Thalion steered the skyship downward until he could spot the mountains below him. Now in his human form, he would still be unable to notice someone with his relatively low perception, but with his blood vision he should be able to see anyone trying to get close.
Thalion noticed something else once the mountains came into view. They were all growing mightier in one direction, which hopefully also meant that this was where the great storm lay. It was a fiftyâfifty guess, but he wouldnât get a better estimate than that. He decided to head toward the largest mountain and, with that decision made, let the skyship speed up while also rising again. Now that he knew the rough direction, he didnât want anyone to see him.
From time to time, he would need to check whether his course was correct, but the journey would take hours anyway. In the meantime, he wanted to work on his soulâand to silence the Sanguis Impera, he began placing metal plates on the main deck. Hopefully, they would be enough to stop the red crystal from burning through the skyship. If one of the plates started to melt, he would simply put both the crystal and the plate into his spatial ring and repeat the process with a diffrent plate. The skyship would repair itself, and even if it didnât, a bit of burned wood wouldnât make much of a difference. At some point, he would probably lose the skyship anyway, so a scorch mark hardly mattered.
The moment the crystal was placed on the plates, they began to warm, and the snow melted instantly. He was soaked now, but it didnât bother him nearly as much as it would have back on Earth. The heat was also bearable, and with the Sanguis Impera content to burn its vines, Thalion could focus on fortifying his soul and perhaps improving his essence blood as well.
These stages were massive, so he had time. With his current leaderboard points, he didnât need to hunt or gather anything besides the grand treasure. Even if the entire trial came after him, he felt completely relaxed, working on his soul and enjoying the peace. It probably wouldnât last long, but until then, he would savor it.
Most others would likely come to the same conclusion and move either higher or lower in search of treasures. As for beasts or other lifeforms, Thalion hadnât seen any during the short moments he had spent observing his surroundings.
After a good amount of time had passed, Thalion switched out the metal plates beneath the red crystal. When the Sanguis Impera retracted its vines, the sudden heat made Thalion wince. He then transformed into Eagly and shot downward. The skyship continued on its course while Thalion simply checked whether the direction was still correct before returning. As Eagly, he was far faster and more mobile. Additionally, he was much harder to spot and had higher perception. The chance of being scouted was far lower than if he had descended with the skyship.
After a quick observation, Thalion noticed that he needed to correct slightly to the left, but otherwise everything looked fine. It was fortunate that these ships were far easier to steer than the sailing ships back on Earth. After making the adjustment, he placed the red crystal back onto the metal plate and continued empowering his soul.
Every few hours, Thalion repeated the dive to correct the flight path. It seemed he was heading in the right direction, because the air steadily grew colder. Eventually, he could even see his own breath. The cold didnât bother him much. As Eagly, it could get uncomfortable, but in his human form he only noticed the temperature change faintly, especially with his bloodline. His essence blood was practically on fireâit would take a long time for him to freeze or truly feel the cold.
From time to time, he spotted other trial takers running or flying across the mountains below, but none seemed keen on flying high through the clouds. Instead, many of them entered caves along the mountainsides. They could have been hideouts or something similar, but Thalion wasnât sure. It seemed worthwhile, given how many people he saw investigating those tunnels.
Regardless, Thalion stuck to his plan. The grand treasures would be his. Everything else, he was willing to give up. A fair trade.
Time passed, and the air grew colder the farther he traveled. Eventually, it became difficult even for Eagly to dive downward, as his wings began to shiver from the cold. Thalion found it interesting how strongly the cold affected him, even with his regeneration. He had expected his healing to counteract the cold once it began affecting his muscles, but that wasnât the case.
After a little over thirty hours of travel, another dive proved especially difficult. Thalionâs wings were now shaking violently, and descending and climbing again had become extremely taxingâto the point where he considered switching to another form. He had already tested his other forms in the cold, and while they felt the temperature, it didnât hinder them nearly as much.
It was just as his eyes landed on a massive mountain aheadârising far higher than any surrounding peakâthat the attack happened.
The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
Thalion didnât feel even a sliver of danger as a half-meter-long ice spear struck the crystal embedded in his chest. The impact was so strong that all the air was forced from his lungs, flinging him through the air like a ragdoll. Thalion lost only a small portion of his health in the entire process. He had been luckyâthe spear had hit the crystal. Otherwise, it would have gone straight through his body, and that would have been close to a kill shot.
His danger sense remained completely silent, which unsettled him deeply. Until now, it had always warned him. How was it not reacting?
Thalion reacted quickly and tried to flap his wings, attempting a sharp curve to avoid a follow-up attackâbut that was when he noticed that his wings wouldnât move at all. Cold spread outward from the crystal into his body, freezing him completely, and panic surged as he began to fall like a stone.
