I realized I was heading in the right direction when the first snow pixie appeared, a malevolent ball of cold energy with gnashing fang-like icicles making up the ‘head’ of the magical inorganic beast, frozen water vapors trailing behind like the tail end of a comet.

I really knew I was going in the right direction when one snow pixie turned into ten.

And I was certain when ten turned into one hundred, the balls of frozen energy prowling through the air as they tried to snap flesh from my body.

“Would you kindly screw off?” I snarled as I dodged out of the way of yet another circling set of ice fangs.

My cat was faring better than I, at the very least. For whatever reason, the snow pixies seemed less interested in her than I. Those that occasionally floated in her direction were quickly smacked out of the air, her claws shredding their nebulous form. It wasn’t enough to kill them, but reforming a moment later, they would drift away from her, apparently uninterested in being further assaulted by my demon cat.

Lucky bastard.

The early rays of sunshine were beginning to pierce through the darkness. By all rights, I was supposed to be nearing my destination, having been hiking through the cold underbrush of the arctic forest for a few hours now.

What if I somehow went in the wrong direction?

The scenery was hardly distinct for leagues in any direction. It wouldn’t be hard to somehow wander off in the wrong direction.

“I say that, but -” I paused midsentence, swinging my blade through a snow pixie that drifted too close. “- but it’s sort of hard to miss that.”

I glanced up at the massive mountains. With the early rays of dawn beginning to shine down on the land, the mountains’ true scale was becoming increasingly apparent, so tall that I couldn’t see the peaks, even craning my neck upward.

Who knows what may live up in those peaks?

I wasn’t sure anything could even live up there. There was something outlandish about the thought of something living so far removed from the rest of the world in such a remote and hostile place they may as well have lived in a separate world entirely.

As if the punishment for daring to let my thoughts wander, a snow pixie drifted behind me, snapping off a chunk of meat from my shoulder before wafting away.

“You little ass.” I snapped, reaching up for my shoulder, blood flowing from the wound. Within seconds the damage was already stitching itself back together. Still, the fact that one had managed to wound me annoyed me.

“Right, I’m tired of dealing with these.” I sighed before glancing at my cat. “Think you can keep up?”

My cat cocked her head at me. Something about the expression seemed accusatory like she was offended that I would assume otherwise.

Warmth flooded me as I began to draw mana throughout my body, every sense and muscle brimming with energy. Racing forward, the trees began to whip past me. I was like some sort of ethereal ghost flitting through the final dark parts of the night, seeking shelter from the vengeful sun. Fast as I was, I could distinctly make out a black shadow keeping pace with speed that an ordinary cat would have never hoped to have matched.

And to think she still isn’t full-grown.

I smiled fondly for a moment before returning to my surroundings. Running as fast as I was through the trees, I covered what remained of the forest in only a little over twenty minutes. The cloistered trees began to thin and peel away until I finally emerged from the undergrowth of the arctic forest, frozen ground, and packed snow crunching under my feet.

Tentatively, I walked out from the trees, wrapping my arms around my chest as the cold began to seep in.

And when I say cold, I mean cold. It was as if the trees had somehow kept the worst of the icy winds at bay, but now I was fully exposed at the base of the domineering mountains. Even my body, resistant to the worst of the elements, was shivering in the bitter cold, the sun doing little to warm me.

“C-c-cold’s an u-u-understatement.” My teeth clinked together as I spoke. “H-h-how are y-y-you doing?” I asked my cat.

My cat, in answer, hissed.

“N-n-not m-m-much b-b-better.” I nodded.

I’d rather not spend more time here than I must.

I glanced around, looking for my destination. Aside from the towering wall of gray and white, there wasn’t much around, only the trees behind me and-

“Never mind,” I whispered as my eyes locked on something out of the normal half a league away. Far away as it was, it would have been easy to miss, but it was also the only thing that looked remotely out of place, a strange patch of timber nestled against the mountains.

