The rest of the delve was useful in the way Sable hoped it would be—she familiarized herself with her strengths and weaknesses as a humanoid.

Getting to watch Aylin and Granite cut their way through their opponents, occasionally struggling but mostly holding up fine, was also enjoyable. The experience excited her for her first real dungeon delve, where she would fight against opponents who actually posed threat to her. She wasn’t sure when that would happen, though.

She’d been toying with the idea of teaming up with a group of adventurers in Wastehaven, simply to learn more about how typical adventurers worked. Part of her recognized that wasn’t the most efficient use of her time, but at least it would provide experience, loot, and knowledge. She would decide later.

They didn’t make it down to the deepest floor and fight the boss. Sable needed to return to the surface after a few hours, after which she flew to Skatikk and conferred with the leadership there. She hadn’t been gone long, but they’d set up basic plans for how to handle domination of the Red Plains without using Sable to capture every single city—which was to say, they would be offering each tribe terms of surrender under the threat of dragon invasion. They also hammered out a plan for handling tributes, so money would start flowing shortly. Her next hoard upgrade might not be far off.

Darkness started to arrive, and Sable returned to her hoard. Her injuries from the [Lesser Aspect] still wore at her, and sleep took her quickly.

She awoke the next morning ready to fight a two-headed polar bear. She wasn’t at one-hundred percent capacity, but more than enough to fight the elite level sixteen, she was pretty sure. And if not—well, who didn’t enjoy a close fight?

When she arrived to the [Frostfang Titan]’s lair, she was pleased to see that he hadn’t run off. Unfortunately, neither was he lounging about, asleep and unaware. Ice blue eyes locked to her, and the enormous, bulky body of the polar bear bristled as he stood and readied himself for a fight.

Not wasting a moment, Sable pulled together an offensive frostfire enchantment to put [Spellbound Claws] to work, then activated [Horrifying Aura]. Unsurprisingly, the latter didn’t immediately cow the charging polar bear, though the skill took effect—the charge faltered slightly, and she knew her opponent’s defenses had been reduced, the other effect paired to the ability.

In return, the Frostfang Titan released its own guttural roar of rage, and ice seized Sable’s heart. It was a similar skill to Sable’s herself, she could tell, though one that turned her movements sluggish more than it unsteadied her mind—though it did the latter too. She fought through the fear effect, finding it not much of a challenge, undoubtedly thanks to [Sovereign Mind], an ability that was quickly becoming one of her favorites. But while she broke the fear, the physical debilitation remained.

She spewed a torrent of white-blue flames toward the charging polar bear. The wide open space of the cavern meant she had enough time to release a full second of the powerful attack before the moving mountain of white fur arrived onto her.

She tried to meet the charge head on, which was perhaps arrogant. It was like being hit by a freight train. Her previous powerful opponent, the [Lesser Aspect], had been a monstrosity of mostly dexterity mixed with strength, swirling around with vicious slashes of its black blade. But this hulking beast, Sable discovered, was entirely power. No finesse, simply raw strength.

Still, Sable buried her claws into white fur and drew blood, weaker physically but empowered by [Spellbound Claws]. One polar bear head went for her neck, the other for her shoulder. In a frantic scramble, she avoided the first, but not the second; vicious teeth clamped down on her scales. The attack was rebuffed by her impenetrable defenses, but the crushing pressure was a devastating attack in its own right. Sable growled in pain and exhilaration, the rumbling noise joining the Frostfang Titan’s, three different guttural roars and howls echoing around the enormous cavern as they tore into each other.

She activated the spell she’d been gathering in the back of her mind, spell-circle slowly forming despite being occupied by the desperate brawl. She was getting better and better at spellcasting while distracted by a fight. After several rapid exchanges of biting teeth and swiping claws, Sable threw herself back, then activated [Frostfire Grasp]. Like against the [Lesser Aspect], she didn’t limit herself to tiny applications of mana; she poured plenty in. The Frostfang Titan wasn’t on the same level of the consumption aspect, but it wasn’t a foe to be treated lightly. It pained her to be draining mana so rapidly, but resources were meant to be expended, and the next several days would come with time to recover as she explored human territory.

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Her spell shattered across the polar bear’s body, its gigantic bulk impossible to miss. The beast was engulfed in a familiar three-ringed prison, thickest at the center, and two howls erupted from either head as its body was coated in a burning-cold manifestation of frostfire.

Then, to Sable’s shock, before she could release a few [Frostfire Spears] to capitalize on having rooted her opponent, the Titan roared, and its body bulged, muscles rippling—and, in a shocking display, the entire prison of frostfire shattered.

