"Why did we have to come here again?" Isabelle asked, glancing around.
"You wanted to learn how I fight, right? I'll teach you something better," I replied. "I just don't want anyone hearing what I'm about to tell you."
We were in the forest, but we weren't that far out.
I didn't want to go very far, since in the off chance Reinhardt made his move early, I wanted to be able to react.
"You'll teach me something better?"
She didn't seem that convinced.
But that's fine.
I'll convince her slowly.
"How do you think your frost works?" I asked.
Although she looked confused, she answered honestly.
"I gather my energy, and then create frost out of thin air. I do have to cool the surroundings down first, but that's mostly instant. Why?"
That's simple.
"You're still a newbie at this. Tell me, when you cool down the air, what do you think about?"
"Do I need to think about anything?"
She raised a brow.
"If I want to activate my Gift fast, I just imagine the air getting colder, and it works just fine."
"Yeah, there's nothing wrong with that. Except, when every Gift is based off imagination, you need a strong foundation."
Even I do.
As it stands, my Telekinesis is plain.
I know the basics, and since I'm powerful enough, those basics work.
However...
Everything I learn moving forward gets added automatically.
Even Mass Manipulation.
I just learned it, and I'm already subconsciously using it every time I activate my Gift.
And the same was for Lightning.
So if I wanted to make Isabelle stronger, I needed to improve her foundation.
"Do you trust me?"
"Maybe?"
"..."
Not the answer I was looking for.
"If you don't trust me, this isn't going to work, Isabelle," I said. "I'll make your Gift stronger, but you need to promise me that you'll cooperate."
She pondered over my words for a few seconds.
Clearly, as haughty as she was suggesting this whole deal, she wasn't that confident in going through with it.
But to my surprise, she soon nodded at me with a determined look.
"I'll trust you, but if you do something weird to me, I will never forgive you."
I would never do that.
"Good..." I smiled. "Now this is going to be a little dangerous, but I'll be here to back you up if anything bad happens."
"Your mind can only picture frost as cold as the cold you've experienced."
"What I mean is... If you've only touched snow your entire life and nothing more, you'll think that snow is as cold as it can get."
In reality, she needed something more.
And that something more was why I asked for her trust.
"Isabelle... I want you to freeze yourself."
She frowned at me.
"Freeze and die? Is that your idea of trust?"
She wasn't overexaggerating.
It really was that dangerous.
The only reason I knew about this, however, was because when the demons attacked, Isabelle had no choice but to encase herself in ice.
No demon could penetrate her ice, and instead, they tossed her to the bottom of the ocean.
Only when the entire ocean froze up did she emerge from her frost, and her Gift had become exponentially more powerful.
That's exactly what I was aiming for right now.
"Start small. I'll be able to keep you in check with my Telekinesis. If I feel that something's wrong, I'll break you out of it immediately."
"..."
I didn't expect her to believe me, but to my genuine surprise, her body slowly began turning to ice.
Within just a few seconds, she was nothing but an ice statue.
Although she was in that situation, she could still blink and look around.
Blood Sight didn't pick up anything weird either.
It wasn't cold enough.
"Try harder," I said.
I sent my voice like a vibration into her ear, and I got a nod in return.
She upped the intensity of her frost.
Her body finally stopped moving.
Only her eyes still moved.
Yet they never left me.
It was strangely comforting.
She trusted me with her life, so I won't disappoint her.
I gestured for her to keep going, and she did.
Repeatedly.
I was slowly starting to get affected too.
However, by creating a small lightning barrier around me, I managed to negate the cold.
Just then, I saw her eyes getting cloudy, and eventually, she closed her eyes completely.
I knew what this meant.
She had entered cryo sleep.
At the same time, the temperature dropped drastically as a thick outer layer of ice formed around Isabelle.
It was working.
But...
Her blood was freezing up too.
In just a few minutes, I was sure that she would be dead.
And that's why I tried something I've never tried before.
I approached the layer of ice and placed my hand on it.
Gathering my Telekinesis infused with lightning, I sent it straight through the ice and into Isabelle's body.
Her blood began to flow normally, and her heart worked at a faster pace. Even her brain seemed to register everything faster as the layer of ice around her thickened.
Now it was only a matter of time.
So I backed off and waited.
A minute, two minutes... an hour.
Five hours.
Ten hours.
A day.
I was patient.
And I felt like I was in a trance.
If I looked away for even a moment, she might die.
It was thrilling.
I knew I could stop this whenever I wanted, but I was looking for something in particular.
Just before the ocean froze over, extremely small snowflakes began to descend from the sky.
They weren't normal snowflakes.
Each one was powerful enough to split a boulder in two.
And as I glanced up and finally saw a couple of snowflakes falling, I knew she succeeded.
I glanced at one of the falling snowflakes.
It brushed past one of the red trees and sliced it clean in half.
I was curious what would happen to me, but since I wasn't that suicidal, I used my Telekinesis instead.
My Telekinesis clashed with the snowflake, and after overpowering it, the snowflake simply disappeared.
It was pure energy.
Smiling in satisfaction, I approached the thick layer of ice surrounding the frozen Isabelle and placed my hand on it.
She did a good job.
And now, it was time to pull her out of there.