collaboration with Gazlowe.

From a certain perspective, the destructiveness of this weapon was truly stunning!

At the very least, it had instantly crippled one-third of the dragonborn. The other dragonborn had also been affected to some extent.

However, the bomb had also forced the dragonborn army into a corner. The soldiers were wildly assaulting the defensive lines of the magical machine army under the instructions of their superiors.

Finally, after so many schemes and plots, the dragonborn warriors were clashing with the magical machines with real steel and fire.

The dragonborn seemed to have realized the firepower of the magical machines’ ranged weapons. Thus, all the charging dragonborn waved large tree trunks around or held up massive boulders as they approached the enemy. They successfully breached the fire suppression line with these objects as their shields. The dragonborn were finally able to engage the magical machines in a close-range fight.

On one side, you had berserk warriors forged of flesh and blood, while on the other, you had magical machines with steel for veins and iron for bones. The intense violence and brutality from the meeting of these two unstoppable forces were exhilarating.

Dong! Dong! Dong!

Several Loggers were blown into the air amid a series of dull thuds of metal against flesh. They were instantly shattered into components and broken pieces. The metal axes in the hands of the ferocious dragonborn had also been broken and bent during the impact. Every inch of their bodies had turned bloody as their scales shattered from the exchange of blows.

A rain of metal bullets then came from every direction in the one moment they had paused after striking the Loggers. The bullets embedded themselves into the bodies of the dragonborn, aggravating their injuries. Finally, the dragonborn collapsed to the ground, roaring in agony as they did so.

Waves of dragonborn warriors charged forward, and waves of dragonborn warriors collapsed to the ground. The Logger defensive line was also thinning out at a rate visible to the naked eye.

The previously tight defensive line couldn’t deal with the relentless assaults and charges of the dragonborn warriors. The line had been moved back again and again. Finally, the dragonborn managed to break through the mud roads and expanded the battlefield to a larger and wider plain.

The magical machine army had also made considerable adjustments to their formation while the defensive line moved backward. The formerly tight square formation had now turned into a looser pocket formation.

Archers were roaming the edge of the battlefield, continually using their long-ranged firepower to wear away at the defenses of the dragonborn. The only remaining thirty Loggers formed several small defensive circles inside of the battlefield. They used their large and robust bodies to divide the formation of the dragonborn army.

Meanwhile, the adepts hid themselves and waited like ferocious alligators hunting beneath the water. They slowly closed in on their prey.

The bloody battle raged on.