The snow continued to fall without any visible change, as if that world had forgotten the concept of the passage of ti. Damon walked beside Xue Lian across the white, seemingly endless surface, watching the small currents of wind lift frozen crystals that danced through the air before disappearing again. The more ti he spent beside her, the harder it beca to fit her into any logical category. She was too powerful to seem like an ordinary human, too calm for soone clearly on the verge of death, and strangely casual for soone who had just inford him that he would probably die soon.
The most irritating thing was that she seed perfectly comfortable with all of this.
Damon glanced at her as they both crossed a region where enormous pillars of ice erged from the snow like trees petrified by so ancient cataclysm. The landscape slowly changed around them, but not naturally. It was as if the world itself was rearranging its geography as they walked. Mountains rose where there had previously been only plains. Cliffs appeared in the distance. Crystalline formations grew from the ground in absolute silence.
"May I ask a question?"
Xue Lian tilted her head slightly without interrupting her steps. Her long white hair followed the movent of the wind, blending into the snow almost indistinguishably.
"You’ve already asked several."
"A new one."
"This seems inevitable."
Damon decided to ignore the provocation.
"What exactly happened to end up trapped here?"
For the first ti since they started talking, Xue Lian remained silent for a few seconds before answering. She didn’t seem uncomfortable. Nor sad. She just seed like soone organizing extrely old mories.
"I’m looking for sothing."
"That’s what I figured."
"A Five Heavens Ice Flower."
Damon blinked a few tis.
The na sounded absurdly important.
And absurdly dangerous.
Which, considering everything that had happened since Arven, probably ant it was both.
"What exactly is this?"
Xue Lian raised one hand and observed her own fingers, partially covered in crystalline ice.
"A root."
Damon waited.
She didn’t continue.
"A root?"
"A root."
"Is that the full level of explanation?"
"So far."
Damon let out a long sigh.
"You’re extrely annoying."
"I hear that often."
"I believe you."
A small smile appeared at the corner of her lips.
It was subtle.
But it was there.
Then she finally decided to elaborate.
"The Five Heavens Ice Flower only grows in places where the cold surpasses the natural limits of the world. It absorbs glacial energy for thousands of years before blooming. Its root contains an absurd amount of vital essence."
Damon listened attentively.
"Vital essence?"
"Life."
She answered as if it were obvious.
"A lot of life."
Now that caught his attention.
Because anything that could interest soone like Xue Lian was probably far beyond the normal treasures of cultivators.
"Can she heal you?"
The question made the smile slowly disappear.
"Maybe."
Maybe.
No, yes.
Not definitely.
Maybe.
Damon noticed imdiately.
And he didn’t like that answer one bit.
"That doesn’t sound very encouraging."
"It doesn’t."
She continued walking.
The snow crunched under his feet as she practically glided across the white surface without sinking.
"My body is dying."
The sentence was uttered so casually that Damon almost tripped.
"You say that like you’re comnting on the weather."
"It’s been quite a while."
That made him genuinely uncomfortable.
Because she didn’t seem desperate.
Nor scared.
Not even sad.
She spoke of her own death with the sa emotional energy as soone discussing the quality of a al.
Perhaps that was worse.
"How long has it been?"
Xue Lian observed the horizon.
"Almost two hundred years."
Damon remained silent.
His brain took a few seconds to process the information.
Then he slowly turned his face.
"Two hundred?"
"Yes."
"You’ve been dying for two hundred years?"
"No."
She shook her head.
"I’ve been dying for about one hundred and seventy."
Damon closed his eyes.
That didn’t help.
Not at all.
"That answer made everything worse."
"Personally, I found it quite enlightening."
He couldn’t help but laugh.
A short laugh.
Incredulous.
Because that woman was completely absurd.
Perhaps that explained why she was still alive.
The world was probably afraid to try to kill her.
The two continued advancing through the snow for several minutes. As they walked, Damon began to pay more attention to her physical condition. Before, Xue Lian’s overwhelming presence had made it difficult to notice smaller details. Now, however, it beca impossible to ignore them.
The ice was worse.
Much worse.
Large areas of her skin showed clear signs of crystallization. Parts of her neck were covered in translucent layers. Small frozen fragnts occasionally appeared on her cheeks before disappearing again. Her fingers seed too stiff. Her breathing remained irregular.
And yet she kept walking.
Without complaining.
Without showing pain.
As if it were normal.
Finally, Damon pointed to one of the crystals appearing on her arm.
"This sounds extrely bad."
Xue Lian observed quickly.
"It’s getting worse."
"That answer wasn’t encouraging either."
"It wasn’t supposed to be."
Damon rubbed his face.
"Is there any answer you could give that wouldn’t increase my anxiety?"
She thought for a few seconds.
"No."
"I respect honesty."
"You shouldn’t."
That made him laugh again.
Damon shook his head as they continued walking.
"But honestly... why co alone?"
She raised an eyebrow.
"Because I needed to."
"You lead an entire cult."
"The Celestial Cult."
"Exactly."
"Yes."
