Issue 117: The Ice Princess

The Ice Princess is the one-hundred and seventeenth issue of the Winx Club Comic Series.

Synopsis
The Trix journey to Asgard, a magical city completely made of ice as, there, Icy wishes to learn the secret behind the city's eternal ice in order to make her ice powers unstoppable. Luckily for them, Icy managed to rescue the city's princess, a lonely young lady named Astrid, who yearns to be with her beloved. Using her heartbreak and desire to reunite with her love, Icy convinces Astrid to freeze over the entire planet Earth in order to make it happen. As usual, it is up to the Winx to reveal the Trix's true intentions to Astrid before the planet is plunged into a second ice age.

Plot
The story opens up in Asgard, a city made entirely of ice. The Trix are exploring the frozen city as Icy explains to her sisters that everything within the city, including its inhabitants, are all completely made out of ice. Icy further explains that Asgard had been forgotten by everyone else on Earth, but the city reappeared once every person had regained their faith in magic. Stormy suspects that Icy led them to Asgard for its magic and Icy confirms this by claiming that her ice magic will become unstoppable once they uncover the secrets of Asgard's eternal ice. She then reveals to her sisters that Astrid, a very powerful sorceress and the princess of Asgard, is the only one who will be able to provide them with the answers they seek. Darcy asks Icy if she is sure that Astrid will be willing to comply and Icy responds by claiming that Astrid has no choice but to comply as she has become indebted to her. As Darcy and Stormy look back at each other in confusion, Icy reveals the reason behind Astrid's debt.

Sometime ago, Astrid had fallen in love with a human; specifically, a musician from Gardenia. Unfortunately, the boy could not survive in Asgard's unforgiving cold and returned home. The lovestruck princess tried to follow the boy back to his home so that they could be together but, in doing so, Astrid had broken the one law of her people: the inhabitants of Asgard must never leave the city's walls. If they do so, they will be unable to survive as their bodies can only survive in the most frigid of temperatures. Icy came across Astrid's melting body and decided to bring her back to Asgard using her ice magic. Once she was back within the city's walls, Astrid's body returned to normal, however, her heart remained broken.

Darcy and Stormy taunt Icy over possibly going soft until Icy insists that she did so because it was easy to deceive a girl as naive and desperate as Astrid. She further explains that she had told Astrid that there was only one way to reunite with her beloved Andy without risking her life: to freeze the world from Asgard all the way to Gardenia! The three witches fly off to the tallest tower in Asgard and find Astrid casting a powerful icy spell with the help of her sceptre.

Her spell creeps over the land, causing various other places to start snowing and freeze over. Icy flies closer in to encourage Astrid and offers to help her accelerate the freezing process by uniting their powers together.

Meanwhile, there seems to be a party going on in Gardenia Beach. Stella notices that Flora is standing around by herself, so she tries to pull her friend out onto the dance floor so that she may enjoy herself with everyone else. Flora, on the other hand, thinks that it is too hot to be dancing, so Stella proposes that they go get some iced drinks to help refresh themselves. The two of them sit down at the bar and get their drinks until Stella feels it getting unnaturally chilly. She thinks that her drink may have been too cold until Flora tells Stella that it had started snowing! Everyone stops what they are doing to stare up into the sky, visibly worried as it had started snowing despite it still being Summer.

Days pass by without any signs of the snowfall letting up. In fact, it had only gotten heavier ever since it had started!

The Winx have retreated back to their loft but they are still left in shock at the unusual weather. Bloom expresses her surprise over how Gardenia has practically been buried in snow until Aisha reveals that the rest of the planet is also suffering in the same way. There is snow in the deserts and whole oceans have frozen over! If the weather keeps up like this, then it may spell out doom for all of Earth's inhabitants!

Suddenly, Tecna rushes into the main room to reveal her latest discovery: the ice covering the world has been giving off a strange, magical aura! Tecna rushes back to her computer to go over all of the data she has compiled as she explains that there is only one place on Earth where the snow holds a similar energy: Asgard, the legendary city of ice. Bloom is surprised to learn that the Asgardian people may be launching a worldwide attack as she has read that they are usually fairly peaceful people, so Stella proposes that they teleport to Asgard to get the full story.

Meanwhile, back in Asgard, Icy notices that Astrid has begun to look rather upset. She asks her what is wrong only to remind her that all of this is being done so that she can reunite with her beloved. Astrid is fully aware of this but she worries that many people may be suffering because of them and that is when Icy asks Astrid if she wishes to remain within Asgard's icy walls. Astrid insists that she wants to escape the city to be with her beloved Andy and be happy, so she continues to freeze the world over. Stormy grows impatient with how slow Astrid is going and gets ready to use her powers to create a blizzard that would make the process much faster. That is until she is interrupted by someone shouting at her from below. Much to the Trix's surprise, the Winx have arrived to put a stop to their dastardly plans as always.

And so, the Winx promptly go into their Sirenix forms in order to combat the Trix. Stormy rapidly descends on the Winx and casts a powerful lightning spell that manages to shock both Stella and Flora. The storm witch quickly notices that Musa had flown behind her and she taunts Musa by asking what she could do to harm her. Musa claims that she can give Stormy a massive headache and casts her Percussion Shot spell upon her.

