The cold wind of the Snowy Mountain wrapped around Kai's cheeks like a gale.
Every time he drew near the Gelu Drake, it was as though death itself were blowing in to bully him.
......Tremendous pressure.
Enough that he could not believe Adrian had endured this pressure alone and fought.
Kai could not hide the tremor that came over him at the Gelu Drake's overwhelming presence.
And so, the moment the drake fixed one eye on Kai, Kai was wrapped in a terror that seemed to freeze him to the soul.
In that desperate moment.
"Get your head straight!!"
At Adrian's thunderclap of a shout, Kai's mind snapped clear.
'That just now...'
It is Dragon Fear.
The aura of terror a dragon possesses.
Going past simple fear to deliver overwhelming despair, it is something no life on this continent can evade.
The dragon is the mightiest being, reigning over all creation.
Before a dragon every being is nothing but prey.
Kai was no exception.
And yet Adrian was not so.
Adrian, crouched low, was sprinting fast and once again aiming for the Gelu Drake's flank.
He did not so much as flinch at the Dragon Fear.
However degraded a Dragon Fear it might be, how on earth...
The Gelu Drake swung its tail hard and threw Adrian off.
And then the Gelu Drake fell back.
Kai moved to pursue the Gelu Drake.
And at that moment, Adrian's shout drove into Kai's ears.
"Stop!!"
Kai's movement halted dead.
He did not ask why.
Because Kai knew as well.
The air of death creeping up from the Gelu Drake as it fell back.
......Something is wrong.
Before long the Gelu Drake drew a great breath, and a bluish chill began to gather in that enormous maw.
"It's a Dragon Breath!"
Adrian shouted, and Kai's eyes flew wide.
Dragon Breath.
Meaning the breath of a dragon, the name was given because energy or matter is expelled from the mouth as though breathing it out.
It was generally known that monsters of the dragon Family could use it.
More precisely, monsters possessing a dragon's genetic factors.
And it was an 'authority' usable only by those possessing dragon genetic factors in strength.
'It can use a Breath...?'
Which meant the Gelu Drake possessed that many of a dragon's genetic factors.
There was a reason it was called the Master of the Snowy Mountain.
Of course it was nothing to compare with a true Dragon Breath.
From the look of it, it did not seem to be something usable carelessly either.
Had it been, there is no reason it would not have used it long since.
That is, the Gelu Drake has no margin either.
It could not be certain of victory against Adrian and Kai, and in the end the Gelu Drake had staked everything on one throw.
With this once, who is predator and who is prey will be decided.
And the Breath the Gelu Drake is expelling now.
It is a blade-blue chill befitting the name Gelu-.
That is, it was an Ice Breath.
However degraded a Breath, take it directly and most things are erased without leaving a trace.
So it has to be dodged.
That is not a kind of thing that can be blocked or answered.
"Right now—!"
Kai shouted, but in the end he could not complete the words.
The moment the Gelu Drake opened the maw holding the Ice Breath.
Because Kai was able to realise how foolish a thought dodging had been.
The air around them froze abruptly.
The sky darkened in an instant, as though a blizzard were rolling in.
Frost of chill spread out, and—
KRAAAAAAAA!!!
A pure white breath of ice poured out like a waterfall.
The force of ice, taking on a cold bluish light, froze everything it touched.
The moment it touched that chill, time seemed to stop and the thing froze in place at once.
The powerful chill covers the Snowy Mountain and freezes it.
Where the Ice Breath passed, everything was frozen, as though an enormous river of ice were being formed.
......It is a different order of thing from an avalanche.
This chill, powerful enough to take life in an instant, was surpassing even great nature.
It cannot be dodged.
But can it be blocked?
Kai hurriedly raised Aura and protected his body.
And even so his whole body trembled like aspen leaves.
Kai simply thought that was only because of the chill from the Ice Breath.
And at that very moment.
Adrian abruptly stepped in front of Kai.
***
KRAAAAAAAAA—!!!
The chill of the Ice Breath sweeping over my whole body.
Almost before I could cross both arms to guard my face, my skin froze.
◆Hardened Skin [D] resists the Ice Breath!
◆Hardened Skin [D] resists the Ice Breath!
Translucent messages surfaced before my eyes without pause.
Every time they did, the chill eased for an instant.
But even so.
Hardened Skin [D] alone could not block the chill of an Ice Breath.
CRACK, CRACKLE!
In the blink of an eye ice crystals spread up my body. Ice that began at my fingertips wrapped my arms and legs and then my whole body in an instant.
Have you ever seen a person freeze rapidly, by any chance?
Probably not.
Because such a thing rarely happens.
And so most people think of it simply as becoming an 'ice statue.'
They think of it as being trapped in ice, and imagine you could break out easily by some method like melting the ice.
