Age of Adepts

The Fire Elementium Plane was incredibly vast. It had nearly a dozen times the landmass of the World of Adepts and was still continually growing and expanding.

In truth, the Fire Elementium Plane wasn’t as peaceful and calm as it seemed on the surface.

It didn’t invade lesser planes ceaselessly as the World of Adepts did. But over the eons since the birth of the Fire Elementium Plane, it had also invaded several famous space civilizations in history. However, it was uncertain if these invasions were intentional.

The stories were always different but similar. The flow of events in each particular incident bore shocking similarities.

It always started with the rise of a dominating species that conquered one world after another. When the power of the civilization reached a certain level, they would cast their gaze towards the Fire Elementium Plane, a world with an endless source of troops and fire energy.

Their past victories and success caused these powerful civilizations to lose their minds. They dreamed of conquering and enslaving the elementium planes to turn them into resource planes from which they could take whatever they wanted.

These civilizations had all undoubtedly overestimated their own strength and underestimated the true might of the elementium planes!

When they opened a direct portal from their homeworld to the elementium plane, it wasn’t them who initiated the charge. Instead, it was an endless horde of elementium creatures that surged into their world, commanded by the Elementium Lords, Elementium Kings, and Elementium Monarchs.

Their dream of conquering the elementium worlds did not come to fruition. On the contrary, their homeworld became ravaged by hundreds of billions of elementium creatures.

The direct connection between the two worlds also caused a clash in laws between the planes. It didn’t matter how well developed these newly risen planes were. How could their laws possibly compare to the ancient elementium planes in complexity and power? Thus, the planar laws were assimilated, and an endless amount of elementium flooded the new world, causing devastating changes to its environment.

Gradually, the new world would be assimilated by the elementium plane, guided by the assimilation of their laws.

The new world would vanish, and the elementium plane would grow much stronger and larger.

Countless powerful beings and species had dreamed of challenging and conquering the elementium planes throughout history. Without exception, all of them had turned into the foundation stones upon which the elementium planes now stood. It had all come about by the elementium planes’ ‘passive’ expansion.

Greem had indeed expanded his worldview just by traveling through the Fire Elementium Plane. He had seen countless fire creatures and diverse species of semi-elementium creatures.

These semi-elementium creatures were new species formed from the assimilation of defeated native creatures from other planes. Such beings were not recorded in the Adept’s Handbook and, thus, possessed research value.

Dustfire Valley, with its strange, unusual scenery. The surging, overwhelming waves of the Sea of Ashes. The Sacred Fire Altar upon which countless fire creatures prayed and worshipped. The volcano ranges covered in smog and black clouds.

The environment of the Fire Elementium Plane was truly harsh and severe. Ordinary planar creatures had no hopes of surviving in such a place. However, this did not mean that there were very few living creatures in the Fire Elementium Plane. The number of living things in the Fire Elementium Plane probably exceeded the number of living things in an ordinary material plane.

After all, the beings who lived in materials planes, especially intelligent species, often had far lower reproduction speeds than elementium creatures.

Greem had witnessed the birth of a fire creature several times during his journey. Fire elementium would abruptly gather at a single point, lights would flash, and an ordinary fire spirit would be born, just like that!

Greem had tried to decipher and research the source of these fire creatures’ birth, but the scorching world consciousness always hindered his progress. He had immense trouble peeking behind the curtains at the secrets of the elementium plane.

He wasn’t a native creature of the Fire Elementium Plane, after all. His soul consciousness was constantly rejecting the Fire Elementium Plane’s mental contamination, keeping himself from becoming impulsive and easily enraged as the natives of this place were. Adept was a profession that required intelligence and wisdom. Greem could not let his mind and soul be so easily taken over by changes in his emotions.

It was because of this unique trait of the adepts that Greem appeared to be so discordant with this world.

Unless he opened up his mind and willingly accepted the origin contamination of the world consciousness, he would remain an outsider in the Fire Elementium Plane, never able to become a part of this world.

However, now that he had the Orb of the Fire God, he had a stable and firm mental connection with that vague, yet surely existent, world consciousness. He could obtain a faint understanding of the flames on a daily basis through every object and every life he came across.

It indirectly furthered Greem’s mastery over the fire laws!

The Fire Elementium Plane was the origin world that all fire creatures and wielders of fire dreamed of, after all. They could only find what they truly sought here in the Fire Elementium Plane.

