The initial parts of our incursion into the central area went remarkably similar to previous trips into the Charland. Sure, we tried to speed things up but ultimately, there was only so much we could do to hurry without taking undue risks. Alone, I had been able to ignore most enemies, simply because I didn’t have to worry about leaving anyone behind. I only had to worry about keeping myself safe, something a lot easier when you could become nearly untraceable, thanks to my cloak rendering me invisible, inaudible and scentless. That concealment also meant that I had attracted far fewer enemies compared to the sizeable number our group pulled as we proceeded deeper into the Charland than ever before.

Where we had to fight groups composed of five, maybe ten, enemies on the outskirts, after about three hours, we had to contend with groups that maxed out at around twenty enemies. Granted, those enemies were amusingly less annoying individually, as the enemies in the outer area had been fast and nimble types more often than not, but that was cold comfort. Or maybe calling it hot comfort would be more appropriate, as the enemies we had to face were generally using a lot more fire. Not enough to overcome the freezing energies I harnessed to deal with them, but hot enough to make things uncomfortable.

On another level, dealing with them was an interesting experience. While trying to overcome the fire elemental sitting in its node, I had begun to work on precise control and was now trying to combine better control with higher power density in a process remarkably similar to the change that Ice underwent as it became Hard Ice. Generally, it seemed to retain its chemical structure, it was still Ice as I understood it and when melting it, Hard Ice became water, just like normal Ice but its physical properties were distinctly different.

Studying the mechanism Hard Ice underwent as it faded back into the Astral River showed even more similarities and differences, one of which was turned out to be quite amusing. Curiously, it was easier to melt Hard Ice into water compared to normal Ice, as the time needed for Hard Ice to fade away was longer than it was for Ice, due to a higher density of Astral Power within the Hard Ice. That, in turn, meant that if enough heat was directed at Hard Ice, especially if that heat was light on the Fire or Light elements, Hard Ice would melt into water, or rather, something that looked similar to water and was chemically water but magically was not. At least not only Water, as I noticed when trying to control it with my magic, the liquid had just as much in common with Liquid Moonlight as it had with Water, giving me quite a few interesting ideas.

One of those ideas was to imbue conjured Water with Ice Magic, mixing their essences in a way that bound the Ice Magic into the Water instead of merely making the water cold. It was a somewhat adventurous process of magical mixing, a little counterintuitive until I managed to wrap my head around it, but it worked remarkably well against the fiery enemies of the deeper Charland. The different types of fiery lizards, with some canines, felines and other assorted critters thrown in for good measure all shared similar weaknesses. Namely, they were creatures of Fire and by now, I was fairly well-versed in what magical fire needed to exist. Instead of the usual fire triad of oxygen, fuel and heat, any of the three could be replaced by adding additional magic, or Fire Astral Power. But, in turn, adding Water or Ice caused the opposite effect, dampening even a fire with plenty of oxygen, fuel and heat. By using conjured Water, I automatically added Water Astral Power, by imbuing the Water with Ice, I further strengthened the effect and by dousing the creatures in what was essentially impossibly cold water, I put out their flames, causing them to take serious damage in the process.

I wasn’t quite sure if these critters would generally die after losing their flames but it certainly seemed that way. So far, none of them had survived long enough after the loss, but their death generally came from a swift strike from Lia or Silva, who used their usual weapons to great effect against immobile targets. Alex, on the other hand, demonstrated that they, too, had learned quite a bit during their time working with the forge formation I had set up, demonstrating remarkable abilities in blocking the initial attacks with some fairly interesting gadgets. It didn’t seem to matter whether the attack was some sort of solid projectile imbued with fiery energies, a napalm-like liquid that allowed different creatures to literally breathe fire or even the odd gaseous attack that exploded moments later, as long as there was fire involved, Alex had some way to either redirect or outright neutralise it. Some of those measures came in prepared orbs that shattered and released some strange stuff, in other cases it looked more like enchanted objects were used, only that I was unable to detect any overt magic from them. It was weird and I made a mental note to investigate at a later point. If Alex could do it to the fire these creatures used, who knew if there was something out there that could do the same to me and the freezing energies I liked to use? Granted, the wide variety of elemental energies I could use would make such attempts difficult but not impossible.

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We managed to progress variably smoothly for a little over four hours and, by my estimation, roughly two-thirds of the way to the centre and I even managed to get a level and some skill points out of the trip. Level seventy-nine, to be precise, and a skill point in Ice Magic, bringing it to sixty-four and two in Water Magic, bringing it to twenty-six. The level reminded me that I needed to allocate my unspent points if I wanted to do so before hitting eighty, which I did, deciding to take the bonus trait I’d gain upon hitting seventy Intelligence instead of putting them into Intuition so I’d hit fifty as soon as I reached level eighty.

The trait was fairly interesting and it sounded like it was greatly influenced by my actions in the Charland. It was called Astral Suppression and, as the description put it, allowed my Astral Power to lose less potency when overpowering other magical effects.’. I took that to mean that I now needed less Astral Power to do things like extinguish the flames on these monsters here but I hoped it also meant I’d need less power to pierce shields or something like that. For now, I would have to keep an eye out but I had a feeling it was ultimately just another overall increase in my magical power, just a slightly different flavour, making it more effective in some special cases. Not groundbreaking but certainly useful in situations when it came up.

Sadly, while the notifications had caused me to occasionally slow down a little, the thing that brought us to a halt was far less pleasant. Or maybe more pleasant in its own way, compared to the numerous small- and medium-sized foes we had been fighting the entire time. Instead of a group like that, we were faced with a pair of massive centipede-like creatures, long bodies, easily twenty metres, bright red in colour and with countless small legs that allowed them to move across the rubble around us rapidly. Well, small legs for their overall size, the legs were almost the same length as Silva’s, and their body was almost a metre in diameter, making them quite imposing. Also disgusting, but mostly imposing, to say nothing of the shrill screech one of them let out right after encountering us, the noise loud and grating enough to make me flinch away in pain, while Silva and Alex let out pitiful whines of their own.

A quick Observe told me that we were facing Scorchipedes, with one of them clocking in at level seventy-three, the other at a quite respectable level seventy-six. Not the strongest foes I had faced thus far, but a pair of them working together could be a threat.

As if to drive home their state as a threat, the weaker Scorchipede sent out a belch of a strange, reddish-yellow gas that gave me some seriously uncomfortable vibes, even without smelling it. Blinking my magical sight on for just a moment, I could see that the cloud was composed of a lot of Poison with some FIre mixed in, almost as if it was an afterthought. Wanting nothing to do with it, I quickly pulled out one of my Mist Marbles and tossed it in, setting off a burst of Astral Power to shatter the Ice. The visual effect of the dark grey mist and the yellow-red gas interacting was quite spectacular, the two distinctly different clouds were vying for supremacy for a few moments, with flares of eldrich energy wreathing through the air as the powers collided, before the entire cloud exploded outwards with an incredibly loud bang and a flash of strange colours and even stranger tastes.

Sadly, that was only the first move of combat and moments later, the other Scorchipede started its own attack, trying to run Silva over with its many, many legs. All of which came with some wicked-looking barbs that I wanted nothing to do with.