"Then why not bring help?"
Xue Lian looked at him as if the answer was obvious.
"The cold."
Damon waited.
Again, she didn’t elaborate.
"And?"
"And no one would survive."
Now she pointed to the landscape around them.
"The cold here isn’t just temperature."
That imdiately caught his attention.
Because he understood exactly what she ant.
Even without feeling discomfort, there was sothing wrong with that environnt. Sothing that transcended normal concepts of heat and cold.
It was almost like a living force.
A presence.
A concept.
"Does the cold here kill cultivators?"
"No."
She answered calmly.
"It erases cultivators."
Damon didn’t like how that sounded.
Not one bit.
Xue Lian continued.
"Ordinary bodies can’t withstand this energy. ridians freeze. Souls weaken. Techniques stop working. Eventually, the person simply ceases to exist."
Silence fell.
Even for soone accustod to absurd dangers, that description seed unpleasant.
"So only we managed to survive."
"More or less."
She pointed to her own body.
"Observe the result."
Damon did exactly that.
And imdiately understood what she ant.
She was surviving.
Technically.
But calling it survival seed generous.
Because her current state resembled more a long negotiation with death than a victory.
He observed again the crystals scattered across her skin.
The stiffness of her movents.
Her unsteady breathing.
Then he asked a question that had been bothering him for so ti.
"How long have you been here?"
Xue Lian remained silent.
Long enough for him to start imagining absurd numbers.
When she finally answered, the answer managed to exceed his expectations.
"Ten years."
Damon stopped walking.
Literally.
"Ten years?"
She continued walking.
Then she had to take a few steps back because he had stopped.
"Yes."
"Ten years."
"Correct."
"Consecutively?"
"You’re asking strange questions now."
Damon stared at her.
Trying to figure out if it was so extrely specific joke.
But there was no sign of humor.
She was serious.
Absolutely serious.
"Are you telling you spent ten whole years here?"
"Yes."
"Without leaving."
"Yes."
"Without company."
"Yes."
Damon ran a hand over his face.
"That explains a lot."
Xue Lian narrowed her eyes.
"Was that an insult?"
"Maybe."
"Fair enough."
The fact that she accepted it so easily only made things worse.
The two resud walking.
Damon was still trying to process the information.
Ten years.
Even cultivators needed to eat.
They needed to drink.
They needed to rest.
They needed to interact with other living beings before going completely insane.
Right?
"Right?"
Xue Lian looked at him.
"What?"
"Food."
"No."
"Water."
"No."
"Rest."
"Sotis."
Damon stared at the woman.
She stared back.
For a few seconds, no one spoke.
Then he finally asked:
"How are you still alive?"
For the first ti, Xue Lian seed to find the question genuinely interesting.
"Cultivation."
"That doesn’t answer anything."
"It answers quite a lot."
She crossed her arms as she continued to move forward.
"Cultivation gradually replaces physical needs. Energy replaces food. Energy replaces water. Energy replaces sleep."
Damon nodded.
He knew that.
To a certain extent.
But there were still limits.
There were always limits.
Xue Lian noticed his expression.
"You’re thinking of normal cultivators."
"Yes."
"That was your mistake."
She pointed to herself.
"I’m not normal."
Damon remained silent for a few seconds.
Then she replied:
"That’s perhaps the truest thing I’ve heard today."
This ti she actually laughed.
Not a giggle.
Not a smile.
A light laugh.
Gentle.
Brief.
But genuine.
And for the first ti since he’d t her, she seed less like an ancient entity and more like a person.
An absurdly powerful person.
Terrifying.
Probably insane.
But still a person.
And for so reason, that was more comforting than any answer she’d given so far.
The snow continued to fall without any change, as if that world had been condemned to eternally repeat the sa winter. There was no dawn, no dusk, no visible change in the white sky that covered everything. Damon had completely lost track of the distance he’d traveled. The only reason he knew they were still moving forward was because their feet kept sinking into the soft snow as Xue Lian walked ahead without leaving a single footprint.
That continued to bother his brain in a specifically irrational way.
She clearly possessed a supernatural talent capable of splitting mountains, freezing oceans, and probably turning entire armies into ice sculptures. Even so, the fact that she wasn’t leaving footprints remained among the most disturbing things Damon had seen since waking up in that place.
"You’re looking at my feet again."
Her voice ca without warning.
Damon blinked.
"Did you notice?"
"You’ve been looking at them for almost an hour."
"It’s strange."
"You’re strange."
"That seems unfair coming from the woman who lives on a mountain made of ice."
Xue Lian took a few seconds to respond.
Then she let out a low laugh.
"Fair point."
The fact that she admitted it imdiately made the conversation even stranger.
The further they walked, the more Damon realized that the initial image he had ford of her was wrong. The first impression had been of an almost divine figure. An ancient, distant, and unreachable entity. Soone so powerful that she couldn’t be understood by normal people.
Now...
Well.
She was still terrifying.
But she also seed like a person.
An absurdly powerful person.
An extrely strange person.
But still a person.
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