Greem leisurely walked across this blazing continent. With every breath, he took in the pure ‘air’ of the Fire Elementium Plane. This air might reduce an ordinary human’s lungs and windpipes to ashes in an instant, but it felt warm and comfortable to Greem.

With every deep breath, it felt as if his chest had been revitalized, and even his steps felt lighter.

There were no humans to deal with, no menial affairs to look at, no concerns of pursuing enemies, no need to worry about politics. It was just him, alone, walking freely upon this land, free to do whatever he liked. This feeling of freedom was something that no other world or environment could give him.

Greem stopped at the edge of a cliff along Skycrack Valley. He then started preparing a sumptuous feast for himself.

The sky was a constant crimson in the Fire Elementium Plane. There was no night or day. As such, even Greem himself had no idea whether this was breakfast, lunch, or dinner.

As a Fourth Grade fire adept, he could instantly elementiumize his entire body and his Spirit. It had reduced the biological requirements of his human body to a minimum. He could go for months without food without any threat to his life. Still, out of his human habits, Greem would eat once a week to satisfy his human cravings.

Greem put up the pot, started the fire, and quickly brewed a mushroom stew for himself. He then tossed in a few pieces of fire dragon meat as well. This makeshift camp was soon filled with a delicious, delectable fragrance.

Just as Greem filled a bowl with the stew and prepared to dig in, the fire mist around him suddenly parted. A strange, elderly fire spirit walked out of the fog.

“That smells good! It’s rare for there to be a guest here at Skycrack Valley. Would you mind if this old one bothered you for a moment?” This unusual fire spirit was clearly different from the rest of its kind. Most fire spirits had very vague facial features that could hardly be distinguished. However, this fire spirit not only had obvious facial features but even behaved like a human noble.

More concerningly, the fire aura he radiated was that of a Fourth Grade.

“I suppose it’s fate that we met. You can sit down and have a meal with me if you don’t mind.” Greem smiled and replied.

“That sounds good.” The fire spirit immediately smiled. “In all honesty, when I heard one of the younglings say that an otherworld traveler was wandering around here, I was only planning to take a quick look. Who would’ve thought you were such a good cook? Of course, I had to approach you for a meal!”

The elderly fire spirit brazenly sat down by the fire after explaining his motivations. He lifted his nose and sniffed. He couldn’t help but praise. “It smells so good! Only travelers like you could bring such unusual delicacies into our world.”

The fire spirit did not hold back at all. He took the utensils that Greem passed to him and immediately started enjoying the stew as he talked with Greem.

Fire dragon meat filled with the essence of fire, strange mushrooms that could change the genetics of high-grade lifeforms, a stew containing forty-one different spices and ingredients. Such a delicious meal was exceptionally valuable, even in the World of Adepts. Every mouthful of stew would cost a fortune.

Just this pot of stew alone would cost a rough estimate of over two hundred thousand magical crystal. That was enough to purchase a small adept tower.

“So good...simply brilliant. I have never had such a good stew in my entire life. The meat is fire dragon meat, probably Third Grade. Just as fresh and delicious as I expected it to be. But what’s in this mushroom stew? I have never tasted such a thing before. Are they mushrooms you cultivated yourself?” The fire spirit was a knowledgeable individual, after all. He had managed to tell the ingredients of the stew just from the taste of it alone.

“These mushrooms are special strains I got from the Spirit World. They can increase the activeness of a high-grade creature’s cells and Spirit.” Greem did not conceal anything and gave a simple explanation.

“No wonder I feel so good after eating this stew. It’s like I just went for a dip in the Sea of Ashes. I suppose I really have to thank you for this grand feast!” The old fire spirit couldn’t help but fall speechless for a brief moment. “I can’t just eat your food without giving back. Here...take a look at these. Take anything that might be of use to you.”

Having said that, the fire spirit waved his hand, and a rift tore in space. He took out a few strange items and put them in front of Greem.

There was a fire marrow stone that was the size of an ordinary rock, glowing with bright yellow flames.

There was the egg of an underground fire dragon, the size of a human head and covered in unusual magical patterns.

There were also strange crystals the size of a fist, flickering like fire in a solid-state.

A Fireblaze queen ant...the core of a magma beast ...and fire cores.

Greem evaluated the items with a smile on his face, something unusual glowing in his eyes.