Age of Adepts

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Alice deserved her status as an Advanced Apprentice Adept. Although Greem had only said a few words, she was able to immediately figure out what her weakness was.

Her innate Spatial talent was still worthy of being called 'invincible'.

At least, she was invincible when faced with foes that were at the same level.

So long as one was unable to break through her paper-thin Protection Barrier, her body was completely safe. No matter what was thrown at her, there was no way you could penetrate that invisible shield and hurt her. At the same time, she could always casually torture her enemy with her Spatial Cut and Telekinesis.

But, no matter how sturdy a shield was, there would always be a weak spot, and Alice's Protection Barrier was no exception.

In order to not be completely isolated from the world when Protection Barrier was up, she had to leave a hole that allowed her to 'communicate' with the outside world. This hole was how she was able to launch attacks at her enemy while her Barrier was up.

So, in order to cover up this 'loophole', she purposely studied Wind Elementium spells. After that, using invisible Wind Elementium, she patched the hole. The invisible Protection Barrier was mixed with the invisible Wind Elementium barrier creating a combination that had previously deceived all her enemies, giving them an impression that her Protection Barrier was perfect and flawless, and that no weak spot existed.

But she never would have thought that today, in this obscure place, she would meet with a group of such strange beings who defied her invincible status. One was a disgusting man who had modified his body and turned himself into a bug man, another was a Beginner Apprentice who could actually see Elementium in the world around him with his naked eyes. Having encountered of this two strange men had brought her to the unluckiest day of her life.

If that bug man had, instead, been some other Advanced Apprentice, perhaps the enemy would be killed by her unpredictable Telekinesis ability. How could she have known she was going to encounter someone with such a strange body modification, which gave them the time to find the loophole on her defense. Also, without this Beginner Apprentice who was able to see Elementium with his naked eyes, how could her Protection Barrier have been broke through, forcing her to taste the pain of a thousand scorpions bites?

The more she thought of this, the angrier Alice became. She wished she could immediately rip his skin off and crush his bones, but she hadn't got the information she was most concerned with yet, so she could only press down her anger and continue, "Is it a magical eye or some kind of special magic spell?"

"It's a spell!"

"Give it to me, and I'll spare your life today!"

"Can I trust your words?"

"Hmm! It seems to me like you don't have a choice! Don't force me to pull your soul out. If that happens, I'll tortuously dig through your entire brain!"

Though Alice's personal image had been completely eroded by the day's events, her pride was still present, and the threatening, dominating manner of her words told Greem that she was not taking no for an answer.

Greem quickly examined Alice's current state.

Either because she had taken so much damage, or that her Protection Barrier was in a latent status, but the Protection Barrier wasn't anywhere to be found around Alice.

Wasn't she afraid of a sneak attack?

I'll just do it!

Being over-cautious and indecisive in front of this extremely strong Advanced Apprentice was simply asking for death.

A moment later, Greem flicked his sleeve, throwing out a small dark green bottle toward Alice's face. Not needing to be activated any spell, once the bottle smashed to the ground, and the green substance was unconstrained by the bottle, a strange looking smoke exploded from the point of impact. A second later, an ugly slime man, who was around one meter tall, slowly stood up from the ground.

This low-grade humanoid puppet was just a temporary product, as it could only last for seven minutes at most, and it's only method of attacking was to surround the enemy, causing them to suffocate within its soft clay body. Of course, using such a temporary slave to attack an Advanced Apprentice was a joke, but it could keep even a powerful enemy occupied for a second.

Meanwhile, Greem swiftly took a few steps back, both hands moving extremely through the air while reciting magical spells out loud. A Fire Arrow began to form in front of him. After the solidification of the Fire Arrow spell was completed, compared to it's former casting time of more than 10 seconds, Greem could now cast it within 5 seconds. It was obvious that this was a huge advancement in combat power for him.

But, too bad, what he did made no difference in front of this terrifying little girl. An invisible Protection Barrier instantly appeared between the slimy puppet and Greem, cutting off the Spiritual connection between them. In the next second, the slime man splashed to the ground and then simply disappeared.

This was the biggest weakness of Summoning Magics.

Once the Spiritual connection between the caster and the summon was lost, under the effect of this world's Principles, no matter how strong the summon was, it was forced to return to where it came. Therefore, before this cheap slime puppet could do anything, it had turned into a pool of acidic liquid.

As for the Fire Arrow Greem cast with great effort, Alice simply responded with an expression of disdain, she didn't even try to stop him from casting.

Right after the Fire Arrow left Greem's hand, it instantly slammed into a tiny 'Mirror Space' hanging in the air in front of him. Blocked by this tiny Protection Barrier, which reflected energy, the Fire Arrow simply exploded.

