A Sorcerer’s Journey

Back in the Demon-Hunter castle, wearing a big mantle and void of emotions, Grimm continued on religiously with his daily schedule as he made his way to the alchemy lab. He walked past the Gnaw that immediately bowed to him while it was in the middle of scrubbing the floor.

His silhouette was mysterious and calm, yet cold at the same time.

Dawn to dusk.

A year had passed in the Sorcerer World.

Today, the Gnaw diligently prepared a full course meal. However, the Myna who was sitting at the dining table took a few bites uninterestedly, and flew out of Grimm’s Demon-Hunter castle, probably to meet its old friend Angelis.

With a peaceful expression, Grimm cut a piece of medium rare steak with a knife and put it in his expectant mouth. He closed his mouth, slowly and carefully chewing it.

As time went by, Grimm was already used to a tranquil and quiet everyday life.

It seemed drab and uneventful, but to Grimm who used to be poor and was full of hopes for his dreams, this was the sort of tranquillity that he enjoyed.

The food in front of him could no longer interest him, Grimm silently ate alone without saying a word. To him, this so-called food savouring was now simply a sort of relief in his life.

He chewed mechanically while deep in thought, his left hand holding a cup filled with a refreshing drink called the Wave Sprinkled Flower.

The two meals every day were supposed to be the only resting time in Grimm’s schedule, but he would always end up using that time to summarize and further plan his research.

Grimm was lost in his thoughts, his gaze was deep like an abyss, a bottomless pit of clear water shining by the silvery moonlight.

After a moment, Grimm slowly took the cloth off his chest and got up from the table while the Gnaw slave bowed deeply.

“How is the food supply?”

Grimm’s long and slender fingers adjusted his robe, his skin clear and full of life, a vast contrast when compared to the Gnaw’s shrivelled skin.

The Gnaw behaved as a Sorcerer World housekeeper would, bowing deeply as he took out a list. He calculated a few times thoroughly and then carefully answered, “It can last for about five more weeks, Master.”

The Gnaw clan, in terms of knowledge, is far more inferior than humans in the Sorcerer World.

“Alright.”

Grimm nodded and said nothing more. A master would not elaborate further plans to a lowly slave. Without wasting his time with more pointless chit chat, he went straight to the Ascetic Prison.

He took off his robe, displaying a strong build. After Grimm checked the Crystallized Energy Stone in the hexagram, he sat on the stone chair in the middle of the hexagram, and as per usual pushed down on the button on the chair.

Boom!

A blaze of fire lit up the stone chair, the automatic barrier around the walls of the Demon-Hunter castle was a little distorted, it appeared as if the fire temperature was at an all time low. Despite all this, Grimm who was sitting in the middle of the fire only gave a low grunt, his brows furrowed slightly, his skin automatically producing a layer of black scars, protecting Grimm from the fire elemental damages coming from the chair.

After half an hourglass, Grimm stood up within the sea of fire on the chair, and mumbled, “Have I become fully immune to this degree of fire attack? I’ll need to tweak the energy configuration of the hexagram to increase the temperature of elemental damage.”

After that, Grimm stopped the hexagram, and put on his loose robe without haste. His golden locks hung loosely on his back as he sat on the chair to start meditating.

The world inside his mind breathed like an infant as he meditated, expanding and contracting constantly, slowly drifting into a deep sleep.

Two hourglasses later.

Grimm stood up after he finished meditating, he drew a line, reached into the dimensional gap and took out a magic book for reference. Then, using a feathered pen dipped into magic ink, he started to make some changes on the runes of the six energy nodes, and also changed the number of one intermediate magic stone to two instead for each node.

Just like this, he made sure the elemental damages done by the hexagram can once again surpass his basic elemental resistance, that way it could improve Grimm’s cells’ behaviour towards constant changes from the environment.

He nodded his head, picked up the magic lamp as he took his leave and closed the door behind him.

In the alchemy lab, Grimm had finished connecting the head and the body of his Elemental Great Staff 1.0 Enhanced Edition, and based on the average alchemy craft, his staff was considered a completed product.

However, since this was version 1.0 enhanced, Grimm would naturally add in his own designs into the staff in terms of the increase in certain elements, making it able to help elevate Grimm’s strength in a beneficial way in the future.

Right now, the elements of this staff included—casting elemental magic lower than 660 degrees saves 5% of magic power, casting elemental magic lower than 750 degrees increases the degree by 4%, and increasing base elemental damage by 20.

