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Chapter 103 - Frozen to the Core
🕑 Added 2024-08-08 20:00:05 +0000 UTCIt wasn't just anger that was running through me, it was my frustrations about everything that had happened so far. We were torn from our home, put into this death trap, and had to fight for our lives against monsters, yet we had to deal with a homicidal maniac like him.
And he had the gall to smile at me.
I wouldn't have been so mad if it was only monsters we were up against, but no, it was some asshole acting like a spurned lover because no one helped him. Throwing a tantrum like a toddler.
Ohh, all of it was making me angry.
I wove my ice together to fend off one of the bosses and could only growl in frustration as the Blaze Lion threatened to melt it.
His Fire Law battling against my Ice Law.
It was absurd.
It wasn't even the actual boss that was fighting me, it was just some mindless thrall that was putting up resistance.
I should have been able to crush it. To decimate it so utterly that it should never have been an issue. Yet here I was.
Fighting and losing against thralls.
It made me angry.
The Vine Bear swatted at me and I had to defend against the Ant Queen at the same time. Both worked together to pressure me away from the man responsible. The one goading me and acting like he was above everyone else.
This never would have been a problem if this... this fucker would just die!
I shot an [Ice Arrow] out at him but it melted before it could reach him.
I had had enough.
The thought of my Ice melting to a mere beast was absurd. It was supposed to be timeless, not melt under the pressure of a wimpy flame. It was supposed to hold firm and be my weapon against my foes, not shatter and break to a little flame.
This wasn't the nature of ice, not the ice that I wanted associated with me. Ice was the bringer of Winter, the harbinger of the changing seasons as if fell from the sky.
It was the end of all, that which awaited all that ever lived. Everything would end up in ice, frozen in the vacuum of space.
There were thousands of years of Earth's history where ice reined supreme, yet mine was melting. Not only melting, but melting to mundane fires produced by a mere beast.
When I first acquired my Law, I focused on the harness aspect of it so that I could make a good weapon. With hardness, came the cold needed to do it. This time I focused on something different.
Ice was more than just cold, it was the desolate landscape of the barren tundra. It was the debilitating chill that was impossible to get rid of. The silent killer that people tried to ward off.
It was the winter wind that made fires go out and refuse to light again. It was more than just hard. It was the basis on which Winter was built. There would be no Winter without ice.
There would be no Arctic or Blizzards or Glaciers without Ice. Ice was where they all started and where cold originated.
That was what I wanted.
I pushed my Law into my surroundings and pushed for it to smother everything. To pervade it with its chill and show it the meaning of cold.
I focused entirely on the coldness aspect of it and the authority Ice held over the environment.
Pulling inspiration from both [Permafrost] and the Frost Rune I spent hours painstakingly building. I wove my Law into the space around me and I ordered it to freeze. I could feel my bloodline aiding my efforts.
I based the effects I wanted on [Frostbite]. I wanted the surrounding Ice Mana to pervade everything I wanted and freeze it from the inside out.
The entire time, my hammer swung through the air trying to kill the bosses attacking me, hindering my progress. This wasn't the mountain meditation where I first got my law, but it was where I would force it into being.
I pushed my will into my idea the same way I had when making my hammer for the first time. A force worked against me, but my will was stronger.
For this, I would not be denied.
My family was facing a crisis right now and the man responsible stood before me yet I could do nothing. I needed more.
There were sharp pains in my brain as I worked to subvert natural order but I pushed through those as well. Some were from reality fighting me, some were from the man standing across from me.
Neither would deter my will.
All of my concentration worked on the task other than what was needed to continue my melee. All the words that spilled out of the bastard's mouth were ignored.
Pushing and prodding, forcing my idea into reality, I felt it click.
I felt the very moment the world stopped fighting me and relinquished what I wanted. Also hearing the notification chime to go with it.
In the middle of battle, I declined to pull it up but I knew what it would say and the words that would be projected.
Law Upgraded:
Least Law of Ice -> Lesser Law of Ice
I felt the difference immediately. The fires of the Blaze Lion dimmed and threatened to go out completely in the new environment I projected. If it were closer, I felt that they would be extinguished entirely.
That said nothing of the area around me which was plunged into a deeper cold. [Glacial Presence] more than doubled its boost from the drop in temperature.
Everything came easier than before and I wielded my new weapon as masterfully as I could. Without the interference from the Blaze Lion, I could focus on killing either the Vine Bear or the Ant Queen.
I felt the Vine Bear was the easier of the two, and started with it. I pulled on my skill and a thick [Ice Fortress] separated the two bosses. The ice felt colder and stronger than normal which I associated with the additional chime.
Now separated, I closed in on my prey. The Bear's vines started to freeze in my presence and as it moved, began to break and flake away.
It couldn't handle the severe cold I was exuding.
My hammer came down with a fully loaded [Frostbite] and I heard another chime.
[Frostbite] thrived on pervading a being and freezing it through, exactly what I had based my newly upgraded Law on. It was no surprise the skill upgraded when the two were used together.
The hammerhead clobbered the Bear upside the head, knocking it to the side. Ice built up on the impact sight in much higher quantities and quickness than before.
