Age of Adepts

The moment of exchanging blows was extremely brief!

With Mary's exceptional Agility, she could choose to move around the outside and close in when she wanted to attack. Roy's attacks would never be able to catch up to her.

However, considering the enemy reinforcements that could arrive at any time, Mary could only choose to break through the situation by force and establish the battlefield advantage by trading wound for wound.

The blood giant beside Roy had similar elementium attributes to Mary. As such, both of their blood magic lost effectiveness, and they could only rely on their strong bodies to fight.

Mary had no choice but to pay the price to break through the blood giant's defense quickly!

The blood giant cut open a half-meter long gash on Mary's right arm as she passed by. Some strange energies had been attached to her wound as well, causing her regeneration ability to be temporarily ineffective.

However, this way, Mary would be able to confront Second Grade Alchemist Adept Roy.

It was difficult to catch Mary's phantasmal figure at this lightning instant. Only the powerful spiritual senses of a Second Grade adept could make out Mary's current position.

Without any hesitation, two vials bubbling with purple potions flew at Mary. Meanwhile, Adept Roy crushed another potion in his hand as he stumbled backward, causing an earthy-yellow mist to gather in front of him.

First, Mary felt her consciousness fade for an instant; everything in front of her began to turn chaotic and upside down. The mist engulfed her, and her body tightened up. Her skin immediately lost all feeling as this strange numbness quickly spread toward the insides of her body.

Dammit! These were Hallucination and Petrification Potions!

Other elementium adepts couldn't possibly instant-cast so many offensive spells that could break through a Second Grade adept's defensive forcefield, especially in such a short time frame. However, alchemist adepts were simply like broken bugs in a computer system. They could achieve such an astounding effect by using potions instead of spells.

Of course, for this very express purpose, they had even invented and come up with a professional handling method to toss out potions rapidly!

The retreating Adept Roy promptly stopped when he saw that Mary had been affected by his potions. He took out a mysterious wand glowing with rainbow light from near his waist and pointed the purple-red crystal at the tip of the rod at the immobilized vampire. He quickly chanted the activation code for the wand.

Ruin!

This magic wand was enchanted with a Second Grade single-target elementium spell- Ruin!

All targets hit by Ruin would have the elementium power within their bodies go out of control and explode. The target of the spell would completely disintegrate, from their flesh bodies to their souls.

There weren't very many adepts who had mastered such a terrifying spell, and those that could enchant a wand with it were even fewer. Even Adept Roy had paid a high price to obtain this wand.

In all honesty, if it weren't for the massive loss they had suffered here today, Roy would never have been willing to use up such a trump card.

Though the spell inside the wand could be used repeatedly after recharging, such a powerful Second Grade magic wand would take five days to recharge. This ace could not be used for the following five days!

However, using up a trump card to kill a Second Grade vampire seemed to be worth it, no matter how you thought about it!

After a short activation chant, a gray beam shot out and reduced 'Mary' to dust. Not a trace of her was left.

Roy opened his eyes wide as alarms blared in his mind.

Regardless of how low Mary's magic resistance was, she should not have been reduced to nothingness in the face of a Second Grade Ruin! What about her magical equipment? What about the vampire core in her body? Internal elementium explosions shouldn't be big enough to vaporize the clothes as well, could they?

This…this was an illusion!

Roy instantly understood everything and his arm shook. The magic wand of Ruin vanished, and eight potions of various colors mysteriously appeared between his fingers. Given one second-no, half a second-he could re-arm himself with these potions with multiple effects.

Sadly, weightless crimson lightning passed by his side without a sound. The next second, his arms flew into the sky along with the eight potion vials and landed far away.

Aaaaaah!

Roy howled in agony as a fountain of blood spurted from his severed arms. He was quickly stained in red.

The blood giant, surrounding magical creatures, and elementium servants charged forward and once again used their bodies to protect Adept Roy. Meanwhile, Mary's pretty figure appeared across from them. She was licking the dripping blood from her sharp claws using her full, red lips.

Good…very good. This Second Grade alchemist adept had lost all ability to resist. She could now bring him back and turn him into her food. In all seriousness, Mary had never tasted the fresh blood of a Second Grade adept since she had become a Second Grade vampire.

