Ghosts of the Past (1)
"Ugh!"
Dolores, hit by a lightning spear, was pushed back.
Fortunately, she didn't suffer any severe injuries or get shocked by the lightning attribute.
Ice grew from her skin, reducing the secondary damage.
'The power is quite impressive.'
If her defensive magic hadn't activated, her chest would have been pierced, and her entire body would have been burnt by the electric current.
Without a moment of panic, Dolores reflexively counterattacked.
Frost spread across the floor and sprung up beneath the man's feet.
As if he had anticipated the attack, the man retreated.
While she stood up again, Dolores continued to cast her magic.
""Ice Arrow"."
Ice arrows sprouted and flew towards the assailant.
He could easily dodge a straight-flying ice arrow.
However, the ice that Dolores shot was different from simple straight-flying ice.
She was the "Incarnation of Cold."
She was a magician skilled in cold magic, capable of changing the trajectory of flying ice.
The curved ice arrow lodged into the man's thigh.
The man groaned in pain and then recited a spell.
The man, who had been groaning in pain, stood up as if nothing had happened.
Dolores could tell what kind of magic he had muttered.
'Did he use a pain-relief spell?'
Pain-relief spells only accumulated pain to be unleashed later, causing significant side effects.
It was a dangerous magic that could turn even a mild pain into severe agony.
Using the pain of being pierced by ice needles as a weapon was no different from saying he was ready to die.
Fighting with the resolve to die?
Dolores couldn't understand the man's purpose.
"Are you a thief?"
"..."
The man didn't answer. Instead, he attacked Dolores with another lightning magic spell.
She had been caught off guard once, but she didn't allow any more attacks.
'I feel like I've seen that face somewhere before...'
Handling lightning magic and attacking opponents recklessly, even at the cost of his own life, was his style.
She didn't have time to search her memory for his identity.
He was a master of lightning magic.
Not only shooting in a straight line but also curved and even radial, he hindered Dolores's movements.
However, the biggest problem was the lightning spear held in his right hand.
It was as if the god of lightning had descended, shooting a lightning spear at Dolores.
It appeared to be an ordinary lightning spear, but it flew slower than usual, aiming for Dolores.
Each time, Dolores rolled her body to dodge it.
She didn't even dare to block it with an ice wall.
Her accumulated knowledge reflexively recognized the lightning spear as dangerous.
'I've seen it somewhere before, no doubt.'
If he hadn't been an opponent she had struggled with before, where had she seen him?
There was one thing she knew for sure.
If it turned into a long battle, she would lose.
"I don't know who you are, but..."
Her hair turned white, and her eyes shone blue.
"I'll end this now."
She raised her staff to the sky with both hands. All the mana within her swirled and gathered into one place.
Mana condensed into white light at the end of the staff.
She slammed the staff to the ground with both hands.
""Domain of Rigea"."
For a moment, it seemed as if time had stopped, and everything was silent.
The cold spread rapidly, and in an instant, sparkling crystals appeared around her.
Moisture in the air clumped together and solidified, shining like glass beads.
Whooosh.
The beautiful scenery of floating jewels was short-lived as they turned into a storm.
The man quickly deployed a protective shield.
He tried to push away the ice beads with a shield of electric current.
As the unpushed ice beads touched the electric shield, the shape of the current froze instantly.
The shield weakened at the same time.
The frozen shield turned into thin ice chunks and was shattered by the ice storm.
As soon as the ice beads touched his skin, ice spikes grew and pierced the man's body.
The ice spikes grew larger.
He ignored the pain and tried to cast magic, but it didn't last long.
The ice spike reached his neck, tearing his vocal cords.
"Cough... cough..."
The absence of pain created a vulnerability.
Due to the exposure of his neck, which is crucial in casting, he could no longer use magic.
With that, the fight was over.
His body slowed down in the cold, and every snowflake that touched him turned into a spike, tearing his muscles apart.
"Hoo..."
Dolores took a deep breath.
Once called the Goddess of Ice, Rigea.
However, she became infamous for being corrupted into an evil deity and swallowing the north in an ice curse.
That's why Dolores called this magic ""Domain of Rigea"."
It was a magic where everything around her became equal, a magic that indiscriminately massacred without any identification of friend or foe.
Although Dolores had developed this wide-range magic, she didn't want to use it.
It was an unpredictable and dangerous skill that could affect even her allies, but the sturdy training ground could withstand her magic.
'It's also a dangerous magic for myself.'
If her mental focus was even slightly disrupted, she could be swept away by the blizzard and suffer the same fate.
Since it was a confined space and a one-on-one situation, Dolores boldly used that magic.
Dolores carefully approached the man after confirming that his life was completely cut off.
'What on earth is this person?'
She thought it might be a simple misstep, but every time she saw his face, something came to her mind.
She thoroughly searched her memory library.
"Ah."
Finally, Dolores retrieved the man's image from her memory.
It was unexpected.
She thought it might be a character from a book she had seen somewhere, but it was surprisingly close.
'A graduation album...'
It wasn't Dolores's graduation album, but that of her master, Anton Eclipsys.
