V3ch5
The Frozen Hell
Crane and Onyx traveled around for some time before they realized an unfortunate truth. It is not easy to get out of the Abyss. The tip to follow the smell of sulfur lead to a place filled with too many demons to successfully use it to escape.
Crane and Onyx also learned something else, the relationship between demons and devils in the Abyss. Demons are beings formed by the energy of corrupted souls, devils however are beings independent of souls but are capable of using corrupted soul energy to use demon magic. The largest distinction between the two, other than origin, is that devils are capable of using regular magic and demon magic, while demons are only capable of using the latter. At the top of the hierarchy in the Abyss are the Archdemons and Archdevils, however it is the Archdevils that rule. Although demons outnumber devils almost a thousand to one, devils are considered upper class elite, rather like nobles, and demons must obey them.
The only exceptions are the legendary Archdemons. The power of an Archdemon is greater than that of an Archdevil because they have fused completely with the darkness, losing themselves completely to it and gaining access to demons magic too potent for even an archdevil to use without losing sanity. There has been a struggle between these two powers for as long as they have both existed, but overall it has always been the devils that have retained dominance because of their leadership abilities.
Crane and Onyx didn’t know where the Archdemons were but would try to avoid them anyways. It was said that being is the presence of one would drive one mad. Crane’s protection of mana status might shield him from the madness but Onyx would be left wide open.
At least one advantage of a devil ruled Abyss was that in her Devil form, Onyx could walk around any town or city without being troubled, and buy and sell items for souls that she had on her but had not subjugated. During such times Crane would stay behind out of town and keep out of sight. He had a few ways to disguise himself or hide himself in plain sight, but he didn’t know if it would work against demons so didn’t risk it.
Crane was currently waiting outside one such town. They had learned that most civilized areas had a certain smell so they could find and avoid them easily when needed. When Onyx returned to camp, she said, “Crane, I found out something interesting. There is a place that demons avoid called the White halls. They grow weak there. Maybe there is something there that can help us.”
“Interesting. Seems worth a look.” Even though there are likely many ways to leave the Abyss, the reason that the upper world isn’t flooded with powerful demons is because the gods weaken demons above ground. If there is a place where demons are weakened, then it could be a place that leads to the surface.
Onyx lifted her wings and flew off with Crane in tow. He didn’t bother to ask what smell lead to the White hall because he didn’t have the nose to smell it. The little demon imp that told Crane that navigating through the Abyss was done with smell, likely told him knowing that humans didn’t have the sensitivity to do so. Luckily Crane traveled with someone who could so it wasn’t an issue.
After about two hours they reached it and almost immediately Crane understood why it was called the White Halls. The walls, the floor and the roof was completely coated in white ice. It was also, by far, the coldest place Crane had ever been. It was a place where hell had literally frozen over, Crane asked Keagan to increase the fire on the overcoat to insulate him from the frigid air. Onyx was fine of course, devils and elves could take most environments in stride.
The frosty winds didn’t do the pair any favors in flight, but it wasn’t a problem until Onyx let out a huff of pain.
Crane asked, “You alright?”
“Yeah. Abilities being suppressed.” She took in a deep breath and continued, “I can see why demons don’t like this place.” Onyx slowed down and started descending.
Crane followed her and landed on a ridge of ice.
Onyx said, “Sorry. Give me a minute. It is only suppressing my dad’s skills.” She paced her breathing for a few moments before saying, “Alright. I’m better. Fighting it caused pain so I just let it happen. I can’t use soul based skills or magic here but other than that, I’m fine.”
She lifted off to make a point, but Crane grabbed her foot and tugged as shards of ice passed over them. “Get your head down!” Crane shouted, as Onyx ducked. Keagan’s cloak gave some warning to the surprise attack, but Onyx’s wings still had bits of ice in them. Crane looked around and saw the ice shards were coming in from a far corner. It was there he saw an ice chasm, and standing before it was six humanoid figures made of ice.
Onyx asked from behind cover, “Demons?”
Crane shook his head and replied, “No. Demons would be helpless here right? Those are something else.”
The pair stayed put and after a few moments the barrage of ice stopped. The six ice men had not moved.
Crane peered over the ice to get a better look. “What are those guys doing?”
Onyx said, “Maybe they’re guarding something?”
Made as much sense as anything. Which meant that if there was anything to be found it would be behind them.
Onyx asked, “What now?”
