CHAPTER 238: CHAPTER 238: HUNTING SLIMES, STAGE 5 – THE MAGE OF THE FIVE ELEMENTS

Johnnie and Jack exchanged a glance, but neither reached out to take it.

Clearly, they both noticed something strange about Benz.

Jack spoke up."Minotaur, is it really that tasty? Go on, swallow it down."

Benz’s face twisted in discomfort. He couldn’t hold it in anymore. Hurriedly, he ran to the side and spit out all the slime in his mouth.

"Ugh!"

He gagged, his eyes watering and nose running.

Jack burst out laughing at the sight."Minotaur, why’d you spit it out?"

Benz shot him a fierce glare.

He suspected Jack had tasted this stuff before and was just messing with him.

After gagging a bit more, Benz complained."Boss, this stuff tastes worse than crap! I really don’t know how that Black Bear Demon managed to swallow it."

"Oh? You’ve eaten it before?" Johnnie looked disgusted and took a few steps back, trying to get as far away as possible.

Benz finally realized the misunderstanding and snapped."Boss, that’s slander! I was just making a comparison."

"Let’s go. Time to keep slaughtering Slimes." Johnnie stopped joking around, and the group kept moving through the forest.

As they got closer to the Slime nest, more and more Slimes showed up—and they were getting stronger, too. Some were already Stage 7 Slimes heading their way.

Flames swept through the air, winds howled, and these Slimes started using all kinds of powerful skills. Every now and then, they’d even spit out nasty slime, which stuck to you and slowed you down.

None of these attacks were really a threat to Johnnie’s group, but they were definitely gross.

Luckily, the Myriad Sword Technique had a much longer range than any of the Slimes’ skills.

Before the Slimes could get close, Johnnie would unleash the Myriad Sword Technique and wipe them all out.

Benz and Jack got busy again, cleaning up the battlefield and collecting slime and Magic Cores.

The Red Carp came over to help, but Johnnie was killing Slimes so fast—and there were so many around—that it was hard for them to keep up.

"Boss, could you slow down a bit?" Benz complained, looking miserable.

He’d followed Johnnie for the fighting, but now he felt like he was just being used for grunt work.

This reminded him of his days as a slave laborer.

Johnnie noticed that the others really couldn’t keep up with the pace of his slaughter.

He had an idea and summoned the Mechanical Golems from the Spiritual Stonevein to help clean up the battlefield.

With the Mechanical Golems pitching in, things got a lot easier.

Buzz!

Waves of sword energy swept out, and the endless Slimes coming from all directions were destroyed in an instant.

The Myriad Sword Technique was fast, but unfortunately, it couldn’t stack with the passive from the Great Transformation Sword Technique.

All these Slimes were stage 6 and above—if he used the Cosmic Eclipse Blade to kill them, Johnnie could at least boost his physical damage by hundreds of thousands.

But right now, Johnnie didn’t care about that. He just wanted to finish advancing to The Mage of the Five Elements as soon as possible.

[You killed a stage 6, level 10 Slime. EXP +10]

...

Prompt messages kept popping up as Johnnie wiped out the waves of Slimes once again.

He glanced at his advancement quest for The Mage of the Five Elements—it was already more than halfway done. If he could clear out a few more waves of Slimes like this, he’d be able to upgrade The Mage of the Five Elements to stage 5.

As they got closer to the Slime nest, the number of Slimes increased again.

Even with The Red Carp’s group and over a thousand Mechanical Golems helping out, they still couldn’t keep up with Johnnie’s kill speed.

"Wow, an artifact!" Benz shouted in surprise, looking at the robe in his hand.

Without realizing it, Johnnie had already killed a million Demonic Creatures. His Lucky Master class triggered, and an artifact dropped.

He quickly finished off the nearby Slimes and took the robe that Benz handed him.

[Elemental Robe: Artifact, can be equipped by mage classes; Magic damage +30,000, Mana points +1,000,000, All four basic attributes +30,000, Insight +5, Magic critical strike +10]

[Spell Combo: Special effect; 10% chance for magic skills to trigger a combo, dealing damage twice, but the second hit only does 50% damage]

This was a complete artifact!

It even gave 5 points of Insight and an extra million Mana points.

Right now, what Johnnie needed most were Insight and Mana points, and since he was The Mage of the Five Elements, he could use this equipment perfectly.

"What a powerful artifact... Too bad it’s only for mages." Nalorin·Sylvia said as she came over, looking a bit disappointed.

Johnnie ignored her and swapped out his Fire Robe right away, making himself even stronger.

But since the Fire Robe was a legendary, upgradeable five-element set and had already been upgraded to stage 5, he didn’t plan to throw it away.

Once it reached stage 9, its set bonus would actually be stronger than most artifacts.

Johnnie kept on killing Slimes, determined to finish The Mage of the Five Elements quest.

Before they knew it, they had been wandering the forest for over two days, hunting huge numbers of Elemental Slimes, and at last, he completed the advancement task.

[Ding! You have completed The Mage of the Five Elements stage 5 advancement quest. The Mage of the Five Elements is now stage 5.]

[You have learned the skills Celestial Obscurity Heavy Water and Earth’s Downfall.]

