Night fell.
"This is too slow."
Lu Changfeng looked at the spherical Ice Chi Dragon Essence in his hand and murmured to himself.
The Dragon Essence was ice-blue throughout, with faint streams of light slowly circulating within it, giving off a piercing, pure chill. He had spent a day trying to absorb it slowly while holding it in his palm, and it was indeed perfectly safe.
But at this rate, it would probably take months to absorb all the Origin Breath within the Dragon Essence.
Ordinarily, that would not have mattered, but the Red Sickle Guard was surely on its way already, and Yan Xiu's retaliation could arrive at any moment. The sooner he consumed it, the sooner he would grow stronger and be able to protect himself if something unexpected happened.
He looked around—the Peach Blossom Grove still bloomed in brilliant profusion, while the invisible yet tenacious barrier of the Eight Trigrams Dragon-Locking Formation shut out all the turmoil of the outside world.
This formation trapped him, but it was also a shield.
Across all of Jade Splendor Mount Hua, there was probably no safer place for secluded cultivation.
His mind made up, he hesitated no longer. He raised the Dragon Essence to his lips and bit into it.
The first bite.
Ice-blue light spilled between his teeth, becoming a bone-piercing torrent of cold that plunged straight down his throat. In that instant, Lu Changfeng felt as though all his internal organs had frozen into blocks of ice.
Dark-Mystery True Qi-the ultimate cold the Ice Chi had cultivated for ten thousand years-exploded within him, sweeping through his meridians and into every limb and bone with the irresistible force of crushing dry wood and sweeping away rotten timber.
A thin layer of frost rapidly formed on his skin. His eyebrows,