Chapter 345: Trap

Translator: imperfectluck Editor: Pranav

The snow seemed to have no intentions of stopping. These two individuals, who were both at the peak of ice magic, had met the most difficult opponents—in ice magic—they’d ever met. To their astonishment, they both discovered that the attacks they were the proudest of seemed to be completely ineffective. It was as if both were immune to the other’s attacks.

The bone giant Mars was pounding the earth, his heavy fists as quick as lightning despite the bulk of his colossal body. He would pierce right through Zero, but each time the result was the same: it was as if he was hitting nothing but the reflection of the moon in water. Zero would simply flicker and then vanish, reappearing in a nearby location.

“Absolute immunity to physical attacks…”

I tossed an ice ball which promptly exploded, sending icicles flying everywhere. These icicles transformed into ice birds—or ice bridges—and there was even a white-bearded old man sitting on a sleigh pulled by reindeer, together with a naughty child chasing after him, demanding presents… My foundational magic of ice sculpting allowed me to draw anything I imagined in the air. It was impossible to dodge these icicles that behaved just like real animals… But the result was the same as the physical attacks from earlier. They simply passed right through Zero, without the sensation of having hit anything at all.

“Complete immunity to ice magic. No, judging by how I also infused Holy Light into my attacks and there still wasn’t any effect, her immunity is at an even higher level—complete immunity to all energy attacks…”

This ancient ghost continued to make an effort to avoid and dodge the ice dragon that was chasing after her. It would seem that the Frigid Nightmares’ special talent of being able to directly damage souls was effective against her. However, the huge power level difference between them meant it was absolutely impossible for Erebella to catch up.

Still, Zero was kept busy by Erebella, and could only watch as Mars did as he pleased on the ground. All her high-level undead subordinates that she likely worked hard at accumulating over the years were now transforming into nothing more than ice sculptures—of course, some moved so slowly they became nothing but food for my newly-born undead creature.

Zero shot through the sky like a meteor, transforming every place she passed into an area of extremely low temperature. Large amounts of ice and snow rushed at me like a vicious ocean tidal wave, yet she was unable to shatter my seemingly light armor of ice.

“Although she’s almost invulnerable, is changing the temperature her only method of attack…?”

I was observing my opponent, while my opponent was also observing me. I figured that Zero was the most confused right now about how her low temperature ice magic didn’t even affect my summoned undead creature, on top of not being able to affect me.

Duels between high-level archmages were typically as boring as this one. Take risks to have the first move, testing each other, defending, learning the enemy’s attacks, attacking again, additional testing, and slowly learning about each other’s aces while fighting each other. Archmages would attempt to understand the special nature of their opponent’s powers and the foundations of how they worked in order to find a weakness. And once all preparations were complete, when the archmage was certain that he or she would win, only then would they finally attack all-out for the critical blow.

Of course, this type of situation could only occur between two powerful individuals at similar levels. Otherwise, if there was a power level difference, the stronger one would only need to suppress the weaker with higher-level magic.

By now, I had pretty much figured out what was going on.

It was common knowledge that the Undead Emperors had been exiled by the mortal plane itself. In such a situation, it was impossible for her to be at her full power while in the mortal plane. In that case, she could only be an existence similar to an incarnation, and from pondering over her condition where she appeared to exist here but also not, I made an educated guess.

“She’s nothing more than an astral projection. According to the mortal plane’s judgement, she isn’t even here. Not a single person is able to attack someone who doesn’t exist, which is why she can obtain near invulnerability. However, the cost for this is that someone who doesn’t exist is also unable to perform any targeted attacks. All she can do here is use her ability to steal heat to create extremely low temperatures and change the environment around her astral projection. She’s unable to attack on her own!”

“…Roland, you’re being looked down upon.”

I found it impossible to counter Harloys’ words. Intending to deal with me with only an astral projection? That was obviously looking down on me. But looking at it from another angle, perhaps she was only here to gather information on me. While astral projections indeed lacked attack power, their near invulnerability was also very difficult to deal with. It appeared as if she couldn’t lose from the very start.

“Hah, how can there possibly be true invulnerability in this world? Allow me to tell my senior that the times have changed, and that she shouldn’t bring out these dated techniques anymore.”

“How specifically are you going to do that?”

“By waiting.”

“Waiting? What, is she going to self-destruct if you wait long enough?”

“That’s right.”