Jogging over, half because I needed a closer look and half simply to keep warm, I soon gained a clearer picture of what I’d been looking at. The pile of timber was clearly dilapidated, a former shed where one might keep a few tools locked up. Except, given there was no human life for at least a day’s journey south, it couldn’t have been here for no reason.

That must be it, then.

Approaching with caution, I stopped in front of the shed. With utmost caution, I reached out to the handle of the door, giving it a slow pull. With a surprising amount of resistance, the door fought back.

“What the…?”

I furrowed my brow before putting more force into pulling. Still, the door fought me like some bitter rival.

“C’mon, you stupid lump of wood.”

Growing frustrated, I yanked one final time. With a crack of screeching metal, the door suddenly lurched free from its hinges, falling to my side and revealing the interior of the small shed.

“Whoops,” I whispered, staring at the broken metal hinges.

Well, not like I had any way to warm the hinges.

Sage I might be, but I still had no affinity for Scorz. Sure, I could manipulate my water magic to higher forms of magic and even potentially deviant forms. Yet, it didn’t change that at their base, my magic was still rooted in the Aulous affinity.

Even if I used mana fusion to align my pure water affinity into a water-fire-based spell, it would create acid magic, Scorlous, which would have corroded the metal, leading to a result no different than simply ripping the door off its hinges.

As if sensing my thoughts, my cat smacked my leg like she was chastising my actions.

“Oh, I don’t need it from a brute like you.” I hissed at my cat. “Anyway, we’ve more important priorities.”

Inside the shed was, well, nothing. It was empty save for a hammer hanging from an otherwise open rack and a bristled matt on the ground. The cold had frozen the individual fibers into strands like stocks of wheat.

“I-i-is this a -j-joke?” Another cold breeze swept past, reminding me of the frigid temperature I’d forgotten momentarily.

My not-quite-domesticated shadow blossom meowed as if in agreement. Just then, the wind picked up, and feeling my skin blistering from the cold, I stepped into the pitiful excuse of shelter the shed provided, my cat hopping in after me.

“N-now what?”

I crossed my arms, shivering in contemplative silence.

Was I tricked?

No, by all rights, this was supposed to be Old Pine.

Unless…

Unless, in some sort of sick joke, the meta-space containing the dungeon Old Pine really had collapsed long ago, leaving behind nothing but the shed where the entrance once was, and Dion had simply sent me here for giggles.

No.

Dion was many things. Scheming, conniving, an asshole, sure, but childish wasn’t one of them. He wouldn’t have wasted his time just to trick me like this.

“So, then what?”

Impatient, I began to tap my foot in irritation.

Seriously, what now?

Tapping away and lost in thought, it wasn’t until Panthera began smacking my foot that I looked down at her.

“What is it?”

Having grabbed my attention, my cat began pawing at the edge of the carpet like she was trying to get at a mouse hidden beneath it.

“What’s gotten into you?”

Shifting my weight to bend over and pick up my cat, I finally noticed what my cat had picked up before I had, something I was too distracted by my own irritation to have noticed.

The carpet shifted beneath me in a way that didn’t make sense if it was upon flat, frozen earth.

Slapping my forehead, I groaned.

“Seriously?”

Realizing what I’d missed, I grabbed the edge of the mat, yanking it out of the way and tossing it aside out of the shed.

Revealing the trap door just beneath.

“That’s stupid.” I sighed.

How cliché.

This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

“And yet I nearly missed it, so who’s the stupid one here?” I snorted.

I swear, this cold is freezing even my thoughts.

The trapdoor was made of thick oak, thick enough and frozen through so solidly that only weight shifting direct center of the trap door seemed to flex the wood just the slightest bit. There was no handle but just enough of a crease between the wood and the surrounding floor. Summoning Rainsplitter, my glorious magical sword I used to best a Nizeium-level adventurer, I used it as nothing more than a crowbar, prying the trap door open.

“And there you go.” I smiled as I opened the trap door, revealing a ladder descending into the darkness below.

“Well, that’s not alarming,” I muttered, staring into the dark. “But I have a job to do.”

