The air was thin and piercing like broken glass.
Every breath Victor drew stabbed at his lungs, frosting his throat with every exhale. His body trembled due tothe creeping exhaustion that clawed at his insides.
What was left of his attire which barely covered up to half of his body were stiff with frost. His lips were cracked, and his limbs were starting to feel heavy due to his depleting qi.
Yet he stood crouched behind a spiky pillar of blue-white crystal, staring into the nest of a creature that looked like a nightmare carved from winter itself.
The nest was an enormous sprawling bowl of gleaming shards and bones cemented by ice. And at its center lay four whitish offsprings that were smaller but no less terrifying than the one that brought them food. Their hides were scaled with frozen plates that shimmered like mirrors in moonlight, and their eyes glowed faintly with an eerie, cerulean hue.
