Chapter 61: Chapter 61: The Fall of Gu Lei
One day later.
Agular walked out of the laboratory, looked down at his now rejuvenated arm, and couldn’t help but sigh, "A breakthrough grants a thousand-year lifespan; it really hasn’t been easy."
After checking his own changes, he directly performed the Earth Vein Traveling Technique and headed toward the top floor of the Wizard Tower.
...
An hour later, Agular returned to his laboratory again.
Unlike before, he was now dressed in a Third Ring Earth and Fire Faction Wizard Robe, holding several pieces of parchment.
On these pieces of parchment, there were a total of five witchcraft models drawn, three of which were optimized models.
He returned to his bedroom and spent three hours either constructing or optimizing several witchcraft models.
Then he took out a Communication Ball, slightly triggered it with his Spiritual Power, and said, "Gu Lei, come over to my place."
"Alright." Five minutes later, an echo came from the other side of the Communication Ball.
...
"Creak——"
Outside Aguilar Manor’s laboratory, Gu Lei, who initially looked calm, sharply narrowed his eyes upon seeing Agular wearing that wizard robe.
"You broke through? How is that possible?"
His face was filled with disbelief; clearly, Agular had at most three or four years left to live.
Once these three or four years passed, he would die, and I would be able to take control of the Earth and Fire lineage’s authority.
Then, before Lor broke through to the second ring, I would spend a year or two maximizing my gains and escape to other continents.
He never expected Lor to forgive him, because he knew well what would happen if he really spoke to Lor that day, without Levan’s presence.
But now, with Agular’s breakthrough, his plans were completely disrupted.
"Nothing is impossible."
Agular’s lips curled slightly, "Now, in the name of the leader of the Earth and Fire Faction, I am assigning you a task,"
"As our Earth and Fire Faction’s territory has recently been frequently harassed by Temple Knights, I have decided to appoint you to patrol our faction’s territory and clear out those troublemaking Temple Knights."
"Due to the urgency, you are to set off within a day."
In the Wizard Tower, Agular indeed couldn’t make a move against Gu Lei.
But with his status as a Third Ring Wizard of the Earth and Fire Faction, he naturally could exert authority over Gu Lei. It’s fair to assign Gu Lei a task once every ten years.
Because Gu Lei enjoyed the benefits provided to Earth and Fire Faction apprentices, he had no reason to refuse.
In today’s world, rights and obligations are equivalent.
If order is a sword, then Agular now wields this sword against Gu Lei.
This strike is unavoidable.
"Wasn’t that matter in the past?" Gu Lei asked through gritted teeth.
"Oh, I’m having second thoughts now," Agular said with a smile, "Are you going to refuse the task?"
If Gu Lei had chosen to apologize and confess after the fact, Agular wouldn’t play the game of backtracking now.
But this guy tried to brush it under the rug, and Agular was naturally pleased to treat it as a gift for his good student.
"No, I am willing to accept, Lord Agular." Gu Lei gritted his teeth and accepted the task, immediately using the Earth Vein Traveling Technique to escape to his laboratory.
Of course, he wouldn’t be foolish enough to truly believe Agular’s nonsense about Temple Knights causing trouble. If they could indeed find those mice, why would they wait until now?
"Agular, you really dote on your student." Deep in a laboratory, Gu Lei’s eyes filled with blood, and he said through gritted teeth.
He only wanted some resources to conduct more experiments, strive for an early breakthrough to the Third Ring, and improve the Earth and Fire Faction’s position in the Wizard Tower. What was wrong with that?
Lor, just an apprentice, even if now turned into a First Ring Wizard, what good are so many resources?
Is it to buy a flashy but impractical spaceship to waste?
Gu Lei’s heart had a thousand reasons to explain, but there was no chance to say them because Agular directly exercised task authority over him.
Without interference from other Third Ring Wizards, the outcome was already doomed.
But where could he find other Third Ring Wizards to intervene?
With Lord Levan standing in the way, who would be willing to stand up for a mere Second Ring like him?
