He knew it was a crazy thing to do.
The very solid foundation he had built up until now could be shaken by this one action.
But in the current situation, Cain had no choice.
The moment he grasped the Snow Crystal, everything around him seemed to stop.
The foot of the Ice Troll that had been charging with tremendous strides remained suspended in the air.
The club raised high also froze as if solidified in mid-air.
Not just objects, but the flow of air surrounding them.
And the flow of mana.
Everything had stopped.
His vision was tinted grayish-white, and he felt as if he had fallen into another world.
But Cain could tell.
‘Time hasn’t stopped. It’s just flowing very slowly.’
No, to be precise, it felt as if time was flowing slowly.
At this moment, Cain’s cognitive speed, under the tremendous pressure of high-purity mana, had temporarily accelerated far beyond its limit.
But he didn’t have the luxury to spend this long instant in a daze.
From the fingertips of the hand holding the Snow Crystal, an enormous force was trying to surge in.
‘Ugh.’
Cain tried to widen his eyes, but his eyelids moved only minutely.
Letting go of the Snow Crystal was now an impossible option.
By the time he let go, his hand would have already burst.
The moment he released the power of the Snow Crystal, it was as if he had crossed a river of no return.
‘I absolutely cannot let it all rush in at once.’
Cain concentrated all his mental strength to block the surging force.
His current body, which was only at the 3rd Circle, could not withstand this enormous power.
‘Even if I somehow endure it, the foundation I’ve built up until now could be shaken.’
Like forcibly plugging a hole in a massive dam, enormous pressure compressed his entire hand.
His fingertips seemed to crumple and his palm felt like it would burst.
But Cain calmly and very delicately began to open the mana circuits in his fingertips bit by bit.
Kwaaaaaa!
As if it had been waiting, high-purity mana rushed in through the mana circuits.
Despite time flowing so slowly it was almost standing still, the mana instantly began circulating through his arm and throughout his body.
Cain let the mana circulate while controlling its speed and path so that the mana circuits wouldn’t burst, become blocked, or collide.
‘Even with cognitive speed this accelerated, it’s moving at this pace.’
If time hadn’t slowed down like this, the mana from the Snow Crystal would have burst all the mana circuits inside his body in just a few seconds.
‘It’s extremely fortunate that my mana circuits are clean.’
If Cain’s mana circuits hadn’t been this clean, there would have been sections that caught somewhere, and soon a chain reaction would have caused some part of his body to explode.
‘For now… this is the only method.’
The mana directly emanating from the Snow Crystal now was extremely pure mana that didn’t even need further filtering.
In other words, if he directly accumulated the water mana that made up most of this mana in his Circle Room, it would immediately lead to an elevation in his realm.
‘Though that won’t be easy.’
Very delicate work was needed to avoid shocking and collapsing the structure he had already built.
‘But I have to do it.’
Kwaaaaaa—
When the pouring mana passed near the Circle Room.
Cain immediately began separating water mana from the moving mana and accumulating it in the Circle Room.
And that first step was fortunately successful.
‘Good. I’ll continue like this.’
This was work similar to inspecting and sorting cargo from continuously incoming carriages at a checkpoint without stopping them.
Moreover, since he had to throw the sorted cargo accurately and stack it precisely in designated places, it was work that would be unimaginable for anyone but a highly skilled expert.
Cain continued this work without rest.
‘The remaining mana after separation goes directly to the dantian.’
Water mana was stacked in the Circle Room with perfect accuracy, and all remaining pure energy was sent to the dantian for storage.
Repeating this process, Cain could tell he was soon reaching the end of the 3rd Circle.
‘This is insane.’
Work that should have taken at least several months was completed in less than a second of real time.
‘Then.’
Cain immediately created a fourth circle with the pure mana that continued to enter.
And he began adding flesh to the framework of the 4th Circle.
