Watching the ice blade shatter against the birds feathered body, I froze in place as the blue feathered beast turned towards me, twisting its body around to search for whatever had tried to attack it.
Since I was still in my armor, which was a dark brown, I stood out on the dazzling white blanket of snow that coated the mountains, and with nothing to hide behind...
Well, the blue bird let out a sharp caw and dove towards me, its talons gleaming in the light as it outstretched them, preparing to tear my body apart.
It was fast, and I had to roll away as its talons whooshed in the air beside me, before it began to ascend once again.
Frowning, I waved my hand and sent two elemental blades towards it, one Water and one Wind; I was curious to know if the bird was Mana resistant or Ice resistant...
Though, since Water and Wind make up Ice, I didn't have high hopes for this attack either.
Even with both blades being incredibly sharp, they did no damage to the bird above me, only working to further anger it.
The Water splashed against its feathers harmlessly, while the Wind dissipated in an instant.
Glaring back at me, the bird let out another sharp caw as it began to descend again, diving rapidly down with the talons outstretched.
Seeing its straight descent pattern, I had an idea as I rolled away again, avoiding the angered bird once more before sending an Ice blade towards it to keep its attention.
As it rose further into the sky, I began to trace a few runes into the air, my thinking shifting for a moment.
Maybe it wasn't magic resistant?
The large bird spun around and once again dove down towards me, its anger apparent in the shrill caws and hate filled eyes.
Finishing the spell, I waited for it to draw closer before casting the spell, smirking as I rolled away.
A giant block of solid ice fell onto the birds back, and it shrieked in pain as bones broke in its wings and body.
Splayed out under a heavy block of ice, the bird tried to twist its head towards me, still glaring at me, only to fall silent as I stabbed a lance of ice into its eye, killing it.
[Arctic Cor : 12,300 Xp]
"So you're called a Cor... interesting."
Crouching down in front of the bird, I stared at its large frame as I moved the ice away, revealing a body almost as large as mine, with a wingspan as large as I was tall.
The bird was massive, and I gently reached forwards and stroked the now dead Arctic Cor's feathers, marveling at the soft, yet firm blue feathers.
My hand sunk in to around the middle of my forearm before I reached the Cor's flesh.
Nodding to myself, I looked back towards the sky and began to search for more, making sure I was alone before I got to work.
Seeing none, I glanced towards the cube I had made and hollowed it out, before expanding it a bit to fit the Arctic Cor.
With my prey now firmly inside the cube, I began to 'pull' the cube towards the nearest tree, where I would gather whatever sticks I could.
Crawling into my hollow cube, I began to butcher the Arctic Cor, pulling out the feathers before slicing into the meat.
I had grown curious and tried to cut into the feathers as well, wondering if the beast was just resistant to bladed attacks, and voila, I couldn't cut even a knick into the feathers.
With that knowledge firmly under my belt, I sliced the bird into eatable chunks before grabbing the sticks.
In order to make a fire, I needed dry wood and some kind of kindling to get this going, but thankfully the trees around here were some kind of pine, which could work quite well...
With the sticks in my hand, I took a deep breath before closing my eyes, focusing on the water inside and on them.
Since we were in such a snowy region, of course the branches were 'moist', so I needed to find a way to dry them.
Normally, you would need to keep them away from the tree for awhile, to let them dry out themselves, but when you have magic...
Feeling the mana inside the sticks, I drew it out and cast it aside, opening my eyes to stare down at the now dried branches.
Stacking the branches in the center of my ice cube, I used solid, mana imbued ice to act as the stone buffer, before frowning as I stared at the kindling I had collected.
The pine needles sat before me, and I had no way to light them.
Could I manage that friction trick here?
Heading outside, I found a larger branch and snapped some of it off, drying that out before going back inside and beginning the tedious process of rubbing wood together rapidly to produce some heat.
Smartening up a few minutes in, I used a cord made from water to expedite the process, speeding up the rotation of the stick and slowly creating some smoke from the two pieces of wood.
It took a bit, but eventually I managed to get a fire going inside my cozy little cube.
With fire now available, I began to cook the chunks of meat as best I could, before setting them off to the side.
Since I hadn't seen any signs of civilization just yet, I wanted to stockpile some food, and with the ability to create ice boxes at my disposal, I could preserve the meat for a day or so at the very least.
Whilst I cooked, I gnawed at a slab of bird meat, enjoying the fatty, gamey taste of the bird as I slowly finished the rest.
As I did so, I asked 'How is the system quests going to work now? Am I just not going to get any now?'
[You still have access to your Daily Quests, but the others... most likely, yes, they'll be rather absent from your life now. After all, what good is a Servant without a Master/Mistress to serve? Or a Shadow Guard who has no one to guard? Though, I believe you'll do just fine on your own. After all...]
[Level 29 - 200,832 / 1,000,000 Xp
Stats:
ραпdα-nᴏνɐ|-сom STR - 61
CON - 64
AGI - 62
DEX - 61
CHA - 64
WIS - 63
INT - 62
Shop Points : 1,432 SP]
[You have quite the spread of stats, your level is relatively high, and you have the ability to access the Shop~!]
My face deadpanned as I stared down at the fire, before I sighed and fell backwards.
Opening the shop, I added the keyword 'Fire' in the search and groaned as I saw quite a few useful little items in... starting fires.
"Goddess above am I stupid..."
[To be honest, I was going to remind you about it, but...]
"I hate you."
[You're welcome~!]
Shaking my head, I sat back up and returned to cooking the meat, not purchasing anything for the moment.
I had no bag to store anything that might be too large, and for the moment I had fire; there was no need to buy something just yet.
Since Shop Points come from completing quests, and now I have a severe lack of quests to complete...
Who knows when I'll need to buy something in a real emergency.
Glancing at the meats I had already seared over the flames, I grabbed another one and began to chew on the gamey meat, satiating my hunger whilst also idly wishing I had some kind of vegetable to go with it...
Seems my 'house training' was rather ingrained into me at this point...
Chuckling at another lame joke about my situation, I closed off the cube, leaving a few small holes around the top edges to vent the smoke before laying down on a pile of feathers, closing my eyes and wanting to get some sleep.
My energy was sapped for the day, mentally mainly, and I needed to be in peak condition if I wanted to continue onwards.
~~~
Anput PoV
The carriage ride was... grueling.
Torturous even.
I couldn't think about anything besides my own failure.
I had every opportunity to leave the line, to go out and search for Kat, and yet...
I didn't.
Not only were my thoughts slowly darkening my mind, but the stare that Jahi sent my way made it worse.
Her golden gaze was accusatory, and I didn't even need to turn to know what she was thinking.
My eyes were fixed to watching the landscape blur by as I held in my tears, my heart hurting more than it had ever before.
Each passing second made me wish the Capital would come into view sooner, so that I could escape this stuffy, claustrophobic carriage and instead...
Instead, be alone.
M-Maybe I would go to my forge to distract myself?
O-Or maybe I would take a walk around town?
S-Something...
A-Anything to get my mind back on track, to stop...
To stop hurting.
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