Age of Adepts

Every single individual who lived in its bosom, regardless of if they were living beings with consciousness, or rocks and woods without any consciousness, they were all humble existences that formed the entire Will of the Plane. If a plane was completely sealed off and the resources and living beings contained within maintained at the same volume, then the Will of the Plane would lose its opportunity to evolve and become stronger.

Only by diligently keeping what it owned and seizing the resources required for its growth from outside of its own body could the Will of the Plane continue to grow stronger. Eventually, this would allow it to awaken and become an even mightier existence.

As a major scale plane, obviously, the Adept Continent had long given birth to its own mighty conscious that solely belong to itself, which had then transformed into the Will of the World that perfectly matched the Adept Continent.

And, after the birth of this Will, the only method to control this plane was using the Hand of Principle that took no shape and was nothingness. Thus, every single material and living being that existed in this plane was bound by the power of countless principles.

Wood could produce fire, fire could melt metal, metal could chop down trees and break rocks, while earth bore the weight of everything, dirt gave birth to life, and water nourished and cherish all things... yet all of this was just the surface of the world. The ultimate hand that controlled and guided everything behind was the ubiquitous invincible Principle of the Plane.

Even the supreme Adepts, who claimed they could conquer every plane and were formidable enough to compete with deities, couldn’t ignore the existence of the Principle of the Plane and act wantonly.

Therefore, the stronger an Adept became, the deeper comprehension he had for the Will of the World, while weaker living beings would only have a vague feeling towards everything. Just like the evolution of Greem’s Inferno Body, at a given time, the Will of the Plane had shown its existence.

There was no God nor Deity here, but a selfless Will of the Plane hiding in the depths of the plane, quietly but surely pushing the course of the world in an orderly fashion. Any behavior that was of benefit to the evolution of the plane would receive positive feedback from the vague Will, which eventually improved the individual’s degree of mastery and control toward the Principle of the Plane.

As for the behavior which defied the Will of the Plane, it would attract ‘its’ dislike, and thus make the individual a target that was hated by every single living being of that particular plane.

And yet for Greem, it was through the monitoring of and analyzing the overall data of his body that he noticed that there was a huge, invisible hand who controlled everything inside of the plane. Otherwise, if he had really thought this was just an unconscious behavior that was put out by the instinct of the body, it would be an insult to his intelligence.

And if an Apprentice Adept wished to become an official Adept, it seemed that one of the thresholds he had to step over was the understanding of the Principle of the Plane. Otherwise, why was there such a huge gap between a Pseudo-Adept with 20 Spirit and an Adept with 21 Spirit?

His mind filled with questions, when Greem finished soaking his Inferno Body, he hurriedly left the lava ocean to avoid being caught by the patrolling Molten Giants.

After rushing to the safe zone in one go, Greem found himself another place as his temporary shelter.

After some time, the food and water he had brought were nearly depleted. Having no other alternative, Greem had to live a primitive life of eating raw meat and blood. His food source were the Fire Lizards he hunted, while the water came from condensing it using magic spells and Fire Lizard blood.

In order to make the best of his soaking time, every two days, Greem would change the location of his temporary shelter. With that, the time and location he appeared at the lava ocean would be completely different. Using this method, he managed to avoid several ambushes and traps set by the Molten Giants, making them really angry. But there was nothing they could do about it.

Through the countless times he ‘communicated’ with the Molten Giants, even though they had never met face to face, Greem had quickly figured out his enemies’ way of thinking and acting. Also, through the countless probes and results, he finally broke through the blockade of the Molten Giant patrol team at the outer perimeter, and successfully drew close to their nest – the Ring-shaped Reef.

Although it was referred to as Ring-shaped Reef, it was in fact, a chain of interlocking huge rocks floating on the surface of the lava ocean. Using a thick alloy chain, the Molten Giants had tied them together, forming into a large floating island anchored right at the center of the lava ocean.

The nest of the Molten Giants was placed on top of these floating islands.

So to speak, from the womb to the tomb, a Molten Giant spent nearly its entire life in this boundless lava ocean. This resulted in the fact that though they had the overall strength of an Adept and high intelligence, they didn’t own the advanced wisdom that matched it.

In brief, they were smart, but hadn’t reached the state of ‘cunning!’

That was the reason why, though they had such formidable overall strength, they were thrown into unrest by a mere ‘Advanced Apprentice,’ Greem.

Of course, an Advanced Apprentice who was like Greem was rather rare to come by.

Through secret observation of the Molten Giants, a thief-like thought arose in his mind. He actually intended to rob the Molten Giant’s clan treasure vault. The Molten Giants were born and brought up here, and they had been patrolling the lava ocean every single day. Nearly all the advanced magical gemstones and top grade magic spell materials that one could find in the underground volcano had to be piled up like a mountain in their treasure vault.

