Chapter 520: A Cold Splash of Reality.
[Humanize (Moderate)] inflicted on [Young Sunfang Dragon, Hestia Atsuko Kargryxmor]
“I thought I could rest easy, knowing Vifi was there to guard you, my lady, especially on Iceskale, but it seems like your bad luck is evolving. I should have realized this when you got attacked even in Iceskale!” Tasianna stated the moment we safely arrived back in Iceskale after yesterday’s disastrous encounter. Clapping her hands, two dragonewt maids approached Vifi and me to put a warm coat around us. “My lady, I demand you to bring the twins and I with you no matter where you go, from this point on. It doesn’t matter if you are out shopping, training, or wanting to return home, I will accompany you, yes? If you wish to go somewhere, I wish you to tell me.”
Tasianna’s forced smile was unable to hide the worry in her eyes, making them squint as if she was glaring at me. Maybe she was, considering the amount of trouble she missed out on lately, or maybe she was starting to lose sleep. Kargryx was a dangerous place, especially for a young rank B like me, but saying stuff like “it is what it is” would be totally inconsiderate of Tasianna’s emotions and entirely miss the point of her care for me.
“Considering what happened, you’re a permanent party member now, whether you wanted it or not,” I said with a deflated sigh, making Tasianna smile for real this time. “I can still feel the frostbite around my scales from yesterday’s blizzard.”
The dragon support I called using the subspace arrived around midnight or so, consisting of Siegragxus, as he promised, and a few Nordor dragoons. We actually had to stay inside the cave for a bit as it was still storming, and nobody wanted to risk me getting frostbite while flying on Sieg’s back, and this wasn’t even mentioning how I had to defrost my body and scales during all that.
It took until morning for things to warm up. Survival shows already looked hard, but being in the middle of a blizzard, trapped inside a cave was kinda scary, admittedly. Although my core hadn’t regrown at this point, it still felt like my core wouldn’t be enough and I needed far more time spent inside our home’s basement to prepare my body for the upcoming expedition.
In a way, that meant that the scouting mission was a success. I finally had an idea of the kinda cold I had to deal with. My body could now simulate the pain as a reference; that pure, unbridled, destructive natural disaster unlike the “kind caress” of the blizzard underneath our home.
“I would suggest you level your [Ice Resistance] up to level ten, if possible,” Sieg said after transforming back into his dragonewt form. “I did have Tasianna warn you to not enter the glaciers.”
“We didn’t!” I protested. “We were on the edge of it before a blizzard came in, summoned by a group of elementals and that ape I told you about.”