The shaking reverberated from the ice up through Oscar to his fingertips. Oscar could feel the creatures gnawing, about to burst through the ground below him with tremendous force. However, he saw this as a good opportunity because the force was akin to a wellspring of Reis.
Oscar drew a deep breath and placed his snow-covered shoes firmly on the quaking ice. The muscles in this body reacted to his command and allowed the rampaging Reis of the ice to shoot up, starting from the toes. Oscar circulated the Reis throughout his body, settling most of it into the specially crafted muscles from his Adamasreis training.
Feeling the Reis locked tightly into his hands, feet, parts of his forearm, and parts of his shin, Oscar released the lingering Reis out of his feet. The ice cracked beneath his feet, but he leaped high into the air and landed deeper in the flat tundra. He turned to see his previous location with his brows furrowed.
The place he once stood collapsed. The ice broke apart as another tall, slim creature rose out of it, crushing a part chunk of ice with its razor-sharp teeth. Oscar's eyes narrowed at the sight of running water from where the creature had popped up.
'This isn't a tundra! This place is a frozen lake.' Oscar's face darkened as beads of sweat formed on his face. 'This is bad. How far does this lake go? These creatures have the advantage in the waters.'
"Made it," Mary arrived next to Oscar with thunder following behind. Her feet crackled with lightning that zapped away all the snowflakes into nothing, revealing a clear layer of ice underneath them.
Oscar and Mary shuddered as they looked below through the clear ice, seeing more of these creatures swimming around. They saw the creatures swimming upwards toward them with dead pale eyes and opening their mouths, brandishing their razor-sharp teeth like a murderous smile.
These creatures had long slender bodies akin to snakes but were thinner and flat like fish. The creatures did not have fins but had large frills near their head that expanded in an intimidating manner as they opened their maw of teeth. They swam at incredible speeds with their thin forms like a harpoon.
Oscar cursed as he kept up his Adamasreis to jump quickly. Mary used her 'Electric Steps' to follow after him.
"Those are Frost Angarens, a large eel-like Exalt Beast that lives in icy waters. They hunt by contracting themselves and shooting their tall bodies like arrows. Don't get caught by those teeth." Oscar shouted as he ran. More pockets of ice started to burst into fragments as more Frost Angarens showed themselves, screeching at Oscar and Mary.
Oscar looked at Mary with worry because of their Ein expenditure. 'I'm doing fine because I'm using Reis to move, so my Ein shroud can keep running. But Mary's using her spell to move. The mountain is still far away; can she hold on until then?'
At the same time, Mary had the same thoughts about her predicament. She had already used up some Ein while moving through the forest, but now she had to keep up her Ein shroud while using her movement spell. However, Mary was not as impulsive as before.
Her mouth parted, letting a large puff of white air escape. Snowflakes landed all over her white fur coat and brown hair, but she didn't mind. The loud sparks of electricity under her feet began to diminish as the twisting arcs of lightning reigned themselves in, lying only under her feet.
Every time she took a step, a small stamp of glowing electricity was left behind, unlike the cracks she had made. Her speed decreased slightly, but the electricity on her feet became more controlled and lessened in output. Mary opened her brown eyes in joy. "Didn't expect that to work so well."
Oscar stared at Mary, astonished. He couldn't believe Mary had learned to control her Ein to this extent so well. 'In our previous battles, she focused more on trying to overwhelm her opponents, so her Ein used to flow out in large droves. This change is unbelievable. Did she somehow grasp it thanks to the threat of the situation?'
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Suddenly, he remembered what Elder Saul and Draven always hounded into him. The mind must be relaxed but not slow, quick but not rushed, and controlled but not rigid. The core facilitated Ein, but the mind was the key to control, and the instinct to survive grew the mind.
'Lessen. I did the same for the Ein of my deer anima, but I had forgotten it as a principle for the rest.' Oscar focused on the Adamasreis that was focused on his hands and feet. He cast off the Reis in his hands after realizing he didn't need them for now, then he looked at his feet. 'Why am I using everything? I can put in more Reis if I need to.'
