The Immortals of Notoriouslandia
Chapter Twenty-Four: The March to Heabary
The sky was a steel-gray sheet stretching endlessly across the world as the Unbound Team stood at the foot of a roadless land. Before them loomed the infamous Heabary Mountains—a jagged range whose peaks sliced clouds and whose winds told stories only madness could interpret.
They had come far—across oceans, kingdoms, and cryptic trials—but the journey to Heabary was something else. There were no marked paths. No return routes. Just instinct, the glowing mark on Descentedrain's wristband, and the echo of Grandalfert's challenge: Come to the Heabary Mountains, and we'll see if you're truly worthy.
The First Wave – The Grandelfies
Two days into their trek, crossing a frozen canyon lined with ancient bones, the air shimmered strangely. The team slowed. Mr. Shonk sniffed the wind.
"I smell… cheap fabric and bad magic."
From behind the rocks and ledges emerged dozens of small hunched figures in oversized wizard hats, their robes stitched with crude stars and crescent moons.
Each one bore a name patch on their backs that simply read:
GRANDELFY
They shrieked and raised tiny staffs, firing erratic bolts of colorful magic in all directions. One bolt hit Kukranchunlikryting's boot and caused a brief polka-dotted explosion.
"These are goblins," he growled. "Cosplaying as sorcerers."
"Goblins with badly pirated spell scrolls," Sapphire added, dodging a blast of glitter smoke.
"Do we even take them seriously?" Mr. Shonk asked, backhanding one into the snow.
Descentedrain didn't speak. He simply raised a hand and released a wave of psychic suppression.
Every Grandelfy froze mid-screech, their spells misfiring in a cascade of colorful sparks—then they all flopped unconscious like bad actors in a low-budget play.
"Moving on," Descentedrain muttered.
The Second Wave – The Gratenlifenters
The land steepened and cracked beneath their boots. A hot, sulfuric smell choked the air as the frozen terrain gave way to steaming fissures.
From the lava-veined slopes, they came.
Gratenlifenters—grotesque beasts as long as trucks, with the scaled torsos of crocodiles and the massive, flame-wrapped arms of apes. Their eyes burned red with elemental rage. Every breath released sparks.
The pack roared in unison, a thunderous rumble of primal fury.
"Oh yeah," Mr. Shonk said, cracking his knuckles, "these boys came to play."
The beasts attacked in tandem—one smashing the ground, sending magma flying; another launching itself like a flaming cannonball.
Kukranchunlikryting spread a mist of thermal inhibitors, dampening the heat aura around one long enough for Sapphire to pierce its chest with a freezing crystal spear.
Descentedrain took the high ground, focusing his gravity field to anchor their footing and launched solar-blades that sliced through the fiery storm.
Mr. Shonk wrestled one by the neck and flung it into another mid-charge.
In a fierce but calculated skirmish, the beasts fell.
"Not too bad," Sapphire said, brushing ash off her armor. "Definitely above goblin tier."
The Third Threat – Grondilate
Just as they approached a glacier cliff, the sky cracked like glass.
A black drop-pod fell from above, slamming into the icy ridge, throwing frost and debris into the air. The pod split open with a mechanical hiss.
From the shadows stepped a monster.
Grondilate—a towering cyber-gorilla, plated in chrome, bristling with cannons, thrusters, and laser turrets. His fists crackled with electricity. His chest glowed with a humming, unstable Bontaine core.
"This one's not magic," Descentedrain said, eyes narrowing."It's designed."
"Someone's building war-beasts now," Kukranchunlikryting muttered."Not summoning them."
Grondilate let out a deafening bellow and fired twin laser beams from its palms, carving molten lines into the ground.
Sapphire blinked behind it, slicing at its knees, only for a hidden turret to pop from its back and fire a gravity pulse that slammed her into the cliff wall.
Mr. Shonk charged it directly, locking arms and grappling it in a clash of raw power. The ground shook as they traded blows.
Descentedrain launched into the air, sword glowing with solar heat and gravitational compression. He pinpointed the Bontaine core and unleashed a beam straight into the reactor.
With a blinding flash, Grondilate screamed, staggered, and exploded—chunks of mechanical debris raining across the ice.
"That was not part of the goblin theme," Sapphire said, breathing heavily."He's getting creative."
"He's getting desperate," Descentedrain corrected.
Camp on the Edge of Heabary
By dusk, they made it to the base of the Heabary range proper, a glacial shelf that stretched up into the clouds. The wind howled like an angry god. Snow danced sideways.
They found a half-collapsed cave beneath a frozen ledge and made shelter there—reinforced with Sapphire's crystal pillars and a gravitational heat dome projected by Descentedrain.
Two huts. Same arrangements.
The smell of their campfire tradition soon filled the cave.
Descentedrain handed out custom rewards, improved once more:
Mr. Shonk received a mango-graham lava-core pastry, toasted to perfection with volcanic syrup drizzle.
"I'll cry if it tastes as good as it smells."
Kukranchunlikryting was handed a mug of acid-scorched cocoa with black crystal marshmelt and ghost-spice crust.
