The night over the Great Western Steppe descended not with a soft fading of twilight, but with the sudden, violent strike of a roaring mountain blizzard.
Outside the heavy basalt walls of the Frost-Pint Inn, the temperature plunged far below zero, turning the dry plains wind into a shrieking vortex of razor-sharp ice crystals. The colossal Frost-Draught Oxen outside huddled tightly together in their wooden stables, their heavy white fur caked in thick frost, while the wooden sign hanging above the inn's heavy oak door groaned and rattled violently against its iron hinges.
Inside the grand hall, however, the three stone hearths blazed with roaring pine fires, filling the wooden room with a thick, suffocating warmth.
The boisterous shouting and drinking of the two hundred patrons had gradually simmered down into a low, tense murmur. As the night grew deeper, the patrons drank more heavily, but their eyes remained sharp and watchful. In a border sanctuary like the Frost-Pint Inn, sleeping with one eye open was a basic survival instinct shared by mercenaries, rogue cultivators, and bounty hunters alike.
At the far corner of the mahogany bar counter, Xiao-Yue had finished her large bowl of warm mutton stew and two soft pieces of rye bread. Her small belly was pleasantly full, and the cozy, radiant heat from the nearby hearth—combined with the gentle warmth of her pink lotus lantern—was making her heavy eyelids flutter sleepily.
She curled up on the long wooden bench, leaning her head comfortably against Li-Wen's thigh. Her small hands kept a loose, trusting grip on his dark coat, her soft, rhythmic breathing sounding clearly above the crackling of the fire.
Li-Wen sat completely motionless, his long, broad frame erect and steady.
His right hand rested casually on his knee, while his dark, void-like eyes stared quietly into the warm amber depths of his clay tea cup. Though he appeared to be in a state of quiet rest, his physical consciousness—unburdened by the need to circulate spiritual Qi—had expanded silently into a subtle, five-hundred-yard spherical domain that encompassed the entire tavern, the snow-covered stables, and the frozen highway outside.
Every heartbeat of every drunken mercenary, every creak of the floorboards, and every subtle shift of iron blades hidden beneath fur coats echoed within his mind with absolute clarity.
Deep within his spine, the dark-violet Void-Piercing Needle remained completely encased in its shell of absolute-zero ice. The void poison attempted to pulse every few hours, seeking a flaw in the ice vault, but Li-Wen's primordial physical marrow held it in absolute, unyielding stasis. To Li-Wen, the poison was not a threat to his life; it was merely an inert piece of dark iron waiting to be crushed when the time was right.
Suddenly, Li-Wen's dark eyes shifted slightly toward the left side of the grand hall.
At a secluded table hidden deep within the shadows of a heavy stone pillar, three men sat in complete silence.
Unlike the loud bounty hunters and fur-clad mercenaries who drank openly, these three men wore skin-tight suits of dark grey sea-leather covered by long, unadorned wool cloaks. They had not ordered a single drop of ale or a single plate of meat. On their table sat three unlit clay cups and a single, low-grade silver compass that flickered with a faint, sickly green light.
These three were elite trackers from the Shadow-Blade Association—the premier dark-guild of assassins and bounty scouts in the Western Continent!
The leader of the three, a thin, gaunt man with a face as pale as a corpse and sunken, yellowed eyes, raised his hand slightly beneath his wool cloak. His long, skeletal fingers held a thin piece of black parchment that vibrated subtly whenever the needle of the green silver compass pointed toward the bar counter.
"It is him..." The gaunt man whispered, his voice so faint and dry that it sounded like dry leaves scraping across a tombstone. "The silver resonance compass reacts directly to the Void-Piercing Needle's unique energy signature... The man sitting at the bar is the Northern Sovereign."
Beside him, a younger tracker with a jagged scar across his lips leaned in, his eyes burning with intense, suppressed greed. "Captain... the bounty poster from the Seven Sects offers ten million high-grade spirit stones! He is sitting right there! Look at him—his meridians are locked! He hasn't used a single thread of spiritual Qi since he entered the inn!"
"Quiet, you fool!" The gaunt captain snapped in a harsh, frozen whisper, his yellow eyes glaring at his subordinate. "Did you forget what happened at the Black-Crag Pass five hours ago?! The scout transmission just arrived before the blizzard hit! The Blood-Axe Tyrant and one thousand rogue cultivators of the Iron-Blood Guild were completely erased! Their five-hundred-foot iron citadel was blasted into fine dust!"
