Snowy Trip III

The giant didn't wait for Kies to attack first. It raised its arm and clenched it into a fist. It walked to the mountain that Kies was on and smashed its fist into it, launching huge chunks of the ice and rock flying everywhere, and it wasn't just the pieces of the mountain that got sent flying.

Although the giant didn't punch directly at Kies, the immense shaking of the mountain also swept him off the mountain. He fell back down towards the foot of the mountain alongside the broken rocks. "Winds, carry me to safety!" he yelled. Responding instantly to his call, a strong gust slammed into him and carried him back onto the snow. But it wasn't over yet.

*Rumble*

Kies looked up behind him where an avalanche even bigger than the previous one was tumbling down and about to bury him.

"No break, huh?"

Kies looked back at the giant and saw that it was planning to do something. But since it wasn't doing something immediately, Kies ignored it for the time being as it wasn't as much of a threat as the hundreds of tons of snow and ice coming down the mountain at him.

Kies put his sword away since it wasn't much of a use right now and ran for it. He gathered momentum and found an almost perfectly horizontal ledge to sprint off of.

Kies sped up his speed, which actually slowed him down since he went deeper into the snow in his path, and this made him have to slow back down again.

Kies heard the rumbling sound getting closer and closer until it was practically right behind him. As he neared the ledge, something hard and cold hit his leg and made his legs buckle.

Another chunk of ice hit his back and sent it sprawling down the snow and off the edge. Kies managed to grab onto the ice at the end of the ledge and tried to pull himself up but when he felt the shaking of the avalanche, he knew that it was too late. It was right on top of him now.

Kies swore silently and looked down. He was hundreds of meters from the ground and there were spiked rocks underneath him. From this height, he was doubtful whether or not he could break the fall with his wind magic, and he didn't want to take the chance.

Kies had two choices in this situation. He could either pray that he somehow makes it through the avalanche while staying clinging onto the ledge, or he could also pray that he survives the fall by some miracle and then the avalanche right afterward too.

On top of all that, the giant was also still doing something to the peak of the mountain and Kies didn't have a clue what it was scheming. There were too many dangers to take into consideration right now...

"Stormcaller, if you're watching over me right now, you better save your last descendant!" Kies made his choice. He let go of the ice and fell towards the ground. Gravity pulled him down at dangerous speeds. Using the little time he had airborne, Kies guided himself to a position where he would land behind some of the spikes and spread out his arms and legs to slow the fall.

But even still, he was falling at a frightening speed. There was no way for him to break this fall entirely. Kies braced himself for the impact. As the distance between him and the ground closed, Kies created an updraft beneath him to slow the speed of his fall. It was successful, but only to some extent.

Kies still hit the ground pretty hard and it rattled his core. "Come on... Move!" Kies forced his body to get up and evacuated the area before the avalanche could bury him. All he could hear while running was the sound of ice breaking. With all the pillars of ice in his way, he had no time to slow down or look back and needed to focus on what was in front of him.

It didn't take long for the avalanche to catch up to him. Very quickly, the avalanche gained ground on him and pieces of ice and snow smashed into the pillars in front of him as well as behind. Kies gathered his magic powers and turned around. He jumped and aimed at the ground and shot a powerful gust of wind, propelling him backward and out of the way of the avalanche.

Kies hit a pillar of ice and crumpled to the snow. While on his knees, Kies glanced up at the mountain and saw that the avalanche was over. He got out of it but he wasn't out of the clear yet. He scoured the mountains for where the giant was but couldn't find it which made him really concerned.

"Ugh... Where is that thing?" Kies commanded the winds to search the entire mountain for its whereabouts but they came back with no results. The massive beast which was almost a tenth of the size of the mountain was nowhere to be seen? How was a being that big able to vanish without a trace like that?

"Find it," Kies told the winds, not giving up his search. But he was looking in the wrong place. Kies felt vibrations from all around him which he didn't understand. The avalanche stopped already so why was the ground still shaking? Wait...

Too late. The snow and ice under him opened up to reveal the face of the monster. It somehow got under the ground and burrowed to his location while he was distracted by the avalanche. Did it also predict where he would go?

The monster grinned. Everything according to its plan. It opened its mouth to swallow Kies as he fell down into its wide-open jaws.

But Kies wasn't going to let that happen. Being eaten by a giant was not the way he wanted to go.

"If you're hungry then eat this!" Kies rapidly fired a barrage of Wind Jets into the giant's mouth, chipping some of its teeth and cutting parts of its mouth.

The giant closed its mouth for a second before opening it again and roaring in pain. The sound was so loud that the entire migraine range shook. Kies was unaffected by this and landed on top of the giant's nose. Kies raised his arm and the winds hurried to him, taking the form of a javelin in his hand. It was time to end this once and for all. He hurled it at the small fragment embedded in the giant's forehead.

The attack connected and the giant let out a screech this time. More avalanches tumbled down the sides of the mountain all around them but Kies ignored them. Hanging onto its fur, Kies made sure that the giant wouldn't shake him off while it was writhing in pain.

To his surprise, one javelin wasn't enough to remove the fragment. But there was always more where that came from. Kies summoned the winds to his side again and formed another javelin to toss at the fragment.

As Kies was preparing his magic, something happened. The winds suddenly disobeyed their master and flew away from Kies. "What are you doing!? Get back here!" he shouted at them, demanding for them to return to his side, but they refused to listen to him.

"Why are you ignoring my words?" Kies asked. The winds didn't respond.

"..."

The giant's cries of pain turned into laughter. An invisible force slammed into Kies and launched him into an ice pillar. He tried to protect himself with his magic but the winds didn't react to his call like before, resulting in him smashing halfway through the ice and leaving a big dent in it.

"Tch..."

Kies didn't know what was going on with his magic, but he had a feeling that the giant was the one behind it. It made no sense otherwise since it was laughing now instead of groaning.

One of the giant's big hands reached out of the hole and grabbed onto the ice. The second hand came out as well and did the same. Kies watched as the colossal creature pulled itself up, somehow managing to not bring down the rest of the ground with it.

While it was crawling up, Kies noticed that there was something glowing on its face and saw the reason why his magic wasn't working.

In the center of the giant's forehead, the fragment was glowing brightly and Kies felt a huge amount of magic power emitting from it.

"So you're the one that's stopping me from using my magic..." Kies said in a distasteful manner. The giant didn't look like it understood what he was saying, but it certainly got the message. It gave a creepy grin and swiped at Kies with its long fingers.

Kies ducked to avoid them as they cleaved all the ice spikes in the area in half. Ice sprinkled all over the place, generating some kind of fog that blurred his vision. Kies instinctively waved his hand, telling the winds to clear the ice, but when nothing happened, he scowled and ducked back into the snow.

The giant's hand came back, destroying the stubs of ice that remained and nearly swiping Kies as well, missing by a tiny margin. Fighting a giant opponent was an annoyance, and even more so when it was intelligent.

When the ice cleared, Kies got up and saw that something was different. Before, the skies had been clear with very few clouds, but now the skies were dark and it looked like a storm was brewing. Kies felt a strong breeze and sensed magic in them. Kies looked around for the giant and saw it standing on the other side of the hole it crawled out of.

Kies felt magic leaking out the giant's body which prompted him to figure out what was wrong with his magic. "So that's why the winds aren't listening to me." The reason why his magic wasn't working was that the giant was stealing all the winds away from him. One of the unique traits of wind magic was that they followed those who were stronger, and right now, they were following the giant because they believed that it was more powerful than Kies.

"If you think you have authority over the winds, I'll prove just how wrong you are." Kies reached into his collar and pulled out the necklace of the bird. "Release."

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