Chapter 644: Battle of Ice and Snow

Translator: imperfectluck  Editor: Kurisu

The snowflakes kept increasing in size. The ground was now thickly blanketed in snow. An ordinary person’s vision could now only see a few meters ahead. The snowflakes were literally as large as a person’s hand. In fact, a snowflake falling on a person’s body would cause noticeable pain.

Extremely condensed ice element separated itself in midair and descended in its natural forms, snowflakes, snowballs, and snow bricks. However, they were foundationally no different. They were all part of the forbidden spell which was creating a world of ice and snow.

Saying that this place had become a world of ice and snow was no mere description. It was a concrete fact. As the forbidden spell spread, all other elemental powers were naturally rejected in this location. All non-ice magic spells would see their power decreased by an extreme amount, or even be rendered completely unusable. This was the anti-magic zone that a complete forbidden spell would bring.

The foundational reason for this was quite simple. The ice element had gathered in far too great an amount here, which reduced the space for other elements to exist. Since mages needed to make use of the power of the elements, it would obviously be a nightmare for those who weren’t ice mages.

The most pitiful would be fire mages as fire was the opposing element to ice. Near the end of the forbidden spell Ice Aeon’s completion, even a Legend-ranked fire mage would be unable to throw a single fireball.

The appearance of the anti-magic zone doubtlessly meant that the forbidden spell was nearing its end. It was already in the final parts of the explosive period. The powerful forbidden spell, capable of destroying everything, was almost ready to be released at any moment.

“Kill him! Stop him!”

Everything would be dying in the next instant? Perhaps death was simply another form of “eternal life”. However, all living creatures had instinctual fear of death, which was currently warning them with full force. The already berserk demons became even more berserk. Yet, the demons found it difficult to proceed forward in the blizzard.

Demons also had their natural elements and natural talent abilities. The fact that most demons reeked of sulfur was already the best explanation. The great majority of demons would be born with excellent fire and poison resistance. Many demons would also be experts at using fire magic.

Not only was this a natural-born ability, explosive attack power would be necessary to survive in the dangerous Chaos Abyss. This naturally meant that fire magic, which was easily usable in most environments and possessed great destructive power, was the most popular magic type. A high-level demon job class like inferno demon was what many demons would consider the perfect job class.

Now, the will of the Chaos Abyss had forcefully conscripted demons and turned them into demon war slaves, giving them the ability to self-destruct. Self-destruction was one of the most common techniques available to all fire element creatures. This basically meant that the demon war slaves had all been bestowed with the fire element.

But now, these natural fire element demons met with great trouble. Not only did the blizzard constantly sap them of warmth and stamina, it was also expelling the burning fire mana in their blood. In fact, some of the demon cannon fodder even became unable to self-destruct.

However, it wasn’t only the enemies that suffered from the blizzard. Elven clothing styles all had one thing in common—they were quite light and simple as elves typically used low-level magical accessories and spells to keep themselves warm. However, all low-level magic equipment had already started to lose their effect in this anti-magic zone. The elves were starting to shiver and regret how little they were wearing.

Luckily, the human reinforcements from the Northlands were likely the most skilled army in the world when fighting in snowy environment. In fact, their ice mages even came prepared with sleds. The snow would be their natural ally. The demons became much easier to deal with after becoming slowed and dulled by the snow, and even if parts of the city wall were destroyed, snow could be stacked up to solidify the walls again.

“Ice Aeon…”

The trembling Empress Afina the First managed to squeeze these words out from between her chattering teeth. All the Elven Gods were shouting the names “Roland” and “Yongye”. By this time, everyone had recognized this ultimate ice element forbidden spell.

A bit more than one hundred years ago, it was precisely Ice Aeon which destroyed multiple elven kingdoms. Some of those elven kingdoms’ land was still even now locked in an eternal world of ice and snow. Emperor Yongye had been quite famous for loathing elves. The elves had also viewed him as their mortal enemy, and Ice Aeon became a taboo buried in history, not to be spoken of again.

