The bear lifted Azael like he weighed nothing.
Its tongue coiled around his waist, slick, strong, and utterly inescapable. It hauled him off the ground. Azael kicked, thrashed, clawed at the air, but it was useless. He might as well have been a rag doll.
The creature carried him to the center of the igloo and slammed him against the wall. The impact drove the breath from his lungs. Old stains and frozen patches marred the ice around him. He slid down, gasping, back scraping against the cold, rough surface.
He pressed himself into the corner, eyes locked on the bear.
It dropped to all fours, muscles coiling beneath its matted fur. Six black eyes fixed on him. No rage. No hunger. Just… cold, empty purpose. Like this was a chore.
"Please… no," Azael whispered.
The bear didn't pause
It lunged it tounge towards him. A sharp, shattering agony exploded in his left arm. He heard a sound like cracking ice. He screamed, the sound tearing from his throat until his vision whited out. His mind screamed at him to shut down, to escape, but the pain was too present, too sharp.
The bear wasn't done.
It scooped him up again and dragged him to the spot where the other man had lain. Then, without ceremony, it tossed the broken, silent man out of the igloo into the storm.
Azael knew what that meant.
He was next. Tears spilled down his cheeks and froze instantly. The bear's tongue struck his leg.
Another wave of agony, deep and rending. This time, he couldn't even form a scream just a choked, broken gasp. He felt something give way, a wrongness where his leg should be.
Before the feeling could settle, it struck his other leg. He was trapped. Pinned and Helpless.
The creature worked with a terrible, methodical patience. It wasn't in a hurry. It had all the time in the world.
Azael's world narrowed to a cycle of sensation. A deep, peeling pressure across his back. A cold, invasive tugging.
The roaring of the storm, and beneath it, the wet, terrible sounds of his own ruination.
He turned his head just enough to see the man outside the igloo, the one who'd been there before him. Even broken beyond recognition, Azael saw it: the man was smiling. Because the pain had passed. And now, someone else was screaming in his place.
Azael closed his eyes.
"I should've never followed the bear…" he whispered, his voice thin as frost on glass.
His thoughts grew quiet. Not peaceful. Just… empty. Defeated.
"What did I do to deserve this?"
"What did the man I used to be do… to earn an end like this? Then, a white light appeared.
It bloomed at his core, a searing, furious warmth that spread through him. The agony vanished. His body was whole again. He could feel his limbs, his skin, as if nothing had happened.
For one blissful second, he thought it was over. Then the bear struck again. Its tongue ripped into his newly healed leg.
"NO! NO, NO, NO—!" Azael screamed, his voice cracking with a fresh wave of horror that dwarfed the pain. "WHY CAN'T I DIE?!"
The realization hit him like a physical blow, colder than the storm. This wasn't healing. It was resetting.
So the torture could start over.
And over.
And over.
His arms were whole so the bear took them again throughoutly. Then the tongue coiled around his jaw, forcing his mouth open and locking it wide. He couldn't scream. Couldn't beg. Couldn't even bite down. All he could do was feel as the creature began its work again, strip by strip, sensation by terrible sensation.
He was facing the igloo's entrance. Couldn't see what was being done. Only feel it. Every nerve was alive.
Every second was an eternity. He prayed for the bear to get bored. To find a new victim.
But it didn't.
It never did.
---
Azael lost track of time.
Hours? Days? In this place, maybe time didn't exist only pain. He'd hoped the bear would grow full. Tired or even distracted by little things.
But it wasn't eating to survive. It felt like it was punishing him.
The sounds never changed: The wet, rhythmic sounds of the bear's work. His own muffled, broken attempts at noise. The endless howl of the storm, eroding his mind like sandstone.
His sense of self began to fray. Memories felt like ghosts. Identity was a distant dream. All that remained was the cycle: destroy, restore, destroy again.
He wanted to dissolve. To stop fighting. To become part of the snow and the silence.
But then, in the middle of the cycle, a fresh wave of agony was followed by something else: rage. A pure, white-hot spike of it, cutting through the red haze.
Why me?
What did I do?
And through the fury, a thought surfaced, cold and clear: The window said I need to recover my memories. Repent. Earn forgiveness.
But how?
How do you remember a life when everything, even your own past, has been stripped away?
"No…"
The word was barely a breath, but behind it burned a new, furious will. His body was being broken. Again. But this time, his mind wasn't shattering. It was more focused than ever.
"If I want answers… I need to get out of this igloo".
The endless cycles had taught him one thing: the bear barely used its legs. Never clawed. Never bit. It Just keep using it's tongue. It relies on it completely.
And it always went for his jaw the moment he made a sound.
A plan clicked into place. When the light comes back… I scream the second I'm whole. And when it goes for my jaw… I grab it. He'd only get one chance, so azael prepared himself.
---
Time blurred. Sensations came and went. The bear worked with its terrible, patient rhythm.
Then followed a eerie silence. The tongue withdrew.
Then as expected the white light returned. Skin sealed. Muscles knitted. Bones reset.
Azael didn't wait. The instant the last spark of healing faded, he sucked in a ragged breath and screamed with every ounce of fury left in his soul.
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAA! STOP IT!"
The sound ripped through the igloo, raw and defiant. The bear flinched. Four of its six eyes blinked in confusion. Then, instinct took over. Its tongue shot forward, aimed straight for his jaw.
Now.
Azael lunged not away, but into it.
His hands snapped up and clamped around the tongue like iron vices.
The bear froze. Its eyes widened. It tried to yank back, but Azael was already rising, using the tongue as an anchor to drag himself upright. Adrenaline flooded his veins. He didn't think. Didn't hesitate. He pulled With everything he had. The bear howled a guttural, shocked shriek.
The tongue, thick and writhing, began to stretch. Azael grinned, a wild, terrible expression. "SHOW ME WHAT YOU GOT!"
He braced his feet in the bloody snow, twisted his hips, and yanked with all the rage and pain of a hundred cycles.
RRRIIIP.
The sound was wet and grotesque, the tongue came free. The bear staggered back, screeching, a dark fluid gushing from its mouth.
Azael didn't stop. He snatched the still-twitching tongue from the ground and charged.
The bear's eyes widened in panic. But it was Too late. Azael looped the tongue around its neck and pulled tight.
The creature gagged, a wet, choking sound. It thrashed, its weak limbs scrabbling uselessly at the ice. Just as he guessed: without its tongue, it was just heavy, helpless meat.
Azael leaned back, arms trembling, teeth bared in a snarl. "This," he growled, "IS FOR EVERY SECOND YOU TORTURE ME!."
He pulled harder, something gave way inside the bear's throat with a sickening crunch. Its legs kicked once, twice, then went still.
Its six eyes glazed over, empty. Azael held on until the body slumped into the snow, twitched a final time, and was still.
The bloody igloo was quiet and only the storm outside can be heard, he let go.
The tongue dropped, limp.
Azael stood there, chest heaving, hands blistered and trembling, his heart hammering against his ribs.
Then, a slow, disbelieving smile spread across his face. "I… I actually did it." His voice was a shaken whisper. "That was insane."
Before he could catch his breath, the sterile, mechanical chime cut through the storm's roar.
A black screen flickered to life before him:
[ CONGRATULATIONS. ]
[ You have defeated a Hellhound Creature: "Ice Bear." ]