(Chapter error, corrected)
Feeling the vitality surging through his body once more, Lu Xiaotian let out a long breath. His blood linked the vitality and strength within him together, but they had later been frozen by the power of profound ice that entered his body. Even the Blood True Intent he had only recently awakened had sunk into dormancy as his blood congealed and his flesh froze.
Rather than awakening and strengthening the Blood True Intent within him, it would be more accurate to say that it was his desire to survive. After Luo Qing had perished in the ice cavern, Lu Xiaotian had fallen into confusion. Luo Qing had understood what he wanted—something more important than cultivating herself. She had not hesitated to destroy her own Dao foundation.
Luo Qing's death had shaken Lu Xiaotian's convictions for a time, making him reflect on the meaning of his cultivation. Such wavering would normally go unnoticed. In fact, if no crisis appeared, that wavering would gradually grow firm again.
But the crisis had come too quickly this time, and that flaw had been magnified without limit in the midst of it. Whether one was an ordinary mortal or a cultivator, a momentary setback was not frightening. What was truly terrifying was the wavering of one's convictions. If even one's desire to survive began to falter, how could the body instinctively resist an external invasion when confronted by a powerful enemy?
Once this thought became firm again, a newborn force would break through the desolation like a shoot piercing the soil. That conviction would rapidly spread, eventually transforming into the Blood True Intent that gradually grew stronger within him, beginning to batter his frozen body without pause.
The power of profound ice within him remained formidable, but his desire to survive was