Frost a litrpg adventure, p.1
Frost: A LitRPG Adventure, page 1
Elemental Mastery 3
Frost
DB King
Copyright © 2022 by DB King
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
v001
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Contents
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Free progression Fantasy Novel!
Contents
Series by DB King
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
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Support DB King on Patreon!
Free progression Fantasy Novel!
Series by DB King
Apocalypse Knights
Crafter’s Fate
Dragon Magus
Dungeon of Evolution
Elemental Mastery
Fatehaven Farm
Kensei
Mage’s Path
Night Guild
Ranger’s Magic
Shinobi Rising
Spellweaver Codex: Elder Mage Chronicles
Summoner’s Shadow
The Last Magus
War Wizard
World End
Chapter 1
Cobalt-hued sparks scattered across the clearing floor, dancing over exposed roots and clumps of upturned earth before climbing partway up the lengths of towering, thick-trunked trees. The last flickers of azure light peeled away from the edges of Zephyr’s vision as he looked up. A dense canopy of intertwining branches and broad leaves hung overhead, interrupted only by a narrow opening as wide as the clearing in which he stood.
The open skies stretched beyond, blue and cloudless. Just a heartbeat ago, he’d been soaring through them alongside his friends and a small entourage of other mages. Blackstone Keep and the war between the Phoenix Knights and the Slave-Masters were now half a world away, and Zephyr couldn’t help but shudder inwardly at the horrors of the last few weeks.
“Hey, it’s cooler here,” Vincent said, straightening the collar of his red Knight robes. The former jeweler’s apprentice stood more than a head-and-a-half shorter than Zephyr, and though he’d packed on a considerable amount of lean muscle over a year of tough training, he was still much slighter and more slender in comparison. He smoothed back a few stray strands of sandy hair from his brow and shook his head. “But it’s not cold and damp like the Tempest School either.”
“The deeper we go into the Boundary Forest, the warmer it’ll get,” Nella said. The ranger was wearing the same clothes she’d worn to the foot of Mount Baltros, where she’d first met Zephyr and Vincent: a sleeveless deerskin tunic and earth-hued breeches. An easy smile shone across her pale, freckled face as she swept her gaze around and caused the red braid trailing from her scalp to swing back and forth. “We’re on the edges now, which means the Frost School can’t be too far away.”
“This is your home, isn’t it?” Lux asked. The beautiful dark-haired Storm Scion had her arm looped through Zephyr’s, and her eyes were full of wonder as she beheld the majesty of the Boundary Forest.
And it was majestic indeed, Zephyr thought. The trees surrounding the clearing he’d landed in were undoubtedly ancient beyond reckoning, and despite the soft gloom and pools of shadows shrouding them and the inner depths of the forest, there was no mistaking the magical aura emanating from their towering forms. Zephyr felt his eyes widen in wonder like Lux’s. This isn’t just raw ether floating around. We’re standing inside a spell, one so big I can’t even begin to sense where its originating point is.
“No, not exactly,” Nella replied. She pointed deeper into the forest. “I live about an hour’s walk in that direction. Or I used to, anyway, before I left for the Tempest School. Druidess Filna might have reassigned the hut where I slept to someone else in my absence.”
“Really?” Vincent blinked in surprise. “She’d do that? Give away your bedroom while you’re gone?”
“It’s no big deal, really,” Nella said, shrugging. “We switch huts around all the time. And besides, I’m probably going to be staying at the Frost School while we study Frost magic.”
“That’s right,” Biri Finne said, walking up to the trio. The pale, blue-eyed mage was dressed in the white, blue-trimmed robes of a Frost Guardian, as befitting her rank and station. She nodded to the trio and Lux, before doing the same to other mages milling around in the clearing. “You and the rest of our guests will have quarters within the Frost School for the duration of your stay.”
Zephyr followed Biri’s gaze and saw that her twin brother, Tosa Finne, was talking quietly to a young mage named Abel Ponur. Less than a month ago, he’d been a senior initiate in the Tempest School. Now, he was the leader of the dozen-strong Storm Scion delegation that had been sent to the Frost Guardians’ aid. Eleven other blue-robed mages clustered around Abel, all of them listening intently to Tosa.
“Be at ease, esteemed guests and colleagues,” Tosa said to the Storm Scions. “I understand that this is your first visit to the Frost School, but there is no cause to feel uncomfortable. Neither is there any need to stand on ceremony.”
“Thank you, Master Finne,” Abel replied politely. The other Storm Scions voiced their gratitude. A white-robed figure strode from their midst. His hair was the same color as his clothing, and his genial, youthful, and handsome features belied his age of ninety-odd years.
“Welcome, my friends, to the Frost School,” Grand Sage Bessun Avora said, spreading his arms in a sweeping gesture that tried to encompass the forest. “And the Blight Boundary. Is it not magnificent?”