Grimm planned to further enhance the staff to—casting basic water elemental magic lower than 500 degrees increases speed of purification and condensation by 10%, casting basic fire elemental attacks increases temperature by 30, withstanding 1000 degrees of slicing and stun attacks.

The increase in speed of purification and condensation of water element and increase in the attack of fire element would help Grimm to cast the Fire Blast Spell faster and with higher firepower to produce the regularly casted Fire Blast.

As for building a sturdy and durable staff, considering that Grimm would be a fake alchemist in the future for a long period of time, it would also act as a long pole for short range combat.

After two hourglasses, Grimm then walked towards his Voodoo laboratory.

It was in the afternoon and the Tree of Life’s great shadow loomed over the Demon-Hunter castle. Grimm usually had his tea and some rest in the afternoons. He opened the windows of the Voodoo lab, letting the fresh air full of life energy as well as the warm rays of the sun into his castle.

The warm atmosphere was filled with vitality.

Creak…

After opening the wooden doors, he lowered his hood and the rays from the bright sun rested on his face. Grimm then idly drank his afternoon tea, the bitter tea filled his mouth and pleasantly slid down his throat, while he closed his eyes.

“Hahahaha, Old Man Lis look at that—”

The Little Myna’s sharp laughter could be heard drifting from Grimm’s neighbour’s garden. As he was enjoying the bitterness of the tea, he looked over to his neighbour’s. Lately the sorcerer named Angelis was up to something, since he had built a mini airship which was a few metres long for some kind of experiment.

He also built a gigantic windmill in his own garden, making Grimm wonder what use it had in his experiment.

Right there and then, the Little Myna stood on top of the shrunken airship. It coated itself with paint and soared through the sky like a one-eyed pirate, and proceeded to write at the back of the airship in sorcerer words “The Soaring Iron Emblem: Physics of the Winged Airship Experiment”.

Huff…

Grimm gently blew on his hot tea, not perturbed even in the slightest by the Little Myna and his neighbour’s incessant time-wasting antics. His gaze was sweeping across his surroundings when suddenly, above his head, a vast shadow covered the sun without any sort of indication, shadowing Grimm who was enjoying the warmth of the sun.

The sky and earth fell into total darkness instantly.

Huh?

Grimm started quivering involuntarily while holding his teacup, his face now filled with horror.

The Blood Moon!

The whole Sorcerer World had plummeted below the layers of clouds, what was happening?

Rumble…

The rumbling sound of thunder was reverberating from the sky, as if an iron monster was waking up from its slumber.

In the sky, the thick layers of clouds were being pushed aside by the Blood Moon, beneath the cold golden plate was an unfeeling, heartless, unbreakable ray of light, the clouds around it were being shoved aside mercilessly by something translucent.

Slowly, the iron-monster-like dimension had fully revealed itself to the view of all sorcerers, standing mightily in front of the terrifying metal fortress. Even an advanced sorcerer such as Grimm himself was pressured by an invisible power.

Rustle…

Grimm suddenly realized that the Demon Hunters who were flying around the Tree of Life, upon seeing the Blood Moon Dimension fortress, had started flying towards their own Demon-Hunter castle.

The small black dots in the sky were like a bunch of locusts in the middle of a frenzy, there was no way of counting how many there were.

While in actual fact, they were the Demon Hunters of the Sorcerer World!

They were the Demon Hunters who were chosen based on the harshest requirements of the Sorcerer World!

The protective barrier around the Holy Tower of Seven Rings and the dimension tower were merging into one, unable to stop the descent of the mighty fortress.

The sky closed in like a meteor and the ground was seemingly endless. Demon Hunters flew erratically in groups, while one by one, flying machines stopped, and out came the snail riders to welcome to descent of the fortress. In the midst of the thundering sounds, the towering Tree of Life suddenly slowly started to open up, like a tightly closed flower bud that had started to bloom, or like a primeval nightmarish monster that was opening its mouth.

Buzz…

Suddenly, the sound of a blaring horn could be heard inside the protective barrier around the Holy Tower of Seven Rings, the sound was melodic yet bleak, just like in the primitive days where clans were battling each other, and it was clearly heard by all the sorcerers.

At this moment, even with the Demon Hunter castles’ soundproof barrier, it could not completely block out the melody of the horn.

Grimm who was in a state of utter shock then realized the sign of a Seven Rings Holy Contract had appeared on the altar at the top.