But that is by no means so.
When a person actually freezes, it is not only the exterior of the body that freezes but the interior as well.
Meaning the blood and bodily fluids freeze along with it.
When blood and bodily fluids that were liquid freeze, they harden and sharpen, and their volume increases as well.
It is the same as ice blades being created in every blood vessel in the body.
By which the blood vessels and cell membranes are all torn apart.
In other words, my blood vessels and cell membranes were being shredded right now.
Only.
◆Temporarily blocking the sensory nerves!
◆Using the skill 'Regeneration [B-]' to regenerate the damaged body!
The instant the blood vessels and cell membranes tore and were destroyed, they simply regenerated.
I was simply blocking the sensory nerves and holding the pain down.
Above all.
'Compared to the Monarch of Frost...! This is nothing...!!'
The frost-chill the Monarch of Frost, Seraphia, gave off.
Compared to that, this was truly nothing at all.
Seraphia's chill was an absolute cold that could not be healed even by the Saintess's miracles, and that an Ice Troll's regeneration like this could not begin to touch.
The horrifying, dreadful chill that took the Hero Ian's left arm.
Compared to that, the Ice Breath pouring over me now was no chill but practically 'warmth.'
CRACK, CRACKLE!
My frozen body turned blue by degrees.
Degraded or not, it is a dragon's authority.
I was holding on somehow with Regeneration [B-], but that was as far as it went.
Holding on is the limit.
Nor is the time I can hold on very long.
Above all, the damage I can deal the Gelu Drake is limited. The one who can deal the Gelu Drake a fatal wound is......
"Kai—!!!"
The moment I shouted, Kai kicked off the spot and leapt.
Thanks to my blocking the Ice Breath head-on, Kai's condition was fine.
Protecting his body with Aura, Kai escaped the Ice Breath's area in an instant.
Before long the deep blue Aura held in Kai's sword shimmered like an aurora.
Kai's sword, as though it would cut anything in the world.
The direction that sword was heading was...... the Gelu Drake's heart.
"Aim for the neck!!"
The moment I shouted urgently, Kai hurriedly twisted the sword's trajectory.
A conversion from a thrust to a cut.
At that sudden conversion the force carried in the sword weakened.
***
SLASH—!
A vivid sensation transmitted through the sword's tip.
But it was shallow.
......And so it did not sever.
Had he aimed for the heart as originally intended, could he have killed it?
Well.
He cannot be certain. Honestly, he is sceptical.
With a drake's great body of over ten metres, driving a sword as far as the heart is very difficult.
Therefore Adrian's judgement to aim for the neck was the best and finest judgement.
In a situation urgent by the moment, Kai too had made a wrong judgement.
But Adrian maintained his cool even in that desperate situation.
KREEEEEEEK—!!!
The Gelu Drake let out a dreadful scream.
He had not severed the neck in a single stroke.
But a half-severed neck is unmistakably a fatal wound.
By which the Ice Breath poured no more.
But it was not dead yet.
Therefore the fight was not yet over.
Adrian is currently unable to fight. Kai has to do it.
......Can he?
Kai readjusted his grip on his sword.
...He has to.
He wrung the Aura of his whole body into the blade.
Just as Kai was about to kick off the ground, in that moment.
Adrian leapt in like a gale.
Kai's eyes flew open wide enough to tear.
Adrian's body had unmistakably been frozen by the Ice Breath.
His whole body should by rights have gone past freezing into being torn to shreds.
'How in the world......?'
Beyond Kai's eyes, mixed with bewilderment and question.
Adrian was chewing on something.
The Gelu Drake was considerably bewildered as well.
It had not expected in the slightest that Adrian would leap in.
By which the Gelu Drake, pouring its whole attention into Kai, could not respond to Adrian.
Adrian mounted the Gelu Drake's back in an instant.
The Gelu Drake's long-stretched claws and teeth trembled faintly, as though convulsing.
Its tail instinctively drooped low and grazed the ground.
A low, uneasy growl leaked out.
There was no longer any confidence as a predator held in that sound.
Nor was there the intimidation of the Master of the Snowy Mountain.
It instinctively realises the fact that it is no longer the hunter but the hunted.
The one struck directly by the Ice Breath had been Adrian.
And yet the one whose whole body was tense and frozen was the Gelu Drake.
By which.
The relationship of predator and prey had become plain.
The predator is Adrian.
And the prey is......
The Gelu Drake.
Adrian forced his hand into the Gelu Drake's half-severed neck.
With a brutish grip he seized the Gelu Drake's neck bone.
And then, with all his strength, he tore the neck bone out.
CRRRRUNCH—!!
That was the moment the Master of the Snowy Mountain finally went to its knees, and......
THUUD!
It was also the moment a new Master of the Snowy Mountain was born.