Supreme Monarch

Feeling the strange cold assault his body. Dohel stood rooted to the spot for some time when Kylyra's voice suddenly snapped him back to his senses.

"Stop standing around dumbly and do your job. If you have so much energy to spare why don't you join Larut and help keep an eye out."

"Ah but... I'm supposed to be the leader, I shouldn't be doing grunt work like this."

Larut laughed silently at the dumb look on their prestigious leader's face as Dohel tried to put up even more of a protest. However, Kylyra wasn't having it this time. She felt irritated as she was not only rejected by a guy she didn't even like but flat out ignored, and the only reason she had even done that was that their dumbass leader had made her do it.

Then there was the uncomfortable feeling she got back at the city's gate. Seeing the one responsible for her misery look so cheerful like he was having fun. She didn't miss the opportunity to get back at him.

"Just shut up and get to work."

"But—"

Dohel was about to put up more of a fuss when he saw Kylyra give him the stink eye and swallowed back the words he was about to say as he chuckled dryly. Anne and Aine giggled by the side which made Dohel feel like he was being targeted for some reason and wanted to defend himself when Larut's voice suddenly cut in from the front of the carriage.

"Shh! There are movements." His voice contained a trace of tension and his calm demeanor now adopted the traits and vigilance of a professional Hunter.

Everyone turned to face the direction he was looking at as they readied their weapons and Kylyra moved forward to take the position of a vanguard.

"Where?"

"There. Over there," Larut said in response to Kylyra's question. He pointed down the path towards the side of a steep hill by the entrance of a cave to the side in the distance. However, they were still too far off so nobody could see anything inside the dark cave whose entrance was slightly covered in snow. Even so, none of them doubted Larut's senses.

"What should we do?"

"Should we go around it?"

"That would add at least an extra day to our trip."

"Hmm... Let proceed with caution. If they don't leave the cave we'll just ignore them." Larut said as he signaled the group to take a defensive formation.

"Alright, we'll follow the plan. Mr. Lix, please fall back and help us defend the carriage if any monster somehow gets by us."

"Understood."

"Thank you."

Tyler had no problem with this as he had no intentions of helping out just yet as he remained seated atop the driver's seat in the front of the carriage although Nadine was the one with the reins. 

The group moved forward slowly and cautiously while sticking closely to the edge of their path. They were currently traveling up a hill so the paths they could actually take due to the size of the carriage were few and in between as most of the paths that lead to the Fabelt pass were incredibly tight and narrowed.

While they tried to move as far away from the cave entrance as possible. The size of the carriage had made it a little difficult as they were still relatively close to it.

As they moved ever closer to the cave in an attempt to proceed down the path. The group suddenly heard movements from the dark cave and the snow and ice that had originally blocked most of the entrance began to quake violently.

"Damn it!"

"Looks like we won't be able to avoid a fight after all."

The ice in the cave suddenly shattered from a loud impact and a pile of snow caved in on the entrance. However, as if to say they weren't bothered by the snow. Monsters slowly moved through the snow and revealed themselves.

They were bluish-grey scaled creatures that moved on all fours. They had ice-blue, four-legged serpentine bodies, long reptilian heads, and very long spiked tails with razor-sharp claws that most of them used to climb up the side of the cave walls as they observe the group.

There were about sixteen of them that came out of the cave as they move about in the snow like it was nothing. Their reptilian eyes scanned the party of Hunters in front of them and a few of them moved forward to meet them.

"Damn it, our luck must not be good if we ran into so many frost salamanders so soon," Dohel said as he brought out a small bottle from his pouch and poured the contents on the blade of his large greatsword.

Frost salamanders were Intermediate class monsters that were usually only seen around this time of the year as they usually hibernated during the other three seasons. Their strength dually varied between the upper Tier 2 to the mid Tier 3 standards so they were classified as Intermediate class beast.

Since they were rarely seen and only ever appeared during winter. This was the first time the group had actually seen them in person. However, their information contained details on this monster and its weakness so there was no panic in their eyes as the monsters approached them.

"There are about sixteen of them, how should we deal with it," Larut asks as he fell back and equipped his crossbow.

"Let's just attack and see what happens," Kylyra answered

"How about be we just stick to the plan instead. Aine and Anne, please get ready."

"Okay."

"Roger."

"Larut, seal up the cave entrance and drag down those perched on the wall. We need to take them out in one go."

"No problem."

"Kylyra, once Larut's give the signal, you're free to go wild."

"Finally, something to do."

Tyler watched from behind as the party swiftly and effortlessly went to work. He could not help but admire their flawless teamwork. Their movements showed their experience and trust in each other, understanding all their comrade's tendencies to their core. Even Dohel looked like a competent leader right now.

"Uh, Mr. Lix, do you need any support magic?" Anne spoke to Tyler in a soft voice that most people wouldn't have heard. However, Tyler had clearly heard her question so he simply smiled under his hood and shook his head.

