Snow trickled from the overcast, gloomy sky, gathering atop the evergreen branches of tall trees and covering the forest's surface. It was a quiet November day near a small settlement a week north of Nova York.
But deep within the forest, there was a disturbance.
There stood a muscular, shirtless man in his underwear, shivering in the frigid snow as his titan grip wrapped around a large rock. Blood trickled down his torso, dying the pearly snow crimson as he slammed the stone in his face over and over.
The man extracted a small fleshy blob from a storage ring and started beating it. His face healed with every blow, and not too long after, he crawled to a small nearby pond.
His fist crushed the surface layer of ice. He scooped a bit of water with his hands and washed the blood off his face, cursing and shouting at the discomfort the cold was causing him.
He'd have thought that with all the suffering he'd gone through, a bit of cold would be no problem, but nope, even with all his pain tolerance, he could barely handle it. His fingers were numb; his body was frigid. While his healing could undo the damage, it couldn't heat him up. And he'd been out butt naked in the cold for nearly an hour.
He used a burst of essence to settle the water into a mirror-like surface and finally took a look at himself.
Freddy checked at his healed face and growled in anger as he punched the soil. "It's too fucking cold for this shit..."
He started his journey out of Nova York a week ago. Since then, he'd been heading straight North. For the most part, his journey had been going just fine. Now, unless he found a way to alter his face, he couldn't afford to be seen by anyone.
Not too far from where he was abusing himself, there was a pile of all his stuff. It was mostly just his clothes, but there was a newspaper on the ground right beside it.
Silver Heart's Resurrection!? 4 Found Dead!
That was the title of the front-page article. And right under it was the picture of Freddy's mugshot from when he was detained for interrogation.
A scandalous title; horrific accusations. No, Silver Heart didn't come back to life. And the murders were self-defense.
Apparently, Jacob had told his father something about "Silver Heart transferring his consciousness," and while nobody was actually taking the comment seriously, the newspaper made it seem like Freddy was the reincarnation of Silver Heart himself.
But of course they didn't actually say that! No, they put a fucking question mark at the end! It was a question, not a statement of fact!
Unfortunately, the damage had been done.
Walking back over to the giant rock, he continued smashing his face in. Then, he healed it again.
Once more, he found no difference. "Fuck!" he screamed.
There was no real reason for him to believe that doing this would help him change his facial structure. He was just desperate. Without Sophia's help, there was practically nothing he could do to—
His eyes shot open slightly.
No.
There was one thing he could always do.
Taking a deep breath to calm himself, he called on his trusty companion. "Bloodshed."
The ring on his finger shone with a sinister glow, and not long after, his beloved skeleton was out.
"What is it, Master?" it asked.
"We have to go find a construct," he said. "A life-affinity one."
Bloodshed nodded and dove into the Netherecho.
Their cooperative search lasted for hours. Finding a life-affinity ether construct wasn't the hard part—finding one they could convince to help them was the main problem.
Eventually, they stumbled upon their desired target.
Standing at around 2 feet tall was a red remnant with a head in the shape of a heart. It acted shy, hiding whenever anything looked at it. "Are you going to hurt me?" it asked, running to hide behind a nearby tree.
"No," Freddy said, talking through his little reaper projection. "I have a deal for you; if you're willing to do me a favor."
The remnant was hesitant. Its concept was that of vitality, not a rare life remnant to see.
Freddy made it a simple offer—he and Bloodshed would supply it with enough ether to turn it into a spirit, and all it had to do in return was help reshape Freddy's face once able to step into the real world.
Unfortunately, sentient ether constructs didn't really "want" to get stronger. Usually, they did so through naturally accumulating ether and building their connection with their core concept. Trying to use something like this as a bargaining chip didn't really work unless offered in an incredibly roundabout way.
Thus, he didn't really offer to turn it into a spirit; Freddy simply offered to give it a chance to interact with a great source of vitality—Freddy's body, to be exact.
It was incredibly hesitant, but after repeated coaxing, Freddy finally managed to phrase the offer in a way that pleased it. However, before the remnant agreed, Freddy had to prove that he could heal from any damage that Vitality might inadvertently do because it simply wouldn't agree to cause harm of any kind.
Feeding a remnant enough ether to turn it into a spirit wasn't an easy task. Not only did it take a lot of ether, but it also required a degree of connection to their concept. Thankfully, the presence of Freddy's body, which was bursting with vitality, was more than enough of a push. Within just three hours, Vitality stood in the real world, guiding its power to reconstruct Freddy's facial features.
