A mage's journey begins with a battle mage.

Chapter 57 Nightmare Island

After watching the burst damage teams with high overall team output, Jiang Shuzhou went to check out other teams, but only one team left a deep impression on him.

The veteran club Dynasty's team is quite mysterious; all that's known is that they have a Paladin, while the other players deliberately conceal their classes.

What caught Jiang Shuzhou's attention the most was the paladin. It had nothing to do with strength; it was mainly the holy shield emblem on the paladin's body that caught Jiang Shuzhou's eye. This thing was the holy emblem of the god of protection.

Although the promotional video didn't reveal much useful information, Jiang Shuzhou knew who his biggest rival was the moment he saw the Holy Emblem.

The Church and the mages have been fighting each other for countless years, and the methods they use to target each other are endless.

For example, they use divine magic to detect spells, and they engrave the holy emblem of the god of protection on their weapons and equipment to enhance the equipment's defensive capabilities, especially its defense against magical damage.

Paladins are already strong enough defensively, but this paladin is the paladin of the god of protection, making him an even tougher, more resilient iron turtle.

Secretly memorizing the details, Jiang Shuzhou prepared to learn the Poison Mist Technique, specifically to deal with these smelly and hard iron turtles.

I'll go buy a bottle of poison later to coat the knife with it.

Indeed, talented people are as numerous as carp crossing a river.

If they jump straight into the game without looking at anything, things will get complicated later.

There's not much to say about the remaining teams. First of all, everyone's smart enough to know that, apart from the streamer teams that might leak some content to attract viewers, the professional clubs simply won't have any extra content.

The promotional videos released only show people wielding knives and slaying monsters. At most, you can see their profession, but you can't tell what combat skills they've learned, what their talents are, let alone their combat power.

However, today wasn't entirely fruitless; at least we dealt with a troublesome opponent ahead of schedule.

All that's left is to wait.

Sigrún has taught at the Iceland University of the Arts as a part-time lecturer since and was Dean of the Department of Fine Art from -. In – she held a research position at Reykjavík Art Museum focusing on the role of women in Icelandic art. She studied fine art at the Icelandic College of Arts and Crafts and at Pratt Institute, New York, and holds BA and MA degrees in art history and philosophy from the University of Iceland. Sigrún lives and works in Iceland.

Map: Nightmare Island

Number of participants: 61

"Number of participating teams: 21"

"Status: Match starts in 10 minutes."

Sitting in the waiting room, Jiang Shuzhou still wore the classic mage skin, his robes blocking all prying eyes.

"Hey, isn't this the mage? Have you finished your PhD yet?"

A man dressed as a warrior looked at Jiang Shuzhou's mage robe and said in a sarcastic tone.

"Huh? Dude, how do you manage to study like this? You love learning so much, what's your educational background?"

This musketeer was at least polite; at least he was less sarcastic than the previous one.

Jiang Shuzhou remained silent. He couldn't reason with these people; there was nothing more to say. He'd see who prevailed on the battlefield.

Looking at the system panel in front of him, Jiang Shuzhou's eyes narrowed. The number of people was wrong, and the number of teams was also wrong.

It seems that Lone Wolf didn't receive any special treatment; he was randomly assigned to a match where all teams were at full strength.

Never mind, this way you'll get a higher score.

Jiang Shuzhou had already clipped the potions from his inventory to his waist and the inner pocket of his mage robe.

There are ten bottles in total: three healing potions, three magic potions, two barrier potions, one fire potion, and finally, one bottle of poison.

All of these were carefully prepared by Jiang Shuzhou. After a game is over, all the items consumed in the game will be returned, which means he can use them without any worries and without fear of excessive wear and tear.

In the final two minutes, all participants were teleported into a black space.

This is to allow participants to organize their equipment freely, in order to avoid information leaks.

The time for research and study is over; now it's time for battle!

Taking out his Miao sword, Jiang Shuzhou held the sword in one hand and a gun in the other, ready for battle.

A flash of white light, and the contestants were all teleported into the map.

"The situation is not looking good."

Jiang Shuzhou looked around at his surroundings and muttered to himself.

The surrounding plants seemed to have been dead for a long time, and the air reeked of an unbearable stench. The sun, which had been hanging high in the sky, had disappeared, and everything was shrouded in a gray haze.

These situations individually may not seem too bad, but when viewed together, they definitely indicate a problem.

Having already guessed what was going on, Jiang Shuzhou took the magic map and marked the nearest mission location to him.

This map is distributed by the system, and each participant will receive one. It has a red dot representing them, and various other information is marked on it, such as the location of the mission where they can obtain blessings.

After walking for about a few hundred meters, Jiang Shuzhou suddenly stopped. He had heard something.

"￥@%!"

"Holy shit!"

It's an abyssal demon!

The demons born from the bottomless abyss are the embodiment of chaos and evil. They have no mercy, no compassion, and no kindness; they are born to kill and destroy.

