The Different Ice Empress

Within the icy mist, the Ice Empress took human form. A faint flush colored her fair little face, yet she showed none of the aggression of someone poised to attack. Instead, she resembled a startled feline, her scorpion tail stiffened with barely natural tension.

Huo Yuhao's Spirit Eye locked tightly onto that embarrassed, irritated fluctuation of Soul Power. His heart hammered inside his chest—something was wrong. Very wrong.

Fragments of future memories surged through his mind: to withstand the Heavenly Tribulation, the Ice Jade Empress Scorpion had been determined to obtain Tian Meng's Million-Year Soul Ring origin. When they met, she had released killing intent enough to freeze souls, and her scorpion tail had gleamed with venomous cold light. How could she possibly look as awkward as someone whose secret had been discovered?

"Brother Sky Dream," he urgently transmitted through spiritual power, his voice suppressing shock and doubt, "don't you think the Ice Empress... is acting a little strange?"

The Sky Dream Ice Silkworm was still giggling foolishly in the Sea of Spirit. "What's strange about it? Bingbing misses me! Look at that tail of hers. Whenever she used to come looking for me, she looked just like this!"

Huo Yuhao: "..."

He almost wanted to drag this love-struck ice silkworm out of his Sea of Spirit and freeze him into an ice pop. The Ice Empress coming to find you? If she had been able to catch you, it would have been a blessing if she had not killed you outright. The embarrassed irritation in that Soul Power fluctuation was exactly like Wang Dong's expression when she was caught secretly hiding Focus-Condensing Cakes—fierce on the outside, weak on the inside, with panic she could not conceal.

Crack—

The Ice Empress lightly tapped her scorpion tail against the ice. An icy pattern spread across the ground to Huo Yuhao's feet, carrying a clear warning. Her voice rang out again, cold and detached, but with a deliberately sharpened edge. "Human, have you looked enough? Keep using those prying eyes to stare, and I'll dig them out and freeze them into ice beads."

There was nothing inherently wrong with those words, but Huo Yuhao became even more confused. The Ice Empress could not possibly have such a temperament. Under normal circumstances, she would have killed anyone who dared offend her long ago.

Something different must have happened!

Huo Yuhao unconsciously clenched the cuff of his cold-weather clothing. Ice grains pressed painfully against the skin beneath the fabric, but that pain was nothing compared to the shock in his heart.

He looked at the Ice Empress again—the anger in her ice-blue eyes had clearly surged to its limit, and even the spike at the tip of her scorpion tail shone with dangerous, ghostly light. Yet that fatal attack never fell. It was like a storm before its arrival: thunder rolled loudly, but the rain refused to descend.

He frantically reviewed everything in his mind. His Spirit Eye suddenly brightened as he pulled Tian Meng from the Sea of Spirit, making Tian Meng speak face-to-face with the Ice Empress. He strongly suspected that Tian Meng was the reason for the Ice Empress's change.

Yet, to Huo Yuhao's surprise, the instant the Ice Empress saw the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm, she immediately reverted to her true form. Her jade-green scorpion tail descended with a sharp sound that tore through the air. Soul Power of Ultimate Ice instantly froze the space within ten meters, even pinning Huo Yuhao's spiritual power in place as he watched helplessly while the spike stabbed toward Tian Meng—its force and killing intent clearly meant to crush Tian Meng into icy fragments!

"Bingbing! Are you insane?!" The Sky Dream Ice Silkworm was so frightened that his plump body instantly curled into a ball. The origin power of his Million-Year Soul Ring erupted in haste, condensing an ice shield before him. "I'm Tian Meng!"

"Shut up!" The Ice Empress's furious roar came crashing down with shards of ice. Her scorpion tail lashed fiercely against the ice shield. With a crack, the shield Tian Meng had condensed was instantly covered in fractures. "You useless bastard! If you hadn't eaten so much Ten-Thousand-Year Profound Ice Marrow, why would Snow Empress and I be worried about the coming Heavenly Tribulation?"

A blue beam shot from the Ice Empress's mouth, yet it deliberately avoided Huo Yuhao.

