Imperial City, The Evergreen Fox Paradise.
The Evergreen Fox Paradise is the biggest forest around the Academy, it is spread around in the wide area, even the Academy didn't have all information about it and only managed a part of it.
Suddenly, a silhouette covered in flames passed through the forest, burning down everything in its way to ashes, the figure stopped for a moment and his appearance became clear, it was a red-haired man wearing a long robe made of fire. It was Simon, the instructor of the main class of Kale's batch, right now, his eyes were burning like embers as he scanned through his surroundings.
He paused for a second then looked at his right "Found you!"
Simon raised his hand in a certain direction, three spears made of molten metal were condensed in mid-air and shot out at the tree.
Just before the spears could hit, the tree flickered like an illusion and turned into a figure wearing a black cloak, the figure flickered once before it disappeared again and appeared several meters away from its previous location.
The magma spears landed on the empty ground and made three deep holes with sizzling hot lava seeping out of them.
Simon stared at the figure, from the body shape alone, it was a man, due to the black hood covering his body it was hard to find any more details, the hood wasn't simple it had inscriptions that hid the wearer's identity completely from others.
The only other thing Simon noticed was the number written on his left shoulder, it was 29.
"Such methods… You have the Void Inheritance, don't you?" Simon said in a solemn tone as he mobilized the mana in his Origin Chasm for another attack.
Void Inheritance, is an inheritance consisted of a Void spell set, Void magic is rare magic created by Supreme Void Sage Zero. It is derived from the equilibrium condition between Time and Space magic, the initial class of a Void Mage is Tier 3, a mage has to reach Tier 2 in both Time and Space magic before they could meet the minimum requirement to practice Void magic.
Void magic is rare, it's not easy to get your hands on, even if an organisation get it they won't spread it easily, for stance, there isn't a single Void Spell available to the normal students.
The man didn't respond to him and just stood there, ready to escape anytime.
"It's enough No. 29, it was a job done well," A woman's voice came from above.
Simon quickly raised his hand and saw a black sparrow flying in the sky, the sparrow looked back at him then suddenly its body inflated giving off a bright light. When the light disappeared, a woman in a similar black hood appeared flying in the air, although her attire was the same as the man, the number on her shoulder was 22.
'Illusion Magic? Two on one? No, the woman was able to hide so deeply, she didn't come for rescue… She was already hiding here before I came, it's a trap!' Simon thought, he didn't talk, he raised his hands in the air then slammed them on the ground.
A wave of ragging flame appeared out of nowhere and burst out in all direction, covering everything in its way and turning all obstacles into ashes.
'With this, I should be able to escape, the help should be arriving soon, I can then overpower then and… Huh?' Simon stopped after thinking this much, he looked at the flame covering his vision then at himself, his eyes got widened, thinking of something he grabbed the pinky of his left hand and twisted it anticlockwise.
With a click sound, his bone joint dislocated, severe pain hit him, Simon greeted his teeth and looked around, he noticed a tiny blank hole in the firewall at his left, Simon raised his hand and shot a fireball at it.
…Swooshh…
The fireball struck the blank hole, just at the time of impact, cracks appeared on the flame wall, it was like the fireball was a stone that struck a glass wall, the whole area around Simon got filled with cracks and shattered at once.
Simon again observed his surrounding, he saw that there was no raging fire around from earlier, not even a blade of grass around his feet was burning, the man and woman in the black hood were silently standing in front of him staring at him.
"Using pain to find loopholes? That was more childish than I expected it to be, tell me No. 29, is he the one we are searching for?" No. 22 said.
"Don't doubt the superior's information," No. 29 said.
A bead of sweat rolled down Simon's forehead.
'She didn't suffer backlash? Then this Tier 3 spell wasn't from her present cultivation stage, but then... Is she a Tier 4?' Simon thought.
He silently activated the Ethereal mastery level sound transmission spell inside his Origin Chasm, it activated and worked.
But Simon wasn't relieved he was more worried, the spell was working fine but can't his enemy guess he would try to contact others? If so, then why weren't they even trying to stop him? They didn't use any type of counterspell either?
The woman noticed his dark expression and smiled "Are you wondering why the spell seems to work fine? Tell me something, is anyone responding to you from the other side?"
When Simon heard her words, he understood something was really bad.
"You are wasting your mana like that, as long as I am here, no sound shall ever disobey my wishes," A faint melodious voice rang in everyone's head, Simon was shocked, he failed to guess the direction where the voice was coming from.
'A Sound Mage? No wonder… I am trapped,' Simon gulped hard.
Earlier in the day, when he got the information that someone was spying around the Academy, he left everything behind to come and chase him as one of the Academy's instructor as well as the protector, but who knew that it was a trap set up by the enemy.
Sound transmission is a General type spell but it was actually derived from the Sound type spells, it was forcible changed into incomplete General Spell so that everyone can easily learn and use it but when a talented mage practising rare Sound Magic is involved, they could easily affect the spell and fool its user.
It was just like Simon trying to call for help but a hacker connected the call to itself then didn't pick it.
Simon was still trying to guess where was the third enemy when he saw the void in a certain place slightly trembling, the silhouette of two people soon came into existence, they didn't teleport or ripped the void, it was more like their body that was completely transparent a few second ago.