Crane hadn’t considered it. The only thing on his mind was how cold his butt felt sitting on the icy ground. He knew of hundreds of types of monsters and creatures, but he had no idea what those ice guys were. The closest thing they resembled was the ice elemental spirit fragments that he once faced. He hoped they weren’t related though since those spirits were pretty much indestructable. The forms of the beings below also wore armor of ice, but it was of a darker ice and seemed quite ornate. Even their weapons were made of ice.
Onyx slowly peered over the ice and stared at them for a while. “They’re made of ice magic,” she said.
Crane didn’t doubt her, Onyx’s magic sight let her see the properties of any magic she laid her eyes on during activation.
It seemed to be worse than he thought, “Archons?” Crane asked.
“Yea, I think so,” she answered.
Archons were beings made up entirely of an element. Demons for example were technically archons of corrupted souls. That being said, elemental archons were said to be even stronger than demon sorcerers, over level 650 at least, and these ice archons numbered six.”
Onyx said, “We should get out of here. Even if the path behind them lead out, it is beyond our strength to reach.”
Crane couldn’t help but agree. The chance of victory against an archon in its own domain was pretty much zero. If the stories were true, any damage they took could be repaired by taking in its own element. If Crane was level 900 and strong enough to fatally damage even one of these beings, it could simply fade into the ice, then re-emerge out fully formed and at full health.
‘But if they are made of proper magic, as opposed to demon magic, then Mana seal would shut off that regenerative ability, and slowly kill them.’
Crane shook his head and remembered the spell he made that stopped a person’s mana from regenerating. It used a lot of mana and created a barrier of his own mana over the target that couldn’t be absorbed by the target and wouldn’t allow for any other mana to pass through it. Like most of his anti-magic spells it was useless against demon magic but these beings weren’t made of demons magic. The spell itself was for long drawn out battles against bosses that used lots of magic, but it suddenly occurred to Crane that it would also prevent ice magic essence from entering, thus prevent the healing of the archons for as long as the seal remained. And since the archons were made of ice magic, without the ability to recover it, just existing would eventually kill them. Like sealing a room with someone inside, eventually they’ll run out of oxygen.
The problem was that Mana seal required Crane to remain in proximity so that the mana barrier over the target could be replenished from Crane’s own mana. That and Crane had no idea how long it would take to work, or even if it would work at all. He only knew of the existence of Archons from some ancient scrolls but otherwise knew little about them other than the fact that they should not be messed with.
Crane turned to Onyx and said, “Go find some cover. I’mma gonna give it a shot.”
“You can’t be serious. You’ll just die again!”
Since coming to the Abyss Crane had died six times. The proficiency of most of his higher level skills had dropped to zero percent. Hundreds, if not thousands of hours of training had been deleted as if it never were. That being said, Crane didn’t think it too much of a loss.The only skills he worried about were ones that his class had difficulty increasing, but for those he would always bring it to its closest level before he stopped practicing. For example, he had gotten blacksmithing to intermediate level 6 before doing anything dangerous, and even though the proficiency was still at level 6, 0%, it wouldn’t drop further than that.
Crane replied to his worried companion, “You know the drill. If I die, meet me on the outskirts of the last town we visited in four days.”
Crane slowly crawled over the ice down closer to the archons. He quietly whispered, “Keagan, I need you to throw everything you got at those guys. Can you distract them for half a minute?”
The embers vibrated with a voice answering, “I do not know, But I will try.”
Crane heard the fear in Keagan’s voice, but he knew the firecat would give it his all.
When Crane got into position, the cloak turned to fire and shot out towards the archons. Crane suddenly ran in the opposite direction, hoping that the guards would be paying attention to the massive fire coming at them rather than the now freezing Crane, who instantly regretted having no backup plan for dealing with the cold.
Keagan’s form regained its massive shape and the enormous fire cat roared at the icy sentinels. The firecat ran passed the air above them, trying not to get too close as to come within range for close combat, while he accumulated white fire around his body.
Crane said, “Mana seal,” as eight different runes formed around him and slowly assembled themselves. He had reached their backs by the time it did and pointed at one of the archons as the great rune symbol glowed for a moment. A small golden mark appeared on the archon Crane had pointed at, as he cast the spell again.
Keagan shouted, “Eternal Flame strike!” As tendrils of white fire that surrounded him split off and attacked the archons. Eternal flames burned mana and lifeforce, it was Keagan’s most powerful ability, but as it struck the archon’s armor, it instantly died out.
