"Give it back to me!" The snow demon's roar carried surging magical energy, echoing across the snowfield.

  Hearing the sound, Ryan's eyes widened in horror. How many lives had this snow demon slaughtered, how much magic had it absorbed, to be able to directly trigger and control an avalanche?

  On the distant mountain peak, the accumulated snow seemed manipulated by an invisible hand, forming a wall of snow that blotted out the sky, rolling with deadly precision toward Ryan's position.

  The howling wind sounded like the whisper of death, vibrating painfully against his eardrums.

  Ryan did not dare hesitate. He abruptly changed direction, pushing his wind acceleration magic to the limit, sprinting at full speed.

  Ordinarily, a snow demon could at most use its magic to trigger a small-scale avalanche, but this one could precisely control the avalanche's trajectory and scale. Its strength far surpassed that of an ordinary snow demon.

  Ryan was certain in his heart: this snow demon could not have merely destroyed a single town. The number of lives lost to it was likely countless.

  "Are all the magical forces in these snowy mountains useless? Not even a single snow demon can be handled!" Ryan cursed silently as he ran.

  During his time at Glacial Arcana Academy, he had already learned that the Northern Border Icefield was not dominated solely by the academy.

  Many magical guilds and family forces existed here, though the academy was the strongest and most dominant.

  Yet even so, a single snow demon had been allowed to run rampant here for so long.

  "Damn it! No natural avalanche, and yet you can still actively condense a wave of snow?" Ryan had been chased all the way to the outskirts of the town.

  Without warning, the snow beneath his feet flew up into the air. Countless snowflakes, under the snow demon's magical control, rapidly condensed into a wave several meters high, crashing toward him like a raging sea and cutting off all escape routes.

  "Stop! If you come any closer, I'll crush it!" Ryan spun around, gripping the heart tightly, his hand poised as if ready to crush it at any moment.

  Seeing this, the snow demon froze in place, its blood-red vertical pupils locked onto the heart in Ryan's hand, filled with fear.

  Strangely, as the snow demon paused, the sky-blotting wave of snow also seemed to hit a pause button, slowly halting midair before gradually dissipating into the swirling snow.

  Ryan held the still-beating heart tightly, fully aware that crushing it would, at most, severely wound the snow demon, but would not kill it completely.

  The mission scroll only required him to bring back the snow demon's heart. It did not say that a snow demon without its heart would die.

  Born in the extreme cold, the snow demon's vitality was far tougher than one might imagine.

  "Return my heart! I'll spare your life!" The snow demon slowly rose from its crouched position, black magical energy raging across its body.

  "Here you go." Ryan's lips curled into a sly smile as he casually tossed the heart into the air.

  The snow demon's eyes flashed with wild joy, and without hesitation, it leapt toward the heart.

  Just as the snow demon was about to touch it, Ryan condensed a beam of magical energy at his fingertips. The beam shot out like a precise laser, instantly shattering the heart into pieces.

  "Only a fool would believe your words!" Ryan laughed loudly, then turned and ran.

  He had never intended to trust a snow demon that fed on human magic.

  The snow demon hung in midair, watching helplessly as its heart was destroyed.

  It clutched the pile of shattered heart fragments in its hands and violently vomited several mouthfuls of blood. With each spurt of blood, its magical aura weakened. Clearly, losing the heart had inflicted a fatal blow.

  Soon after, the snow demon's entire body rapidly frosted over. Frigid air poured wildly from within it, and wherever it spread, even the falling snowflakes froze into crystalline ice.

  The halted avalanche surged once more, this time on a far greater scale than before. A wall of snow hundreds of meters high collapsed like a falling sky, roaring forward with air ripping force, blotting out all light beneath the overwhelming white tide.

  Even towns along the border more than a hundred kilometers away, which had not yet been ravaged by the snow demon, could see that terrifying curtain of snow. Many residents fell to their knees in fear, praying toward the snowy mountains, believing it to be divine punishment from an ice god.

  The snow demon's shrill roar pierced through the storm, spreading in all directions. People in distant towns faintly heard the howl, and the despair and fury within that sound made their hearts tremble. Even across such vast distance, its terror could still be felt.

  Facing the crashing wave of snow, Ryan did not hesitate in the slightest. He immediately pulled out the protective rune scroll given to him by Evelyn from his storage pouch.

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  He tossed the rune scroll above his head. It instantly floated there, releasing a brilliant golden curtain of light that formed a solid magical barrier, firmly shielding his body. At the same time, magic surged beneath Ryan's feet as he continued sprinting away from the town.

  The massive wave of snow slammed violently into the golden barrier, producing a deafening boom.

  Even with the rune scroll protecting him, Ryan still felt an overwhelming impact. His steps were forcibly halted, and every step forward became extremely difficult.

  He sighed inwardly. With his current power as a Fourth tier Senior Mage, he still could not draw out the full strength of this rune scroll.

  This was also the reason he had never dared to use the Stellar Sword. That weapon was far too domineering. With his current reserves of magic, forcing it into action would leave him gravely weakened, even if he did not end up completely drained like Evelyn, and he would lose all ability to protect himself.

  "I will flay you alive and tear out your tendons!" The snow demon's furious roar came from behind, filled with bone chilling hatred.

  "It caught up already!" Ryan glanced back.

  The snow demon was less than ten meters away. Its magical power surged madly, its aura rising to the verge of a Master Mage.

  Yet perhaps because it had lost its heart, it could never break through that final barrier, remaining stuck at Ninth tier Senior Mage. Even so, its strength still far exceeded Ryan's.