Forbidden spells were also categorized into different levels based on the power, area of effect, and functions. But, no matter how you tried to categorize Ice Aeon, it would definitely be top-tier among all forbidden spells.

The complete version of Ice Aeon was all about creating a world of ice and snow. The area of effect and duration could all be modified based on the caster’s desire. Of course, the more powerful the spell, the more mana and preparation time would be required. The Ice Aeon spell had already created countless calamities before. The largest ever usage of this spell had directly frozen the territory of an entire elven kingdom.

That was only a smaller country that only had several mid-sized cities. However, even that elven kingdom’s territory was several thousand square kilometers in size. The power of ice magic had frozen over this entire territory for more than a century by now. Even in the current day, this location showed zero signs of thawing. However, some powerful individuals had still managed to survive that incident. In that case, most people understood that Ice Aeon’s strengths were its tremendous area of effect and long duration, but its overall attack power wasn’t that ridiculous.

Just one use of Ice Aeon would likely transform the new Moonwheel Capital Elven Empire into another land of ice and snow for more than a century. It was likely that not a single elf would be able to calmly leave here when thinking of this.

The elves could only have tears in their eyes as they said goodbye to their home. They would then board the airships in the sky while having incredibly complex emotions and expressions. Without a doubt, Emperor Yongye was currently casting Ice Aeon from the sky.

Events that happened one to two hundred years ago would be nothing more than bedtime stories or legends to other species. However, the long-lived elves could remember such events like they happened just yesterday. Every elf would tremble in fear when talking about the forbidden spell Ice Aeon. Yet, Ice Aeon had now resurfaced, and was even being cast in order to protect the elves. It was truly ironic.

But right now, I didn’t have the free time to care about the elves’ feelings. The current situation was giving me a headache.

“I think I used too much mana… I think I used three times more than what I was expecting?”

As I was always overly cautious, I personally felt that the forbidden spell’s explosive period would only be half an hour, which was why I added some extra time just to be safe in case I went overboard, but I really did go overboard in the end…

Ice Aeon was probably the forbidden spell cast the most over the past three hundred years. I could be considered incredibly experienced in comparison to unfortunate mages who either exploded themselves or suffered a decrease in power level after casting a forbidden spell.

As I was one of the few mages in the world with the experience of casting forbidden spells repeatedly, along with the fact that I personally invented Ice Aeon, there would be no need to emphasize how familiar I was with this spell.

However, while the spell Ice Aeon hadn’t changed, I, and the surrounding environment, had changed.

Compared to before, since I now had a far more powerful bloodline, along with better understanding of ice and death magic that improved my mana pool, my magic power and mana pool seemed to be equal or even greater than when I was previously Yongye. My improved understanding of the fundamental nature of ice, along with the foundational ice magic I learned from the Frigid Nightmares, meant my magic abilities had greatly increased. Something that I previously would have needed to give 100% of my magic power to would now likely only require 50% or less.

Even I didn’t expect that my foundational ice magic would be so compatible with Ice Aeon.

As I previously mentioned before, my foundational ice magic was the most basic ice magic of all: ice sculpting, creating what I imagined with ice. Meanwhile, Ice Aeon was a spell to materialize a world of ice and snow that I imagined in the actual world. Foundationally speaking, Ice Aeon was also a type of ice sculpting, although of course the scale was much larger, and the final formula far more complex.

To use an analogy, I was like an artist who had previously required three hours to paint a single person’s portrait. But then, I worked hard on my fundamental skills, and also changed my drawing tools. Now, three hours would be enough time for me to paint an entire family. Since I was still calculating time by my previous abilities, it was only natural for me to make a mistake with the estimation in the end.

The end result was that I used the same amount of magic as before, but with about twice the results. Plus, my new physical body also strengthened the effects of my magic, along with the new high magic environment also buffing all magic power. It seemed likely that the Ice Aeon I cast here would far surpass all Ice Aeons in “historical records”.

This wasn’t a good thing.

