Dungeon of Niflheim

95 Chapter 95: Taking a blow from Rock

Frost felt a strong sense of danger, the hairs on his arm standing upright. He, Luna, and Leo managed to cover most of the journey by the time they heard the second sonic boom, but they were still several metres from reaching the exit.

Suddenly he heard in the distance Bastion roaring.

“Frost lookout!” Bastion couldn’t see past the smoke, so he shouted as loud as possible to get Frost’s attention, which worked just in time.

The moment he heard Bastion’s roar, Frost could sense Rock nearby. He rapidly turned around, but Rock was almost in striking distance, giving him very little time to prepare. His entire body tensed up as his eyes met Rock’s.

‘Shit!’ Relying on his instincts Frost prepared himself to face the threat. He grasped his glaive with both hands and positioned himself in front of Leo and Luna nudging them towards the exit with his elbow as he braced himself for battle.

The show will be on the other foot this time, Frost was now the underdog, no longer would he have an advantage in speed or strength.

“Tsk” Rock clicked his tongue in annoyance, Frost positioned himself directly in front, barring his path to Leo. He’d have to take care of him first before moving on.

His annoyance lasted but a moment before he realigned himself to strike against Frost instead. He raised up one of his axes above his head before rapidly bringing it down with great force.

Dooooooooon!

.....

The axe met Frost’s glaive with incredible strength, sending powerful vibrations through Frost’s arm.

‘Shit that was a heavy strike!’ Frost struggled to endure the blow while using both hands and that was just a single axe. His arms felt strained as they stubbornly endured, not allowing Rock’s axe to move any further.

“Hmph! Saved by your weapon!” Rock snarled in contempt as he brought his other axe to bare, this time swinging from the side all while continuing to force his other axe downward. His movements were incredibly quick, Frost had barely enough time to react, the difference in strength was quite substantial.

With what little time he did have he gathered as much of his ice chakra as possible and funnelled it towards his right arm, encasing it within a thick armour of ice.

Dangerously he removed his right hand from his glaive forcing his left to endure the entire downward force exhibited by Rock’s first axe. He moved his right hand covered in ice towards the impeding second strike attempting to use his protected arm as a pseudo shield. Not the best choice, but one that was quick and sure to protect from a serious injury at least.

At the same time, he jumped backwards slightly hoping to reduce the amount of force that he was about to bare by any means necessary.

Smash!

Rock’s second axe met with Frost’s ice covered hand and shattered its protection without much effort, but Frost’s method succeeded. The axe’s momentum was stopped, and the ice shattering prevented his arm from breaking alas it did hurt a great deal.

Frost ignored the pain signals his right arm was sending his way; he didn’t have time to be distracted. By moving backwards and removing one of his arms from his glaive, Rock’s first axe had a lot less resistance to contend with.

Rock smirked with glee as he redirected his axe downward with another dose of strength sending Frost and his glaive hurtling backward his axe smashing into the arena floor with his unopposed strike. He won this short exchange and it brought him great joy, seeing Frost’s handsome face wince in pain was incredibly satisfying so much so that he needed to do it again.

Rock slammed his feet against the ground as he leaped at the still reeling Frost. He crossed his arms and filled his axes with energy preparing to cast a skill towards his unguarded prey.

Frost panicked; Rock was quicker than expected. His ploy to be knocked backwards and generate some distance between them backfired. He was now unbalanced and would struggle to put up a worthwhile defence.

‘Shit!’ Frost inwardly cursed as he saw Rock charge up his axes in preparation for a skill. Images of the powerful beams of light he saw smash apart bits of the arena earlier filled his mind. How was he supposed to guard against that.

For a second, he felt the stench of death fill his body and subconsciously moved towards the talisman Maya had given him in case of emergencies but quickly erased those thoughts from his mind. He wouldn’t improve if he called for help every time he was outmatched, besides, he didn’t need to beat Rock just stall. Bastion would arrive in moments well at least he hoped he would.

Gritting his teeth Frost kicked off the ground and performed a backflip while at the same time summoning out his 2 star pykrete glaive he bought through the dungeon menu. Now that he had a peak 3 star or even possibly half step 4 star weapon there wasn’t much use for this weapon, but he held on to it just in case. One of the things he learned from the adventures he saw, they all had spare weapons, so he followed suit and thank goodness he did.

Utilising all he learned in glaive mastery, the moment he landed and milliseconds before Rock unleased his skill he slightly squatted and crossed his two glaives before him creating a perfect cross block.

“[Cross slash]!” A moment later Rock was upon him, his axes glowed with energy before a blue light escaped from each one generating a blue cross of light within the air that beamed its way towards Frost.

Frost stuck in his heels and braced himself for the impending impact, all distracting thoughts were put to one side, even the shocked gasps by Leo and Luna didn’t register. His breathing was calm, and his gaze focused. Subconsciously he summoned his ice chakra once again this time covering his glaives, he was ready.

Howwwwwwlllllll!

The cross of blue light released a grating howl as it barrelled into Frost’s glaives and was struggling to proceed but every moment the pressure on him grew stronger.

