“Well, it sounds like he did… at least for a minute.” I drew my dueling cane with my left hand. I wasn’t as good at using it with my left, but I could manage, and the demi-gauntlet would interfere with using it in my right.
“True,” Jin admitted.
“Going left.” I stepped left and opened fire with the cane, feeling the sharp pull of mana through my hand. It was a familiar sensation, as invigorating as it was painful.
Only half of my blasts landed. I’d expected a rush, but it started leaping in a zig-zag pattern to avoid the assault, showing more intelligence than I expected. Spines descended from the air as it approached. I flicked the switch on the cane’s hilt, side-stepped, and deflected the first spine with the blade.
The creature hissed, the second spine missing me as it winced at the impact of a bullet against its side. I jumped over a sweeping claw, then danced back as it attempted to gore me, jamming my blade toward the bullet-hole that Jin had put in its skull. I missed as it continued to move, losing my grip on the cane as it impacted an undamaged portion of the skull. The weapon went flying to the side, further gunshots piercing the creature’s hide as it reared up on its hind legs.
I didn’t like the look of that.
I was already jumping to the side when it slammed its feet down and breathed fire in a vast arc, blasting nearly a quarter of the room. Even outside the main arc of the flames, my barrier still visibly manifested to protect me from the rising heat.
It was still spitting out the blast of incendiary breath when I rolled beneath it, grabbed the hilt of my sword, and pulled.
The saber’s blade was sharp, but I wasn’t pulling at the right angle to make a good cut.
I had something a little different in mind: cracking some ice.
I put my full weight into it as I pulled, feeling something give in the creature’s side as the section of frozen hide began break apart.
The creature howled, dragging me along the floor as it rushed toward a wall, one of its massive legs landing on top of one of mine with a crunch.
I slipped free, sword in hand, as a section of frozen hide gave way.
The creature, still solid, slammed into the wall a few meters ahead of me. At last, it lay still.
It was only in reflection afterward that I realized that I’d almost made the thing collapse on top of me… which would have brought a swift and uncomfortable end to my test.
As it was, I couldn’t feel my left leg, the one it had stomped on as it retreated.
“Jin…” I mumbled, a spark of cold surging through my leg, “Make sure it’s dead.”
He walked over to me, reaching out a hand expectantly. Nearly incapacitated by the spreading feeling of numbness, it took me a moment before I understood what he wanted.
Oh, right.
I flipped the sword around, offering him the hilt. He accepted it, walked over to the monster, and stabbed it a dozen times.
“Dead,” he pronounced, and walked back over.
I breathed a sigh of relief, pushing myself into a seated position.
“You going to get up?” he asked mildly.
“I’m not sure I can. Thing stepped on me while I was under it.”
“That was a stupid move.”
I nodded, wincing. “Yeah, I guess so.”
“Worked, though,” he allowed. “And you gave me an idea.”
He walked over to one of the last two unlit torches and swiped my sword into the globe.
A moment later, the blue-white glow of frost manifested within the sphere. Jin smirked in satisfaction, moving to the last torch as I ineffectively massaged my leg.
Another flick of the blade — Jin clearly knew how to handle the thing — and the last torch was lit.
The cage in the center of the room rumbled, and then lifted, an unseen hook pulling it until it contacted the ceiling. The cage remained in place, hovering over the statue, but there was sufficient room to access the things within it now.
Jin walked over to me next. “The pain is in your head. Shake it off.”
“Uh, trying.” The best I managed was to push myself into a crawl, getting me a little closer to the statue. “Anything in there aside from the key?”
He shook his head. “No.” He looked down at me, sighed, and laid the sword down on the floor. “You’re no good to me like this.” He reached into a pouch at his side, withdrawing a flask, and then handed it to me. “Drink, it’ll heal you.”
I didn’t know if a healing potion would work on illusory damage, but it was probably worth trying. I opened the flask and took a drink. The liquid inside tasted foul, nothing like any healing potion I’d ever tried. I made a face. A whirring sensation started in my head as I handed the flask back to him.
I felt weirdly warm in the aftermath, and the leg did feel a bit better. “Thanks.” I fumbled to pick up my sword, sheathed it, and pushed myself to my feet.
The numbness was still there, but it felt distant and weaker, so I managed to stumble my way over to the pool. I started to reach down to the water, but Jin slapped my hand away.
“Wait.”
I turned, tilting my head at him in confusion.
He tossed an expended bullet casing into the water.
I watched as it disintegrated a moment later.
Oh.
Not water.
“Well, that complicates things,” I mumbled.
“Yes.”
I considered my original plan of clearing some of the water with my gauntlet, but the key was at the bottom of the pool, and the water from the goddess’ hands was flowing right on top of it.
I drew my sword again. “Might be able to freeze it.”
“Good way to break your magic sword.”
“You think the acid is that potent?”
He shrugged. “Just saying I wouldn’t risk losing a permanent magic item on an exam.”
There was wisdom in that. I waved the sword close to the water without touching it, hoping the aura of frost would be sufficient to freeze the liquid, but nothing visible happened.
I could feel the weapon’s aura, though. Not the chill consequence of its presence — the aura itself felt tangible in my mind, much like how I could briefly feel the mana in my dueling cane before it was released.
Why was that? I couldn’t feel the power from my demi-gauntlet or shield sigil while they were inactive. Was it because the sword’s aura was a passive effect and always on? Was it subtly drawing from my own mana at a rate too slow for me to detect, connecting me with the cold?
I wouldn’t know without further testing or research, but at the moment, that wasn’t what was important. It gave me a new option.
I leveled the tip of the blade, putting it an inch from the waterfall’s edge, reached out into the aura… and shoved.
Snap.
The aura lashed out with a piercing thrust of rime that breached the waterfall. It left a blade-shaped wedge of ice frozen against the statue’s surface, the still-flowing water above splashing against it and forcing me to step back to avoid the droplets.
Now that was interesting.
“Hm.” Jin looked bemused. “I was not aware you could do that.”
“New trick.” I smirked. “Time to get us a key. Take a few steps back?”
He obliged.
I swung the sword this time, feeling the aura whip along with the arc of the weapon. As the weapon traveled alongside the waterfall, I pushed again. The water froze as aura cut deeply into it, leaving a crescent-shaped platform to mark the blade’s passage.
The newly-frozen section was more effective, but the water still struck the top of it and flowed across it into the pool below. Considering for a moment, I changed my approach, freezing water just where it appeared in the hands of the goddess next. The flow of water ceased. I thought I could hear the ice cracking in her hands, most likely the result of pressure building from water behind it.