Age of Adepts

As Anna was charging towards the enemy, she quickly tossed a few bizarre magical rings onto Mary’s body.

Confusion spell!

Slow spell!

One spell could confuse the target’s mind and cause there to be a delay in their reactions, while the other one could reduce the target’s movement speed by nearly half. If the target didn’t have immunity or couldn’t quickly dispel them, then these two simple curses could lower their strength by more than thirty percent.

But, Anna wasn’t done yet! She cried out and stretched her arms out, facing her palms towards the sky. A strange-looking, glowing green rune soon appeared on each palm. Almost as soon as those runes appeared, the lower section of Anna’s arm began to transform into green vines. These vines brought about a fierce gale and began to whip Mary, who was standing there, motionless.

It was Spirit Summoning.

However, Anna’s Spirit Summoning spell was quite unique and could massively enhance her combat ability. This was because she could actually let a part of her body merge with the summoned spirit.

The powerful whip smashed into the ground, causing two large cracks to branch out like a spider web. As the debris shot in all directions, Mary’s body suddenly turned into a series of after-images, and, within a split second, she appeared beside Anna.

Anna couldn’t help but be shocked by Mary’s ghostly speed.

In actual fact, Mary’s after-images were formed under the effect of the Slow spell. Anna shuddered as she realized that if the Slow spell wasn’t activated Mary probably wouldn’t even have left after-images at all. As soon as she realized that she was facing an opponent who possessed super speed, Anna couldn’t help but curse at her reckless and impulsive actions.

Damn it! She shouldn’t have tried to start a melee fight with an opponent like this!

However, it was too late to pull back the whip now. Anna cried out loudly as she unleashed a dazzling ring of green light that started to spread around her body. Soon, the light transformed into a thorny set of armor that perfectly covered her well-rounded body. After ensuring that she had a proper defense, Anna restlessly swung the whip above to protect her head, shattering all the after-images that had appeared in front of her.

Although Anna had a nearly impenetrable defence, ripples still continuously appeared on the surface of her armor. A few crisscrossed scratches were seen on the armor near her chest and ribcage. Also, after suffering a few hits from the enemy’s sharp nail, a long strand of the vine had been cut off from her left arm. Despite the fact that only green liquid was oozing from the wound, Anna couldn’t stop herself from taking a step back and letting out a painful groan.

Anna crazily forced a new strand of the vine whip to regrow. After regrowing, it once again began swinging violently in all directions, brutally attacking every possible enemy that appeared.

As a matter of fact, she had absolutely no idea where the true form of the enemy lay. The only thing she could catch was the bizarre after-images that were left behind by the enemy attacking at their top speed.

It was clear that Anna wasn’t familiar with melee fighting, and she could only decently attack by using the summoned spirit. Thus, when comparing Anna, a beginner-level melee fighter, with Mary, who was a master of melee combat, it was obvious that she would suffer a tragedy today!

Her whip vine, that she crazily swung from side to side, couldn’t touch Mary at all, and her body armor could only barely spare her from Mary’s attack. However, despite this, she was still hanging on. At least, under Anna’s crazy offensive strikes, Mary found it rather tough to get close and attack the body armor. Although from time to time, Mary could successfully attack it, it still wasn’t enough to deal a deadly blow.

At the same time, far behind them, sudden, rapid booms were heard from the other side of the tunnel. This tunnel had been clogged up by countless rocks and sand. It was obvious that the black-robed Pseudo-Adept, who was led down the wrong tunnel, had discovered that something was amiss. The rapid booms were probably caused by him crazily attacking the clogged tunnel.

The raging magic spells that the Pseudo-Adept was unleashing caused a large amount of rock debris, and countless stalagmites and stalactites to fall down and break into pieces. They were falling apart in haphazardly, filling the entire battlefield with smoky, rock dust.

If that Pseudo-Adept was given sufficient time, it was likely that he could really break through the cave wall and open a new temporary passage.

Anna knew that her reinforcement would soon arrive, so she gave up on attacking and just focused on defense. Anna ignored the fact that Mary kept leaving bloody scratch marks on her body and just kept crazily swinging her whip.

Indeed, it seemed that none of these advanced apprentices could be taken lightly.

Although the magic spells they had mastered hadn’t yet reached an extravagant stage, they still covered all the aspects of combat: offensive, defensive, distraction and self-enhancement. This meant that the outsiders barely any weaknesses to exploit. This eventually led to the outsiders gaining a quick win.

Anna and Mary were both advanced apprentices, but, judging from the situation, Anna was clearly weaker than the quick and aggressive Mary. Although Mary wished to end the fight as soon as possible, it was something that was easily said but not done. At the very least, Mary couldn’t do it without paying a price!

Mary’s attacks had caused the cave wall to be on the brink of collapse, with many cracks decorating it. After seeing this, Mary gave up on killing Anna alone.

“Rascal! Don’t just hide there and do nothing! Quickly come over and help me!”