“It is, sir,” Zephyr agreed. “I grew up hearing stories and songs about just how grand the Boundary Forests are, but it seems to me that no words can truly capture the sublime beauty of this place, nor do it any justice. The trees are strong and proud, their every branch heavy with history and duty.”
“Duty?” Vincent asked, scratching his head. “Is that another Wu metaphor of yours, Zeph? The trees here are huge and all, but they’re just trees, aren’t they? What duty could they have?”
“A truly profound one,” Avora said, smiling. “And I’m not surprised it hasn’t escaped your sensibilities, Zephyr. Only a mind molded by the philosophies of the Wu could have encapsulated the trees and their role in the Boundary Enchantment so succinctly in a single word: duty.”
“I…” Vincent sighed and bowed to the Grand Sage. “I still don’t get it, Your Excellency. I know there’s a powerful spell going on in this forest, and it’s made up of Frost magic and another type of magic I don’t recognize.”
“It’s Life magic. That’s what the druids and druidesses–the Boundary Mages–use to keep the Boundary Enchantment going,” Nella said, nudging Vincent and pointing to a section of the intricate magical web woven across every tree in the forest. She smiled. “Druidess Filna told me about it when I was a child, but now, seeing it for myself with my own mage sight is really something else.”
“The last time we were here, we didn’t really notice all this because we didn’t stay very long,” Vincent said, his gaze following the direction of Nella’s pointing finger. “Nor did we have a Frost Aspect yet, which makes seeing Frost magic in action so much easier.”
That’s right, Zephyr thought. He glanced down at his inner right forearm. A few inches below his wrist, an azure thunderbolt sat next to an orange-red triangle and a white sphere. They were the Tempest Mark, the Inferno Mark, and the Frost Mark. We did awaken our Frost Aspects just before we attacked the Unliving Empress’s Eternal Palace.
He conjured a codex display. A scroll unfurled in the air, visible only to him, Vincent, and Nella.
Ascender Name: Zephyr
Magic: Tem pest (archmage), Inferno (archmage), Frost (initiate)
Tempest Aspect: Soul of Thunder
Inferno Aspect: Dragon Lord
Frost Aspect: Winter Paladin
The codex display was a manifestation of the Codex of Ascension, a spiritual artifact bound to the trio’s souls by Avora. It allowed them to track and monitor their progress in their magical studies in stark, numerical terms. It also absorbed, purified, and converted the dark magic of any Shadowswarm creatures they destroyed into essence orbs, which could in turn be—and had been—used to give the trio immense magical power.
Thanks to the Codex of Ascension, Zephyr, Vincent, and Nella had become quite possibly the three most powerful mages in the realm, if not the entire world, after only a year plus a few weeks of studying magic. No one else possessed even a modest fraction of their power, not even Grand Sage Avora or Archmage Brass of the Phoenix Knights. And neither would Archmage Thorn of the Frost Guardians, if Zephyr had to guess.
With that power, the trio had wiped out entire armies of Shadowswarm entities and turned the tide in the war against the Unliving Empress and her endless hordes of iron drones. And Zephyr knew they would only become mightier still when they mastered Frost magic, something which wouldn’t take very long given what they’d already accomplished.
The sheer ease through which the trio had accrued power had unnerved Zephyr at first, but he’d come to terms with it, believing that as the threefold reincarnation of Caruthas, the Hero of Light, it was their duty to return his magical mastery to the world and bring it to bear against all that threatened humanity.
Now, Zephyr was not so sure, because he didn’t think that he, Vincent, and Nella were Caruthas reborn anymore. Many twilight fiends, powerful Shadowswarm entities, had called them their Sacred One, incarnated into three separate bodies. The Unliving Empress had thought that they were the Elemental Anathema, Caruthas’s killer reborn to torment the world once more and usher in a new age of suffering and horror.
But in an earlier lifetime, the Unliving Empress had also been Azaria Hastur, a stalwart companion of the Hero of Light and a mage of immense power herself. She’d known Caruthas on a personal level, and she’d fought alongside him against the Elemental Anathema. If the trio really were Caruthas reborn, wouldn’t she recognize him in them? And if the trio weren’t the Elemental Anathema, surely she wouldn’t have been so adamant on her insistence that they were?
Of course, the Unliving Empress could have been simply mistaken. After all, she’d succumbed to madness long before the trio had managed to fight their way to her. Or she could have been lying, since she was no longer the Glyph Mistress, revered heroine, but the Unliving Empress, a monster that had ravaged the world for centuries until her defeat by the trio and execution by Avora. Lying was a trifle when set alongside all the other atrocities she’d committed.
