9 C09.Ice Domain

"Ice Domain."

A sweet but icy cold voice echoed in its ears as it felt his knees weaken, about to give out. Looked around in shock and vigilance to find who had interrupted its kill. It saw a young lady behind him; her skin was as white as snow, her eyes were icy blue as she looked at him with zero expressions on her face.

Her whitish-blue long hair was let down to her waist; it flowed like a river as it complemented her pale skin in a way that made her look like a beautiful ice sculpture or maybe the goddess of ice.

Looking at those cold, emotionless eyes staring at him, the Rykir felt a chill run down its spine and penetrate its bones. It didn't take long for it to figure out what was going on. Without any hesitation, it immediately turned around and fled at breakneck speed.

It had lived a long life; its instinct had been developed over hundreds of years through various life and death situations, and it could practically smell when death was approaching.

To its dismay, the lady behind him reeked of death, and it was all directed at him. It didn't have time to activate or deactivate any skills nor was it able to think in that direction; it had to act fast and escape; any wrong move could mean the end. Unfortunately for the Rykir, the lady had plans of her own.

"Ice prism."

With its skill "Shadow body flames of hell" and Body of the Reaper, it could cross a distance of tens of meters in a few seconds, but Ice Domain covered a range of 150 meters; it was too late to escape in just the time it took for ice prism to form.

Four angular transparent surfaces emerged from the icy grounds as they trapped the Rykir in a semi-transparent prism. Without any hesitation, it launched an attack with its fiery claws at the transparent wall in front of him.

"Reaping Slash."

Three terrifying crimson flames in the shape of a claw escaped the Rykir's claws as they flew at the prism with great intensity. This was a subsidiary skill that could only be activated after the main skill was activated. The main skill was usually not an attack skill but a control skill like ice Domain; the main skill was impossible to learn, so it was rare to see anyone using it, not to mention the backlash.

Boom!

The attack was reflected at him two-fold. Flustered and confused, the Rykir was unable to dodge the more terrifying attack; it slammed him straight to the ground, and the Rykir was wounded by its own attack. It started to panic, filled with foreign emotions like fear and confusion; it tried shooting out its horn, only to receive the same results. It was hopeless; every attempt was doomed to fail, and one thought kept reappearing in its head over and over again: DEATH.

'What is this? Who is this Monster!'

••••••

A distance away in the Darknar forest, in a barren area of the forest, the area was void of life. Both plants and animals avoided the space; even though birds would occasionally fly through the air, no monster could be found within a quarter of a mile radius. Even though this was the middle of the forest, unlike the rest of the place, the area was void of trees and vines. It was sandy plains that extended within a 300-meter radius.

Smoke could be seen coming from the middle of this area, as a group of people sat around a campfire, roasting one of the most common animals found in the Darknar forest, a Red hawk.

The area was considered a safe zone as the beasts and monsters in the forest actively tried their best to avoid the place. There were a handful of places such as this in the forest, each ranging between 200 and 1000 meters radius.

The Darknar forest was expansive. After the Demon King's region fell into ruins, the forest had swallowed a large amount of the land around the castle. It was large enough to fit a few large cities.

In the barren land, the men sitting around the campfire merrily chatted and laughed with one another when they suddenly stopped as they simultaneously turned their heads and stared intensely toward the southeast of the forest, the hairs on their backs standing on edge.

"Did you guys feel that?"

One of the men asked his companions with a frightened expression. He had dark orange skin, an average appearance, and two small horns on his forehead.

"I've never felt anything like this before. What kind of monster is that?"

Another man replied with a similar expression on his face. He had a similar appearance to the one that had spoken previously, only he had a single horn on his forehead.

The four men looked visibly shaken as they felt a chill deep in their bones. This was the first time they had ever experienced something like this, and it felt like the temperature had dropped a few degrees as well.

"That's not a monster."

A voice came from behind as the four men turned their heads simultaneously. "Ha boss, you're back. What do you mean by that?" Bam, the first to have spoken previously, asked in surprise at the figure that had appeared behind them without them ever noticing.

"If there was a monster that strong in the forest, we would have died a long time ago. It's coming from the direction of the castle."

The figure spoke as he stared in the same direction as the others were previously looking. "We need to report this to Lord Aur."

••••••

In the Demon King's castle.

Standing behind the throne as he observed what had been engraved on the wall, Tyler suddenly turned his head to the right, staring at the wall in front of him. A cold sweat was clearly visible on his forehead.

"What in the world is that? Crap, don't tell me someone is headed here. Was this like a hideout for bandits?"

He was both surprised and anxious by what he was sensing; having never felt this before, he didn't know what to make of it, and his mind went rampant with ideas.

Clearly shaken by the possibility of being caught in this castle, Tyler quickly left the room that was supposedly the throne room and entered back into the hall with the statues.

There were no windows on the fifth floor of the North wing, so he simply walked back the way he came and left the fifth floor. Soon he arrived by a window overlooking the direction he had sensed the strange feeling from.

"What to do, what to do, what to do. Crap, I can't just stay here and wait for whatever that is to reach me."

He was on the fourth floor, but in his anxiousness, he didn't think about the height as he jumped down from the window without hesitation.

As a Warrior Swordsman, he could do things like this quite easily, although he had trained his butt off to achieve what was a simple feat for most.

However, what surprised him was his soft landing, almost like he didn't have any weight. He felt the incredible sense of balance he possessed.

Such a thing wasn't normal, but now was not a time to investigate this change; there was something of more importance at the moment: his life.

