Age of Adepts

As the old voodoo doctor mumbled to himself, the mosquito beat its translucent wings and vanished from sight as it rapidly circled the hut.

In just a few seconds, the mosquito had covered every corner of the hut. Even the dark corners of the room did not escape its notice.

Unfortunately, it found nothing!

Ye'ke couldn't help but become confused as he continued to hear the mosquito's beating wings.

Could the divine spear have been mistaken? He had personally raised this mosquito. It excelled at scouting and sensing any life force present in the area. The mosquito would not miss it if there were indeed any enemies nearby.

These confusing inconsistencies made Ye'ke doubt himself.

After using a few spells to confirm the results and finding nothing, Ye'ke was finally confident that the bloody spear humming was most likely only a mistake. The mistake could only be regarded as a whim of that unpredictable Fate.

Ye'ke was relieved. He reached out, grabbed the mosquito, and shook lightly. The mosquito instantly turned back into a wooden doll. Ye'ke put it back on his belt and stood up. He extended his trembling, frail arm and tried to pull out the spear that was stuck in between the sacrifices.

However, just as he relaxed his focus, a strange black silhouette suddenly emerged from the shadow beneath him. The sharp claws on the shadow's arms pierced into the left of his waist and the back of his head and quickly twisted.

An enemy.

An intense sense of impending death filled Ye'ke's heart.

By the time he realized the danger, Shadow Demon's attacks had already landed in full force.

A surge of shadow energy burst forth from his claws, erupting in Ye'ke's heart and brain, instantly destroying all of his life force.

Ye'ke's body trembled and fell limply to the ground without even a chance of resistance. Shadow Demon carefully held his body.

It leaned Ye'ke's corpse against the stone wall and closed his eyes, which were still wide-open with anger. From a distance, it looked as if Ye'ke had only fallen asleep from fatigue. No one would have imagined he had already been assassinated.

After a simple arrangement of the murder scene, Shadow Demon flickered forward and put the bloody spear in the room into its storage ring. Its silhouette flickered as it traveled through the shadows out of the hut.

Greem had invested a lot to create the Fourth Grade Shadow Demon.

The storage ring he had given it was nothing compared to his other investments. Greem had given all the precious dark-attribute equipment he had just obtained to Shadow Demon.

Ring of Shadows. Shadow's Breathing.

Both of these pieces of Fourth Grade equipment were with Shadow Demon.

Greem even gave Shadow Demon the Orb of Shadows.

It couldn't be helped. They were going to pick a fight with a native god in its den, after all. They had to use something powerful if they wanted to guarantee victory.

That said, being able to obtain a piece of Fourth Grade magical equipment just by assassinating an elderly Third Grade was more than worth it!

The Feathered God will not be able to create any magical equipment more powerful than this. Even this spear, the Bleeding Spear, was Fourth Grade divine equipment that cost the Feathered God over a hundred years of her faith powers to forge.

It had been placed with Ye'ke to make it more convenient to summon the Feathered God.

The Feathered God had not emerged from her den in a few thousand years now. Everything that occurred in the troll empire was managed solely by Ye'ke and the other leaders. It was only when the trolls ran into severe troubles that they would pray to the Feathered God for power.

This Fourth Grade divine equipment was used as a channel to project her power.

The Bleeding Spear allowed the Feathered God to project her power to any place beyond her den perfectly. This way, she could propel her power to any corner of the troll empire without leaving the safety of her shelter.

Of course, the pre-condition to that was that the Bleeding Spear had to be in the hands of the trolls.

Now that the Bleeding Spear had fallen into the hands of Shadow Demon, the Feathered God would lack a tool with which to unleash her power.

It was a good thing for Greem, who was intent on starting trouble against the Feathered God!

Shadow Demon turned into a cluster of shadows, leaping from shadow to shadow. At times, he would be inside the shadow of a stone pillar; at other times, he would be hiding in the shadow of a patrolling troll; sometimes, he would even be inside the flickering shades of a torch.

It didn't matter how small the shadows were; Shadow Demon would always be able to hide within.

Looking from within shadow space, the world appeared to be twisted and distorted. It was a completely different visual sensation compared to the human sight that Greem was so used to. It was something that Greem couldn't get used to as a human. However, this was home for Shadow Demon. It navigated the shadows as freely as a fish swam through water.

