Please read the author's notes. (Examples and explanation of moves and appearance+ Monster Sources)
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pat.treon:/Keanu_Eugene
CHAPTER START---
Three weeks after Yang stopped the ice storm from battering Orario. The Trifecta find themselves getting dressed in their tent on the lower floors.
Putting on their combat gear Thalie and Welf both have an extra layer of fur in their equipment. A mix of Ice bears and other monster furs to keep them warm. Yang however is actually wearing less equipment than before. His coat was completely shredded after their last expedition so instead of making a new one Welf simply reinforced the layers of his clothes. His standard battlemage enchanted gear of black combat pants and boots with a grey top. A bright blue armguard on his right hand and thin blue lines on his boots.
"Can't believe it took us two months to get this far last time," Thalie says as she packs up her stuff and hands it to Yang for storage.
Placing the chest of clothes and other items into his inventory he hears Welf respond.
"Well, it's easier when you know what to expect and where to go. Plus Yang's more used to the ice now. I doubt it would even take us more than maybe five days to get back here after this expedition," he says while handing Yang his items for storage.
"Let's focus on this expedition before we plan the next one, if all goes well this time tomorrow we're in the safe zone," Yang says as he hands Welf his visor. A wide piece of eyewear he and Thalie would be wearing to protect them from the snow.
"Agreed," Thalie says while putting on her visor, "let's go."
Only a few minutes later they all find themselves standing at the top of a gentle incline. A slope made of solid ice acting as a ramp into the final room of floor 68.
With the tunnel leading to the previous chamber at their backs, the Trifecta look forward, seeing a literal army of frost giants. Hundreds of the monsters sleeping in piles all across the glacier-like room.
The floor being solid ice under barely a foot of snow as howling winds carry the soft snow across the room and into the tunnel at their backs.
Each of the monsters is a humanoid with blue skin, all different body types but some traits are constant. Their 10 meter (32ft) average height, protruding tusks, and sharp claws. Some were even holding giant icicles in their sleep as if they were clubs. Looking around the floor there were some of these Natural Weapons as adventurers called any weapon made by the dungeon, rising out of the floor as spikes. Reaching almost 5m(15ft) on their own.
Narrowing his eyes Yang tries his best to peer through the wind and snow toward the other end of the room. The map said that's where the next doorway is but he simply couldn't see it.
"The exit is too far, all I see is more and more of these Frost Giants, you guys ready?" he asks.
Drawing his sword Welf ignites the blade, turning to Yang and giving him a nod.
Thalie removes her spear from her back and gives him a nod as well.
"Good," Yang says. "Both of you stay together. Thalie doesn't have range so she needs to get close. Both of you working together is a must in this place because it looks like we've got a room I can't see the end of and hundreds of monsters. If either of you gets separated and swarmed they could get lucky hits in and overwhelm you with numbers. Stay at this end of the room and just let them come to you. I'll go further out since I can just fly out if needed and get back here," he says.
"Weaknesses?" Welf asks with a smile on his face, already having an idea of what Yang was going to say.
"Fire and lighting. Cold doesn't work. Do your thing Ignis," Yang chuckles slightly at Welf's giddy smile. The further down they go the more it seemed the dungeon gave monsters fire resistance or outright immunity. Yang's explanation of fire being the most common element therefore the most resisted didn't help to lift the smith's spirits at all these past few days.
"Finally some good news," Welf says.
"Alright just wait for them to turn on me then stab them in the back," Yang says as he gets into a low crouch and jumps forward.
As he soars through the air toward the middle of the room with one massive leap Thalie pulls Welf down prone into the snow, hiding them from the soon-to-be awake monsters.
Hearing a thunderous crack echo throughout the chamber, one of Yang's favourite applications of wind magic. Amplifying the sound of him simply snapping his fingers to an absurd level to get everyone's attention.
Thalie and Welf see the monster stir awake before the entire chamber trembles with hundreds of booming and deep roars.
Seeing the monsters turn toward Yang and begin trudging along toward the middle of the room Thalie and Welf sprint down the ramp.
Now wading through a foot of snow effortlessly they close in on the army of Frost Giants. Welf raises his sword and points it forward to unleash a devastating cone of fire.
Crimson flames topple each other as they crash through the army of giants. With their vulnerability to fire, the giants never stood a chance. Even with the magical winds and cold fighting against his flames Welf clears out dozens of monsters with ease.
"How many of those can you do?" Thalie asks as she raises her spear up to meet the giants that are moving to swarm them.
"Not enough for this army, let's just break the crystals," Welf says as he forms a 10ft long broadsword construct from his flames. Effectively extending the reach of his weapon to strike the crystals.