He didn't know who or what was giving him this cold chills in his spine, but Tyler knew he couldn't just stay put and hope they were headed for the castle as he hadn't spotted any other buildings around.

However, he currently faced the greatest adversity of all. He didn't possess any sort of enhanced senses and couldn't tell exactly what that was or where it was coming from.

He also couldn't just wander aimlessly through the dangerous land of demons, so his best bet right now was to locate the source of this feeling and monitor them from a distance.

Luckily, this was also the direction he came from, and there shouldn't be any dangerous monsters around, so he could always retreat back into the cave if he encounters something he can't handle.

He may not be a rogue-type fighter, but he was always decent at sneaking around. So if he was lucky, perhaps he would encounter nothing or gain some valuable intel on the enemy as he desperately needed to return back into the magic library.

•••••

In the Darknar forest.

Staring at the transparent ice walls that formed a prism trapping it, the Rykir was getting more aggravated and rash.

Even though all its attacks were getting reflected with twice the strength, like an aggravated beast, the Rykir was getting more irrational, its intelligence nowhere to be found.

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

Launching one attack after another, it tried its best to avoid as many of the reflected ones as possible, which proved almost impossible. The only reason it was still standing was the two skills it had activated. Still, this was a testament to how resilient the beast was. Even in this state, the Rykir wasn't stupid; it could feel the temperature in the prism dropping rapidly as time passed. It didn't want to find out what would happen when the temperature reached a certain extent.

The flames that engulfed its body were the only thing keeping it alive. It didn't have much time until the skill times out, and it would be reduced to an ice sculpture.

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

It launched each attack at a single spot with one aim in mind: To escape.

"Blood Rage!"

The greyish-black flames that engulfed its body burst in a golden-red hue. As the flames intensified, the Rykir increased in size until it was almost four meters in height, standing on all fours. As its size increased, the intensity of its aura skyrocketed tremendously. It raised its right claws and slashed at the ice wall with insane speed and strength.

BOOM! Crack...

The ice wall visibly cracked. It was a small crack that didn't extend more than a couple of inches, but it didn't reflect the attack like it did the previous times. The Rykir was visibly relieved; if this had not worked, it would have to just sit there and make a pose for him to become an ice sculpture.

Just as it was preparing its next attack, the spot that had cracked started to repair itself. The Rykir started to panic; even with its final trump card, it still wasn't strong enough to shatter the wall in one hit. Why did it come here, to begin with? It had seen two fairly wounded females running through its territory and thought it would teach them a lesson; now, however, it was on the verge of dying because of that mistake.

The Rykir began to regret why it did not just let the two girls pass in peace. It had activated three skills already, and one of them was very dangerous the longer it was used.

Activating another one might have serious consequences, but it did not have time to consider what might or might not happen; it only had one thought: to escape, and it would do everything in its power to do so, no matter the consequences.

"Hell's Descent."

The number of flames its body emitted multiplied once more; the temperature in the prism started to rapidly increase, its scales showed signs of melting. The Rykir did not wait for a second longer; it launched a barrage of attacks at the spot that was about to be repaired.

Crack... Crack... Shatter!

The ice wall shattered under the sheer force of so many attacks. The Rykir rushed out of the prism as soon as it could; it turned around to find the lady but could not locate her.

The entire forest around it was covered in ice; the mist made visibility almost impossible. It was interfering with its senses; the trees and vines were encased in ice; it was like a forest made of ice. The Rykir was alarmed; without knowing where the enemy was, it was hard to decide on its next action. Running in a random direction was foolish and would lead to death.

Roar!!!

The Rykir's roar echoed around it; the sound carried intense flames that blew away the mist and restored its vision. It saw the lady again, standing in the same spot she had been, several meters away.

It had tried running away but had failed miserably; it was obvious that would be pointless now. Its best option was to distract the enemy with one of its skills, then use that to create an opportunity to escape.

"Ice Prism."

Before the Rykir could even take a step, it heard that icy cold and emotionless voice again. It was devastated; it had spent all its life-saving skills just to escape the prism once. It did not expect the lady to be able to use such a powerful skill in such quick successions.

There was no time for despair; it still had some time left on its skills. As long as it acted now, it had a chance to escape. Just as it was about to repeat its barrage of attacks, it heard the dagger of a voice again.

"Ice Prism... Ice Void."

As the last words left her mouth, the space within the prism lost all forms of an atmosphere. It was as cold and desolate as the vacuum of space. The Rykir's skills were now burning through its mana like gas, and because of the skill Blood Rage, its life force was draining as fast as its mana.

The multitude of bad news didn't end there; as the Rykir's body became stiffer by the second, its body was freezing from the inside.

The Ancient Rykir didn't have a counter for this; its skill had been rendered useless. They kept its body warm, but now the cold was coming from the inside. It had no idea of how to solve this problem; nonetheless, it refused to die like this. In an act of desperation, it burned through its life force faster as it dashed towards its opponent with bloodshot eyes. The beast moved at near-light speed and arrived near the lady in an instant as it prepared to launch a kamikaze attack, taking the lady with it.

The Rykir watched as the lady stared at it emotionlessly with her ice-blue eyes. She hadn't moved an inch since the very beginning, and even as it launched its suicidal attack, it made the Rykir realize one thing: it was out of its league. There was no hope of winning, and worst of all, it did not even scratch its opponent.

The Rykir was stuck in place only a few inches from its target; its legs were frozen stiff. It could only look on in despair as it froze to death.