Chapter 670: The Trap

Once the beasts were right on top of the Frost Stalker corpses, Moon gave the signal.

At the same instant, he cast Frost Pillar, again and again in quick succession, and a semi-ring of ice pillars erupted from the snow behind the pack, cutting off their retreat toward the spire.

The Arctic Fire-Prowler broke from its hiding position and rushed in, steam boiling off its hide as it closed on the group. And Moon dropped his Camouflage, appearing out of empty air twenty meters from the beasts, sword already in his hand.

The Grizzlers reeled in confusion.

Pillars where there had been open snow, blocking their view from the spire and a human where there had been nothing. And all around them, Moon’s team surged up out of the drifts in a loose circle, weapons drawn, immediately moving to surround the pack and pen it in. Moon’s own controlled Grizzlers, which had circled wide from their earlier position, thundered in from the flanks, seconds away and closing.

"Let’s dispose of them quick," Moon called out as he activated a silencing rune that would cover the area, ensuring no noise escaped during the battle.

He didn’t waste a moment.

Lightning crackled down the length of his sword.

"Ice Storm."

The blizzard erupted across the pack, icicles tearing into them from above, and the slowing effect sank into their limbs, dragging at their movements, robbing the durable beasts of what little speed they had.

Whoosh!

Moon dashed forward, closing the distance in just moments before raising his sword to strike the closest one.

Tempest Symphony flowing through his strikes, phantom blades layering over every real cut so that each swing landed as three, and the Grizzlers couldn’t tell the true strike from the false ones until his sword was already through their hide.

The team hit the pack from all sides.

Vela anchored the western edge, her hammer crashing into a Grizzler’s skull, staggering the massive beast and holding it in place while Marek’s shield bash caved its flank. Kayn flowed between two of them, his twin blades carving lines faster than the slow beasts could turn, his mobility multiplied by the Ice Storm dragging at the beasts. Nina pressed the eastern flank, and Theo worked the gaps, appearing behind a Grizzler to bury a dagger in the base of its skull before vanishing again.

Elsa loosed arrows from range, each shaft finding an eye or a joint, and the Frost Pillars Moon had planted fired autonomously, ice spears punching into the pack’s rear ranks, pinning beasts in place, breaking their footing so the melee fighters could finish them.

The Arctic Fire-Prowler showed why it was a true predator to the arctic beasts.

Its attacks tore into the Grizzlers, flame pouring from its jaws and washing over the ice-affinity beasts, and where the fire touched them their frozen hides cracked and their flesh seared.

A Grizzler that turned on Kayn caught a gout of the Prowler’s flame across its face and reeled back blind for a moment.

Kayn did not waste chance he was provided, spinning in his place, his blades opening its throat before it managed to recover. Blood gushed out of the Arctic Grizzler’s neck like a fountain, before stopping shortly after as the Grizzler froze the wound.

Kayn frowned but did not complain. He had seen these beasts get taken down before, they weren’t invincible, he just needed to land enough strikes to kill them.

Another that bore down on Vela was intercepted mid-charge. She turned her head to see who saved her, and it was the Prowler slamming into its side and dragging it to the snow, jaws closing on its neck in a burst of fire.

The fire beast moved through the fight under Moon’s commands, protecting his teammates, gutting the very species it had evolved to hunt.

Moon’s controlled Grizzlers arrived just seconds after the fight broke up, hitting the pack from behind, and now the local Grizzlers found themselves fighting their own kind, shocked to see that the beasts tearing into them wore the same hide.

The Frost pillars did their job perfectly well, making it difficult for the Grizzler’s to retreat, whilst also continuously firing at them, dealing damage and annoying them greatly.

Moon moved through the center of it all, his sword a blur of lightning and phantom strikes, dropping Grizzler after Grizzler, and the notifications flickered at the edge of his vision faster than he could read them.

Within minutes, the pack was broken, more than twenty Arctic Grizzlers dead in the churned red snow, and not a sound of it had carried far enough for the white spire’s commander to notice.

Moon lowered his sword, his breath coming a little harder than usual, and looked out toward the spire in the distance.

The horde hadn’t noticed a thing. The white spire stood tall and pale against the ash sky, its beasts still clustered at the base, completely oblivious to the fact that they had just lost a major chunk of their force out in the snow.

"Well done, everyone. You all did great."

Moon’s eyes moved across his team, most of them sprawled in the snow, chests heaving, pulling in long ragged breaths after the brutal pace of the fight. Twenty-plus Arctic Grizzlers in a matter of minutes had taken everything they had.

Marek dragged himself up and began casting healing spells on the others despite his own exhaustion, green light spreading from fighter to fighter. The battle hadn’t come free, several of them had been hit, bruised, cut and battered by the durable beasts, but nothing that Marek’s healing and a health potion couldn’t deal with.

The injuries slowly closed one by one.

"How," Nina managed between broken breaths, staring at Moon like he was a monster. "How are you still standing there like it’s nothing? That fight took everything out of me."

Moon smiled.

"I do a lot of cardio at home."

Nina’s mind went somewhere it shouldn’t have, and her face flushed pink, the cold environment doing nothing to hide it. She looked away quickly and busied herself with a healing potion, muttering something under her breath.