Will of a Prince

"No... no..."

Jacob’s fists were horribly damaged. His knuckles had bone sticking out of them. Everyone shivered as they stood on top of the ice.

"Jacob..."

Suddenly, Maria and Lidia had finally caught up to them. Something looked horribly wrong with Maria. She tried walking up to Jacob, but as she got closer, her legs began to shake, and she dropped to her knees. Jacob stopped staring downwards to see what was wrong. Maria looked at her hands.

"My... my strength. Somethings wrong."

Her short and messy, dark hair covered her face as she tried to stand up again. However, she fell over once more.

"I can’t move my legs."

Jacob moved over to her and helped removed her thick dragon armor. The cold wind made her shiver, as her long thin undershirt was now the only thing covering her body. However, this immediately allowed Maria to move around.

"What’s wrong? Did you push yourself too hard?"

Just then, Sarah fell to the ground and held her stomach. Jacob looked over, his eyes wide with fear.

"I don’t feel so good. Something feels incredibly wrong."

Maria and Sarah started to shiver. Slimo, Lidia, Jacob, and Squabee were the only ones unaffected by the elements currently.

"Just activate your power, Sarah."

Sarah looked at him, her teeth chattering.

"I... can’t."

Jacob raised an eyebrow.

"You hardly fought. You should have plenty of energy."

"I know, Jacob. I just... it’s not working!"

A dark intuition started forming inside of Jacob’s gut.

"Don’t tell me."

He looked at Maria.

"Maria, try and activate your power."

Maria’s face strained as she tried to lift herself off the ground. However, she once again could hardly move. She was able to stand and walk, but her movements were vastly slower than they were before. She looked at Jacob with empty eyes, on the verge of tears. Jacob wanted to scream. On top of everything that’s already happened, now everyone’s Zalo’s have mysteriously stopped working... or they had been taken away from them. However, if that’s true, he still had to test a few others. He stared at Lidia firmly and raised his hand out to her.

"Lift your right arm."

He felt no pull on his soul as he shouted the command. Lidia stood still, leaning on Slimo without ever making a move. He walked up to Lidia.

"Hold out the palm of your hand."

Lidia did as she was told, but not because of Jacob’s power. This was to test something else. Jacob then threw a small kick into Lidia’s palm.

"Use that energy to heal your wounds."

Lidia closed her eyes and tried to focus. However, nothing happened. Her energy transfer had also disappeared from her body. There was only one last person to test, and this was the one he desperately hoped still had her power. He looked over at Squabee.

"Squabee?"

Sqaubee’s dim eyes looked at Jacob, then she gave him a nod of approval. Jacob walked up to her and tried to throw a kick into her stomach. However, right before the kick landed, his other foot lost its balance, and he slipped before crashing down on to the ice. If there was somehow one good outcome to the entirety of the situation, it was that the Squabee was still her usual self. Or so he had seen so far.

Jacob winced, holding his hand as he stood up.

"We need to keep moving."

Squabee looked at the group hopelessly.

"But where do we go?"

Jacob hesitated.

"Somewhere that isn’t here. We need to get as far away from that continent as possible."

Maria stuck herself right up against Jacob, shivering as she walked.

"I thought the other continents had already fallen?"

Jacob clenched his teeth held Maria close to him in a weak attempt to keep her warm.

"It’s still better than being on a continent with a Providence Deity."

Maria looked over at Sarah who was shivering as well.

"Squabee, keep Sarah warm as best as you can. Jacob can help me and Slimo can help Lidia. We need to keep moving."

Sarah nodded and found the strength to huddle close to Squabee. Their whole group walked close together to try and conserve as much heat and energy as they possibly could.

"What do we do? What is our goal? Where are going?"

Jacob clenched his teeth.

"There’s only one thing to do. We survive. No matter what it takes."

Maria, through clenched teeth, whispered to Jacob.

"S-Sheeby is... not here."

Jacob held Maria tighter.

"She’ll be okay. She’s our kid after all. She’s strong."

"It’s my fault she’s not here."

"Don’t say things like that right now. Save your energy, please."

Maria quickly let out one last question.

"The warning about the ocean. What do we do?"