After dodging the vine whips attacking her sides, Mary once again waved her hands. She then left two deep, bloody scratches on Anna’s body. However, as Anna had quickly regained the initiative and had begun to attack again, Mary was unable to attack any more. She quickly dodged the vine whip that curled backwards. When she once again broke Anna’s defence and managed to move closer, she found that both the wounds had been completely covered by the thorny armor.

It had happened again and again. Eventually, Mary couldn’t tolerate anymore and called for help.

Anna’s face turned pale in an instant.

Anna was already struggling with fighting Mary alone. She was absolutely convinced that, if she had to face the combined attacks of two people, she would face disaster.

Anna didn’t dare to neglect this thought, so she immediately bit off half of her tongue. As she spat out a mouthful of blood, her body suddenly became taller.

Before this, only a small part of her arms had been transformed into green vines. But now, her body started to expand and her skin started to break apart, exposing countless green vines worming in between.

By forcefully increasing her summoned spirit’s level, Anna had completely transformed her body into a frightening Man Eating Flower. Her feet had transformed into green roots that dug their way into the ground, her arms were fully transformed into whip-like green vines, and her body played the part of the thorny flower stalk. However, her head, the only thing left that resembled a human, was surrounded by a countless number of huge flower petals.

After transforming into the carnivorous, violent “Flogger”, all of her vital organs had disappeared from her body. She knew that as long as she could hold on until Gary arrived, all the energy spent on performing the secondary transformation of her summoned spirit would be worth it.

Greem, who had been hiding in the dark, dared not to neglect the fight anymore. He finally made up his mind and got himself involved in the battle between the two advanced apprentices.

A vibration suddenly resonated through the ground. The ground underneath the Flogger’s feet had turned into a slippery, muddy swamp-like area. Before Anna could flee from this area, a huge and frightening figure emerged beside her. It opened up its huge mouth and bit on the flower stalk that made up her waist.

Anna let out a jarring shriek as the pain hit her. She violently waved her two thick, long vine whips, hitting the Demon Alligator’s clay armor over and over again. Debris and clay flew across the room, turning the cave into a violent battlefield. At the same time, behind the heavy protection of the huge petals, she opened her mouth and spat out a clump of sticky, stinking, green, acidic vomit.

The acidic vomit sprayed at the Hunter who was riding on the back of the Demon Alligator. The vomit instantly corroded and melted its upper limbs and skull. If the crystal control core of the Hunter wasn’t located at its chest, it would have likely been completely destroyed in this attack.

Greem, who was lurking in the shadows, was struck by terror.

It was as expected. The battle between advanced apprentices was not something he, a beginner apprentice, could easily get involved with. If it wasn’t because he was being cautious, and only let the Demon Alligator Hunter ride on the Demon Alligator instead of him, he probably would have been killed.

He hadn’t mastered a defense magic spell, so, when facing a furious counterattack by an advanced apprentice, he had no trump cards that he could use to bring him out alive.

But, the Demon Alligator Hunter, controlled by Greem, only needed to briefly restrain Anna’s attacks. That was more than enough to turn the tides of battle.

Before Anna could save herself from the Demon Alligator’s gaping jaw, Mary’s attack had arrived.

The sound of flesh being cut rang through the air. Mary bent over and stared at Anna’s head. She reached out and, using her sharp nails, she sliced through Anna’s firm skin. Then, she sunk her fangs into the area where the head and the stalk met.

The quick, sucking motion made Anna go berserk. She struggled desperately, waving her arms and using them to violently whip Mary’s mutilated back. However, no matter how hard she tried, there was no way to stop the vampire from wildly sucking her blood.

As more of her blood essence was drained, the power behind Anna’s whip began to shrink. Finally, her arm dropped and her body began to quickly dry up. Her eyes, hiding behind her petals, began to hopelessly close.

As her life force was quickly departing from her body, Anna could no longer maintain her summoned spirit body transformation. Her body kept shrinking

and transforming and finally returned to her original human form. Just as she died, Greem ordered the Demon Alligator to open its huge mouth and swallow Mary and the dead body into its body. It then turned to Greem and did the same before quickly descending into the earth again.

The moment after they had disappeared, a loud boom was sounded out from a cave wall on the far side. Parts of the cave wall crumbled, resulting in a huge hold. A Pseudo-Adept, whose black robe was covered in a mist of green, illuminating light, sprinted into the cave.

As he stared at the remains of, what seemed to be, an incredibly tumultuous battle, and smelled the stinking vomit that had spilled all over the cave, Gary unintentionally let out an extremely angry roar.

He didn’t roar because he was heartbroken about Anna’s death. He simply hated the fact that the enemy had used the simple method of luring the strong and striking at the weak to eliminate his partner. This... this action simply displayed contempt towards him!

“You bastards! Come out and fight me now, damn it! I’ve remembered your auras. You better not let me bump into you again. I...”

After spending a long time furiously roaring into the cave, Gary had never sensed any abnormal auras. Left with no choice, Pseudo-Adept Gary turned around and dissolved into the darkness of the tunnel.