Qin Heng's luck was quite good. Before long, he encountered the first Ice Mist Frost Butterfly concealing itself within the icy mist.
After observing it for a while, he shook his head and walked away, because this Ice Mist Frost Butterfly's age was unsuitable for him.
The way to determine an Ice Mist Frost Butterfly's age was by the eye patterns on its wings. Its wings bore beautiful natural patterns formed from phosphorescent powder. Aside from mutated Ice Mist Frost Butterflies, all members of the species displayed eye-shaped patterns.
White patterns indicated ten years, yellow patterns indicated a century, and purple patterns indicated a thousand years.
For Ice Mist Frost Butterflies over ten thousand years old, the eye patterns on their wings turned black. At the same time, an actual eye would grow between their brows. This eye allowed them to better wield their spiritual power, and Ice Mist Frost Butterflies of ten thousand years also mastered many unique spiritual attacks.
As for determining an Ice Mist Frost Butterfly's precise age, those below ten thousand years could be judged by the completeness of their eye patterns.
A one-hundred-year Ice Mist Frost Butterfly only had the rough outline of a pair of eye sockets. After reaching two hundred years, eyeballs appeared inside the sockets. At three hundred years, details such as pupils emerged. At four hundred years, a second pair of eye socket outlines appeared, and so on, until at nine hundred years, three pairs of beautiful eye patterns were present.
Ten-year and thousand-year Ice Mist Frost Butterflies could also be identified this way; only the colors of their eye patterns differed.
For Ice Mist Frost Butterflies over ten thousand years old, one had to look at the color of the eye between their brows. It was white upon first reaching ten thousand years, purple from twenty to fifty thousand years, black from fifty to ninety thousand years, and naturally blood-red at one hundred thousand years.
However, according to Guang Ling Douluo, the highest recorded Ice Mist Frost Butterfly so far was only a little over sixty thousand years old. Hundred-thousand-year Ice Mist Frost Butterflies existed only in legend.
The Ice Mist Frost Butterfly before Qin Heng had only just passed a thousand years of cultivation, far below what he had expected.
"Let's keep looking!" Qin Heng sighed and continued deeper into the forest.
The closer he got to the center of the Ice-Sealed Forest, the more powerful the Soul Beast auras around him became. Qin Heng had no choice but to remain exceedingly alert.
Before long, dusk silently descended.
Yet the Ice-Sealed Forest at night did not seem gloomy or dark.
This place was already a world of ice and snow draped in silver. Cool moonlight filtered through the sparse canopy, reflecting again and again off the thick snow and ice, as though the entire forest had been coated in a faint silver radiance.
Even without firelight, visibility was sufficient for normal travel, but Qin Heng deliberately stopped.
He found a small hollow sheltered from the wind. The terrain dipped slightly, while towering ice cliffs stood on both sides, effectively blocking the biting winds blowing in from the Far North.
Qin Heng first released the Asura Armor. The armor transformed into streams of light and returned to the Summoner.
Although maintaining the armor could barely keep his Soul Power expenditure balanced, the muscles and joints throughout his body, as well as his mind from prolonged intense concentration, would all suffer noticeable fatigue. He needed to truly relax and rest for a while.
A small campfire was soon lit in the middle of the hollow. Qin Heng took out the dry rations he had purchased in Heaven Dou City from his Storage Ring: several coarse flatbreads that looked thoroughly unappetizing.
He skewered the flatbreads on branches and lightly toasted them beside the fire. Their surfaces soon turned faintly golden and charred, while their hard texture softened slightly, releasing a subtle scent of wheat.
He heartily devoured the simple meal. After finishing two flatbreads, Qin Heng took out a waterskin and drank several mouthfuls of cold water containing tiny bits of ice. Then he sat cross-legged beside the campfire, closed his eyes, and circulated the Pure Yang Infinite Skill.
Warm Pure Yang True Qi slowly flowed through his meridians, dispelling the cold and fatigue from his body while gradually restoring his depleted spiritual power.
More than an hour later, Qin Heng, who had been meditating, abruptly opened his eyes!
His gaze shot like lightning toward the darkness in the southeast. There, a pair of ghostly green pupils stared at him without blinking, their gaze filled with obvious ferocity and hunger.