First of allâwhy hadnât he been warned? There hadnât even been a strange feeling beforehand. And secondâwhy was the cold spreading like this? The most disturbing part wasnât that it was spreading, but how. The power was flowing through the crystal in his chest. The storm crystal was filled with wind and lightning; no energy should have been able to enter it, let alone spread through his body.
A sluggish question passed through Thalionâs mindâshould he shapeshift or not?
Damage always transferred between forms, and he couldnât remove the ice lodged in the crystal. The ice should have had little effect on his human form; his bloodline should have been strong enough to counter the cold. He had switched forms while injured before and had never feared losing one.
But this was different.
He was constantly fighting the cold, trying to force electricity through his body while activating all his skills, but far less happened than it should have. Some skills didnât activate at all. That was when Thalion realized he had to risk losing Eagly to survive.
He was still hundreds of meters above the ground when he made the decision and triggered the shapeshift skill.
Nothing happened.
Thalion fell several more meters, and real panic set in. He tried to take out an escape tokenâthe last good one he had bought in the tutorial. That failed as well. He kept falling. His skills were locked or heavily dampened. Instead of the powerful lightning storm that should have erupted around him, only a few weak sparks danced across his feathers.
Thalionâs mind raced.
An attack that wasnât recognized by his title and could suppress his skillsâthis screamed
chosen
. Someone with an absurdly powerful bloodline.
His eyes scanned the surroundings as he desperately tried to fuel his skills with mana, to make
anything
happen.
Then he spotted the attackersâand confusion hit him all over again.
Two elves stood on a ledge carved into the side of the massive mountain. One was a tall woman; the other was a young girl. The girl was happily smiling and jumping up and down while the woman tried to calm her.
Their skin was a pale blue, as if antifreeze flowed through their veins.
The real anomaly, however, was the girl.
Whenever Thalion focused on someone using his title, he always felt
something
, even if it was faint. But from the young girlâwho was currently cheeringâhe felt nothing. To his title, she didnât exist at all.
The second strange thing was the adult elf. When Thalion concentrated on her, she felt genuinely happyâno greed, no hunger, nothing of the sort. For someone who had just taken down the first place on the leaderboard, he had expected something far more predatory.
Through the howling wind and his sluggish thoughts, Thalion couldnât make out what the girl was shouting at the older elf. The woman simply nodded while the child bounced excitedly in front of her.
Then the girl turned around, looked directly at Thalion, and stretched out a hand.
The next moment, Thalion felt as if a giant hand had grabbed him.
It seized his form itself, icy energies freezing him from the inside as he was dragged toward the girl. The initial jerk was violent enough that Thalion would have wincedâif his beak hadnât already been frozen shut.
âSo that girl must have a super-powerful bloodline, and by the demeanor of her and the older one, it doesnât look like theyâre trial takers,â Thalion thought while trying to use
Identify
. It worked no better than his other skills.
The question now was: what did the girl want from him?
Did they know Iâm a trial taker? Why would they even want to capture a beast? Do they want to eat me?
Thought after thought raced through Thalionâs mind as he drifted toward the girl. In the end, he came to the conclusion that it didnât matter anyway. He couldnât move nor use his skills. Being this powerless didnât feel good, but it was probably just part of life in the system. There was always a bigger fish, and being in the wrong place at the wrong time could be fatal.
Thalion couldnât even say what he would have done differently. The snowfall was still heavy, and even with his high perception he wouldnât have seen the attack coming unless he had already been looking in that direction. That his title hadnât worked was simply terrible luck. Being more careful wouldnât have changed much. He had already been cautious, only diving down far enough to adjust the shipâs course. The risk had been minimal. Hiding completely or steering blindly couldnât have been the solution either.
âWell, at least the little fellow is happy,â Thalion thought, a mix of amusement and sadness washing over him as he accepted that this was likely his end.
Couldâve died a million other ways. At least it wasnât to someone like Kael or an elven chosen.
The way the two interacted gave him the impression that the girl was at least somewhat alright in the head. To be fair, with elves you could never be sure, but that was the feeling he got as he was pulled closerâclose enough for what he expected to be the killing blow.
Instead of killing him, the girl grabbed him by the neck, flipped him onto his back, and in the next moment his vision was swimming as she jumped up and down.
âLook, look! Itâs so beautifulâand it even has a crystal in its chest! Please, can I keep it?â the girl pleaded, bouncing excitedly.
Now not only Thalionâs vision blurred, but his thoughts did as well.
She wants to do WHAT?