"Yeah we can't let the corpses pile up," Thalie says as she strikes out. Leaping up almost a dozen feet before stabbing forward with her spear toward the center of the monster. The monster immediately dies, but the body stays. "Crystals aren't where the heart would be!" she announces for Welf to hear while moving on to the next target.
With a vertical slash, Welf cleaves one of the monsters in two. Dividing it from the left shoulder right through to its feet.
Seeing the innards of the monster he notices a purple crystal the size of a baseball in the middle of the belly, not at all where he expected it.
"They're in the belly, just aim for the belly button!" he yells out while slashing out horizontally and shattering five crystals all at once.
'That's so dumb,' Thalie thinks to herself as she pierces a monster crystal.
She immediately spins in mid-air and kicks out. Stabbing her spear into the ground to give herself leverage to generate power and not be knocked back. The looming shadow of a massive club crashing down on her was just enough of a warning for her to react.
As her foot slams into a large ice weapon. Almost 6ft wide at the very end but she hits it hard enough that the giant was caught off guard. The weapon slams into his face and breaks his tusks, completely crushing his skull as the ice shatters.
Before her feet can even touch the ground another club is swung at her. This time horizontally not vertically. Reacting quickly she pushes down on her spear with her palm, using the weapon as footing to send herself a dozen feet into the air to safely evade the strike.
As the club passes below her she draws a Magic Shuriken, the red blade flies out and becomes a small pillar of flame as it hollows out the giant's belly. Shattering the crystal so the body can become ash.
Finally getting to land beside her weapon she retrieves it from the ice and takes a breath, looking over to see Welf effortlessly cutting everything in half with his flames she too leaps back into the fray to fight the seemingly endless hoards of giants.
As Welf and Thalie were having their war, Yang was waging one of his own.
As soon as he landed in the middle of the hoard and called all the monsters to him, with his axe out he quickly got to work dividing the monsters.
Waving his axe around in one hand, the metal flowed through flesh as if it were nothing. In his right hand he would swing his weapons while jumping around the battlefield or flying with flames only on under his feet.
With a wave of his left hand he controlled the elements. Seamlessly flowing between controlling the ice and snow around them to form walls for cover, icicles to skewer the monsters and anchor them in place. Or just control the snow to push the monsters back.
When the bodies pile up he summons a wave of flames to wash across the area, clearing the battlefield and giving himself space.
As an ice club descends onto him, he swings upward with more force, shattering the weapon as his blade crashes through it.
He flies up to the monsters head as it reels back from shock and slashes down, dividing the Frost Giant in two.
As more and more monsters endlessly swarm him Yang realizes something. His weapon simply wasn't effective here. His weapon was made for big damage on single targets that were hard to pierce. These monsters were peak level five, he'd have no problem slashing through but their numbers made the large weapon less efficient.
Landing on the ground he stomps his foot, leaning into the environment instead of trying to hide from it or fight against it. He does exactly what he's been doing since leaving Orario, acting with nature.
All the snow in his surrounding area piles up like waves as he uses 'Control Water' to shape it. Pushing all the massive giants back and blinding them for just a moment.
As they break through the soft snowbanks he made and pull themselves together, some of these monsters find themselves riddled with holes.
Standing on a pillar of ice almost at eye level to the giants. Yang has his elemental wheel out, with Water, Cold and Fire each sharing a third of the wheel.
He seamlessly flows through the elements as the army of monsters charges his pillar, playing the ultimate game of King of the Hill.
With his weapon stored away, he stands unarmed, with a wave of his hand icicles shoot out of the pillar as if they were bullets to pierce the monsters. Frost giants are immune to cold damage, but sharp ice still cuts and pierces. He wasn't trying to freeze them as all.
As he fires volley after volley of ice the snow surrounding his pillar is quickly pulled into the base of it. Refilling the gaps he makes as quickly as they form, giving him an endless amount of ammo as long as he has magic.
Tired of this game one of the monsters throws its icicle club at the pillar. While reaching out with his right had to fire a volley of ice spikes and kill another monster Yang punches out with his left to create a powerful blast of fire from his hand. Melting the pillar before it can even reach him and killing a cluster of Frost Giants in the process.
His movements are no longer as stiff and structured as before. No longer trying to fight his environment. Now every move was fluid, natural, and reactive. No overthinking just actions and reactions. Instead of his previous reliance on fire, he's leaning into his environment to make it work for him. Unlike humans who could only weather the storm, he could dominate it and use it. He could create and dispel it. He was one with nature, now he could play god.
With a calm mind, he sends out hundreds of icicles before the corpses begin to hinder him. The monsters don't seem to care, easily crawling over the corpses of their allies to mindlessly charge his pillar, but they were unintentionally using them as cover to approach.
"Time to clear the area," he says while taking a deep breath. Feeling the cold air fill his lungs he stops making projectiles and brings his hands together.
