Chapter 6: The Snow Mountain Sect’s Frost Mist Qi and the Slap and Blood Poison
Just as Xu Yourong had forgotten about the unconscious Chen Changsheng, Bai Hai had never paid any attention to that young cultivator covered in frost and ice. Moreover, he was at this moment intoxicated by the illusory supreme bliss brought by the Heavenly Phoenix True Blood, caught completely off guard, and was thus pushed away by that hand.
The cliff cave fell silent. Bai Hai stared at Chen Changsheng, his expression somewhat stunned. After a moment, he realized what had happened and sensed something amiss.
At that moment, a drop of blood still lingered at the corner of his mouth, paired with his twisted, aged face, looking exceptionally vile. Just as that drop of blood was about to fall, he came to his senses and hastily licked it back into his mouth with the tip of his tongue. To him, who sought to cultivate the secret arts of the Falling Sun Sect and break through to the Penetrating Obscurity Realm, every drop of Xu Yourong’s blood was a treasure of utmost value—how could it be wasted? Yet this scene was all the more disgusting.
For some reason, he felt a sweetness at the root of his tongue, but a numbness at its tip. He wondered if this was the taste of Heavenly Phoenix blood.
During this process, Chen Changsheng, supporting himself against the stone wall of the cliff cave, struggled to sit up. He was so weak at this moment that it seemed a mere breeze could knock him down again—how could he possibly overcome the enemy?
Bai Hai felt a tingling numbness on his face. He reached up to touch it and found some moisture there. Then he looked at Chen Changsheng’s palm and noticed it was also covered in frost and ice. He narrowed his eyes.
Without warning, he pointed a finger through the air, and a surge of terrifying earth-fire energy shot straight toward Chen Changsheng.
Chen Changsheng, seemingly on instinct, slapped his palm forward, and instantly a mirror of ice formed in the air before him.
That earth-fire energy struck the ice mirror, hissed, and dissipated into green smoke.
Bai Hai’s eyes narrowed even more. He grinned at Chen Changsheng eerily and said, “So you’re a disciple of the Snow Mountain Sect’s Hidden Gate. Do you think you can stop me with Frost Mist True Qi?”
The Snow Mountain Sect was a sect in the northwest of the continent. Legend had it that its founding patriarch possessed the bloodline of the Frost Mist Dragon, awakening on his own to create a cultivation method, thus establishing the sect in the extreme cold of the northwest. At its peak, it was immensely powerful, and neither the demon race nor the orthodox Central Plains state religion dared to provoke it lightly. However, as time passed, the remnants of the Frost Mist Dragon bloodline grew scarcer, and the Snow Mountain Sect gradually declined. Several hundred years ago, it had already submitted to the Li Palace, and for many years, no true experts or promising young disciples had emerged.
No one would underestimate a sect that had once been glorious. Just as the Southern Streams Sect had inner and outer divisions, many important figures knew that the Snow Mountain Sect also had a Hidden Gate lineage, though it rarely walked the world. The Falling Sun Sect cultivated earth-fire, which naturally clashed with the Snow Mountain Sect’s cold-based arts, and there had been many conflicts in the past. As an elder of the Falling Sun Sect, Bai Hai was naturally well-versed in the Snow Mountain Sect. Seeing the frost mirror Chen Changsheng formed with his horizontal sword, he immediately saw through his origins, and his killing intent surged severalfold.
Xu Yourong, looking at Chen Changsheng’s face before her, thought to herself, So he’s a Hidden Gate disciple of the Snow Mountain Sect—no wonder his cultivation method is so unique.
Her vision was blurry, but she could clearly sense the calm in Chen Changsheng’s eyes. Though the situation was still dire, and Chen Changsheng remained gravely injured and weak, for some reason, she suddenly felt she could relax, that she could entrust the rest to this young cultivator.
“I never expected to meet a descendant of the Snow Mountain Sect’s old friends in the Zhou Garden, nor did I expect that before completing my divine art, I’d have to kill one more of you.”
Bai Hai grinned at him eerily and said, “But this isn’t too troublesome.”
With those words, he turned his palm into a blade, wreathed in flames, and mercilessly slashed toward Chen Changsheng’s face.
Even if Chen Changsheng were not gravely injured and weak, even if he were in perfect condition, he would be no match for this Falling Sun Sect elder.
His awakening seemed utterly pointless—one could even say he woke at the worst possible time.
The true essence within him was completely depleted. He couldn’t even hold his short sword, let alone summon the yellow paper umbrella.
He had no way to block this fiery palm strike. The only thing he could do was raise his hand and slap the other’s face.
He had just woken up, with no idea what had happened or who this old man was. He only knew that the old man was doing something cruel and disgusting. The old man’s smile was stiff and eerie, his laughter sinister and terrifying—he clearly wasn’t a good person. So… he wanted to hit him.
The next moment, he might be reduced to ashes by the old man’s fiery palm, but he still wanted to hit him. As long as he could land a blow on that sinister, terrifying old face, it would be worth waking up for.
That’s what Chen Changsheng thought, and that’s what he did.
But he never expected his palm to actually strike the other’s face.
*Slap!* A crisp sound echoed through the silent cliff cave.
His palm struck Bai Hai’s face.
Though his swinging motion was light and seemed to carry no strength, the sound was very loud.
A resounding slap.
Bai Hai was stunned, completely unable to understand what had happened.
His palm was still mid-strike, a foot away from Chen Changsheng, the terrifying earth-fire at its edge gradually dying out, looking somewhat pathetic.
Why could this Snow Mountain Sect Hidden Gate disciple’s palm land on his face? Why had his body become so stiff? Why had the true essence within him vanished in an instant? In that moment, countless questions flooded his mind, filling him with shock and fear.
The next moment, all that fear was reflected in his eyes. He twisted his neck with difficulty, looked down at Xu Yourong beside Chen Changsheng, and spoke his final words.
His voice was unusually hoarse and dry, his words fragmented and barely coherent, filled with fear and despair: “Demon… demon… woman… blood… blood has… poison…”
With those words, he died.
Bai Hai, elder of the Falling Sun Sect and a peak Penetrating Obscurity Realm expert, died like this in the cliff cave.
When he died, his body was already stiff, his right hand frozen in the air, his eyes unable to close, glowing with a faint green light, making him look like a statue carved from uncracked jadeite rough stone.
The scene was eerie and sinister.
The next moment, his skin began to fester and change. The decay didn’t penetrate deep into flesh and bone, only remaining on the surface, gradually becoming mottled.
Some mottling is beautiful; some is disgusting.
Chen Changsheng found it disgusting.
Only then did he realize that the old man had been poisoned with some kind of deadly toxin, though he didn’t know when it had happened.
The eerie smile on the old man’s face earlier was the effect of the toxin taking hold—by then, his consciousness had already been separating from his body.
This poison was truly fierce.
Only then did he remember there was someone else in the cliff cave and looked over.
The girl’s dress was covered in bloodstains, nearly obscuring its original white. Her ordinary, delicate features were almost hidden by her weak, exhausted expression, but her eyes were very cold and clear.
He paused for a moment and asked, “Are you alright?”
…