The ice chakra on his weapons was disintegrated at first contact and though Frost continually kneaded his mana to generate more, it wasn’t enough. His glaives were vibrating madly under the pressure and his arms felt as though they were holding up a mountain. His feet started to slide backwards ripping lines into the arena as he was forcibly pushed back but his focus didn’t falter, not for a second in fact, he felt good.

His blood was pumping, and his entire body felt on fire as he fought against this incredible weight. He was holding on, at least for the moment and something was starting to unravel in his mind, new knowledge coming to fruition.

Rock simply watched on in joy as he saw the pretty elf boy struggle against his cross slash skill, but his joy quickly turned to frustration and then to anger.

‘Why is he still standing?’ Rock didn’t have a lot of time, given Bastion’s strength his brother could only hold him down for so long that’s why he used a skill, ‘it should have bulldozed through this ant but here he still stands.’

His frustration turned to anger the moment he saw Frost smiling, it was also the same moment that Frost stopped being forced back, his skill and Frost’s defence had come to a stalemate with neither side coming out on top.

He felt insulted and anger filled his mind, he took his wariness away from the incoming Bastion and fully concentrated on killing the ant barring his way.

‘If one isn’t enough then how about two!’ Rock crossed his axes once again, filling them with energy to cast another cross slash.

Meanwhile with Frost information flooded his mind and body, his glaives suddenly felt lighter and easier to move, faster, more accurate and all around stronger and Knowledge about a technique involving glaives rushed towards the surface of his mind.

Frost smirked and his smile grew bigger, he finally achieved adept glaive mastery thus allowing him to withstand Rock’s skill but that wasn’t all. Given the situation and his newfound mastery he was also granted a skill, one in which would be perfect for this situation.

Not wishing to wait, Frost used the first skill he had ever gotten.

Energy from his body filled his glaives, it was difficult to describe, it felt similar to mana but more akin to his stamina itself being drained, a weird feeling.

He finished charging before Rock and shouted out the name of his new technique.

“[Shattering strike]!” As he spoke light filled the two glaives before they violently smashed downward utterly destroying Rock’s cross slash attack, sending the remnant pieces of skill light into the distance where they carved up more of the arena but away from Frost.

His new skill could shatter an attack whether that be a weapon or skill. It had very short range but packed a lot of oomph as just witnessed.

It was a defensive skill that destroyed the attacking object or skill with pure brute force.

‘The stamina drain wasn’t actually too bad.’ Thought Frost as he relished in the results of his first skill. Since the skill didn’t have to travel too far, he could use it again without much issue, but would Rock give him that much time.

Frost gazed at his opponent who’s face was scrunched up beyond belief as he witnessed his cross slash being destroyed by someone, he deemed unworthy of his attention. But that short interaction lasted but a moment before Rock shouted in anger.

“Bastard! Think you’re pretty hot shit being able to survive that attack then think again! Try this one on for size you godman pretty boy!” Suddenly Rock’s axes filled with light again but this time the light was red, blood red and his axes started to emit a wave of pressure.

Frost quickly detected the danger and braced himself once again preparing his new skill but was met with contempt.

“That’s not going to work this time asshole [Demon’s sun......]” The moment Rock was about to cast his skill and unleash its torment upon Frost he was interrupted.

“I don’t think so [Holmgang]!” Suddenly Bastion having forced Jin out of his way had clear line of sight towards Rock and with intense speed he used his own skill.

A chain of light whizzed through the air before wrapping around its target, Rock and dragging him against his will towards Bastion. Rock couldn’t even resist as he was lifted off his feet and dragged through the air, panic in his eyes as well as frustration. He was so close to killing the ant, all he needed was another blasted second, but he didn’t get it.

Bastion dragged Rock right towards him and swung down his axe on his capture, smashing him against the ground resulting in him spitting up blood but that was it, it’ll take a lot more than that to kill these two C-ranks it seemed. Even Jin who Bastion who had forcibly pushed back was already on his feet and charging towards him with his great sword. The fight was just beginning.

With Rock now where he belonged and Frost momentarily frozen in confusion, he once again heard Bastion shout.

“Get going I’ll handle these two!”

Brought out of his daze Frost nodded towards his saviour before turning backwards and leading Leo and Luna out of the arena. Their work in this area was done, they had to find Adam now.

However, Leo struggled in worry, he’d managed to catch sight of how Frost fared against Rock and was anxious about Bastion’s prospects but was quickly corrected by Frost as he forcibly dragged him through the doorway.

“That old dwarf will be fine, those two were weaker than he expected so there’s little to no chance of him dying.” Frost spoke with clenched fists as he struggled to get rid of the feeling that Rock’s next skill generated.

‘Demon something?’ He took note of it, he’d ask Maya later.

“What do you mean weaker than expected, Frost-senpai you barely lasted a couple seconds.” Leo lashed out forgetting his usual attitude when dealing with Frost.

Frost winced at his reply, he couldn’t deny that, but having it pointed out so clearly still hurt.

“Ah...sorry Frost-senpai” Leo got a pinching from Luna alerting him of what he just did so he apologised, he didn’t mean it like that.

“No need for that I am weaker after all.” Frost waved his hand to show that Leo said nothing wrong.

“Your uncle Bastion’s no weakling and besides, we’ve got other fish to fry.” Frost looked sternly into Leo’s eyes reminding him what they needed to do while Ryuu and Bastion held back Adam’s strongest force.