Age of Adepts

Inside a secret cabin room.

Greem and Alice sat across from each other. A palm-sized wooden idol was the only thing placed upon the crude wooden table. At this moment, several red ropes were wrapped around the wooden idol haphazardly, going in every direction.

These red ropes looked normal as if they were just everyday objects, but the strange magical flux radiating from them had completely sealed the mysterious aura of the wooden idol within it.

This appeared to be a sort of strange sealing spell!

However, given that its material was an ordinary red rope, Greem couldn’t help but be amazed at the wonders of magic.

"What’s there to be curious about?!" Alice seemed to have picked up on Greem’s surprise. She naughtily pursed her lips and smiled, "The materials that ancient adepts used were all trash that they simply picked up from the ground– things like stones and dirt, or even bones and tree sap. The spells they cast could all move the planar laws with the power of laws. They had no need to rely on powerful magical materials to enhance and supplement the effect of their magic like the rookie adepts these days."

"Er," Greem was speechless, "Why does it feel like I’m also included in those rookie adepts you just mentioned!"

"You are much better than them!" Alice giggled and spoke softly, "I still remember back then. If I hadn’t been knocked silly by your strange instant-cast spells, I would never have been so unfortunate as to land in your hands."

Her eyes were full of nostalgia as she spoke!

Greem rolled his eyes helplessly and grumbled, "Didn’t you call me here today to investigate the secrets within the wooden idol? How did things get dragged to the stuff of the past?"

In truth, the process by which he had defeated Alice back then didn’t seem to be all that merry of a thing. There were plenty of tragic memories of being chased around by Alice. Greem felt his whole body shiver and itch at the mention of these events. He wanted nothing more than to scrub these scenes from his memories.

Alice had become much more mature and reliable after enduring so many trials and such heavy pressure. However, that trace of slyness and mischief engraved within her bones was still there. She couldn’t help but go over the old record books with Greem whenever the opportunity presented itself.

Alice finally let the issue go when she saw Greem’s awkward expression. She put on a serious expression and gave a warning.

"I will be unsealing this idol in a bit. If I make any mistake during this process, I could alert that legendary God of Moonlight."

Even Greem’s face turned solemn upon hearing this.

Deities. This word was a huge taboo for the adepts.

There were no deities in the World of Adepts, and no gods were allowed to appear.

What the adepts worshipped were knowledge, power, and a perpetually calm and wise mind!

Once a follower knelt before a god, they were actively handing over dominance of their consciousness. From then own, all of their actions and thoughts would have to be measured against the will of the god.

They would become the extension of the god’s will; a carrier, or more simply, a puppet!

Adepts were not suited to have faith!

If they had to have one, then it could only be in knowledge!

Once they lost this foundation by which to establish themselves, the adepts would have lost their independence and the meaning to their own existence.

That was why personal idolization and faith had always been differentiated in the World of Adepts. Any adept that crossed this boundary would instantly become the public enemy of all adept organizations.

Still, rejecting faith was rejecting faith. Many adepts still conducted deep and extensive research on this entirely different and mysterious force known as the power of faith out of curiosity. They had gained a basic understanding of the attributes and traits of the power of faith.

First, the formation of the power of faith relied on intense psychological suggestions.

The gods would think of all sorts of way to plant the core commandments of their clergy into the minds of their followers. They would then have their followers repeatedly strengthen their psychological suggestions through specific actions, speech, or rituals, thus forming a sort of psychological reliance upon them. It caused the followers to treat the core commandments of the gods as the set of highest goals meant to realize the meaning of their lives.

During this process of interaction between minds, the pure and stubborn soul consciousness would then stimulate a strange soul power that would turn into the power of faith. If one were to analyze the power of faith from the perspective of the magic origin, it belonged to the category of supernatural powers of the mind attribute.

If one were to look at things from the aspect of the narrow mind attribute, these gods were practically no different from the infamous mind flayers of the multiverse. There was only one slight difference. One brazenly devoured the brains of other creatures to strengthen themselves. The other was just extending this process over an extremely long period of time, taking their followers as their sheep and the source of their powers. The only real change was them beautifying and polishing the process of their devouring, making them appear to be all the more noble and moral.

However, what difference was there between the two if one were to peel away the facade?

What truly made the adepts despise the gods was their attitudes and method of treating their followers.

All sorts of research had demonstrated that weak and foolish intelligent species were the best source of power of faith. To maintain the purity of their followers’ mindsets, the kingdoms and territories controlled by the gods always rejected the development of technology and civilization.

