Chapter 81: Ice (Patreon)

AN: sorry for missing so many posts these past weeks. I'd been keeping track of what I missed with the intention of catching back up, but it got a bit overwhelming, and I think I'm gonna have to call the missed chapters a wash and just plan on resuming the normal posting schedule from here.

Because of that, I've paused the billing cycle for the next month (until march 6th), so on whatever day of the month you originally signed up you shouldn't receive a charge until then. Thanks for sticking around, and enjoy the chapter!

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1HEYS1AB7Xo8bro82BcIlH_VKV1-cDoBR1i60GxJlmaQ/edit?usp=sharing

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The next three minutes passed in the same vein as the first – Cayden and Valeria danced around the room, dodging, ducking, and weaving around the cloth tentacles, and hiding behind the few remaining pillars when they needed to catch a breather. Twice more the monster paused to open its maw and shoot spikes at the two adventurers, and each time Cayden was forced to use [The Moment] to avoid being impaled. Which worried him -- he was regenerating some mana as they fought, but not nearly as much as he was using. At this pace, he wouldn't have enough to use [The Moment] the next time the monster launched its spikes.

"How much longer on the chant?" Cayden asked during the pause after the third launch of spikes, to which Valeria only shook her head. She was bleeding in a few more places than when he had last talked to her, but otherwise she looked no worse for wear. Despite the sweat, dirt, and blood, even the small portion of her that Cayden could see outside of her armor looked radiantly beautiful, and though he tried to keep his eyes on his surroundings, they kept naturally drifting back to the young girl.

Which wasn't a good thing – Cayden didn't know exactly how her sacrifice skill worked, but he took his failing self-control as a sign that her charisma was increasing back to its normal values. Truthfully, he was amazed at how long the skill had already lasted; she'd been fighting when he'd arrived, and it'd been a full five minutes since then. He knew of no other active skills that had that long of a duration, at least none with such powerful effects. He'd noticed her drink a few potions while they rested after the spikes, which he assumed were mana potions. But even with high-quality potions, he assumed she was pushing her limits.

Regardless, they had no other options. It was already hard enough dodging the flailing cloth tentacles at range; trying to dodge them within melee range of the monster sounded like a suicide mission. And even if they could get close, he doubted his borrowed sword would do much to the powerful monster. All they could do was keep distracting the monster and wait for Valeria's teammate.

Although...

"Can't we just run?" Cayden asked after a glance to where Delphia and Marrianne were still crouched over the gorgon girl. "It might not be the best for..." he paused, realizing he didn't know the name of his fellow frontliner. "...your teammate. But better to be jostled as we flee than to die here."

Valeria shook her head. "It followed us here. It is faster than you would think. Henrietta took more wounds than just from the spike keeping its wrappings off of us in the corridors."

Cayden grimaced. He supposed that if they couldn't run, that only left what they had already been doing. He sighed heavily as the monster finished 'recharging' and shot out a new batch of tentacles, he and Valeria sprinting in opposite directions with practiced coordination.

It wasn't easy. The cloth wrappings that chased them were dextrous and unpredictable, able to move in ways that normal weapons couldn't, and Cayden's [Blade Sense] was no help. But with the experience of having done it for the last few minutes, neither was evading the attacks overly difficult.

No matter how the cloth tentacles contorted, they were limited in their attacks by the immobile monster to which they connected in the center of the room. Cayden wasn't sure why it wasn't moving around or chasing them, as that would make everything infinitely harder, but he wasn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth. As it was, he could stay near the edge of the tentacles' range – never stepping quite beyond the edge, as he didn't want to risk losing the monster's aggro – and count on his agility to stay ahead of the appendages.

Eventually, though, the true danger would return: the monster's spikes. He'd tried to come up with a plan, but at the end of the day, without [The Moment] he wouldn't be able to dodge the spike attacks. And if the pattern the monster followed continued, he wouldn't have enough mana to activate the [The Moment] during its next spike attack. So as the time when the monster would normally switch up its attacks approached, his best idea was to curl into a ball to minimize the target he presented and pray he was durable enough to withstand whatever hit him.

Luckily, before he was forced to test that idea, a tall girl dressed in blue-white robes stepped out from behind a pillar in the far corner of the room.

'Chants' were an interesting subclass of skill. While Cayden could vaguely remember Elise mentioning something about them ages ago as a suggestion for his build, it wasn't something he'd personally encountered before, and he wouldn't know anything about how they worked if it weren't for a recent skills class explaining them.

In short, 'chant' type skills gained some aspect of a skill in trade for a longer cast time, with the added risk of the skill being interrupted before it could be completed. The new aspect could be anything: extended duration of the skill's effects, reducing the mana cost of the skill, or granting the caster greater control over the skill's precise effects. Most often, though, chanted skills granted one thing.

Power. Lots and lots of power.

"...and with the winds of winter, the spring dries, the summer darkens, and the fall withers. For none can stand against the cold; the uncaring, the unfeeling, the..."

