Chapter 130: Champion Of The Horde
"Stay back, you’re both tired." He said to his women. "I’ll deal with this."
Josinia and Sifa moved back toward the mansion wall without argument.
The baby dragon stayed pressed against Sifa’s leg.
Kalon stepped fully into the open ground in front of the approaching horde of strange ice creatures.
Then the first wave of those creatures charged.
Kalon raised his hand and activated a weakened Photon Slash, roughly of the A rank.
It was time to test things out.
A blade of light formed, far smaller than the full version, and swept horizontally through the front line.
Three of the jagged ice beasts split cleanly in half and collapsed into broken shards. He kept the power low enough that the residual light only reached a few metres beyond the targets.
More creatures pushed through the cold mist.
This time, he switched to his fire skills.
A weakened version Ninefold Sunbreaker activated, so that it’s impact wouldn’t effect his women or the mansion.
The orbs orbited him, providing the space with light and warmth, then one orb shot forward towards a group of creatures.
The sphere landed right in the middle of a cluster of the multi-legged ice beasts, exploding fiercely and sending drops of fire through their bodies, melting them with ease.
Steam rose where the fire met frozen flesh.
After a while, all that was left of that group was melting water that flowed across the street.
The mist kept delivering more enemies.
A larger group of taller, bone-plated ice constructs emerged, their limbs longer and their claws sharper.
Kalon felt his water skill, Deep Sea Pressure, attacking all of the creatures at once. The sudden weight in the air slowed the entire group. Their movements turned sluggish.
While they struggled against the pressure, he launched another limited Photon Slash that carved through four of them at the joints, dropping them in pieces.
Josinia watched with wide eyes, hands still raised but not interfering. She had no need to, since her lover had things under control.
Sifa’s expression was filled with focus, tracking every movement as though she was trying to learn from them.
The baby dragon made small, anxious sounds but stayed still.
The horde did not stop.
For every creature Kalon destroyed, two more dragged themselves out of the thickening fog.
He kept cycling his skills at reduced output. He mostly used the skills that required less cool down, such as photon slash and astral counter. At the same time, the orbs of Ninefold Sunbreaker orbited around him, constantly melting his enemies.
He never let the light or fire expand far enough to risk the women behind him.
Minutes passed. The ground in front of the mansion became filled with broken ice and steaming remains. Kalon’s breathing stayed calm.
His stamina was currently being buffed by daily blessings, giving him enough energy to fight without getting tired. As for his mana, that was a slightly different issue.
Then suddenly, the mist parted more widely.
A much larger figure stepped through.
It stood nearly three metres tall, assembled entirely from dense, ancient-looking ice bones. A jagged crown of frozen spikes sat on its skull.
In one hand it carried a long sword of pure black ice. Its empty eye sockets burned with a deeper blue light than the weaker creatures.
When it stepped forwards, the temperature dropped again and the smaller remaining beasts moved into a loose formation around it.
It was as though the creature was some sort of king.
Sifa’s eyes widened as she saw this. She called out to Kalon.
"It’s... It’s him. He really exists.. the champion of the ice horde..."
Champion... I’ve heard of this before. They say he’s the one that causes the horde itself.
Why is he here?
Can he sense that I’m the biggest threat on this planet, and wants to get rid of me early?
Kalon rolled his shoulders and faced the new opponent directly.
The King raised its black-ice sword and pointed it at him.
The remaining lesser creatures charged forward again.
Kalon answered with another controlled volley from Ninefold Sunbreaker, two spheres this time, and burned a path through the fodder.
The King itself did not flinch. It advanced through the steam and swung the massive sword in a wide horizontal cut.
Kalon sidestepped, feeling the extreme cold that trailed the blade.
He answered with a full-power Photon Slash aimed at the sword arm. The light blade cut deep into the ice bone, cracking it, but did not sever it cleanly.
It seemed to have used some sort of skill that hardened the ice on its arm, enough to defend against an SSS rank skill. However, it took a lot out of the beast.
The King staggered one step, then tried to swing the sword around again.
Kalon decided to end it.
He raised both hands and activated the SSS+ ice skill he had gained on Cryos.
Shard of Itztla.
Above the Skeleton King, the air warped. A massive spear of absolute-zero ice, weighing a full thousand kilograms, condensed out of nothing and hung for a fraction of a second.
The champion felt a shadow being cast over it and looked up.
Before he could even perceive what was happening, the shard fell.
The enormous ice shard slammed down with crushing force and drove the Skeleton straight into the frozen ground.
The impact sent a shockwave of extreme cold outward, but Kalon had aimed the skill with precision, the worst of the freezing effect stayed centred on the target.
The crown shattered. The black-ice sword snapped. The dense skeletal body cracked in multiple places and then collapsed into lifeless fragments under the weight of the shard, eventually being ground into nothingness.
The remaining lesser creatures froze in place for a moment, as if their connection to the leader had been severed. Kalon finished them with two quick, low-powered Photon Slashes. The last of the bodies fell.
The mist began to thin almost immediately.
Silence returned to the grounds behind the Ice Mansion. Broken ice and melting remains littered the street.
Kalon lowered his hands and exhaled once, checking that no further shapes were moving in the fog.
Behind him, Josinia and Sifa stood together, both staring at the destruction and at the place where the crowned skeleton had been crushed. The baby dragon peeked out from behind Sifa’s leg, eyes wide.
Kalon turned to face them.
"I... I think it’s done."