The Battle of Wills

The moment Dago stepped through the door.

A vast ice plain stretched beneath his feet to the horizon. Half-frozen rivers flowed slowly, their low roars echoing across the land. Towering glaciers rose in the distance like enormous sculptures, thrusting skyward like swords and halberds, their surfaces gleaming with a cold light.

Even the sky was coated in frost, traced with vast, intricate, irregular patterns. Snowflakes drifted down, covering the earth in a soft white blanket.

Dago took two steps forward. A faint crunch sounded beneath his feet, like the whispers of unseen sprites.

This was no simple natural phenomenon. Through the microscopic view of Dago's Dimensional Detection Technique, every snowflake contained an exceptionally stable arrangement of low-temperature rules.

They were not falling at random. As though guided by some immense will, they were building a vast, closed-loop energy field.

The Ring of Law's Ice Element Inheritance Mark Space looked remarkably similar to the inheritance dream of the Despair Winter Dragon that Dago had once entered.

Both were worlds made entirely of ice and snow. But compared with the Despair Winter Dragon's inheritance dream, this world lacked much of its ancient weight and held a measure more mechanical precision and coldness.

The ice-element particles here were more like trained soldiers than savage beasts. They stood silently arrayed in the air, holding back far more violent tides of energy.

Behelet.

At the mention of that name again, fragments of memory flashed through his mind like shards of a broken mirror.

They were ancient memories of power, sacrifice, and the struggle to survive in this world of despair.

A slight throb struck Dago's temples, as if something sharp had pierced them, but his expression remained calm. He slowly called up his current system panel.

``` [Talent: Despair Winter Dragon Bloodline (1%).]

[Strength: Second