Chapter 125: Twenty-Seven Times

[Regression Activated.]

"OH, COME ON—" Lucas's voice cracked across the frozen expanse the instant his vision cleared, fury and exhaustion tangling together in equal measure. "I did everything right that time!"

He had— though not entirely, but close enough that the failure stung considerably worse than the ones before it. He'd tried aiming for the joints instead of the thick, frost armored hide. He had tried closing the distance fast to deny the creature room to build momentum. He had tried retreating toward the ice formations, hoping the terrain might slow it down.

None of it had worked. The Yeti simply adapted relentlessy in a way that made every fresh strategy feel like it was a complete waste of time and his life.

[Player has returned to designated checkpoint.]

[Checkpoint has been restored to the last stable moment prior to death.]

He sighed, paying no attention to the screen that popped up in front of him. 'Alright we go again. Figure it out this time.'

He rubbed his face, watching the spot that the Yeti was supposed to burst out from. "Okay. You can do this…"

The creature rose from the snow exactly as it always did, and Lucas threw himself back into the fight despite the exhaustion that was creeping onto him.

He tried aiming purely for the eyes next, betting that even frost hardened hide had to yield somewhere vulnerable. But the Yeti simply closed them, tanking three solid hits before a backhand swipe hit him in his so hard it shattered his midsection.

[You have died.]

He tried climbing one of the taller ice formations, hoping height might offer some advantage the open ground didn't. But the creature simply ripped the ice apart at its base, burying him beneath the collapsing snow before he even had the chance to strike a single blow.

[You have died.]

He tried outlasting it, using pure defense as a strategy hoping exhaustion might work in his favor the way it had against other lesser beasts and discovered the hard way, that the Yeti apparently barely got tired at all, pushing him back instead until a final crushing blow ended the standoff decisively in its favor.

[You have died.]

He tried baiting it toward a frozen lake he'd spotted at the edge of his vision in one of the previous rounds, hoping that the ice might crack beneath its weight. He was shocked that the ice held fine beneath the creature, and when he tried to engage instead, one wrong move caused the ice began cracking beneath him, plunging him into water cold enough to stop his heart before the beast ever needed to finish the job.

[You have died.]

He kept going, even after the eighth attempt, the deaths merging together into an exhausting overlay of memories — claws, cold, crushing impacts, the agony of frostbite creeping up limbs he could no longer properly feel before the end finally claimed him each time.

He tried feigning a retreat and doubling back for a sneak attack, and the Yeti anticipated the feint before he'd even fully committed to it.

[You have died.]

He tried digging into the snow himself, hoping to ambush it from below the way it had ambushed him and simply froze half to death in the attempt, barely conscious by the time the creature found him anyway.

[You have died.]

He tried, somewhere around the fifteenth attempt, simply screaming incoherent frustration at the creature before the fight even started, completely annoyed that he had died so many times already to just one beast.

The beast however, simply killed him faster, apparently unimpressed.

[You have died.]

By the twentieth death, Lucas had stopped bothering with elaborate plans entirely, throwing himself at the creature with pure frustration, testing minor variations on the same handful of approaches, cataloguing every scrap of new information even as his own body grew number and more exhausted with every reset.

'Left shoulder drops before it swings. Right claw does mostly wide arcs. It doesn't like fighting near the ice formations so it avoid avoids getting too close to them'

That last detail tugged on something in his exhausted mind, and he filed it away even as the next death claimed him regardless, his experimental attempt to lure it toward the formations cut short before he could properly test the theory.

[You have died.]

In the next round, he managed to actually draw it close to one of the taller ice spikes and discovered that his own understanding of why it avoided them had been entirely wrong. The ice spikes came down after a few strikes, killing both of them in an instant.

[You have died.]

At this point, Lucas had gone completely numb as the fear of dying barely registered anymore.

He fought like a man that had grown tired of this endless trial and error, as his mind had fully shutdown from the cold and overthinking.

[You have died.]

By now, he finally landed a real solid combination: three strikes as hard as he could, and the creature actually staggering for the first time in longer than he could properly remember.

He celebrated a moment too early though, giving it just enough time to recover and end things as brutally as it had always did.

[You have died.]

He lay in the snow after that one, not moving, not attacking again as he let himself simply breathe for a long moment before forcing his body back into motion.

He pushed himself up, because sitting still accomplished nothing, and prepared to face the Yeti one more time.

[You have died.]

The familiar rush of the reset crashed through him, and Lucas opened his eyes to the same endless sea of white with bags under his eyes, frostbite burning in his feet and a hollow expression on his face.

[Ding!]

[Player has returned to designated checkpoint.]

[Checkpoint has been restored to the last stable moment prior to death.]

His gaze shakily moved to the system screen and as he read the message, he exhaled one more time as his eyes went wide slowly.

"Twenty-seven…."