There were many times where Shadow Demon would choose to hide in the shadow of a patrolling soldier. You could see two black feet walking above your head through an obscure, gray veil, and you could see the constantly swaying world from between two legs.

The sight of this, the sensation of all this, made Greem feel dizzy!

Shadow Demon's talent for controlling shadow powers was obviously far superior compared to Greem.

As such, Greem wasn't as foolish as to personally take command of Shadow Demon's body. He was simply giving out general orders every once in a while.

This time, Shadow Demon was infiltrating the magnificent temple sitting atop the city.

Here, the patrols were no longer ordinary troll warriors or troll hunters. The only ones that could set foot in the temple and protect the Feathered God in its sacred domain were carefully selected elite Second Grade trolls.

However, even they only patrolled the border of the temple. None of them dared take a single step into the temple.

Thus, when Shadow Demon finally emerged from the shadow of a temple guard, he leaped right into the giant shadow cast by a thick stone pillar of the temple.

Through the shadow, Greem and Shadow Demon could extend their spiritual senses into the hall.

The hall was empty. Not a single person could be seen.

However, a large platform was placed at the center of the hall. The statue of a massive, life-like Feathered Serpent stood there.

Sinister scales, flared feathered wings, a long and slender tail, terrifying fangs, and a chilling, gleaming pair of eyes.

Even though it was only a stone statue, Greem could sense a trace of soul aura on it, one unique to high-grade lifeforms. A faint mental flux engulfed every inch of space in this hall. There was no room for anyone to sneak around.

If Greem and Shadow Demon's auras hadn't merged completely with the shadow of the stone pillar, they would not have escaped the spiritual senses of that statue.

At this point, Greem didn't dare expose even a trace of his aura. He could only borrow Shadow Demon's ability to sense everything happening within the hall passively.

The Feathered God was not here, but a spatial singularity to her den certainly existed here.

Don't ask why Greem knew this. It was because Alice told him.

And how did Alice know about this? Heheh! In all honesty, ever since Alice advanced to Fourth Grade, this native god of an inferior plane no longer had any secrets in front of her. If she wanted to, Alice could even peek at her 'gracing' her male Feathered Serpent guards with her 'presence.'

Witches of Fate might not amount to much in battle, but they were horrifyingly powerful when it came to certain unusual domains!

According to Alice's description, that singularity existed inside the statue of the Feathered God.

The inside of the statue was empty. There was plenty of space for a singularity the size of a finger.

It would have been exceptionally difficult to sneak into the Feathered God's den while avoiding the detection of the mental consciousness attached to the statue if it were Greem alone.

It was nearly impossible.

However, with Shadow Demon's help, this was as easy as breathing.

Greem gave an order, and the Orb of Shadows inside Shadow Demon trembled slightly.

An insignificant tremor appeared in every shadow inside the temple. It was a negligible surge of power, but it did not escape the Feathered God's notice.

The Feathered God's mental consciousness was projected into the temple at the same instant the shadow powers rippled.

The eyes of the statue lit up as an overwhelming consciousness descended on the temple. The consciousness quickly calmed down the flux in the shadows.

Mm? The doing of an enemy? Or commotion in the Shadow World that spread over here?

The Feathered God's consciousness formed a delicate web and swept the temple in an attempt to quell her questions. However, she found nothing out of the ordinary.

No enemies. Something must have happened in the Shadow World then. Something large enough to affect the material world!

In the past, the cautious Feathered God would most certainly have attempted to extend her Spirit into the Shadow World to search for the cause of the tremor in the shadow powers. However, the extended exhaustion of her Spirit and stamina had caused her to become less diligent.

Moreover, her temporary absence had caused the little life inside the egg to throw a tantrum again.

The Feathered God was frustrated once more. She had no time to investigate the reasons behind the tremor in the shadows. She turned and returned her consciousness to her den.

She had no idea that in the instant her consciousness was projected to the statue through the singularity, an enemy skilled at stealth had brazenly slipped back into her den.

Just as the Feathered God possessed the statue to search for an enemy, Shadow Demon had arrived in that unusual divine domain with Greem's mental consciousness in tow.