As he exhales his hands spread out and an explosion of fire erupts from his body. Completely evaporating the snow and ice around him, cracking the crystals of the corpses and clearing the battlefield.
Yang finds himself standing on solid stone with a wall of ice a few feet high at the edge of where his flames ended. The ground beneath him was red hot from his attack, he'd melted the ice at the floor as well it seems.
Seeing the monsters dropping into the pit he notices their numbers still appear endless.
Rocketing into the air he surveys the battlefield once more. Welf and Thalie are still fighting at the edge of the room, he sees them doing well. It would seem they realized the problem with all the corpses before him and were more efficiently destroying monster crystals.
"These things are endless... I need to use something big..." he ponders while dropping back onto the battlefield. Deactivating his Elemental Wheel and retrieving his weapon to conserve some magic.
'Ok Yang use your head,' he thinks to himself while slashing through the army of monsters. 'Fire is super effective against them but the magical cold here makes larger attacks cost way more mana than normal. Ice can work to pierce. Area of effect lighting that would be any good here costs too much. Earth costs a lot and takes time that I don't have. Wind might get disrupted by this other wind...what do I do?' he ponders to himself.
Slashing through a dozen more monsters. As another club crashes down on him he catches it with his hand. His Elementalist Gauntlet cracking the ice.
"I've got it!" he yells out excitedly. Leaving the confused monster staring up at him as he flies through the air on a trail of blue flames.
Withdrawing his message ring he raises it to his mouth mid-flight. Looking down at the countless Frost Giants as they crane their necks up to follow his flight. Shuffling along to give chase.
"Welf, Thalie!" he shouts into the ring.
A few moments later he gets a response from Welf, "you need help?" the smith asks.
"No, but I think we'll have endurance problems. This room is freaking ridiculous size, definitely a kilometer or two and every inch has giants," Yang tells him.
"Fuck, what's the play?"
"Stay at the doorway we entered from and kill anything you can, I'm heading to the other doorway. Do the biggest attack you can to make space then hide when they lose vision. I'll take over for a while so you can use elixirs and stuff then on my mark you jump back in the fight," Yang says as he sees the tunnel to floor 69 ahead.
"Gotcha, just say when," Welf says.
As he gets closer to the tunnel, Yang's flames begin sputtering out. His usual output wasn't enough to sustain flames in the face of this cold wind.
Pushing more magic into his flight he barely gets half of his usual output for the magic he uses, pushing against the wind as he lands in the tunnel. The giants already swarming him.
Withdrawing his weapon he begins cutting more and more monsters in two while focusing his magic.
Forming an icicle in his hand, simply controlling the snow slightly immediately formed a sharp piece of ice. Giving it some more magic to reinforce it he threw it above his head.
Immediately it was caught in the wind and moves like an arrow from a war bow. Piercing the flesh of one of the monsters as it continues to rush Yang.
"Ok," he cuts the monsters' leg off. "Takes less magic to make and reinforce them because this place is a magic ice storm," he says while cleaving the monster in two. "This might really work," a devious smile forms on his face.
Leaping backward into the tunnel, he sticks his weapon into the icy floor before slamming both his hands on the ground.
Immediately a wall of ice and snow forms and pushes back the first line of monsters.
This buys him just enough time to store his weapon away and summon his elemental wheel.
With Wind, Cold, and Water on his Elemental Wheel, he clasps both hands together as if he were praying and raises a small wall of ice behind him. His back was only inches away from the wall with his face toward the monsters. The backside of the wall was a smooth ramp so the raging wind would simply pass around it.
"WELF, NOW!" Yang yells out.
Immediately the ice and snow around him begin to form sharp icicles as the giants enter the tunnel, lumbering toward him.
With the snow, wind, and cold of the environment, the cost to his magic for this trick was reduced by an absurd amount.
Using Water and Cold magic to form the projectiles, he used his wind to amplify the almost hurricane winds of the tunnel.
He effectively made the tunnel into the chamber of a gun with an endless supply of bullets, and the giants were just walking into it.
Icicles pierced giant after giant, only occasionally needing his assistance to hit specific areas to shatter crystals to clear the path for more monsters.
On the other side of the chamber, after using well over half his magic to clear at least a hundred giants with a massive arc of blood-red flames. Welf is laying behind a snowbank drinking a Magic Potion while Thalie peeks over their cover.
She sees all the giants turning away from them. Not even bothering to cross the melted area to look for them, only heading toward Yang.
"What the hell is he doing over there?" she wonders aloud before ducking back behind cover with Welf.
"Whatever it is we need to get ready to re-engage," Welf says as he drinks another Magic Potion.
