Shova, 10th, 10,391
Six went about, healing the injured and checking his prompts.
You have killed level 9 Churli. Experience gained 561.
You have killed level 9 Akat Tsuli. Experience gained 561.
You have killed level 13 Raynair Tuttles . Experience gained 2221.
You have killed level 12 Tumbo. Experience gained 1852.
Then came a long list of low level kill notifications.
Not something Six was proud of. It was just how things were.
He and his constructs had all earned enough experience to level, and he took the opportunity to do so while he cleaned up the battlefield.
You have reached level 15, advancement options available.
Skill points: 10
Perk points: 55
Stat points: 6
His skill points he wouldn’t touch until they reached twenty or until he had to.
Two of his stat points went into strength bringing it to 27. Then one went into Constitution, Luck, Endurance, Dexterity, and Wisdom. Bringing them all up to 53, 28, 14, 13, and 13 respectively.
While 55 perk points was enough to get something, the oerk he wanted, Titanic Empowerment, cost 60. So Six would wait until the next level unless some other perk was immediately useful.
More prompts,
Skill increases:
Survival - Initiate - 14
Stealth - Initiate - 13
Perception - Initiate - 16
Elemental Magic - Initiate - 19
Analyze - Initiate - 16
Cycle Magic - Initiate - 14
Chainsaw - Initiate - 13
Blood Magic - Initiate - 16
Blood Casting - Initiate - 18
Heavy Armor - Apprentice - 26
Traps - Initiate - 13
Mindfulness - Apprentice - 21
Unarmed - Initiate - 12
Force Magic - Initiate - 9
Analyze went up by two while everything else went up by one, minor but wide gains overall. It seemed battle always led to a reliable advancement. Training helped but immersing himself in a challenging fray pushed him and yielded results.
Athletics hit 20 and with that came a prompt.
Apprentice Skill Evolution triggered
Choose Skill Evolution? Yes/No?
Yes.
Defensive Breathing: Breathing is the foundation of life and health. Increases the users natural defense and overall stability while performing athletic movements or maneuvers. Defenses increase by 0.5% per level.
Weighted Carry: The user is a master of lifting. Greatly increases the user’s strength while performing lifting or dragging movements or maneuvers. Strength increases by 0.2% per level.
Stride: Unbound and free. Increases the user’s speed of movement by 1% per level.
Improved Jump: To overcome one’s limits is the essence of jump. Improves a user’s jump by a flat 100%
Forest’s Stride: At one with the domain of forest. Greatly increases the user’s speed of movement by 3% per level while in a forest.
Six immediately discarded Weighted Carry and Improved Jump.
Weighted Carry was only good for moving a lot of stuff all at once, not a priority for Six and he had other ways of accomplishing that.
Improved Jump was alright but Six didn’t understand the order of operations between the evolution and his jump bonus from his gear. It could stack very well or not at all. He didn’t want to gamble only to find it was an additive effect. It just wasn’t worth it.
Stride was good, simple movement speed transformed into an overall advantage, both offensively and defensively.
Forest’s Stride was three times as effective, but only in forests. Six was ok with specializing to a degree but not to the point where he was crippled outside his preferred environment. So if he was to go with either it would be the base Stride.
Defensive Breathing was good and synergized with his build mission which was survivability. It would currently give him an additional 10% to his natural defense, which for an unevolved person was half their strength score.
Six had 27 strength so that meant he had 13.5 Natural Defense. Was that alot? He compared it to a normal man who would sit around 5 or so and to his chestplate which had 32 defense. Taking Defensive Breathing would improve his 13.5 by… 1.35? Was that worth it compared to a 20% increase in speed?
He knew Natural defense would scale 1 to 1 once he evolved and that he would be putting more points into strength as he leveled but would it be worth it by then? He should really write all this math down and look at what the projections would be.
This wasn’t the time nor place for such considered deliberation. He was in the middle of healing one of his last soldiers, a bad arrow wound to the woman’s shin. There was a small part of him that wanted to mutter something about ‘taking an arrow to the knee,’ but there was no energy for that stuff these days. With the last of his people healed, Six moved on to the enemy wounded, considering.
If Six evolved and pushed his athletics skill to let's say, 50. What would it look like then?
