"Let's see, and then we head this way…" Ivan waved around the compass again, after the great rabbit massacre a wall opened up to reveal a secret passage.
And of course, that meant— even more walking. If not for the talkative Felis the travel through the solemn ice tunnels would've only weighed on their mental sanity, she was truly their little ball of sunshine.
"Felis, I swear if you try to lick the ice again I'll cut that tongue off this time…" Canis threatened her sister who was too close to her own reflection for comfort. The last time Felis got her tongue stuck she let her off easy and pulled her out, this time she wouldn't show mercy and allow their regeneration to take care of things.
"I-I won't make the same mistake twice!" Felis puffed her cheeks before turning her head away, her tail standing on end to show how agitated that comment made her.
Ivan meanwhile praised Canis' restraint, as similar to Felis she too had never been in an environment like this, and yet she showed great restraint in her emotions. Even when she stared enviously at Felis who dove into the snow to make angels.
'Perhaps this is just a way of letting off her petty anger~' Admonishing her elder sister for doing the things her shame wouldn't allow her, seemed about right.
"This is…" Finally, the endless tunnel of ice showed signs of ending at the point they reached. One turn around a corner revealed to the group a large open area.
Icicles hung from the ceiling, and along the walls were jagged pikes formed of ice. Though there were no lights, for some reason the large cave was bright enough so that even those without special optical skills could see.
And in this huge opening was a lake of solid ice, ice so polished that the reflections shown might as well have been doppelgangers. But the group focused their attention on the figures lazily lying on the ice.
They were hairy head to toe, their feet the size of two people's heads, and the only places barren of brown curly hair were their chests and face. Though they weren't standing Ivan estimated that their full height was close to seven feet.
"Sasquatches…" Ivan's mutter awoke the seven slumbering giants, they stood up and pounded on their chiseled abs before releasing an ear-shaking roar.
"RAAAAAAHHHH!!!"
They were bigfoots… or bigfeets? No— those titles did not fit the creatures when Ivan witnessed how they maneuvered through the lake of ice. Like professional athletes, they held both arms behind their backs and skated across the ice in mesmerizing beauty.
Some of the hulking figures even did pirouettes as they skated their way. Honestly, even to the others who didn't know of the sport from Earth, the skating was a beauty that anyone could appreciate.
Unsurprisingly Felis found herself reluctant to kill something again. Though this time there wasn't much of a choice, as the, what Ivan was going to call, Yetis, swiftly raced toward them.
Among a volley of magic spells and sorceries, the Yetis deftly dodged everything coming their way effortlessly. On the ice, they were kings.
BANG BANG BANG!
Seven alone were enough to hold the group still, both sides have failed to make a decisive move. The Yetis didn't dare get close as they felt the odds of being hit would only increase while Ivan and his group had difficulty hitting the large elegant monsters.
To remedy the standoff Ivan asked Yue to cast her elemental dragon spells once more, with her control over gravity magic entangling the yetis should be an easy feat. She nodded before allowing herself to be encapsulated by the group as they all stood in front of her to protect her.
"I'll be counting on you Tio to take care of these guys until Yue is ready, be careful not to expend too much mana. Even if we could refill, it would be unwise to empty reserves this early into the dungeon. Especially on enemies such as these…"
While Ivan didn't look down on the bipedal creatures he saw more of a threat from the tidal wave of rabbits than them. The reason is that at least three of the fighters in his group would likely be able to fight them off with physical strength should they close in, and seeing as how the Yetis have no other option than to close in he even contemplated allowing such.
At least that was until Yue finished casting—
"Go, elemental dragons…" Yue uttered each word with apathy, the cave luminosity grew intensely as dragons of earth, ice, flame, and lightning each flew at their respective yetis. Their tails threaten to slap the remaining four yetis should they get close.
"GRAAAAGH!"
The only yeti that stood a chance was the one facing the earth elemental, it grabbed the dragon by its head before planting its get into the ground. Its strong arms gripped it so hard that the dragon was unable to open its large maws.
And as such it took the opportunity to flip the dragon over, grunting aloud while showing off its impressive strength.
THUD!
The dragon's body slammed into the ice, creating large cracks through its surface. The Yeti went to pound its chest in victory, angling its head up to release a roar.
Unfortunately for it, it had completely forgotten the dozen or so enemies that had spectated the whole bout.
Ivan took advantage of the creature's single time of pausing to step towards it with 'air walk' when it lifted both arms to roar; he simply placed his right hand on its chest.
"...."
It stared down at him for a second, stagnating before attempting to slam down its arms again in the quickest possible amount of time.
"I apologize for ruining your moment, I truly feel as though this is a bit unfair. But my group and I have more pressing matters to attend to… as such, I must ask that you exit this fight."
