Chapter 100: Frigid Serenity

Eostre’s voice filled her with understanding as the nasty gouge in her side bubbled and frothed; the dyed maroon liquid restored her skin and organs as her hair, ears, and glow matched the Infernal sphere as her spirit sank into endless oblivion.

"Selene’s eye... The bloody tears she sheds for Ambrogio, the ancient goddess’ cursed lover, a mortal who did everything in his power to be with her—to the point of becoming a monster. Only to be kept in sight but never together for all of eternity by a cruel twist of fate, made an immortal, soulless creature of the night."

Rachel’s fingers closed around the handle of the necrotic sickle that attempted to mar her spirit. Yet, her spirit was slipping away from its grasping taint, as was Nia’s, joining her ascent to the embrace of a deep limbo.

Yanking the weapon free to splatter the ice with her crimson blood, Rachel twisted it around her hand before running her other hand over her bubbling stomach. Twinkling light brought Nia’s reconstituted body beside her, Ambrogio’s curse of immortality in undeath preventing the disease from harming her while their spirits lay inside Hades.

The dyalitha’s white eyes narrowed, head lowering as it sank into the ice, a howl reverberating beneath their feet with four more answering it. Rachel wasn’t rushed, though. Instead, her bloody eyes observed the tinted landscape with Nia, seeing everything the crimson rays touched, the thump of thousands of heartbeats radiating like a musical symphony with tens of thousands of corpses beneath the ice.

She followed the dyalitha as they phased through the mystical ice, wondering if this was what it was like for Scarlet, feeling the pulse of life waiting to be culled. Rachel’s teeth flashed as she lifted her clawed fingernail to press against her fangs; she was a different kind of nightmare now compared to the Black Moon she’d experienced earlier.

Sickles shot out from multiple angles, ripping into Nia and her body, slicing off limbs, and looking for something to infect with their necrotic taint, only to find an empty shell dedicated to the hunt. Nia reflected her cold smile as fissures cut through the sheets, releasing an army of the dead kulina, green flames carrying them up with the wolves’ howls.

Dionysus’ words rang in her mind as Rachel walked toward one of the frozen rabbit people, eyes quivering in its prison as it watched Nia and her take the ceaseless abuse. It was fun to see prey bark and bite until they realized how unlucky they were to fall within her sight.

"I do love the build-up, Rachel. I really do," he stated with a strained laugh, clearly beginning to get agitated by her continual fortune. "But how about we add a time limit to this challenge? Ten minutes. It will bump up your reward by a decent amount. Won’t you accept?"

Rachel’s claws broke into the ice to grip one of the kulina warrior’s hammers, frozen with them. Nia did the same to another pillar, her wounded outfit and body restoring as she bathed in the sight of the bloody moon.

Heh. You don’t want me to farm as much EXP as I can in this challenge and Nia to soak in these lunar rays for later? Look at all the juicy animated corpses... Is Conner sweating at the increased difficulty? I want to milk this opportunity."

She caught the rabbit creature’s tormented eyes; this person wasn’t make-believe or an illusion but a real soul. From what she understood from Dionysus’ explanation, this was a fractured cluster of universes, realms, and worlds within Conner’s Greater Seed, and the Arbiter could pull in limited elements from external objects to fill in the spots.

"Increase the Challenge Rating to three, not just some tiny reward bump, and I’ll accept a ten-minute time limit," she laughed, extracting the weapon without effort to flip it in a sharp circle, creating a cyclone that removed all the snow blanketing the scenery and shoving back all the undead advancing on her.

"You’re practically a demigod right now with that damnable curse! I would need to add fifty more dyalitha with their elites to make it compatible when you’re under the Blood Moon; it’s not a challenge otherwise!"

"You are the one who allowed these Unique Moons," she reminded, confirming in the explanation that he wasn’t all-knowing when it came to these games; the Blood Moon was a surprise. "And, heh, you can teach them how to defeat us...but you know that won’t help them. Accept it. You don’t want to do it because of the Experience it will give me."

The swift-moving reanimated undead kulina shot through the mist she’d expelled across the hellscape to rush her, running as fast as her standard sprint and likely packing far more of a punch.

Rachel leaped over one hundred meters into the sky to land on the highest ice spike nearby, the seething Arbiter in her mind. Nia followed her; the Living Denier was listening in, a similar massive hammer slung over her shoulders, waiting for the signal to act. Every minute they bought in this challenge brought more Blood Moon energy into Nia’s Lunar Pool to be stored.

"Actually, there is a limit to how much ’EXP,’ as you call it, can expand your spirit. And you are so far beyond it here your spirit would explode if it took in this much pressure all at once."

"Interesting," she commented, spotting Nia’s silent laughter as the chattering and clicking undead bunnies began to climb the icy spire to reach them; the dyalitha were spread out, snarling at one another, no doubt communicating to solve the mystery of what kind of terrifying creatures she and Nia were. "You are really not good at this Arbiter business."

"And you are not good at entertaining me!" he spat back. "Hmm. Fine. Five minutes. And you want it changed to the 3rd Challenge Rating? If you fail—all of these worlds die. You are okay with that?"

"Five minutes?" she spoke aloud, further grating on his nerves while bringing the bargain to the attention of the audience. "Heh. Give us a challenge. And you already said I’m practically a demigod. Let me give a show to the people!"

"Three."

"Done."

"...Enjoy your hell."