A Sorcerer's Journey - Chapter 43

Chapter 43: Grimm Got the Bead
Translator: John_Cui Editor: Zayn_

Grimm’s group kept throwing rocks, twigs, lumps of clays, you name it, into the altar. And three days had passed on. Most of the people had left since they had nothing at their disposal to deal with the hidden protector. Only around a dozen people remained. Those who had stayed ran into several skirmishes, but nothing disastrous was inflicted.
It was a moonlit night. The audio waves sent back to Grimm using echolocation was telling Grimm that the Virtual Helminth was under one tenth of its body to vanish.
“It’s about time!” Grimm nodded his head to his group.
Lefay, Chris and others replied by nodding. They had concurred for the final attack.
Carrying many materials with them, the team sneaked towards the altar .
The group stepped softly to not to wake up any of the students, who were either asleep or were meditating. But they couldn’t proceed without waking up the ones who had maintained their vigilance and were waiting for the moment to come.
“Finally, someone has cracked the code!”
It was the Machine Heart. He had been sitting there, keeping his eyes and mouth shut, until Grimm’s team moved towards the altar. He then sprung up and rushed towards the altar.
Although the Machine Heart moved fast, he didn’t disturb the ones who were in their dreams.
Grimm’s team had been in the altar. The Virtual Helminth shrunk much faster as humans approached it. Grimm estimated that it would be gone forever after it breathed another several times.
Grimm was in a bliss. Once the powerful bead hanging in the air became his property, even the Desperators would dread him. The bead itself would play a deterring role to the Desperators, whether by enhancing Grimm’s existing capabilities or by endowing him new, deadly skills. It was said the bead could make its owner ride the wave of this Gory Test and get out of it safe and sound.
As Grimm was extending his hand to get the bead, a menacing voice came.
“Keep it where it is. I’m taking that!” The Machine Heart had emerged only ten meters away from Grimm’s team.
Accompanying the Machine Heart’s voice, a large disk spun forward at Grimm.
Grimm retreated a few steps and stamped on Lefay.
“I’ll take that.” Chris turned into a wolf and growled. He brandished his axe, jumped out of the altar at the swishing disk targeted at Grimm,and hacked it.
“Wow, a 70 point power!” Grimm yelled, “What a miracle!”
An ordinary student had held off the disk attack of the Machine Heart—a Desperator. That was indeed a miracle.
A huge sound broke as Chris’s axe stopped the disk. But it was too soon to celebrate. Although the disk had stopped moving forward, it kept wheeling fast and produced a strong magnetic force. As a result, his axe was sucked to it, and Chris’s claws, which were made of metal, were pulled to the disk, too. In less than a second, Chris had been deprived of his weapons and had been rendered non-threatening.
Before anyone could react, Lefay played her trump card. She pulled a Hurricane arrow. With a thumping sound, the arrow was let flying towards the Machine Heart. It moved so fast that a whirl of wind came into being. It was larger than the one that had hit Grimm.
Soon, the Machine Heart was swallowed by the whirl. The leaves in it kept cutting and slicing him.
Everyone—Grimm’s teammates and the others who had been jerked out of their dreams—watched the Machine Heart suffering in the whirl.
In the meantime, the disk had lost its pulling strength, and Chris recovered his weapons.
As the whirl diminished and then disappeared a minute later, people could see what had happened to the poor Machine Heart: his clothes were gone, muscles were minced; his mechanical tail seemed to have undergone malfunction and sank down listlessly on the ground, and his arm sparkled!
“The Hurricane Arrow! It’s ridiculously strong. You just triumphed over a Desperator!” Grimm marveled, “What a pity that you have only three of them now!” 1
Lefay didn’t reply to Grimm’s compliment. Her face was terribly pale, and the next second, she almost collapsed. It turned out that the Hurricane Arrow had depleted her magical force.
And the Machine Heart was not subdued. He took back his disk and aimed it at Nina and Robin!
At the same time, seven mechanical bugs came out of his sleeve and flew towards the bead.
Robinson and Chris ran towards the two girls to rescue them immediately. This time, the disk was more powerful and worse still, Chris had consumed most of his magical force and was unable to replenish it within such short a span of time. Nina could have done that, but she herself was being targeted! 2
Grimm was holding his weak Lefay and could not help them, let alone the bead was about to be grabbed by the bugs.
“We need the bead to survive! Grimm, leave me here and go to take it before the bugs do it.” Lefay looked into Grimm’s eyes. She said imploringly.
Grimm wouldn’t abandon Lefay, and he didn’t.
At the time, Robinson, Robin, Chris and Nina were all down. They couldn’t take the Desperator on.
Seconds before the bugs were going to snatch the bead, an idea occurred to Lefay.
“Use the stick you got from the mirror house! Use it to delay them!”
“Right. To hypnotize them!”
Grimm took the stick out from Lefay’s pocket, pointed it at the bugs while he enchanted something. The bugs were indeed being “slow motioned”. They moved like snails as if it would take half a day to get to the bead.
As soon as they had dealt with that threat, another came.
The Machine Heart was exasperated by Grimm slowing his bugs down and produced a beam of golden light, which contained an unbelievable level of energy.
As the light was closing in on Grimm and Lefay, a gust of wind blew through the forest. It rustled the student’s robes and Lefay’s hair.
Grimm was calm and he comforted Lefay.
“I’m here. He can’t do you any harm!” Grimm lightly kissed Lefay’s forehead.
Grimm then turned around and faced that golden light. The next second, he produced his Firebird and the shield. After he gave the order, the firebird charged at the Machine Heart and set him in blaze. At the same time, the light hit the shield and exploded.
The Firebird could not have caused too much damage to a Desperator, but Grimm had used that stick again, which provided 40 points of offense power. The Machine Heart extinguished the fire by rolling himself on the ground. But he had received grave injuries from that high energy fire.
“I got it!” Robin exclaimed from inside the altar. When the Desperator was on fire, she had arrived at the altar, and taken the bead.
The Machine Heart stared at Robin ferociously and then turned his eyes to Grimm. He said nothing and left.
The Desperator was gone. The Virtual Helminth was gone. And Grimm had obtained the bead. 3