Huo Yuhao stood frozen in place, his Spirit Eye wide open.

Something was wrong! Far too wrong!

When facing him just now, hesitation had been hidden beneath the Ice Empress's embarrassed anger, restraint wrapped within her killing intent. But when she faced Tian Meng, her attacks were utterly merciless. The rage in her eyes was as pure as an untainted icicle, and even her scorpion tail radiated genuine murderous intent—she truly wanted to attack!

"Brother Sky Dream..." Huo Yuhao's voice trembled, not out of fear, but confusion.

His Spirit Eye swept wildly over the scene and suddenly caught a detail. Every time the Ice Empress's scorpion tail came down, she instinctively avoided his direction, as though afraid of accidentally hurting him. And whenever her gaze swept over him, the killing intent Tian Meng had just provoked in her eyes would immediately fade slightly, stained by the faintest hesitation, one so subtle that even she herself had not noticed it.

That was it!

The Ice Empress's abnormal behavior had nothing to do with Tian Meng. It was because of him!

Her killing intent toward Tian Meng was real, the rage of long-standing resentment. Yet toward him, this human, she inexplicably held an extra measure of concern.

Why?

Tian Meng screamed as he retreated back into Huo Yuhao's Sea of Spirit. The Ice Empress's jade-green eyes locked onto him. "Human, what are you staring at?!"

Her scorpion tail slowly rose, yet instead of attacking Huo Yuhao, a probing scrutiny appeared in her eyes. "Human, the aura on your body... is very unusual..."

Huo Yuhao's heart jolted. His Spirit Eye instantly condensed into an ice-blue point of light, while his spiritual power spread like a fine net, sorting through every thread of his own aura with absolute clarity—Tian Meng's origin was like warm jade, the elemental transformation of his Ice Martial Soul like flowing mist, and the spiritual web of his Spirit Eye. The three intertwined, forming a rhythm that even he found strange.

"You flatter me, Senior." He suppressed the storm in his heart. "This junior is merely a Soul Master who has just entered the Northernmost Land. How could my aura be anything special? Perhaps I have been touched by Brother Sky Dream's origin and practiced a few rudimentary ice-element techniques, making you laugh at me."

He deliberately spoke lightly, but his gaze remained fixed on the Ice Empress's reaction.

The Ice Empress's scorpion tail hovered in midair. Her jade-green eyes narrowed slightly as Soul Power surged around her like tides, circling Huo Yuhao and testing him. When that jade-green Soul Power touched his collar, it did not erupt into conflict as it had with Tian Meng. Instead, it gently formed a small whirlpool before retreating.

"The aura on your body is very unusual. I cannot understand it. Come with me to meet Snow Empress."

Huo Yuhao's pupils contracted. He almost thought he had misheard her.

Meet Snow Empress?

Although it aligned with his own goal, he had not yet persuaded the Ice Empress. The result of meeting Snow Empress was basically an unknown, and Huo Yuhao hesitated for a moment.

He had imagined countless possibilities—the Ice Empress attacking the moment they met, persuading her to become his second Martial Soul, or the Ice Empress refusing to cooperate even unto death and unwilling to bring him to Snow Empress. He had never imagined that she would take the initiative to bring him to Snow Empress.

With the protection of Tian Meng's shed shell, Huo Yuhao was confident that his safety could be guaranteed. But the consequence would be the complete collapse of his plan in the Northernmost Land. For a moment, he even felt that perhaps he should simply follow his future memories and steadily fuse with the Ice Empress.

"What? Afraid?" The Ice Empress raised a brow, and a trace of mockery flashed through her jade-green eyes. "The aura on your body is unusual. I cannot understand it, but you give me a feeling that you are very important to me. I do not know what that means, but Snow Empress surely does. Even if you refuse to come with me today, you will still have to come with me."

Huo Yuhao took a deep breath and suppressed the waves in his heart. He knew this was the closest he had ever come to Snow Empress. Whatever the Ice Empress's intentions were, he had no right to refuse.

"This junior dares." He straightened his back, determination gathering once more in his Spirit Eye. Since the future had already been shattered, then he would properly write a life that belonged to him.