His natural defense would be at least 30 and the Defensive Breathing bonus would be 25% meaning an increase of 7.5, so 37.5 natural defense which would make him more durable than his chestplate.
Or
50% movement speed.
This was actually an incredibly hard decision.
But ultimately his build was that of utter survivability, a shield, a wall, a sentinel.
He shouldn’t be thinking about running.
Six selected Defensive Breathing and felt the skill evolution take hold, literally altering the way Six breathed and held himself on a subtle level. The skill now teaching his body the correct posture for optimal sturdiness.
Along with the skill evolution came a maneuver selection, Six continued with his build mission and selected the one to synergize the most with his new evolution.
Maneuver: Brace
Rank: Minor
Cooldown: 5 seconds
Range: Self
Performance Time: Instant
Duration: Instant
Stamina Cost: 55
Effect: User braces their body for an instant, flexing and guarding with absolute skill, increasing their natural defense by 100+1% per level of Athletics.
For a moment Six would be nearly unbreakable.
Six was finished with his own progress and emerged from within himself to see himself healing the bomb archer. The half-aelf pale and sweating, clearly in shock but alive. Fear and recognition in his eyes as Six applied a Vital Surge and took the archer’s weapons and bags.
Six moved on to the next wounded and returned to consolidating his gains.
In this case the gains of his constructs.
Poh Doh reached level 11, gaining two points in strength and one in constitution and endurance. The strength increase feeding into his Crystal Skin trait and making him that much more durable.
Lump on the other hand reached level 10 and gained four free stat points and the option of a new trait.
Six put two stat points into intelligence and constitution, to improve Lump’s magical damage and mana reservoirs.
As for the trait, Six was presented with three options.
Master Link: The golem gains access and the ability to cast the spells known by its master.
Bloodcharge: The golem gains the ability to overcharge spells and their effects through investing more bloodmana into the spell. 1% Overcharge per 3% increase in mana cost.
Blood Draw: The golem gains the ability to exert its rudimentary will on living creatures to violently draw the blood from their body.
Six immediately knew he was picking Master Link.
The near vertical increase to utility was undeniable, opening lump and its formidable effective mana pool up to a variety of spells than just blood dart. A bloodcharged blood dart wasn’t something that Six thought particularly strong, so Bloodcharge just didn’t make sense.
Blood draw was just another offensive ability, of which Six had many. Six would prefer the increase in overall casting magnitude than another damage source which Masterlink would also give him.
It was Master Link
Six felt a small shift in his connection with his subordinate golem and knew it had gained access to his mental arcane library. He tested it on an enemy, Lump bubbling to the surface from underneath his armor and casting Vital Surge into the man at Six’s order. It required no effort beyond the mental prodding on Six’s part. Easy, simple and incredibly strong. Lump grew in an almost indefinable jump in value with this upgrade.
There was one last series of prompts.
3/3 samples obtained, Traits obtained,
Ork: Racial Ability: Relentless. Gain additional stamina regen per point of END and receive reduced mental resistance per point of WIS.
Halfling: Racial Ability: Easy Eyed. Gain additional mobility and precision per point of DEX and receive reduced power output and natural defense per point of STR.
1/3 Bloodwell slots filled.
Archive traits? Yes/No?
His number of bloodwell slots had increased by one, a result of his improved bloodmagic skill.
He had received archival prompts like this before during his forest grinding. Nothing he elected to keep.
The discarded bloodlines were of bristlehounds and mountain boars. Both bloodlines were like the ravsnok bloodline and lowered ‘computational power’ in regards to intelligence; such a sacrifice was antithetical to Six’s vision of the future, ultimately a net negative if allowed into the populace.
This time though, Six saw some benefit in filling out the empty slots for the time being. They were good bloodlines for marching or sharpshooting, things that could help his people under the right circumstances and with the right safeties. So he selected Yes and filled the last two empty slots of his bloodwell.
He had yet to test the active portion of the moderate blood spell and felt a tad bit trepidation experimenting with the strong magic but he knew it was but an eventuality. So it would pay to have some decent options when he chose to do so.
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In light of his new musings on natural defense Six considered experimenting with the Ravznok bloodline. If it worked as stated it would give Six 1 natural defense per point of constitution. That equated to 53 extra points of natural defense which would put him well beyond the defense of his own armor.
