The metal spear flew towards the skull of the three-horned dinosaur, but when it reached the water, it suddenly stopped in the air.
"Why won't it let my metal through?" Kyotyoryon made a nasty face.
"Because there's a barrier around the server," Iksan explained. "You can't see it, but I can."
"If the server runs everything, then why are you here?" Halankuo asked. "Can't the server do the same thing without talking?"
"Aaah…" the flower spirit didn't expect to hear such a phrase, so she opened her mouth wide.
"There must be a reason," Halankuo continued. "For example, you were put here to distract us so we wouldn't escape."
"But you can't escape," Iksan looked at the snow. "The server controls all the space here, and only it can decide whether to let you go or not."
"So the server can let us go?" Halankuo asked.
"Yes, if he decides that you won't tell anyone about him," Iksan answered. "But for that, you'd have to lose your memory."
"I just need to not think about anything," Halankuo closed her eyes and remembered the battle with the electric penguin that could read minds.
Unfortunately, it was too difficult to do. That time, Halankuo's brain contained her mother's data, which could somehow stop the thoughts from appearing, but now there was nothing stopping the generation.
"That's probably it. I'm sorry, mom, I couldn't do it."
While Halankuo tried not to think, Kyotyoryon acted.
The metal spear that hit the invisible barrier disappeared, but released new metal for the summoner.
Metal balls appeared around Kyotyoryon's horns, forming something like a ring. Unlike their predecessors, they didn't fly off, but remained in place.
"What are you planning?" Iksan asked.
"Can't you read my thoughts?" Kyotyoryon asked.
"The server isn't sending them to me."
Iksan touched the flowers on her hat and found that they had closed.
"My creator, you can think," Kyotyoryon said.
"What?" Halankuo looked at the character and accidentally noticed the metal balls "hanging" around her horns.
"I understood," Halankuo looked at her opponent and noticed that the flowers on her hat had closed. "Kyotyoryon used her antennas and metal to suppress the signal from the server's antennas."
"Your antennas are real," Iksan's lower face trembled. "Why... are they... yours and not mine..."
"My creator, right now," Kyotyoryon waved her hand.
It was a sign. Halankuo extended her hand forward and released a bolt of lightning. Iksan, unprepared for the sudden attack, was electrocuted, though the snow continued to hold her in place.
"It worked!" Kyotyoryon shouted. "Now we can leave."
The spirit of metal tried to leave, but the snow wouldn't let her go.
"She spoke the truth," Halankuo said. "The server controls the snow."
"But my metal has no effect on a naked, horned head with a beak. Maybe your lightning will work? It works on everything."
Halankuo looked at her palm, which still contained a barely noticeable electrical clot.
"If there's an invisible barrier, that means it's made of air," the creator clenched her fist. "Lightning is an air element. The barrier has the highest resistance to it."
"So you can't make a boo-boo with lightning, even from the sky? It's powerful."
"No. But I know what can be done."
A wrench appeared in Halankuo's hand. The girl looked at the distant skull with violet pupils, and then aimed her weapon at it.
"It worked, creator!" Kyotyoryon cried. "I can fly."
Halankuo also felt that she could move, although she could not do so.
"Leave, Kyotyoryon. I can't leave yet."
"I won't leave without you. This can't happen. Who's going to cut you?"
"I'm holding this thing. While I'm holding it, it doesn't hold the snow, and the snow doesn't hold you."
"But my creator..."
Kyotyoryon didn't have time to finish her sentence. A yellow flower the size of a human head emerged from beneath the snow then opened and released a stream of water…
The spirit of metal, who had already risen into the air with the help of her wings, suddenly felt that she could not move again.
"Hey, snowdrop, let me go, I won't cut you!" Kyotyoryon shouted. "But my metal will cut you."
The metal spirit was right, even though she couldn't see the icy "tongue" protruding from the flower and gripping her leg.
"My metal will take you apart like a doll and hide you in different places," Kyotyoryon continued to threaten. "Your head will lie in white water and will not find your feet."
Unfortunately, the flower did not listen to the character's words. Its icy tongue grabbed her leg to the knee and dragged it into the snow.
"What are you doing?" Kyotyoryon moved her other leg. "That's so wrong! I should be the one pushing you into the white water, not you me!"
The short metal blade emerged from Kyotyoryon's ankle bracelet and sliced through the ice "tongue." The spirit of metal rose a few steps higher and looked at her opponent.
A stream of water shot out from the flower's center, quickly reaching the second leg and freezing. A second ice "tongue" formed, but it too was soon destroyed. A short metal blade flew toward the flower...
A new stream of water shot out from the flower's center, hitting the blade, freezing it, and then dragging it toward itself.
... Kyotyoryon watched in horror as her metal disappeared among the petals and sank into the snow...
"Hey, snowdrop, give it to me, this is mine!" Another blade flew into the snow, but never reached its target.