The younger tracker swallowed hard, a cold shiver running down his spine. "B-But... the transmission said he relied purely on physical air pressure! If he has no spiritual Qi, he cannot fight a long, drawn-out battle! Once his physical strength is exhausted, the void poison will destroy his heart!"
"We do not fight him inside a Sanctuary Lodge," the gaunt captain said coldly, his pale fingers tracing the edge of a thin, dark throwing dagger hidden up his sleeve. "The Mercenary Association's enforcers are stationed on the third floor. If we break the sanctuary law inside the inn, the high-grade arrays will activate, and we will be hunted by every guild in the realm."
He looked toward the frost-covered window, his yellowed eyes narrowing like those of a poisonous viper hiding in the snow.
"The blizzard outside will reach its peak at midnight. It is a Soul-Freezing Galesmith Storm—the kind of extreme weather that suppresses physical body functions and reduces visibility to zero. When he leaves the inn tomorrow morning, or if he steps outside into the storm tonight, our three hundred hidden assassins stationed in the pine forest will strike together!"
The captain picked up his green silver compass and tucked it back into his robes. "Keep your eyes on him. Do not touch your weapons. Let the idiot bounty hunters in the hall test his strength first if they dare..."
At the bar counter, Li-Wen slowly raised his tea cup and took a quiet sip.
His face remained flat, calm, and completely unbothered. He had heard every single word of their quiet, hidden conversation as if the three trackers had been screaming directly into his ear.
He did not care about three hundred hidden assassins. He did not care about the green resonance compass. To an absolute Northern Sovereign, three hundred ants waiting in a snowstorm were no different from three hundred fallen pine needles resting on a frozen road.
As the clock on the central hearth struck midnight, the heavy wooden doors of the inn creaked open once more.
A sudden, freezing gust of howling blizzard wind blew through the doorway, extinguishing several candles near the entrance and causing the roaring flames in the hearths to flicker wildly!
Three tall, intimidating figures stepped into the tavern hall, shaking heavy sheets of white snow from their massive fur cloaks.
The patrons in the hall fell silent almost immediately. Even the drunken bounty hunters stopped laughing, their eyes filled with deep caution as they recognized the heavy iron emblems pinned to the newcomers' chests.
The leader of the three was a towering, eight-foot-tall behemoth of a man. His body was broad as an iron gate, clad in heavy, spiked plate armor forged from dark blue cold-steel. Across his massive shoulders rested a colossal, two-handed serrated iron broadsword that radiated the icy, blue aura of a Stage-5 Intermediate Sovereign!
His face was wild and fierce, covered in a thick, snow-white beard, and his right eye was covered by a black iron patch. He was Commander Iron-Frost—the high commander of the White-Frost Mercenary Guild, one of the top three armed forces operating in the Western Steppe!
Behind him walked two Stage-4 Peak lieutenants, both holding heavy iron maces, their sharp eyes sweeping across the tavern hall like hunting hawks.
"Innkeeper!" Commander Iron-Frost boomed, his massive voice echoing off the basalt walls like a rolling avalanche, instantly cutting through the quiet hum of the room. "Bring three horns of hot rum and ten pounds of roasted boar! The storm outside is cold enough to freeze an ox's blood!"
"R-Right away, Commander!" The chubby innkeeper stammered, frantically waving his young attendants toward the kitchen.
Commander Iron-Frost unclipped his heavy fur cloak, tossing it onto a empty wooden table. However, instead of sitting down immediately, his single, sharp eye drifted slowly across the packed hall, inspecting every face with practiced, military precision.
When his single eye landed on the far corner of the bar counter, his gaze stopped dead.
He looked at the broad-shouldered man in the dark, torn coat sitting calmly beside a sleeping child. His gaze moved slowly up to the massive, pitch-black heavy blade strapped across the man's back.
Commander Iron-Frost's single eye widened slightly. A subtle, sharp glint of recognition flashed within his pupil.
He took a heavy step forward, his iron-shod boots clicking loudly against the sawdust floorboards, heading straight toward the mahogany bar counter!
