A Sorcerer’s Journey

Grimm went to Johann’s side.

“Grimm, besides hunting for the sea serpents’ pearls, we can also get part of the power of Serpentine by killing these creatures from foreign lands. Of course, this method of gaining is much faster than hunting for the sea serpent’s pearls but it is also more dangerous.”

At that moment, Johann was overjoyed, as if killing this creature from the foreign land had increased his power of Serpentine.

Finally, Johann added, “Of course, the prerequisite for this is to have the original power of Serpentine in your body.”

“Oh, I see.”

This guy, Johann, had gone so far as to use the power of Serpentine at Mount Serpentine, to form an ability similar to the inborn world blood ability of Hattori the Hidden, the Dark Sorcerer in the Sorcerers World.

Grimm suddenly thought of something and asked, “Why was Shyann not in the cavern, the one whom the pupae and Grandalph kept on mentioning?”

Johann had absorbed all the power of Serpentine from the body of the creature but his power had only increased by a little.

To Johann, this bit might be dozens of sets of Spring of Serpentine.

Johann dismembered the creature with his hands full of blood. He seemed to be looking for some tools and materials which were useful for sorcerers.

For sorcerers, many of the materials could be acquired from the carcasses of the creatures.

“Him? He will only be back once in a very long time. I estimate, after the arrival of only a few Eye of Destruction, he would try to leave the maze of the sea serpent.”

After collecting parts from the carcass of the unknown creature, Johann kicked the carcass down Mount Serpentine. In his hands were the creature’s nails, teeth, fur, skull and the bone tooth dagger.

“I’m going back, you be careful, don’t die.”

After saying so, he wiped his bloody hands on the prey’s whitish-gray fur and marched towards the sorcerer’s cavern.

Grimm looked at his figure and went into deep thoughts.

‘All these look real! Are these sorcerers imaginary or did they enter a Spectral World, just like I did?’

***

The gray whirlpool in the sky stopped gradually and the Eye of Destruction had once again arrived.

A gigantic blood-red eyeball kept circling in the sky. The sea serpent’s pearls flew out from the countless Phagocytic Shells, just like many mini Eye of Destruction flying in a group, making an inspection.

They were all very close to one another. What a terrifying sight.

Grimm stood on a piece of protruding slab in his Level-1 Wild Instinct form. With the arrival of the Eye of Destruction, the power of Serpentine which appeared on Mount Serpentine had obviously become stronger, enveloping everything within the radius of a few hundred meters.

Grimm’s focus was in the sky, looking for his target, hoping to catch a few isolated sea serpent’s pearls.

“Two sea serpent’s pearls flying together, nope!”

“The distance of this pearl from that group of hundreds of sea serpent’s pearls is too small, nope!”

“That, I can try…”

The amount of time the Eye of Destruction was present was limited. If Grimm wanted to reap something, he had to make the best use of the time given. He finally found a lone target.

Without hesitation, Grimm leapt forward and dashed towards that particular sea serpent’s pearl with the force of nature.

However, Grimm’s speed was nowhere near the pupae’s. The pupae were Level-3 creatures and Grimm could never match their speed. Hence, when he finally reached the pearl, the pearl was already aware of Grimm’s presence and a light red ray was cast.

The pearl that was isolated a moment ago began changing its trajectory, aimlessly darting towards the pearl-filled sky. Grimm, stuck in his initial trajectory felt hopeless, and had no choice but to descend back to Mount Serpentine.

Whoosh!

The nature of the light gray ray and the light red energy which were enveloped by Mount Serpentine collided and could not threaten Grimm. The sea serpent’s pearls dared not even go near the surroundings enveloped by the power of Serpentine.

“Um? Here…”

With reasons unknown, a twenty-plus meter tall tree giant flew out of the area enveloped by the power of Serpentine with an amazing dash of power, towards the Eye of Destruction in the sky. It might have happened because of the hopelessness it felt in trying to escape from the Spectral World.

Lots of sea serpent’s pearls came flying towards the tree giant. Beams after beams of light red light were shot but the tree giant was able to endure all of those and continued to dash indomitably towards the Eye of Destruction.

Compared to the Eye of Destruction, the tree giant was merely a tiny sesame seed on top of a huge piece of cookie.