Jacob went silent for a few moments.

"We deal with it if we have to. Until then, we keep fighting."

Slimo was the quietest of the whole group. Even though he was much stronger, he had suffered bitter losses twice now. Once to Jacob, and now another time to the General. He had been useless in both fights. And now, the whole group was relying on him, Lidia, and Squabee for power. Jacob, Sarah, and Maria were still strong, but both Maria and Sarah in particular relied very heavily on their powers almost all the time. Living without them was going to be an adjustment for everyone.

Something that caught Jacob’s attention was his curse mark. The end times were here, the runes on the skull were gone, yet the skull never left either his or Maria’s body. He was mostly expecting the mark to simply disappear when the Great Calamity happened, so he was a bit disappointed to see the cruel reminder of his failure sill burnt on his flesh.

Now that there was no sun in the sky anymore, keeping track of time was next to impossible. Not only that, but there were constant flurries of snow circulating above them, so clouds constantly covered the sky anyway. They could have been walking for days on the dark, lifeless expanse of cold without knowing it. All that Jacob knew is that every passing second was becoming more and more maddening. They were hungry, injured, tired, and freezing.

Maria was turning blue. The cold was getting to be too much for her. Jacob looked over towards Lidia.

"Lidia... mom... please help me keep Maria warm. Please. She’s not well."

Lidia walked over to Jacob and held on to Maria from the other side.

"Her skin is so cold. We need to make a fire soon before it’s too late."

"But... with what?"

They both looked around. Nothing but cold flurries blew around their area.

"Just... keep moving. We will find something eventually. Whatever you do, don’t let Maria fall asleep. We need to keep her awake."

The worst part about travelling through the cold was easily the wind. Every few seconds a strong gust would blow in their face causing their eyes to water, their nose to sting, and their bodies to shiver. The wind would pierce through every piece of clothing they had on, making it feel like the ice was pressing right up against their body for a moment. This cycle would repeat for hours on end with each step they took in front of them.

Suddenly, Maria started going limp. Jacob rubbed her face trying to keep her up.

"Maria. Don’t fall asleep yet. We need you awake just a bit longer, okay? Just a little bit longer."

"J-Jacob..."

"That’s right. Keep talking to me. Just don’t close your eyes."

"S-So... cold."

Maria suddenly blacked out and went limp in their arms.

"Maria?! Maria! Wake up!"

Lidia tried shaking her awake, to no avail. Everyone at this point was beyond exhausted. Each of their faces were turning white, early signs of frostbite appeared on their fingers, and no one had eaten anything in incredibly long. They were beyond their limit.

"We need a fire. We need anything to make a fire, or we’ll all die out here."

Suddenly, Slimo took off his armor and rushed over to Maria. He wrapped the large set of armor around her then took off his undershirt.

"Someone, give me another blade, quickly."

Slimo’s skin was already starting to change colors as the wind beat against his body. Jacob threw him a dagger and threw off his armor as well before adding his undershirt to the pile Slimo was making. Using both of the blades, Slimo struck them together, allowing the sparks to ignite a small fire on the shirts.

"This might hurt like hell, but it will warm her up enough to keep her going for a while."

Slimo quickly shoved the fire inside the armor Maria was wearing. Immediately, the outside of the armor began to steam. Maria’s face churned slightly in pain and she started coughing.

"This won’t stay heated for long but it’s all we’ve got. Quickly, everyone else do the same for their armor."

Everyone followed Slimo’s command and steamed their armor to the point of it almost burning their skin. This small act alone was enough to grant everyone a short respite of energy. Lidia looked at Slimo’s bare body.

"What about you? Are you going to wear Maria’s armor?"

"It won’t fit me. Let’s just keep moving. I’ll press myself against all of your hot armor for now. I will be fine."

"But... there’s no way that will-"

"Lidia... this was the only way. We need to keep moving. Or this chance would be for nothing."

Lidia was too exhausted to argue and started walking. At this point, everyone huddled close to one another as they walked, keeping Maria in the middle as to give her the most warmth possible.

Just as they continued their journey across the frozen landscape once more, multiple glowing red eyes glared at them in the distance, veiled slightly by the small bits of snow surrounding them.

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