Sword God in a World of Magic

"Oh, hey! You're still alive!" One of the Peak Ancestral Mages shouted to a Mid Ancestral Mage with a smile.

The other Ancestral Mage floated over and nodded. "Yep, and I also made quite a bit this time. I completed three trials."

The first Mage let out an impressive whistle. "Impressive," he said. "Anyway, did you get Maruda?"

The second Mage slowly shook his head. "Couldn't find him."

"Huh, he's normally one of the first ones that return. I thought that you got him," the first Mage said.

"Nope," the second Mage said again. "It would suck if he suddenly dies. I wouldn't get my payment and his wealth."

"Speaking of," he added as he looked at the gathered Mages above the surface. "I also don't see my contractor."

The first Mage shrugged. "Maybe they're still in a trial?"

The other Mage just furrowed his brows. Then, he turned to Lucin, who was looking at the ocean. "Lucin, who are we still waiting for?"

"There's one more Peak Ancestral Mage. She's choosing her rewards right now. I don't think it will take longer than a couple of minutes," Lucin answered.

When Lucin said that, several other Mages raised their eyebrows in surprise.

Wait, basically everyone was already here?

They looked at each other and counted.

Twelve Peak Ancestral Mages.

Two Late Ancestral Mages.

Two Mid Ancestral Mages.

One Early Ancestral Mage.

Three Initial Ancestral Mages.

in total, and with the one they were waiting for, they

36,

had expected that there would be about 30 left near

quite a devastating

on the first

within expected parameters, but 80% of Early Ancestral Mages and 70% of

What happened?

the extremely rare group trials with a

these kinds of trials were only open for Peak Ancestral Mages that

left one other

had killed a lot

But who?

After all, an Early Ancestral Mage couldn't possibly kill that many Initial Ancestral Mages since they

each other via voice transmission, trying to find out who it

Ancestral Mages had been at that level for quite a time to accumulate power, and

them focused on inspecting the wildernesses and noting down locations of trials to make a lot of money. She even had several deals with other Clouds. In

was why everyone was quite certain that she hadn't been the

Initial Ancestral Mage was

Ancestral Mage's biggest customer, and he specialized in

lot of stuff which he would then

even took requests to find certain extremely rare materials in the right

to kill so many other Clouds since that would

from the auras of the first two Clouds,

third Initial Ancestral

with light-blue

the leading Bolt about

just a couple of decades

knew that she had an Ice Affinity, but they hadn't

still

single Cloud had seen her fight in

two Initial Ancestral Mages also noticed all of this, and

were thankful that they had traveled

could earn more by combining their