Chapter 1138: Chapter 888: Semi-Crazy Demon
"You certainly wouldn’t dare, I was just joking. Why must I have Long Yi? Why would I start a war across the entire Plane to get him? Because Long Yi holds a tremendous secret, a secret to immortality! It’s because of this secret that he can coexist with the Crystal Poison! I must have him!"
The two had arrived at an experimental lab. Below the laboratory was a huge and empty space where crowds were queuing to be injected.
"I’m about to become stronger, hahaha!" An excited Mage being injected shouted to the person behind him.
"Haha, don’t be too hasty, I will soon surpass you!" His friend behind him laughed aloud.
In another area of the empty space, some workers in protective gear were closely monitoring a Mage. In the center of an Array, under its Resonance, the Mage’s hair was all falling out, and a series of crystals were growing on his head. His eyes became clear like crystals, and his body grew taller. At the same time, an uncontrollable torrent of Mana burst forth from within him.
"Oh... this Mana! I can feel my Mana growing stronger! Hahaha!" The Mage laughed madly.
"Don’t talk, focus on feeling the change!" A nearby worker scolded.
"Who do you think you are to speak to us like that! We are in Master Elma’s Imperial Guard!" The transforming Mage bellowed at the worker.
The scolded worker merely lifted a hand, and the Resonance of the Array instantly changed. The Mage who had just been blustering collapsed on the ground in agony, his Mana rapidly draining from his body!
"No, please don’t take my Mana! I was wrong! Sorry! Sorry!" The Mage desperately apologized, and only then did the worker wave his hand to return the Array back to normal.
"Great power often leads people astray, immersing them in self-satisfaction," Elma stated loftily to Zulal.
"That’s because they lack Your wisdom," said Zulal.
"If they had my wisdom, wouldn’t this Ancient Mage Tower have to change hands?" Elma laughed.
Zulal gestured behind him, and the lab supervisor, who didn’t dare approach, immediately delivered a report with a bowed head to Zulal and retreated with his head still lowered.
"So far, over a hundred thousand Mages have volunteered for enhancement, but less than ten thousand have completed it. A small portion showed allergic reactions, completely transforming into Crazy Demons within three days, retaining no consciousness. However, most have shown great adaptability, becoming Semi-Crazy Demons. After battle testing, their combat power has increased by more than threefold," Zulal summarized the key points from the report to Elma.
"Slower than I expected," Elma commented.
"After all, this is the first time this experiment has been widely implemented, and the workers are very cautious," Zulal replied.
"Cautious? Hmm, caution is good, considering this is a brand-new life form. But this will be the future of the entire Plane! The Semi-Crazy Demon life, possessing normal intelligence, the vitality of a Crazy Demon’s Mana. Isn’t this the perfect life form?" Elma mused seemingly offhandedly.
"No, I believe the full Crazy Demon form is the perfect one, fearing no change in environment, pure and utterly powerful," Zulal countered.
Elma turned to give Zulal a glance, clapped his shoulder with a smile, and without saying anything more, turned and left.
Zulal secretly breathed a sigh of relief, his back drenched with cold sweat. Since becoming what he is now, Elma’s temperament had become increasingly unpredictable, and a simple misstep could spell big trouble for oneself. Words and actions required extreme caution; although Elma believed he still needed him, who knew what might happen next?
Elma, with Zulal in tow, left the laboratory and entered a passage rarely tread by others. At the end of the passage stood a door that only Elma could open. Behind the door was a massive creature, restrained by chains.
It was a Black Dragon, bound by chains, looking to be in a poor mental state. In front of it were heaps of food, but it had scarcely eaten. There were about a dozen scales in front of it, evidently shed from its hide.
"This speed is too slow," Elma muttered discontentedly as he stooped to pick up the scales. He looked up at the Black Dragon. Despite its massive size, its back was mostly armored bone, and its belly had very limited scales. Even if all were stripped, that would be all there was, and besides, performing the Dragon Scale Armor required the Dragon’s cooperation. Forcibly taking the scales might cause the Black Dragon to react unfavorably.
"If only there were more of the Dragon Clan," Elma muttered to himself.
Zulal, with his head bowed and standing aside, didn’t dare to speak.
"It’s time to start a war," Elma suddenly declared.
Zulal’s second personality quickly handed over all these matters to a Crystal Demon warrior hidden among the Crazy Demons. After the Crystal Demon warrior returned to the Crystal Demon Plane, the information immediately reached Long Yi’s hands.
"War? Has Elma gone mad?" Long Yi handed the information-filled crystal to Ai Lin.