The gigantic blood-red eyeball kept wriggling in the sky and the black pupil finally noticed this little thing. Only a light red beam about tens of meters could be seen and after that there was nothing left of the tree giant.

The blood red eyeball was still twirling to and fro in the sky, as if looking for something in the Spectral World.

Grimm was waiting for an opportunity but the opportunity never came so finally he stopped.

After a while, the Eye of Destruction was shut once again. The sea serpent’s pearls returned to the Phagocytic Shells and the world was peaceful once more. Grimm went back to the sorcerer’s cavern.

Usually, sorcerers who had lost their sorcery would gather all their magic power and inject into a simple and crude magical array to fully support Grandalph’s Mana Pool.

Even so, the Mana Pool could only support half of Grandalph’s mental strength and the factors contributing to this were the small number of sorcerers, the existence of the Spectral World and the magical array.

Grandalph would pay each sorcerer for their magic power with the corresponding Spring of Serpentine but the number was miserably small.

“What happened? Didn’t you get anything?”

Grimm nodded while looking at Grandalph grind a skull into powder. Not a word escaped from him.

In this Spectral World that was lacking resources, any material that the sorcerers had identified as containing magical value was precious to them.

“It’s ok. Johann, too, did not get anything for a long time when he first started. Shyann will be back in a few days. Let him guide you and give you some important tricks in hunting for the sea serpent’s pearls.

A person who had been mentioned all the time by others but had never made an appearance could arouse others’ curiosity and attention.

Automatically, Grimm was attracted by this mysterious sorcerer named Shyann.

“Great master, is Shyann also an Anatomy Refinery Sorcerer?”

Grandalph replied calmly, with her head down while grinding the skull powder, “No, he’s an Elemental Sorcerer, but just like you, he possesses a mystical power.”

‘He too possesses a mystical power?’

Grimm started to feel suspicious, was this really an illusory mirage?

After the analysis of sensible clues, no matter how you looked at it, it still looked like a double illusory mirage, a form of the creatures from the endless world falling into a Spectral World which truly existed.

Many parts of this explanation were still difficult for Grimm to understand.

After a few arrivals of the Eye of Destruction, Grimm finally reaped his very own harvest. He returned with a little sea serpent’s pearl the size of a skull.

After the sea serpent shells had entered the area enveloped by the power of Serpentine, they became very weak, just like dead fish.

“Master Grandalph, this is the sea serpent’s pearl that I have just hunted.”

Grimm passed the sea serpent’s pearl to the old sorceress and he then noticed an unfamiliar sorcerer in the room, sitting on a stone chair. The lower half of his body was a blurry shadow.

According to Grimm’s analysis, this was not the effect of Johann’s power of Serpentine but rather a mystical power.

“Master Shyann?”

The upper half of the body of this sorcerer was naked. His skin was dark and he was skinny. Was his mystical power a power to turn his body into a shadowy form?

It was slightly similar to some of the Level-2 sorcerers’ elemental body but of a higher grade.

“Are you Grimm, the one whom Master Grandalph just mentioned? I heard that you possess two types of mystical power. Although they aren’t suitable for battles, at least there will be a successor for this sorcerer’s cavern so I can rest assured and try my luck in escaping from the maze of sea serpent.”

Shyann had slanted eyebrows and looked very gentle. He should be a Bright Sorcerer.

“Are you leaving, master? How much power of Serpentine have you collected? How confident are you?”

Grimm asked impatiently.

Although Grimm knew he was still in some kind of illusory mirage, all these seemed so real. Grimm dared not ever leave this maze in a suicidal manner anymore and he had begun to suspect that this was a double illusory mirage.

Otherwise, if he had truly entered some kind of Spectral World physically and attempted to leave the Spectral World in a suicidal manner, he would really die.

If he was under a spell, then this spell must have some hidden loopholes in the law as well as the spell caster’s objective.

Grimm was slowly looking for the hidden loopholes in the law. He already knew that the spell caster’s objective was to go all out to hunt for the sea serpent’s pearls.

That part was very obvious.

He was still in a mirage and could not return to Little Myna whereas the beneficiary of his endless hunting for the sea serpent shells was Mount Serpentine!

In other words, his hope of leaving this place was the Eye of Destruction!