Each of the ice archons pointed their hands, palms forward, at Keagan and shot out thousands of shards of ice. Keagan built up the fire around him as he ran about trying to dodge, but the fire did no good and his pelt was soon filled with shards.
Crane had gotten a seal glyph on three of them, he needed Keagan to stall just a little bit more.
Unfortunately, one of the archons stopped firing shards and took out a spear made of ice. When Keagan flew past a cliff of ice, the archon threw its spear like a bolt of lightning which pierced his side and nailed Keagan to the cliff. That would have been bad enough, but in an instant the spot in the cliff where the spear had stuck erupted in ice like an enormous ice spike attack that completely engulf the huge fire cat. Another archon threw something which shattered the whole of the ice formation, Keagan along with it. The body of the fire cat turned into golden light and faded away.
Crane wasn’t worried about him. After becoming a Mythic Fire cat, Keagan became the same as a summoned creature, except Crane kept him out at all times in one form or another. When he died, his essence went to another realm where he could recover his form. When he did Crane could call him back at the cost of a lot of mana. What Crane was worried about, was that after casting another spell, he still had two archons to seal, and their attention was now completely on him.
The six faceless warriors of ice clad in armor of dark blue turn simultaneously at Crane, giving him an eerie sense of doom.
Although they all looked similar, each was unique enough for Crane to tell them apart. The remaining two he had not sealed were in the back.
Crane could not cast a seal and cast something to defend himself simultaneously, so he decided survival was the first priority and jumped back before calling out, "Speed force."
After a back dash to get some distance the runes assembled themselves and activated. Two of the archons moved to strike while the others cast magic to strike Crane through the ice. Crane increased his speed as high as he could make it, something that cost him 3000 mana per second but was his only way to avoid the swords and magic. He watched in slow motion as the ground beneath him turned to spikes and slowly grew larger. He couldn’t fly at that speed so he used the spikes to gain footing enough to jump to the side to a nearby wall.
You have sustained 4177 damage from impact.
Upon hitting the wall, even though he braced himself with his arm, the shock of the impact took a large chunk out of Crane’s life. Although from his own perspective he hit the wall smoothly, from a normal perspective he jumped into the wall at over two hundred meters per second, a tenth the speed of a bullet. His body wasn’t strong enough to handle such force, so it was damaged everytime he hit something. The first time he used Speed force’s max speed and tried attacking something, the sword shattered and the recoil of the hit crippled his arm. Though the man he slashed through was sent a few dozen meters away and was dead before he knew what hit him.
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Crane still had a bit of momentum left that clug him to the wall, so he ran along it until he reached the back of the Archon group and let the spell end as he landed on the ground.
“Mana Seal!” Crane cast the fifth seal as the archons started turning around. The ones in front of him were still midway through casting magic that attacked where he just was, and the ones physically attacking were on the other side of the group. The archons standing in front of him finished casting their spell before Crane did, and since Crane couldn’t use speed force again until his own spell was complete, he was wide open for their next spell to skewer him to death. Crane thought it was over, but instead of casting, the archons switched to melee. Swords of ice slowly came from their hands, and they started to swing. It seemed the monsters only used magic at long distances and melee at close, something that gave Crane the necessary time to complete his seal and use speed force again.
He got some distance away, avoiding walls and cancelled the spell again. As he predicted, the archons started casting magic. With another casting of speed force, Crane moved to the last of the six. He cast the last Mana seal as the archon switched from magic to melee, but the result was not what he was expecting.
Thick ice spikes sprouted around the archon group. The last round of magic was not an attacking spell, but a defensive one, and now Crane was trapped within those defenses.
‘Encase yourself in ice of Isa and wait them out.’
Crane shouted, “Over Ice!” as Isa runes formed in a circle around him and converged on him just as two of the sword wielding Archons struck. As Keagan had only a moment before, Crane was instantly encased in ice.
The swords stopped an inch from Crane's head. The ice froze and covered the blades, but the archons withdrew them from the ice as easily as they would a sheath. The archons then began to strike the ice with their swords, but it was to no avail. Ice is as strong as it is cold, and the ice of the spell was getting colder every second. This however was a problem for Crane as well. In normal situations he could break out of the ice, but the very hardness that now protected him, prevented such an easy escape. He wondered for a moment why he did such a foolish thing, but the answer was obvious. ‘Have to stay close to the sealed beings for the seal to work.’ This was his only option, it was already established the archons didn’t move from there and attacked all within range, and this was his only way to be close to them without dying. That is if he didn’t die.