That sounded incredibly strong but the loss of ‘computational power’ wasn’t something Six was prepared to lose within himself. Not with 12 intelligence anyways.
And with that, Six was done with his gains.
He was done with healing too.
He was exhausted and found a tree to sit down against. Taking a deep steading breath. He looked around and took in the death. Red soil and the tang of copper thick in the air. Bandit corpses being tossed on a small pyre and most of the dead of Mountain’s End being wrapped in shrouds to be brought back for whatever rituals the family required. Those who had no rituals were burned alongside the bandits.
By fucking Kynairos, Six wanted to relax, and by that he meant getting lit. blazing it up. Smoking a fucking chonger. He looked down at his blood covered gauntlets and sniffed. He was disgusting.
That didn’t stop Nibbler from finding her way to him, making her way up, scrabbling at Six’s helm and trying to pull it off. He unlatched it for her, letting it drop to the ground with a clank.
Six smiled at the little creature and went to scratch but the bloody gauntlet gave him pause.
Nibbler chittered before nuzzling his hand anyways.
There was nothing quite like the simple earnest love of an animal to help a man ignore the brutal indifference of the world.
Shova, 16th, 10,391
Six knew he had been neglecting his entire military role as an enchanter in favour of his civic duties as a construction mage. The peaceful nature of the work and the immediately tangible benefits for the village made it incredibly gratifying.
Six’s soldiers had performed incredibly well against the bandit army but many of their losses… casualties, many of the casualties could have been prevented with more and better equipment.
His enchanters were coming along but none of them had even reached apprentice rank yet. Most of their advantages were slivers of power compared to what Six could produce and it would be years before they could rival his acquired knowledge.
Six considered this and decided to split his military enchantment into two streams of development. Experimental and scaling. For his strongest and most promising fighters he would put aside the time and resources to develop something cutting edge and personalized. Something experimental and unique. For the army he would spend an amount of time mass producing low level, military golems. Standardized with sovereign restoration and golem genesis they would be low cost high return investments as they grew alongside the army.
Today was an experimental day. He was about to enchant some shit.
To that end he spent 25 perk points upgrading his Enchantment Strength perk to rank three bringing its buff to 15% improved efficacy to all of his enchantments. The cost for rank four ballooned to 50 perk points, almost as much as a unique perk.
30 perk points remained, leaving him with just enough for Titanic Empowerment next level.
Six, Charles, Tavi, and Biggo began the day gathered at Hodgekin’s leatherworking yard. This was where Six’s first commission was just nearing completion.
The enchanter had placed the order a few days ago and Hodgekins refused to work with the chosen leather at first but she still owed him and she was the village’s best leatherworker.
She had the pieces of armor arrayed on a table in the yard. All the pieces of a fine set of almost done leather armor.
Hodgekins looked miffed, “It’s done yer lordship.”
“Thank you, Hodgekins.” Six said.
“You should have never asked me to work with that material.”
Six sighed. “I didn’t ask you to, I ordered you to. Sorry bout that. Thank you for doing your job. Sorry.”
She harrumphed but remained ready to finish the pieces.
They considered the armor and Six talked about his methods, understanding, and expectations for the coming enchantments. This, while primarily an advancement in power, was also a learning opportunity for his students.
Six joined with his coven and drew upon the land’s ley mana. It was a torrential amount and Six enchanted with abandon.
The breastplate and bracers were festooned with Runes of Perpetual Resilience, granting durability and regeneration. The leather circlet enchanted with the moderate Rune of Amplifying Nexus. The greaves were altered with the Rune of Cloud and Rune of Jump, creating a lesser version of Six’s Slypheon greaves. The leather gloves held a Rune of Dominate Control, allowing for Charles to amplify, absorb or redirect any spell. It was much the same as Six’s set but better in many ways, a superior set overall especially when you considered its defense of 32 and its extreme light weight. Additionally, Charles had provided a few reagents along the way that gave the armor it own unique quirks, simple things.
As Six laid the enchantments down Hodgekins worked with her new orichalum tools, the old set of leatherworking tools, too weak to properly work the material. It was especially hard to work with after Six had Elementally Infused the material with the earth element, but the gains to its durability and defense made that increase in difficulty worth it.
Six pushed the enchantments close to breaking, and put every last ounce of focus into not fucking it up. This was life saving gear, for his friend, he needed to do it better than right. So each piece was cared for like the first and overclocked like it was the last.
