Alone.

John woke, Celsius was no longer near him. He crawled through the pile of wagons and looked around for any other students or even the knights that had helped them. John found nothing.

The area around where the group has been attacked was covered in a bubble of faintly glowing purple magic, John didn't enjoy the prospect of crossing it but knew he had very few options.

He decided to test the safety of the bubble by putting his arm through, the arm was uncomfortably cold but he suffered no injuries, deciding to try and walk through.

John walked through the bubble. His entire body was struck by a feeling of unbearable cold, like a thousand tiny daggers of ice pierced his skin. John felt himself fall for a moment before the hellish cold partially subsided and he found himself in a poorly lit wooden room.

John investigated the room and discovered cracked sections of the floor that let in water.

"Am I on a boat? How?"

John wanted an answer to his question but knew an icy death would provide him no answers, he went up to the deck of the boat to scout out where exactly he was.

John had unknowingly found himself on an almost arctic coast, snow covered mountains and boreal forrests in the distance. The shore was enticingly close but John was wise enough to know that he'd die of exposure if he got into the murky water, and his body would probably go into shock if he dove in instead of adjusting himself slowly.

"Well I'm fucked... I hardly think waiting around for the medieval equivalent of a coastguard would be helpful even if I wasn't in freezing cold conditions. I'm probably gonna have to pull a titanic I guess."

John had decided to try and free up a piece of the boat to float on and keep his body mostly dry whilst he paddled across, he had figured that it would be a better shot than blindly jumping in.

John had begun to sew a seed of hate towards the demon that had almost certainly put him in this situation, he had made a mental note to beat the demon to a pulp once he got back into a more comfortable enviroment.

"Alright. Let's find a good candidate."

John spent a while freeing up a suitably sized piece of wood to use for floating, he also made sure to search the boat for supplies but found only a bag of unopened red bottles.

"Well there's an equal chance of them being either a potion or a poison or even just some mundane drink, in any case I'll take them."

John gathered his things and moved the piece of wood to the edge of the ship, he got on and started using the piece of debris like a paddleboard to cross the ice cold water.

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John knew that on earth even the coldest of waters still contained dangerous oceanic predators and decided to paddle as fast as he possibly could.

The closer he got to the water, the greater his fear of being dragged back to sea became. John was never an ocean fan but he had to try his best to ignore his gnawing paranoia.

When he reached the shallow part of the water he felt two sharp spines pierce his legs, electricity shot up through his calves and he fell backwards. Johns belongings were pushed to shore but he himself sank around a meter before hitting the floor.

A school of small fish began to swim towards John, investigating him and shooting more spines into the rest of his body. They seemed to be crystals that created electric current, magical no doubt.

What the fuck do I do? I can't win in this situation! I'm far from in my element and I'm pretty shit at swimming to begin with!

John's arms were already covered in the spines, so reaching for his axes was impossible. He tried to overcome the electricity and somehow move his body forward but the creatures were already biting at John, the combined strength of the group began to carry him away from the shore.

Not like this! I'm not dying. That'd be beyond unfunny. These little electric pieces of shit are gonna die, not me.

John activated his skill hard body to prevent any more spines piercing his skin, the first few spines had already seemingly ran out of juice and his arms were able to move enough to start pulling out the rest.

John pulled more spines from his legs and paddled towards the shore, he got to the point where he was barely in the ocean and stood.

The creatures had approached too close to shore and now John was no longer playing in an unfair battle ground, despite his limbs being somewhat dulled and slower he used his axe to kill two of the fish.

John's mind filled with rage as he struck more of them with his other axe, killing enough of the fish to feel satisfied as the reat retreated.

The power that came with levelling up filled John. He knew that meant higher stats and more skill points but he wasn't exactly able to sit down in the freezing cold and mess with his stats.

John now had both fish meat and somewhat tough and sharp crystals, he had been given an idea but he needed to rest first.

John took both the fish and the crystal spines and added them to the bag of bottles he found on the ship, he gathered them all and tried searching for a temporary resting place.

John eventually found an uninhabited cave and tried starting a fire with the wood he had floated to shore with. He was unsuccessful but realised he had probably gotten enough points to purchase some kind of fire spell.

and words.

John Maxwell Level 5 Strength 27 Agility 27 Dexterity 25 Perception 25 Vitality 25 Intelligence 29 Fortitude 25 Unspent status points. 0 Unspent skill points. 2 Experience for LVL UP 0/1600

 He added 2 of the spare status points to intelligence. John then opened the skill shop and found two fire spells, both one point each warm and Ember.

Buying the two spells and trying them out allowed John to dry the wood and warm up his body, and then add an ember which lit the fire and allowed him to rest and stop using his magic.

Thinking about this logically... what the hell am I gonna do?