If he could rob a clan treasure vault of this magnitude, Greem felt that he wouldn’t have to worry about harvesting resources himself for the next few hundred years. Just doing it once was more than enough to fill his need to the maximum!

However, after a few more times of careful survey, Greem was discouraged once again.

As expected, the Molten Giants attached a very great importance to their treasure vault. Not only had they built the treasure vault on the largest floating island, it was placed right next to the residence of their elders. Also, round the clock, two elite level Molten Giants guarded its entrance with high vigilance to make sure there would be no leakage of any kind.

Greem had the Chip design him countless plans, but still he couldn’t find a safe and sound method that allowed him to sneak into the treasure vault under the watchful eyes of two elite level Molten Giants.

Nevertheless, during the fruitless course of finding his path to the loot, unintentionally, Greem made another discovery.

He discovered the graves of the Molten Giants!

Although Molten Giants could live more than 2000 years, as time went by, unavoidably, they still had to face their deaths. In order to give their deceased people a place to rest forever, the Molten Giants had built a graveyard on one of the floating islands amidst the Ring-shaped Islands. Whenever a Molten Giant was facing its own death, it would enter this graveyard and wait there quietly for its death to come.

Once they were dead, their huge and flaming hot bodies would cool down gradually, and eventually solidify into a stone statue that stood quietly. Hence, in this graveyard stood great numbers of stone statues, and many of them were the dead bodies of formidable existence that stood seven to eight meters tall.

No doubt the Molten Giants had put a heavy guard on their treasure vault, to stop any human Adepts or some Fire element creatures from sneaking into it and stealing their treasures. But for the clan graveyard, Greem didn’t find any real safety precautions.

Actually, this was understandable. After all, no one or creature would have improper thoughts toward a lifeless stone statue! But when the Molten Giants were met with Greem, an expert who could even squeeze oil out of stone, their clan graveyard was facing great peril.

Greem was after the element core that remained in the dead bodies of the Molten Giants. Of course, the element cores which had been dead for a long time had no soul aura and couldn’t be used anymore. However, among the element cores from Molten Giants that had been dead for less than one hundred years, Greem might be able to find some which could be used as the conscious core for his golem.

After all, the Molten Giants who had the right to enter their clan graveyard were all old fellows, so the lowest level element core he could find would be of that of Adept level. If he was lucky enough, perhaps... perhaps he might even find a Second Grade Adept level core.

Whenever Greem thought of owning a golem of such level, his heart raced and he couldn’t hold down his emotions. He wished he could just bolt into the Ring-shaped Islands, crush all of the giant dead bodies, and seize all of the element cores into his arms.

It was a pity that such thought would always remain a mere fantasy. If he really put it to action, he would face his death, as the Molten Giants would definitely skin him and swallow him alive!

Approximately, there were over two hundred Molten Giants living on the island. Around seventy of them were juveniles of the Pseudo-Adept level, yet more than one hundred forty of them were adult Molten Giants. In this environment where they had no natural enemy and no worries about food, their defensive mechanism wasn’t considered too strong.

If it weren’t for Greem’s level being too low, the stupid giants who only possessed a large body and strong overall strength would definitely become his best prey. But as for now, even if it was just a juvenile Molten Giant, Greem would have to put in huge effort in order to defeat it.

Hence, if he wanted to pull chestnuts out of the fire, the only way would be to fish in troubled waters.

After he tentatively drafted out his plan, he wasn’t in a hurry to provoke the Molten Giants. Instead, he became quieter than before. Every day, he only traveled and hunted at the outer perimeter of the volcano world, took a bath at the border of the lava ocean every three to five days, and stealthily scurried away.

Relying on this regular mode of action, Greem successfully deceived the Molten Giant patrol teams, causing them to loosen their vigilance and not consider him as an enemy that could pose any threat to them. Although the hunt for Greem was still going on, it was more like a routine activity; every couple of days, the game of cat and mouse would be carried out.

Of course, Greem wasn’t in a hurry.

The duration of his mission was three months, and if he wanted any progress in his Inferno Body, he needed time to accumulate the energy. What he needed to do now was wait for the breakthrough of his Inferno Body. When the day came, that would be the moment he put his plan into action.

Finally, two months after he entered the volcano world, the Inferno Body he had anticipated for long made the breakthrough.

When the progress projected into his mind by the Chip jumped from 99% to 100%, Greem felt a tremendous transformation suddenly happen to his body.

Everything had become different from the past!

Flame Body!

He had finally stepped over the stage of Inferno Body and owned a Flame Body of his own!