  Ryan had already unleashed all the power of a Fourth tier Senior Mage, yet there was still a gap of nearly six full minor tiers between them.

  He scanned his surroundings. Heaven and earth were completely swallowed by endless white snow, leaving nowhere to escape.

  Ryan understood clearly that only by completely killing this snow demon here would he have any chance of surviving.

  Moreover, this snow demon had slaughtered countless lives. Killing it today would be justice for the innocent.

  As for the academy mission, the snow demon's heart had already been destroyed. The requirements of the mission scroll no longer mattered. At this moment, all he wanted was to survive with everything he had.

  With his resolve set, Ryan stopped fleeing. He pulled out another weapon from his storage pouch, a blazing runed spear, a rare grade weapon engraved with high level flame runes.

  Gripping the spear tightly, he turned and charged straight toward the snow demon.

  He refused to believe that with a rare grade weapon in hand, he could not defeat a heavily wounded snow demon that had already lost its heart.

  Ryan swept the spear horizontally. Raging flames burst from the shaft, instantly spreading into a sea of fire.

  The extreme heat rapidly vaporized the surrounding snow into white steam, which spread through the storm and temporarily blocked the snow demon's vision.

  "Ah!" Burned by the flames, the snow demon let out a painful shriek as much of the frost on its body melted away.

  "Stop screaming and fight properly!" Ryan shouted impatiently.

  Seizing the opening while the snow demon was injured, he thrust the spear forward. The spear tip aimed straight at the snow demon's wide open mouth, determined to pierce its throat and silence that piercing howl forever.

  High above, hidden within the clouds, Mora watched the fierce battle below with perfect clarity.

  Although Ryan wielded a rare grade weapon, his current magic level was far from sufficient to fully unleash the spear's power.

  Even so, he could still engage in direct combat across nearly six minor tiers of difference, something Mora had never anticipated.

  Impressive indeed, truly worthy of his Grand Magus potential. The Headmistress had certainly not misjudged him this time.

  Mora watched the entire fierce battle between Ryan and the snow demon in its entirety and had completely acknowledged his talent.

  The only worry lingering in her mind was that the Headmistress's heart seemed genuinely captivated by this boy, which posed quite a dilemma.

  Three days later, the residents of the border town still occasionally lifted their eyes to the horizon over a hundred kilometers away.

  The chaotic blizzard had been raging uncontrollably for three full days, and even after so long, their eyes still betrayed deep shock.

  "Is this the true power of that snow demon?"

  Many people stood atop the town walls, murmuring as they gazed toward the snowstorm in the distance.

  They had originally come as a joint party from several small local guilds, intending to hunt this rampaging snow demon, only to find someone else had beaten them to it.

  But then they silently breathed a sigh of relief. The snow demon noted on the mission scroll was supposedly a Fifth tier Senior Mage.

  Yet the continuous, clearly marked avalanche before them was clearly triggered by a Ninth tier Senior Mage at least to produce such terrifying natural phenomena.

  "Stop! It's stopped! It's really stopped!"

  A sudden shout of excitement echoed from the town. People busy with their daily tasks immediately froze, looking northward toward the horizon.

  The avalanche that had raged non-stop for three days and nights had finally ceased. This meant the earth-shaking battle had at last come to an end.

  Everyone silently prayed that the unnamed warrior had won. If the snow demon had prevailed, its brutality would have inevitably swept through nearby towns, leaving ordinary people defenseless.

  Moreover, if it had absorbed the opponent's magic and life essence, its power would have grown even further.

  By the time anyone from Glacial Arcana Academy could arrive to suppress it, the snow demon would have already wreaked havoc across the surrounding towns.

  At the center of the dissipating avalanche lay a slender figure in the snow: Ryan, who had battled for three days straight.

  He gasped heavily, his chest rising and falling violently, and shakily pulled a bottle of softly glowing green liquid from his storage pouch, pouring it into his mouth.

  Battling across tier differences was far from easy. Without the rare grade weapons Evelyn had provided, he likely would have been beaten into a chaotic retreat by the snow demon, unable to even strike back.

  "Fighting across tiers is really pushing it. Next time, I'll leave this kind of thankless work to Derrick."

  After regaining some strength, Ryan struggled to stand, restoring his right hand from its polearm form to normal.

  He realized that the Arcane Enchantment was far more intricate and terrifying than he had imagined, with the most astonishing feature being its ability to extend in size.

  For example, the length of his arm could, when the Arcane Enchantment formed into a war spear, be magically extended threefold.

  From a distance, it looked as though he were wielding a massive spear in battle.

  Ryan stood, brushing snow off his body, and stored the blazing runed spear and rune scroll back into his storage pouch.

  He then walked a few steps forward, bent down, and collected the snow demon's headless corpse along with the grotesque severed head, placing them into his storage space.

  【Recovered the headless corpse of a Ninth tier Senior Mage snow demon, gained Origin Value fifty thousand.】

  "Not bad, not a total waste. As for this head, I'll bring it back to Glacial Arcana Academy as proof of completion."

  Ryan murmured to himself, straightened up, and began circulating his magic to resist the biting cold. He trudged through the thick snow toward the town a hundred kilometers away.

  【Host, someone is watching you!】

  Ryan had not gone far when a sudden alert from the Grimoire startled him. He focused and sensed his surroundings but detected no abnormal magic.

  【The other party is an Elder Mage. Her concealment magic is extremely advanced. I only just detected her presence through a source scan!】

  Ryan continued moving forward while rapidly thinking: Within the Northern Border Icefield, who would have the power of an Elder Mage and specifically target me?

  Aside from one of the three academy Elders, could it really be that she has come to protect me?