As they finished with the last piece, Hodgekins swore.
“Shit, I just made master. By Kynairos.”
It was a good beginning to the day. Not only did they craft a set of amazing equipment, the village gained a master leatherworker.
“Congratulations.” Six was a little interested in what evolution and technique choices she would get but felt it too rude to ask. He did analyze her though.
Aretta Hodgekins
Dwarf
Level 2
Level 2 was good for a non combatant but it was unlikely she’d ever get beyond 3 or 4. Six wanted her to get her class but there was basically one way of going about it.
“How would you feel about going out on patrols, Hodgekins? Gaining a few levels and making your class one day?”
“Hah,” she laughed. “No sir, not me. I don’t think I want to be anywhere near fighting. Not even if you order me.”
Six waved it away, she’d already done enough. “That’s fine, just seeing if you were interested.”
“I’m not.”
“Yea, I got that. No problem. Thank you for your hard work.”
She sighed, clearly conflicted between her morals and her skill gains. “Yer welcome, yer lordship.”
Charles donned his new armor and they admired the make and craftsmanship of it. It fit Charles perfectly and the young man seemed elated with it, a big smile on his face.
They left the leatherworkers yard and went to their next place of enchantment, Ravna’s smithy.
Inside was an incomplete set of fullplate sized for Tavi. It shone with a crimson sheen, the red truly coming out where the armor caught the light. Air Infused Bloodsteel Fullplate. It utilized a large amount of Mountain’s End’s immortal steel and the rest of the blood branches but the result was a beautiful alloy that emanated a primal power. Six then used his new Elemental Infusion technique to infuse the alloy with the air element, reducing the material’s weight while maintaining its durability and defense stats.
He had experimented with the infusion ability on cheap materials with Tavi as they explored options for her setup and the reduction in weight was the trait that interested her most from the gathered results
Ravna gave Six a peck on the cheek and they began the final process. Ravna heated a piece up for the last finishing temper, the ideal stage for armor enchanting.Tavi received a similar set of enchantment to Charles with the exception of her helm being enchanted with several runes of resistance tuned to solely mental resistance. She apparently did not care to enhance her spellwork in favour of sheer mental defense. Her choice to make.
In each enchantment he added a reagent that Tavi herself provided, altering the final product and introducing little quirks into her kit.
The finished armor was better than Six’s on a simple material level and comparable on an enchantment level. Her reagents were not as good but overall, much like Charles’ new armor, Six would think her set a tad stronger than his.
Tavi donned the new set and stood naturally in it, the armor well made and imposing.
Cool. This was a good exploration of the capabilities of Mountain’s End and what they could produce as a community, defining the production line. Six was happy to see progress in that regard, they were developing more and in more directions everyday.
Once finished at Ravna’s they left for the research facility, there was yet more work.
They passed by the sealed wings of fire, water, and darkness and entered the earth wing where the enchanters of Mountain’s End practiced. Now was another demonstration but for the entire class this time.
He had asked Charles and Tavi to configure their own mana cores for personal golems and they had spent the next few days in conference with their peers and hunched over work.
Tavi presented her creation and Six examined her creation. He smiled at the audacity, it was a fine thing indeed.
She had configured two elements into the core, a risky move but possible with enough care and skill. Both of her manas, fire and air, resided in the core. The two mixing to form something of a plasma golem?
Six was impressed at Tavi’s greediness and willingness to push this first golem to its limit. The air of the chamber would serve as its primary material and they brought the lamps closer to feed it fire.
Tavi supplied a reagent, a humanoid brain suspended in a jar.
This silenced the excited murmurs of the classroom and ice seeped into the room. This was just as taboo as Six using Amog’s skin, perhaps more. Tavi held it out, almost asking permission.
“Where’d you get this?” Six asked.
“From the mage you defeated. The priest of Xymok.”
“The black robed vrill?”
“Yes.”
Six nodded and took the item, before continuing with the enchantment.
There was a collective release as Six sanctioned this magical cannibalism. The leader taking responsibility for the acts of the tribe.
It made them feel less connected to the deviance.
Six channeled mana into the core and brought Tavi’s creation to life.
The core igniting and he breathed life into it like a new ember, giving it fuel and watching it bloom into a singularity of blue orange fire. Within it depths there was a face with a slight vrill cast. Six could see intelligence on that face.