‘I’d like to maintain balance with the fire-type circle if possible, but…’
If he ignored the water mana that made up most of the composition and extracted fire mana to stack, he definitely wouldn’t be able to handle the amount of incoming mana.
The reason he had tried to maintain balance in the first place was because it was better for building perfect circles, but since he was already achieving that perfection in real-time, it didn’t particularly matter.
‘…But just how long will this keep coming in?’
It was good that his realm was building correctly and quickly.
The problem was that during this work, the mana that could be stored in his dantian had nearly reached its limit.
‘If I suddenly discharge the rest like this, the pressure inside the mana circuits will change rapidly.’
That’s why Cain had been continuing to store the filtered mana in his dantian.
It might be different after all the work was done, but discharging mana now would be like pricking an inflating balloon with a needle.
Having thought that far, Cain decided to implement an alternative plan.
‘I’ll compress and store mana in the two empty Circle Rooms.’
Storing mana in empty Circle Rooms—anyone would call it crazy.
‘But it’s not theoretically impossible.’
Cain continued the work of separating water mana and stacking it in circles while compressing and storing the filtered mana in the Circle Rooms.
Though mental fatigue reached its peak during the endless cognitive time of complete concentration, Cain didn’t stop for a single moment.
‘This is the final stage now.’
That work continued until Cain absorbed all the power the Snow Crystal possessed.
When Cain succeeded in absorbing all of the Snow Crystal’s mana without releasing a single bit.
Cain had reached a complete Ice-type 5th Circle.
Hwaaaaaaak—
Snow Crystal.
The small, beautiful snowflake-shaped crystal that could fit perfectly in the hand of a boy who had just turned sixteen poured out all the energy it possessed.
Crack.
And like a flower that had reached its time dropping its lifeless leaves, it lost its vitality.
Thus, the Snow Crystal that had revealed itself to the world for the first time in hundreds of years lost its light and crumbled from Cain’s fingertips.
And.
That meant the stopped time had begun to flow again.
“Guwooooo!”
“Guluk!”
The creatures still seemed not to realize that something had gone wrong.
‘Of course. I absorbed all the energy the Snow Crystal emitted internally without releasing any of it outside.’
Though tremendous things had happened inside, from the outside it would just look like Cain had briefly held the Snow Crystal.
“Guwooooo!!”
The creatures charged straight at him.
Watching the Ice Trolls rushing from multiple directions simultaneously, as if betting on who would smash Cain’s head with their clubs first, Cain chanted quietly.
“Ice Square.”
Patsutsutsutsu!
With the incantation, ice walls rose from all four sides around Cain.
The rising ice walls bent at a certain height and grew to firmly cover the ceiling, creating a shape where Cain stood inside a cube made of ice.
Kwaang!
The Ice Trolls screamed and wildly swung their clubs from outside, trying to smash the Ice Square.
Kwang! Bang! Bang!
“Gu, guoooo!”
However, unlike the Ice Wall that had collapsed after taking a few hits before, the Ice Square didn’t show even a crack despite repeated strikes.
Rather, the troll that saw its mana-infused club break from the forceful strike was bewildered.
And the next moment.
Cain made his second incantation from inside.
“Icicle.”
4th Circle magic, Icicle.
This magic, meaning icicles, wasn’t actually used very often.
It was a projectile-type magic that reacted water mana with terrain, landforms, or the surface of objects to summon and launch multiple sharp cone-shaped ice spikes. While it had the advantage of consuming little mana directly, it had the disadvantage of slow summoning speed.
Moreover, its destructive power was similar to Ice Sphere, a 3rd Circle magic, making it an unpopular minority magic among projectile-type spells.
However.
“Guok…!”
“Guooook…!?”
Thunk, thuunk. Thunk.
Using not the existing terrain, but the Ice Square itself that contained water mana as a medium.
By consuming the thickness of the inner surface of the Ice Square to reduce icicle generation time to the extreme.