"I call this one the 'throat hammer.'"
Sapphire received a rare crystal-berry sorbet, chilled by the mountain's own wind, topped with starlight glaze.She took one bite, exhaled, and leaned toward Descentedrain.
"Every time I think you've peaked… you cook something even more unfair."
"Maybe I'm just preparing for the end," he said.
"Or maybe you're just dangerously husband-material."
He froze.
Mr. Shonk's voice rang out from the other hut:
"STOP RIZZING, WE'RE IN A BLIZZARD."
Everyone laughed.
And somewhere above, on the frozen spine of the world, Grandalfert waited, staff in hand, throne made of time, riddles sharp as swords.
Climbing Heabary – The Last Ascent
The Heabary Mountains weren't just tall.
They were vicious.
The air thinned with every step, howling winds tearing at their cloaks, snow blasting sideways with razor-sharp sting. The ground was black ice over ancient bones. Gravity fought them. The mountain pushed back.
And yet—
They climbed.
Sapphire's blades cleaved footholds in sheer stone.Mr. Shonk's strength cleared falling ice boulders with shoulder slams.Kukranchunlikryting released thermal toxins to warm the path.Descentedrain, leading, stabilized them all with precise bursts of gravity flow.
At last, they reached the summit—
A flat plateau lined with ancient pillars, frozen runes, and a throne of cracked ice.
There he stood.
Grandalfert.
Draped in eight flowing layers of shimmering snow-silk, beard frozen into a spiral, leaning dramatically on a staff carved from glacier bone and hubris.
He raised one hand theatrically as snow flurried around him.
Grandalfert's Poetic Prologue
"So you have climbed the pathless heights,With fists and fire, blades and blight.You stand before a sage betrayed,A wizard scorned, a warlock flayed!"
He twirled dramatically, arms outstretched.
"You struck me down with trident and flair,You scorched my robe, destroyed my lair.But I return, now thrice-refined,With snow, and storm, and frost-aligned!"
Descentedrain sighed loudly.
"Get to the part where you lose again."
"Silence!" Grandalfert roared, slamming his staff.
The ground trembled.
The Blizzard Avatar – Grandalfert Ascends
With a flash of light and a sonic crack, Grandalfert transformed into a towering giant head of snow, complete with glowing glacier-eyes, a frozen beard that whipped like icicles, and a howling mouth that blasted blizzards, frost missiles, and freezing breath across the peak.
His laughter boomed like thunder:
"I AM BLIZZARDFERT, FIRST OF THE ICE-SPOKEN!FREEZE, FOOLS!"
The battle began.
The Battle – Fire vs Ice
Blizzardfert fired arctic beams from his eyes, turning stone to crystal. With every breath, he summoned stormclouds that rained hail like meteor showers.
But the team had prepared.
Descentedrain tossed each of them a shard—Firestones, drawn from the molten heart of Brytotanic's core, infused with solar rage.
Each Firestone burst with power.
Sapphire superheated her crystal blades, carving through the storm like twin suns.
Mr. Shonk's trident became a molten anchor, punching holes in the blizzard wall.
Kukranchunlikryting turned his toxins to vaporized firebombs, boiling the snow from inside.
Descentedrain unleashed solar-gravity combustion, punching holes through froststorms with pure incineration.
They assaulted the giant ice head from every side.
It screamed, fired back, summoned glacier spikes—but nothing stuck.
Descentedrain rocketed into the air and drove his blade—flaming and thunderous—right between its colossal eyes.
BOOM.
Blizzardfert exploded, snow scattering across the range.
And He's Gone… Again
The snow settled.
A faint, annoyed voice echoed into the air:
"I will… possibly return… probably not…"
"We're so sick of this guy," Sapphire groaned, collapsing into the snow."Like, does he respawn on a timer or what?"
"I think he writes his speeches before he even comes back," Shonk muttered.
"At this point, it's just performance art," Kukranchunlikryting added.
Descentedrain just nodded silently.
"He's consistent, I'll give him that."
A Rest on the Mountain
They built a small snow dome shelter at the summit, glowing from within with Descentedrain's gravity-forged warmth. No monsters. No missions. Just quiet.
The stars glittered above, clearer than anywhere else in the world.
Sapphire handed out blankets from her endless crystal pack.
Mr. Shonk roasted volcanic marshfruit over a hover-heater. Kukranchunlikryting stirred a new brand of spiced toxic cocoa called "Infernal Lungburn."
Descentedrain passed out this evening's custom rewards:
Shonk received a mango-graham smolder s'more with spicy caramel lava.
Kukranchunlikryting was handed a mug that hissed when touched.
Sapphire's dish was a crystal-berry soufflé topped with gold-glitter frost.
She took a bite, leaned toward Descentedrain, and whispered:
"You cook like someone who wants to be married on top of a mountain."
"It's mostly fear-based culinary instincts," he replied.
"Still counts."
They all laughed. Not because it was funny—because they could.
Because for once—
They were warm. Full. And peaceful.
If only for a night.