The sound of the swords against the ice was becoming more distant. Crane cleared his mind, he only lost health in the ice of Niflheimr if his mind wasn’t focused.
A moment later, Crane opened his eyes to the sound of a large crack. The next instant the ice shattered around him and he was on the floor, gasping for air. Before him was a screen which had over twenty messages, all saying the same thing.
You have levelled up!
At the very bottom of the list was another few messages.
You are the first individual to defeat an elemental archon in over a thousand years
Fame increased by 700.You have destroyed powerful creatures of chaotic alignment
Fame increased by 300
Infamy decreased by 1000You have earned the title- Slayer of Magic
+15% Resistance to Magic
+40% Increase in all damage dealt to magic beings
Fame increased by 500
The title would be useful in fights against elementals and summoned creatures, but for now he would keep his current title equipped. The levels were a great bonus as it would allow him to regain the stats he loss through constant deaths and then some, but the biggest gain was the loss. The loss of infamy.
Crane said, “Contact Onyx,” to open the whisper menu to her.
“Hey, where are you?” Crane had already searched the area but she wasn’t there.
“You’re alive? I thought you had died so I went back to the last town we encountered.”
“Nope, still, alive, which is more than I can say for the archons.”
“What? How?”
“I sealed their mana, without it they couldn’t live forever. Speaking of which, how long has it been?”
“Twenty-four hours.”
Crane felt a chill run down his spine. That meant that it had been eight hours in the real world. Eight hours out there, twenty-four in here, and it passed in an instant. The time lost wasn’t too much of an issue since he started on saturday night so it was sunday morning now, about 6am, but something like this had never happened before when he was stat training with ‘Over-Ice.’ Crane suddenly realized he had no idea on how he got out of the ice. Why did it break apart?
Too many questions, not enough answers. He decided to table it for now and look over the broken archons. He didn’t find the bodies, but what he did find, was the armor. Each archon had left their armor after dying, six in total.
“Identify.”
Failed to identify
Crane tried several more times but failed to identify any of them. He packed them into his inventory for now and waited.
After Onyx returned, the pair ventured into the area the archons had been guarding. Onyx was still in a weakened state but she said as long as she didn’t have to fight anything, it wouldn’t be a problem.
It lead to a cave with a crack in the roof that let light inside. At the very end was a giant block of ice wrapped in chains. The chains themselves were made of teorokite, just like his own equipment. However, unlike his own equipment, the chains were forged by someone who knew what they were doing.
“Equipment enhancement.” The chains glowed lightly, with several tiny bits glowing just a little bit brighter. Crane smiled, they may have been forged better than his own, but they weren’t forged perfectly. His blacksmith skill allowed him to see the weak points in any forged piece, and a chain was only as strong as its weakest link.
After about two hours Crane broke through all the chains to the ice block.
“So what’s in it?” Onyx asked.
Crane wiped away the mist over the ice and looked inside. “Seems to be a frozen guy.”
He saw a fully armored man frozen inside. “Imma break it open.”
No matter how cold it was, as long as the ice didn’t fight back, he could break it. Crane used a fire control spell he created using Fehu and Kenaz to intense heat through line of the ice into pockets of the ice block. After these spots melted into water, Crane sent a surge of heat into each, causing a steam explosion strong enough to shatter the whole block in one go.
With a crack that sounded like thunder splitting, the block crumbled and an armored barbarian fell out. Crane quickly used a healing spell based off Uruz, the rune of healing and flowing water. It could only be used when the target was wet, but the man certainly was.
A light blue glow emanated from the water, besides the fact that this meant the healing had started, it also meant that the man was alive.
When the man finally opened his eyes, he was in front of a small fire and covered in a blanket.
Crane noticed this and said, “Good morning,” before handing him a bowl of gruel.
The food tasted bad no matter how well it was cooked, but it had all the nutrients needed to survive, and considering it was food made with magic, he couldn’t expect more.
The man took the food and started eating. After a moment he asked, “Are you a mage?”
It was the obvious question since gruel of this quality was the only food that could be made with magic, and since most creatures in the Abyss were not made of meat, but souls, gruel was the only food that could be eaten in the abyss unless one brought a large supply before coming.
“I can use magic if that is what you’re asking. Who're you, and how’d you end up in a block of ice?”