Before Sable could react, the Titan charged forward, many times faster than it had been before. The beast swiped at her, and the air distorted with the strength of the swing. Sable could tell it had been empowered with a skill. She threw herself out of the way, but the attack still glanced off of her, and it was the single strongest hit she’d ever taken—it sent her crashing across the cavern, even having mostly dodged it.

She recovered in short order, though still dazed. Her previous spell had been interrupted, the attack having broken her concentration entirely, the spell circle fizzling. That was almost as devastating as the blow itself; she had almost finished preparing her next attack.

To her relief, the outrageously strong attack had come with a downside—the Titan seemed winded. It still charged her in an attempt to capitalize on having knocked her across the cavern, but the gigantic boost in strength had come with immediate downsides. It had probably hoped that the blow would disable Sable, and though she had definitely been dazed, the glancing attack wasn’t enough to stun her.

With the Titan moving sluggishly across the cavern, and no longer distracted by a melee, Sable had enough time to throw together a second [Frostfire Grasp]. The prison of ice erupted around her opponent, and this time, the beast had no skill to escape. One, two, three [Frostfire Spears] pelted into thick polar bear hide—which was stained red in places from slashes with [Spellbound Claws]—and the outraged roar erupting from two polar bear heads turned pained rather than simply infuriated. The beast thrashed, and frostfire ice splintered as it broke free.

As expected of a powerful elite beast, it hadn’t played all of its cards. Sable wasn’t the only one with powerful skills. The entire cavern shimmered with magical power as the Titan summoned a thick, raging blizzard. Gusts of icy winds blasted around her, obscuring her vision to only a dozen feet in front of her. She desperately started working on a new [Frostfire Grasp], ready to intercept the Titan—

The beast plowed into her from the side, emerging from the flurry of snow in an instant. Knocking her over, the gigantic bulk of the Titan pinned her down, exposing her belly. Both heads vied for her throat, snapping and biting for the weak point, and they almost seemed to fight each other as much as Sable, losing control in its bloodlust. It scraped and dug at her exposed stomach with its claws, of which her scales provided less defense—they were still durable, but weaker than the ones covering most of her body.

Losing the melee, Sable had no choice but to throw out a point blank [Frostfire Grasp], filling the space between them. Ice imprisoned her as much as her opponent, and Sable didn’t spare a moment to unleash a deadly torrent of fire breath right afterward.

She had massive resistance to frostfire and regular elemental damage, but having turned the deadly frostfire prison into a kiln, even she felt the heat—and cold. With some thrashing, she escaped the grasp of the Titan, keeping the torrent of fire going the whole time, filling the space between them. Heat sweltered around her, melting the icy prison, and painful even to her. But the Titan had it worse, with only a fraction of the elemental resistances. It howled and thrashed in a primal response, scrambling away from Sable, as eager to escape the frostfire-oven as Sable herself.

Emerging out of [Frostfire Grasp], Sable saw that the blizzard the Titan had summoned had calmed, only slight gusts and banks of snow remaining. The two beasts panted at each other from a distance away, nursing their respective wounds. Sable’s stomach was bleeding, deadly claws having managed to dig into the gaps between her plating. But the Titan hadn’t outright broken any of her scales, which was fortunate.

She could read the wariness on the Titan’s face. Bloodlust too, but mostly wariness at this point. It knew it was outmatched.

Seeing that, Sable growled and couldn’t help but charge forward. She sensed weakness and wanted blood. Her predatory instincts wouldn’t be denied.

A [Frostfire Spear] slammed into the Titan right as Sable herself arrived, and one last melee ensued. Sable’s enchanted claws tore into the polar bear’s neck, shoulders, and arms as powerful appendages grappled with each other. The bear’s movements flagged, its lifeforce draining under Sable’s vicious assault. Weakened, Sable finally latched her teeth into the neck of the left polar bear head, and she shook and tore. Blood filled her mouth, and she reveled in the taste.

The Frostfang Titan struggled feebly against her, the fight being taken out of it moment by moment, its wounds too numerous and deadly. Sable continued to tear into flesh with both teeth and claws, rejoicing in her victory, until finally the beast stopped moving entirely. Releasing her grip on its neck, she took a few steps back and sagged down, exhausted and panting—but exhilarated. Blood covered the cavern floor. Not all of it was the Titan’s, but certainly the majority.

She basked in the thrill of her victory for a few moments, catching her breath. No level up came, but that was expected, since she’d done little hunting since her advancement to ten. Instead, her rewards from this encounter came in other ways. First, the valuable corpse of an elite monster—the Frostfang Titan would undoubtedly make all sorts of valuable trinkets and items for her, or perhaps Aylin, to use.

And more than that, Sable had earned herself a new home.