You try to fight him now.

"I'd rather say I won't let you kill me." You angrily reply. "There's no chance I will die here."

"For sure." Atsura simply says, with a grin, as a slight darkness starts clouding around him, before he jumps backwards. Seeing him jump backwards, your instinct tells you to step backwards too, and you were right to follow it, as a mere instant after you stepped back, a shadowy stalagmite emerged from the ground at very high speed. Seeing that, you didn't want to think about what would have happened if you didn't move.

After the stalagmite disappeared though, it was time for you to attack, and so you rushed to Atsura, as fast as you can, before starting to throw a flurry of slashes, using both your sword and your knife, hoping to at least do something to him, but he either dodged or parried your attacks, seemingly without even giving much thought about them as he did. You knew you were far slower, weaker than him, but you continued to attack, in the hopes of at least touching him at some point.

Meanwhile, the other man watched your struggle, captivated by your attempt at even slitghly touching Atsura, not caring about the other fights around him, the fights between the questers and the ice elementals that haven't died already. As for Lady Kogai, she stood up after some time, before going to attack Atsura too, to help you, but even she was no match for his dodging skills.

As this fight carried on, Atsura sent more and more small attacks with his polearm, whenever he saw an opening, may it be in your guard or in Lady Kogai's, and you had far more openings than she did.

However, at one point, Lady Kogai started to attack even faster than she already did, seemingly almost overwhelming Atsura, not even letting him dodge as she used fire to seal every exit he had, forcing him into parrying her blows, ever quicker and stronger, and after some time, you saw it : one small opening on his side. How did you know it was an opening ? Because the fire was burning his side, and he seemingly did not care about this.

There was no time for you to think, as you once again rushed to them, launching a blow at the opening Atsura had. You knew it would only last for an instant, as you braved Lady Kogai's fire, uncaring for your own health, only trying to weaken him, to do something. But your blade never touched him, as ice encased your arm and almost the whole right side of your body, leaving you unable to move your right arm or leg, as the other man, who was only watching until now, said.

"This isn't a fight for you, weak guy, let the strong ones decide their fate."

As he spoke, you gritted your teeth, the **** coldness of the ice already almost starting to burn you, as you took your knife and started stabbing the ice, trying with all your limited might to break it. You stabbed and stabbed the ice, not even scratching its surface but continuing to do so, desperation starting to overwhelm you, until your knife's blade loudly shattered in front of your eyes.

It just exploded, like that. Nothing fancy, but it meant that you had no hope of freeing yourself of the ice, of helping anyone to fight anymore until someone gets you out of it. You wanted to help, but weren't able to, because of this man who could manipulate ice, and what he said just put salt on the wound.

"You are like this blade, too weak to fight the strong, and shattering if you do so. For now, you have no hope of doing anything against Atsura."

Saying this even made him smile a touch, almost as he mocked you, playing with your desperation and growing anger at Atsura and the Chaos Legion.

Because you couldn't do anything else, you resorted to looking at the battlefield, noticing that the fight was starting to get even, even though no questers had fallen thus far. The more the fight went on, the more the ice elementals had an advantage, as the questers started getting more and more exhausted. The fireball rain had stopped a while ago, and the arrows, still raining on your foes, didn't have any special effect whatsoever. There was only one conclusion you could have from such a sight : your surprise attack had failed.

Although, at some point, while Atsura was still fighting Lady Kogai, the man looking at the fight, the questers and the ice elementals fighting around you, as you were stuck into this ice block, one arrow suddenly pierced the ice that was encasing the right side of your body, followed by another one, as the ice started to melt before your very ice. Two other arrows came out of the same direction, one aiming for the man looking at the fight between Atsura and Lady Kogai, and one for Atsura himself.

It didn't have much effect on the man, as he just made an ice block appear out of nowhere to catch the arrow, but Atsura had to deflect it, giving a tiny window for Lady Kogai to land a punch and send Atsura flying, right into an ice elemental.

But something else happened because of this : the ice that was containing you quickly melted away, freeing you, and letting you continue the fight.