Typhon rummaged through Tayla's clothing and took out a gold bracelet from her pocket.

“Tayla told me to give this to you if she was killed. Even though she was very hard on you she told me many times while watching you in training that she thought you’d make a great bounty hunter one day. I think she was a little jealous of your skills with the katana.”

Typhon handed Osian the bracelet.

“What is it, master?”

“It has no magical properties or effects, but it had sentimental value to her.”

Osian took it and examined it. It was a simple bracelet, something that could bought at a hundred different stores.

Osian put it in his coat and patted his chest where it lay.

“I’m ready, master!”

“Good. And by the way if you had not shown any pity or remorse for those being killed in your hunting party I would have failed you as a recruit!”

Osian gulped and followed Typhon as he led the way to the nearby staircase. Together they climbed up and went to the top level of the temple. It was definitely the coldest of the levels and Osian saw his breath mist up and drift away. The level was full of ice boulders and ice columns. In fact everything that the young man could see was ice. The walls and floors were covered and there was no sign of any stonework at this level. He looked down and realized that that they were a long way up now. Any fall over the edge here would be instant death.

At the far end of the platform was a large set of double doors. They were sealed shut by clear ice. The doors has more demonscript markings, but these ones were worn away slightly from many centuries of decay.

Scattered all over the platform was over a dozen frozen corps of the Snow Witch. Many of these victims were completely frozen inside ice blocks, but then others appeared like Kayla and were petrified by the demon witch Yuki-Onna herself.

Osian could see that some of the warriors were ancient; some even looked like they were several hundred years old.

"Stay close to me Osian," Typhon told him. "If the witch appears her attention will be on me now."

"Yes master."

The aged Japanese bounty hunter gripped his katana with both hands and led Osian to cross over the ice field. They were headed for the double-doors with the demonscript. They didn't have Chimon their tracker, but the master hunter seemed know exactly what to do.

”Do you know where's the she-demon Master?” Osian whispered.

After his words the noise of ice cracking reverberated around them. The frozen water seemed to breath with a life all its own around them.

“No, Chimon has the real expertise for this, but I believe the ley lines here are very strong and they lead me towards the double doors.”

The ley lines were things that experienced bounty hunters could sense, but young rookies like Osian could not. Some very gifted apprentices had been known to tap into the energy of the earth, but he was not one of them. He knew that the lines were the principal locations on Earth connected the world to the demon plane. There was a lot of teachings about ley lines in the first month of his apprenticeship. The Archmagi were the true experts as they had been studying them for hundreds of years. Ley lines were thought to have been a left over from the dawn of creation. Many believed that they were like the nervous system of our galaxy.

Osian strained his eyes in an attempt to see the ley lines. As much as he wanted to see them he could not.

“There, they run along the floor here and towards the doors. These lines are the key to defeating the witch. It's impossible to dull their effects, but we can use their forces against her if we do it correctly.”

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"I don't understand master."

"You will one day Osian."

As they walked along they passed several figures caught frozen in the ice. One of them was only a small child that could have been no older than 6 years. Her face was pressed up against the ice block and her visage gave Osian the shivers. She was dressed in an ancient Japanese kimono and looked like she was screaming in terror. The ice must have been formed around her when she died.

As they got closer to the double doors the ground started to shake. The entire temple seemed to come alive and the floor started cracking. Blocks of ice started shifting and sections of the floor started to come tilt and come apart.

Typhon started sliding in another direction away from the young apprentice.

"Osian, take my hand!" He said as he reached out.

The young man tried to grab his teacher arm, but missed and slide away towards a large crevasse that had formed below his position.

The witches' laughter rang out across the pagoda.

Sliding on his feet Osian deftly sprang off a chuck of ice and landed safely before the falling into the precipice. A cold mist blew up from below and given him shivers.

The entire pogado seemed to be coming apart like chunks of ice on the surface of a lake. The rumbling continued as both hunters avoided falling ice and wood.

“Osian, hang on i'm coming for you,” said Typhon.

The two men were separated by a huge open section of floor. Another crevasse had opened up between them. Osian stood at the edge of a very small part of the platform. He position was precarious, but he'd be okay as long as the flooring didn't move any further. Typhon struggled to move as his section of flooring was still shifting and tilting in multiple directions.

The ice block with the frozen child shifted and caught Osian in the side. It pinned his foot in a crack and the weight of the ice block was enormous. His ice platform shifted again and he managed to break free, but was now carrening over the edge. Osian leapt nimbly in a desperate attempt and vaulted over the ice block. He landed safely on the other side and used his katana sword to anchor his feet in place.

When he looked up he couldn't see master Typhon anywhere.

"Did he go over the edge?" wondered Osian.

He looked around in all directions, but saw nothing except the scattered debris from the eruption inside the pagoda.

Osian grabbed at the edge of his ice formation and held on for dear life. He ducked and weave in place as debris cascaded past him. The entire pagoda erupted furiously and he started to wonder if the witch was going to burry them inside her lair.

Suddenly, everything went quiet. The quacking stop.

Bits of ice continued to ping pong around, but the shacking had stopped.

“Typhon, Master, are you okay?” Osian yelled out.

His voice echoed around crazily. He realized that he shouldn't yelling, but he wanted to know if his teacher was still alive.

He waited, but didn't hear any reply.

He was about to shout out again when he heard a whistle. He knew this was a signal from his master and meant for him not to speak.

Several ice blocks shifted towards the center of the temple level and from within the ice blocks Yuki-Onna appeared. She was dressed as before when Osian saw her attacking Tayla, but this time she also had three snowballs are her side as protectors or guard dogs.

Osian felt a surge of fear at the sight of the witch. She was standing about one hundred feet away from him. She seemed beautiful in her appearance, but had an aura of death around her. She appeared to be like a young woman in her early twenties, but Osian knew that this was simply a mirage. Most demons appeared in pleasant forms to disarm human prey, but their true appearance was much more grotesque.

The Snow Witch crackled and the snowballs rolled away from her in three separate directions. It was obvious that they were being sent to hunt Osian and Typhon.

The snowballs started hopping from platform to platform searching the area around closest to the demon witch. They rolled around easily and hopped from place to place. It wouldn’t be long before they would find and corner the young apprentice.

Osian knew exactly how to defeat the snowballs, but when he looked around there was no stone flooring like last time. Everything he could see was ice and snow, except for a warrior with a shield buried in ice not too far away.

"That might work," he thought to himself.

He would need to cut the ice with his katana or break the ice block some other way.

Osian realized that one of the snowballs was getting too close and he was feeling exposed. He decided to leap over towards the platform with the warrior nearby. When he landed the snowballs erupted in noise as they communicated amongst themselves. He was sure that he hadn't been seen, but huddle behind the ice block with the warrior.

“Where is Typhon,” he wondered.

Was his master fighting something else lower down? He couldn’t hear anything.

The wind started picking up as the Snow Witch grew closer to his position. He couldn't see her, but she was no longer where she had appeared.