Versatile: Alternate World

The ice particles scattered around are small, but those fragments are looking more like white quartz crystals scattered around the place. I tried touching one and like a block of normal ice, they are cold to the touch. When I touched it, a description box appeared before me.

[Eternal Ice]

Type: Item

Info: An ice formed by the solidification of impure mana and water, causing the phenomenon of forming the Eternal Ice to occur. It is a block of ice that will never melt under the sun but will melt if flames formed by mana are directly infused or used to cut it. Not edible but it is much colder to the touch compared to a cube of normal ice.

Wait, huh? This was the Eternal Ice Almira is talking about? That means the one that I am looking for and the one that Almira wanted to get are the same things?"

"You don't know this was the Eternal Ice?" Cath Palug looked at me with a questionable face.

"Hey, I don't recognize all kinds of stuff that exists in this world. That means even this thing is something I don't recognize."

"Hmph. You should hit the books once in a while, perhaps you will get smarter in the process."

I wasn't expecting to know that this was the Eternal Ice. I thought it was an ore or something as Almira wanted to use it but to make that this was the Eternal Ice is something else. Did perhaps Almira already know that I am going to look for the Eternal Ice beforehand? I don't know but perhaps she did.

Despite already finding the Eternal Ice, I didn't take it just yet. If my assumption is correct, the place that I was looking for would be covered or littered with the Eternal Ice and I can grab some of them in the process.

As I dive deeper and deeper into the forest area, more and more Eternal Ice covering the place appears. Not only that but the plants like the shrubs and weeds no longer grow and the trees in the vicinity are frozen. Just by that alone, I can tell that the Eternal Ice will not just be a good thing as I can see it spreading.

Venturing further, I heard a few people talking in the distance. I ready myself and hold the handle of the Versatile Weapon in case it is an enemy or monsters just mimicking human voices before checking it out. It turns out, there are indeed people there. No, not people, they are insect people which means they are NPCs and not players. I surveyed and observed for a bit and I can confirm that there are no players around instead, there are only NPCs around. I managed to count at least 4 of them. 3 female and one male. The three females are all armed to the teeth as they while the male one does not have any weapons in him. Instead, he has a bulky backpack with him and he wears glasses. From the looks of it, he is a researcher of some sort and if my assumption is correct, the girls are his bodyguards.

"Hey, what are you hiding there for? Go and attack them!" Cath Palug taunted me to attack them.

"Are you crazy? I am not as bloodthirsty as you so keep your mouth shut or I will tie you up into the tree and feed you to those Carnivorous Vines we saw earlier."

"Damn. Fine, fine."

I didn't approach them just yet. I needed to make sure that these NPCs are not hostile NPCs as I don't want to immediately lock myself into combat the moment I approach. After a few minutes of observation, I immediately concluded that they are not a threat and if ever they are, I can easily deal with them.

"Oh, are you going to kill them now?" Cath Palug is excited.

"One more yammer from you and you will see stars while you are laying down a pit."

"..."

I slowly approach the area and entered the vicinity of the Eternal Ice.

[You have discovered  Eternal Ice Grave]

Eternal Ice Grave? That is a grim-sounding name for a place. I proceeded with caution as the three warriors are still there and perhaps if I enter the vicinity, they might attack me so I needed to get ready to defend anytime.

As soon as I appeared, the three female warriors immediately pulled out their weapons and assumed a combat stance. I also assumed my combat stance in case they will attack without hearing my explanation,

"Who are you!? What are you doing here?" one of the female warriors aimed her gun at me, ready to pull the trigger.

"I don't mean any harm. I am just exploring when I stumbled around here in this place after following the trail of white ice substance."

The guy who did not even turn around and continued to check up the Eternal Ice speaks. "Drop it down girls, I don't sense any hostility from him, and you girls won't win if you fight against him so just give it up."

When the three heard that, they dropped their guard and they continue to stand guard in the area, waiting for further orders or enemies that breach the way.

"Welcome to the Eternal Ice Grave, stranger. Feel free to explore. There's nothing much for you to do in here. And if you are just here to harvest some of the Eternal Ice, feel free to mine them. I don't mind as I don't own them. Feel free to mine them."

"Oh, thanks."

"No problem."

The guy talks without looking at me once he is just focused on what he is doing and did not care about his surroundings at all but since he noticed me without looking, it seems his senses are much more profound than usual.

Since the guy did not mind my presence there, I began to look around the area in which place the girl was seen. I pulled up the photo and used that as my guide in locating the exact location. Since the area is quite big, I think I have to fully explore the area before I can properly locate it.

"If you are looking for the girl in the photo, give it up. The girl is nowhere to be found," one of the female guards speak behind me.

"You know this photo before?"

"Yes. We were the first ones who received and saw the photo so, of course, we knew about it. If you are looking for the exact location of that photo, you just passed it on the way. You see that big chunk over there? That used to be the place. However, it is pretty clear that the woman that was in the photo is no longer there so if you are looking for that woman, then give up. You can no longer see her here, the female guard explained.

"Wait, so you guys commissioned adventurers to explore this place?"

This time, the male guy who did not look at me while talking stopped what he was doing and faced to talk to me.

"We didn't commission them. They just accepted the request we put on the Insect Kingdom's Headquarters and they fulfilled it. We detected an abnormal amount of energy fluctuations around this island before so we decided to ask adventurers to check out what all of this was about. Turns out, we had a whole village in this area being encased by Eternal Ice."

"A village?"

"You didn't notice it did you? Yes. This was supposed to be a village before but apparently, due to the Eternal Ice, it no longer resembles a village and it is now a grave of insect people who were too late in evacuation from this place. From my findings, the event happened a few years ago already and since we didn't hear of this thing happening up until now, it means that no one has survived from the village to report the incident and it was soon forgotten as time goes by."

No wonder it was called Eternal Ice Grave. Because it was literally a grave of the dozens of families living here before the incident happened.

"Based on the look on your face, you are not so familiar with the Eternal Ice huh?"

"I am not. This is the first time I have seen an Eternal Ice so I was surprised that a whole village was engulfed by it."

"It's natural as it only exists in the Aquagius continent. If you have come from either Resurgia, Sandurk, or another continent, then you are pretty much knowledgeable about these kinds of things if you have heard of the Eternal Ice."

The female warrior from before who revealed that the frozen female in the photo is no longer here started to explain.

"Eternal Ice is not a beautiful phenomenon. In fact, if the first signs of the phenomena take place, it is recommended to evacuate immediately. After all, you cannot be thawed out once you get frozen solid by this particular ice. In short, the moment this ice crystallized your body, you are dead."