The golem scowled and Tavi approached it, scowling back and making a connection, establishing her will over the thing. She quickly gained control and brought it to heel. The gathered enchanters clapped and ooh’d at the display.
Then Charles presented his core, and Six smiled at the ostentatiousness.
Charles had made a split core as well, his of earth and darkness.
He’d shaped it like a stallion of shadow with a core of steel.
An interesting design.
For a reagent the boy supplied the brain of that barbarian Six had defeated.
Another flinch from the class at the taboo. Less so this time. Already they became desensitized.
Internally Six had a chuckle. They had planned it together, Charles and Tavi using brains. Mundane brains weren’t even particularly strong reagents but the eventual consciousnesses that would emerge must be something the two enchanting initiates had decided on. Taboo be damned they had plans and needed power for those plans.
Six smiled and shook his head. “Remind me to tell you of the folly of faustian bargains.”
They shuttered most of lamps, and created darkness in the room. Not just shadows but corners of completely black. The darkness would feed one half of the construct.
Charles provided a strange bluish boulder flecked with gold that would provide for the earth aspects of the golem.
Then Six began.
He drew out tendrils of darkness and coalesced them around the core that was fusing into the boulder. The physical center quickly becoming obscured by the growing inky blackness that eventually shaped itself into the form of a large void black horse.
It reared onto its hindlegs, and looked about before Charles made contact and asserted himself over the construct.
Six had done it.
He was exhausted, his mind abuzz and tingling under the strain of the day. He began a round of applause for his newly equipped elites. Charles and Tavi were somehow both elated and skeptical of the day’s gains but the cheers of their peers broke them into celebration.
Six was satisfied. That was all the focused development he had planned for the day and was about to go make some military golems before he was stopped by Biggo.
“My lord,” the man rumbled out. “If you have a moment I would ask you a favour.”
“Sure. Sup?”
“I would have you know it would be incredibly hard for one such as myself to repay your master services but,” then Biggo withdrew a configured mana core and presented it to Six. “Would you be able to enchant this into a golem with your evolutions? Please.”
Six examined the proffered gem and was surprised to see another rather unique configuration. Pure mana. Such golems were never popular as simple mana batteries could fulfill the primary purpose of a mana golem with a more efficient mana core usage. The golem also often broke when they ran empty on mana, leading to the type being quite situational.
But Sovereign Restoration may change how useful such creations were in general. Six was intrigued. Biggo was still a criminal serving his sentence though and Six was hesitant to offer power boosts so freely.
“Are you ok with additional restrictions on your access to this golem?”
Biggo pursued his lip and sighed but nodded gently.
“Thank you for understanding, Biggo.”
Receiving a large increase in mana was like going from a single pistol mag to several extended magazines. It needed to be restricted away from high risk individuals. Biggo, while talented in enchantment, was still serving his sentence for being one of Amog’s bandits and thus was such an individual.
He had well over a year remaining and Six wasn’t about to trust him with that amount of power.
But rehabilitation was about trust and giving people the chance to join society.
If Biggo was trying to scale his ability to contribute rather than kill, well that was something to be promoted.
An increase in mana could also be likened to getting a larger excavator or other piece of machinery. It didn’t have to destroy.
Six created the mana golem immediately, needing only the mana within him to create it. The construct appeared as a set of resonating force fractals, fractures in reality organized in a series of ever decreasing patterns. It floated about, without physical form but still emanating a sense of arcane power.
Biggo thanked Six profusely, assuring him of his loyalty and rehabilitation. Before taking control of the mana golem and putting it to practice and use.
It was later that night that Six met with Tavi alone in the leyhall.
She entered the meeting room and closed the door. He asked Big Sister if anyone was attempting to spy on them.
No, Six. No one is anywhere near. It is just me, should I go away?
No. Six thought back. I am trying to share almost everything with you.
They sat down against each other, a table between.
“I called you here,” Six began, hesitating.
“You did,” Tavi nodded, being a little cheeky but with an undertone of understanding that something serious was about to happen.
He cleared his throat. “I mean to ask you. What is your plan?”
“My plan?”
“I want to understand you a little better, Tavi. What is your destination?”
“I want to get stronger.”
“To what end?”
