The ice wall was not truly a wall. Walls are barriers, meant to separate one space from another—like a house from the outside. They are borders. But the ice wall was something more. It was a landmass.

  A continent of ice that soared into the sky like a mountain range, its surface so far above the other lands that from the distant continents below, it appeared as a colossal, impassable barrier.

  No one knew its true size, but according to the accounts of a few brave Explorers, it was a frozen ring encircling the entire world, locking all other lands within its glacial grasp.

  Theories and rumors swirled about its origin. Some claimed it was the work of the Gods, the place they once dwelled before ascending to a higher realm. Others whispered it was the domain of ice giants, a kingdom separate from the world of men.

  These were tales spun by those who had never set foot upon the ice—those who had only glimpsed its blinding, distant majesty from the deck of a ship.

  The most consistent rumor, however, came from the handful of Explorers who had actually walked its surface and lived to tell of it. They said the ice wall was a hellscape of endless frost, killing cold, and monsters. A realm where a single misstep meant instant death from the cold, unless one was magically protected.

  And if the cold did not kill you, the creatures that called this frozen hell their home would. Every beast that survived here, regardless of its size, was a lethal threat to any human.

  Only those prepared to die should ever set foot on such a treacherous continent.

  So said experienced Explorers. And any man worth his salt heeded their warnings. Only fools and the insane ignored them.

  The wind howled, whipping snow and ice into a stinging cloud that blinded and disoriented. But it didn’t matter. Arthur wasn’t navigating; he was fighting for his life against a creature that saw him as a meal.

  He ducked under a massive, swinging arm, avoiding steel-like claws meant to split him in three. He countered by surging forward, close to the beast’s torso, and swung his blade upward in a vicious arc, aiming to gut it. The creature’s hide was thick and hard; his cut was shallow.

  The monster roared in pain and fury, lashing out with shocking speed. The blow caught Arthur on the side, the force sending him tumbling across the frozen ground until he skidded to a stop meters away.

  He rolled back to his feet in one fluid motion, brushing the snow from his face. His eyes locked onto the beast—a monstrous hybrid of badger and ape, standing ten feet tall on its hind legs. The cut on its stomach bled sluggishly, the blood freezing instantly upon contact with the air, staining its white fur with crystallized red.

  The creature watched him, cautious now. Instinct warred with hunger. Its eyes darted to the headless corpse of a snow ape nearby, the source of the blood scent that had drawn it here. To claim its meal, it first had to kill the man standing guard.

  It dropped to all fours and charged, a blur of muscle and fur defying its immense size, kicking up a plume of snow as it closed the distance.

  Arthur grinned, sheathing his blade and settling into a ready stance. This time, he wouldn’t hold back. He exhaled a plume of mist and moved.

  He pushed off, becoming a blur himself. He met the charge head-on, the sound of his sword cutting through flesh and bone a sharp, final note in the wind. With one precise, powerful motion, he bisected the beast cleanly.

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  The two halves of the badger-ape hit the snow with a heavy thud. Blood gushed, then froze.

  “Yessir, now we're talking!” Arthur exclaimed, a piece of slang from his old world slipping out. He did that when he was excited, when no one was around to question it.

  Sheathing his blade, he stood and waited. The blood would call others. He didn’t need to go looking.

  The wind screamed, its bite lethal enough to flash-freeze a normal man. But Arthur remained untouched. A plethora of magical artifacts shielded him from the killing cold.

  “There we go.”

  Another shape emerged from the white haze—a silhouette running upright like a man. But only monsters lived here. As it drew nearer, its form resolved into a massive yeti, its body thickly furred, its height triple that of a man.

  It stopped, scrutinizing him and the carnage behind him.

  ROAR!

  The sound was a physical force, a warning to clear out. Arthur stood firm, pointing his blade in answer.

  The yeti lunged. Arthur sprang forward to meet it, the grin still etched on his face.

  ……

  “I guess the rumours held true,” he muttered, pulling his blade from the yeti’s torso. Its blood poured out like water from a broken faucet, freezing solid the moment it touched the air.

  Monsters here had innate defenses against the cold—thick fur, magical resilience—but they were not immune. He swung his katana, flicking the blood onto the snow where it solidified into dark red ice. A faint current of electricity ran along the blade, a skill to keep it warm and prevent the steel from turning brittle.

  With the last monster slain, he turned toward the edge of the wall. He hadn’t ventured far. He’d had his fun. Now, it was time for his long-overdue vacation.

  “This was an excellent trip!”

  A bright smile bloomed on his face. Blood coated his gear, frozen into a thin, crackling layer of ice, but he was warm. The fight had seen to that, and his artifacts did the rest.

  He glanced back at the trail of frozen corpses—his handiwork, and the last monsters he would slay for years. He faced the edge again and began his walk.

  The ice wall rose a hundred meters above the sea. A regular person might take days to descend; an Explorer like Arthur needed only a few hours.

  He had begun his career at thirteen. After ten years on the job, he wanted a vacation—to settle down, find a wife, live peacefully. But first, he had to see the ice wall, the world-encircling glacier that was a conspiracy theory in his old life and a terrifying rumor in this one.

  He’d gotten his wish. The initial skirmish with the snow ape had been enough, but the bloodshed had drawn a crowd. In this frozen hell, blood meant food, and food had to be defended. Arthur was more than happy to oblige.

  Now, the fun was over. The vacation could finally begin.

  He could never truly retire; Explorers didn’t. They took long vacations, but the world always eventually called them back. It was an essential, and rare, profession.

  “It's a good thing I know what she looks like,” he said, a memory from a year ago surfacing—from before this months-long journey began. It sucked that there were no airplanes.

  With that, he began his descent, humming to himself to ward off the boredom. Boredom was the least of his worries. Soon enough, he’d be rowing his little dinghy all the way to the nearest island.