Age of Adepts

Most of the magical beams Kirkburn fired had missed, avoided by the adept’s strange movements. Even the occasional beam that made contact was blocked by the adept’s shield and lava armor.

His attacks couldn’t threaten the adept, but the adept’s attacks made him hurt tremendously!

The fire spears that Greem casually threw at Kirkburn were all shot down by the magical beams. However, the Third Grade Vicious Fireballs possessed horrifying offensive power.

The three hundred and thirty points of fire damage were combined with an odd fire poison and Coldflame effects that made it extremely difficult for the beholder to defend. If it weren’t for his scales having sufficient defensive power, Kirkburn would already have been wounded by Greem’s attacks.

While Kirkburn was busy dealing with Greem’s attacks, a deafening roar rang from behind. A frenzied, towering giant strode across the earth, charging toward them with unstoppable momentum.

Being stalled by the continuous barrage of Frost Rays for seven seconds was an incredible humiliation to the elementium magical machine. The machine itself might not care about this, but the fire clone hidden within the device was furious.

Visible spatial distortions and cracks could be seen around the machine from its extreme magical energy output. The Frost Rays that had initially been slowing down its movements directly lost their function, allowing the elementium magical machine to charge toward the beholder unobstructed.

Kirkburn also possessed decent melee abilities, but they were still shy of a magical machine’s strength. As such, he concentrated power without any hesitation, preparing to once again teleport out of the magical machine’s range of attack.

However, this time, the elementium magical machine would not let him leave so easily!

The machine lifted its right hand under the command of the fire clone and grabbed at the beholder from afar.

The magical elementium in the air quickly gathered as an elementium hand that covered the skies formed, smashing toward the beholder in a tight fist.

Unprepared, the magical energy that Kirkburn had just gathered around himself was forcefully dispersed. The energy forcefield around him turned to stray sparks after only 0.3 seconds of resistance. The elementium fist then smashed furiously into his body.

A massive dent appeared in Kirkburn’s two-meter wide body, and the sound of crushed flesh and broken scales was clear for all to hear. His round shape bounced away like a ball, rolling through the air for hundreds of meters. Its bloody mouth opened, and a stream of blood spewed forth like a fountain.

His soft and sturdy sphere-shaped body might have helped him neutralize most of the violent force, but the remaining shockwaves still caused him tremendous damage.

Before the beholder could recover from this ferocious strike, a red silhouette teleported over. A Vicious Fireball then erupted on his body in a massive explosion.

Aooooo!

A tragic and agonized mental scream boomed in the minds of all living creatures.

Those who had mental defenses or resilient Spirits did fine. They only felt a bit of dizziness. Meanwhile, the ordinary humans and beasts started bleeding through all of their orifices before mysteriously collapsing to the ground.

The mental shockwave that the beholder released due to its injuries made no distinction between friend and foe.

The humans and goblins inside the fort were protected by an elementium barrier that managed to absorb some of the power of the mental shockwave. As such, while many of the civilians collapsed, they were only injured, not dead. However, the horde gathered outside the fort was completely unprotected and exposed to this terrifying shockwave, resulting in many casualties.

If someone were to observe the battlefield from the skies right now, they would see many of the beasts collapsed on the ground near the battlefield, as if a massive scythe of death had just sliced through the area. Only a few magical creatures had barely managed to survive and were howling in agony on the spot.

The beasts that had been quietly waiting for the conclusion of the battle between the Third Grades erupted into chaos. Countless monsters started fleeing into the woods, ignoring the orders of the powerful magical creatures. The First and Second Grade magical creatures also started assessing the battlefield with suspicion and doubt. A desire to retreat emerged in their hearts.

However, at this moment, Kirkburn’s massive body once again appeared as the flames slowly subsided.

He managed to barely hover thirty meters in the air with his unique anti-gravity barrier. However, compared to his dominating and overwhelming aura from when he had first appeared, he was now in an absolutely terrible state!

A half-meter crater had appeared on the right side of his body, while he had lost half of his sharp fangs. Scraps of meat and flesh could also be seen hanging on the remaining half.

While scraps of flesh would usually come from the enemy’s body, they were all his flesh today.

The wounds on his body were not all that significant to him. What truly pained Kirkburn were the fine cracks that had appeared on the crystalline eye in the center of his body. It looked as if the eye would shatter instantly if any more force were applied.