The pupils glimmered with a cold green light beneath the moonlight and firelight, like two drifting ghost flames.
Alarm bells instantly rang in Qin Heng's mind. With a flick of his right hand, the Summoner activated at once, and the Asura Armor rapidly covered his entire body. The helmet's visor snapped shut with a click.
Almost at the exact instant the armor fully manifested, the Soul Beast that had been lurking in secret could no longer restrain itself.
Its body flashed out like a bolt of white lightning, carrying a howling icy wind as it lunged forward. In the blink of an eye, it crossed several dozen meters and crashed heavily into Qin Heng!
The Soul Beast directly knocked Qin Heng, who had just completed Martial Soul Possession, to the ground. Its dagger-sharp fangs viciously bit down toward Qin Heng's exposed throat!
Clang!! A crisp, ear-piercing metallic collision suddenly rang out.
Fangs capable of tearing through the flesh of ordinary Soul Beasts bit fiercely into the Asura Armor's neck guard, but only sent a spray of tiny sparks flying. A sharp sound like a heavy hammer striking a thick bronze bell rang out. Not only did the fangs fail to pierce the armor, they were even numbed by the powerful recoil.
A cold gleam flashed through Qin Heng's eyes. He abruptly raised his left arm and clamped down tightly around the Soul Beast's thick neck.
The terrifying strength bestowed by the Asura Armor exploded in an instant. With a low roar, he twisted his waist and violently hurled the Soul Beast off him!
Boom! The Soul Beast's massive body flew sideways like a cannonball and slammed heavily into an ice cliff more than ten meters away. The hard ice rock instantly shattered, sending shards of ice flying in every direction with a thunderous crash.
Qin Heng sprang up from the ground in a swift kip-up. Only then did he finally get a clear look at the Soul Beast that had ambushed him.
It was a massive Icefield Snow Leopard!
It was nearly four meters long and almost two meters tall at the shoulder. Thick, resilient white fur covered its body, dotted with faint silvery-gray markings that made it nearly blend into the surrounding ice and snow beneath the moonlight.
If not for those ghostly green pupils being so conspicuous in the darkness, it would have been extremely difficult to spot in advance. Its limbs were thick and powerful, its claws sharp as hooks, and its long, thick tail was flexible enough to stir up gusts of cold wind with the slightest flick.
The most direct way to judge a leopard-type Soul Beast's age was by the length of its tail. Guang Ling glanced at the snow leopard's tail from the air and immediately determined that it was a three-thousand-year Icefield Snow Leopard, vastly stronger than the low-level Soul Beasts on the outskirts.
Qin Heng had never studied knowledge related to Soul Beasts, so naturally he did not know this Soul Beast's age. However, seeing that its attack had failed to bite through his neck guard, he guessed its age could not be very high.
So Qin Heng decided to kill it and treat it as combat training.
Meanwhile, the Icefield Snow Leopard had slowly risen from the shattered ice rock. It shook the ice chips from its body and let out a low, threatening growl from its throat.
Its green eyes stared fixedly at Qin Heng. Beyond their brutality, they now held a trace of wariness.
It clearly had not expected that this human child, who looked no older than eight or nine, could actually injure it.
Qin Heng rolled his neck. Beneath the armor's visor, the corner of his mouth curled slightly. His voice passed through the faceplate with a cold metallic edge. "Ambushing me? You've got some nerve."
He slowly clenched his right fist, killing intent faintly circulating over the armored gauntlet. "Perfect. I'll use you to test my strength."
The Icefield Snow Leopard seemed to sense the battle intent steadily rising from Qin Heng. Its hind legs bent slightly as it gathered power, ready to launch an even fiercer pounce at any moment.
The temperature in the air seemed to drop several more degrees. Frost faintly condensed around the snow leopard's body, showing that it was ready to use its innate soul skill.
Man and leopard faced each other in the wind-sheltered hollow, separated by the flickering campfire.
Guang Ling Douluo quietly watched everything below from the air, an interested smile appearing at the corner of his mouth. He also wanted to see just how powerful a god-tier Martial Soul could be.
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