Not excited at the prospect, I dismissed Rainsplitter; I’d only needed it to prop the trapdoor open in the first place. Placing my feet upon the rungs, I began to climb down, one foot beneath the other, until I stopped as my shoulder was level with the floor.

“You coming?” I raised an eyebrow at my cat. Tail flicking indignantly, she prowled over before perching herself upon my shoulder with the utmost balance.

“You’re lucky you don’t have thumbs, or I’d make you climb yourself down,” I muttered as I resumed my descent. I continued like that for several minutes into the pitch-black darkness below until my feet finally touched solid ground.

Enhancing my sight with mana, I looked around my surroundings. There wasn’t much to see, a simple unlit room, frozen cobbled walls at least confirming the space was manmade.

It wasn’t just an empty room, though. Opposite where I stood was a column of marble-looking material hovering off the ground.

“It’s a dungeon, all right.” I sighed. It wasn’t my first time seeing a similar monolith or column. They’d been the primary method of traversing through the different ‘levels’ of the Citadel of the Moon, the dungeon I now technically had dominion over.

Unlike the monoliths within the Citadel of the Moon, the monolith before me was relatively simple, with no intricate carvings or riches adorning it.

“Pretty clear what we have to do, eh?” I said to my cat, who was still perched upon my shoulder. Walking across the dark room, I stopped before the obelisk, pressing my palm against it.

Expecting what was to come, I was instantly swallowed up by a massive column of light that appeared from nowhere; I’d barely had enough time to shield my eyes before the light nearly blinded me.

Well, time to see how this all goes wrong.

With that comforting thought in mind, I was whisked away to what only gods and lords above knew where.

------------------------------------

When the light faded, I no longer stood in what may have been mistaken for an ordinary cellar.

No, now I was standing upon a floating patch of ice in the middle of a damned ocean.

“Wonderful.” I sighed. I remained where I stood for a moment, waiting for something terrible to appear and try to eat me.

When nothing did, I let myself relax.

“Guess he wasn’t lying about this place being less dangerous than when it was first cleared,” I said, speaking my thoughts aloud. “Which is a relief.”

Around me, there were hundreds more floating ice patches drifting around lazily. Bored of standing around, I almost hopped over to the next nearest ice patch before I caught myself, something occurring to me before I’d had the chance to leap to the next ice float.

“A pattern?”

The ice floats that had appeared to be drifting aimlessly, as I watched them more closely, weren’t. They were carried upon currents in what looked to be concentric rings, the rings of floating ice patches floating in opposite flowing currents.

Interesting.

I continued watching for several minutes longer, mentally cataloging everything I could until I nodded to myself, sure I’d figured it out.

The ice wasn’t just some scenic addition. They were a puzzle. Within every layer or ring of flowing drifting ice, several patches of ice appeared unmoving, remaining anchored precisely where they were. Furthermore, there seemed to be twenty-four points where the stable ice could be anchored along. The ice I was standing on was located dead center of the rings, like the orbital center.

Meaning?

“It’s a zero-sum lock,” I said aloud, satisfied with myself for figuring it out.

My cat stared at me as if waiting for an explanation.

“Zero-sum,” I answered, reminded of giving lectures before my students. “The lack of context clues for this is the context. Standing central to the puzzle, you’re at point zero, meaning to move on from here, you must reach the final ring while maintaining zero. That’s why some of the currents flow in reverse. They represent negative values. The cardinal directions would be twenty-four, six, twelve, and eighteen. Using all that, I can chart exactly which unmoving ice patches I must reach to maintain zero.”

Rings one and two were clockwise, indicating positive values, with ring three turning counterclockwise. Ring four returned to a clockwise flow, with five, six, and seven having a negative counterclockwise flow. Finally, ring eight had a positive clockwise spin. Ring one only contained a single unmoving ice patch at grid point seven, with ring two having two at locations nine and fifteen. Ring three had anchored ice at points negative four, negative nine, and negative thirteen. Ring four had only a single anchored ice patch at point twenty, as did ring five at point negative seventeen. Ring six and seven were where things became difficult, each ring containing eight different anchored points, values negative one, two, three, seven, fifteen, seventeen, and nineteen and twenty-three for ring six, and negative eight, eleven, twelve, fourteen, fifteen, seventeen, nineteen, and twenty, for ring seven. Lastly, with its positive clockwise values, ring eight only had two points, seven and twenty-four.

