Chapter 492: Otter under Ice
[Huh…coordinated…echoes…]
=The term you’re looking for is resonance. It’s what happens when two wavelengths occur at the same frequency. They end up enhancing each other and make even more potent sound.=
[Under…standable…]
<=Yeah.=>
[…]
<=...=>
[You…want…me…to…talk…to…Wyvara…about…her…behavior…later?]
=Out of everyone presently there…you’re the only one that’s qualified enough to talk about what she is going through, because…you know…=
[Al…right…I can…try…]
[Fair…enough…]
‘Frosttusk, I know you’re probably tired from holding back that ball of lightning via the ice shield, but do you mind looping behind those Ravager Otters? Call it paranoia, but I think we might need a back-up plan,’
[Sure…thing…will…need…heat…though…]
‘Of course. Rendezvous with Nepehrage when you can then…and maybe check on Hurricroak when you do. Something about her has been feeling…off lately.’
[…will…do…]
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*Bing-Bong*
The following sequence technically happens all at the same time, but to help with ease of reading, it is being told as if it was happening one at a time.
Thank you.
*Bing-Bong*
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The moment Zhen Ye escaped from the clutches of the Ravager Otters, all hell broke loose.
Or rather, it sounded like all hell was let loose again, because there was a whole lot of noise made during and after Zhen Ye grand escape from the soon to be ice zone, made by three distinctive sources.
The first was Zhen Ye’s deployment of the [Thunder Step] art.
As the name implies, [Thunder Step] was a movement aether art, at the Corporeal level, that had the intended side effect of causing the user to release a thunderous shockwave from wherever they employed the art.
At low levels of mastery this sound was annoyingly loud, but at the higher levels, this art could be used to a blast of thunder so loud it could discombobulate anyone in a certain radius of the practitioner.
A radius that just so happened to be big enough to stun a whole pack of Ravager Otters.
The only drawback to this particular movement art was that it can only be used for straightforward acceleration, so even though Zhen Ye used the art to escape upward, the only direction he could go after this was down.
Hopefully his father and brothers could deal with the Thunderscale Dragon Otter before his descent.
‘Seriously guys, any time now!,’ Zhen Ye thought to himself as he now had an even closer look at the terrifying dragon otter that had been the cause for this mess.
Speaking of, the second source of hellish noise was none other than the sound of the Thunderscale Dragon Otter destroying her own attack with an empowered claw strike.
The sound of colliding energies, coming from the same source no less, filled the surrounding area with a noise akin to crashing thunder, screeching metal and low grade mining explosions.
It didn’t help that the Thunderscale Dragon Otter was roaring the whole time as well.
Normally, such drastic actions wouldn’t be necessary for a wielder of dragon force, all they had to do was think it and any attacks of theirs would stop in their tracks, even reverse.
Unfortunately, due to a mixture of inexperience and injuries accumulated during this fight, the Thunderscale Dragon Otter had no choice but to use another attack to cancel out her own attack, ironically injuring herself even more in the process.
However, none of these aforementioned noises could hold a candle to the [Echoing Frost] employed by Zhen Shi and his sons.
[Echoing Frost!]*4.
While the Thunderscale Dragon Otter was occupied destroying her own attack, and the Ravager Otters were busy trying to reconstitute their wits after being blasted by thunder, Zhen Shi, Zhen Long, Zhen Lao and Zhen Yan finally managed to synchronize their attack and released a chorus of roars that was quickly followed by a howling blizzard that could freeze the world three times over.
If one were to stare at this quartet firing off this technique at this time, they would see faint shadows in the form of a serpent’s head,a lion’s head, a peacock’s head and a wolf’s head all roaring and howling at the same time, as if they were the faces of some primordial nature deity, one that would signal the end of the world in a layer of frost.
But enough about the noise, it’s time to focus on the devastation.
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[Neph…rage…]
[Huh? What’s up, Frosttusk?]
