Chương 341: Chapter 327

The new monsters advanced toward the team without stopping, every step spreading ice around them, while the air itself was cooling down, allowing Sam and the others to see their breath. That didn't really stop them. They prepared well in advance. They had the elixirs, clothing, and buffs from Clarissa and Isabella. Not to mention whatever skills they all had on their own. The atmosphere still plummeted, and Sam could feel the danger in the air.

He watched a few recordings of guilds trying their luck with this fracture and knew what was coming. Increased intelligence in the monsters. Better strategies and stronger environmental effects. However, that didn't mean they were lost. Raising his sword in his right hand, Sam looked directly into the eyes of the lead monsters advancing toward them, reached up to grab the sword with the other hand, and let magic run through it.

A deep hum sounded as the void-natured magic covered the blade, obsidian black magic absorbing all light, vibrating with barely held back potential. Then he brought the blade down with incredible speed. WHUUUM The undead monster in the armor had enough time to bring up its own weapon to probably parry the attack, but to the rest of the undead's surprise, it went through the sword clean. And the armor. Then the body. Leaving the cleaved undead to fall apart.

SPLAT The undead paused for a brief moment, less than a blink, then continued. The fall of their comrade didn't even faze them. They just kept walking. And then dying. Sam's team, still almost fresh, with none of their ultimates popped, made short work of the next few waves, reaching thirty-five, the 'official' record that was made public, defeating another incredibly armored undead with a small crown on their head. Once again, the reward box changed, and they continued.

In wave thirty-six, the golems' bodies changed again; instead of tall humanoid forms, they took the shapes of lizards, deep blue, the ice crystals forming into scales on their bodies, ice blue tongues darting out of their mouths, with rows upon rows of sharp teeth, ready to devour Sam and his friends. The humanoid-looking undead still wore armor enhanced with runes, and their armaments looked wicked.

Some used greatswords, but they clashed with several who sported circular shields and swords, undead twirling two axes, maces with spikes on them, maces on chains, simply just long chains used as whips, and one enterprising undead even tried their luck with their fist only. Around wave thirty-eight, the undead began riding on the lizard golems. And said lizard golems began to have more and more appendages, with a few of them skittering around on eight legs and having two heads. That breathed ice…

At wave forty, the laughter started dying down as the team began focusing more and more on the fight. Clarissa, beginning to miss a few hits here and there, made the others use their own defensive and healing skills as the ice lizard golems bathed the arena in an icy fog that covered everything in hoarfrost. Isabella was bouncing around the arena with the familiars, taking out conjured ice spirits, assassin undead, or ice golems breaking through the ground under their feet.

Her singing and dancing were continuous, looking like a demented ballerina was doing their best to break-dance. Funnily enough, with Katie having to focus on the fight, absorbing most of the attention and damage from the enemy, she had to stop the maniacal laughter and jumping around willy-nilly, transforming into the berserker tank Sam knew Katie in his memories, moving not unlike Isabella, performing aggressive ballet dancing moves as she spun around and eviscerated the appearing monsters.

The two of them, whenever the action brought them into the same area, would twirl around each other in a sickeningly cute way. Sam was pretty sure they just did that on instinct. Thankfully, he was recording, so he would have some blackmail material for later… Dan – despite the freezing cold – was sweating as if he were in a sauna, his entire body surrounded by the haze of heat. It was hot enough that Clarissa had to step away, lest she be burned.

He was constantly raining plasma and fire on their enemies, burning them in seconds or letting them run around aflame, setting other monsters on fire. But his biggest task was keeping the creeping ice at bay, preventing the temperature in the arena from plunging beyond numbers they could endure. It was still below zero, but Sam estimated that the temperatures – thanks to Dan's magic – stopped dropping after reaching around twenty to thirty degrees Fahrenheit.

That was cold, and Sam could feel the bite of it on his exposed skin – mostly on his face – but it was bearable with their protections, buffs, elixirs, and the blazing heat that Dan was in the middle of the arena. Lucky was barreling through monsters by the dozens, his runic claws tearing at the ice golems, having fun dominating the lizard-shaped ice golems.

Sam himself was playing a roving artillery, using his sword to protect himself and cut down the undead that came close enough, while launching his void mana toward everything he could see, trying to use the situation to train his own efficiency, accuracy, and ability to inflict maximum damage with minimum resources. Instead of sweeping crescents of void mana, blasts encompassing every free place, he used small bullets of void mana, aiming at weak points, thin blasts launched from his sword, doing surgical strikes.

Stolen novel; please report. The more he did so, the more he could feel his control improve – once again proving whoever invented the brain interface for the game was beyond genius – the mana thrumming under his digital skin flowing just a little easier and freer. He didn't really have time to brag to the others as he slid between two greatsword strikes, returning his own with a small spark of void energy, taking out the heads of the undead, letting their bodies fall to the ground behind him.

Wave forty ended with a giant ice lizard golem – big enough to fill almost a third of the arena – that emerged from wherever the monsters came from during this fracture. After that, they had to buckle down. Strikes that went through their defenses came faster and faster, hitting just hard enough that Clarissa had a devil of a time keeping them topped up. Sam suspected that if she hadn't had those super-powerful skills, they would have long died to the amassing monster army.

The group stood in the middle, armor slightly tattered, frozen blood covering other parts, backs to each other, ignoring the uncomfortable heat coming from Dan as they all breathed heavily, chests heaving, hands shaking, just as the last ice golem fell. Most of the familiars had long since retired, their less battle-oriented skill sets not being able to keep up with the carnage. Only Lucky, Melody, and Puffball stayed.