Over the course of hundreds and thousands of years, the gods took full advantage of the tension and conflict between the king and the nobles, the greater nobles, and the lesser nobles. It was also between the nobles and the peasants in order to create all sorts of disorder and military clashes. It was only then that these beings living within this hell of perpetual conflict and suffering would entrust all they possessed in the vague and intangible idea of faith.

The vast and endless stream of faith became the source of power that allowed the gods to grow stronger continuously. However, in doing so, both the gods who resided at the top of the food chain and the lowest of peasants had become two grasshoppers on the same chain of faith. One was terrifyingly powerful, while the other was horrifyingly weak.

Sadly, it didn’t matter how significant the power difference was. Both of these groups of individuals had been reduced to parasites of the planar laws.

The gods gathered the power of faith and used the portion of planar laws they had control over to turn this faith into purer and more condensed divine power. Thus, they became the powerful shepherds standing at the peak of the plane.

The plane was like the ranch of the deities, while the intelligent followers were their cattle and sheep. On the other hand, this wooden idol on the wooden table was the device the foolish livestock used to communicate with their masters!

Greem and Alice might be fearsomely powerful characters compared to the ’cattle’ and ’sheep,’ but they were no more than two slightly stronger livestock or in the eyes of gods.

As such, they had to undertake all actions against the gods with the utmost caution.

Some magic tomes had revealed that mentioning the name of a powerful god within a plane would stir the planar laws, causing this deity to receive some faint impressions. If these gods also possessed holy divination professions, they might even be able to use this vague sense they had obtained to calculate all the elements behind it, along with the countless possibilities that it would bring about in the future.

That said, the Goddes of Moonlight Meve that they were dealing with this time wasn’t skilled at divination. Otherwise, Alice would never have dared to attempt deciphering and analyzing an idol soaked in her aura of faith while still in Faen.

Greem couldn’t help but scratch his head upon seeing how eager Alice was, "What did you call me over here for? I know absolutely nothing about the power of faith. I’m afraid I won’t be of much help!"

Alice smiled slightly, "I didn’t call you here for anything. I just wanted you to sit by my side and watch as I do it."

"Then?"

"You are the calmest and smartest adept I have ever seen. You can judge for yourself. If anything goes wrong during my unsealing ritual or my process of investigation, you must instantly destroy the idol without any hesitation. I’m worried... I will no longer have the power to destroy this idol at that time."

Greem nodded his head in comprehension.

It seemed Alice had called him here to be a supervisor. If Alice’s actions stirred the Goddess of Moonlight, she would have plenty of means to crush this First Grade shrimp to death. When that happened, it would be Greem’s time to find a way to save her!

Of course, this was only out of the cautious nature of adepts.

The Goddess of Moonlight was a goddess– a high and aloof deity. If it wasn’t a particular reason or a unique motivation, it was hard even to attract her attention. That was why the two of them never really expected something like that to arise when Alice gently told Greem about his purpose here. Their moods were still very relaxed.

Greem smiled when he saw Alice’s white and slender fingers lightly touch the red ropes upon the idol and remove them in a specific order. He started communicating with the Chip in his mind.

Chip; note, observe, and record all of Alice’s actions. Immediately take intervention measures upon detecting any oddities.

[Beep. Order received. Scanning and recording in process.]

With an agile movement of Alice’s slender fingers, the red ropes sealing the wooden idol finally snapped cleanly apart!

The next second, a sinister, unfathomable, and strange power emanated from within the idol. This crude idol that had originally been carved of oak had, oddly enough, come to life.

The formerly coarse and crude face that only possessed simple eyes and a nose started to stretch and transform. The wooden patterns turned smooth and clean. The protruding wooden nose also turned straight and pretty. Even more terrifying were the pair of shut eyes and the eyelashes upon them quivering, as they were about to open wide.

[Beep. Detecting the appearance of a mysterious power. The source is the inside of the divine object. Detecting the appearance of a miniature spatial cave-in. A mysterious spatial passage is forming.]

A series of red alerts quickly rang out in Greem’s mind. Greem looked around the room and immediately realized that Alice was staring at the wooden idol and her eyes were out of focus. She didn’t seem to be aware of the impending danger.

Spatial passage?

What exactly was that damned Goddess of Moonlight trying to send over?

Even if it was only a small spatial cave-in, the power being transferred over was probably not something that Greem and Alice could endure.

That was why Greem raised his right hand without hesitation and furiously punched the wooden idol.

The ferocious power of fire exploded in an instant. The wooden idol that had barely started opening its eyes immediately split into thousands of pieces. That strange power also vanished at the same time.

The next second, Greem and Alice spat out blood and collapsed limply to the ground. An odd projection of a moon surfaced upon their foreheads.