The brown scales on his body were also covered in scorch marks from the flames. The flesh exposed where the scales had peeled off were burnt and charred. These charred pieces of flesh also started to peel off as the beholder moved, turning into dust as a gust of wind blew past.

Tragic, tragic, tragic.

Unbelievably tragic.

At this moment, Kirkburn looked like nothing more than tragedy manifested!

The First and Second Grade magical creature lords turned and fled without any hesitation when they saw the situation. Only the six Second Grade magical creature lords under Kirkburn’s mental control started roaring and charging at the human adept standing in the sky.

“The enemy has been defeated.”

“We can’t just let them escape like this.”

The adepts of the Crimson Clan immediately got excited. One by one, they courageously charged out of the fort and used their various magic spells to catch up to the magical creature lords fleeing into the forest.

Kirkburn also had no doubts. He endured the violent attacks of Greem and his elementium magical machine as he fled from Doverand Basin, coughing up blood all along the way.

Though Greem and the elementium magical machine could easily crush the beholder in battle, they still did not have sufficient power to stop him from escaping. If Mary had successfully advanced to Third Grade, they would have had a chance at stopping the beholder with her extraordinary Agility.

Though Greem possessed powerful fire spells and the elementium magical machine had incredible piercing attacks, they held no advantage when it came to speed. They could only severely injure the Third Grade beholder and watch as it escaped into the Black Forest, bloodied and beaten.

The injuries he had sustained would require at least three to five years to heal.

As such, the Crimson Clan didn’t need to worry about this unfortunate beholder for the next three to five years!

The magical creature lords had already started running. Naturally, the beasts they had gathered also started fleeing in every direction.

The Crimson adepts chased for a while longer and finally returned to Doverand Basin after confirming that the beasts would not turn and fight anymore.

The First Grade adepts and apprentices were all sent out to exterminate the magical creatures still left in the woods. Meanwhile, the civilians and goblins were mobilized to search for surviving magical creatures and beasts on the ravaged battlefield.

The villages near White Tower lacked food for winter at the moment. The meat of these beasts was great nutrition for an ordinary person. As long as they extracted the poison glands and the terrifying magical organs, the flesh of the magical creatures would allow the civilians to grow stronger over time.

Moreover, the chance of apprentice adepts emerging from a population that frequently ate magical creature meat was ten times that of ordinary humans.

It was a universally known fact in the World of Adepts!

However, most adept clans did not have such tremendous power to provide their civilians with magical creature meat. The civilians of White Tower only happened to ride on the large-scale expansion of the clan. That was why they were able to enjoy copious amounts of magical creature meat over an extended period of time.

Moreover, no other adept clan would be willing to arm their civilians with magic energy rifles and goblin firearms. It was such that apprentice adepts and adepts were the only ones who could hunt magical creatures. In such cases, there was no way the noble adepts would ever serve the civilians with magical creature meat!

Given all these conditions, only the Crimson Clan was capable of being so extravagant in the treatment of their civilians. It was all due to the large amount of goblin equipment they had obtained from the Goblin Plane.

The Crimson Clan slaughtered a large number of the beasts and magical creatures of the Black Forest during this stampede. The survivors had then escaped even further and deeper into the Black Forest.

That meant that the two hundred square kilometers of the Black Forest to the North of White Tower was no longer as dangerous and terrifying as before. Many regional ores and plant resources could now be properly excavated.

However, to do this, the Crimson Clan would have to recruit even more civilians and free peoples from the outside.

After returning to White Tower, Greem held a discussion with Meryl. They authorized the goblins to send out an engineering party to Doverand Basin to take down the fort and reconstruct it as a more secure and safe forward base for the Crimson Clan.

Once that was done, they only needed to send some adepts and apprentices over, paired with some magical machines. They could then defend against any magical creature attacks from the Black Forest.

This way, the vast area between Doverand Basin and White Tower would become a safe zone where the civilians could freely move about and farm.

Meanwhile, the Crimson Clan had not given up on the magical creature lords that had escaped. They sent out many elite pseudo-adept parties to investigate their locations. In particular, the Third Grade beholder was a focus of their investigations.

Greem didn’t mind personally visiting the beholder if they discovered its hiding spot, adding some necessary trophies to his collection.