[The Frostfen Hollow - 3rd Circle Gate]
"Are you feeling ok?"
Soren asked Ryan as they stepped through the portal into the frozen marsh beyond. The temperature dropped instantly, their breath fogging the air as their boots sank slightly into the bush.
"Yes, don’t worry about me," Ryan replied while brandishing his sword. "But this place is really vast."
"Indeed," Soren whispered as he looked at their surroundings.
The marsh stretched out in every direction, a flat expanse of brittle ice and muddy water, broken only by the skeletal remains of dead trees. Their branches clawed at the pale gray sky like frozen veins, offering no shelter and casting no shadows in the dim, directionless light. Thick patches of fog drifted between them, rolling through in slow waves that swallowed the landscape whole before releasing it again.
Thanks to his high Ice Affinity, Soren could easily see even in this fog. He didn’t feel any cold or discomfort either. In fact, he felt a lot stronger than usual in this environment. Even his senses felt sharper, picking up the faint vibrations in the slush.
"Get ready; we have company."
Soren barely finished the words before the slush beneath them exploded.
He threw himself sideways as a massive jaw snapped shut where he had been standing. He hit the ground, rolled, and came up with Nightfrost already in hand. Before he could fully regain his footing, a second shape burst out to his left. Then a third. Then more. He counted at least ten ripples moving through the ice around them, pale blue bodies sliding in and out of the slush with barely a sound.
"Ryan, on me!"
"Coming!"
Soren thrust his spear through the closest one as it lunged, the blade punching clean through its open mouth and out the back of its skull, and before the creature could even begin thrashing, he had already sidestepped a second strike and swept Nightfrost in a wide arc that opened a gash across another Lurker’s throat.
Ryan fought at his back, sword flashing as he hacked at anything that got too close. One Lurker shot past his guard, and he had to drop to a knee to avoid the bite, the creature’s scales scraping against his shoulder pauldron as it sailed over him.
"They’re too fast!"
"Keep moving. Don’t give them a target."
Soren formed a spike of ice and hurled it into a Lurker that was circling toward Ryan’s blind spot. The spike caught it in the side of the head, and the creature veered off course with a shriek, crashing into the slush a meter short of its target as two more surfaced behind it and slithered over its thrashing body without slowing.
He swept his spear low, catching one across the underside and flipping it onto its back before driving the blade down through its belly. The other lunged for his leg. He stepped into it instead of away, slamming the butt of his spear into its snout and following up with a thrust through the neck.
The remaining Lurkers paused, their heads swiveled as they sensed the vibrations of the dying thrashing around them. Then, one by one, they sank back beneath the slush, and the ripples retreated into the fog.
"They ran away?" Ryan muttered in disappointment.
"Seems like it." Soren chuckled. "However, stay on your guard; there might be more of them lurking around. Perhaps they left to bring the rest of the pack."
"Then we should pick up the pace."
Soren nodded and knelt beside one of the corpses, quickly storing its body before the slush could swallow it. Ryan followed suit and stored some in his own storage ring.
[Ding!]
───────
[Equity Stake Liquidated]
[Target: Frostscale Lurker]
[Stake: 82%]
[Dividend: +120 Refined Mana]
───────
───────
[Equity Stake Liquidated]
[Target: Frostscale Lurker]
[Stake: 100%]
[Dividend: +140 Refined Mana]
───────
───────
[Equity Stake Liquidated]
[Target: Frostscale Lurker]
[Stake: 100%]
[Dividend: +130 Refined Mana]
───────
....
───────
’Woah!’
Soren’s eyes widened in disbelief as a series of notification windows appeared in his vision.
’Is this how Equity Stake works in reality?’
According to what he learned after the authority advancement, Equity Stake allowed his attacks to accumulate a stake in the target proportional to the damage he dealt. When the target died, the stake was liquidated, granting him a dividend of refined mana based on his contribution. There was also a small chance of extracting one of the target’s abilities, with higher stakes improving the odds.
But he never expected it to be this powerful.
’That was almost a thousand mana from one skirmish.’
Coupled with his investments, passive returns from the threads, and now this ability, his cultivation speed was about to take a sharp turn upward. The road ahead was still dangerous, and the enemies still lurked in the shadows, but for the first time in a long while, the future didn’t feel quite as bleak.
’If I keep this up... I might actually be ready when the time comes.’
"Brother Soren, is something wrong?" Ryan asked from the side.
"Huh?" Soren blinked while dismissing the windows. "No, I was just a little distracted. Don’t mind it."
"If you say so," Ryan nodded. "Shall we go then?"
Soren nodded, and the two pressed deeper into the marsh.
The next hour was a blur of frost and steel. Frostscale Lurkers hunted them relentlessly, drawn by the vibrations of their footsteps through the slush. Soren lost count of how many they killed. Some came alone, others came in packs of ten or even twenty, coordinating their strikes with the eerie intelligence of creatures that had evolved to hunt in perfect silence. Their speed and abilities made them dangerous, and more than once, Soren felt jaws snap shut inches from his ankle as he twisted out of the way.
Ryan adapted quickly, learning to read the ripples in the ice and strike preemptively. His sword flashed again and again, and by the time they cleared the worst of it, his arms were streaked with black blood up to the elbows.
They also fought with Rotbeak Stalkers a few times.
They were a bit trickier to deal with because they could read surface memories of anyone who entered their territory, pulling out voices and faces to use as lures. Even though they had already researched them beforehand, Ryan almost ended up getting himself killed.
The monsters imitated his family’s voices and made an illusion of them being dragged away by monsters.
It looked so real that even Soren was caught up in it for a moment.