The entire tavern hall went completely dead silent. Over two hundred patrons held their breath, their eyes darting between the towering Stage-5 Mercenary Commander and the solitary traveler sitting at the bar. Many of the bounty hunters rested their hands on their knife hilts, suspecting that a massive battle was about to break out!
Commander Iron-Frost stopped three paces behind Li-Wen's stool. His massive, eight-foot frame towered over the bar, casting a long, dark shadow over the wooden counter.
Li-Wen did not turn his head. He did not draw his weapon. He calmly refilled his clay cup with hot barley tea from the steaming teapot.
"Traveler," Commander Iron-Frost said, his deep, booming voice dropping into a low, surprisingly grave tone. "That heavy blade on your back... it has no scabbard markings. But its iron mass is far too dense for any standard blacksmith in the Western Continent to have forged."
Li-Wen took a slow sip of his tea, his voice flat and calm. "It is just iron."
Commander Iron-Frost stared at Li-Wen's back for five long seconds. He could feel no spiritual Qi radiating from the man—not a single thread. Yet, as a seasoned Stage-5 expert who had spent thirty years fighting on the frozen battlefields of the Western Continent, his battle instincts were screaming a wild, frantic warning inside his brain!
The solitary man sitting before him did not feel like a human cultivator. He felt like an ancient, dormant volcano disguised in a dark traveler's coat!
Commander Iron-Frost's eye narrowed as he glanced down at the small, sleeping girl resting against Li-Wen's leg, and then at the pink lotus lantern resting on the counter.
The commander reached into his leather belt, pulled out a small, sealed iron scroll, and placed it quietly onto the mahogany counter right beside Li-Wen's tea cup.
"The Western Guild Alliance has issued a total blockade order across the entire central highway," Commander Iron-Frost said in a low, heavy whisper that only Li-Wen could hear. "Three major guilds—including the Shadow-Blade Association and the Golden-Eagle Sect—have deployed four Stage-5 Sovereigns and over five hundred elite assassins into the Frost-Bite Forest five miles west of here. They know about your poisoned meridians."
Li-Wen did not look at the iron scroll. "And you?"
Commander Iron-Frost let out a low, rough chuckle, his hand resting on the hilt of his colossal broadsword.
"The White-Frost Mercenary Guild does not collect bounties for the Eastern Sects," the commander replied firmly, his single eye burning with a quiet, rugged honor. "We only fight honorable battles on the open field. But I will tell you this, traveler—the storm outside will last until dawn. If you step into the Frost-Bite Forest tomorrow, you will be walking into a bloodbath."
He stepped back two paces, bowing his broad head slightly in a gesture of warrior respect. "Enjoy your hot tea, traveler."
Without another word, Commander Iron-Frost turned on his heel, walking back toward his table with his two lieutenants to drink his hot rum.
At the bar counter, Li-Wen picked up the small iron scroll, his thumb casually crushing the heavy iron seal into fine grey powder before tossing the scroll into the nearby hearth fire. The parchment burned instantly, turning into bright orange ashes that drifted up the chimney.
Beside him, little Xiao-Yue stirred softly in her sleep. She rubbed her large, clear eyes with her tiny fists, blinking sleepily at the warm firelight before looking up at Li-Wen's face.
"Brother Li-Wen..." Xiao-Yue mumbled sleepily, her voice sweet and innocent. "Is it morning yet?"
"Not yet, Xiao-Yue," Li-Wen murmured gently, his broad palm patting her small back with a steady, rhythmic comfort. "Sleep a little longer."
"Mmm..." She snuggled back against his leg, her hands hugging her pink lotus lantern close to her chest, falling back into a deep, peaceful slumber.
Li-Wen sat quietly under the warm light of the hearth fire, his dark, void-like eyes staring out through the frost-covered window into the shrieking, black blizzard outside.
In the dark forest five miles west, hundreds of hidden blades were waiting in the freezing snow, hungry for his life, his heavy blade, and the child's lantern.
Li-Wen's expression did not change by a single fraction. A quiet, cold softness touched the corners of his lips—a look of absolute, unshakeable dominance that had belonged to the Northern Sovereign for three hundred years.
"Five hundred blades..." Li-Wen thought quietly to himself, his deep breath steady and slow. "Let them wait in the cold."
He picked up his tea cup once more, drinking the last drop of warm barley tea as the roaring blizzard continued to howl against the basalt walls of the ancient inn.
See you in next chapter...