Clearly, this explosion was going off too close to Greem. In the next instant, the raging flame was reflected by the 'Mirror Space' and sent spewing towards Greem, swallowing the body of the young Apprentice.

Although Greem could sense any changes in the area with his Elementium Vision, he was unable to react to this kind of sudden change in the space around him. He could cast a familiar magic spell in 3 to 5 seconds, but Alice could unleash her innate spatial magic in less than a second.

The massive gap between them allowed Alice to sit down and watch as Greem completed his spell casting process. She had plenty of time to decide if she wanted to block it or launch a counter attack. Not only that, if she wanted, Greem would never be able to finish casting any spell that took longer than 3 seconds.

As she watched the flame envelope the Beginner Apprentice in front of her, a scornful look appeared in Alice's single remaining eye.

How dare a Beginner Apprentice take the initiative to attack an Advanced Apprentice. This guy was simply asking for death!

She suddenly felt something was amiss.

An egg-sized pebble suddenly shot out from the rolling flame, rushing in Alice's direction. At the same time, Greem also dashed out from the flame, both hands covering his head.

The raging flame, obviously, didn't distinguish between friend and foe, and thus Greem had suffered a great deal of pain when forcing his way out of the inferno. His body had been severely burned by the flame, and both of his exposed arms were covered with burn marks and blisters.

With a cruel and hideous grin on her face, Alice gently waved her fingers, sending a few barely visible streaks flashing through the air. The flying pebble was sliced into four pieces when it came into contact with streaks. Violent blue-colored lightning spread across the air for a second and then disappeared.

His attempt at using the Lightning Stone to attack had been a complete failure.

Without hesitation, Greem pulled out another blackish object and threw it towards Alice. After that, he simply turned around and ran, as if trying to escape another explosion.

"Didn't you hear what I said before? You're forcing me to chop off your legs! Well, if that is what you really want…" Alice spoke while sneering, but before she could finish, her expression suddenly changed and she immediately turned to face the approaching object, as it had just avoided one of her casually cast Spatial Cuts.

A tiny bat had performed a swift turn in the air and avoided the Spatial Cut that came at her, flipping its wing at an incredible speed. She quickly arrived above Alice's head.

A summon? Was it a contracted creature or some kind of demon?

Alice couldn't immediately identify the source of this weird bat that came to her. Shrugging, she waved her hands, unleashing a couple of Spatial Cuts and completely sealing off any paths that the palm-sized bat could take. After doing this, she felt at ease, thinking that the bat would not be an issue anymore.

But, in next second, something happened that made her cry out in surprise.

Transforming rapidly, the tiny palm-size bat bloated up like a balloon, turning into a tall, slim human girl wearing a striking red dress. Not only that, she didn't perform any dodging movements, and simply fell straight toward the Spatial Cuts, aggressively leaping onto Alice's body.

Relishing in Alice's greatly terrified expression, claws appeared on the fingers of this red-dressed girl, becoming extremely sharp and pointy and indistinctly glowing like molten metal. Also, as she fell, the look of this young girl changed dramatically, as her green eyes turned bloody red, looking as if blood was going to drip out of them.

As the red-eyed girl fell through the Spatial Cuts, the sound of flesh being torn apart by the spatial attack sizzled through the air.

A huge amount of blood splashed out from the back of the red-dressed girl, and numerous crisscrossed holes could be seen on her body. The series of cuts had turned her body into a human mesh.

But this red-dressed girl didn't pause or back off as her bright red lips were opening wider and wider, and two frightening looking fangs poked through her lips. When she finally reached Alice, she simply bit into her exposed neck.

Damn it, she was a Vampire!

She, like everyone, had heard of these bloody beasts before, but, as an Advanced Apprentice Adept, Alice immediately realized what was faced with.

Like a mosquito biting on her neck, a tingling sensation was felt, which quickly turned into a pleasurable feeling that made her feel like she was walking on clouds. Following the drawing of her blood, she clearly felt her life force was quickly fading away. Her body felt drowsy and was so comfortable that she just wished she could let go of everything and fall into a deep slumber.

But no matter what, Alice was an Advanced Apprentice who had a strong will, and she had high resistance toward the paralytic poison being injected into her body via the Vampire fangs. After being dazed for only a brief moment, she managed to regain control of her will.

For the first time in her life, Alice felt like death was knocking at her front door.

In her previous two battles, though he had managed to damage her, Evil Bugs was not her match. As for Sinbad, if they hadn't fought in her swamp, the leader of Ghost Nanny would have been instantly slaughtered.

But at this moment, Alice really felt the threat of death.

If she didn't properly manage her current situation, she, who would very likely become a great Adept, would die in this filthy land.

Having no alternative, Alice gathered the very last drops of her strength and, once again, let out a frightening scream that shook the world around her.

In next second, space shattered, and everything around her was crushed into powder!