However, just as she took a step forward and prepared to deal the finishing blow to these annoying fellows, a sense of danger that came from the depths of her soul instantly overtook her entire being.

Mary lunged backward without hesitation and retreated several dozens of meters.

The next second, a cloud of blood mist engulfed her original position.

The mist was dense and smelled intensely of blood. Terrifying blood corrosion power was contained within the fog, as it was clear from the strange sizzling sound of corrosion that came from the mist's contact with the air and the ground.

The initially tough volcanic rock floor melted at a visible rate under the corrosion of the blood mist. Soon, a crimson pool of blood one meter in diameter had appeared on the ground.

Mary's body trembled and her face instantly flushed white!

If she hadn't dodged earlier, her entire body would have been melted there and turned into part of the blood pool. Her magic resistance was no more than a joke before blood corrosion powers of this level.

Dammit! This was just a precursory skirmish. How did it turn into the personal show of a high-grade adept so quickly!?

Mary didn't need to look with her eyes or sense with her Spirit. Just this terrifying elementium blood pool was enough to inform her of her new enemy. He was an old opponent of the Crimson Clan and the nemesis in Mary's life!

The blood knights and blood elves retreated from the battlefield without another word. They gathered before Mary and glared with their crimson eyes at the tunnel leading to the surface.

A tall and skinny figure slowly emerged from the darkness.

Before his appearance could be clearly seen, his intimidating crimson eyes were already shining through the darkness.

Pride, disdain, and unconcealable hatred shone in those crimson eyes, forcefully placing an overwhelming aura of might upon Mary's mental consciousness.

Mary's trembling intensified, and the blood knights and blood elves in front of her crumbled to the ground. Their limbs gave way as their entire bodies shivered uncontrollably.

"Haines Vik!" Mary gritted her teeth and pronounced this wicked name with a cold and chilling tone.

The figure in the darkness slowly approached. Finally, he broke free of the shadows aa the light in the stone hall fell upon him.

He wore extravagant and fancy noble clothes, had neat, slick brown hair, and a carefully trimmed mustache. This outsider appeared utterly different from the average adept in terms of appearance. In fact, his elegance made him look more like a human noble.

However, those strange crimson eyes that were bright as stars betrayed his true identity. His entire being was shrouded in a veil of mystery.

Compared to before, this ruler of the Vik Family appeared significantly older. The wrinkles on his face were also apparent for all to see. It was evident that the past few years had not been kind to this Third Grade vampire clan leader.

At the very least, his Spirit seemed to be a lot more shriveled and worn-out!

"Gargamel, I need back-up!"

Mary silently used a messaging spell to communicate with Gargamel, who was within the adept's tower.

A short moment later, a red layer of light appeared around Mary and her bloodkin, helping them resist the spiritual pressure projected by the Third Grade vampire.

The disabled vampires instantly regained their energy, and they got up from the ground with pale faces. Though they had temporarily returned to normal, they still didn't dare to lock eyes with the Third Grade vampire in fear of their mental consciousness being suppressed again.

It couldn't be helped. Their bloodline origin came from Mary, and the vampire bloodline flowing through Mary's body originated from this Third Grade vampire in front of them.

Seeing this vampire was like seeing their bloodline ancestor. Being able to stand up straight with the protection of the tower was already an incredible feat!

The four subordinates transformed into bats and fled back underground with Mary's approval. As long as Haines was here, they would not be able to help Mary at all! As such, it was best to flee as soon as possible.

"My lord, these vampires killed five of my adepts. You can't just let them go." Adept Roy protested as he hastily healed himself and reattached his arms through some strange method.

Unfortunately, his protests fell on deaf ears. Haines only had eyes for Mary at this moment. He couldn't care less about a few Second Grade blood servants.

"Good. Very good," Haines laughed coldly, "I thought your first thought upon seeing me would be to flee! Who knew this bloodline would assimilate so perfectly with you. Good…very good; simply too excellent!"

No one could understand what Haines was feeling or thinking as they listened to him mutter to himself wildly.

However, what surprised the adepts was that the Second Grade female vampire had no intention of fleeing in the face of Adept Haines increasing aggression. Instead, she bared her fangs and looked as if she was about to counterattack at any moment.

What? She…she intended to challenge a Third-Grade vampire with the strength of a Second Grade?

For a moment, everyone was stunned!