“You know, I may have figured out how it works.” I felt self-satisfaction drain away as I began to do the math in my head. “But I really wish I had a piece of paper with me.”

Squatting down, I conjured a thin water blade over my finger, using it to scribble into the ice patch I was currently standing on.

“I know my current value is zero, and I need to zero out by ring eight. I also know three values that must be utilized rings one, four, and five, with values seven, twenty, and negative seventeen. I have an excess value of ten that I must then calculate the rest of my steps around. Since ring eight only has twenty or seven, the end value after ring seven needs to be either negative seven or negative twenty-four.”

I sat on the ice for nearly an hour, scribbling away as I drew a flowchart of possible values. It was easy until ring seven, as ring six, which had forty-eight possible outcomes, was then multiplied against the eight values of ring seven, leading to a whopping three hundred and eighty-four possible values.

Too many. There must be a faster way of figuring it out than doing them all by hand.

I took a minute to reflect on what I knew the final value of ring seven must be to zero out with the possible two options of ring eight, seven, and twenty-four, given that ring eight had a positive rotation.

“Easy enough, negative seven, and negative twenty-four.”

I returned to my scribbling, drawing up a table of the forty-eight options from ring six. Since I knew the final value heading into ring eight had to be negative to zero out against its positive values, I could immediately discard any values that wouldn’t result in a net negative going into the final ring eight.

As I sifted through the possible options, I was surprised when more than one viable path emerged. Considering seven and twenty-four as the final two values, my range of values would work between negative sixteen and positive thirteen. Anything less than negative sixteen meant that even summing with the highest possible value of ring seven, it would still be too much for the final twenty-four of ring eight to zero out, and anything more than positive thirteen meant that even with the smaller value of positive seven of ring eight, the final value would still be too large to correctly sum out.

So as long as I stay within that range, I should be able to make it safely.

Satisfied with my reasoning, I finally began charting my course. With a short hop, I jumped upon the only standstill ice flow of ring one, a seven value. Next, I took another short leap to ice patch nine of ring two. My cat, who’d hopped off my shoulder while I’d been scribbling away on the ice, followed me, bounding along with ease. The third ring was where things became a little more distant. Praying my assessment was correct, I stepped off from my unmoving patch of ice onto one of the ice patches flowing along the current. I’d assumed that the moving ice platforms counted for no points and were simply a way to ferry around to close the distance between my next destination.

In this case, it was position four of ring three, with each ring more and more distant; they required me to board floating ice patches if I wanted to make it there without falling into the water. Something I did not want to learn the consequences of. Waiting until I was finally close, I stepped from my moving ice flow onto position four of ring three.

“So far, so good,” I muttered as I scanned my surroundings. Thankfully, nothing had changed. No signs of any arctic sea monsters ready to eat me.

Seven, nine, minus four. That puts me at a total value of twelve.

Ring four was a clockwise flowing ring, so re-doing the math in my head to ensure I was correct, I stepped onto a patch of moving ice, waiting until it ferried me closer to position twenty of ring four.

“Which brings me up to thirty-two,” I announced as I finally stepped off onto the stationary ice patch. With ring five also only having one static ice patch, I left the fourth ring behind almost as soon as I arrived, another miniature iceberg gently bringing me over to the fifth ring, a counterclockwise oriented ring.

“Fifteen,” I said with a huff, keeping track of my progress aloud.

Now it’s time for the complicated part.

Ring six and seven, and the eight stationary ice patches they contained.

“Fifteen, and if I’m shooting for zero….” I let the words hang in the air, quickly doing the math. “Then I’m almost certainly clear.”

