Age of Adepts

The fires of war had already spread to every corner of the city.

However, while the mutated beasts were tied up with the arcanists, two unusual figures slowly appeared in the sky.

One was a tall and muscular man with a wolf’s head who had short, bristly hair all over his body. The other was a fox girl with a petite and pretty figure. She had a red, bushy tail behind her back, making for an eye-catching sight.

“Hehehe. Who would’ve thought this place would have been invaded by the mutated beasts already? We were only slightly late to the party. What now, Rose? Where do we go first?” The werewolf was the one who spoke first.

He looked around the loud battlefield with fierce red eyes as he spoke. His vicious and barbaric manner of being was clear for all to see.

“What is it? Are you afraid? Didn’t we already hear about it before we came here? The invader is that bastard Illhoof. Given the way he always does things, he’s most certainly doing this alone. All we have to do is track him down and wait until the most intense moment in his battle with the Great Arcanist to......” The fox girl had a fox’s head and a sharp tongue. Yet, despite how vicious her words seemed to be, there was an indescribable seductiveness and softness to her big, lively eyes.

A jasper in the shape of a crescent moon lay on her head, glowing with an unusual light.

“Me? Afraid of Illhoof? Hmph! If that bastard weren’t so good at running away, I would have snapped his neck in half the last time. Just wait and see! Watch how I wipe the floor with that bastard that loves tunneling underground.” The werewolf lifted his snout and took a big sniff of the air. An odd expression appeared on his hairy face. “No, something’s wrong. Why do I also smell the stench of those evil adepts here?! Dammit! Could Illhoof have joined hands with the adepts?”

“Hehehe. Illhoof would never sincerely work together with anyone. In my opinion, he probably tricked a few adepts into helping him somehow. He’s probably waiting for the invasion to conclude before devouring all those adepts. Typical of him!” The fox girl pouted in disdain.

“Then who do we kill first? Illhoof, or the adepts?” The muscles on the werewolf’s body seemed to swell at the mention of murder. Even the size of his body seemed slightly larger than before.

“Kill the adepts first to prevent them from stirring any trouble when we fight with Illhoof!” The fox girl was clearly not a kind person. She came to a decision almost immediately.

“Follow me. I have already locked on to the smell of one of the adepts!” The werewolf bared his sharp teeth and licked his lips before charging down towards the city.

Meanwhile, the fox girl waved her tail, and her entire body mysteriously turned translucent. She followed after her companion as an odd shadow while they rushed towards a certain building in the floating city.

Their target was Adept Holly.

It couldn’t be helped. Ever since they entered the inner circle of the floating city, both Greem and Cherisha had remained invisible. They had also concealed their auras entirely. It was no wonder that the two powerful beastmen had found Holly almost immediately.

Holly was currently attacking a golem factory. It seemed to be technologically advanced. Over a hundred half-finished arcane golems lay on top of dozens of rows of crystal platforms. Each crystal platform was a small control platform of its own. It allowed for up to three arcane apprentices to work on a golem at any one time.

The apprentices’ mission was to etch the necessary arcane runes onto the metal components of the arcane golems.

Depending on the arcane apprentices’ proficiency, the golem factory could produce ten to fifteen standard Moya-I combat golems, or twenty to twenty-five Sofia-III general-use golems. These golems were all considered the public property of the floating city’s Arcanist Association.

Unfortunately, due to the malfunctioning of the energy core, this golem factory had lost all arcane energy supply and could not continue operating.

When Adept Holly found this place and tried to break in, he was stopped by the arcane guards here. Although there were also five arcanists and over seventy arcane apprentices in the factory, they were no threat to the three-meter-tall astral construct. They attacked with all their strength, but the arcanists could not inflict any damage at all.

Just as Adept Holly took down the few high-grade golems at the factory’s entrance and prepared to enter, he stopped and turned back to see who was coming.

A vicious wolf’s head was quickly growing in his vision, accompanied by ten terrifying claws glowing with a cold and dangerous light.

“An enemy.”

Before Adept Holly could finish the thought, his armor started creaking from the grip of the ten claws. Meanwhile, the werewolf’s large mouth opened wide and bit at Adept Holly’s slender neck.

Saliva dripped from the werewolf’s fanged mouth. It was a pungent, sour smell.

