Villain Transmigration: Author Transformation

'What?!'

Literally, Keith sucked in a frigid breath, quite a lot of it burning his lungs with the sudden frostbite, but it never amounted to the astonishment of what bad news delivered in his ears.

By and by, his throat ran dry when he took his time observing him.

Right affront was Johannes, who was in tattered clothing, now shivering akin to a wet bird. The high-quality fabric of his clothes got ruined with different slashes, tears, and even burn marks found in them. 

From the gap found his ivory skin rather fresh layer compared to the rest—which he assumed was recovering from recent gashes and wounds, leaving him confused overall.

Such a powerful individual, a renowned yeti at that, reduced to this state he hadn't seen for a long time. 

Even Keith had a hard time landing a hit, let alone several blows and an injury. Only a few would outmatch him, Arnold included.

Seeing him in this state, he knew it was someone stronger; he couldn't let it slip past him.

Meanwhile, Mystique covered her mouth, gawking at the head butler, who suffered from the unprecedented incident, and he was in cold feet as the words rang his head several times.

Somehow, a part of himself wanted to deny as it was rather far-fetched with such an idea. But his throat and tongue-tied failed him to utter, at least, "W—Who?"

"I—I couldn't… Invisibles—the cloaks— high-quality artifacts…" Johannes stammered, fidgeting in his stead. "Though, they—have imperial insignia, a real—and a writ— for— crime aforementioned."

Yet, without hesitation, Johannes dropped the great bomb right off the bat.

'Imperial decree…'

A moment of shock soon fueled into a rage, searing his eyes almost blinding him when prominent figures popped out of his imagination like culprits.

At that moment, as though the already heaviness that weighed on him was too much to bear, and almost overwhelmed from the sudden onset of nausea inside his head. 

A Myriad of emotions started as fear loomed inside his heart…

Then, out of bewilderment, toppled him. Peering to the left, his heart ached when she stared into nothingness, but shed a tear and left a frosty trail against her cheek.

But most of all, deep-seated anger finally lost him as he roared and thrashed the nearby winter shrub away from him, turning it into splinters.

'Damn it!' he gnashed his teeth, controlling himself out of frustration. 'Out of all, why it the imperial—?!'

[What crime?]

For a while, Johannes now stared at Mystique, unwilling to tell her, but her insistence broke him down, sobbing in tears, "T—Treason..."

Neither of them moved.

However, Johannes shared after the sudden visitation, they caused havoc, going so far as to summon Arnold in front of them. When he looked around, seeing how they all suffered far enough, he surrendered himself not to further cause damage to properties and people under him.

Keith lost it. 

He slammed his paw on the ground, leaving a large crack on the pavement. Inwardly, he cursed non-stop from the mishaps.

On the other hand, the head butler went on about how the Grand Duke of Blackwell was more than willing to go through the due process on the trial as deemed fit, for he knew his conscience was clean.

'Your Grace….' He shut his eyes, deciding for himself, as he knew what was his priority at hand.

Upon noticing that she was trying to get back to her normal composure, he took a sharp turn at her. "My Lady, we need to go to the Imperial Capital and save His Grace—!"

"No," Johannes cut him off. "They're heading to 'Mountain Taiga' for a while now."

It was as though his insides churned for the worst, nearly wanting to retch so badly, and exactly what she went all giddy the whole time.

"My Lady, let's—"

[You don't have to tell me twice.]

Simultaneously, she dropped several crates of potions on the pavement for Johannes to use and hopped on his back. 

[Don't hold back on using them. Keith, hurry!]

With a roar, he skipped around the stone barricades, leaped whenever tall walls blocked his way and sprinted for all he cared as he went along the direction they had to go.

After a great leap, they reached outside of the castle, and then slid from the layers of snow and permafrost at the great slope of the mountainside.

Both braced themselves, until they reached the lower end, and went back, bolting amidst the thicket of snowy woods.

While on top of Keith, Mystique reached out of her smartphone and said, "I'll message him, just in case."

"Hold on tight. Ready when you are…"

After a couple of minutes, both of her hands now hugged around his neck as she leaned close to him.

Traversing in the middle of the woods turned every tree trunk to brown streaks of light alongside the great swatches of white. 

The once orchestral sounds of insects and birds suppressed with the chaotic winds howling to his ears.

None of which irritated him. 

Not once he got tired with the rush of adrenaline overcoming his body, and his brain dictated to run even faster than ever.

Among the tundras, to rocky slopes and frozen rivers became less of a problem for him, as he took a glance on the ground, filled with subtle footsteps on a single trail. 

He followed closely, and before he knew it, they had already reached the lush evergreens of spruce with a little glaze of snow on its branches.

The brilliant contrast of its viridescent colors was mesmerizing, but the silence was so serene, not a presence of monsters and animals heard. 

He stretched his limbs, arching his neck upwards, whispering, "My Lady, we're finally here…"

Mystique nodded and gestured to him to prowl slowly.

Undoubtedly, Keith became nervous as his first time entering the beyond danger zone, but he couldn't help but anger washed his wariness away with the footsteps becoming so pristine.

Then it didn't fail to surprise him.

For what was ahead of them, found Arnold, though unharmed but cuffed on both hands. Behind him were the knights also in a series of chains.

His eyes gazed at every single one of them, their familiar faces, the camaraderie he had with them. Their fearless gazes brimmed with hopelessness.

But what more wouldn't erupt him out of anger, almost to the point of charging among several people donned in dark robes, when one of them announced.

"Now, you must awaken the 'Frost Wyrm' and renege the pact!"