Many people went after spirits to try forging deals with them, most often related to healing. Naturally, that was a batshit insane healthcare option reserved for the most desperate people society had to offer, and Freddy wouldn't dare try it without Bloodshed's protection.
Vitality did a pretty decent job, all things told.
But a small number of them survived. With time, they were joined by people coming from the empire. However, the newcomers weren't there because they enjoyed the idea of living in a frozen hellscape with a number of life-threatening dangers.
The people who went there were those who wanted a bit less oversight by the empire.
With time, that population kept growing, eventually giving birth to the Northern Belt—a border area notorious for crime and internal conflict.
Usually, such areas would be struck down by the empire.
But this was a special case.
The Frozen Wastes were a truly massive area, connecting all the way across the Arctic to the Eurasian continent. Needless to say, the number of wild passages scattered through this place was practically uncountable.
Thus, there was a near-constant trickle of monsters migrating toward the American Empire.
The Northern Spine mountain range was a natural barrier against these monsters, but it didn't hurt having settlements on the other side. And while a government-sponsored criminal utopia sounded like an awful idea for any country, its existence was a net positive for the rest of the empire.
How?
Easy enough.
Going to the Northern Belt was a simple ordeal. They let anyone who wanted to go there through no problem. Of course, as long as they had a valid ID and weren't actively trying to escape legal trouble.
The main issue was coming back from there.
It was a trap, basically.
Why chase after people with criminal tendencies when it was so much easier to bait them to a place away from society at large?
It seemed like a good deal, but there were plenty of non-criminals who were just trying to survive over there, too. They were the ones paying the price for this compromise.
While it would no doubt be easy to find a corrupt government office or two in the Northern Belt, moving to live there was something Freddy didn't want to do.
Or... Or did he?
There was one thing that the Northern Belt was also notorious for—there were practically no Lords living there. Everyone who made it to the fourth star was almost immediately recruited by the empire and brought back, most likely as a countermeasure against those who might plot a coup or try to become independent from the empire.
While going there would no doubt be a surefire way to get himself into trouble, wasn't it kind of an upgrade compared to most other places?
At the very least, he wouldn't have to be afraid of a Lord coming after him. Three-stars were by no means easy opponents, but he wasn't that far from getting to the third star himself.
At that point, wouldn't he be the safest in a place without four-stars?
A big pro for sure, but there was a massive con—that place fucking sucked. Even without the shitty people, there was always the endless stretch of land crawling with horrors that were probably even worse.
Sighing, he got up, paid his bill, and walked out into the cold afternoon.
He was in a rather small town, so there were no huge buildings blotting out the sky. The pale, depressing white of the cold expanse above shone down on him with an uncaring light, doing nothing to ease his dilemma.
What did he want?
He wanted a good life. He wanted fun. He wanted to become rich and famous.
If there was one thing he'd learned, it was that this life wouldn't come cheap. He had to fight for it and make sacrifices. He caught a glance of his new face in the window of a small shop.
It was sickening. To think it had been that easy to just... become someone else. But then again, wasn't that proof of his resolve? Casting away his face was something that hurt him more than he expected, but it was also a move that saved him a lot of trouble. It was a sacrifice that came with benefits. A payment that covered the cost of freedom.
Sighing again, he shriveled up and put his hands in his pocket. "God, it's so fucking cold!"
Just that alone was almost enough to dissuade him from going anywhere where he had to tolerate weather like this.
For the time being, he didn't have to make a choice. There were at least a hundred settlements between where he was and the Northern Belt. Maybe, just maybe, something along the trip would pop up and solve his problem for him.
He spent the rest of that day walking around and finding places to stay warm until his next bus arrived. Then, when the bus was there, he boarded it and traveled to the next town.
Over and over, he looked for places to stay warm and tried sniffing out a solution for his issue. And with every new stop, the more certain he became.
The days of travel became weeks of travel. The winter became more bitterly cold, but with time and a lot of Adaptive Water Body use, he finally started to kind of tolerate it.
And after a month and a half of living on the road, he finally spotted the horizon-shaping chain of gigantic mountains.
Without an ID, there was only one way he was getting to the other side.
He left the final bus and couldn't stop a smirk from quirking up his lips. "Man, I hope the damn army doesn't catch me."
There was a small shopping trip to get out of the way, but as soon as he was done, he had no more reasons to stay in the empire proper. Once done with that, well...
It was time for a mountain hike.