Alvian didn't stop running until the enraged, ethereal shrieks of the Icewraith Matriarch had faded into the mournful howl of the cavern's wind. He found a small, secluded side-tunnel, a dead-end alcove barely large enough to stand in, and sealed the entrance with a loose pile of icy rubble. It was a crude hiding spot, but it would be enough. He needed a moment. His body was a wreck, thrumming with the residual, agonizing chill of the Heart of Frost. The attunement process had left him feeling like a piece of brittle, frozen glass.
He slumped against the ice-cold wall, his breath coming in ragged, steaming clouds. He was exhausted, but a fierce, triumphant fire burned in his eyes. He had the key. He had the catalyst. He had paid the price. Now, it was time to claim his reward.
He held up the thin, frost-covered leather tome. It no longer felt painfully cold to the touch. The essence he had absorbed had changed him, forged a bond between his own mana and the book's chaotic power. He was no longer an outsider; he was a compatible host.
With a simple mental command, he gave the order.
"Learn."
The book dissolved in his hands. It did not fade into gentle motes of light like the [Shadow Weave] tome had. It exploded. A violent, uncontrolled nova of pure cryo-energy erupted from him, flash-freezing the entire alcove in a thick, crystalline shell of ice. The temperature plunged to absolute zero for a fraction of a second, and a wave of raw, untamed power flooded his mana channels. It was not a gentle stream of knowledge; it was a hostile takeover, a blizzard being born directly within his soul.
He felt the skill settle into his being, a new and dangerous weapon in his arsenal. But with its birth came the curse. A vicious, tearing sensation ripped through him as the spell's fundamental flaw manifested. A portion of the immense power he now wielded turned inward, attacking him.
[WARNING! You have successfully learned the A-Rank (Flawed) skill: [Frost Descent].]
[-350 HP!]
[You have suffered backlash damage from the skill's unstable matrix!]
Alvian grunted, a sharp spike of pain lancing through him. It felt like being stabbed with a thousand tiny icicles from the inside out. This was the drawback, the price of the spell's immense power. Thirty percent of the damage dealt, inflicted back upon himself as True Damage that bypassed all defenses. To use this skill in a prolonged fight would be suicide. It was a weapon of mutual destruction.
But for Alvian, a fatal flaw was not an obstacle. It was an opportunity. It was the entire reason he had come to this frozen hell.
His expression hardened into a mask of pure, unyielding resolve. The pain, the exhaustion, the lingering chill—he compartmentalized it all, his mind becoming a razor-sharp point of focus. He still had his two charges for the day.
'System,' he commanded, his mental voice an iron spike of intent. 'Activate Super Upgrade System on [Frost Descent].'
The system, as always, responded with its hard-coded, logical protest.
[WARNING! Target skill [Frost Descent] is flagged as [UN-UPGRADABLE] due to a fundamentally unstable mana structure. Attempting to modify the core code may result in catastrophic failure. Proceed?]
A cold, humorless smirk touched Alvian's lips. 'Catastrophic failure' was just another term for 'interesting results.'
The familiar, divine authority of his talent overrode the lesser system's warning.
[Ding! SSS-Rank Talent [Super Upgrade System] authority invoked!]
[System limitations bypassed. Forcing modification of unstable mana structure.]
[Consuming one (1) daily charge… Upgrade in progress…]
A wave of warmth, the first he had felt since entering the caverns, spread through him. It was the raw, creative power of his talent, a golden light that poured into the chaotic, icy blue skill matrix within his soul. It was not a gentle repair; it was a forcible rewriting of fundamental laws. He could feel the chaotic, self-destructive energy of the spell being seized, wrestled into submission, and reforged.
The skill icon in his interface shimmered, the text re-writing itself.
[Your skill [Frost Descent (Flawed)] has been elevated to [Frost Descent +1]!]
[The unstable mana structure has been partially stabilized! Self-inflicted backlash damage reduced from 30% to 15%!]
[Base damage has been increased by 50%!]
A significant improvement. The skill was now viable, if still dangerous. But Alvian was not here for 'viable.' He was here for 'overpowered.' He was here for 'broken.'
'Again.'
The single word was a hammer blow of command.
[Ding! Consuming one (1) daily charge… Upgrade successful!]
[Forcing secondary modification of core mana structure… Recalibrating elemental output… Integrating new control parameters…]
[Upgrade Complete!]
This time, the sensation was not one of warmth, but of profound, absolute control. The raging blizzard in his soul did not vanish; it was tamed. The chaotic, self-destructive energy wasn't just suppressed; it was repurposed, transformed from a flaw into a feature. A new, chilling understanding of the skill flooded his mind. He didn't just command the cold; he now commanded its very essence, its ability to steal warmth and motion.
The text in his skill panel did not just shimmer; it shattered and reformed, the words burning with a new, terrifying power. The word 'Flawed' was violently erased, replaced by a new, golden descriptor.
┏━━━━━━━[ Core Skill Evolved ]━━━━━━━┓
│ Name: [Frost Descent +2]
│ Rank: A (Perfected)
│ Type: Active AOE Spell
│
│ Description: You manifest a perfected, hyper-concentrated blizzard at a target location.
│ The vortex of pure cryo-energy deals massive, continuous ice damage and applies the
│ [Crippling Frost] debuff to all enemies within its radius.
│
│ ▷ Evolution: The chaotic backlash has been successfully repurposed. The self-harm
│ drawback has been completely REMOVED.
│ ▷ New Effect: All enemies hit by [Frost Descent +2] are afflicted with [Crippling Frost],
│ reducing their movement speed and attack speed by 60%.
│ ▷ Enhancement: Spell radius increased by 100%. Damage dramatically increased.
│
┗━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┛
Alvian's breath hitched. He stared at the description, a slow, predatory grin spreading across his face. It was done. He had taken a piece of suicidal trash, a skill abandoned and marked as impossible by the system, and transformed it into a god-tier weapon of crowd control and mass destruction.
He was no longer just a single-target phantom assassin. With [Shadow Weave +2], he was untouchable. With [Frost Descent +2], he was an army. His solo-focused kit was now perfectly, terrifyingly complete. The cold ache in his bones was gone, replaced by the thrumming, eager power of a blizzard held in his hand, waiting to be unleashed. He felt a profound sense of satisfaction, the joy of a master craftsman who had just completed his masterpiece. Now, all that was left was to find something to break with it.