Reincarnated as a Phoenix

Chapter 142 - All Powerful

Seven days later...

"You know Petra, your new look really suits you"

"Heh, th---- Ikarus. You al---- look as ------ful as ever t--"

"Sorry, what was that? Ah, these poxy gasmasks!"

Crunching through the never-ending snow with both of us wearing gasmasks, me and Petra wanted a little bit of time outside for a while, there's only so much being cooped up we can handle really. Witnessing the settlement covered by a layer of dark clouds and knee-deep snow, it's slightly creepy if you factor in the lack of any voices coming from anywhere around here. It's almost as if our town is completely dead.

The gasmasks are simply down to the volcanic clouds still smothering this area causing the quality of air to be terrible. You can breathe for a little while but it's like breathing in a mouthful of dust, it still is pretty bad right now so going out without a gasmask is really not a great idea. Apparently as an immortal phoenix, you still need to breathe oxygen. I know, I still can't bathe in the volcano unfortunately. I'm pretty sure the no damage ability would allow me to do it for five minutes though.

Due to the cold as well, Petra has changed her style a little and has added a black and red layer to her current outfit. I've also got a new outfit made, obviously still from the same enchanted base. The colours are a mixture of white, orange and black and I now kinda look more like a freaking German barmaid with this getup! Combine that with the attached stockings that somehow manage to trick the aura, I look pretty good to be fair. I'm used to feeling embarrassed and uncomfortable by now so wearing something like this even in the freezing cold is nothing!

Time hasn't been limited when all of us have been unable to stay on the surface for too long so upgrading my enchanted dress was something from boredom more than anything else. It's still revealing as hell but feathers in the hybrid form basically make the cold a non-issue anyways. Ah, I have some resistance to that sort of thing as well, forgot about that.

How we're actually fairing right now, the first days in particular were hell but we seem to be adapting well enough now. Starvation could be a real problem if the crops underground don't start to grow quickly enough but we still have a good enough stock to last for now. Most of the settlement are either locked up inside homes or underground so we can afford to ration things out a lot with most people not being able to work.

We have no idea how other places are currently faring right now. Obviously, we're going to get the worst of it since we're the closest settlement to the volcano excluding the dwarfs but news has been eerily quiet right now. Due to the cold, the ocean has mostly frozen over and it would kill any message birds to be sent as well. We should only focus on ourselves right now though, helping the entire world get through this crisis is an impossibility. And frankly, I don't care about them.

"You still go--- to do w--- you pla--ed, Ikarus?"

"Ah, fuck this, I can't hear you Petra! I'm taking this stupid thing off!"

"Aesa advises -Ikarus- leave mask on otherwise breathing will become much harder"

"It's already been a week Aesa; you'd think it would be safe to breathe by now"

"-Ikarus- should already know not everything in this world is easy to predict"

Ah, should probably mention clone Ikarus is with us out in the snow dressed in nothing but that pink dress Aesa now wears. She can always speak inside my head so communication with her is fine and clones don't need to breathe apparently. I don't make up the rules folks!

Anyways, Petra comes up to me and adjusts something on my mask almost immediately making things better. I'm such a freaking child at times.

"Heh, that better Ikarus? You were wearing it wrong again. You haven't forgotten what you came out here to do, right?