“Haha, do you really think that it’s so easy for an Undead Emperor to self-destruct? Or…”

Harloys didn’t finish her sentence, because Zero’s astral projection in the air suddenly shook and fell downwards. Although she soon recovered her balance, her shocked and confused expression revealed that she didn’t comprehend the reason she had taken an attack in the first place. Yet, it was indeed true that she had suffered an invisible attack, which confused her greatly.

“How did you do it?”

“Heh, I had a marvelous plan… Forget it, I won’t explain it as you wouldn’t understand.”

“Impossible! I’m Harloys the All-Knowing; how can there possibly be any magic I don’t understand! Just what did you do?”

“Have you taken high school physics classes? Do you know the Law of Energy Conservation? Have you graduated from high school? All-Knowing? I think you’re nothing more than an illiterate teacher without a single certificate… Stop biting me, have you ever seen a sword that can bite its owner? Fine, fine, I’ll explain it for you later, so could you please work hard for me for now? Go! I choose you, Harloys!”

The Pokéball—er—magic sword sliced through the air. However, its target wasn’t the ghost in the air; instead, it sped towards the few Myth-ranked Winter Demons alive and struggling within Mars’ hands. High-level existences part of an Undead Emperor’s personal army definitely wouldn’t be easy-to-come-by weaklings. Since they were strong enough to have survived for so long in such circumstances, not even an Undead Emperor would be willing to freely sacrifice them.

And, as I expected, Zero arced elegantly through the air and created another large area of extreme low temperature, causing countless ice pillars to form. And amongst her ice pillars were all sorts of snowballs, snow mountains, and large pieces of ice.

She discovered that extreme low temperatures were ineffective against me, so she decided to start using physical attacks? And in order to increase the attack power and difficulty of dodging her attacks, she even made her pieces of ice into all sorts of strange shapes, but…

“Damn, this suddenly makes me recall a really old game…”

“…Whack-a-Mole?”

This situation caused Harloys to have a rather bad thought, but she was off the mark.

“Tetris!”

Fine, I suppose that both games were about smashing things from above. One game depended on your speed and reaction, while the other required logical processing, but considering the fact that both games were about smashing things down from above, there wasn’t much of a difference…

“Circle, triangle, square. How am I supposed to put these pieces together? Are you intending to kill those with obsessive-compulsive disorder?”

[That’s enough out of you. Nobody’s forcing you to put the pieces together here, and even if you put them together in a line they won’t automatically disappear! System Notification: Don’t you agree that my commenting service is excellent as always? 5 Justice Points have been deducted.]

“Nobody wanted you to comment at all!”

Although I looked quite unseemly as I dodged these heavy objects, I still smiled victoriously. That was because I noticed how Zero’s complexion was becoming worse and worse. It seemed her own power was taking worse and worse of a toll on her body.

Her own power? Yep, actually, right after I detected that her true method of attack was to rob the heat in the air, I already placed a trap for her. And after fighting each other with magic for so long, it would appear that this trap had finally been activated.

“Stealing the heat? Then where did all the stolen heat go? This is far too unscientific!”

To be honest, I never could understand just where the heat stolen by ghosts would disappear off to. But, in the world of Eich, the Law of Energy Conservation wasn’t in effect. The stolen heat would simply mysteriously disappear somewhere.

It was apparent that this world where magic existed was an unscientific one. Perhaps magic wasn’t even the biggest unscientific culprit—when it came to the myriad racial talents, even magic theory was unable to explain some of the more powerful ones.

“Well, let’s at least make my world a more scientific one.”

Frigidwinter Earth was my personal world. Its natural laws were based on my own beliefs of how worlds should be constructed. In my world, I could create the Absolute Coldest Ice that didn’t seem magical to the outside world. Naturally, I would also be able to make even magic become more scientific.

The Law of Energy Conservation was a basic law of physics that I understood well enough. Since Zero had entered my world, she would need to obey the basic laws of my world.

The moment I used Frigidwinter Earth to envelop her Soul World of ice, she had already stepped into my trap. According to the natural laws of my world, she could still steal heat as she pleased. However, this heat wouldn’t just magically disappear on its own. Just like how Yins mentioned the karma of cause and effect earlier, every action taken would have a reaction, every cause would have an equivalent effect. All of the heat that Zero stole was absorbed by Zero’s main body!

“All the heat you stole and the temperature difference you lowered this entire area by will be forcefully experienced by your main body as an equivalent amount of high temperature!”

This was the power of a Concept. Perhaps it seemed rather weak—even dangerous as it wouldn’t differentiate between enemy and ally—but any action a natural law took would give a headache to even the most powerful of individuals.

