"Anna?" Azalea called out, because she had been in there for a while now and the flight spell was starting to waver. There was no reply.
He frowned, because it seemed they had finally found the right cave.
He floated forward into the cave, carefully avoiding the frozen stalactites hanging above him, and the cold inside was noticeably worse than outside, sharper and more immediate. He closed his eyes and focused.
Fire.
The tattoo on his hand flared immediately, and he imagined warmth spreading outward and coating him against the cold, this time being careful to use as little ether as possible, and it worked, the heat settling around him steadily as he continued deeper into the cave.
"Now this is convenient," he said, satisfied, and kept going until he saw it.
"The book."
It was there at the far end of the cave, a skeleton leaning against the wall with a book held against its chest like something precious, and nearby he spotted pink hair spread across the cave floor, Anna unconscious, while some creature with one arm missing occupied the other end of the cave, the whole area looking like it had been through intense heat at some point, and the creature was definitely still alive with three arms remaining.
He sighed and looked back at her.
"Hey, get up, or keep sleeping in unbearable pain," he said, and her eyes shot open instantly.
"AHHHHHHHHHHH!" She screamed and twisted on the ground in agony.
"Good," he said, then turned toward the creature.
"FUCK YOU, I HATE YOU, ARGHH!" It was the first time he'd heard her actually curse properly, which was mildly interesting, though not interesting enough to dwell on. "Now kill that thing, I don't have all day."
He pointed at a stalactite nearby that was slick with ice, then shot a thin beam of fire that bounced off it, then off a second, then a third, before hitting the creature squarely in the forehead, and it woke up and fixed its attention back on Anna since the beam had come from her direction.
"ONE DAY YOU WILL PAY, ONE DAY!" she roared as it lunged toward her, and despite being injured she got up immediately and rushed forward, manifesting a sword of fire in one hand and one of ice in the other, and in these few brutal hours her control over her affinity had improved enormously, though she hadn't noticed.
"Pardon me," Azalea said to the skeleton, kicking it so that the bones snapped and the book dropped free, and he took it while still floating, then rose higher and looked down at the fight below, and the creature was clearly a high tier.
"Kill it in the next ten minutes or stop breathing," he said casually, then opened the book and ignored the string of curses she threw up at him, and when he turned to the first page his expression shifted entirely.
It really was it.
A complete collection of alchemy knowledge he only knew existed because of how thoroughly he'd explored the game's map out of pure curiosity, and this was the first step toward something much larger.
"Let's get powerful first, Goddess of life," he muttered quietly, "I just hope you can kill me before I find you," and there was something wicked in the way he said it, and he was already deep in the pages and completely unaware of how bad things were getting below him, because Anna had barely five minutes before her body started rebelling against her, and the creature she was fighting was a tier six evolved, something she shouldn't have been able to touch at all, yet somehow she was holding her ground, and that advantage wouldn't last much longer.
"AHHHHHHH!" She hit the cave wall hard after the creature's extra arm caught her, and from the floor she caught a glimpse of him actually reading, peacefully, while she was fighting for her life.
"Haah, haah, haah," she breathed hard, and her eyes went dark, "fine, if I'm dying, I'm taking you with me."
Her ether pool expanded suddenly and dramatically as she pulled from herself far beyond what was safe, enough to blow the entire cave apart and kill everyone in it, because she had completely lost it and she wanted him dead, she wanted it badly enough that she didn't care what it cost her.
But then she looked up and saw him floating calmly out of the cave without so much as a glance back.
"WAIT, STOP, COME BACK YOU BASTARD!" She tried to pull enough ether together but she wasn't fast enough, and he was already gone, drifting away leisurely like nothing in the world was wrong.
She looked forward and the creature was already in the air, all three arms coming down toward her at once.
"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"
BOOOOOOM!