"Why is everyone stealing my metal?" Kyotyoryon pointed her hand at the "white water".
The snow moved. The spirit of metal rejoiced that she would soon regain her metal, but what emerged from beneath the snow was not her metal, but a yellow flower on a long, icy stem.
"What is this?"
Huge petals opened in front of Kyotyoryon's face. The metal spirit saw a circular screen in the flower's center, on which its summoner's face soon appeared.
"Hey, snowdrop, why are you there?" Kyotyoryon flew back a few steps.
"That's because I'm the flower spirit," Iksan answered from the screen. "I could be anywhere. I've come to give you your metal."
The end of a metal spear emerged from the inside of the flower. Kyotyoryon aimed her hand at it, but couldn't pull it toward her.
"I'll give it to you if you agree," Iksan said.
"No. Just give me my metal."
"You don't even know what you're agreeing to."
"You're mean and you're stealing my metal, so I don't want to agree to anything. I'll cut you."
Kyotyoryon waved her hand. A metal rod flew at the flower, passed through the screen, attached itself to the spear, and began pulling it back.
"You're stupid," Iksan said. "Soon your creator won't be able to endure it anymore…"
Kyotyoryon looked down. Halankuo was kneeling in the snow, but she continued to point the wrench at the horned dinosaur's skull.
"I'm not stupid," the metal balls above the metal spirit's head attached themselves to its horns. "And my creator will endure it."
The spear stopped pulling back and, along with the rod that was supposed to evacuate it, disappeared inside the flower.
Kyotyoryon flew toward her creator. The metal arm emerged from the back of the character's neck, grabbed Halankuo by the robe, and pulled him upward.
By this time, Halankuo was almost exhausted. Her purple eyes had closed, and the wrench was the only thing stopping the server from manipulating the snow.
"My creator, don't fall asleep! The horned head will turn you into a doll!"
Halankuo opened her eyes and saw that she was rising above a snow-covered mountainside, from which a large yellow flower was sticking out.
"My creator, I am alive, and you are alive too," Kyotyoryon continued. "Even if you die, I will make you alive."
"No need," Halankuo said sleepily. "Better tell me, what is that thing over there?"
"It's a snowdrop. It's evil. It wants to take us away. We need to fly away from here."
Unfortunately, Kyotyoryon had also weakened, so she moved very slowly through the air. The yellow flower noticed this and shot out a stream of water.
"Ah!" Kyotyoryon screamed as if she could actually feel the pain.
The stream of water missed, but froze in midair and transformed into a huge ice "tongue."
"My creator, that's it," Kyotyoryon said. "I can't anymore."
The "tongue" shattered into countless fragments, which then fell into the snow. Kyotyoryon landed on a large black rock almost at the top of the mountain.
"There's no white water here, and that's good," Kyotyoryon said. "But my metal is almost gone too. I won't be able to replenish."
Halankuo pulled a sword-sized metal rod from her inventory, which almost immediately transferred to Kyotyoryon's hand.
"Now I can do something," the rod vanished into thin air. "But I can't fly."
"I can't fly either," Halankuo looked at the mountaintop, which seemed very close from afar. "Maybe we should walk?"
"There's white water there."
"But we've gone far. It's unlikely that she'll appear here."
"White water is evil. You can't walk on it."
"This snow is truly strange," Halankuo thought and sighed. "I didn't think the signal could control snow. It has no brain. But what if the flower girl is being used as a brain? If she can read minds, then she can control snow, too."
"My creator, someone is coming here," Kyotyoryon bowed her head.
Halankuo looked at the snowdrift next to the rock she was standing on and noticed it was moving.
"I can feel my metal," Kyotyoryon's gaze settled on the shifting snowdrift. "It's hiding."
Halankuo aimed a wrench at the snowdrift, hoping to quickly control the object that would emerge from it, but the snow suddenly stopped moving.
"It's disappeared," Kyotyoryon said, turning toward the sea.
Halankuo followed her character. From here, the horned dinosaur's skull appeared as a small blue dot due to the aura surrounding it, and the sea was a gray-blue background with white ice floes.
"Maybe it's some kind of animal," Halankuo suggested. "There are snow moles that live far north, where the land ends. That's probably where it is."
"Are they soft?" Kyotyoryon licked her lips.
"I don't know. I haven't seen them. I couldn't even find pictures on the network, but I did find an article that described where they live and what they eat."
"There's only white water here. Do they eat that?" Halankuo didn't answer.
"They're evil. They draw their anger from the evil white water. My creator, we must fear them."
Halankuo smiled, but then felt the stone they were standing on shift.
"Kyotyoryon, do you feel anything?"
"No, only this stone thing is moving. But it's evil because it serves the dolls, so this is normal for it."
"What a logical train of thought," Halankuo thought.
