Badge in Azure

Jason knew his student’s weakness very well. If a mage did not have the courage to face obstacles alone, then it would be difficult to become a sorcerer, much less reach grade-9.

Beyond grade-9 was the mage trainer. Jason had never spoken to Saleen about that before, but the number of mage trainers on the Myers Mainland would never be more than 10. Such knowledge regarding grades had never been made known.

Every mage trainer must be strong mentally so that they could face any challenge. They had to have no fear, even if death was imminent.

Joey might have said that he would flee, but that was a decision made out of his own assessment of the situation, and not because he was trying to avoid the same enemy. When Saleen encountered the Angel of Fear, his first thought was to escape as well. The difference in their grades was the main reason.

When Saleen was unable to escape, he did not give up and did not hide in the divine tree magic tower without thinking of solutions. Even when the winged skeleton was in danger, Saleen managed to make his decision instantaneously.

He decided to fight. When faced with a powerful opponent, he would use all ways and means to keep fighting.

Nailisi was in her devil-form and was peeling off the skin of the Angel of Fear. There was only a small cut within the hair on the entire body. The wound was still trying to heal itself, so Saleen decided to throw the Angel of Fear’s skin into his water flame and refine it on the spot.

Within the broken jade, the Angel of Fear’s soul howled along with her linked soul but did not attack Saleen in any way. Saleen even continued to provoke them verbally.

“What is fear? It is something you feel when you are facing danger, but there is nothing you can do about it, and not when you are about to die. There is nothing scary about death. It will pass very quickly. I will punish the two of you slowly. This is only the first step. By the time your physical body has no more value, that’s when I will start to deal with your souls. My advice is that you should slowly get used to it. The day will come very soon.”

Saleen touched the leather bag on his waist, which contained the winged skeleton’s golden heart. The winged skeleton’s soul flame had not been extinguished yet but Saleen could sense that he was extremely weak. Most of the power of a spirit was gathered in its soul flames, but once the physical body has been destroyed, the spirit would be in a very fragile state as well. Saleen had no idea how to remodel a body.

He was not a death mage, so he had no idea if winged skull’s body could heal. If the heart was all that was left, Saleen had no idea how to accept that fact.

Saleen had gotten Soldier from Daniel as an attempt to take advantage of the latter. After getting the winged skeleton, Saleen began to develop feelings for him until he saw the winged skeleton as a friend. Saleen knew that the winged skeleton’s loyalty was not because of him as a person, but because of the many days they had spent together.

He had never treated the winged skeleton as cannon fodder, nor ever deserted him. He had always believed in the principle of a mage and treated the winged skeleton as his partner. That time around, the winged skeleton rushed all the way here because he believed Saleen was in danger. Such loyalty could hardly be found between creatures that possessed intelligence.

As a mage, Saleen knew too well what loyalty was about. Loyalty was an exchange of things with equal values. Ultimately, the target of your loyalty could only be rules.

The winged skeleton’s feelings towards Saleen had already gone beyond the rule of equivalent exchange.

“The two of you can slowly enjoy it…” With that, Saleen threw the broken jade into another leather bag. His bag, which was made from a purple-gold sea urchin, was meant to be distributed to his subordinates for their own use. Since the broken jade had been put in, the souls would still be able to sense Saleen’s actions. That was because the purple-gold sea urchin bag was not an independent space from an interdimensional space and there were no protective features.

After Nailisi has peeled off the Angel of Fear’s skin, what was left was a bloody mess on the ground. Nailisi dug out the Angel of Fear’s eyes and fed them to her long lance. All six eyes on the lance opened at the same time. Both of the Angel of Fear’s eyes instantly melted into fluid and were absorbed directly by the six eyes.

Nailisi sensed an invisible power gathering within her long lance, but something seemed to be lacking. She patted the body of the long lance, which made a whimpering sound.

“Alright, next time when I find something suitable, I will definitely feed it to you,” Nailisi consoled her weapon. The weapon was about to develop a Weapon’s Spirit!

It was not surprising for the Twelve Notes of Purgatory to develop a Weapon’s Spirit. After all, she had thrown in many high-quality materials and it was a very mature weapon in the first place. Nailisi merely repaired it a little after advancing.

By right, Saleen’s divine tree magic tower should have been able to develop a Weapon’s Spirit most easily, but its grade was too high, and it had not been completely refined. There were still some ways to go before the spirit could be developed.

Nailisi’s long lance was about to develop Weapon’s Spirit; that meant that the long lance could advance. It was already terrifying enough as a grade-10 equipment. If it was to advance, then Nailisi’s weapon could very well be on the same level as a Godly item.