Naturally, Lucky was raised by Sam with battle in mind, but even the loyal wolf couldn't keep up forever, so around wave forty-six, Sam used his skill to transform Lucky into his own armor, boosting his own strength while letting the excitable animal still enjoy the battle. Melody, the murder goose, however, was just that stubborn. No matter what kind of monster tried to squash, break, crush, eviscerate, or eat the angry bird, it always escaped at the last second with an angry honk or squawk.

Sam suspected that the bird was more spite than spirit at this point.

'I really need to ask Clarissa what skills that goose has…' he mused as his eyes alighted on the last familiar still present. Puffball, the chaotic 'cat', was still in the royal undead woman's lap, getting pampered by her elegant hands. [Ice Rumble: Wave #50!] [FINAL WAVE!] The screen, as expected, appeared right on time, declaring the start of the last wave. The entire team tensed, waiting for some kind of new icy nightmare to appear.

But the stands around the arena were empty – and in ruins – there were no undead watching. No undead cheering. Aside from Sam, Dan, Isabella, Katie, Clarissa, and the familiars, the only thing that moved was the one undead that had been present since the beginning. Silence flowed around them as the team, all of them experienced in recognizing what was happening, stared at the throne made out of ice shards and the individual seated on it.

Calmly running her ice-cold fingers through Puffball's fur, the undead began to speak without even looking up from her task.

"Congratulations…warriors…of…the…arena. You…are…just…a…step…away…from…final…victory," came the whisper-like voice, echoing around them, much creepier without the undead audience creating background noise.

"But…are…you…ready…for…it?" Sam glanced at the others. Katie was nodding feverishly, eyes fixed on the undead. Isabella simply nodded, keeping a hand on her girlfriend's shoulder. Dan's eyes were shining.

"Let's burn this thing down…" Clarissa gave him a thumbs up, eyes staring at her own screen, probably already planning her actions. Sam smiled, looked back at the undead royalty, and called out.

"We are ready… your Majesty!" The undead woman finally looked up and smiled.

"Good…" Instantly, the temperature that had risen to over freezing point, with no more monsters appearing for a while, began to drop. The moisture in the air began to freeze at a visible speed. Dan's magic flared, and Sam sensed the cold magic of the undead and his friend's fire magic clashing, with the ice mana ultimately slowing down, yet never stopping.

"Shit! We're on a timer!" Sam called out, knowing that the cold in the air would at one point be too strong to protect against. The rest of the team tensed again, hands tightening around their weapons, mana thrumming under their digital skin. The undead woman stood up, sending Puffball skittering as the feline threw a disgruntled look at his previous comfortable seat.

"Then…let's…begin!" The moment she finished speaking, ice materialized around her, shaped in the form of different weapons. From daggers to giant maces with spikes the size of Sam's forearm. She raised a delicate arm, covered by her exquisite dress, and pointed at the team.

"Perish!" Her voice was just as cold and sharp, the hesitant way she spoke no more. The ice weapons floated into the arena, surrounding them. Sam gripped his sword harder. He had a feeling this wasn't going to be an easy fight. The first phase of the fight was against ice weapons, directed by the female undead. Conjured in unending waves, no matter how many times they had destroyed them. With Dan's help and his plasma magic, most of the small ones sublimated before they could even come closer.

Meanwhile, as they fought, the temperature kept dropping and dropping, returning the arena to below freezing point. Sam cut down another shield made out of deep blue ice, covered in runes and glyphs, and swirled around to strike at the next target when he realized that there were no more conjured weapons. Before he could call out to the others and warn them about the next phase, the undead spoke up.

"Good. You are not useless," she spoke, her voice cutting through the arena, gathering all attention onto her.

"You have earned the right to hear Our name." Sam glanced around and flashed a few signs with his free hand, causing the team to begin moving around, following preset plans. Thanks to Magic Unbound having NPCs with advanced behavior, perception, and thinking patterns, players couldn't really shout their plans when fighting against intelligent enemies. Thus, hand signs.

There were a few general ones, mostly taken from sign language, but he knew a bunch from several guilds, as, due to secrecy, a lot of them developed their own ones. The undead woman just looked at them, uncaring of their movement as she continued her monologue.

"Our name, echoing around the ice peaks of the Forever Mountains, Ruler of the Northern Empire, Empress of the Snow Vaults, is Eldara Iceguard, the last protector of the Titan's Fang!" Hearing the name, currently unknown to the people but very well-known after a few expansions, he smiled. Raising his sword in front of him, he saluted and then bowed a little. The others, while looking at him oddly, also bowed awkwardly.

Eldara, looking proud of her name and respect she had been given by the team, inclined her own head by an inch, then her eyes began to shine with unearthly blue light.

"Allow me to show you what it means to rule an EMPIRE!" With the last word, her body exploded in a blaze of blue aura, the very air solidifying around her, as snow began to fall on the arena, and the temperature took another dive toward the deep end of negatives. Her hands were filled with wicked-looking ice scimitars, each blade covered by thousands and thousands of tiny runes, each one glinting with enough magical energy to Sam's senses to power several high-level spells. She smiled.

Then, without any movement, she vanished, only to reappear in front of Sam, scimitars already striking at him. Panic flooded his body, skills activating in an instant, giving him enough time to bring up his own sword, absorbing the attack. Even then, the strength of the strike was strong enough to drive his feet into the mushy ground.

The empress of the forgotten empire simply disengaged, jumping back in the air, twirling artistically as snow swirled around her, before falling back toward Dan, whose fire melted any snowflake that came close to him. Sam moved. His sword once again clashed with the scimitars as Dan stumbled back, swearing profusely.

"We need to slow her down!" he called out as mana began to thrum around all of them. The beautiful face of the undead empress lit up with an excited smile, and Sam could see in her eyes that she was just like the rest of the warriors. They lived by the blade and died by the blade.