Combination (3)

To properly gauge the efficacy of my aura, I purchased some water from the auction house.

One might ask why I didn't simply melt the ice stored in the storage crates, but if my hunch turned out to be wrong, I would have had to trek all the way back out to cut more ice. Loath to suffer that unnecessary hassle, I opted to buy water just this once.

I poured the water into an iron bucket and submerged the blade of my sword. All that remained was to manifest my aura, just as I had done earlier, and watch the results.

Crackle!

The moment the aura flickered to life along the steel, the water cooled at an alarming rate. It didn't stop at freezing the water solid, either; creeping frost rapidly spiderwebbed across the entire surface of the iron bucket. At this rate, I was going to lose an entire iron bucket to brittle frost cracking, so I hastily withdrew the sword. Fortunately, the effect seemed restricted only to where the aura touched, and the ice hadn't bonded to the blade itself.

Can I not control this?

Freezing water was well and good; after all, I had gained an incredible ability. But if I couldn't regulate it, it would become a hazard rather than an asset. Whether my mana itself had fundamentally altered or not, I needed a thorough grasp of its mechanics.

For now, it seems I can adjust the intensity through the volume of aura I output, but...

Through trial and error, I confirmed that the strength of the cold scaled with the amount of aura deployed. What eluded me entirely was how to toggle the chill on and off. I had no way of telling whether this was a permanent alteration or something that would fade over time.

In the end, after agonizing over it, I decided to consult the Gallery.

So this ability wasn't an unmitigated blessing after all. If not for the mnemonic oral formula taught to me by the Heavenly Demon, which facilitated the absorption, I would have been in grave peril. Only time would reveal the truth, but since side effects could manifest down the road, I had to stay vigilant.

I may have acquired a frost attribute, but I hadn't obtained cold immunity. Left unchecked, this could easily turn into a white elephant, making practice mandatory. Excess in anything was bound to cause trouble.

Wait, can I use this barehanded?

Would the cold manifest if I channeled aura into my hands rather than my sword? Curious, I smashed the ice in the iron bucket with a hammer, refilled it with water, and plunged my hand in.

Crackle!

As expected, the water froze solid. The effect worked through my bare flesh just as easily.

This will come in handy when I'm disarmed.

I was heavily reliant on weapons, knowing next to nothing about hand-to-hand combat. This ability would give me a fighting chance to break out of worst-case scenarios. Naturally, as had been stressed repeatedly, failing to control it properly could invite unforeseen disaster.

Looks like I'll have to practice controlling it for the time being.

Swordsmanship drills, practicing my mind cultivation method, and now training this new trait—my schedule was packed. Perhaps this was why people advised sticking to a single path. I decided it was best to master the frost only to the extent required for precise control.

It's not like I'm trying to cast Ice Age or something.

Even in a fantasy world, magic on that scale seemed out of the question. Granted, there were monsters who casually sliced through mountains with their blades, but I was an ordinary mortal compared to them.

After finishing cleanup, I resumed chopping trees. Unable to use blade-qi due to the uncontrollable frost, I had to rely on pure muscle. Fortunately, my enhanced physique allowed me to stockpile logs without much strain.

Time to eat dinner soon.

Perhaps because it was winter, the sun seemed to set exceptionally early. The speed of sunset, as far as I knew, was dictated by orbital mechanics rather than axial rotation. If the sun was truly sinking faster, that implied a planetary-scale shift rather than a local quirk.

I've heard of the midnight sun, where daylight lasts around the clock, but this...

I couldn't make heads or tails of it. In the end, I had to chalk it up to the eccentricities of the Forest of Four Seasons.

I dined on smoked tiger meat and threw fresh firewood onto the hearth to warm my body. Despite all the commotion throughout the day, our little darling Wonmo was fast asleep. It seemed he conserved energy in winter by sleeping around the clock.

Well, he's just a cub...

Besides, the other forest beasts had grown sluggish as well. Up until now, the only real crises I had faced were blizzards and avalanches. Inexperience had made them terrifying, but they were all hazards that could be planned for.

I need to build an emergency escape hatch... Should I construct it like a vertical chimney?

Considering the destructive force of an avalanche, it had to be made of brick. Even when the avalanche struck before, the chimney had remained intact, so a brick shaft wouldn't be easily swept away. Still, damage was inevitable over time, meaning regular inspections would be required.

Something better than mud mortar... It has to be cement, right?

Did cement exist in this world, or was there an equivalent substitute? Back on Earth, countless ancient structures stood firm across millennia. Fortress walls, in particular, could barely be breached even with artillery fire. Ancient people had pushed past technological bottlenecks, utilizing whatever was at hand to build civilization. I was in the same boat. I would use every resource available to survive until the bitter end.

Should I ask Passing Dwarf... Wait, no, I'll ask the general Gallery. If it's outside his field, he might not know.

The dwarf had brought this up frequently: if a topic fell outside his specialization, he was as clueless as anyone else. Everything he had taught me so far had been the result of his own research.

My eyes widened. Did cement really exist in this world? Assuming the word wouldn't carry over, I had avoided mentioning it, only for the dwarf to bring it up unprompted. Even if the ingredients matched, I never imagined the name would be identical.

The gift Allfather referred to was the subspace backpack. While it couldn't defy total mass, it completely circumvented physical volume constraints. It saved an extraordinary amount of space, making it an invaluable tool.

Was this the classic trope of an ancient super-civilization found in novels and comics? Lost technology from an empire that vanished without a trace?

Given that Earth had its own share of architectural mysteries, I wasn't particularly shocked to see the same pattern here. Look no further than ancient Egypt: to this day, modern mankind still debated the exact logistics of the pyramids.

Though once you serve in the military, you realize humans could definitely pile up those stones through sheer forced labor.

Setting aside ancient history, I returned to the practical matter at hand. Now that I knew cement existed, all that remained was learning how to apply it. The dwarf possessed foundational knowledge and shared it readily.

Do I have to head downstream or toward the sea?

The surrounding area was all soil, not sand. Sand was only found downstream along riverbeds or along the coast. Even with winter in full swing, I wanted to avoid the sea if possible. Heading downstream was the far better option. I wasn't planning to build the escape hatch immediately, but I could start stockpiling materials.

No one sells sand on the auction house, huh.

After a quick browse through the listings, I replied to the dwarf. Putting cement aside for a second, another curiosity popped into mind.

As the dwarf pointed out, forging one was impossible unless I discovered more Ice Snow Flowers. Even if I did, I had no intention of fusing them with a blade.

Well, maybe if I found two or three more...

Trading idle chatter like that, I brought the day to a close. Fast Tree Sloth remained transfixed by the fire well after I fell asleep, staring into the embers with solemn dedication. I figured I could safely leave the duty of adding firewood to him.

The next morning broke under pristine, crystal-clear skies.

"Oh? There's another one here?"

While chopping down timber, I stumbled upon another Ice Snow Flower.

"And here... and over there too... Why are there so many?"

It wasn't just one. There were several. If one searched diligently between the roots and tree trunks, they were everywhere.

Is this like seasonal produce?

It was blooming everywhere, as if it were nothing more than common wild spring greens.