I could feel the invading Ice Mana inside the bear and I grinned at the beast savagely. What I was about to do was almost an homage to the first time I had faced the beast. At least then, the fight had been honorable. What just occurred was a mockery of that.
I paid those thoughts no heed and continued with what I had planned. The bear put up a fight against my skill but it was worn out and half-ragged at this point. The only reason it was still standing was because it was forced. It wouldn't be standing long.
[Shatter]
Half of the bear's skull exploded in a shower of gore that quickly froze. I used the skill again on the [Ice Fortress] which showered everything near in ice spikes.
It died quickly.
Not wasting good ammunition, I began my usual tactic of spinning them around me.
The fire in the camp and the Blaze Lion had made that unfeasible before, but not anymore.
Their efforts were comical at best at disrupting what was mine. My ice would not be melted so easily again.
With the Vine Bear's death, I turned on the pesky Ant Queen who had been a thorn in my side the entire fight. Taking chunks out of my armor and gouging out pieces of me.
I didn't go at this the same way as before. The last time I had fought it, I pummeled it into submission with my hammer without letting up. My ice couldn't penetrate its exoskeleton rendering most of my skills useless.
Not this time.
Metal didn't do well in the cold and it had only grown colder as the fight went on. The first time, I hadn't been able to freeze the thing through to kill it. It had enough power and a Law of its own to fight me over it.
It was a losing battle that I had abandoned the first time. It was harder to affect another's body offensively than it was to defend your own. In a battle where Laws were at the same tier, it would be extremely difficult to influence the other person's body.
While saying it was an uphill battle didn't make it an iron-clad rule. Using Laws that were strong against one another made the fight significantly easier, like with Lightning and Water.
A Lightning Law would have an easier time electrocuting a Water Law wielder than it would for an Ice Law to freeze a Fire Law wielder. It was just the way nature worked.
Metal and Ice didn't have that relationship. Metal didn't have an inherent weakness to the cold but it was disadvantaged at severe cold temperatures.
Like now.
It wasn't a weakness to the cold per se but it certainly affected it. It grew brittle and broke easily in sub-zero temperatures but the metal itself didn't grow weaker. It actually grew stronger.
Strength wasn't the issue I was having though. The massive dents in the Ant Queen could attest to that.
I could overwhelm the Ant's metal body, but I couldn't do any lasting damage because it only deformed instead of fracturing.
The cold would fix that.
The oversized insect tried to do battle against me but it was slow and sluggish from the environment which I wasted little time exploiting.
The newly upgraded [Frostbite] slammed down on it a few times, pervading it with Ice Mana. [Shatter] wouldn't work this time as there were no fluids to freeze and explode like the Vine Bear.
I used [Frostbite] for a different purpose. A purpose that became apparent when my next hammer blow hit.
Layering on [Mighty Blow] as well as the upgraded [Frostbite], the area where the hammer landed shattered into metal shards.
Its hardness overwhelmed, causing it to fail. More and more blows rained down on it to increasing effect. The cold brittle metal was unable to hold up.
It didn't last long.
With both bosses killed, my next target was what stood between me and my enemy. The Blaze Lion positioned itself between us, forcing me to go through one more enemy.
"W-what h-how did y-you-"
The man's words lost their sultry effect as he stared dumbly at the two slain bosses. I could see the gears turning in his head as he looked over my form.
Observing what was no doubt a host of wounds with blood freezing them shut, a knife lodged in my back, and deep gouges that had ice patched over them keeping them from leaking.
I could feel the incredulousness in his gaze. Like he couldn't believe what he was seeing. It was so shocking to him that his words lost their effect.
Standing over the two dead bosses, I could feel something stir in me. Like the core of my being was waking up, asking to be heard. I didn't have time to figure out the feeling right now and focuses my attention back on the fight.
Ignoring the stunned man, I launched myself at the Blaze Lion. It was the weakest physically of the trio sent against me and the lowest level from how it felt.
It was mostly there to hinder my Ice which was impossible now.
As I swung down to pulverize the beast, I thought of something different. It was a stupid and wasteful idea, but I did it anyway. If nothing else then to keep the man stuttering in shock.
I released my grip on my hammer and reached out with both hands to grasp the beast. It tried to escape but I didn't let it.
My stats were higher than its and all of my boosts pushed them beyond what the Lion could achieve.
After firmly holding it in place, I flooded it with ice mana with the use of [Frostbite]. The skill wasn't meant to be used like that, but I pushed it anyway.
The Fire burning inside the beast tried to fight back, to burn with higher intensity but it couldn't. My Ice invaded its body and snuffed it out with vigor.
The fire in its eyes dimmed and the struggle it put up diminished. The kicking legs and snapping jaws slowed until it stopped utterly. Its fight smothered completely before a stronger will.
Frost built up on its fur and the fiery mane itself froze.
I pushed more and more against it before it finally lay still. Unmoving in an unlikely death for a member of its kind.
Frozen to the core.
Comments
James Faulkner
Goddamn that’s badass, let’s go anchor formation!!
Demonlord
What an amazing fight and ending the fire lion as ice sculpture is fitting