“To be strong.”
“Don’t be purposefully dense. This is important.”
She grimaced and adopted a more serious demeanor before nodding. “So no one can take what’s mine ever again”
Six tapped the table, “What did you lose?”
“Nothing,” She looked guilty, like she lied. “My lands, my people, my responsibility.”
Six grunted. “You have none of that here.”
She looked up at him, pissed. “Not so. I have people, I have responsibility.”
Six held out a hand, contrite. He nodded apologetically. “I misspoke. Do you plan to stay?”
“I do.” she said, resigned.
“Why so glum? What's this place for you?”
“Somewhere for the new me to grow. The old Tavi died, I am whats emerged. And I’m glum because death is always a bit dark.”
“I feel that.”
She smiled, bittersweet. “My old home is gone. Everyone I knew, grew up alongside. All dead. I know people here. This is my new home.”
“Think you can stand me being the boss?”
“I see what you’re doing Six and I must say you work harder than any of the nobles I saw growing up. What I had is dead, this is nice for what my life could have been. I give myself to fate.”
Six felt a chill at those last words, he wasn’t much for ‘signs’ but if there ever was one. “I have something for you. Something I had kept a secret.”
“Oh? Who knows about it?”
“Me, Jebbedo, and now you.”
“Jebbedo? The rogue turned cook?”
Six pulled out the large glass jar that contained Amog’s heart floating in honey based preservative. He put it on the table between them.
Tavi covered her mouth. “Oh. What in Kynairos’ name is that? Is that a heart?”
Six nodded. “It's a heart.”
“Why do you have such a thing?”
“It's a powerful consumable.”
That made her pause and look at it with a less disgusted, more considered gaze. “It looks like a human heart,” she remarked.
“Humanoid,” Six clarified.
She sighed, and pulled the jar closer. “Why not give this to Charles? Or eat it yourself?”
“Two reasons. Firstly, I believe this will boost some sort of physical stat, so its improvement will most likely synergize with a brawler or skirmisher type. Charles is long range damage and command, you are more suited to melee and close combat. Thus, you are the more synergistic choice.
Secondly, Charles is going to leave sometime after he evolves. Level 20 or 25, something like that. So I’d prefer f-”
“What? Charles is going to leave?”
“Eh? Yea.”
“He hadn’t told me.”
“He keeps things pretty close to the chest that kid.”
“I cant believe he was keeping that a secret?”
“What? You dont have any secrets you don’t wanna share?”
She got his point.
“Anyways” he said, slapping the table. “I have my reasons for not taking it that I don’t believe you share.”
She seemed dubious of it. “It's dangerous for you but not dangerous for me?”
“If I didn’t already have said reasons I would eat it in a second.” Six said, straight faced.
“Why?”
“I think it would make me stronger.”
“You think?” She asked, more for reassurance.
“I do.”
She sighed but nodded. Many things in this life were not guaranteed.
“You are planning to stay with Mountain’s End?” Six asked again.
She nodded. “Yes.”
“Then it should go to you. Your progress and loyalty should be recognized.”
She looked at the jar and sighed before looking at Six. “Do you have to watch me eat it?”
“I want to stay just in case anything bad happens. If you want, we can get Kali Kik or Celine to watch over you. Anybody really.”
“Kali sounds great, thank you.”
Six nodded and left Tavi alone, sending a town guard off for Kali Kik.
The vrill woman showed up near immediately and shook her head in disappointment when Six gave her a vague explanation of what she should expect.
“I trust you to do whatever needs to be done to protect her.”
That made her scowl. But she left to watch over the young woman and her trial.
Six sat on a bench that had been placed infront of the townhall and watched the nightlife go about the village square. Two bonfires burned with sparse crowds surrounding the blazes. Simple folk going to and from the makeshift taverns that were built onto the side of the longhouses. A light din of music and laughter emanating from the places.
It wasn’t really much but it was something.
Six people watched until Tavi emerged from the leyhall with Kali Kik providing a steadying hand. Six could feel the change already, there was a lesser beat of that familiar resonance between him and Tavi, the connection between threadlings.
She stumbled a step, caught herself, and stood tall. She looked Six in the eye. “Thank you for the gift. It's called. Elevated Barrier. My natural defense has increased by 300%.”
Six grinned at her triumph. “Nice.”