There had been no fluctuation of Soul Power, nor any sound of air being torn apart. It happened almost instantaneously, as though even time had frozen at that very moment.
Snow Empress's flawless figure crossed several hundred meters in an instant, appearing beside Xue Bingchen out of thin air.
Her exquisitely beautiful face, which had remained as tranquil as an ancient well for ten thousand years and always carried an air of ultimate coldness and indifference, was now filled with undisguised panic and tension.
Snow Empress swiftly pulled Xue Bingchen, who was about to fall onto the ice rock, tightly into her arms.
Her movements were so gentle, as if she were handling the most fragile and priceless treasure in the world.
Her fair, slender hand, white as mutton-fat jade, trembled slightly as it touched Xue Bingchen's burning little forehead.
"Chen'er, what's wrong? Don't scare Mommy!"
Snow Empress's voice was no longer cool and ethereal. A faint, nearly imperceptible tremor had entered it.
At the same time, an incomparably pure and gentle source of Ultimate Ice Soul Power, utterly devoid of aggression,
flowed rapidly into Xue Bingchen's body through Snow Empress's palm, like spring rain carried on a breeze.
Carefully, inch by inch, she examined his extraordinary meridians, internal organs, and every part of his body, terrified of overlooking even the slightest hidden danger.
Ice Empress, standing nearby, was frightened out of her wits as well.
Her emerald-green eyes were filled with anxiety. She transformed into a streak of green light and rushed to Snow Empress's side, clutching her twin ponytails tightly as she paced in frantic circles like an ant on a hot pan.
"What's going on? What's going on?! Wasn't he perfectly fine just now? Could the medicinal effects of that bowl of Ten-Thousand-Year Polar Snow Lotus soup I gave him have been too strong? That can't be! I spent seven days and seven nights brewing it, removing every bit of power that would have been harmful for Chen'er to absorb!"
As Ice Empress muttered incoherently, she leaned anxiously toward Xue Bingchen and asked loudly,
"Little Bingchen, where exactly do you feel unwell? Does your stomach hurt, or does your chest feel tight? Tell Auntie Ice Empress quickly!"
Yet in response to Ice Empress's anxious questions, Xue Bingchen merely kept his eyes shut tight, his brows twisted in pain. His little hands clutched his head as weak cries of pain escaped him.
Snow Empress had already completed three full examinations, but the results only filled her beautiful ice-blue eyes with deep confusion and even greater worry.
She had found absolutely nothing wrong!
Not only were Xue Bingchen's meridians completely undamaged, but after watching the Dance of the Heavenly Snow Woman, they had even developed a peculiar resonance and become tougher and broader.
His blood and vital energy were exceptionally abundant, and his internal organs brimmed with life. Apart from his heartbeat being somewhat fast and his temperature slightly elevated, this little body, nurtured for three years by countless heavenly treasures of the Far North, could not have been healthier.
"No poison, no internal injuries, intact meridians, not even the slightest chaotic fluctuation of energy..."
Snow Empress bit her lower lip tightly, her stunning face filled with incomprehension.
"But why is Chen'er in so much pain?"
Seeing Snow Empress at a complete loss, Ice Empress finally panicked.
She stomped her foot hard, and the incomparably solid Ten-Thousand-Year Profound Ice Rock beneath her instantly split open with countless terrifying cracks. A savage, freezing killing intent erupted from her petite body.
"No! We can't just wait around like this! The constitutions of soul beasts and humans are different in the end. Maybe there's some strange illness in his body that only humans can get, something we can't detect!"
A ruthless and resolute glint flashed through Ice Empress's emerald-green eyes. She abruptly turned toward the distant human world beyond the outskirts of the Far North and gritted her teeth.
"Snow Empress, stay here and watch over Little Bingchen. I'm going to the human territory right now! I heard that the human world has some damned 'healing Soul Masters' who specialize in treating people. I'll capture a healing Soul Master at the Title Douluo level with the highest cultivation and bring them back! If they can't cure Little Bingchen, I'll freeze every last one of them into ice sculptures, grind them into ice shards, and bury them with him!!"
With that, green light blazed from Ice Empress's body. The enormous phantom of her Ice Jade Empress Scorpion true form seemed about to emerge, and she was on the verge of tearing through space to charge into the human world and begin a massacre.
"I-Ice Empress Auntie... don't... don't go..."
At the very instant Ice Empress was about to lose control, a small hand, trembling yet remarkably firm, suddenly reached out from Snow Empress's embrace and grabbed Ice Empress's icy little hand.
Feeling the faint strength in that hand, Ice Empress shuddered all over. She immediately dispersed the terrifying Soul Power fluctuations around her, crouched down sharply, and tightly clasped Xue Bingchen's little hand in return. Her voice even carried a sob. "Little Bingchen, you're awake? How do you feel? Does it hurt badly?"
Xue Bingchen struggled to open his eyes within Snow Empress's warm, soft embrace.
The fusion of his memories from his previous life had brought intense pain to his head, but fortunately, he had lived two lives. Combined with the extraordinary toughness of this body, transformed by the treasures of the Far North, the dizziness was rapidly fading.
He looked at Ice Empress, whose eyes had reddened with anxiety and who had even been prepared to head into the human world to kidnap a Title Douluo. Then he looked up at Snow Empress, whose eyes were full of doting affection and who was so nervous that she had stopped breathing. An indescribable warmth and gratitude welled up in his heart.
Even though he was merely a human, even though he was unrelated to them by blood, these two Rulers of the Far North, standing at the very peak of Douluo Continent, truly loved him as if he were their own flesh and blood.
Xue Bingchen took a deep breath and forced out a somewhat weak yet brilliant smile. In his childish voice, he reassured her, "Ice Empress Auntie, don't be impulsive. I'm really fine. I'm not sick, and I'm not injured anywhere."
"Then why did you suddenly clutch your head and collapse just now? Your face was so red too!" Ice Empress clearly did not believe him and continued staring at him suspiciously.
Xue Bingchen scratched his soft white hair. His gaze shifted evasively, and after holding it in for a long while, he finally muttered in an extremely strange tone,
"I... I just felt... after watching Mommy dance, it seemed like a lot of things suddenly appeared in my head. It felt... felt like my brain was growing..."
"My brain was growing?!"
Hearing that self-deprecating phrase with its distinctly modern internet flavor, Ice Empress froze for a moment, her beautiful emerald eyes filled with enormous confusion.
Such a description simply did not exist within the straightforward way soul beasts understood the world.
Ice Empress's mind raced as she tried to comprehend the literal meaning of his words.
Suddenly, as though she had thought of something utterly terrifying, Ice Empress sucked in a cold breath. She sprang up as if struck by lightning, pointed at Xue Bingchen's head, and cried out in alarm,
"Could it... could it be the legendary second growth spurt?! Or could a martial soul mutation have caused a physical deformity?!"
"But you haven't even awakened your martial soul yet!"
Before you continue