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For once, as she faced down the dire bat, there was no smile on Alja's face in combat.

She'd seen other flail users occasionally in Pariah. They weren't as common as spears, or swords, or maces, but they [i]did[/i] exist. She wasn't unique in that. But what she was unique in was her particular approach to combat with one. Most she'd met stood back, swinging their flails in slow, almost hypnotic circles, waiting for an opening. Alja, though...well. As soon as Seele dropped a buff on her weapon, she compounded it with her own: the unstable shards of Tundra Glass coalesced, forming a jagged shell around the weapon. Then, with a deafening bellow, she plowed down on the injured dire bat, swinging her flail overhead with all her considerable strength.

[i]THOOM[/i]

It dodged far faster than a creature its size should've been able to and Glacier Chain barely clipped it in the leg. Still, even a strike on a limb was enough: the impact triggered the Tundra Glass, and it exploded in a burst of razor-sharp ice needles. Most of them bounced harmlessly off her plate, but a few swarmed towards her head. She barely averted her eyes in time to have avoid having them skewered, and the jolt of pain than ran through her as her skin was slashed by the passing shrapnel brought a furious snarl to her face. She saw red, and her vision tunneled on the bat. At least it hadn't gotten off totally unscathed; the impact of her flail and the spreading shards of ice had completely mangled its left leg, shattering it in several places and reducing the skin to a bloody pulp.

She brought the flail back again, whirling it over her head a few times, before it cracked again into the floor. A claw of ice tore up from the ground beneath the bat, gripping it in place as she dashed towards it, weapon whirling for a kill-strike. But just before she reached it, the ice released under the strain and it pitched backwards, taking clumsily to the air. She spat bloody saliva and swore at it, teeth clenched in pain, fatigue and frustration. 

Then, rolling her fatigued shoulders and accepting the introduction of even more exhaustion, she shrugged a suit of Tundra Glass armor over herself. It wouldn't be able to stay up for long with tears like those in its wings. It'd need to come down sooner or later. And she'd be ready.

She winced as the cuts stung. [i][color=d1fffc]I need a helmet.[/color][/i] Dealing damage would be a lot harder now, it seemed. And if her abilities were hurting [i]her[/i], then they'd probably hurt her allies as well. She couldn't risk that explosion near the backline, no matter what. And using something like Be The North? Pfft. Forget it.