[Need…some…heat…]
[Why?]
[Back-up…plan…]
[Ah.]
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“ROOAAARRR!”
*SMASH!*
With a final push and almost exhausting her energy to the limit, the Thunderscale Dragon Otter finally managed to destroy her own ball of lightning with a powerful swipe of her claws and prevent the electrocution of her own pack.
It was bad enough that a bunch of squishy, furless mortals, a weird frog woman, a walking talking chunk of rock and a weirdly hairy elephant man had either injured her and/or prevented her attacks from taking the desired effects, but if she had also been tricked into hurting her own pack with her own attack without at least taking some prey out with them, that would have been the last straw.
But thankfully, that wasn’t the case and she could now go back to dealing with those stronger than average mortals while her subordinates/children made short work of the rest, as soon as their hearing came back and they were no longer stunned.
‘NOW. I CAN. GO. AND. … WAIT.’
Just as she was about to turn around and go back to fighting, this time aiming to just outright eat one of those hairless bastards, a strange feeling came over her.
‘WHY. IS. IT. COLD?’
The Thunderscale Dragon Otter didn’t understand how or why, but a strange feeling of coldness somehow managed to penetrate her fur and caused a creeping sensation to occur at the skin beneath it. The only times she felt this way was whenever she dove deep, deep into the riverbed and touched the bottom floor, where the crabs and clams would sometimes hide, or when it was nighttime and the moon was dark.
Why was she feeling cold when it was a bright and sunny day?
It wasn’t until she heard the roaring of beasts much large and more dangerous than herself that she realized what was going on.
From behind her, the Thunderscale Dragon Otter could see the shadowy forms of a giant sea serpent, a giant lion, a giant wolf and a giant peacock, composed of what she barely recognized as being ice and snow, coming towards her like she was simply prey to these dominators of the food chain.
Once she realized what was going on, that coldness from the environment had transformed into a coldness of fear and death.
‘DEATH?! NO!’
However, she would not go quietly into that night.
Through a mix of desperation, fear, rage and pure survival instinct, the Thunderscale Dragon Otter channeled the last of her power into one last blast of lighting in an attempt to destroy the incoming giant beasts.
The lighting ball produced this time was significantly smaller than the one she had just destroyed moments ago, a sign of her weakening vitality and lack of aether; evidently, there wasn’t even a trace of dragon force to be found inside of this attack either.
*ZAP!*
*ZWOOP!*
‘NO!’
The Thunderscale Dragon Otter’s last ditch attack did nothing more than slightly delay the incoming snow giants, harmlessly passing into one of them before being torn apart by the howling blizzards that composed their massive forms.
As the giant beasts of frost came barreling down on her, the dragon otter debated with herself whether or not she should just cut her losses and abandon her pack of stunned Ravager Otters to their fate of being frozen over while living on herself.
She could live on for their sake, right?
Carry on their memories with her and future children and pack, right?
They didn’t die in vain, just…an unfortunate accident.
But alas, she didn’t even have time to justify leaving them behind.
Because before she could even flap her wings and go.
[Echoing Frost: Second Verse!]
Yet another howling blizzard appeared behind her and her pack.
Only this time, the beast shadow accompanying it looked a lot like a giant, hairy elephant, one that felt unfathomably old.
The Thunderscale Dragon Otter couldn’t even curse its own fate, before everything went white and cold…
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“HOLY SHIT!”
“HEADS DOWN, NOW!”
An explosion of ice, snow and mist occurred soon after Zhen Shi and his sons fired off their coordinated attack at both the Thunderscale Dragon Otter and the Ravager Otters.
Many of the branch clansmen knew how powerful this World class art was when it was being used by their patriarch, however, none of them knew just how much more powerful it could be when it was used in conjunction with the elders.
Then again, maybe the name should have been a bigger hint.
Once the attack had run its course, the area had gone very quiet and very still, as the people on the sidelines tried to figure out one single question.
“Is it over?”
