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.

with the one

36,

there would be about 30 left near the end, but

quite a

the deaths mostly focused on the

80% of Early Ancestral Mages

What happened?

they enter one of the extremely rare group trials with a

Ancestral Mages

only left one

killed a lot of

But who?

Ancestral Mage couldn't possibly kill that many

via voice transmission, trying to

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

down locations of trials to make a lot of money. She even had several deals with other Clouds. In exchange for her safety in the Wilderness

be detrimental to her business, which was why everyone was quite certain that she hadn't been the

was a notorious

biggest customer, and he specialized in a

a lot of stuff which he

to find certain extremely rare

him to kill so many

from the auras of the first two Clouds, they were not happy about this

third

woman with light-blue

the leading Bolt

she had joined just a couple of decades ago and that her powers were

knew that she had an Ice Affinity, but

still

a single Cloud had seen her fight in the Wilderness

Ancestral Mages also noticed all of this, and they

were thankful that they had traveled

they could earn more