It was a woman holding the hand of a man who held a white flute in his hand, the woman had the No. 30, while the man had the No. 15 on their dresses.
'A mutant woman with the trait of invisibility and a Sound Mage?' Simon frowned deeply.
He then took a deep breath to calm himself down 'I still have a chance, as long as I take that Sound Mage by surprise, his spell would be interrupted and I can ask for reinforcements. Sound Mage are weak in close combat so I can make it if I close the distance,' Thinking of this Simon felt somewhat relieved, he then raised his hand and snapped his fingers.
'Flame Deviation Clone Set'
Suddenly, his whole body got covered by flames, hiding all his skin and clothes, then his body got separated into four figures that dashed towards the four opponents all at once.
The Sound Mage looked at the two flames made figures coming at him and the woman beside him, he chuckled.
"Sound Mage are weaker in close combat… Is that what you are thinking?" He said then out of nowhere, he disappeared from his location, Simon disguised as a flame clone heard a sonic boom passing by him, but before his ears recognized the sound, the Sound Mage was already standing just before him.
The man extended his hand and flickered his fingers, another sonic boom rang and Simon was thrown backwards, all the four clones disappeared at the same time, he rolled down on the ground several times before stopping.
His condition was bad, his ears were bleeding, he could only hear a buzzing sound, his vision was blurred, he was stunned, Simon lost his ability to fight mentally.
The Illusion Mage woman saw his downstate and snorted "Not impressive at all, the level of Imperial Academy has fallen in the recent years, is that Queen really someone that needs to be feared, if I was an Immortal too then..."
"Stop dreaming with open eyes," The Sound Mage muttered without looking at her, the woman stopped at once, there was no dissatisfaction on her face towards him, there was only fear and reverence. The man continued "The means of Immortals, can we understand? We may be stronger on the mortals' side but thousand like you can't be compared to the weakest Immortal, don't forget that and stop using words like If and But.
Talking about strength, you follow me without question because I am ranked 15, do you know what is his rank?"
The Sound Mage said as he slowly walked to Simon.
All three people looked into each other's eyes, his question had piqued their interest.
The Sound Mage, No. 15 didn't say more, once he was close to Simon, he squatted down on his knees and took a white orb out of nowhere, the orb looked mostly simple except the flickering speck of light moving inside it.
No. 15 then crushed it, the second the orb was crushed, its debris turned into white smoke, while numerous light specks came out of it and moved wildly in the midair, then one of them willingly drilled into the Simon lying on the ground, the first was then followed by second, third, soon all the light specks shot themselves at him, disappearing into his body.
Simon's body twitched from time to time as the specks made their way into his body. There was no physical change in his body compared to that, inwardly, the change was everything but simple, Simon was having a tough time, a huge battle was taking place inside his head, the memories he had built in his life until now seemed blurred, they seemed fake, like he was thinking of a projection as a family until now, the past didn't seem feasible anymore.
At the same time, new memories of a completely different life were surfacing in his head, for a second he thought he was living two lives all this time at the same time, but then he noticed one life was of just around 20 years at most while the other surpassed several decades.
The change in memories wasn't the only thing, the Magma spell set inside his Origin Charm was also rapidly transforming, it was like only a small part of his ‹Magma Star Constellation› was shown till now, and the curtain was now being lifted, an enormous ‹Magma Star Constellation› with numerous types of spells came into existence.
As the ‹Magic Star Constellation› changed, the vitality of his body also started to rise, his body shape changed too, finally, it was his life level that was increasing every moment.
Wisps of crimson flames appeared all over his body and covered him, the little wisps then turned into raging flames, a few seconds later another change occurred, the crimson flame changed into magenta flame.
No. 15 and all others backed off, their eyes were locked onto the heap of flames, although they couldn't see the insides but could still feel the presence of the entity that had reached Tier 5 peak, an existence at Level 50, it was the stage where a practitioner was qualified to make changes in the mortal world and even dream of ruling it!
Under Immortals, Tier 5 were Supremes!
The raging magenta flames soon cooled down and the figure of a man with long red hair came into view, the man had no injuries on his body. In terms of appearance, he was somewhat different from Simon, he had a red tattoo all over his body that could be seen due to the hole in his clothes, he had his hands folded behind his back, his eyes were pitch red and a calm expression was present on his face.
No. 15 took a step forward and got on his knees "Subordinate greets No. 7,"
The second the words came out his lips, the other three were frozen on the spot, they expected it to be a 2 digits top ranker meaning No. 11 at most, but from his words, they realized he was not only a single-digit ranker in the organisation but also No. 7.
They hurriedly got on their knees and paid their respect.
No. 7 remained quiet for a few minutes, he closed his eyes and breathed deeply a few times, then spoke "It's two years early, why?"
"There were some complications in the plan, we don't have that much time anymore, No. 5 wanted you to awaken just in case, he also wanted to know if you have obtained some information on Queen," No. 15 asked.
"No, the Queen is very deep, even after being here for so long I only learned one thing," No. 7 said slowly.
"And what it is No 7?" No. 17 asked with raised brows.
"That she isn't simple as people think, rather than a ruler, she is a conqueror, she is a threat that needs to be removed early but it's not easy to do that," No. 7 said in a deep tone.