FROST
Chapter 122: When Stars Dream

Chapter 122: When Stars Dream

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The ground quaked violently beneath them, the tremors surging like waves through stone and steel.

Dust swirled into thick clouds as chunks of debris rained from the cracked ceiling, the walls of the chamber groaning in protest. Arcs of unstable magic flashed like lightning—searing bursts of color that lit up the shadows in blinding pulses.

And in the heart of it all, two figures collided in a blur of raw power and mirrored grace.

To the untrained eye, it looked like chaos incarnate—a storm of motion and light too fast to follow. But for those who dared to look closer, the truth unraveled: two women, locked in a deadly clash, each bearing the same face.

One wore the wind’s whisper, her aura humming with elemental precision—Silvermist, the loyal apprentice of the Wind Guardian, her body reacting instinctively with the finesse of training and restraint.

The other was darker, cloaked in crimson flame and laced with crimson marks that glowed beneath her skin—Silvershadow, the disciple of the Demon of Discord—Nix, her presence oozing with volatile intent and feral cunning.

One body. Two souls. A war waged within.

Their forms twisted and danced with unnatural speed. Wind spears met shadow talons, shrieks of colliding power echoing like thunder across the chamber. Silvermist ducked a vicious arc of corrupted mana she never knew she had and retaliated with a slicing burst of wind and ice, but her strike halted midair—as if her own magic hesitated, recognizing itself.

"Stop fighting me!" Silvermist gasped, pain searing her chest as her own limbs betrayed her for a heartbeat.

Silvershadow grinned back through the same mouth, eyes flashing with chaotic delight as she hovered mid air. "Why? I am you. And you... you’re the only one keeping us weak and yet—you refuse for me to fully take over?! Then die!"

They separated for a heartbeat—both panting, both bleeding, both unyielding. The skin on their shared body shimmered, shifting from silver to brown and back again, patches of hair morphing in color like flickers of flame.

The strain of housing two opposing forces in one vessel was beginning to show—fractures spreading across skin like cracks in glass, magic leaking out in wild, violent bursts.

The healers outside the barrier recoiled in horror. Some began chanting stabilizing spells, while others merely stood frozen, helpless.

And yet, inside that collapsing orb of sealed containment, the battle raged on.

The apprentice of the Winter. The apprentice of Discord.

A mirror war. A reckoning.

"Fine!" Silvermist growled, her voice cracking under the strain. "If you refuse to leave, then I’ll break this body myself. That way, you’ll have nothing to use even if—by some miracle—you win."

It might have been a bluff, a reckless cry thrown into the storm—but Silvermist wasn’t lying to herself. She knew the truth.

Yes, the mana surged through her veins like a river finally released, wild and burning—but this wasn’t something she’d trained for. This wasn’t strength she understood. She could barely hold it. It was like wielding a blade forged from starlight with hands made of glass.

Her limbs trembled beneath the strain. Every breath came jagged. Deep inside, she felt it—the tearing. Her body, once stabilized by the healers’ magic, was starting to unravel. Bones groaned. Skin split at the seams, glowing from within. Internally, she wasn’t sure what was left to salvage. She might have already broken beyond repair.

Across from her, Silvershadow hovered effortlessly, arms folded, lips curled in a cruel smile. Her laughter echoed in the chamber—mocking, dismissive.

Yet something in her eyes betrayed her. A flicker of confusion. A twitch of disbelief.

She didn’t understand it—how Silvermist, a girl who should have crumbled the moment Nix took over Frost’s body, was still standing. Still fighting. Matching her blow for blow.

Silvermist’s appearance had shifted—her frame laced with cracks of mana, her eyes and lips now stained black, her hair glowing silver-white in defiance—but she had grown stronger, not weaker.

Every attack she launched threatened to tear her apart—and yet she moved forward anyway.

It was madness. It was desperation. And it was working.

Silvershadow’s jaw clenched tightly, her entire frame rigid with fury and something else far more dangerous—uncertainty. She could feel it now, deep in the marrow of her soul. Nix’s mana thread, the ancient tether that connected them, was flickering, straining under the pressure like an overdrawn string ready to snap.

This isn’t right

, she thought, teeth grinding as she hovered in midair, red energy pulsing violently from her veins. We were the original. Nix was born first—before Frost emerged. Before any of them! I was shaped before this even became one of the Moon’s damn contingency plans.

