Advancing to Wizard

Although Greem might be deceived, the Chip certainly would not!

Dynamically monitoring all the data within Greem's body, the Chip could track in real-time—and even predict—subsequent changes through the curved fluctuation graphs of various bodily functions. If he were to continue accepting those unfiltered and unscreened alien energies pouring endlessly from the bloody altar, he might indeed condense some unknown conscious core.

Yet once the supporting alien energies subsided, his fall would be disastrous. A shattered conscious core would be the least of his concerns; by then, even his soul would fail to escape the terrifying backlash brought on by a failed advancement.

It was time to counterattack! He must never drag this out until the moment the conscious core formed; otherwise, he would lose the chance to forge a core centered around his fire-type affinity!

Greem suddenly began to struggle violently in the execution chair. However, his limbs were all bound and fixed to it by a special kind of rope, and a hemispherical iron cap even covered his head. Every tiny movement of his triggered a violent rebound from the execution chair, causing eerie runes to surface on the black ropes, burning his skin and flesh with a sizzling sound.

The ropes were drawn terribly tight, looking as if they intended to embed themselves into his flesh and blood.

As many as seven or eight red-hot spikes on the iron cap above his head pierced fiercely into his skull, releasing a bizarre wave capable of disrupting normal human thinking. Intense pain and cognitive interference—either of these alone would have been enough to disrupt Greem's subsequent actions!

Greem's physique was at 13 points, a high enough constitution to endure the vast majority of physical pain. Even so, he still found it difficult to resist these special torture devices that Master Anderson had prepared specifically for the three of them.

One had to admit that Anderson had indeed gone to great pains to keep the three of them under control.

The ropes, tanned using black jiao skin from the Eastern Coast, were sufficient to withstand any quasi-adept level spell attack. Moreover, none of the three possessed any particular talent in physical strength; it was impossible for them to break free from the execution chair's restraints using mere physical power alone. Coupled with the influence of the Gnome Brainwashing Cap, even if the three of them truly became adepts, without the opportunity to extract external elemental energy to restore themselves, they would forever remain nothing more than three pieces of meat with the status of adepts but none of the power.

This was a small pocket dimension controlled entirely by him, and all spatial permissions rested in his hands. Without his permission, Greem and the other two could not hope to extract even a shred of elemental energy. Three sacrificial offerings who possessed adept-tier ranks but remained at the quasi-adept level—this was the lavish feast Master Anderson had prepared for himself!

The alien energies emanating from the altar continued to seep relentlessly into Greem's body through the execution chair, pushing him ever closer to that most terrifying abyss. Even at such a life-or-death juncture, Greem remained as calm as usual, his mental faculties even clearer and more thorough than during ordinary times.

"Alice, are you done over there yet? If you drag this out any longer, not only will I find it hard to escape death, but you will likely end up buried along with me!"

"Almost... done... Give me... half a quarter-hour longer... These... damned... Tower Guardians... are really hard to kill..." Alice's consciousness fluctuations, leaking from the depths of her soul, were intermittent, clearly showing that she was in the midst of fierce battlefield combat.

"Remember, you only have half a quarter-hour. For now, transfer what I need to me first!"

"Dammit... This is killing me... Do you really have to... ask for things... at a time like this? Asshole... I'm... ouch..."

Alice cursed hastily a few times, her final shrill scream clearly employing her most terrifying move, "Spatial Rupture." Having momentarily cleared the enemies surrounding her, Alice finally freed up her hands and feet to transmit the items Greem required.

Feeling a slight vibration in his palm, Greem sat upright in the execution chair, flipping both hands over. In each palm, a miniature spatial spell array was triggering ripples of space in concentric circles. When the spatial ripples grew dense enough, a small spatial passageway was torn open there.

Plop.

With a soft sound, two objects passed through the rune-array—which resembled a short-range teleportation circle—and appeared in Greem's hands.

Over the past month or so, Alice had repeatedly tried various methods to deliver items into Greem's hands, only to be blocked and kept out by elemental defenses and spatial barriers. Driven to absolute extremes, Alice's imagination had truly run wild, conceiving of something as bizarre as a miniature spatial positioning rune-array.

Then she provided the idea, the Chip did the heavy lifting, and the mysterious rune-arrays in Greem's left and right palms were thus successfully created!

With the guidance and positioning provided by the rune-array, Alice found it much simpler and easier to deliver items to Greem. In fact, on many occasions, it felt as effortless as executing a short-range spatial teleportation.

Landing in the palm of Greem's left hand was the Flame Lord puppet crystal core, while the item falling into his right hand was his most reliable weapon of choice, the Flame Lord's Scepter.

Having long had a premonition that his equipment and belongings would be confiscated by Anderson, Greem had stashed the two great trump cards capable of aiding his comeback with Alice early on, ready to be transferred over when necessary.

Now that the magical artifact was in hand and the puppet was in grasp, it was time to lock horns with that Master Anderson!

The flame scepter in his right hand waved gently, and a large gate of flames immediately materialized behind Greem. Through the billowing, rolling continuous flames and the terrifyingly high temperatures visible through the hazy, translucent fiery door, one could vaguely glimpse the terrifying world on the opposite side of the Fire Elemental Plane, composed entirely of pure fire.

Endless fire elements gushed out from the gate of flames, instantly transforming the adjacent space into a sea of fire. Amidst the soaring sea of flames, Greem hurled down the puppet crystal core.

