Chapter 104
Booommmm
The next second, ice was already forming beneath her feet, spreading outward in a wave that flash-froze the stone and sent cracks spidering through the ground.
Ethan reacted without thinking.
Wind Spell: GaleStep
Air compressed beneath his boots, launching him sideways as a wall of crystalline ice exploded where he had stood. Shards of frozen stone scattered across the basin, each one sharp enough to draw blood. He landed in a crouch, his sword already drawn, his eyes tracking the woman as she turned to face him.
She did not pursue immediately. Instead, she raised both hands, palms up, and the temperature in the basin dropped. Ethan's breath misted in front of his face. Frost formed on the hilt of his sword.
Abyssal Ice Spell: Frozen Domain
The air itself began to crystallize. Thin needles of ice formed from nothing, hanging in the air between them, thousands of them, each one pointed at him. Ethan's mana sense told him what was coming before she released them—a wave of frozen projectiles moving faster than arrows, dense enough to shred anything in their path.
He slammed his palms together.
Wind Spell: Vortex Shield
A cyclone erupted around him, spinning so fast the air became a wall of white. The ice needles struck the vortex and shattered, fragments spraying outward, cutting shallow lines across his arms and face where the shield could not cover everything. He held the spell, feeding it mana, letting the cyclone grind the ice to powder.
The woman lowered her hands. The barrage stopped.
Ethan dropped the shield and moved.
Wind Spell: Gale Step
He crossed the distance between them in a heartbeat, his sword raised, the blade already coated in wind. Which She responded by raising her arm, and ice formed across her forearm, a shield of black-veined crystal that caught his strike.
CLANG!
The impact sent shockwaves through the stone beneath them. Her shield held, but cracks spread across its surface. She looked at the cracks, then at him, and for the first time, something flickered in her pale eyes, as she felt Annoyance toward Ethan.
Abyssal Ice Spell: Frost Eruption
Ice exploded from her body in a wave of jagged spikes. Ethan threw himself backward, but one caught his side, cutting through his coat, through the leather beneath, opening a gash across his ribs. He landed hard, skidding across the frozen stone, his hand pressing against the wound. Blood seeped between his fingers.
She dashed forward moving at around 140 meters per second, each step left ice spreading beneath her feet, claiming more of the basin, shrinking the space he could move.
Ethan pushed himself up even when he felt extreme pain from his side and his breath had shorten. But he had fought enough battles to know that pain was not the same as defeat.
He raised his sword.
Wind Spell: Slip stream
The air around him shifted, flowing over his body like water around a stone. When she hurled another volley of ice spears, the wind caught them, pulling them aside, deflecting them into the rock walls where they shattered.
She frowned, not have expected that.
Abyssal Ice Spell: Glacial Prison
The ice beneath his feet rose, not in spikes, but in walls—closing in from all sides, sealing him in a cage of frozen stone. Ethan moved before the walls could close completely.
Wind Spell: Gale Step
He shot through the gap, his shoulder scraping against ice that burned with cold, and came out the other side already swinging.
Wind Spell: Pressure Blade
The wind around his sword condensed, becoming an edge thinner than paper, harder than steel. He brought it down across her guard.
She raised both arms, ice forming across them in layers, thick enough to stop a boulder. The Pressure Blade cut through the first three layers, the fourth, the fifth—and stopped at the sixth. Ice dust sprayed between them, clouding the air.
She smiled.
Abyssal Ice Spell: Heart Freeze
Cold pierced his chest. Not the cold of the air, but something deeper, something that reached past his skin, past his ribs, straight for his lungs. His breath seized and his limbs went rigid. The Pressure Blade dissolved, the wind around his sword vanishing as his focus shattered.
He fell. His knees struck the ice. His sword clattered beside him.
She stood over him, her arms still raised, her eyes watching him struggle for breath.
"You are strong," she said. "But you let your guard down."
Ethan's fingers found his sword which she didn't notice.
She raised her hand for the final strike. Ice gathered in her palm, forming a spear of black crystal, its point aimed at his heart.
"You are not strong enough."
Ethan's lungs burned and his chest was a block of ice. But his hand was on his sword.
In that time he drew the wind it into his lungs, into the space the cold had claimed, and held it there.
She thrust the spear.
He exhaled.
Wind Spell: Burst
The air exploded from his chest, throwing him backward across the ice, away from the spear's point. The blade cut empty air. He rolled, came up on one knee, and saw her already turning, already raising her arm to block.
He was faster.
Wind Spell: Gale Step
He crossed the distance in an instant moving at 150 meters per second. His sword came up, the wind already condensing around it, not into a blade, but into a point—a spear of pressure that would not stop at her armor, would not stop at her ice, would not stop until it had driven through everything she put in its path.
Wind Spell: Lance
Her eyes widened and she raised her arms, ice forming in layers, desperate, thick. The Lance struck the first layer and shattered it. Then second, The third, The fourth, and finally stopped at the fifth.
For a moment, they were frozen—her arms raised, her ice cracked, his sword pressed against the last barrier between them. Her lips curled. "Not enough."
Ethan looked at her. "No."
He drew the wind back into his blade, pulling the Lance's pressure inward, compressing it further, condensing it until the steel began to hum.
Wind Spell: Pressure Blade
The edge reformed, as he moved to push through the last layers.
The fifth layer split, Then the sixth, The seventh.
Her ice shattered. His blade drove through her guard, through her armor, through her chest, and out the other side.
She stared at him shocked at the turn of events with her mouth opened. No sound came out then the blood leaving her mouth. Her hands fell to her sides, the ice around her crumbling into dust.
Ethan pulled his sword free. She collapsed, her body hitting the ice with a sound that was barely more than a whisper.
He stood over her, his chest heaving, his side bleeding, his breath fogging in the frozen air. The ice around him was already beginning to crack, the cold fading, the basin returning to stone.
His hand was shaking. He did not know if it was from the cold or the wound or something else.
He looked across the basin, Austin was still fighting, Kaya was still fighting.
He had no time to rest.
He turned and walked toward them, leaving the white-haired woman behind, her body already dissolving into the ice that had once been hers.