Grimm closed his eyes for a moment, and when he opened them once again he murmured in surprise, “In the time of an hourglass, continuous supply of 1000 degrees of magic power to the altar shall be rewarded with one piece of Sorcerer Essence?”

That would explain why all the Demon Hunter Sorcerers were in a hurry to go back to their own castles!

Grimm put down his teacup and quickly glanced at the Gnaw shaking in terror, but did not care as he flew straight to the altar at the top of the castle. He had an advanced magic stone in one hand, while the other hand was supplying his own magic to the altar.

The Gnaw was trembling in fear, probably because seeing the Blood Moon triggered some unwanted memories of his.

As if droplets of water had slowly dripped into a lake, as soon as Grimm started injecting magic powers into the altar, the pressure from the dimension in the supernal sky pressed down upon them. At the same time, the runes of the Demon-Hunter castle belonging to Grimm started to shine and glitter, slowly merging together with the other Demon-Hunter castle runes, with the Tree of Life as the centre of it all.

In the sky, on the earth, and in the air, a terrifying energy had started to accumulate, this is a power so tantalizing that it shook the entire Sorcerer World itself.

Zoom! Zoom! Zoom!

The topmost protective barrier at the edge of the Holy Tower of Seven Rings, from six towers that supported the barrier of the sorcerer Tower, suddenly had pure energy light beams bursting out from each tower, all pointed towards the source of the dimension fortress of the Sorcerer World which had completely descended.

It was like a powerful charge, with countless runes dancing beneath the half circle of the fortress. At the same time inside the black cabin doors, three-hundred-metre-long aircrafts shaped like sharks started to fall tightly and neatly in line as the cabin door closed.

Right there and then, Grimm in his Demon-Hunter castle felt as if his magic powers were entering a tunnel of torrents rushing into the sky, but it was a torrent made entirely out of energy.

Rumble!

The shadowing dimension slowly made its way towards the Tree of Life.

The Tree of Life had now fully bloomed, and become a field of tens of thousands of metres wide, with the six mighty energy beams projected straight into the skies. On the side lines, the iron box of the Heart of the Seven Rings Tower sat silently in the middle of the six energy beams, the amount of energy accumulated there was simply unimaginable to a low tier sorcerer.

This…

Grimm gulped as he quietly watched the dimension fortress move slowly towards the heart of the Tree of Life, moving right above the Heart of the Seven Rings Tower.

Boom!

Suddenly, a foreign wave of energy trembled across the land, Grimm could even feel time and space starting to distort, different layers and patches appeared, followed by the tilting of the grand golden balance of the Sorcerer World, a far and unknown foreign world had their coordinates overlapped with the endless Sorcerer World.

A tear in time and space had opened up!

Bam!

Beneath the Tree of Life, tens of hundreds and thousands of Demon Hunters’ magic powers erupted, under a beam of magic light, the Heart of the Seven Rings Tower pushed the dimension fortress above it up into the sky.

It started off slow, and quickly picked up speed.

Crack!

Grimm who was channelling his magic powers to the altar on the Demon-Hunter castle could feel the distorted tear of that space, the torrent of magic power was mercilessly forcing the void fortress into the other, and the tear in time and space started to slowly close back up.

Hush…

The whole protective barrier of the Holy Tower of Seven Rings fell into a weakened state, as if the whole Sorcerer World was gasping for air.

Grimm squatted at the edge of the Demon-Hunter altar, gasping aloud, “So this is the void fortress of the Sorcerer World in its battle against foreign lands, preventing their entrance to the time and space tunnel? Enveloping all the magic powers of the Demon-Hunter sorcerers in the Holy Tower of Seven Rings as the source of power, inciting the lever of the world’s rules of fate, opening this tear that could hold the entire void fortress?”

It was unknown, however, how long it would take for this void tower to go through this interval to be able to start conquering a foreign land.

Time, to the void fortress, when entering the tear in time and space, might only be a few moments long as they arrive in a foreign world in the blink of an eye.

However, to that foreign land, a Blood Moon would hang high in the sky, for days, months, or even years. Only then would a Sorcerer World void fortress known as the ultimate crystallization of wisdom appear before the descent of the world, announcing the presence of this horrifying war machine that held innumerable powerful Demon-Hunter Sorcerers and unlimited numbers of soul slaves, plunging the world into a battlefield of nightmares.