When dealing with natural laws, the greatest trouble was that they were completely unreasonable. They would be able to suppress any other power out there. Yet at the same time its greatest threat was also that it was reasonable. Everything would be fine and dandy as long as you obeyed the reason of the natural law. Anything deemed unreasonable by the natural law would be forcibly suppressed.

And as the only Creator of this world, only I knew all the “reasons” and natural laws of my world. This was also why the Goddesses of Chaos and Order were basically undefeatable in Eich. Apart from their personal power levels easily being able to defeat everyone else, their ridiculous administrator privileges and knowledge constituted the biggest reason behind their invincibility.

But we were now in my world, where I made the natural laws. Zero had created countless ice mountains and low temperature areas and sent down large amounts of ice and snow. She had stolen away a countless amount of heat already.

It would have been fine still if she had used normal ice magic. After all, one of the natural laws of my world was indeed the construction of the elements. Yet she had used her natural talent of robbing heat. In that case, the heat that she stole wouldn’t simply vanish like it would in Eich or the Undead Planes. It was time for her to enjoy the consequences of her own actions.

That was why, from the very start, I had no intentions of stopping her from lowering the temperatures here with her Soul World. Instead, I even helped her out, allowing her unscientific natural talent to be used to the utmost. Perhaps her astral projection would still seem fine—it was impossible for anyone to harm something that didn’t actually exist. However, her main body might already be literally ignited on fire with all the heat energy she absorbed, without her even knowing it.

And if you calculate the cause and effect of all this, then it would count as self-harm. How would it be possible for anyone to avoid the effects of self-harm? That was why her astral projection’s invulnerability and non-existence were finally losing effect as well. There was no need for me to completely analyze just how she accomplished being able to count as a non-existence here in the mortal plane. I only need to take advantage of my own world’s natural laws to make her bear the consequences of her own actions.

“…Just what did you do!”

The translucent ghost’s body began to melt, and burn marks appeared on her ancient clothes. At the current moment, Zero experienced the strongest sensation of fear she had ever felt in her life. Her main body, which was still back in the Ice Plane, was actually attacked? Not only that, the attack was the type she feared most, a high-temperature attack. And high-temperature attacks were one of the few she wasn’t immune to.

Seeing this, I nodded and smiled.

“Haha, would you like to know how it was that I managed to attack your main body?”

“…”

Although she didn’t reply, the look of expectation in her eyes mixed with obvious traces of confusion made it evident that she hoped I would tell her.

“Hehe, I won’t tell you~~~ Don’t glare at me like that; I’m no idiot villain who dies just because I told too much information to my enemy. How could I possibly tell you about my trump card? But what I can tell you is that if you don’t want your main body’s situation to become worse, you shouldn’t do anything more at all.”

Of course, I didn’t tell her the truth, but I also didn’t lie. To be honest, as long as she stopped using her heat-stealing ability, then she naturally wouldn’t receive any backlash. And after I told her this much, no matter whether she believed me or not, it would still become a mental restraint on her and limit the actions she could take.

The ghost glared at me one last time before she started to fade. It would seem that she had given up on this situation and was intending to cancel her astral projection so that her soul could return to the Ice Plane.

However, once she became clear to a certain extent, her ghostly body suddenly went back to a near solid state. This time, her expression was even more afraid as she cowered and looked at me. It would seem that she had noticed that her astral projection was unable to leave.

*Clap!*

I copied Zero’s magic casting and clapped my hands, dispelling the blizzard and making the sun shine from through the clouds again, revealing to her the true form of my Frigidwinter Earth.

This world was no longer just barren, ice-filled plains with nothing in it. Icy waters could be seen in the distance, while giant magical whales were shooting out jets over a dozen meters high. Glaciers were floating in the ocean, while endless mountains could be discerned in the distance. There were even the intermittent faint sounds of roaring beasts.

And we were currently located at the foot of a mountain, inside an ice crystal forest. The faint outline of buildings could be seen afar: this was becoming more and more like a real world.

“Would you like to know why it is that you can’t leave?”

“…”

“Ha, I won’t tell you~~~ Leave this astral projection behind, and then go think about it by yourself! Right, your essence… give me all your knowledge! Otherwise, I’ll use your astral projection to film porn videos, and I’ll sell the videos to the fairies and gnomes! Don’t people love teacher fantasies? …Ah! Silly cat! Don’t bite me, you’re not a teacher—you’re a master! Besides, nobody would buy a porn video focused on a cat!”

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