Originally a projectile-type magic, Icicle pierced the hearts of the Ice Trolls just by instantly sprouting from the ice walls.
“Guok…”
And it pierced through the head of an Ice Troll that had jumped onto the Ice Square and was pounding the ceiling, penetrating from under its jaw upward.
Having disposed of the entire Ice Troll group with just two incantations, Cain dispelled his magic.
Thud.
Cain lightly avoided the corpse of the Ice Troll that had been on top of the Ice Square’s ceiling.
“…It’s really over now.”
Cain looked down at the corpses scattered on the ground.
And he looked at the spot where the Snow Crystal had been.
Only tiny ice fragments remained in that place.
The Snow Crystal that had called together the magical beasts of the snowy mountain and disrupted the ecosystem was gone.
Even if he wanted to take it as evidence, even if he wanted to sell it, it had already crumbled like the petals of a withered flower.
But instead, Cain was able to leap beyond the realm he had anticipated in one bound.
Since he had eliminated the Ice Trolls, which were the direct culprits of ecosystem disruption, the ecosystem would gradually return to normal.
“I wonder if those guys caught a lot of snow rabbits.”
They weren’t slacking off while I wasn’t watching, were they?
‘As for evidence, I just need to take one of these Ice Troll heads.’
I should hurry back and show them the Ice Troll head to announce the successful news.
‘But why is my body…’
Thud.
It was the backlash from overworking his mana circuits while absorbing the Snow Crystal’s power.
“…I should rest a little before going.”
Cain collapsed and fell into sleep.
“Fire Arrow! Nice, we got them all!”
Bolio clenched his fist and shouted.
“Th-this side is done too.”
“I only caught two. There weren’t as many here as I thought.”
Ed and Fon also approached Bolio.
“With this, we’ve cleared all the places Cain marked for us. Heh. He probably didn’t think we’d complete every single location without missing any, right?”
“We should surprise him when he comes back.”
“Ah, we caught so many that the snow rabbit ears won’t all fit in the bag, right? Kahaha!”
“I-it’s not that much.”
“I know! I was just joking.”
Bolio snapped at Fon’s words.
The three returned to the cave where they had last been with Cain and waited for him.
“He said he’d come by noon today, right?”
“That’s right.”
“Th-there’s not much time left…”
Looking at the sky, the sun was already almost at its zenith.
“…”
“…Don’t tell me.”
“Hey, don’t say ominous things.”
“He’ll come. Who do you think Cain is?”
But the sun passed its zenith.
Even after 1 PM passed and it became 2 PM, Cain didn’t return.
“He’s not coming?”
“Wh-what should we do…?”
“Haa… I knew it from when that bastard kept acting tough!”
Bolio couldn’t stand it anymore and jumped up.
“Where are you going?”
“Damn it, where do you think? I’m going to look for him!”
“What? Cain told us to wait here.”
“R-right. If we cross paths accidentally…”
“And Cain said if he doesn’t come by noon, don’t come to rescue him but go back and inform the family. Maybe Cain is late and will go directly to the family later.”
When Ed and Fon tried to stop Bolio, he exploded in anger.
“Then you guys can go! Damn cowards.”
“Why are you suddenly like this? That’s not like you. You said you don’t worry about Cain.”
“I’m not worried, I’m angry. Because I believed that bastard would succeed! I’m angry that I was wrong!”
Bolio really shouldered his bag and began walking decisively through the snow toward Cain’s direction.
“Haa… What should we do?”
“Sh-shouldn’t we follow him?”
“Right. Let’s think as we go. If Cain is really in danger, we need to work together to save him. And if… if he’s dead, at least the body…”
“D-don’t say such things, Ed.”
“Damn, you think I want to say this?”
Ed’s eyes were slightly welling up with tears as he spoke.
And as they were walking through the snow.
“Where are you guys going? I’m sure I told you to return to the family if the promised time passed.”
“Uaaaak!”
Bolio screamed at the voice heard from the side.