The sudden attack caught Holly by surprise.

He was a golem master with golem creation as his professional skill, after all. Even though he also possessed powerful melee fighting skills and ranged attacks, he was still inferior to someone with an actual fighting profession.

Moreover, this werewolf was a little too ferocious!

It had only been a mere three seconds from when Adept Holly’s security array was triggered to when he turned around, but the werewolf had already crossed five hundred meters of distance and appeared in front of him.

Moreover, he showed no signs of negotiating at all. He was going straight for the kill.

The large amounts of astral substance that formed Holly’s astral armor did not excel at physical defense. Instead, it was best at magic defense and disruption. The thick metal armor quickly started to contort under the ferocious bite of the werewolf. It almost seemed like he would be able to penetrate with a single bite.

His ten claws had also dug deep into the armor. As the claws tore into the metal, ten terrifying scratch marks were left on its surface.

The panic and terror in Holly’s heart reached a peak as he felt the intense pain from his body and the absolute strength of the opponent.

As he let out an ear-piercing scream, an overwhelming beam of starlight fell from the sky, enveloping both him and the werewolf.

The murderous starlight surrounded the werewolf’s lithe and muscular body. It ignored the werewolf’s hair and violent strength, penetrating straight into his body.

As the starlight continued to surge into his body, the werewolf couldn’t help but let out a grunt. Silver starlight flickered between his black hairs as the strength of his attack faltered.

“Die!”

The terrified Adept Holly punched forward with both hands, but the werewolf dodged both of his attacks. The werewolf kicked the astral armor with his thick legs, knocking Holly away from him.

Adept Holly crashed into a stone wall and left a deep crater. He fell to the ground and rolled several times before coming to a stop. The hole in the wall was deep, and all the stone at the site of impact had turned to dust. Cracks ran along the entire length of the wall.

Adept Holly struggled to get up from the ground, breathing heavily as he did so. Blood flowed out from the bite wound and deep claw marks. However, the astral armor’s damage was also quickly healing as starlight shone upon him.

After a quick chant, Adept Holly began to gather a cluster of white starlight between his palms. Moreover, as the amount of starlight increased, the energy aura started to intensify as well. Adept Holly ignored everything else and kept his eyes fixed on that fearsome werewolf.

The werewolf had backed away with an elegant leap, landing a hundred meters away from Holly. He was crouching on the ground, the front of his body bowed low and the back of his body arched high, his two hind legs prepared to jump at any time. Judging from his stance, he could lunge at Adept Holly at any time.

However, when the werewolf’s fierce gaze landed on the starlight between Adept Holly’s hands, his red eyes couldn’t help but shrink. There was a trace of frustration and fear in his eyes.

The starlight in his opponent’s hands was far too strange. It had the scary ability to ignore all physical and magical defenses. Adept Holly appeared to be the one who had lost the exchange from earlier. After all, Holly had suffered tremendous damage, even while hidden in the astral armor, while the werewolf was untouched.

However, the werewolf was the only one that knew the truth.

It had only been three seconds, but that sinister and terrifying starlight had inflicted fairly terrible injuries to his internal organs. He had backed off, seemingly to adjust his stance, but he was also buying time for his body to heal.

After all, the physical regeneration abilities of werewolves were exceedingly fearsome as well!

“A werewolf? A believer of the Beast God.” Adept Holly quickly identified the opponent at a single glance. He took a step back at the same time as he recognized the enemy. The starlight in his hands turned into a beautiful halo and spread outwards.

Just as expected, a petite figure suddenly appeared twenty meters to the right behind him, where the starlight had spread.

“Dammit! The enemy did have a companion!” Adept Holly cursed with his bloodied mouth and waved with his hand. A cluster of brilliant starlight crashed from the sky at the new enemy.

“Hehehe, you adepts sure have a lot of tricks!” Naturally, the fox girl was frustrated, having failed at her ambush. She revealed her pretty figure and threw Adept Holly a sultry glance. She lifted her slender hand and erected a crimson barrier that shielded her from the starlight.

Her tail moved slightly. It looked seductive, but in truth, she had secretly fired a dozen inconspicuous, fine hairs from her tail.

If Holly was seduced by her appearance and let down his guard, he might just be badly injured by the foxtail needles.