Age of Adepts

“Titan, a physical construction with a powerful magic at its foundation. It is a magical automaton. It is made using mystical materials, such as the Magic Repelling Steel from the Master Material Universe. The primary characteristic of it is the resistance toward the elements.” –Lilo • Ann

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Golems are artificial, self-locomoting objects created by Adepts. The Titan was the most powerful of these golems. The most defining characteristic of these Titans was their resistance toward elemental attacks. In other words, only those golems which possessed elemental damage resistance could be called Titans. It was all because of the mightiness of Adepts. It was only thanks to the characteristic of elemental damage resistance that they were considered to be so powerful.

However, being able to resist elemental damage didn’t mean the golem was the ultimate weapon for an Adept. This ability only allowed a Titan to be immune to spells targeted at its body. For example, using a fireball on the ceiling above a Titan, causing it to be crushed by the weight of the ceiling, or casting an Acid Pool spell and causing the Titan to fall into the generated pool of acid. Both of these spells were very effective against Titans. Not to mention that all Titans had very low Spirit. They could only follow simple commands, which was their biggest weakness when facing intelligent lifeforms.

Also, Titans were not totally immune from elemental damage, as using a specific elemental spell would cause a specific effect to a certain type of Titan. By properly understanding their weaknesses, it was rather simple to fight against a Titan.

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So golems were mechanical living organisms who possessed powerful strength and were created with magic. The most significant difference between them and other golem was their strength, making them seem full of vitality. Golems gained their magical life from an elemental soul, which was usually of the Earth element. The process of creating a golem was taking a soul and tying it onto a manmade body. It would then merge with this specially prepared vessel, and obey the will of its creator.

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Golems didn’t have their own minds, and they wouldn’t do any other things unless their creator specifically gave them the command. They would follow simple and precise commands, and couldn’t accept complicated strategies or tactics. The creator could only command a golem within a 60-meter radius, and he had to be able to see or hear the golem. If no new command was given, the golem would usually give their all in carrying out the last command given to them. Of course, they would fight back if somebody attacked them.

If the creator was not going to be near the golem, he could preemptively give the golem a simple command to guide its movement, or could make the golem follow another person’s commands. But as the creator of the golem, he could always make the golem only follow his command, revoking another person’s control rights at any time.

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Somehow, once he started reading the book, Greem was instantly caught up in the content of it, hardly able to tear himself away from it, and, thus, he finished it in one go.

Golems were a really good thing!

Putting aside those advanced steel golems, even the lowest level clay golem could challenge an advanced Apprentice Adept. In other words, only a group that worked well together, and all were at the advanced level of a combat profession, would have the possibility of defeating a clay golem.

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As guards for Adepts, Titans, and other golems, were so much more dependable than human guards, as they were absolutely loyal. On the downside, the cost of a Titan, or any other golem, left Greem speechless.

Take the lowest level clay golem as an example: a clay golem, without any additional magical equipment, weighed 600 pounds, was 8 feet tall when standing straight, and was entirely made from soft clay. This type of clay golem wouldn’t take any damage from sharp weapons, but some heavy weapons could cause physical damage to them.

The base cost for this type of clay golem was 21,000 gold coins. As for the stone golem, which was one level higher than the clay golem, their basic cost was 55,000 gold coins. And the even higher leveled iron golem was a shocking 80,000 gold coins.

This was the base cost before taking in the effects of supply and demand of the market into consideration. If it was during a period of war, these golems, which were extremely suitable for use on the battlefield, would have their prices doubled and people would still easily pay for them. As long as a small lord purchased three to five clay golems and placed them into his own army, he would be able to gain a huge advantage when fighting with other nearby lords.

Therefore, if he was able to become a golem creator, money would no longer be an issue for Greem!

Unfortunately, not only did it take a huge amount of unique materials to create a golem, but it also required an extraordinary wondrous item crafting skill and the ability to create soul vessels. If Greem’s innate elemental affinity was the Dark element, maybe he could extract souls from some human-like creatures. Then he would be able to easily create soul vessels, which could give a golem basic intelligence. However, his elementary affinity was the Fire element, and that killed off any possibility of making a golem anytime soon.

What Greem could do now was ask the Chip to store all the content on this ‘Golem Creation Manual’ temporarily, so he could do more research in the future. After considering all these things, he began to research the new functions of the Chip.

Following the slow chanting of a magical incantation, Greem, who had stretched out his right arm, suddenly had a glowing magical flame ignite in his hand, covering his entire palm and part of his arm.