"I have to say, this Elma is really a genius, he even figured out a way to create half-crazed demons." Ai Lin exclaimed.
"The Ancient Mage Tower has always been almost the peak of both technology and magic in this plane, and any country with a genius would absorb them into the Ancient Mage Tower, so it’s not that surprising that they could develop this technology," Long Yi said.
"But what’s his intention with this war? Can he find dragons through war?" Little Zi asked.
"War may not necessarily lead to finding dragons, but maybe it can lead to finding more treasures," Long Yi said.
"What do we do then? Just wait passively for the enemy to attack?" Ai Lin asked.
"It seems there’s not much we can do, after all, their rat holes run deep, and I have no clue where they might pop out from. However, as soon as they appear in any airspace, our people will inform us, and we’ll try to get there as fast as possible," Long Yi said.
Long Yi communicated the matter to the Emperors of The Divine Auffa Empire, Saint Jialin, and the Sanctuary Empire, Saint Danze. Both emperors immediately set about mobilizing troops and stationing these soldiers in different regions, so that if any area detected traces of the Ancient Mage Tower, the nearby soldiers would immediately reinforce.
However, more than ten days passed without any news, making the two emperors suspect it was a false alarm. But when the Ancient Mage Tower suddenly appeared, everyone realized it was real!
The first target of the Ancient Mage Tower’s attack was an agricultural planet, where most of the land was extremely flat and open, suitable for planting food and livestock breeding. Therefore, this planet had always focused on agriculture, exporting a large variety of agricultural products to swap for resources from other planets, making the people of the entire planet quite prosperous. The planet issued a declaration of no military establishment, permanent neutrality, and to prevent looting by interstellar pirates, various nations had stationed troops there, which saved the planet a great deal of military expenses.
One could almost say that provoking this place was making an enemy of the entire plane, so even the most brutal interstellar pirates had never thought about looting here.
Yet unexpectedly, where pirates dared not tread, the Ancient Mage Tower did.
The enormous Ancient Mage Tower hovered high above the granary, with Semi-Crazy Demons leaping down from the sky. They launched indiscriminate attacks without regard to who or what was before them.
Initially, the emperor of the planet thought they were after the food, but when the granaries exploded under the flames of magic, they understood that these bastards were here just to destroy!
"Counterattack! Send out distress signals!"
Because of the early warning, the distress signal was immediately sent out, and the transport ships nearby immediately sped towards the site.
Given the importance of food, both The Divine Auffa Empire and the Sanctuary Empire had troops stationed here. Not long before, both empires had replaced ordinary troops with Divine Armor units—soldiers who possessed both the strength of Sanctuary Mages and Divine Armor were extremely powerful, although their numbers were only a hundred each. Yet, these mere two hundred soldiers managed to staunchly hold back the army of Semi-Crazy Demons!
"All units, full firepower! We’re responsible for defense!" shouted a Divine Armor Mage.
Behind him, soldiers from various nations were desperately unleashing their firepower.
But this firepower was ultimately too weak; the magical onslaught that struck the Semi-Crazy Demons couldn’t even push them back!
Seeing that the soldiers from other countries were useless, the Divine Armor Mages had to come up with their own plan.
"Cross-defense attack!"
This was a collaborative combat tactic between the soldiers of the two nations, taking turns defending and attacking to share defense and offense.
While one side used shields to withstand, the other would go all out with magic attacks under the protection of the shields. With a three-layer protection system comprising Mana shield, Rune armor, and metal armor, the attacks of the Semi-Crazy Demon Mages, although powerful, were blocked. Yet, the counterattacks from these Divine Armor Mages were not so easily resisted. The spell intensity, which surpassed that of ordinary mages, could turn even common spells into Sanctuary spells after being amplified by the Divine Armor, not to mention that these Divine Armors were all manned by Sanctuary Mages!
Spells burst through the air, shattering groups of Semi-Crazy Demon Mages with powerful magic spells, temporarily depriving them of their offensive ability.
Yes, only temporarily. These Semi-Crazy Demons inherited the Crazy Demons’ terrifying restoration ability; even if their bodies were pulverized, they could reconstitute themselves using Crystal Poison. Of course, each reconstitution would take them a step further towards complete demonization and their intelligence would continue to decline.
But this was certainly better than death! (To be continued. If you like this work, you’re welcome to vote for it with recommendation tickets or monthly tickets at Qidian (qidian.com). Your support is my greatest motivation. Mobile users, please visit m.qidian.com to read.)