Many Godly items did not even have Weapon’s Spirits actually. Even if they did, they were either clones of Gods or souls of disciples. On the other hand, the Weapon’s Spirit produced from human-made equipment was an independent lifeform. It could advance like humans and become powerful beings.

For Gods and Mythical Beasts, from the moment they were born, their grades had already been decided. It would be extremely difficult for them to advance. To do so, they would have to spend millions of years, take in countless disciples, and absorb the powers of many dimensions. As for humans, although they were weak at birth, they could continue to advance and the speed at which they could advance was something that left all other creatures feeling envious. They would be able to advance all the way to grade-24, and no dimensions would be able to contain such power.

Only humans could reach grade-24, not Gods. This was a saying that had been passed down from the past. Of course, no human had ever reached grade-24. The saying spoke about the future and about hope.

Nailisi might not be a human but her bloodline was also of a very high status. Luoluokaluos were like humans. They gained incredible power and status through their invasions into many dimensions. The demon dimension only became weaker when the power of the Myers Mainland dropped drastically.

Demon weapons were also capable of developing very powerful Weapon’s Spirits. The weapon was refined by humans in the first place, though, and Nailisi was pleased. She pierced the tip of the lance into the Angel of Fear’s blood vessel so that the six eyes could absorb the blood.

“Saleen! I will never forgive you…” the Angel of Fear never stopped scolding from in the broken jade in the leather bag.

Saleen knew what to do in such a situation because of his past experience with the Mechanical Soul. He activated a sliver of electric current and the Angel of Fear immediately kept quiet. The two linked souls screamed in pain until they did not even have the energy to scream anymore.

Although her soul was very powerful, once it left the physical body and was attacked by electric current, it did not matter what grade it was. A soul that was being electrocuted had no choice but to tolerate it. If the Angel of Fear’s soul had not left her physical body, the electric current from Saleen would not have been able to affect her at all.

After Nailisi pierced the long lance into the Angel of Fear’s blood vessel, she spat out a Dragon Crystal Needle to split open her muscles so that Nailisi could search for her tendons.

The tendons of grade-12 creatures should be very resilient, otherwise they would not be able to produce such incredible power. It might have looked easy for the Angel of Fear to wield her long knife, but the power harnessed within was not something that even Nailisi could handle. To put that in context, Nailisi possessed the Power of a Giant Dragon. Even if she did not transform into a giant dragon, she should be as strong as a golden grand swordmaster.

Although the Angel of Fear had taken on a humanoid form, the muscles and tendons in her body were still slightly different from humans. Ultimately, the insides of the body of a grade-12 creature were still imperfect.

Nailisi quickly found a huge tendon and observed it with her Eye of Demon. After locating the arteries and veins of the tendon to be around the spine and near the tailbone, she slowly cut it in half with her Dragon Crystal Needle before taking it out. By right, the Angel of Fear’s physical body could still retaliate, but after Saleen’s clan badge had absorbed all of its power, this empty shell without a soul could do nothing against Nailisi.

Peeling the skin and taking out the tendon was only the first step. The most valuable resource was the bones. The Angel of Fear’s bones were incredibly strong, and since the winged skeleton’s body had been destroyed, the latter would need materials for restoration. The bones were just the right type of materials to be used for refining Soldier.

The Angel of Fear’s bone marrow possessed a mysterious life strength. Nailisi could transform into a three-faced bone demon to extract the bone marrow out to be refined into soul beads.

After seeing the various abilities of soul beads, Nailisi had always been very envious. Unfortunately, she never managed to possess suitable materials to refine soul beads and she was never going to beg the winged skeleton for some. Since Saleen had given her permission to scourge the Angel of Fear’s body, but ultimately only needed her skin, naturally she was going secretly create a few soul beads. She would definitely be able to put them to good use in the future, when her spirit form was about to advance.

There must be something special in the bones of the Angel of Fear that allowed her to devour souls. The substances were more important than the internal organs that stored souls. Without the substances, she would have lost the ability to store souls as well.

Demons could devour souls too, so they were particularly sensitive to substances related to souls. After extracting 12 of the most resilient tendons, Nailisi released two magic bugs to consume the Angel of Fear’s muscle.

Saleen was refining the Angel of Fear’s skin by her side, oblivious to what Nailisi was doing.

Two red magic bugs crawled out from the gaps of Nailisi’s fingers and pounced onto the Angel of Fear. They began chewing madly, but they were soon full, and their mouth organs broke down rapidly. Each magic bug could only consume about two mouthfuls.

Two and half mouthfuls were enough to feed Nailisi’s magic bugs. The two bugs immediately began to mate in the bloody mess of the Angel of Fear’s body. In about three minutes, eggs were produced, and the two red magic bugs died.