As he was staring at the flame burning calmly on his hand, the mechanical voice of the Chip resounded in his brain.

*Beep* “A complete Spirit energy model has been detected. Please confirm if the host wants to solidify it? Warning: The solidification will reduce Spirit by 2 and Profession Experience by 50!”

The same message had appeared once when he was inspecting the outside of the Tower. But, as he was at a dangerous place at that time, Greem hadn’t dared to test it, and, hence, he had chosen to ignore it. But today, he decided to check out what this Solidification was all about!

“Confirm!”

*Beep* “Solidification task commencing now... expected completion time: 12 hours, 27 minutes and 13 seconds...”

Greem’s mind trembled as with the Chip began the ‘Solidification task’. He clearly felt part of his Spirit had disappeared. After a self-inspection, he found his Profession Experience had dropped from 614/1000 to 564/1000.

Ugh... his 614 Profession Experience was the result of Greem’s past six years of effort, including constant meditation, countless failures while practicing spellcasting, countless hours under the dimmed candlelight copying those hard to understand books of magic, and those dangerous, but unavoidable, magical experiments...

Frankly speaking, in the past, Greem had, indeed, been pretty useless. He had become an Apprentice Adept six years ago but had only accumulated half of the Profession Experience required to become an intermediate Apprentice, and he had only mastered one spell – Burning Hand. As for the second magic spell he was currently learning – Fire Arrow – he had only just begun gathering the preliminary knowledge for it, and thus was still far away from a successfully casting of that spell.

After analyzing this data, he realized that, among all the Apprentices in the Tower, the innate attribute of his body was considered low-grade... No wonder he hadn’t become an intermediate Apprentice in these six years.

But that was the Greem of the past!

Now, with the support of the Chip, he had gained a fresh start and would soon be able to solve all the difficulties in front of him.

The task of solidifying the Spirit model for the Burning Hand was occupying most of Greem’s mental capacity, which made him feel mentally exhausted. In this situation, it was no longer suitable for him to carry on with any spell practice or reading that would consume his Spirit. Therefore, Greem simply lay down on his bed and began to meditate.

Following the start of his meditation, Greem gradually calmed down. His breath became longer and more regular, and his entire Spiritual conscious was completely indulged in extending from his body.

The once noiseless room became emptier and quieter, as if everything around him had suddenly become muted. The feeling of his body became indistinct, and he felt like he was sinking into a gigantic piece of cotton candy. It felt like everything his body was being pulled apart.

Finally, his spiritual conscious broke through the boundary of his body and went into a bizarre world.

This was a world full of lights.

Mystical specks, of a variety of colors, were dancing in the air, completely filling every inch of space he could sense.

Perhaps the intrusion of his spiritual conscious alerted these illuminating specks, who seemed to dance around irregularly and unconsciously. Suddenly this bizarre world shifted and became a little bit of different.

Greem’s spiritual conscious started to swim aimlessly in this world full of bright specks of light. Wherever he went, it seemed like each different speck had its own independent conscious, as they each acted in different ways.

Those illuminating specks who dimly glowed red showed an obvious welcoming behavior toward Greem, as they would jump into his soul when got close enough, giving him wisps of warm sensations. On the other hand, those cold toned illuminating specks, for example, Blue, Gray, Black, White... clearly, they were keeping a distance from him.

As for those neutral colors, like Purple, Green, Yellow, these illuminating specks didn’t move away from him nor show any passionate behavior, but when Greem’s spiritual conscious touched them, they would still merge with him slowly. The entire process was calm and harmonious, and nothing unnatural could be found.

The bright orb representing Greem’s spiritual conscious slowly roamed in this boundless ocean of light, passively accepting the merging of those specks of light. Out of curiosity, he tried to control his orb and moved toward some White specks. Apparently, his arrival had alarmed the White illuminating specks, as the leisurely and mindless swimming specks immediately fled the area.

Finally, Greem couldn’t bear it anymore. Under a strong conscious guidance, a spiritual tentacle suddenly stretched out from his transparent orb of soul and poked through a slightly bigger White speck.

The White speck exploded, turning into a stream of Spirit and flowing into Greem’s soul. Compared to the warm sensation he got when merging with the Red specks, what this pale looking speck brought to Greem was gloomy, dead silence.

The feeling was like when someone woke up at midnight and suddenly drank a glass of cold water. It just made his body shiver. Aside from the shivering sensation, Greem’s spiritual conscious felt a shock and a corrosive pain. It seemed that, while it would bring his Spirit some advantages, merging with the White specks would also damage him.