Cold Pool, Icebound Divine Crystal

"Hmm, neither Nan Qiuqiu nor her mother is at the Earth Dragon Sect."

After locating the well that led to the Ten-Thousand-Year Mysterious Ice Cavern, Xia Yu curiously began investigating the people of the Earth Dragon Sect.

The original work had described how the mother and daughter's Rouge Dragon Martial Souls possessed a powerful annihilating force capable of erasing energies such as soul power.

To be honest, Xia Yu really wanted to study such a special power.

If he could replicate it and incorporate it into his soul tools, that would be even better.

But what he had not expected was that after searching the entire Earth Dragon Sect, he still could not find any trace of the mother and daughter.

They had probably led a team to Radiant City to participate in the Soul Master Tournament by this time.

With that, Xia Yu's plan naturally came to nothing.

This was fucking regrettable!

"Forget it. If they're not here, they're not here. I'll consider it letting them off. But as the price, I'll be taking the Earth Dragon Sect's Ten-Thousand-Year Mysterious Ice Cavern."

After unilaterally declaring the Ten-Thousand-Year Mysterious Ice Cavern his, Xia Yu stopped lingering and quickly left the Earth Dragon Sect, returning to the hotel.

"Ugh, you bastard... you went back on your word. I'll bite you to death, bite you to death..."

The moment Xia Yu returned to the room, he saw Meng Hongchen already asleep, yet still muttering in her dreams.

Although she was asleep, it did not stop her from making an angry biting expression.

Of course, she could not possibly bite Xia Yu. The only thing suffering was the blanket covering her.

Judging by how hard she was going at it, those velvet pants would probably be torn apart before long.

"Tsk, just how little does she trust me? She's guarding against me even in her dreams. It's not like I'm some kind of beast."

Xia Yu was speechless at Meng Hongchen's reaction in her dream.

Still, in order to help her sleep more peacefully and not be troubled by nightmares, he made his move.

But who would have thought that just as Xia Yu reached the bedside, Meng Hongchen suddenly shot upright in bed.

"You bad guy, you don't keep your word. You're absolutely awful..."

Before she could even wake from her daze, Meng Hongchen launched into an endless stream of accusations against Xia Yu.

One sentence after another, she went on without pause.

She looked so aggrieved that anyone unaware of the truth would have thought Xia Yu had truly bullied her terribly.

"No, how about you figure out the difference between dreams and reality before accusing me? I'm being wronged to death here."

Xia Yu had not expected such a turn of events. Listening to Meng Hongchen's accusations, he nearly lost his composure.

But Meng Hongchen did not care about Xia Yu's reaction at all and continued accusing him without stopping.

Once she had vented all her grievances, she did not even open her eyes before groggily lying back down and falling asleep again.

Seeing this, Xia Yu was so annoyed that he laughed.

What even was this?

If he had not been able to sense that Meng Hongchen's aura had never undergone even the slightest violent change, he would have thought she was doing it on purpose.

But she was not.

She truly had not noticed Xia Yu standing beside her. Everything had happened because of that dream.

That left Xia Yu with no way to deal with Meng Hongchen.

Well, even if he did have a way, he probably would not do anything to her.

At most, he would give her a small lesson—nothing painful.

Buzz!!!

Although Meng Hongchen did not continue having "nightmares" after falling asleep again, Xia Yu still followed his plan and used vitality and spiritual power to soothe her.

Only after finishing all that did he lie down on the other bed.

The next morning.

As expected, Meng Hongchen did not remember anything that had happened the previous night.

She even broke from her usual behavior, eagerly hugging Xia Yu's arm and urging him to hurry and take her to the Earth Dragon Sect to search for treasure.

After all, their main purpose in coming to Dragon City was to find treasure at the Earth Dragon Sect. How could Meng Hongchen forget that?

The reason she had not been in a hurry yesterday was simply because she had been too exhausted to think about anything else.

Now that she had rested well, it was naturally time to put treasure hunting on the agenda.

Xia Yu had no objection to that.

After breakfast, he quietly brought Meng Hongchen to the Earth Dragon Sect and headed straight for the well in the rear courtyard.

"Is the treasure really hidden in this ancient well? How did you know? This well looks pretty ordinary to me..."

Meng Hongchen had already been full of enthusiasm for this treasure hunt. Now that she discovered the treasure was hidden in an ordinary ancient well, she became even more interested.

Without another word, she clung to Xia Yu and kept asking him question after question.

She looked as though she wanted to pour out every doubt in her heart in one breath.

"Alright, instead of asking me, why don't you go down and investigate it yourself?"

Xia Yu did not answer Meng Hongchen's questions and instead told her to descend into the well to find the answers herself.

Though Meng Hongchen was dissatisfied with Xia Yu's suggestion, she accepted it.

"Let's do as you said. Let's go down!"

Meng Hongchen examined the environment below the well. After confirming there was no problem, she leaped up and dropped into it.

"Wow, I can feel it! There's a special ice-attribute energy in the cold pool inside this well. It has an enormous attraction to the Vermilion-Eyed Ice Toad Martial Soul."

Meng Hongchen truly acted as if she had come treasure hunting. The instant she entered the well, she began carefully observing and sensing her surroundings.

She really did discover the frigid power leaking out from the Ten-Thousand-Year Mysterious Ice Cavern.

After confirming that the frigid power was coming from beneath the bottom of the well, she plunged headfirst into the water again.

"She really is treating this like treasure hunting. But without some real ability, there's no way to obtain the treasure here."

Seeing Meng Hongchen's impatient appearance as she searched for treasure, Xia Yu shook his head meaningfully.

He then followed Meng Hongchen and headed deeper beneath the well.

They continued diving until they reached a depth of around twenty-five or twenty-six meters before Xia Yu and Meng Hongchen finally stopped.

Meng Hongchen had originally intended to keep diving, wanting to reach the bottom of the well to search for treasure.

As an ice-attribute soul master, the extreme cold of the well water truly could not do anything to her. Here, she was completely in her element.

But that state was only useful while she remained in the well water.

Once she entered the Icebound Divine Crystal Cavern and the Ten-Thousand-Year Mysterious Ice Cavern, the top-tier ice attribute granted by her Vermilion-Eyed Ice Toad would become useless.

After all, those two places had been prepared specifically for Ultimate Ice.

Without the Ultimate Ice attribute, one could only pray that one's luck was good enough, like Skydream Iceworm's. Otherwise, one would die miserably.

Or one could simply bulldoze through with even greater power. Whether it was Icebound Divine Crystal or Ten-Thousand-Year Mysterious Ice Marrow, as long as one was strong enough, there was nothing one could not obtain.

"Brother Yu, isn't the treasure at the bottom of the well? Why did we stop here?"

"The treasure we're looking for is indeed at the bottom of the well, but another rare treasure is hidden here as well. We'll collect the treasure here first, then go to the bottom."

As he answered Meng Hongchen's question, Xia Yu began searching for the mechanism set up by the Earth Dragon Sect's ancestors.

This did not pose much of a challenge for him.

Very quickly, he found the mechanism and used the method from the original work to open the stone door sealing off the Icebound Divine Crystal Cavern.