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Joe waited patiently for the answer but saw Garnedell’s face starting to color red in anger. Joe brought the Q and A to an end not wishing to cause Garnedell to become too angry. Man, quite the temper… need to work… wait, should I work … I’m supposed to be his teacher, um… Yeah… I need to work with him on that I guess. Maybe not now, but in private.
Joe smiled in reassurance to Garnedell but didn’t say anything, not wishing to embarrass him in front of his new friends, and gave them the answer, “Have you seen how any of the people out there are hurt? It just makes them cold. They seem to be… very weak, for a third floor monster. Cold is bad, yes, but the damage is from long term exposure… uh… being cold for a long time. Short fights like this isn’t going to hurt us much, so why are they third floor monsters instead of first floor? How can they hurt us?”
“They can freeze us, master.”
“Freezing is not instantaneous.”
The three looked at each other with some concern before Garnedell responded, “Maybe for you master, but our resistance is very weak.”
Joe nodded silently, not responding, but feeling a bit surprised by their comments. Even Garnedell? Have they never played in snow? Or is snow… huh… maybe resistances? Wait, do I have mine left over from Earth like my stats? Joe flipped up his status and glanced through it quickly but found no new information that came with the possible revelation. OK, guess their freezing attacks are pretty insane. Joe responded quickly as his eyes flipped through his status screen, “Exactly. They look weak, and the people here are fighting well enough, but we need to be wise because they have to be able to attack somehow. I haven’t seen a significant attack yet. Have any of you,” Joe asked as he turned to look out at the field.
The three remained silent although the silence seemed one of consideration than disagreement or uncertainty. It took a bit but Garnedell finally answered tentatively with a no.
“Me, too. I’m not seeing any serious attack. Let’s watch a bit more, then maybe I’ll attack and you guys stay back. If things seem to be OK, you can join me, then maybe split off and the three of you do your thing while I do mine. Sounds good?”
The three nodded much more certainly this time, even bordering on eagerness and the four settled back to watch the fights happening out in the monster killing floor. It took another ten or twenty minutes before Joe saw what he had feared: the attack that defined these creatures as significantly more dangerous than the previous floors. It has to be pretty dangerous if the suffocation mob was considered an easier monster.
One of the team’s had cursed loudly, drawing the attention of most on the floor, and Joe’s eyes flickered towards them. He saw the snow was now glowing brightly, looking much like pristine snow under the clear blinding light of a winter snow, even as snowflakes formed in the air around it and began to generate a swirling vortex targeting the group. The tornado was actually over on its side with the point originating at the snow and the open ended ‘top’ pointing at the group. The vortex grew in intensity and rotational speed with more snowflakes flooding into the vortex which also began to gain a hint of the glow the snow now blazed. The vortex, however, did not grow in size.
While the snow continued to charge its vortex attack for a good ten seconds, the group that had been fighting it scrambled to escape with most that were far enough away running while those that were closer huddled in a line behind one of the members who held a large shield in front of him. The shield was almost a full body one, and he thunked it to the floor hard. There seemed to be some confusion for a moment as several of the members darted in different directions before one of them suddenly turned and sprinted to hide behind the shield bearer, tucking their head and shoulders down in behind the shield bearer as they knelt.
The confusion seemed to indicate poor planning at first but then Joe quickly realized that it had been intentional. The snow did not move in that time, but simply rotated to maintain its target and Joe quickly realized that the group had been more than ready as the three who had been mostly in front of the snow had sprinted in opposite directions to figure out who the snow was targeting. After they figured it out, one of them had shouted and sprinted behind the shield bearer, while the others heard the shout and corrected their movement to run tangentially away from the shield bearer. Huh. Smart!
Joe watched to attack play out and saw the snow released a torrent of … Joe wasn’t sure what it was, but it seemed to literally be just a wave of cold. The ground itself seemed to ice over and the very air and surroundings in a cone shape from the snow outward took on what Joe could only describe as extreme cold. The air itself frosted over, creating an instant cone of condensed water that fogged then froze almost immediately before falling to the ground. Joe almost swore he could hear the sound of crystal tinkling as the ice shards fell to the ground.
Joe was terrified at the amount of power displayed there, but then relaxed as he realized that although the transformation of the temperature from ambient to insanely cold was instantaneous, the front of the cold wave was not that fast, taking several seconds to travel the ten meters or so to the crouching shield bearer. The cold wave flowed visibly across the space, a truncated cone of fog growing outward from the snow with the rear of the fog quickly condensing to liquid then solid before falling to the ground. The effect was incredibly strange and almost fake looking as Joe watched a growing wave of fog about a quarter meter in depth spread away from the snow towards the shield bearer and his quavering teammate. The fog bank actually grew in width and height although its depth didn’t seem to change much.
