Twenty hours had passed.
Inside a military vehicle racing through the snow-covered roads of the Caucasus Mountains, the atmosphere shifted sharply. Beyond the frost-bitten windows, the mountains rose like silent giants, guarding bloodstained secrets within their frozen bodies. Snow continued to fall without mercy, smothering the world in a suffocating white.
Levan sat behind the wheel, clad in a thick leather jacket and gloves. His eyes stayed locked on the icy road ahead—one small mistake was all it would take to awaken a nightmare long asleep.
In the cargo compartment, the fugitives lay unconscious. The cold crept in slowly, freezing every breath. Thivi shivered in her sleep, Frans groaned softly as if trapped in a nightmare, and Raphael slept with his hand still gripping the knife at his waist.
Isabel held the Tome of Omnicent tightly against her chest, as though it were her only remaining hope. Felicia, already awake, slowly opened her eyes. Her body felt weak, yet something was different. With trembling fingers, she reached out, feeling the space around her.
"How long… have I been asleep?" she murmured, staring at the dark interior as the vehicle rattled on.
She tried to wake the others, but the sleeping gas still bound their bodies. In frustration, Felicia kicked the metal door of the compartment. "DRUUG! DRUUUG!" The sound echoed violently, tearing through the silence.
Levan's calm voice flowed from the speakers, distant and hollow. "Don't kick the door, Felicia. We're almost there."
His tone was flat, but his thoughts raced.
So she's a descendant of Omnivalor… No wonder her body resists better than normal humans.
Felicia let out a quiet groan, sensing the growing danger. Outside, the threat of the mountains loomed closer with every second.
A few minutes later, the vehicle came to a stop on a frozen plain. A two-story building stood alone in the vast white silence, as if time itself had chosen to rest there.
Levan stepped out quickly, his boots carving firm tracks into the snow. As he reached for the cargo door—
"DRUUG!"
Felicia burst out and crashed straight into him. Levan fell backward into the snow, pinned beneath her weight.
"Where are we?!" Felicia demanded, breathing hard, her sharp eyes locked onto him.
Still stunned, Levan struggled to sit up. "Is that how you greet your rescuer? We're in the Caucasus Mountains. I mean you no harm. I can explain—but we need to go inside. The snow's getting worse."
Felicia glanced around. Endless white. An unfamiliar world biting at her skin with brutal cold. Beneath her confusion, a strange sense of relief surfaced. She gave a small nod and stood.
"Crazy…" Levan muttered, brushing snow off his clothes. "She's barely conscious, and she's already this strong. If she fully recovers… this could be interesting."
He quickly moved to wake the others. Kaivan, Ethan, Radit, Frans, Raphael, Livia, Isabel, Thivi, and Zinnia slowly opened their eyes one by one, confusion clouding their faces as they struggled to adjust to the freezing, unfamiliar surroundings.
The air on the frozen plain bit like death at the edge of every breath. Each falling snowflake felt like shards of glass, whispering sorrow against their skin. There was no sound except the wind, carrying an unbearable emptiness—as if the world itself refused to witness their survival. Nature wept in silence, cradling each fragile breath in a rigid embrace that froze the soul.
Levan stood beside the aging vehicle, nearly swallowed by fog. His eyes narrowed, peering through the icy vapor clinging to the windows. He said nothing, motionless like a statue in the storm. With a sudden yet calm motion, he opened the rear door of the truck, its surface coated in ice crystals. The hinges screeched—a metallic cry tortured by time.
He crouched and gently, firmly tapped Ethan's cheek, fingers checking his pulse to make sure he was alive. "Wake up…" he whispered—more to himself than to Ethan, like a spell to deny the end.
Zinnia flinched softly as her shoulder was shaken. Her purple hair clung to her pale neck, and her breath froze in the air, fear flickering behind her eyes. She squirmed weakly, lips trembling, still unable to speak.
Levan moved on, pulling the thin blanket away from Livia's face. She blinked up at the gray sky above. Her eyes widened—not from the cold, but from the terror of the unfamiliar landscape. She wrapped her arms around her trembling body, realizing that something had changed forever.
One by one, they began to rise. Fragile bodies dragging themselves out of silence.
Ethan blinked several times, his pupils adjusting to the dim light. His voice came out hoarse. "Are we… in an ice hell?" His lips had turned blue, his breath fogging the air. He looked like a shadow of his former self, as though half his soul had been left behind somewhere else.
Frans knelt with one knee in the snow, clutching his temple as pain throbbed through his head. He looked around like a lost child suddenly realizing the world had abandoned him. When he tried to stand, his legs wobbled, his body rejecting reality.
Radit lifted his face, sneezed loudly, then cursed under his breath. "Damn… this is colder than being ignored by your crush…" He tried to laugh, but only a weak breath escaped, carried away by the wind.
Isabel touched her frozen cheek. "I… dreamed I was burning… so why is everything frozen now…?" Her voice trembled, eyes unfocused between dream and reality. She clung to the side of the vehicle for balance, the light in her gaze dimming like embers on the verge of extinction.