Only one option within ring six would lead to me being unable to zero out by ring eight, ice patch one. I’d be left with a value of fourteen, where even if I took the largest negative value of ring seven, negative twenty, I’d come up one short.

Confident in my math, I hopped on the moving ice before hopping off at the nearest stationary ice patch of ring six, position nineteen.

“Negative four,” I said with a smile.

Perfectly easy.

Once more, I hopped onto a moving ice patch before hopping off at the next closest stationary ice patch, position twenty of ring seven.

“Negative twenty-four.” I crossed my arms, thinking.

Really, it wasn’t that hard.

A lot of math was involved, but then the math itself was simple.

I’d expect more from a fearsome dungeon.

With only one more ring to go, it was as simple as stepping onto another moving iceberg and waiting as it took me the long way around until finally reaching the cardinal north stationary ice patch of ring eight, position twenty-four, I stepped onto the anchored ice.

“And ta-dah,” I announced with a fake cheer, throwing my hands up in mock celebration.

“So…. Now what?” I asked no one in particular, now standing on the ice with no further plan.

The seconds began to pass into minutes, apprehension growing that perhaps I’d somehow been mistaken. Before the growing fear could get the best of me and turn me back to the center of the eight rings, the water directly in front of me began to move as if something were emerging from the depths.

Instantly Rainsplitter was in hand as I prepared myself for a fight.

What sort of monster could it be?

My answer came when a vast, primal-looking shark surfaced. I raised my hand, ready to swing at the creature, before slowly lowering my weapon.

Because the monster was already dead.

Lodged through its eyes was a spear made of what looked like mana-tempered silver. For a moment, I was tempted to retrieve the weapon, but I wasn’t exactly adept at wielding a spear; thus, the spear could prove liability in the wrong situation.

And besides that…

The primal shark monster, which at first I’d assumed had risen from the water on its own, was, in fact, lying on a marble platform. A pointed white tip, barely visible over the shark’s immense bulk, poked out from behind it, belonging to one of the monoliths I associated with the dungeon.

“Oh. That makes sense.” I finally realized. The puzzle had seemed so simple because, when it had been first cleared, the shark that now lay dead had been harassing those attempting to solve it. It had likely made one final assault as the clearing party raised the last platform, and slain, it would later find its final resting place upon the very same platform containing the monolith to the next level of the dungeon.

Not just had I been free to consider the puzzle without any attacking monsters, but without a party accompanying me, I wasn’t trying to balance out differing ideas of how to solve it, arguments that would push people to false assumptions of the puzzle’s nature.

Can’t say I haven’t experienced it myself.

For a moment, I was a teenager again, the group of gold adventurers, or what remained of us, arguing about the nature of the night sky puzzle we had been brought before. We would have likely failed if it had not been for a cleverer member who had put his foot down.

And failure in a dungeon was oft punished through death.

“And I guess I’m the clever one now, eh?” I winked at my cat, who rustled her fur as if offended.

“You can’t talk, so you don’t get to assume that role.” I chuckled, hopping past the shark, and walking around it, my cat in tow.

Unlike the prior monolith, the monolith hovering before me was marked by a single symbol. In my younger years, the character would have stumped me, uneducated as I was in my youth.

Now, the meaning was clear.

Life.

“Life. Of course, it’s probably not referring to that literally.” I wagged my finger at the pillar as if I’d caught on to some trick. “Mana is often referred to as the lifeforce of creation. Whether that’s true or not doesn’t matter, does it?”

Pressing my palm against the monolith, it remained inactive.

That was until I sent a single mana pulse into the marble. Instantly the rune glowed, and a brilliant light flared out from the glowing rune, blinding me.

Looks like I was right.

“Layer one cleared, onward to layer two,” I called out, pleased with the speed I was traversing the dungeon.

If it continues like this, I could be through in less than three days.

With a broad smile splitting my face, I felt the magic finally take hold. Bright light intensifying, a split second later, it beamed me away, and I was more than happy to leave behind the frozen sea, even as short-lived as my time here had been.

Onward to whatever frozen hell is next.