Fire Mage (Web Novel)

Chapter 344: Time-Elemental Crystal

'Time-Stop ability!' Charles's pupil constricted all of a sudden!

At that moment, Smog Phantom moved away from where it stood before and soon turned blurry.

Simultaneously, Charles felt some invisible power attacked him out of nowhere!

'N…o… It's… affecting… my… thoughts…'

Without any hesitation, he released his wisdom power and activated the [Accelerate Thoughts] skill!

Only then did he saw a blurry black shadow was moving towards him at a fast speed. Moreover, it held an eerie black scythe in its smoke-like hand!

The shadow arrived in front of him in a blink and slashed the eerie scythe at his head.

Upon noticing the upcoming attack, Charles cast the [Fire Born] spell in a hurry and turned into an elemental being.

Simultaneously, he took a step back and was about to back away but soon felt his whole body was turning stiff.

'Damn it; my body is not responding to my thinking speed. Moreover, I can't even create my Fire Domain.' Cursing inwardly, he mustered his strength and leaped backward.

The eerie black scythe tore through his [Sun's Shield] spell and almost appeared in front of his cheek.

Thankfully, Charles managed to move his body at the last second and evaded the attack.

Still, a light scratch appeared on his right cheek.

'A troublesome enemy.' Charles turned his gaze towards the black shadow and cast [Burning Thoughts] spell.

But to his shock, the Smog Phantom didn't stop at all.

Instead, it retracted its scythe and once again slashed at Charles's head!

'Why? Does this creature have no consciousness? Impossible. There must be another reason for it. How am I supposed to kill it?' He was baffled for a moment.

Charles then hurriedly released his invisible strings and tried to stop the Smog Phantom.

Unfortunately, even that attempt went futile!

All those invisible strings pierced through those smokes and couldn't touch anything physical at all!

'Sh*t! My body isn't responding faster to evade the scythe.' Without any choice, Charles squatted a little and jumped upward a little.

Simultaneously, the eerie black scythe directly tore through the air, slashed at his neck, and entered deep into his neck!

But instead of panicking, a smile appeared on Charles's face.

Then, an eerie blackish ball of flame appeared from his hand, moved towards the Smog Phantom, and crashed on its body!

Unlike before, the Rank-4 [Black Inferno] managed to burn almost half of its humanoid body!

On the other hand, the Smog Phantom's scythe also cut Charles's neck and decapitated his head from the body!

Even though Charles was in his elemental body form, he still felt a sharp pain.

'No good!' A frown appeared on his face as he instantly shifted his attention towards his Inner World and cast the Rank-4 [Heart of Fire] Spell.

The next second, his decapitated head pulled towards the sliced neck and reattached on its own!

Simultaneously, he returned to his human self and felt a wet sensation on his neck.

At this moment, the Black Inferno spell continued to push the Smog Phantom towards the frozen [Finger of Destruction] spell and then started to burn the Smog Phantom's black smokes.

A shrill cry came from the creature's mouth as it tried to back away.

With no other choice, it released the [Time Stop] skill that frozen the [Finger of Destruction] spell and used it on the [Black Inferno] spell.

But a second later, the reddish chaotic bullet started to crack and began to explode.

A loud explosion came from the Smog Phantom's back and caused the nearby spatial cracks to enlarge!

Although the Smog Phantom could turn into black smoke and evade most of the physical attack, it still wasn't powerful enough to completely block the heat.

In seconds, the chaos fire engulfed the creature and burned it.

[Target Eliminated! 60,400 Exp rewarded!]

'What the hell? Only 60,400 exp? Does that mean that this creature is only a peak Rank-3 Creature?' Charles got stupefied for a moment.

'Damn, even a Rank-3 creature could pose a serious threat to a pseudo-Legendary Mage, huh.' He muttered inwardly and soon turned his attention towards the diminishing chaos flames.

At that moment, Charles suddenly saw a fist-sized transparent crystal and raised his eyebrows.

Then, he used the [Sleight of Mystery Hand] skill, picked up the crystal, and pulled it towards him.

Soon, he caught the fist-sized crystal and inspected it using the [Arcane Eyes] skill.

The next second, his expression turned serious.

'A Rank-3 Time-Elemental Crystal? So, this crystal has a dense amount of Time-Elemental energy, huh.'

'This creature only used two skills, but it almost killed me… The first one is to stop the Time around a particular area, and the other is to slow down one's thinking… Decelerate Thoughts? So, it's a Magical Beast with Time affinity?' He stared at it in surprise and soon tried to store it in his space ring.

But to his surprise, he couldn't!

No, he felt that a fierce elemental clash appeared in his space ring!

With no other choice, he stored the fist-sized crystal in his pant pocket and continued to walk.

During the next few hours, Charles met the Blood Mosquitoes a few times but didn't face any difficulty to kill them.

Soon, Charles reached the other end of the Blood Valley and started climbing up.

After some struggle, he finally reached the Domain of Lava Giants and soon got stunned.

Because what he saw was not some strange fire-elemental trees, creatures, and insects. Instead, the whole land appeared gigantic rocks, trees, plants, creatures, and animals.

Even a rodent-like animal appeared more than one meter tall!

The same goes for the plants and vines.

'Crossing this land seems to be a challenging one.' He muttered inwardly and soon zeroed his gaze on the dense red forest filled with monstrous birds, trees, plants, and vines.

Although he got shocked a little, he wasn't anxious at all.

'Hmm, other than their monstrous bodies, there seems to be nothing abnormal about these creatures.' He thought to himself and stepped forward.

He first found a safe place, returned to the Edhen World, and gave the Time Elemental crystal to the Holem's Crown.

After that, he returned to the Fire-Elemental Plane and started his journey.

Along the way, he met many giant creatures like Giant Wolves, Red Ogres, Behemoths, and even some Lava Orcs and killed them before sending the creatures' bodies to Edhen.

Although most of them were Rank-3 creatures, their values were pretty high because of their rarity.

The days passed as he crossed the Domain of Lava Giants and finally reached the other territory.

As he walked out of the red forest-like region, he looked at the front and soon widened his eyes.

The next second, hot air assaulted him from the front and made him breathe harder.

As the name says, embers and fires were the only things that appeared in this land!

Multiple times of fires flew out from the ember-filled lands like volcanoes and made the surrounding air hotter.

As Charles surveyed the land, he suddenly noticed something at the center and soon squinted his eyes.

A monstrous castle stood at the center of the desert-like land caught his attention.

Ember Castle!

Unlike other lands, there was only one creature that survives in this harsh land.

They were the Ember Golems!

Most of them stay in the castle and continue to strengthen this castle defense.

They would rarely come out of this land and always maintains a neutral relationship with all other races.

'They also worship a strange 'God' called 'Mother Earth'… But unlike the believers in Edhen World, these Ember Golems never preaches and rarely invite outsiders to participate in the ceremonies. They are peaceful creatures.' Charles glanced at the information he got from the Tebs and stepped on the embers.

Although he felt a slightly itchy sensation, his foot wasn't affected by the heat and the flames at all.

No, he felt a warm feeling instead.