"What is that?" Grey whispered.
Ethan's expression was grim. "I think we're about to find out."
The scraping stopped abruptly, leaving them in tense silence. Then, without warning, the cave entrance exploded inward as something massive punched through the rock face like it was paper.
A claw the size of a tree trunk withdrew from the hole it had created, followed by an eye larger than a shield. The eye was ancient and intelligent, filled with a cold malevolence that made both fighters instinctively step backward.
The Frost Wyrm had found them.
"So much for stealth," Grey muttered, drawing his sword.
The creature's head pulled back from the opening, and they could hear it moving outside—circling, assessing, preparing for a proper assault. The cave that had seemed like shelter now felt like a tomb.
Ethan recalled all his knives to hover around him, their metal surfaces gleaming in the firelight. "Stay behind me."
"Like hell," Grey replied, energy already beginning to flow into his blade.
The next attack came from above. The Wyrm's massive tail punched through the cave ceiling, sending tons of rock and ice crashing down. Both fighters threw themselves toward the entrance, barely escaping as their shelter collapsed behind them.
They emerged into a world transformed by the Wyrm's presence.
The creature was magnificent and terrible—easily a hundred feet long, with scales that seemed to be carved from glacial ice. Its body was serpentine but massive, capable of coiling around the mountain peak itself. Six legs, each ending in claws that could tear through solid stone, supported its tremendous bulk. Its head was draconic, with intelligence burning in eyes like frozen stars.
Most intimidating of all, the air around the Wyrm shimmered with supernatural cold. Where it breathed, the very atmosphere crystallized and fell like snow. This wasn't just a creature of ice—it was ice given consciousness and malevolent will.
The Frost Wyrm reared back, its head rising nearly fifty feet above them, and let out a roar that shook the entire mountain. Avalanches began cascading down distant slopes, and the ice formations around them cracked and groaned under the sonic assault.
The Wyrm's attack was swift and devastating. Its massive head whipped downward like a striking serpent, jaws opening to reveal teeth like ice-covered swords. Both fighters scattered, diving in opposite directions as the creature's bite took a chunk out of the mountainside where they had been standing.
Ethan's response was immediate and coordinated. All seven of his knives launched into complex attack patterns, each blade following a different trajectory toward the creature's massive form.
His normal knife—Razor Fang—sought out gaps between scales, looking for vulnerable flesh. His ice knife created frozen barriers and projectiles, trying to slow the creature's movements. His defense knife protected him from the Wyrm's retaliatory strikes, while his teleport knife allowed him to appear at unexpected angles of attack.
But the Frost Wyrm was no ordinary monster. It had lived for centuries, defending its territory against countless challengers. Its movements were graceful despite its size, and its ancient intelligence allowed it to adapt to threats with disturbing speed.
The creature's tail swept across the battlefield like a living avalanche, forcing both fighters to use every ounce of their agility to avoid being pulverized. Grey responded with a series of energy-charged attacks, his blade glowing like a beacon against the creature's icy hide.
His first strike connected, carving a line of scorched flesh across the Wyrm's flank. The creature roared in pain and fury, its head whipping around to focus on this new threat.
What happened next would haunt Grey's dreams for years to come.
The Frost Wyrm's breath weapon was beyond anything Grey had imagined. Not fire or poison, but pure, absolute cold—a stream of crystallized air that froze everything it touched to absolute zero in seconds.
Grey tried to dodge, his reflexes honed by months of training pushing him to his limits. But the stream of supernatural cold was too wide, too fast. It caught him across his left side, and the effect was instantaneous.
His clothing froze solid and shattered. His skin turned blue, then white. Ice crystals began forming in his blood, and his left arm went completely numb. Worse, the cold was spreading—creeping through his body like a living thing, seeking to freeze his heart.
Grey collapsed to one knee, his sword suddenly too heavy to lift. For the first time in his life, true fear entered his eyes. He couldn't move anymore. His body was betraying him, shutting down piece by piece as the supernatural cold claimed him.
Fear—real, primal terror—began to consume him.
But then Ethan stepped forward, moving between Grey and the massive creature. His back was to Grey, but something in his posture had changed completely. Gone was the careful, measured fighter who had been protecting Grey throughout their journey. This was something else entirely.
"Stay back!" Ethan commanded, his voice carrying an authority that made even the Frost Wyrm pause. "This is my fight!"
Grey, his arrogance never allowing him to back down, opened his mouth to protest. But as he looked at Ethan's figure from behind, he saw something that made the words die in his throat. An aura of deadly seriousness radiated from Ethan—something Grey had never witnessed before. Ethan always smiled, always maintained that calm, controlled demeanor. But this... this was different.
"Fine," Grey managed to say, his voice barely above a whisper. "But it doesn't mean I'm afraid or that I've lost. This was your mission from the beginning. I'm just some busybody."
Ethan's knives began to orbit behind him like satellites of death, their metal surfaces gleaming with lethal purpose. Two knives detached from the formation, flying into his hands—the teleport knife and Windcutter. The familiar weight of the blades in his palms grounded him, focusing his intent into razor-sharp clarity.
The Frost Wyrm, sensing the shift in its opponent's demeanor, reared back and let out another earth-shaking roar. Its massive form coiled and uncoiled, preparing for what it somehow knew would be a fight to the death.
Ethan walked forward with measured steps, his eyes never leaving the creature that sat thirty feet away. The distance seemed insurmountable, but Ethan's expression remained calm, calculating.
Without warning, he hurled the teleport knife toward the Wyrm.