Only a novice would try to cast the most powerful magic spell possible. An overly powerful magic spell would quite often be beyond the ability of the mage to control it. Basically, an overly powerful magic spell was like a bomb that might detonate at any moment, and even if it didn’t, the casting time required and difficulty of the spell would be greatly increased. Currently, time was of the essence, and equaled lives…

“I still need at least another half an hour? I’ve truly gone overboard this time…”

The battle between mortals and regular demons was still alright as the blizzard had greatly reduced the demons’ attack power. However, Anslo’s situation was constantly worsening in his battle against Donatis.

As I previously mentioned, in normal situations, during a battle between Main Gods, it would be quite common for the battle to last several years or even decades rather than just a few days or months.

However, this was no normal situation. The demon wave was Donatis’s home territory. His combat strength was at its very peak. Meanwhile, not only had Anslo lost his Divine Kingdom, he was also seriously injured, and most importantly of all, Anslo would still be weaker than Donatis even if Anslo was also at his peak. With all these factors added up, the difference between them was now even greater.

The gigantic Anslo was knocked over yet again. His head, which had just been crushed, speedily regrew. The entire head had finished regenerating by the time that Anslo got up again. However, this would consume precious divine power.

Every single part of a God’s true body would be crafted out of their divine power. The God’s true body would be the final line of defense. Although regenerating a head seemed quite easy, that would mean losing several hundred years’ worth of accumulated power.

Meanwhile, Anslo’s opponent, the even taller black giant, was also covered in injuries, but had yet to be knocked over even once.

Time was limited. Donatis didn’t fight like normal by testing the waters first. Since his heroic spirit temple was completely empty, he was unable to summon any helpers. So, Donatis unhesitatingly chose a melee fighting style where he was willing to risk injury in order to kill his opponent. This was already the fourth time that he had “killed” Anslo.

It was quite obvious to everyone that this was a terrible situation for Anslo. Nobody could guarantee how much longer Anslo could hold out. Without his Divine Kingdom and countless worshippers, it would be difficult for him to even replenish any divine power.

When his divine power became used up to the point where he was no longer able to regenerate himself, that would result in his death… And, the death of any Main God would mean the end of their entire faction.

Since we were on the losing end in the Gods’ battle, it naturally meant that more Demon Lords and demon war slaves were able to pass through the Elven Gods’ blockade. The mortals also met with even more powerful enemies, while even I was coming under threat.

Some inferno dragons had already neared the new Borealis. Although they were instantly killed and shot down from the sky, the inferno dragons were still a threat, and if the new Borealis was knocked down from the sky, that would mean that the forbidden spell would fail.

I didn’t know how much longer Anslo could hold out, but I felt like it might even be possible that my people would lose first.

My anxiety transformed into motivation as I did my very best to think of what I could do. Yet, the anti-magic zone brought by the blizzard also decreased my own options.

“Wait a moment, perhaps I can make use of all this ice element.”

My previous experience with constructing ice walls to block off Conservation’s undead army reminded me that I was the one who controlled this forbidden spell. All of this ice element had been born because of me. In that case, I could also use this ice element how I wanted.

Right now, I was still muttering the Ice Aeon incantation and constantly making hand gestures to control my forbidden spell. It was impossible for me to focus on casting other spells. However, mages had long since invented a workaround to cast spells while they were busy casting another spell: using the other half of a soul connection to cast spells in their stead!

That was right, having the magical pet who signed a soul contract cast spells for the mage!

“Harloys!”

I unhesitatingly gave her all of my relevant knowledge, memories, and creations regarding ice magic. Her magical knowledge far surpassed mine anyways, so I might as well teach her everything I knew.

Elven Empress Harloys, who was currently on the city walls and commanding the battle, was suddenly stunned for a brief moment as if someone had hit her on the head. She then immediately understood as she helplessly shook her head.

“This is… forget it, I’ll just treat it as grinding reputation.”

Harloys looked around her and saw that the other Elven Empress and her retainers weren’t far away. Both sides were looking at each other with rather awkward expressions. This was especially more so for Empress Afina the First. She had a truly complex expression as she looked at Harloys.