The man looked around at his surroundings, scrutinizing every detail. “Name's Roth. I was frozen by the arch-devil Estrothus, before I froze completely, I used ‘God’s Aura.’ The skill weakens demons and devils around me, and while frozen, the skill was set permanently in effect. That bastard probably wanted me as an ornament, but since I weakened his base while there, he had to throw me out. That’s likely where I’m here I suppose.”
Onyx flinched at the name and stuttered back, “Es... Es- Estrothus? What were you doing?”
The man looked over Onyx, she was in 100% elf form to prevent him from attacking her out of misunderstanding.
He answered, “Trying to kill him obviously.”
This shook Onyx up even more. “Are you crazy?!”
The barbarian shrugged his shoulders. “I have my reasons.”
Crane said, “So what are you gonna do now?”
The man looked over Crane and said, “That’s my business. However, what is a human like you doing in the Abyss?”
Crane had been anticipating this question so he answered, “Did some traveling through the leylines, wound up here. You know a way out?”
The barbarian smirked, “You tried one of the four towers?”
Crane rolled his eyes. The tip he was given to follow the smell of sulfur lead to what Crane learned was one of four towers, in what was arbitrarily called the north, south, east, and west of the Abyss. Each had hundreds of floors that lead all the way up to the surface world. Of course the closer to the surface they got, the weaker the demons got, so they couldn’t actually be used by them to invade unless the power of the gods suddenly disappeared. That being said, for someone as weak as Crane to try to go through it, from the bottom up, was like sending a single mouse into a continent sized labyrinth filled with ten million cats cats hoping to get to the end.
Crane said, “A different way please. Did you come through the towers?” Each tower lead the the surface world, so that meant there were at least four places one could use in the surface world to travel directly to the abyss, these were of course, classified as the hardest dungeons to ever exist.
The barbarian said, “Towers take to long. The inner parts shift around just like this place does, so it could take years to go from one end to the other. I got here through a dimension cutting spell.”
Crane perked up at this, “Can you use it now? I’d really like to get out.”
He shook his head.”The spell isn’t mine, it’s my sword’s. I got a demon slaying blade from the gods and it lets me come and go from the Abyss as I like. Estrothus took it before freezing me."
The barbarian looked pensive for a moment, then he turned back to Crane and said, "You want out of this place, I want my sword. Without it I'm not strong enough to fight off more than a few soldier demons, so I can't get it myself. You on the other hand took out the guards that arch-devil had on me though you're so weak. I'll tell you what. If you can get my sword from Estrothus's fortress and bring it to me, I'll use it to send you out of the Abyss. What do you say?"
To Hell and Back
Rank A
Roth's sword is somewhere in the fortress of the arch-devil Estrothus, break in, find, and return it to Roth so he can use it to open a rift in space between the surface and the Abyss.
Reward
A way out of the abyss.
Additional unknown.
Rank A Crane thought. The difference between ranks in Royal Road was like the difference between magnitudes in an earthquake, each was about 10x more difficult than the previous. If it took 30 days for him to complete a B rank quest, it could take a year of preparation to complete an A rank. He was lucky in that he wasn't timed, but a year was a bit much to spend in the Abyss. That being said, Crane loved a challenge.
"Sure, I'll get it back for you."
You have accepted the quest.
Onyx looked frightened, stunned, speechless, and mortified. The fact that Crane could see each of these was a testament to the expressive nature of the elves.
Roth nodded and said, "I'll stick around. If any demons come I'll use God's Aura to drive them off. See you later."
Crane and Onyx left the cave. When Onyx felt they were out of earshot, she practically screamed, "What were you thinking?! It would be easier to go through one of the four towers than it would be to break into an Arch-devil's fortress!"
Crane said, "It's not like we have to fight the archdevil." If that was a quest requirement it would have been an S, or even an SS rank quest. He continued, "Besides, I've done this kind of thing before. All we have to do is get the arch-devil and his forces out of his fortress. Then it will be a walk in the park to go in and get the sword."
Onyx frowned and asked sarcastically, "And how exactly are we gonna do that?"
Crane gave his most wicked smile and said, "We're going to find an arch-demon."
http%3a%2f%2fi39.tinypic.com%2f28sqb0l.jpg [http://i39.tinypic.com/28sqb0l.jpg]
Sorry I haven't posted for a while, been working on new ff. here a link if anyone interested. viewforum.php?f=357