The next second, a towering Flame Lord that scraped the heavens and earth was born within the rolling, blazing inferno!

The very first action of the Flame Lord upon its debut was to swing its lava-covered, flame-engulfed hand, tearing the execution chair that bound Greem to shreds in a single grab.

As Greem exercised his somewhat numb arms, the horrifying wounds on his body quickly began to close and heal amidst the flames engulfing his entire body, until they vanished completely. Possessing a fiery physique, wherever there was fire was his home turf, allowing him to pull off a spot of self-healing along the way.

Master Anderson floated above the bloody altar, looking down at the upright quasi-adept brat standing tall below. The raging fury and hatred in his heart had grown so intense it could no longer be increased. Under the interference of the powerful gate of flames, the operation of the bloody altar was severely affected, and the other two sacrificial offerings on the altar also began to writhe and struggle, looking as though they were about to wake up at any moment.

Dammit, dammit, dammit...

With a rapid-fire succession of cursing roars, Master Anderson launched an attack against Greem without the slightest hesitation.

Countless violent and ferocious wind blades whistled toward Greem.

Without even needing Greem to make a move himself, the Flame Lord—which occupied a small half-space of the altar's top tier—strode forward two steps and hurled a Blazing Storm right back.

The wind blade slashing and the Blazing Storm collided in mid-air, instantly dyeing the surrounding area red. Countless violent flames and sharp, pure wind blades collided and thrashed against each other in the void, quickly revealing the differences in their destructive power.

The power of the Blazing Storm was too scattered, and its might was far inferior to the opposing wind blade slashing.

Consequently, under the slashing of countless howling wind vortices and wind blades, the fire elements—whose full might had not yet been unleashed—were torn to shreds and reduced to a routed army. Having annihilated the Blazing Storm, the remaining violent wind blades finally struck the body of the fire giant.

The fire giant stood tall, its body's undulating lava shield combining the ferocity of the fire element with the sturdiness of the earth element. Therefore, although it was covered in deep slash marks, its inner fire-origin remained undamaged.

Relying on the protection of the fire giant, Greem roared loudly and finally succeeded in summoning a Fire Djinn. Contrary to the past when the fire djinn was always sent onto the battlefield as cannon fodder, Greem acted completely out of character today, reaching out to plunge his hand into the chest of the Fire Djinn and pulling out a special firestone with flickering runes embedded within.

Roaring up toward the heavens, Greem opened his mouth and swallowed the blazing, steaming firestone in a single gulp.

It was like swallowing a miniature sun. From his mouth to his throat and down to his stomach, infinite light and heat radiated outward from Greem's body, almost turning him into a transparent man of fire. Once such a concentrated aggregate of fire elements entered his stomach, the numerous magic-pattern rune-arrays on the surface of Greem's body began to light up one by one, driven by the homologous fire-type energy.

Greem roared loudly as blinding, dazzling light and heat radiated from every bone and joint of his limbs. An elemental flame originating from the depths of his soul finally ignited his body and soul.

In the past, Greem had bathed in the embrace of elemental flames countless times, but those had always been flames formed by the mutual excitation and collision of fire element energy and a fiery physique. At this moment, however, Greem was ignited by the flames diffusing from the depths of his soul.

Having understood fire, played with fire, and studied fire for so long, for the very first time, Greem touched upon the internal rules of fire element particles, establishing a faint connection and resonance with the fire-type laws within the plane's consciousness. This was the true origin that Greem would rely on to continue forging ahead on his adept path in the future.

"Not enough... This is not enough! I need more..."

Roaring at the top of his lungs, Greem finally unleashed the miraculous special ability bestowed upon him by his magic-patterned set—the Flame Fiend Transformation.

A fire man, far purer and more powerful than the fire giant, appeared in the arena. His two-meter-tall physique continuously expanded and swelled under the infusion of massive fire-type energy, quickly growing to three meters. A thick pillar of fire projected from the gate of flames behind him, pouring an endless stream of fire-type energy into his body.

Because the fire man was usurping and absorbing fire energy too violently and urgently, even the gate of flames struggled to keep up with his demands. The towering pillars and the flames on the doors of the flame gate gradually faded, revealing an archaic stone body covered in dense runes.

Supported by such a massive amount of fire energy, Greem once again let out a horrifying roar that shook the entire space. Driven by his powerful will, all the absorbed fire energy rushed frantically into his spiritual space, where it was repeatedly compressed and tempered, then compressed and tempered again...

This level of fire aggregation was no longer something his mere fiery physique could control. Every time his spiritual space vibrated and contracted, the powerful fire energy compressed and tempered by his spiritual consciousness entity inflicted terrifying fire damage upon him.

When the fire damage grew strong enough to a certain degree, even a low-tier fiery physique could no longer exempt him from it!

Every time his spiritual consciousness entity compressed fire energy, it was no different from an ordinary person embracing a brazier capable of inflicting massive harm upon them. There were no strange sounds of burning skin and flesh; the only thing present was the intense pain piercing straight to the depths of his soul.

Greem grew numb amidst wave after wave of intense pain, while his spiritual consciousness entity was likewise purged of the vast majority of impurities and useless dregs by the terrifying flames. Driven by his fearlessness of pain through repeated mental compressions, the powerful fire energy finally began to condense and manifest, crystallizing around that single thread of fire-type rule into the conscious core essential for advancing to an adept.

Greem had successfully advanced to become a fire adept right on the battlefield!