SHOOSH!
The blade cut through the air at such incredible speed that even Grey, despite his enhanced reflexes, couldn't track its movement. It was a silver blur, a streak of lethal intent that covered the distance in a heartbeat.
In that split second, as the knife reached its apex, Ethan teleported.
The world blurred around him as he materialized behind the Wyrm, his body positioned like a sprinter crossing the finish line—arms extended backward, body and head pushed forward in perfect aerodynamic form. Both knives were in his hands, Windcutter humming with contained power.
ZHOOOSH!
The attack was surgical in its precision. Windcutter's power concentrated into a razor-thin edge of compressed air, sharp enough to cut through steel. The blade sliced through the Wyrm's massive leg, finding the gap between its ice-hard scales. Despite the creature's thick hide and supernatural durability, the wound was deep and devastating.
The Frost Wyrm's scream of pain and rage echoed across the mountain peaks, causing distant avalanches to cascade down the slopes. Dark blood—nearly black in the frigid air—poured from the wound, steaming as it hit the snow.
But Ethan wasn't finished. Before the creature could fully react, he was already moving.
The Wyrm's tail swept toward him like a living battering ram, but Ethan's teleport knife was already in flight. He materialized above the sweeping appendage, using the momentum of his teleportation to drive both knives downward into the creature's spine.
The Wyrm twisted with surprising agility for something so massive, its serpentine body coiling as it tried to crush Ethan against the mountainside. But Ethan was already gone, teleporting again as razor-sharp claws carved gouges in the stone where he had been standing.
What followed was a dance of death unlike anything Grey had ever witnessed.
Ethan moved like liquid lightning, appearing and disappearing around the Wyrm's massive form. His teleport knife allowed him to strike from impossible angles—materializing above the creature's head to drive his blades into its skull, then instantly appearing beneath its belly to slash at vulnerable points.
The Wyrm fought back with ancient fury. Its claws, each longer than a man's arm, swept through the air in deadly arcs. Where they struck stone, they left deep gouges. Where they struck ice, they shattered it into deadly shrapnel.
But Ethan was faster. His Windcutter knife created barriers of compressed air that deflected the creature's strikes, while his teleportation allowed him to stay one step ahead of its massive bulk.
The creature's breath weapon lashed out again—streams of crystallized air that would have killed Ethan instantly. But he was ready. His ice knife, Frostbite, created walls of frozen vapor that absorbed the worst of the attack, while his teleportation carried him out of the danger zone.
CRASH!
The Wyrm's head slammed into the mountainside where Ethan had been standing, its jaws snapping shut with enough force to pulverize stone. But Ethan was already behind the creature, his normal knife—Razor Fang—carving deep lines across its flanks.
The battle intensified as both combatants realized they were evenly matched. The Wyrm's size and power were countered by Ethan's speed and tactical brilliance. Every attack the creature launched was met with a counter-attack, every defensive maneuver matched by an offensive strike.
But it was a war of attrition, and Ethan was beginning to feel the strain.
The supernatural cold emanating from the Wyrm was sapping his strength. Ice crystals formed on his clothing and weapons, and his breath came in short, visible puffs. The thin air at this altitude made every movement more difficult, and the constant teleportation was draining his energy reserves.
The Wyrm sensed this weakness and pressed its advantage. Its attacks became more coordinated, more vicious. It began using its breath weapon strategically, creating fields of absolute cold that limited Ethan's movement options.
During one particularly intense exchange, Ethan found himself cornered against a wall of ice. The Wyrm's massive claw swept toward him, and there was nowhere to teleport. Instead, he did something unexpected—he met the attack head-on.
His defense knife, Ironward, intercepted the claw with a sound like thunder. The impact sent shockwaves through both combatants, but Ethan held his ground. His muscles strained against the creature's immense strength, and for a moment, they were locked in a deadly test of wills.
Then Ethan's other knives joined the fight. Windcutter sliced across the Wyrm's extended arm, while Frostbite created spikes of ice that stabbed upward into its belly. The creature roared and pulled back, dark blood flowing from multiple wounds.
But the Wyrm was learning, adapting. It began to anticipate Ethan's teleportation patterns, positioning itself to intercept his attacks. During one exchange, its tail caught Ethan mid-teleport, sending him crashing into the mountainside.
Ethan rolled with the impact, but he could feel blood trickling down his face. The creature's next attack came immediately—a stream of crystallized air that would have ended the fight.
Ethan's response was desperate and brilliant. All seven of his knives formed a defensive barrier around him, spinning in complex patterns that deflected the worst of the cold. But the effort left him vulnerable, and the Wyrm pressed forward.
The creature's massive head swept down, jaws open to crush him. Ethan rolled aside, but the Wyrm's teeth scraped across his back, tearing through his clothing and drawing blood. The pain was immediate and intense, but it also focused his mind.
He was losing this fight. The Wyrm's size and endurance were starting to tell. But Ethan had one advantage the creature couldn't counter—his willingness to sacrifice everything for victory.
As the Wyrm reared back for another attack, Ethan made a decision that would haunt him for years to come. His hand moved to his belt, where his seventh knife waited—the blade he had sworn never to use except in the most desperate circumstances.
But before he could draw it, the Wyrm's strategy shifted dramatically.
The creature, realizing that it couldn't defeat Ethan in direct combat, began to retreat. Its massive wings spread wide, catching the mountain winds as it prepared to take flight. If it escaped to the sky, it would have an insurmountable advantage.
Ethan couldn't let that happen.