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.

total, and with the one they were waiting for,

36, and now they

had expected that there would be about 30 left near the end, but there

a

more, the deaths mostly focused on the first two levels

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

What happened?

they enter one of the extremely rare group trials with a

trials were only open for Peak Ancestral

only left one

a lot of

But who?

one of the three remaining Initial Ancestral Mages. After all, an Early Ancestral Mage couldn't possibly kill that many Initial Ancestral Mages since they were not

Peak Ancestral Mages talked to each other via voice transmission, trying to find out who it

end, it came out that two of the three Initial Ancestral Mages had been at that level for quite a time to accumulate power, and they had always been quite

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

was why

Mage was a notorious serial trial

Ancestral Mage's biggest customer, and he specialized in a wide variety of

one trial after the other, earning a lot of stuff

took requests to find certain extremely rare

for him to kill so many other Clouds since that would damage his

the first two Clouds, they were not happy about

third

light-blue hair, and they

that had asked the leading Bolt

exchanging information, the Clouds concluded that she had joined just a couple of decades

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

that still

had seen her

also noticed all of this, and they moved closer to

thankful that they had traveled

if they could earn more by