BANG!
The Yeti wasn't allowed a moment to respond as its body was completely eviscerated, the remaining bits of flesh and parts were compressed once again with Ivan's gravity field, leaving nothing but blood scattered in the air.
Ivan stuck his left hand out this time, activating his field and infusing it with his water transmutation. The specs of blood floating in the air gathered around his arm and coagulated to form a two-handed halberd.
"...."
The remaining Yetis, the three that hadn't been eliminated by elemental dragons, stared at the weapon in trepidation. From it, they felt fear, anger, resentment, and regret. It howled at them as if to transmit the pain it felt moments before being created.
"Infused in this weapon is the soul of your compatriot, so, what'll you all do now? Would you like to join him?"
Ivan only inched forward, making sure not to turn his eyes to the figures sneaking toward the distracted Yetis.
SLASH!
In a synchronized movement each of the lined up Yetis was beheaded in a single instant. Each of them held expressions of regret before staring at their assailants right before the loss of light in their eyes.
".... Hmph, that most certainly does leave a foul taste in my mouth… however, with this we can guess that your assistance with this trial will count to the labyrinth's completion~"
Ivan gave approving nods toward Claire, Ari, and Canis, each of whom returned the nod with pride of their own. The Yetis in their opinion were just annoying enemies they were glad to have dealt with while they were distracted.
Rather than fight, the Yetis held an instinctive nature to avoid the group for how dangerous it felt when opposing them, as rather than waste over an hour of them dodging attacks with skating techniques this result was preferable.
RUMBLE RUMBLE
"Oh, it's just the next part. Phew~!": Ivan relaxed his guard as another wall came tumbling down, revealing another series of tunnels that he believed would be the key to progressing their travel into the dungeon.
He held his compass into the air, waving it around before nodding. Without looking back he stepped forward, not worrying that the group would lose his trail.
By this time Felis' fascination with the frozen climate had diminished greatly, instead, her boredom grew seeing the plan mirror-like walls over and over again. The same with the matching floors and ceiling.
Oddly enough she found out that being surrounded by a single color only greatly affected her mental psyche more than she initially thought it would.
"Hm~?" She jolted, feeling something warm encompass her mind, the muscles in her body she didn't know were tense had greatly relaxed seeing her father stare at her with a kind smile and one glowing hand in the air.
Ivan nodded, proud of his control over spirit magic. A side attribute he found to it was relieving the mental fatigue of others, albeit only briefly. And another thing to mention was that its effects were barely noticeable when conducted on someone whose mind had collapsed.
That didn't matter, for now, he was satisfied that he managed to turn Felis' frown into a smile with it.
He laughed lightly, feeling her tackle into his back using her head, not bothering to turn around as she latched to his waist and allowed him to drag her to the destination.
'Perhaps I should've added a similar mental fatigue relieving attribute to the wristbands huh…?'
To Ivan the best part about creating was witnessing the result and thinking of how he could further improve it, sure it meant more work would need to be done but chances were he'd be way more satisfied with the result than initially.
That in his opinion was all the more worth it.
"This is?" The group came to a strolling speed as compared to the baroness that was present before what now surrounded them were ice sculptures of beings from different races. Demons, Humans, even Beastman.
"Wait a second, these are…" They weren't sculptures, it was more accurate to call them remnants.
They were the frozen corpses of past challengers who had succumbed to the cold climate of the dungeon. Most of the frozen even held expressions of relief which suggested to the group that they had been frozen in their sleep without any notice.
"How terrifying…" The rest of the group nodded before clutching their wristbands. Even with their regeneration, the homunculi sisters knew there was nothing they'd be able to do if they were perpetually frozen in this land of ice. They'd be forced to stay frozen for who knew how long.
The same applied to Yue, who inspected each of the frozen figures carefully.
"Mmm… they're wearing uniforms similar to Freid's…" The demons who had met their demise seemed to be adorned with military-like outfits.
"I see, they must've been attempting this dungeon alongside Freid. Or maybe he sent them in after to see if any other members of his race could conquer it."
"Well, for good measure let's smash them!" Ivan followed up before kicking the head off a nearby statue. The others followed alongside him after hearing stories of his world where stuff like this usually comes to life when no one's looking.
After several minutes the deed was done, none of the ice sculptures remained with a head atop their shoulders.
"Umu, that seems alright~ Now let us continue our trek~! As soon as those words left Ivan's mouth the sound of ice skidding across the ground resounded from behind the group. They turned their heads slowly, hoping what they had heard was just an illusion.
But nope— the sculptures broke apart, flecks of ice were sent flying as the once-living beings inside of it cracked and moved their limbs like broken marionettes.
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