How is it doing that? You don’t… create cold! You make or take away heat… cold isn’t an energy itself?! Joe watched with some shocked alarm but quite a bit more flabbergasted curiosity. While he had never been much of one for school or the STEM fields, he did remember enough of his junior high and high school science to know that cold wasn’t an energy itself. It was simply the absence of heat.
The fog bank continued its crawl across space, the front edge clearly defining where the cold front began, with fog instantly forming as it scuttled onward. When it hit the shield bearer, the fog bank parted around the shield, the cloud bank puffing in the expected way as it slammed and rebounded off the shield before the cold wave continued on past the shield bearer and his team mate another couple meters before stopping.
The foot wide fog bank past over the two members, freezing the shield solidly but still having a hole through the freeze wave to save them. It passed around the two, with the frozen water sprinkling down to the ground amidst a dusting of snow as it layered over the two. The two men were incredibly cold, shivering, but alive.
Magic shield? Hmm… Range is about five meters… that should be easy enough to run away from, right?
Joe watched them carefully as the rest of the party members dashed back in and quickly finished off the snow. The two crouching behind the shield actually took a significant amount of time to react, the furthest member back able stand up and step forward towards the fight at a struggle, fighting strongly to overcome his frozen state.
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The shield bearer was still alive, but actually seemed unable to move for several moments, his whole body shivering wildly even as Joe watched him struggle to move. Huh… it isn’t just cold… there must be some kind of paralysis involved… a full body muscle lock? The fight ended quickly and Joe saw the snow destroyed. Immediately after, the two who had been ‘frozen’ by the freeze wave seemed to thaw much more quickly than before. A lingering freeze that lasts … maintained by the snow somehow…
Joe watched for a few moments, then returned to sit down next to the three kids. He hadn’t even realized it but must have stood when the snow sent out its freeze wave. He settled in, then pointed to the snow, “That’s why it’s on the third floor.”
The three looked back from the fight back at Joe, eyes wide with some shock and no little amount of fear. Zilnek nodded vigorously while the other two seemed to nod with a bit more consideration.
“See why it’s a good idea to watch and learn.”
This time, the nod was much firmer and Joe watched them out of his peripheral vision before continuing, “So. Let’s watch until we see another freeze wave. They don’t seem too dangerous, but if you’re not ready for them…” Joe left the sentence unsaid and watched the fights continue.
It took almost another twenty minutes before another snow sent out a freeze wave. Joe had watched carefully the whole time and noticed, as the two other teams had, that the snow had halted and gathered its power before releasing its freezing wave. The gathering was an obvious absorption of some kind that seemed to suck in something from the air around it. It took at least five seconds, if not longer, for the attack to begin. After the freeze wave finished, Joe nodded, seeing the same kind of attack, the same range, and the same response of those who had been frozen as they were freed by freezing paralysis much faster after the snow had been killed. Joe turned after a few moments and quizzed the kids again.
“OK. What did we learn? We know now why the snow is the third floor monster instead of the second or first, but now what can we do to fight the snow?”
The three kids looked at each other before Garnedell stepped forward to answer first, “The shield can block the frost-wave?”
“Possibly. We don’t know if the shield is magical or if it just a piece of metal, but possible. Anything else?”
The three looked at each other, a little surprised at the qualification but then considered carefully before Zilnek offered another two suggestions, “It slows you down if you are hit by the freeze ray until you kill it, so killing it quickly is very important.” Zilnek’s words increased in excitement and speed as he spoke, finishing in a rush of confident excitement.
“Nice. Two things. Any more,” Joe turned to Kilniara to give her a chance to speak?
“Um… well… It goes a pretty long way?”
“Yes. About eight meters or so?”
When Joe spoke the phrase eight meters, the strange compression in the air around him formed before rushing outwards in a spherical shock wave that somehow had no force, echoing outwards through the area. Several of the closest people glanced towards them, staring with some confused wariness before returning to their conversations or fights. Joe grimaced slightly but realized it made sense; this was the first time he had given a unit of distance, so the magic would have to translate the differing units of measure.
Joe gave a quick explanation to the siblings, “Sorry. The magic is just translating the units of measure. Anyway, anything else,” Joe glanced at all three?
The three this time fell silent before Joe nodded and continued his explanation, “Well, it moves pretty slowly, taking maybe five or so seconds to reach its full distance. It gets bigger the further away, but it doesn’t seem to get weaker! And the way to fight this… well… there seems to be two ways, but these groups are only doing one. We could hide behind a shield like them or we could just run away to the side. Well, unless it turns while attacking! Then we just run directly away from it, since it seems to only have a range of about ten meters, so… Can you guys think of anything else? I can’t.”