Oscar slowly released the Reis stored in his feet, cracking the ice slightly as they exited his feet. With half the Reis remaining, he spread it evenly throughout his feet. Like Mary, his speed also dropped, but Oscar was still fast enough to avoid the constantly erupting ice. He smiled widely at his success. 'The speed has dropped, but I'm using less Reis to boost myself. With this, my Adamasreis should last longer than expected.'
After a session of running, Oscar felt his Adamasreis finally reach its new limit, and he quickly summoned his deer anima to ride on it. He picked up Mary and sped the deer anima up by focusing Ein on its hooves.
Mary rode behind Oscar with a puzzled look. "Won't you be wasting your Ein like this?"
Oscar calmed himself from the aftereffects of Reis; the lessened output helped to make his heart not hurt as much. He turned to Mary. "It's fine. I've been using my method, but I must let it recover. Take this time to recover your Ein; I can see your cheeks are getting blue."
Mary rubbed her slightly blue cheeks with a frown, feeling the numbness and cold embedded in her skin. Her Ein shroud was weakening. She turned it off and entered her Ein meditation.
Oscar focused and wrapped his Ein shroud around Mary to help abate the blue frost while she recovered. He saw Mary's complexion returning to her usual rosy cheeks. Everything seemed to be going fine, but Oscar frowned as more eruptions of ice and water came up around them.
"These persistent beasts!" Oscar put more Ein into the effort to get as close to the mountain as possible. He used 'Ein Awaken' in intervals to recover some of it while his deer anima sprinted ahead. After a good distance, Oscar felt Mary had recovered enough and released his deer anima.
"Thanks for the cover." Mary was grateful, and her steps were electrifying.
Oscar nodded and continued with his new lesser Adamasreis.
The Frost Angarens were persistent and continued to pierce through the ice to catch Oscar and Mary, who were still sprinting and dodging before the ice erupted. Sometimes the creatures would blast out ahead of them and try to swipe their long bodies across to trip them or snap their heads to bite them.
But Oscar and Mary were well coordinated in their dodges, helping one another get across each obstacle. Then, finally, the attacks stopped. Oscar was puzzled because he was sure they were not out of the lake yet. "Be careful; we don't know if they truly backed off. Get on my deer."
Oscar summoned his deer anima again due to his Adamasreis limits and Mary's waning Ein. They were only a short distance from the mountain, so this was the last burst.
With Mary behind him, Oscar rode his deer anima with quickened steps. Its hooves knocked off snow and ice as its master rushed it to reach the end. However, the ice quaked more than before.
If the previous attacks were akin to a magnitude one earthquake, this was four on the scale. Suddenly, a wall of Frost Angarens popped out of the ice ahead of Oscar and Mary. They all screeched at them with their hideous mouths, expanding their frills.
"Smart creatures. They went away to go ahead and block our route completely." Oscar said. His eyes narrowed as he saw no way of getting through that blockade. He thought of turning to the side, but who knew how long this lake stretched out? 'For all I know, the lake might be a moat around the whole mountain. Going to the side is not an option; that would only extend our journey here.'
"Mary. Cling tight to my back. Put your arms over my neck." Oscar had one idea.
Mary didn't respond with any words. She did not hesitate in putting her arms around him and gripped tightly.
Oscar jumped on his deer's antlers. The deer anima grunted with a low tone and suddenly stopped. It flung its head upwards as Oscar used the momentum and a final burst of Reis and Ein from his feet to go high.
"Kuh." Oscar spat out some blood because his deer anima took damage from his own Reis. But the result was what he desired. They were high in the air.
"Oscar!" Mary finally started to scream as they flew or fell through the air. She saw the tall Frost Angarens opening their maws widely and extending further to tear them apart.
The Frost Angarens were closing in.