The idea of being dethroned—of being matched by the "weaker" half—made her stomach twist. She bared her teeth in a feral snarl, eyes narrowing at Silvermist, who floated opposite her in the collapsing chamber like a radiant, fractured mirror.

The more Silvershadow looked, the more she hated what she saw.

Silvermist was cracked and trembling, yes—but she was glowing. Her hair whipped behind her in a silver torrent. Her lips, though blackened with shadow, curled not in fear but in resolve. The runes that spiraled along her arms shimmered with raw mana, unstable and yet somehow resolute.

She should have fallen. She should be mine already.

"Why won’t you just disappear?!" Silvershadow screamed, her voice a twisted echo that cracked the air like thunder. Her fingers splayed open with trembling rage, mana crackling along her arms—and then, with a sharp jerk, she summoned twin spears of crystallized blood-red ether, forged from rage and discord.

"JUST DIE!!!"

She hurled the first spear with a scream, the tip slicing through air like a comet. It missed Silvermist by a hair—but before it even landed, she had conjured another, and another. Her arms moved in a blur, a rain of spears cascading toward the other her like a storm of falling stars. The sound of the spears ripping through the air was deafening—sharp, fast, relentless.

Silvermist didn’t dodge all of them.

She couldn’t.

The first few grazed her arm, her side, her leg—splashes of blood erupted in slow motion, mixing with the pulsing glow of her own mana. A few connected fully, slamming her into the dome’s edge, shattering parts of the containment orb outside like cracked porcelain.

The chamber filled with smoke, dust, and the hiss of burning magic. Silvershadow hovered above it all, panting, her expression twisted in victory—finally.

Silvermist’s mana signature vanished.

Silvershadow let out a breath, but then the smoke shifted. A sudden rush of wind dispersed it like shredded mist—and there she was.

Silvermist, her eyes now glowing in crimson light—just like hers, and it made her more furious. Wounded, yes, but her form radiated something sharper now. Something not just determined, but ready.

Her body was a blur, propelled forward by pure speed, her movement almost soundless—save for the resonant hum of her summoned weapon. An obsidian spear, rippling with light and shadow, flickered into her hand as if born from her very will.

Silvershadow barely had time to react.

Her hands instinctively summoned her own crystalized spear, thrusting it up just in time to intercept.

The collision erupted in a violent wave of mana that splintered the air and split the floor below into jagged scars. Cracks spiderwebbed outward beneath them as the two spears locked in midair, the force of their clash freezing time for a split heartbeat.

Silvermist’s momentum didn’t waver.

She twisted her body midair, using the weight of her spear to drive her forward with a second strike aimed at Silvershadow’s exposed flank. Silvershadow snarled and spun in midair, meeting the blow just in time—but the impact sent her spiraling backward, blood dripping from her palm.

Before she could recover, Silvermist was on her again, relentless. The crimson gleam in her eyes was no longer gentle. It was fire. Fury. Survival.

"You don’t get to erase me," she hissed. "Not today."

Their battle erupted into a spiral of wind and flame, silver, obsidian, and crimson, two mirrored souls caught in the storm of their own making.

Outside the containment barrier, the chamber pulsed with oppressive silence, broken only by the rhythmic thrum of unstable magic pressing against the seal. No one could see what truly raged within—only a single figure suspended in the center of the orb: Silvermist.

Her body began to convulse, trembling violently as if struck by invisible forces. Without warning, thin red lines carved across her skin—scratches at first, then deeper gashes that bloomed like cracks in fragile porcelain. Blood seeped from wounds that had no origin, no weapon, no enemy visible to the eye.

East’s eyes widened. He stepped forward, instinctively, though the barrier kept him from reaching her.

The healers moved in unison, extending their hands, weaving threads of restoration in the air. One wound closed—only for three more to open. The magic faltered, overwhelmed. Panic flickered in their eyes.

Silvermist’s form twitched again, another burst of invisible agony tearing through her—her silver hair flashing to deep brown and back in erratic pulses. The marks on her skin continued to spread, trailing down her arms, across her neck, over her face.

"This is bad," East muttered, his voice tight with urgency. He turned sharply to the nearest attendant.

"Summon Theo the moment his mana stabilizes. This is beyond healing now—her soul is tearing itself apart."

The attendant nodded and sprinted down the corridor, leaving East staring at the sealed orb, heart pounding.

Inside, Silvermist floated—battered, bleeding, breaking.

But still she fought.