After Abium disappeared into the woods, two purple and pink gem-embedded rings appeared above the Three-Eyed Giant's corpse and silently hovered in the air for a minute.
''He is indeed special. He managed to get out of Udnir's temple without any scratch.'' A lustful voice came out of the Pink gem-embedded ring.
''Freya, don't try to steal my prey. He is mine and mine alone.''
A cold voice came out of the Purple gem-embedded ring.
''Tch, how are you planning to get his soul? You need my help, Invidia.'' Freya said calmly.
After a second, Invidia in the Purple Ring released a fierce light and spoke.
''I have a plan.''
Then both rings talked secretively and soon disappeared into the woods.
...
A few days later,
Abium returned to the Fire temple and began to take a long rest.
On the third day, he woke up from a deep sleep and began to organize his plan.
'I'm so weak. I need to find a way to improve my spirit power in the future. Although I can search for one or two divine fragments in those dungeons, it's not a permanent solution to increase my spiritual power.'
'Azolla, can you give some idea to increase my spirit power at a faster rate?' Abiun asked solemnly.
'It's not a good idea to forcefully increase one's spirit, lad. There are a few artifacts hidden out there. But I don't think you can find any one of those easily. Moreover, all those artifacts are wicked intelligent artifacts, so searching for them is basically a suicidal mission.' Azolla warned him sternly.
'I know. But I don't have time. If I used a normal meditation method to increase my spirit power, it would take several decades or even centuries to promote to a third-tier mage.' Abium said with a bitter smile.
Azolla went silent as she heard those words. After a long silence, she let out a heavy sigh in his mind and spoke,
'You can find one or two lawful intellectual artifacts in Light God's main churches or Cathedrals. Mostly Church followers use these special artifacts to collect the faith power from the masses and offer that power to their gods. These artifacts are mostly twisted and are not trustworthy. If you steal one of these artifacts, you will have an easy time promoting to a legendary tier mage.'
'But you also have to face the wrath of Light God. If he finds out someone is stealing his power, he will even send one of the '99 Judges' to kill you.' Azolla said solemnly.
'99 Judges?' Abium raised his eyebrows in interest.
'It's a secretive organization filled with crazy bastards. Light God Welos created this organization solely to eliminate all future threats. If you ever happen to encounter one of them, run for your life. All of those Judges have strength above Pseudo-Legendary realm mages. I even heard that the Head Judge is actually a Demi-God.' Azolla's words caused him to frown deeper.
'Troublesome indeed. But I will lose many things if I don't risk myself.' He muttered to himself and sat on the floor in a meditative position.
Then, he took a fist-sized elemental crystal from his spatial ring and placed it on the floor.
It was a fist-sized darkness-elemental crystal.
'First, I need to create an adept-level artifact.'
Nodding, he took a gold coin from his spatial ring and placed it on his palm. It had a bird symbol on one side and a tree symbol on the other.
After that, he took out the second-tier spell book and searched for a spell model. Abium didn't plan to create an artifact with an attack spell or defense spell, so he skipped those pages and directly looked for supportive spells. After searching for a bit, he finally found a spell model and smiled.
It was a spell model called 'Illusion Area.' At first, he planned to create an artifact with an attack spell. But he changed his mind after he battled against the Three-Eyed Giant.
'With this, I will have one more trick to fool the enemies.' he nodded pleasantly.
Without wasting any time, he began to create his first Adept-level artifact. First, he inscribed basic rune circles and began inscribing the 'Shrink' circle on the gold coin. Once he finished inscribing that circle, he took the fist-sized darkness elemental crystal and placed it on the gold coin.
As the darkness-elemental crystal touched the gold coin's surface, it began to shrink into a small red dot and soon disappeared.
Abium didn't delay any longer and began to inscribe the 'Illusion area' spell model on it.
After that, he drew rune characters in the air like Ubius and started sending them into the gold coin. He carefully inscribed the rune characters and created a miniature second-tier spell model on the gold coin's surface. Although his writing speed had increased in these last few months of training, he still began to face difficulty.
Time flew by, and on the fourth day, he finally finished inscribing the 2100th character and drew a deep breath. Once he finished inscribing the spell model, the gold coin began to shine and return to normal.
Meanwhile, Abium carefully picked up the gold coin and placed it separately in his pocket. After that, he again walked out of the temple and explored Fex's Dimension.
Time flew by, and finally, it was the beginning of the fourteenth month. Although Abium didn't get any rare herbs, he still managed to get his hand on a few precious things. The most important thing was the vial of the Blood Essence of the descendant of Three-Eyed Titan.
With Azolla's help, he had already purified the blood essence's chaos energy and carefully stored it inside a vial. This blood essence could improve any mortal's strength to the first-tier warlock in just a couple of months.
During the past few months, he also got a large amount of platinum ore in an abandoned cave mine at the other end of the Fex dimension and became wealthier.
His wealth and understanding of Runology and Potioneering had also increased drastically during the past fourteen months.
At that moment, he could be considered as Adept Level in both fields. Although he still needed some practical experience to make real potions, his knowledge and abilities were at the level of Expert Realm!
