On the day we left Neyto, we made good speed south. Our plan was to visit Tegi first, trying to take care of the Devourer, then move on to Sigmir's former tribe. Sadly, while Sigmir knew the area around her tribe and had a rough idea of a direction, her flight had been rather chaotic so we would have to search for them. And make a plan; taking out the leader of a tribe consisting of hundreds of people and a cadre of warriors would be impossible without a good plan. Luckily, we had some time to make one.

As we travelled through the snowy forest, I once more realised that there were always multiple levels to my perception. On the first glance, the forests around us were repetitive and boring, pines, snow, a few rocks and nothing more. Looking closer, every tree was unique, every snowflake, every rock different. It made me wonder about one's place in the world, both this one and the real world outside. Was everyone only a tree like all the others around them, unique in the details but at the end of the day just one tree in a forest? Or was there something else out there, making one into a special snowflake, as the expression went?

I spent quite a while deep in thoughts, observing nature around us and trying to figure out the big questions of individuality and life. Unsurprisingly, I was not successful and had to push the questions from my mind.

We made quite some distance before making camp that day. I wanted to place my wards and Adra was able to use some as well. I watched her use a few trees to anchor her magic and, when she was done, I asked her to explain her doing to me. She had no problem to do so and I learned that her affinity to nature made it easy for her to use trees. Rocks were rather universally usable for simple and weak wards. If I wanted to anchor something more powerful, I'd have to use something different, attuned to the wards or to magic in general.

There were crystals one could use, mostly called wardstones and those, while not truly rare, were not something you could just pick up from the ground. Curious, I tried to use a normal stone to anchor an idea I had for a mist-ward and at first, I was unable to make the magic stick to but as I persisted, the stone started to crumble and break. After picking up a new set of stones, I realised that I did not want to place the alarm-ward just yet, we were still going in and out of camp. The stones were set aside for later and I helped Sigmir gathering wood and prepare a fireplace.

Some time later, I watched Adra use a spell on the fire, making it burn hotter while consuming less fuel and felt a little slighted. My magic was great for combat, but utility? Not really.

During the evening, I read through the Grimoire once more, hoping to gain inspiration and learn more about magic. After a little reading, I was sure that my idea could work. I moved some distance away from our camp and started to form runes out of ice. I had to greatly focus in order to make them just as I wanted to and I knew that it would only work with Ice-Runes. As I made them, I placed them into a spell-formation, linked by lines made from more ice. After I was done, I took my place in the middle of the formation and tried to stretch my mind out to feel it. There was a contact and I managed to work my Astral Power into it, slowly feeling an effect form above me. My Astral Power was draining quickly, but what I had done worked as proof of concept. I had no doubt that if I managed to power a formation like this, I could create some seriously large magic, even consciously use the weather to strike at my foes.

Skill increased You increased your skill: Ice Rune-Mastery [50/100]

As I came back to camp, Adra and Sigmir were still doing their own form-work, stretching a little after a day of travelling. Before bed, I settled down, letting myself float into the Astral River, looking for a stream of Ice to dive into. It did not take too long to find one, There was a lot of Ice in the Astral River; maybe it was part of the location I was in, maybe not. Who knew?

My mind still had visions of me unleashing frozen hell upon my enemies, and the Rune I comprehended was a stronger version of the Hail-Rune: it read “Blizzard”, and contained the link between the Elements of Ice and Storm. I had a feeling that I would come to like this rune. After luxuriating in the feeling of Astral Power flowing around me for a while, I drew myself back into my body, feeling both exhausted and refreshed at the same time.

After my meditation, it was time for bed, so I snuggled up to Sigmir and enjoyed a completely different feeling of comfort.

The next morning was a little muggy, there was a cold fog in the air, making it miserable. After breakfast we broke camp and started our day. The weather made all of us a little withdrawn and grumpy so there was little talk or happiness. The feeling of isolation within the white fog did not help our mood in any way.