But for some reason, Zephyr didn’t think she was. The Unliving Empress was vicious and insane, but she wasn’t a liar. In fact, she’d called someone else a liar. Zephyr fought to keep his features neutral as he met Avora’s approving gaze. The Grand Sage hadn’t exactly deceived the trio in any overt manner, but he’d left important things that needed to be said unsaid on more than one occasion, and Zephyr couldn’t help but wonder what the trio needed to know about the Codex of Ascension that Avora still hadn’t told them.
He can take knowledge from our memories and plant ideas in our heads with his Codex of Elucidation, Zephyr thought darkly. But I don’t think he can read our thoughts, at least not yet. What else can he do to us?
“Why duty, though?” Vincent’s voice drew Zephyr from his ruminations. “It seems to me that you’re saying these trees are fulfilling some kind of duty.”
“I’m not sure,” Zephyr replied, shaking his head. He rubbed his jaw thoughtfully. “Perhaps I got that impression simply from the way they stand, reaching to heavens, so tall and proud. I might very well be mistaken.”
“Or you could have deduced that the trees are not mere bystanders within the Boundary Enchantment, but active participants in its great magic,” Avora said. He nodded politely to Nella. “If you would, Nella, please explain to your friends what the Boundary Enchantment entails. As a ranger, you should know this.”
“Of course I do!” Nella snapped at the Grand Sage, her tone drawing a fearful tug on her upper arm from Vincent. The ranger had never been especially reverent to Avora, and her waspishness toward him had only become more pronounced since the trio’s battle with the Unliving Empress. But Zephyr knew Nella well enough to be confident that she wouldn’t hurl their suspicions of the Grand Sage’s intentions in his face.
For one, they had no concrete evidence to prove that Avora had any nefarious designs. Secondly, for all his duplicity, Avora had fought valiantly alongside the Storm Scions and Phoenix Knights against the Shadowswarm and the hordes of Fennean iron drones and sustained many severe injuries in the process. As far as anyone was concerned, the Grand Sage’s valor was beyond reproach. Third, what if Avora were actually capable of seizing control of the trio’s minds through the Codex of Ascension? If the Grand Sage were indeed a Shadow Cultist, capturing three mages as powerful as Zephyr, Nella, and Vincent and subsuming them to his cause would spell disaster for the world, if not the outright extinction of humanity.
Nella had suggested simply launching a surprise attack on the Grand Sage and killing him outright before he could do anything in response. Vincent had gasped in horror at the notion, and Zephyr had firmly rejected the ranger’s idea. Such an act was not only dishonorable, but beyond horrific, since Avora could very well be genuinely well-intentioned and utterly undeserving of such an incomprehensible and ignominious death, especially not after a lifetime of fighting against the Shadow and its countless agents. If the trio were to kill an innocent man simply because they found him threatening, how would they be different from a Shadowswarm entity or a Fennean Slave-Master?
Also, on a darker note, Zephyr wasn’t especially keen to find out whether the trio could actually move against Avora without the Grand Sage simply stripping their magic away or seizing control of their minds at the speed of thought.
No. Zephyr gave Lux’s hand a gentle squeeze and smiled hollowly at her. We’ll have to bide our time and find some way to sever the connection between our Codex of Ascension and his Codex of Elucidation.
“In the beginning, the world was frozen and lifeless,” Nella said, launching into a speech that she’d undoubtedly heard many times before, judging by the furrow of her brow and the distance of her gaze as she recalled its words. “One day, the earth broke apart, opening a chasm to its depths that was known as the World Hearth. From the World Hearth, warmth emerged, and life bloomed and spread.”
“Hey, I know this story,” Vincent said. “I heard it in school when I was five years old, I think.”
“Hush and let me finish.” Nella frowned at Vincent before she continued. “But then Shadow emerged, dark and spiteful, hateful of life. It reached out and spewed its hatred and spite into the World Hearth, forever poisoning its warmth with Blight. And from that point on, the life and warmth that poured from the World Hearth was diseased and tainted with horror. It took the form of countless beasts that sought only to corrupt and devour flesh untouched by their impurity.”
That would be the Elemental Anathema, Zephyr thought silently, knowing better than to interrupt the ranger as she spoke.
“The Hero of Light rallied warriors and mages to his side, and together, they spoke to the oldest of living things, the ancient trees around the World Hearth,” Nella went on. “The Hero of Light came to an understanding with the ancient trees, who agreed to maintain a vigil upon the World Hearth and contain the Blight, allowing only pure life and warmth to pass through their ranks and wash across the world. They would be aided by the Hero’s companions.”
“The warriors among them would be known as rangers, and the mages would be named druids, wielders of Life magic.” Pride, bright and fierce, shone in Nella’s eyes as she spoke. She clenched her fist and thumped it against her chest. “And so the Blight Boundary was born, a covenant between the ancients and humanity. It is embodied in the Boundary Enchantment, through which no blight-tainted ether may flow, and it is enacted in the blood and toil of the rangers and druids, who put to rest any blight beasts that seek to spread their foulness into the world.”
