Yang Yi closed the chat channel, gulped down two mouthfuls of Charred Liquor, then began to tremble.
The burning sensation was simply too intense, even a little intoxicating.
Once he recovered, he used Three Eyes to scout northeast again, then stood up.
The Ice Nest Believers had begun to move.
They slowly rose to their feet, their movements extremely sluggish.
As they did, pieces fell off their bodies-fingers, ears, toes, and even half an arm.
But the broken surfaces did not bleed. They were already frozen, like the fractured edges of glass.
Only the giant at the very center was an exception.
He seemed to have adapted completely to the extreme cold, utterly unaffected by the freezing temperatures. Or perhaps he had adapted to being frozen.
In any case, no pieces fell off him, and he stood up quickly. Once upright, he was nearly ten meters tall. His head had no face or features, only a massive, diamond-shaped lump of ice.
His limbs were exceptionally long, too. His legs exceeded seven meters, and his arms were six meters long, making him look like a noodle man.
His right hand also supported an egg-shaped ice crystal, with something frozen inside. It appeared to be an elderly person's head, with a crystal chip embedded in its forehead.
While crouching earlier, the giant had been cradling this egg-shaped ice crystal, keeping Yang Yi from observing it. Only now did he notice it.
And the head inside the crystal was alive. Its eyes were open, and it could speak, its lips opening and closing.
By observing it and imitating its lip movements, Yang Yi tried to read its lips.
"Not permitted... approach the White Palace... must drive out... high temperatures..."
Then he read more and more fluently, muttering to himself as though possessed.
"In