"My metal is stronger than stone, but not now. I can't cut it, and neither can my metal. Forgive me, my creator."
The stone stopped moving, as if it had heard the words of the metal spirit, but instead, the snow around it began to move.
"These white water eaters..." Kyotyoryon looked at the snow. "They are strong."
"They're unlikely to be snow moles," Halankuo imagined a doll's head emerging from the snow, its eyes so large they wouldn't fit inside. "I've seen photos of other types of moles. They're small. It's unlikely that an animal that big could live in the north."
Suddenly, the snow stopped moving. It seemed to Halankuo that the creature beneath it had gone somewhere else. The girl opened the map and noticed that very close was a visible part of the landscape, with green and white mountains.
"We're getting close," Halankuo looked at the peak. "Let's go there."
"But there's evil white water there."
"We won't walk through the snow. My energy has been replenished. It's not much, but it's enough to get to the summit."
"But there could be nasty white water there too," Kyotyoryon looked at the map. "It's already captured many of the pillars."
"From there, we'll have to descend. You have skis."
"What?"
"These are legs, like rails."
"I have them. I summoned these things several times this winter."
"You summon them again, and we'll go down to where there's no white water."
Suddenly, Kyotyoryon agreed. Soon, the creator and her character were sitting on a rocky mountain peak that dropped sharply toward the mainland, connecting only at one point to other mountains.
"You said there was no white water there," Kyotyoryon pointed at the snow-covered slope. "But you deceived me. You need to be cut, but only just a little."
"Look closely," Halankuo pointed her wrench at a green dot at the bottom of the mountain.
"Yup... Are there pillars there?"
"I don't know. I don't think trees will appear there right away, but at least there won't be snow."
Kyotyoryon waved her hand through the air, and a screen with circular skill slots appeared.
"My creator, I don't remember where to click."
"Just scroll down."
Kyotyoryon ran a grey metal claw across the screen and soon noticed a familiar slot with two identical sticks inside.
"I found it," the claw descended on the slot, and it activated with a gray "metallic" glow.
The screen disappeared. Kyotyoryon was thrown slightly upward. Blades emerged from the bracelets on her legs, which then changed direction and turned into large, thick skis.
"My creator, climb on top of me."
Kyotyoryon dropped to all fours. Her hair fell over her shoulders and chest, almost reaching the snow.
"You don't have to bend over like that," Halankuo smiled.
"It's so you don't have to jump."
A metal tail emerged from beneath the feather-shaped lower portion of the armor-dress, then spread out to form a small sled with a seat.
"Kyotyoryon, that wasn't in the skill," Halankuo opened her mouth in surprise and almost stuck out her tongue, like her character.
"I changed the skill myself so you could ride with me," the spirit of metal said. "I thought that the creator might not be able to hold on, might fall, and then I would lose her and not find her, because there is little metal in her."
"Is this really Kyotyoryon?" Halankuo couldn't believe what she was seeing and hearing. "Okay, I'll check later. The main thing now is to get out of here."
Halankuo sat down in the sleigh. Kyotyoryon rose to a vertical position, after which some force pushed the sled forward...
… From under the snow on the top of the mountain, a hand emerged with an eye in its palm, which, due to its pallor, almost merged with the background. The black pupil watched the sled, which quickly moved away until it turned into a small gray point.
"Sis, that's not the server," a purple-haired doll appeared above the mountaintop, surrounded by an electric aura. "The server is on the other side. You're looking in the wrong direction."
The hand turned back. The black pupil enlarged slightly, and the eye itself began to tremble.
"Yeah, sis, this is the very server," the doll landed on the snow. "Now you need to fly here. This is only your hand, but we need your body. Dolls have all their power in their bodies."
The doll wrapped her arms around her beast, supporting it from below, then let go. Filled with "doll power," her breast still trembled from inertia.
"Sis, I've become stronger than you. When you come here, I'll check it."
A screen with a white background and black text appeared in front of the doll.
"Why haven't I gotten stronger? You just tested it wrong. Let's test it correctly."
The symbols on the screen disappeared and were replaced by dots, but after a few moments, the text reappeared.
"We won't be able to test the dolls' power if we become human. Let's test it now. It will be too late later."
Bare, pale legs with short feet landed on the snow, and then sank into it up to their knees.
"Sis Toloruchan, I know it's you," the purple-haired doll noticed a strand of pink hair next to her and turned around.
A pink-haired doll wearing a solid white mask stood before the electric doll. But Nyonyokyo's gaze, unsurprisingly, fell on two nut shells that partially concealed breasts the size of a human head.
"I came up with a way to check."
Nyonyokyo raised her hand. An energy camera surrounded by lightning bolts appeared above her head.
Nyonyokyo closed her eyes and then stood next to her sister and even sank into the snow to the same depth.
Lightning crackled around the camera, and then a powerful flash illuminated the summit…