[Celestial Obscurity Heavy Water: Level 1 (1/10,000) Water magic skill. Summon Celestial Obscurity Heavy Water to deal massive water magic damage to enemies. Consumes 1000 Mana points per second.]

[Earth’s Downfall: Level 1 (1/10,000) Earth magic skill. Earth Surge deals heavy earth magic damage to enemies, with a 10% chance to stun for 1 second. Consumes 1000 Mana points per second.]

[Your level has increased to stage 6, level 2. The Mage of the Five Elements stage 6 advancement quest triggered.]

[The Mage of the Five Elements stage 6 advancement quest: Raise Five Elements Affinity to 50% (not completed), Raise Five Elements Technique to level 6 (not completed), Kill 1 million stage 6 or higher Demonic Creatures with Insight attribute (not completed).]

As the prompt messages flashed, Johnnie finally upgraded The Mage of the Five Elements to stage 5 and learned two more powerful magic skills.

Celestial Obscurity Heavy Water—Black Tortoise had used this powerful skill before. It could attack a single target or hit an area.

Earth’s Downfall was a powerful earth-element AoE magic skill, and it even had a chance to stun enemies.

Looking at the descriptions of both new skills, Johnnie noticed they both seemed to be damage-over-time spells, kind of similar to a Domain skill.

He had a feeling he might unlock a Domain for The Mage of the Five Elements in the future.

Maybe after the next advancement.

Johnnie already had the Ashen Sword Domain from his Sword Immortal class. If he could also learn The Mage of the Five Elements’ Domain, he’d have two powerful Domains at his disposal.

But the next advancement requirements were even tougher: 50% Five Elements Affinity, the Five Elements Technique at level 6, and killing a million stage 6 or higher Demonic Creatures for each of the five elements.

That meant he’d need to take down at least five million Demonic Creatures.

Now, Johnnie and his group were almost at the Slime nest. There were a lot of Slimes here, but definitely not a million.

Plus, there were Slimes with other rare elements too, like Wind, Lightning, and Ice.

"Master, should we go exchange for Spirit Stones now?" Jack asked.

Over the past two days, Johnnie had killed so many Slimes that they’d collected over 700,000 portions of slime, which could be traded for more than 7,000 Spirit Stones.

Still, he hesitated. With so much slime, would that Black Bear Demon really make the trade?

And did he even have that many Spirit Stones in the first place?

Johnnie looked at Jack and asked."Jack, do you know where the Mountain Hunter’s Spirit Stones come from?"

"I do." Jack nodded."He can make them himself. The Mountain Hunter has a special treasure inside him that can absorb Magic Cores, Slime, and other stuff, and turn them into Spirit Stones."

There’s something this valuable?

He asked another question."Then why is he so willing to help you guys trade for Spirit Stones?"

"I’m not sure about that." Jack replied."I guess it’s because he’s on our Demon race’s side, and he wants to help us get stronger." Jack had never really thought about it; trading Slime for Spirit Stones with the Mountain Hunter just seemed normal for their kind.

Magic Cores could also be exchanged for Spirit Stones, but since Magic Cores were useful in many ways, most Demon race experts didn’t trade them away.

But Johnnie wasn’t so sure. In this world, there was no such thing as kindness for no reason.

Even the NPCs who seemed to help players were really just using the players’ power to finish their own goals.

"Master." Nalorin·Sylvia spoke up."that Black Bear Demon can absorb the energy from all this Slime. I think that’s how he managed to become a Divine powerhouse."

Absorb the power of Slime? So, does that mean you don’t actually need a hundred portions of Slime to make one Spirit Stone?

Johnnie suddenly had another idea. If he could get his hands on that treasure, would he even need to trade with Mountain Hunter for Spirit Stones? He could just refine them himself.

He asked."Jack, do you know what treasure Mountain Hunter uses to refine Slime? And if we kill him, will it drop?"

Jack was stunned and said in surprise."Master, don’t tell me you want to go after Mountain Hunter? He’s a Divine powerhouse!"

"So what? He’s just a Half-God. I can handle him." Johnnie replied with confidence. He had already killed more than one Domain, and they were all strong mechanical Domains.

Mountain Hunter might be Domain too, but he didn’t seem that powerful—probably just advanced recently.

Jack glanced at Nalorin·Sylvia nearby.

In his mind, Johnnie’s confidence mostly came from this woman.

But he didn’t think Nalorin·Sylvia was strong enough to take down Mountain Hunter by herself.

Still, Jack didn’t say anything to stop him. After thinking for a moment, he said."Master, in the Land of Confusion, when someone dies, everything they have drops."

"Boss, are we going to kill another Domain?" Benz asked excitedly.

He’d been following Johnnie around, just cleaning up after him for days, and was itching for real action.

Jack rolled his eyes and said with a sneer."Kill another Domain? You talk like you’ve killed one before."

Benz glared back and boasted."Maybe I haven’t, but the boss has—and not just once!"

"Yeah, yeah, sure." Jack said sarcastically, obviously not believing him.

He could feel Johnnie was strong, but compared to a Domain, there was still a big gap.

If Johnnie really died at Mountain Hunter’s hands, maybe the soul contract would be broken. For Jack, that wouldn’t be a bad thing.