Plants withering, foul odors emanating from the ground, darkness enveloping the land—these are all omens of the appearance of demons.

The conjecture was confirmed, and Jiang Shuzhou's expression became somewhat solemn. Demons were not weak in combat. Jiang Shuzhou was not afraid of low-level demons, but he was afraid of those higher-level demons.

Carefully lowering himself, Jiang Shuzhou slowly walked towards the direction from which the sound came.

"@@%￥#!"

The incomprehensible voice came again; it was clearly the language of the Abyss, which Jiang Shuzhou neither understood nor wanted to hear.

What good things could these embodiments of chaos possibly say?

Most of the time, the greetings are directed at the family tree and the parents, covering 360 degrees. This is considered mild. Jiang Shuzhou had seen these devilish insults in the book.

It's so extreme and disturbing that it wouldn't pass censorship if released.

Therefore, not knowing the Abyss Language is actually a good thing for Jiang Shuzhou now, especially since his rank is too low and he can't do much even if he learns the Abyss Language.

Jiang Shuzhou carefully observed the demons in front of him who were frantically tearing each other apart. In the short time he had been thinking, three original demons and one cowardly demon had already been killed by the other demons.

Jiang Shuzhou heard that the Abyss language came from them, but he was very curious about what caused a group of demons to gather here.

A coward began to roar, and a series of wailing sounds came from his throat. The sound was extremely piercing, and it was clear that he was speaking something in the language of the Abyss.

The coward's actions were quickly met with a response. A sharp claw pierced through the coward's body, and the coward died instantly before it could even react. The other demons, seeing this, had no intention of helping their companion. Without hesitation, they opened their blood-red maws and began to devour their dead comrade.

Jiang Shuzhou recognized the owner of those sharp claws: the Quassa, a type of low-level demon. These demons are excellent assassins; they are born with the ability to become invisible, and their claws are covered in deadly poison, poisoning any target they scratch.

Its hands and feet are covered with sharp claws, it has a pair of long horns on its head, its tail has barbs, its body is thin, and it is green all over.

"Master, are you enjoying this? Would you like to join me in slaughtering these filthy fools?"

Suddenly, Quassamon spoke in the direction of Jiang Shuzhou. It seemed he had discovered someone was spying on him. However, instead of attacking directly, he politely invited Jiang Shuzhou to join in.

"Great! I can't wait any longer! I also know another group of humans has arrived. Let's go and slaughter them together!"

Quassa is quite intelligent, so it's normal for it to be able to speak human language. In fact, many mages would even keep Quassa as their pets.

However, Jiang Shuzhou didn't believe Quassamo's words at all. He thought Quassamo was all talk and no action, but he had simply changed his strategy because he found it difficult to kill him.

As long as Jiang Shuzhou dares to believe, Quassamo dares to betray him.

The devil's credibility is no credibility at all.

"Come, I'll take you to my foolish kin, and we'll fight together for the thrill of slaughter."

The dialogue is quite formulaic; many mages use this trick to deceive demons.

"Yes, yes, how can those lowly people compare to you? Come closer, come closer, let's sign the contract together."

The fox's tail has been revealed. I don't think any of the demons in the abyss have an IQ over fifty. It's a miracle they can even speak normally. It's hard to imagine how a demon who gives himself away after just a few words could fool anyone.

Even so, Jiang Shuzhou slowly approached Quassamo. He wasn't afraid of the opponent's close combat; he was afraid that the opponent would disappear and run away.

In that case, Jiang Shuzhou would not only fail to complete the blessing mission to gain talent and improve his strength, but he would also have to be constantly wary of assassination attempts by an assassin.

And so, both the human and the demon were luring each other closer, and now they were evenly matched.

"Oh right, come on, let's sign the contract...hehehe."

Quassamon secretly hid one hand behind his back, and the thought of tasting the hot blood of mortals made him laugh.

"What are you laughing at, you idiot!"

As he spoke, Jiang Shuzhou swiftly drew his Miao sword and slashed at the Quassamo.

The slash was as fast as lightning. Quassamo had never expected that the mage in front of him was a melee fighter, so he was completely unprepared. With one strike, Quassamo's body was split in two, and it was clear that he wouldn't live much longer.

How could that be? Didn't the inherited memories say that mages can't fight in melee?

These were its last thoughts before it died. Then its consciousness went dark, and its body turned into a puddle of pus. Fortunately, Jiang Shuzhou dodged quickly, otherwise it would have splashed on him.

"This devil is so easy to fool," Jiang Shuzhou remarked.

After all, chaos and evil are instincts. Demons can always come up with evil and crazy plans, and then make all sorts of mistakes and omissions in their execution, even explaining their plans to the enemy in advance.

There's no way around it; that's how the underlying code is written. If the demon weren't chaotic, wouldn't it just become a devil?