The three shook heads negatively in caution and Joe grunted before looking back at the groups fighting. Joe did have a shield he could use, but it wasn’t nearly big enough to cover… Wait! The wave grows the further away it goes! What if I run forward and shove my shield straight in its face! Will that block the whole wave? Joe considered, wondering if anyone else had considered the idea. Maybe the wave gets weaker the further away? Maybe…?
Joe almost wanted to see but didn’t want to waste any more time, but figured it would be a good idea to make sure before he tried it and stood, a plan forming up.
“Alright. Let’s go out there and try this. But I want to see another of these freeze waves, alright? So when I notice one, I’m going to back off and watch the freeze wave, OK? You guys need to take over killing it. I’ll stay and watch over you guys, but I’ll need to back off and make sure of some things. Got it?”
The three quickly nodded excitedly as the jumped to their feet, circling around him as the stood. Joe smiled and slipped out his shield and spear, but then stopped as he remembered he wanted to get his club up. He returned them and pulled out his two clubs and settled in to his combat mindset, leading the way out into the field and choosing the closest snow to attack.
“You guys stay behind for now. I’ll kill a couple to see how it is. After I get a feel, you guys can join in, OK? But watch and try to learn.”
“Yes, Joe,” Garnedell shouted out!
The two siblings instead called out a more respectful and restrained, “Yes, master.”
Joe stopped and looked at the two siblings, a quirked eyebrow and a humorous look of long-suffering, “Master?”
The two blinked, eyes widening slightly, “Ah.. um… Yes… Joe!”
Joe nodded as the two returned another response disjointedly but relaxed as Joe offered his nod with a smile. He stepped forward and engaged the closest snow.
Right. Let’s see what this is like!
Joe stepped forward and settled into his combat persona. He turned with his right side forward, arm and leg leading with the club held upright pointing, canted, towards the snow and ceiling. He shuffled forward, keeping both feet firmly and stably on the ground but moved quickly, closing to melee with the snow. Even as he came forward, his right club came forward to rest against the snow’s side even as he swung his left club around in a powerful swing into the snow’s side. He made sure the two clubs were off center, with his right club resting against the snow slightly above the snow’s center of mass while his left club smashed just below. The left club smashed spectacularly into the snow and shattered its body, snow splashing into dust that coated Joe and his face even as he flickered his eyes closed against the snow which exploded outward before falling to the floor.
Joe opened his eyes and saw the snow had been shattered, the bottom half having disappeared in a shower of snow dust. Joe didn’t let the shattered body surprise him even as he brought his right club back over his head and his left came up in front of him for defense until his right came down in a heave overhead swing. As before, his left came up to offer a counter force to his other hand strike, settling his left club off-center to the creature while bringing over-head right handed strike down off-center on the opposite side from his left hand club, once again shattering the snow in a mighty shower that dusted everything around. And again, Joe’s eyes flickered shut to allow the dust to splatter against his face without blinding him.
Even as his hands brought his clubs up in defense in front of him, his eyes flickered open to see the snow greatly reduced and a small glowing object that Joe quickly recognized as a cold core. Cold core? Or… snow core? Heat core? Low heat… Never mind. Snow core. Even as his eyes flickered across the snow and recognized the core, his left hand slipped the club into a reverse grip and into its sheath. He then punched his left hand into the snow’s body and wrapped his hand around the core before ripping it out of the snow. The temperature of his left hand dropped drastically and he pulled it out, whipping his hand back and forth before clutching and unclutching his left hand into a fist to get the blood flowing and return his hand to a more normal, healthy temperature.
Just like with the slime, the snow that was no longer connected to the core dropped to the ground, loosing cohesion. He flipped up the snow core quickly, knowing he hadn’t received any notification of the snow’s death, and looked around it, finding a tiny pebble sized pack of snow still sticking to the core and flicked it off with a finger. The last of the snow flew off the core then dusted off into a flurry of snow even as Joe felt the wash of experience suffuse over him and he smiled before looking at the core, a beautiful ice blue but identical in shape and form to all the other cores he had seen. He looked at it with some fascination before shrugging and then turning to the three, tossing the core to Garnedell to pocket it.
“OK. Doesn’t seem too hard to do. We just need to be careful of the snow’s freeze wave. Otherwise, it’s a pretty easy fight. Oh! And don’t punch it or stick your hand in it. It’s really, really cold!”
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