He felt depressed, silently collecting some valuables, while calculating in his mind how to escape once he was out of the Wizard Tower.
"Taking the spaceship is too conspicuous, I must escape using the Earth Vein Traveling Technique," Gu Lei thought to himself, "Agular just advanced to the Third Ring, he should not have optimized his model yet. I have a chance to escape."
After packing, with a decision made, Gu Lei did not hesitate and immediately performed the Earth Vein Traveling Technique to leave the tower.
The longer the delay, the more likely Agular would optimize the Third Ring Earth Vein Traveling Technique and the Third Ring Earth Vein Perception Technique. When that moment comes, it would all be over.
"Sigh——"
In less than two seconds, Gu Lei escaped from the Wizard Tower using the Earth Vein Traveling Technique, darting rapidly to the south.
At the end of the south, there is a sea, and hidden within it are some wizards like him, who have lost in power struggles and have no way out.
As long as he escaped into the vast sea, he wouldn’t need to worry about Agular anymore.
"Running pretty fast." On the twenty-seventh floor of the Wizard Tower, Agular smiled, and in the next instant, also followed toward the south of the Wizard Tower.
...
"Tsk, what a show."
On the forty-fifth floor of the Wizard Tower, three Third Ring Wizards in earth-colored robes sat around a long table, each using the Earth Vein Perception Technique as they observed.
"Gu Lei is a bit unlucky, aiming at the wrong target with Lor."
"Heh, could you have predicted that Lor would take Lord Levan as a disciple?"
"That’s true; if Lor didn’t take Levan as a disciple, Gu Lei might have made a big profit and even had a chance to use the resources to break through to the Third Ring."
"The gifts from fate have long been secretly marked with a price."
"Dadan, stop with the talk; the Goddess of Fate was burned to death in her Divine Kingdom by Speaker Yassen hundreds of years ago."
"I just think her teaching is quite interesting, it has nothing to do with her death."
They watched coldly, with no intention of stopping Agular.
The internal conflicts of the Multi-Element Faction are ’inconvenient’ for the Single-Element Faction to interfere with.
...
Five hundred miles south of the Nelson Wizard Tower, beneath a forest.
"Creak—— Bang——"
While Gu Lei was rapidly fleeing south, the earth vein around him suddenly had abnormal fluctuations, causing his escape to fail and forcibly trapping him underground.
"No——" Gu Lei’s Spiritual Power surged, striving to shout, "Agular, you can’t do this!"
He was filled with despair because he had recognized what interrupted his witchcraft.
"Creak—— Creak—— Patter——"
No one responded to Gu Lei, and the Elemental Shield around him was almost instantly crushed by the surrounding soil.
"Agular, our friendship of over a hundred years, can it not earn me a chance for mercy?"
Unwilling to give up, Gu Lei continued to vibrate his Spiritual Power, shouting for mercy.
Simultaneously, he desperately expanded a glowing sphere filled with Earth and Fire Elements to cover his body, rapidly expanding outwards, fiercely compressing against the seemingly soft soil around.
"Bang—— Crack——"
The sphere managed to push back the strange soil around him for ten meters, even causing the ground above to rise for an instant.
Unfortunately, after that, the sphere was crushed by the soil.
"Boom——"
In the next instant, Gu Lei himself was crushed into a similar shape by the falling soil.
"Sigh——"
A mass of deep blue flames ignited at the place where Gu Lei had fallen, seemingly capable of melting everything, until it burned his remaining body into ashes.
Leaving behind only some Divine Power Crystals, Magic Crystals, and a few materials with a black-gold sheen.
"Friendship?"
In an underground space ten miles away, Agular’s lips twitched, suddenly feeling like laughing.
In the hundred-plus years since Gu Lei’s rise, Agular, feeling too old and with little hope of breaking through, gave away a seventy percent apprentice share to Gu Lei.
However, this action was taken by Gu Lei as something natural. Not only did it not earn gratitude, but Gu Lei even wanted to take an inch for a mile.
Does such a person deserve to speak of friendship?