Though it sounds like it took a while, everything happened in less than thirty seconds from beginning to end. And it was about time Sheer Cold took its toll.
Despite being only at the foot of the mountain, they were still within Sheer Cold area. Sai suddenly started feeling groggy, aside from the already cold environment.
He dashed away again, and again, but his movements only got more sluggish.
Eventually, he felt like he couldn't move, despite wanting to.
"My stamina!" He had forgotten about this precious resource.
"Kukuku! This guy Sia is pretty fun… although he's weak."
At this point, Sai no longer cared about Aether. He was focused on not dying.
He slowly walked away, trying to think of something. When the hilichurls were about to reach him, he had an epiphany.
He mustered what he could from his tired body, and made a beeline for Aether.
"Please take the aggro away from me!"
As he got closer to him, Aether's appearance got increasingly more transparent, until when Sai touched him. Or rather, tried to. His fingers went through his body like he didn't exist, and he disappeared from his place.
But as soon as he wasn't in contact anymore, Aether came back, although almost invisible, like a ghost.
"What the—"
"Huh? What is this? Why does he not do what I want? Hey Jake, is the game broken? I can't make him go where I want him to go, and now he's just unmoving!"
The voice came from Aether. Another voice responded:
"Hang on, let me just kill this boss."
In the meantime, the Mitachurl, or hilichurl boss, stuck his hand into the ground and pulled a red slime from it. After squeezing it along his axe, he threw it towards Sai.
Seeing this, he quickly dashed away to save himself.
'Booom!'
"Hggh!!" Sai was sent flying by the explosion.
"Why?? I am sure I dodged on time…" He felt a numbness spread through his injured back. And then a fiery pain took place.
"Ahhhh it burns! Ouuuch! Ouuuchhh!"
"See? He is now moving without me telling him to!"
"Hmm… is it a delay in the feedback? Maybe your phone is just trash."
"What trash? I saved up my money to get one of the latest models of the fruit branch! How is it trash? Huh?!"
"Whatever. It might be your internet."
"Oh."
Although Sai was still confused with the situation, he finally managed to calm himself down a little. Maybe the cold was helping it too.
"Is there no way to escape from them? No… it seems like that force won't let me run away… then what? Do I really have to fight them?"
At the moment, Sai was managing to dodge all of the hilichurls attacks while conserving his stamina based on the experience he had with the game. But he knew it was a matter of time before—
"Shit! It's here!"
The most annoying attack of the Axe Mitachurl: the fidget spinner. Imagine a 3-meter tall humanoid bull spinning a 2-meter long, 1-meter thick blazing axe coming towards you. Not a fun situation.
The pressure Sai was feeling was huge. If he got too close he would be dead in a second. Just the wind pressure from the axe was almost enough to make him fall down.
"I have to run!"
The situation was grim. Sai kept running in circles around the flame tornado, all the while dodging the attacks from the three hilichurls.
"Oh it seems like it has auto-fight! How did you do that?"
"I didn't do anything."
Eventually, the bull stopped spinning.
But at the same time, Sheer Cold started for real.
"Arghh! What is this!?"
Sai's skin started to freeze. Literally.