As the minutes passed by, Welf and Thalie find themselves trudging through the snow a hundred meters behind the giants as they lumber toward Yang.
Eventually, after almost 40 minutes they get the signal, "alright that's it, your turn now!" he orders through the message ring.
Welf immediately uses an arc of flames to get the attention of the monsters before he and Thalie leap back into the fray.
At the other end of the chamber, Yang was breathing heavily trying to catch his breath while avoiding attacks. Ducking and weaving trying to make it past the monsters and out of the tunnel.
As he stumbles for just a moment one of their icicle clubs slams into him, embedding him into the wall.
"Argh, shit..." he shakes his head and quickly pulls himself out of the wall to avoid another hit.
Taking a deep breath he breaks into a full sprint, knocking the giants aside, their cold leathery skin touching him for the very first time. He ignored the clinging and shattering of magic crystals at their feet in the tunnel as he rushes past.
The entire floor of the tunnel was purple with crystals. If not for the wind constantly bringing more snow there wouldn't be a speck of white after the thousands of monsters he killed with his plan.
Tusks and pieces of leathery hide were scattered about but he ignored it all, focusing on winning before looting is the best way to survive after all.
After only a few moments he makes it out of the tunnel, leaping up he grabs onto the ice wall of the chamber by sinking his hands in.
With a kick of his foot, he commands a thick veil of snow to wash over him, hiding him for a moment from the monsters. When the veil passed, he was completely gone. Disappeared without a trace, leaving the monsters to turn to his friends.
After 10 minutes of fighting Frost Giants after the re-engaging. Welf and Thalie make it to the other end of the chamber to see all the crystals and drop items in the tunnel.
Hearing the sound of ice shattering, they look up to see a piece of the wall above the tunnel entrance break only for Yang to pop out. Landing beside them and taking deep breaths. With frost covering most of his body, he moves around a bit for pieces of ice to break off.
"Hey, you ok man?" Welf asks, seeing Yang hunched over with his hands on his knees.
"Yeah, just... need a minute," he says. Walking over to the side of the tunnel entrance to get a bit out of the direct wind.
Placing his hand on the chamber wall, Yang makes a hole large enough for them to camp if needed and walks in. Withdrawing a lamp and setting it down for some light as he controls the nearby snow to pull all the crystals and drop items toward them.
"Let's get this shit locked away, I'm fucking freezing," he says while igniting his Mage Armor for the flames to warm him up.
10 Minutes later the Trifecta are sitting in their now sealed-off cave warming up.
Yang is now warmed up as they check their equipment and items.
"So, how was that for you guys?" Yang asks.
"Annoying," Thalie says.
"Kinda fun honestly," Welf says with a small smile.
Shaking her head at him, Thalie asks something that's been on her mind. "What did you do exactly, what was your plan back there?" she asks Yang.
"Oh, well. Basically, when I was flying I noticed even giants that can't see where we are were swarming, follow the leader style. With you guys being downwind and out of sight since all the wind was blowing toward you and away from the giants, and me being upwind at the source and in the tunnel. The moment you disappear they all have to come to me so I used the natural wind, cold, and water down here to bolster my magic and use it against them," he explains.
With a snap of her fingers, Thalie instantly recognizes the strategy," because numbers don't matter in narrow corridors, that's pretty clever," she says.
"Yeah, saw it in a movie...uh, it was in a popular story back home," he says. Quickly remembering movies don't exist here.
"So the giants were tracking with smell. Didn't expect that," Welf says. "But whatever. Enough about that, what's next. We've only been awake for like an hour so we can still keep going today," he says.
Thalie nods in agreement.
"Yeah, we are," Yang confirms. "Honestly I felt really damn cold even with a wall protecting me from direct wind. But that took like half-hour with me amping it. I'm guessing the monster rex is either dead or changed since the Ice Serpent wasn't stated to have any kind of snowstorm magic," he says.
"Seriously, a new monster-rex?" Thalie asks," whatcha think the new boss is to be making all this snow?"
"Hmm," he puts a finger on his chin and mulls over the idea. "I was expecting maybe an ice elemental or something to be in this chamber causing the wind and the monster rex to be unchanged. Since it is changed I'm guessing either an Ancient Ice Elemental, Colossal Sentient Blizzard...or Ancient Ice Dragon, the dungeon seems to have a love for dragons after all so I'd bet on that," he says.
With a raised brown Welf can't help but ask, "how the hell do we fight a Sentient Blizzard?"
"You find the core, but we're about to go over the most likely options anyway while we get some rest. We'll head down in an hour, the next fight is the big boss fight..."
END CHAPTER---
Next Chapter: Monster-Rex ******...Feel free to make your predictions for the boss here :)
Yang is definitely fighting more like an Elemental Bender now, more than a brawler who happens to have elements.