"Ah, not for us. Please focus on supporting your comrades."

"O-okay."

"Alright then, Larut, we'll start once you're ready."

Larut nodded and took to a knee as he aimed his crossbow at the lead salamander that was slowly approaching them.

*Whoosh! Boom!

An arrow flew through the air with a whoosh and pierced the stone wall of the cave entrance next to several of the blueish gray salamanders and before the salamanders could understand what was happening, a loud boom resounded in the hills as the cave entrance collapsed along with the four salamanders that had been perched up on the wall.

With the entrance to the cave shut, Larut smiled thinly.

He sent another arrow downrange when the enemy was about thirty meters away. The arrow traveled in a straight line and cleanly pierced a frost salamander's cranium and another explosion followed suit. The frost salamander at the end of the formation took a few wobbly steps before collapsing to the ground, where it died.

The other frost salamanders look on in confusion before shrieking and growling at the one that had fired the arrow. Driven to frenzy by their bloodlust, they finally charged at their enemies with staggering speed.

"Alright Now!"

The moment the words left his mouth, Kylyra's foot kicked off the earth as she lunged at the small horde of frost salamanders, charging straight at them. The party immediately went into action as well as Dohel held his great sword with both hands and charged after the reckless Kylyra.

Larut fired some more arrows as support although he could not use any more explosive arrows. His strikes should still be enough to slow down the monster's movement speed even if by just a little. However, frost salamanders were incredibly fast and nimble, especially in cold environments.

With quick and slithery movements, the frost salamanders all easily avoided Larut's barrage of arrows and the few of them at the lead opened their jaws wide as a dark blue ball of icy energy gathered in them for a few seconds before several large waves of freezing breaths were fired at the approaching Kylyra and Dohel, threatening to turn them into ice sculptures.

"Protection Blessings."

"Magic Shield."

As Kylyra raised her battle-ax in an attempt to block the freezing breaths. Aine and Anne cast two layers of protection on her. Although the magic barrier couldn't stop the freezing effects of a freezing breath, it could negate most of the physical damage attached to the attack while protection blessings would increase her elemental resistance to the attack.

Dohel shadowed Kylyra and stood behind her when she received the attack. Once she was done they both shot forth at the massive blue lizard-like creatures ahead of them. Frost salamanders may not be highly ranked monsters, however, they were very dangerous in areas like this at this time of the year.

It would be foolish for the party to underestimate them at all. So Naturally, they had to reduce their numbers as soon as possible. There were around eleven of these monsters before them and while they would not be able to stop them by themselves, they had full confidence in their team.

BOOM

Kylyra foot kicked off the ground the moment she got close enough to the monsters. Her body flew through the air as she raised her battle ax overhead and a burst of pinkish flames engulfed the blade. Her body came crashing back down to earth and she immediately swung her ax down.

°Frenzy Crash.°

Her massive battle-ax had created a small crater where she had landed and the monster that received her blade, died in an instant. The pink flame swept across the area around her like a wave up to a 10-meter radius and although the frost salamanders that were hit by flames alone did not receive much damage, their bloodlust was immediately redirected to Kylyra.

Seeing her skill work its magic so easily, a seductive smile crept across her face as she tightens her grip on the battle-ax and prepared to face them all head-on.

With Kylyra attracting more than half of the frost salamanders to her and Anne backing her up with several support and enhancement spells. Dohel only had three Frost salamanders to face with the help of Aine and Larut.

"Dark Vine Hostage."

As Aine cast her spell, several thick black vines shot out of the snow-filled earth and wrapped rapidly around one of the salamanders. Larut also fired a barrage of arrows at another and Dohel was free to go head to head with the last remaining frost salamander.

It would be hard for him to face multiple frost salamanders at the same time as each of these salamanders had roughly the same amount of strength as a platinum-ranked Hunter. The only reason these monsters were not ranked higher or considered more dangerous was due to their staggering stupidity as they were fairly easy to track and were easily susceptible to crowd control spells.

However—

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As Dohel charged at the frost salamander, his blade was met with a claw strike and the moment he tried to retract his weapon, a sudden beam of freezing breath came from the side and hit him point-blank.

The attack came from his blindspot and even Larut, a ranger with the best senses amongst the group had been unable to see the attack coming.

Several more frost salamanders came from underneath the earth all around them as the ones behind them nimbly charged at the unsuspecting Dohel, Aine, and Anne, while the others blaster their freezing breath at Dohel.

Tyler's eyes went wide the moment he saw this as even him— from the high vantage point of the carriage driver's seat— was unable to sense the cold-blooded monsters as they performed an increasingly well-timed and well-coordinated sneak attack. 

"Huh, did I just watch monsters execute a trap to perfection? Interesting."