The girl's voice had a strange cadence to it as she emerged, the sound becoming...not exactly louder, but somehow easier to hear. As if it had more weight behind it – more significance.

It seemed that, whatever she was doing, the monster could sense it, and the bandages which had been chasing Cayden immediately swerved toward the girl. Cayden aborted his previous dodge and chased after the appendages, attempting to grab the nearest one before it could get away, but that had about as much effect as his earlier sword swings.

The girl seemed oblivious to the incoming attacks, her gaze locked on the monster's body as her voice gained even more significance.

"...and in the end, there is nothing left. No motion. No heat. No life. [Sheer Cold]!"

And as she spoke the last words, with the wrappings only a dozen feet away and quickly closing the distance, there was a loud snap followed by a thump as all the air in the room got sucked toward the monster. And of the monster itself, only a pillar of ice remained where it had once stood. So cold that, even with [Resistance] and standing halfway across the room, Cayden shivered and wrapped his arms around himself for warmth.

The bandages which had been extending away from the monster were still there, but they had also frozen the moment the girl had completed the spell, dropping to the ground and some of them shattering from the impact.

Finally. After so long running around the room, it seemed the monster had finally been defeated. That was – by a large margin – the most powerful skill Cayden had ever seen, even compared to what the princess's bodyguards had displayed. There was no way that the monster had survived.

Still in her corner of the room, the girl who cast the spell dropped to her knees, the motion easily audible in the sudden silence. On the opposite side of the room, the princess did the same, the price of her constant effort finally coming due.

Cayden looked between the two of them, unsure of which girl to help first, but ultimately decided on the princess. He took a single step forward and opened his mouth to call for Delphia, about to say that it was safe for the healer and the rest of them to come out – only to pause at the sound of cracking.

A cloth tentacle, one which hadn't shattered after dropping to the ground, twitched. Once, twice, and then it slowly rose into the air. Chunks of ice flaked off of it as it curled in toward itself, angling toward the monster to which it was connected and the pillar of ice which enclosed it.

And then it surged forward, striking the pillar of ice with a resounding thunk. It left nothing more than a chip, the pillar created by the chanted skill much more durable than the mostly-destroyed stone pillars lining the room, but around the room, some of the other tentacles started to twitch as well, rising into the air and mimicking the first in its continued attacks on the pillar of ice in the center of the room.

Cayden lunged forward and attacked the nearest slowly-rising tentacle, his sword this time cutting into and shattering the brittle cloth. But the temporary weakness created by the chanted skill was quickly fading, and the next tentacle took several strikes to destroy, while the third he could only cut halfway through before it regained its previous resiliency.

And all the while, the rest of the cloth tentacles continued their assault on the pillar of ice. It was slow progress, but it was progress nonetheless, with larger and larger chunks of ice knocked off after each attack. The princess and the damage dealer remained on their knees, the damage dealer staring at the pillar of ice with despair, and the princess impassive. Cayden continued his fruitless attacks against the closest appendage.

He wanted to yell at the two girls. To call for help, to have them do something – anything – to try and delay the monster's escape. But what could they do? Aside from the first two tentacles, his efforts weren't doing any more than the girls' stares.

So instead, he yelled the opposite. "Let's get out of here! Grab Delphia and the others and run! Maybe we can get away before it escapes."

The princess' vacant stare sharpened, and she unsteadily pulled herself back to her feet and stumbled toward where Delphia had been treating the gorgon. The damage dealer, though, didn't react to Cayden's words, simply staring in shock at the flailing tentacles. Cayden snarled in annoyance before rushing over to the stunned girl, grabbing her by the shoulders, and yanking her to her feet.

"We need to go!" he yelled in her face, and though her eyes came back into focus, she still seemed only half-there, and Cayden had to practically carry her to get her moving. But they'd only traveled a few steps before a loud crack echoed through the chamber. Cayden looked back at the pillar of ice, expecting the worst.

The monster was free. Still coated in a layer of frost and a few frozen chunks of ice, it unsteadily stepped from its prison, its cloth-wrapped head turned toward Cayden.

No – not toward Cayden. Toward the girl next to him, the one who'd put it in its temporary prison.

The tentacles around where a stomach would be on a human slowly unraveled, revealing a gaping black maw. And then, with dark spikes pointed at the girl standing next to Cayden, it attacked.

Even without [The Moment], time seemed to drop into slow motion as Cayden analyzed his options. He didn't have the mana for [The Moment], not that it would do any good for the girl next to him if he did. He wasn't fast enough to move himself or the girl out of the way of the attack, and he had nothing to block the spikes with. Nothing but his body.

Without hesitating, Cayden pushed the girl to the ground. He crouched down in front of her, ensuring that he was completely between the monster and the tall girl's frame. He ducked his head and held his resilient hands in front of his face. And then, with a thought, he dumped his saved free stat points – all twenty-eight of them – into vitality.

He only had an instant, a fraction of a second, before the spikes impacted. But it was long enough for Cayden to question his decisions, to wonder what he could've done differently.

And then the instant was over, and all he felt was pain.

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