The combination of bad mood, bad vision and carelessness is probably to blame for what happened next. We were moving on a clear stretch that normally would be a meadow but was now snowed in. As we came close to the treeline, a tingling sensation caught my attention. Sadly, it was too late and plant-roots shot out of the ground, entangling the legs of our mounts. The Spiritgolems were not made to withstand any punishment and disintegrated instantly. As I was falling, I saw a few figures hidden in the treeline come forward. Out of instinct and panic, I reached out with my Ice Magic. I did not reach for the shuttles on my back or the blades on my side, I reached for the snow at our feet. Not trying for individual snowflakes I tried to simply throw up as much snow as I could to obscure us and it worked like a charm. For a moment, we were all swimming in a sea of white.

I landed on my side and sprung up as quickly as I could, while seeing Sigmir land with a lot more grace. The red aura I had seen a few times sprung up but instead of simply radiating outward, it wrapped around her, forming into a shimmering armour, making her look like an angry deity. The moment she landed, she exploded forward, showing an incredible speed. Her aura was glowing strong enough to let me see her even through the obscured vision as she charged into the figures, her Lok'nar pulled back for a devastating strike. Most of the snow quickly settled back down, leaving my vision impeded but not totally obscured.

Just as Sigmir arrived in front of our attackers, I saw Adra get to them as well. She had managed to dodge out of the attack and moved forward in her goat-form and just as Sigmir barrelled into our attackers, Adra took a mighty leap, still in her goat-form, just to shift in mid-air, turning into her dryad-form, with her spear already poised to strike. She did not waste any time, stabbing forward, adding her momentum to a vicious thrust. Her chosen target was obviously not prepared for her, trying for a hasty dodge and failing. He got impaled right through the chest, before Adra pulled back for a follow-up attack.

As I watched my two companions wreak havoc, I saw a strange disturbance in the fluttering snow around me. It almost looked like a figure moving but other than the disturbed snow there was no indication. 'Stealth!' That thought enraged me, there was another attacker out there and he was after me. 'Fucking rogues!'

Recognizing the danger, my mind went into overdrive, activating Bullet Time and Overflow at the same time to give me the best chance. My shuttles were not good for area-attacks, my runes took too much time, so I triggered my Eisblumen, letting the vines flail out and strike into the direction of the disturbance. One of the vines connected with something and I used all my control to wrap the vine around that 'something' it had connected with. When I felt a good grip, I yanked the vine upward. My would-be attacker's stealth broke and I saw him for the first time. It was some kind of cat-beastman, clad in dark leather, two daggers in hand and more on his hips.

My vine had wrapped around his leg and taken it out from under him and I knew that I did not want to get up close and personal with any of his knives. I fully focused on the Eisblumen and on using them to control my Attacker. I wrapped my vines around his other leg and both arms so I had him immobilised facing the other way and upside-down. Now, I just had to take care of him and I would be good. With supreme effort, I managed to create one extra vine and used it like a spear, impaling my attacker through the back. In my anger, I pulled at the other vines the moment I felt penetration and I failed to control my strength. Fear and anger made my magic stronger than I ever thought and I saw limbs rip away. The rage within me was still not satisfied, even with the dismemberment of my foe, so I used the vines to flick the collected limbs at the guys in the treeline.

In the short moment, I had used to deal with my attacker, Sigmir and Adra had cut our attackers down to size. There was just one dwarf remaining and by now I knew we were fighting the four Travellers chasing after Sigmir. It turned out that I was either a genius when it came to throwing dismembered limbs with ice-vines or I got lucky but the casually thrown arm hit the dwarf right in the face. Not only that, the tumbling motion made it a slap, right out of a comedy. Well, if a comedy featured dismembered body-parts. There was no damage but getting slapped in the face by a teammates arm, without the teammate, was one hell of a distraction and both Sigmir and Adra made sure to use it, ending his shock by simply ending his life and the fight at the same time.

Half-Orc Traveller died. You gain 2500 EXP. For killing an opponent without a Traveller in your party, you gain Bonus EXP . . . Dwarf Traveller died. You gain 2550 EXP. For killing an opponent without a Traveller in your party, you gain Bonus EXP You reached level 50. Skill increased You increased your skill: Ice Magic [63/100]