As long as he uses his advantages properly, he wouldn't need any teacher's assistance to make Adept Level potions!
Additionally, he also killed a total of seven first-tier magical beasts and got seven thumb-sized elemental crystals. Three of them were nature elemental crystals, which he got from Trends, and the other four fire elemental crystals were from Fire lizards. After realizing the wealth hidden in this dimension, he understood how important this pocket dimension was.
'If I somehow manage to get my hands on this Fex dimension, I can achieve many things.' Abium began to think seriously.
But to achieve that, he needed to improve his strength up to the third-tier mage and tame the Redbird. Or he had to ask for help from the Bidora Empire's Empress Athena and make some agreement. Although Azolla had already managed to find out the correct coordination of this dimension using some strange formula, she said there was a mystic force constantly blocking others from entering and leaving.
Grold and other necromancers were using the precious Dimensional travel stones to leave this Fex dimension mainly because of this. As for the reason how that Redbird was controlling this dimension, Azolla vaguely guessed someone must have forcibly made that Redbird become its guardian. Once Abium heard those words, he instantly thought of Emperor Jack and the other five family elders.
'Only they must have done that to stopping other mages from stealing this dimension.'
'Moreover, Lockridge family members can talk to the Redbird... Hmm, it might be Lockridge family elder.' He made a possible guess and felt pity for the family. If no curse had been placed on the Lockridge family, they might have created another Empire like Bidora in this same land.
After thinking for a moment, he sighed deeply and took out the first-tier spellbook. This time, he chose a spell called Create Space. This spell was an advanced version of the storage spell.
Once he constructed this spell model, he could open space of up to fifty cubic meter space and use it for storing his belongings.
But what was more impressive was that he could also control the space in the outside world. If he makes this spell appear in the real world, he could even be able to stop the enemy from teleporting using this dimensional lock-like spell!
Only now did he understand Azolla's previous words about creating a storage spell. After he finished constructing the final spell, Abium became more assured.
'Now I'm a peak first-tier mage and have the strength even to kill second-tier mages.' Abium's lips curled upward as he thought of his current progression speed. In these last fourteen months, he accomplished many things.
'I became an Adept Level Alchemist in both fields and also got many rewards. Not only that, but I also got my hands on many potion materials and treasures. Was it due to my luck?'
Abium quickly stopped daydreaming and walked out of that Fire temple's entrance. After that, he cast the 'War Angel's wings' spell and flew towards the other side's dense forest.
...
On the other side of the volcanic mountain range, a green monster with pointy ears sat on a wooden chair and gazed at the volcanic mountain. Behind that goblin stood a single-storied house, which could accommodate a large family. After Abium left it alone in the woods, Grold didn't know what to do and decided to build a house in a safe place. It also remembered Abium's final word and waited for him to come here.
Grold frowned in displeasure as it thought of the damn royal elf and started angrily punching the newly crafted table.
"Damn you, bastard!" It roared towards the empty reddish sky and soon saw a crimson-colored bird flying in its direction at an unimaginable speed.
A second later, its eyes became bloodshot as it recognized that bird was that damn elf and instantly started to chant in a loud voice.
'I will give that elf a surprise attack and cripple him permanently!'
Although its boss Watcher had told Grold not to kill him, it didn't mind killing him now.
That damned elf had humiliated Grold and even stole that Dimensional Travel crystal, making it angrier. Simultaneously, its voice grew louder, and a dense black-colored dark element gathered around its tiny hand.
Abium also noticed the abnormality in the forest and became serious. He knew that the sneaky goblin was up to no good, so he decided to end the battle before it could even start.
The next instant, his crimson figure disappeared from the sky and suddenly appeared one meter above Grold's head.
Abium quickly flapped his wings to slow down the momentum and landed on Grold's face while interrupting its loud chanting.
"Guahhh!! Damn you, puny elf!" It cursed with a roar while directly crashing into the two-storied house. Meanwhile, Abium landed on the ground and dispelled his fly spell.
"Get ready! We are going back." He spoke coldly without even looking behind and took out the blue-colored crystalline Dimensional travel stone. Meanwhile, the goblin stood up with an anxious face and packed its belongings while staring maliciously at Abium's back from time to time.
As it suddenly remembered its current appearance, it froze for a second and soon used the transformation spell scroll to change itself into a black cat. After that, Grold shifted its gaze towards Abium and started walking closer to him.
On the other hand, Abium didn't mind the sneaky cat's or goblin's behavior and threw the Dimensional travel stone toward Grold.
Meanwhile, the black cat casually grabbed the crystal using its tail and started to chant in abyssal language to activate the dimensional travel stone.
After two minutes of long chanting, it threw the stone forcefully using its black tail. But that crystalline stone didn't fall on the ground. Instead, it started to float in mid-air.
At the same time, a dense amount of space elemental energy gathered around it.
A slight crack appeared below the stone a second later, revealing a bluish-black empty void.
Soon, the crack began to expand and formed a one-meter-tall portal!
"Let's go." Abium said and walked closer to the portal.
Without any delay, both Abium and Grold jumped into it and disappeared from Fex Dimension.
...
[End of Volume-4: Chaotic Capital.]