Bloom tries attacking Darcy with her Lava Lightning, but the spell just goes right through her! Suddenly, Bloom finds herself surrounded by multiple copies of Darcy as they all taunt her over how she hit the wrong one. They then execute a combined attack on Bloom until Aisha and Tecna fly in to protect their friend.

Tecna quickly takes notice of how each of the copies can also attack and Aisha claims that they must find the real Darcy and attack her or else they will not be able to fight for long. That is when Tecna notices that snow has only been collecting on top of the Darcy to the right and attacks her with her Digital Attack spell.

Confused by the sudden fight that had broken out before her, Astrid demands to know who the group of fairies are and why they have come to Asgard. Icy simply tells Astrid that they are nothing but a bunch of busybodies who can easily be defeated if they were to combine their powers and so she tries to land a sneak attack on Bloom and Flora. Unfortunately for her, Bloom catches on quick and casts up a shield to protect Flora from Icy's incoming attack. Flora tries to retaliate by casting her Spring Banner spell in order to bind Icy down in vines, but the ice witch is easily able to freeze the vines and break them apart. Icy looks back at Astrid and demands that she help her defeat the Winx, but Astrid seems too scared to do so. Icy shouts at Astrid to attack immediately and the ice princess casts a powerful icy blast towards Bloom, who quickly tries beating back the ice with her Expansive Fire.

Bloom comments on how the Dragon's Flame and Astrid's ice are evenly matched, leaving her unable to fully subdue the raging ice princess. Stella tells Bloom to leave the rest to her as she casts her Light Diamond spell in an attempt to heat up the area to weaken Astrid.

Astrid recoils back from the intense heat and collapses to her feet, quickly noticing that she has begun to melt. She fears that she will die as Stella does not seem to let up on her spell, until Flora cuts in and tells Stella that their fight is over. Stella wonders why Flora is stopping her and Flora reveals that she can sense Astrid's emotions. She is convinced that Astrid is not a bad person as she possesses a noble yet somber soul that truly does not wish to harm them. Flora suspects that the Trix are manipulating Astrid until she is suddenly attacked by Icy. Icy then blasts the tower in order to bury Flora in an icy coffin, which catches Astrid off-guard. Astrid warns her people to clear the area now that the tower is collapsing and she frantically rushes to save a small boy from the impact. Luckily, Bloom swoops down just in time to shield Astrid and her people from the collapsing tower!

Once she is sure that her people are safe, Astrid furiously reprimands Icy for bringing harm to her people. Icy tries to call her out on her hypocrisy as Astrid had been ready and willing to harm everyone else on Earth in order to reunite with her beloved musician. She then warns Astrid that she would never be able to set foot in Gardenia if she were to cancel the frost spell, however, Astrid no longer wishes to sacrifice the lives of millions for her own selfish reasons. She then leaves Icy, proclaiming that she will now side with the Winx as they have helped save her people from the harm that Icy brought to them. Knowing full well that they do not stand a chance against the Winx and Astrid's magic, the Trix decide to retreat for now, with Icy assuring the six fairies that it is not over yet.

With the Trix gone, Astrid apologizes for jeopardizing everyone else's safety and assures them that the sun will be able to melt down most of what she had caused. Flora tries to assure Astrid that she made the right decision but Astrid is still upset over not being able to see Andy ever again. Bloom catches Astrid mentioning Andy and asks if the musician she had fallen in love with was from Gardenia. Astrid confirms that he is and reveals that they had met a month ago at a concert his band was holding. That is when Bloom reveals to Astrid that Andy is a very close friend of hers and she is certain that he would be more than happy to see Astrid again.

In fact, the Winx return to Asgard with Andy by their side just a few days later! The girls guide Andy to Asgard's royal palace, where he reunites with Astrid. The two lovers waste no time embracing each other as Astrid expresses her fear in losing him. While they are both aware that neither of them can survive in either of their homes' conditions, Astrid is certain that their reunion is not going to be their last. Andy agrees by claiming that he will be able to visit Astrid any time she wants him to and the two of them share a kiss.

Spells Used

 * Percussion Shot - Used by Musa against Stormy.
 * Lava Lightning - Used by Bloom against Darcy, but she attacks a copy instead.
 * Morphix Barricade - Used by Aisha to block the Darcy copies' attacks.
 * Digital Attack - Used by Tecna to attack the real Darcy.
 * Fire Protection - Used by Bloom to protect Flora from Icy's sneak attack. Used a second time to protect Astrid and her people from the collapsing tower.
 * Spring Banner - Used by Flora in an unsuccessful attempt at trapping Icy.
 * Expansive Fire - Used by Bloom to beat back Astrid's ice.
 * Light Diamond - Used by Stella to heat up their surroundings.

Mistakes

 * Throughout the issue, various cuts will appear or disappear randomly on the Trix's Dark Sirenix attire.
 * As Bloom is being attacked by the three Darcies on page 13, her bracelet is missing.
 * The ribbons that Flora wears around her left arm while in Sirenix go missing when she tries to attack Icy on page 16.

Debuts

 * Princess Astrid

Characters

 * The Winx
 * Bloom
 * Stella
 * Flora
 * Tecna
 * Musa
 * Aisha


 * Enemies
 * The Trix
 * Icy
 * Darcy
 * Stormy
 * Royalty
 * Princess Astrid
 * Humans
 * Andy

Trivia

 * This is the only case in which Andy is seen starting up a new relationship of his own.