“Mmm…” Mia tossed and turned in her sheet of snow, pulling herself up she rubbed her tired eyes “hrm… what time is…oh right, dungeon…”

She slowly stood up, stretching and trying to wake up. “Hungry.”

[Morning Mia, Thankfully you slept without any incident. The stench of death keeping them away. If you will allow me to, I can start my explina-]

“Hungry.” She stepped off the platform into the water, halting at the sudden weight increase “Huh?” she looked back, her boot had in the short time it was submerged from her set, accumulated ice as the water around it had frozen “What the…” She looked down at her other foot, it having the same problem.

She crooked her head to the side, now that she got a closer look, she had tiny ice crystals attached to her body “Weird… from the snow?” She blinked, now wide awake “My breath…” she breathed in and out a few times, her breath was visible in a cold mist.

[Yes, the consequences of your actions… Well for starters-]

“Eh.” Mia shrugged, leaping out of the boots and landing atop the water, freezing the surface where her feet touched, creating little platforms “have to walk like this now…” She headed towards the tree, repeating her platforms all the way.

[Are you still going to ignore me?]

Now standing below the half sunken treant Mia looked for more fruit, smiling softly when she found some “No, just food first.” She got ready to climb but then stopped, her mana was hardly going down from these platforms, in fact, she was recovering it faster than she was using it “Huh…” she stretched out her hand, a portion of water freezing and extending up, forming a small hand.

She then reached up with the ice hand, grabbing the fruit and squishing it “oops.” She tried again, extending the hand and this time carefully grabbing the fruit…and squishing it “aaah…” she then tried another, this time giving up and just piercing the apple, bringing it down towards her.

Apple in hand she formed a little chair, taking her seat and went to take her first bite, frowning again when the apple had already started to freeze in her hand “…annoying…” desperate, she tried to bite into it anyways, presently surprised when she was able to “Mmm, sweet. Ok Ami, now can.”

[Which do you want to hear first?]

“Uhm…” She tried remembering yesterday, shivering at the last bit. Her shaking causing tiny little ice crystals to fall loose from her body “Well, ok, why am I freezing everything?”

[Simple. That is due to your new title [Maiden of Snow] as it is affecting your essence or being.]

“And that means I am just cold now?” Granted, she didn’t feel cold. But that was never an issue for her ice magic, in fact the chair she was sitting in was quite comfy. But now it seemed like her entire body was cold, freezing even. “Ah, also about the magic…”

[Yes, it will do more than effect your other elements of magic. Your natural body temperature has dropped to around freezing, this will fluctuate based on your control of it, your feelings, state of mind, and health. You will also find it harder to deal with heat, as such you now have a weakness to fire magic. Among other potential things not yet apparent.]

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

Her face distorted, a bit displeased “That it? How can I change my temperature? Is it all just negatives… how did I even get this title?”

[Well, it comes with a bunch of positives, such as the ice penetration, power boost to ice, natural resistance to ice, and affinity to ice increased. That might make the trade off worth it, to some people. To change your temperature, you are going to have to focus on that with some trial and error. At best I think you can get to slightly below normal. As for how you got it…]

[That is what happens when you abuse [Time] like that and try and force a result for a year. And before you ask, no you cannot get rid of it.]

“haaah…” She’d have to live with it she guessed. Still, it might not be so bad. Depending on how weak she is to fire… oh and the water magic.

She stood up, focusing on the water infront of her, trying to raise a small ball of it up into the air “HNnnnnng!!!!” she struggled with it, she could tell she was doing something with how the water was rippling, but it wasn’t rising “Come one!!! Why is this… so…hard!”

[It’s level 1. With your zero experience towards other elements of magic. Just calm down and focus.]

“I am!” she grit her teeth, pooring everything she had into it, the water started to rise, a thin pillar rising up “Hnnn- I give up.” She plopped right back onto the chair, the water returning to normal “Will try later.” She sighed, wanting to move on to the next “Sooo, who was that?”

[Hrm, one moment.]

“…?” Mia sat up in the chair “Hey, you promised honesty, and I am still mad at how you forced control.”

[Yes, and I will still be honest as possible, as promised. I am checking how much I can tell you with my limits loosened. And I did apologize for that, it was an emergency. That women would have done worse than kill you.]

“She seemed mad… so who was she?”

[Ok, confirmed. She is another being like [Void], [Fate], and [Destiny]. She is [Arcane] and as the name suggests she is in charge of…maintaining, magic.]

Mia tilted her head, holding out her hand to catch another pierced apple “So why was she mad at me?”

[Complicated. What I can tell you was she was aware of every single time you loaded, and instead of disabling her awareness decided to take matters into her own hands to make you stop the short repeats.]

“…are they all aware? Those people.” She was starting to worry, it sounded like there was more than just those four, and if they were all aware of every time she loaded…and they got mad and came for her…

[Don’t worry, not all of them keep the awareness on at all times, those that do are taking advantage of it just as much as you do. [Arcane] just got ahead of herself, she has no authority to stop you. Pay them no mind and do as you wish…even if you want to force progress like that again…I recommend not, unless you want to some how end up with double fire weakness and die the moment you step out into open sunlight.]

“That’s a thing that can happen?!”

[No, you need at least quadruple weakness to it for that to happen, with double you’d just heavily sunburn.]

“Ah…” Yeah, she wouldn’t do that again.

“So, about how you dealt with her…”

[Do not try and repeat that, it’s dangerous.]

“Is she still in there? Is that ok?”

[She will get out, eventually.]

‘well, ok then…’ She leaped out of her chair, the state of someone who would apparently do worse than kill her was not worth thinking too much about. Plus, by the sounds of it she also made [Void] mad, somehow…teacup? Whatever, if Ami’s words can be trusted then again, she didn’t have to worry, she was already worrying about her changed *essence*.

for now she figured it would be best to explore this dungeon, back to the original plan but this time with a power boost.

Speaking of.

She still had a lot of stat points to distribute, but at this rate, she was starting to question her methods. Did she even need to gain a lot of weapon skills? She could just go full magic… granted, most of her stats would go back to base when she loaded… Those crusher stats were starting to add up…

“Eh, I’ll deal with it later.” She shrugged and started walking atop the water while gradually pointing both Dex and Int, not feeling the need to point Mnd for now due to the effects of mana tank.