Harloys then started floating up in the sky as floating snowflakes gathered around her, transforming into a staircase of ice and snow. She had her eyes closed as she stepped high into the air, causing shouts of astonishment from below.

*Snap!*

One snap of her fingers caused several dozen flying snow birds to appear. These were ice element creatures that had just been born.

Harloys was borrowing my abilities over ice to gather the ice element and create ice elemental creatures. This would be no different from using a mage tower’s assistance to cast magic spells. There would be barely any mana consumption at all for Harloys personally.

These snow birds were soon torn apart by the demons and returned to ice and snow. However, Harloys chuckled at seeing this scene because it meant that her experiment had already succeeded.

“Arise, my guardians of snow and ice.”

At Harloys’ command, ice element creatures were continually given life from the snow. They then unhesitatingly attacked the demon army.

Snow wolves, horses, dragons, and so on. The ice element creatures had many different forms. There were hundreds, then thousands, then tens of thousands, and even more of them in an astonishing amount. The most critical of all was that even though they were soon shattered into tiny pieces, the snow and ice would then reform into a new ice element creature.

Right now, the Moonwheel Capital appeared more like the Ice Elemental Plane than the Ice Elemental Plane itself. Challenging the ice element creatures here was basically no different from challenging the limitless Elemental Tide.

Even more astonishing was that these ice element creatures were actually evolving in battle. These newborn ice element creatures were indeed quite weak, but after multiple rebirths, they became sly and skilled warriors. The elite elemental creatures who survived longer even started melding together to create even stronger ice element creatures.

Any Elemental Plane would require hundreds or even thousands of years to complete the path of evolution. Yet, evolution was completed here in just a short few minutes. Additionally, as various higher-level ice element creatures were born, it seemed like Ice Elemental Lords were about to be born soon as well.

There was a tall and muscular ice giant, an arctic wolf king whose roars could summon blizzards, and a tremendous ice dragon that covered the skies. These were all extremely rare elemental creatures. Yet, these ice element creatures showed everyone how they evolved right in public. They had all evolved from the most basic ice element creatures.

The creature that attracted the most attention was an ice phoenix. She didn’t fight on the frontlines, but everywhere that she went, ice eggs would appear. Soon, young ice phoenixes would jump out of the eggs, and then these ice phoenixes would dance in the wind and snow and soon grow to the size of their mother before unhesitatingly jumping into battle.

These high-level ice element creatures obviously already possessed intelligence. After they were born, they would first glance at the Borealis in the sky. Roland, who was still casting his forbidden spell, was the source of the magic that gave birth to them. It could be said that he was their father. Then, the ice element creatures would lower their heads to Harloys as she could be considered their mother who created them.

After that, the ice element creatures would unhesitatingly step into battle. They instinctively understood that if this forbidden spell was interrupted, they would all return to being nothing more than ice and snow. Furthermore, as long as Ice Aeon was cast successfully, this entire land would become a frozen land of ice and snow, and they would be able to become truly independent ice element creatures.

It was evident that at this time, Roland and the Goddess of Order’s powers over Creation had miraculous usages here.

Due to the addition of these ice element creatures, the battle which had been going poorly for us was now in stalemate once again. Meanwhile, Harloys’ tremendous display of power by casually summoning such powerful ice element creatures so easily truly astonished all the witnesses.

“Is this the power of the ‘most naturally magically gifted species of all, the Goddess of Order’s most spoiled children, the Gold Elves?’ Or, is this something unique to ‘Harloys the All-knowing?’”

Before, working to rescue the elves had given others the impression that Elven Empress Harloys was magnanimous and kind. But now, Harloys had displayed the power necessary to any leader in this dangerous world.

Being magnanimous to one’s own people as well as being incredibly powerful would mean that her crown would become ever more solid as long as she didn’t do anything too foolish.

Meanwhile on the floating airship, Didina finally came to a decision as she watched what unfolded before her.

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