The Shen household had obtained a rather unnerving silence following the banishment of the young master Yuanchen.
The mansion could feel that the ball of sunshine, the lively one had long passed and behind was a talking house—with every door being closed, the house would talk in the form of creaking sounds, even the maids could feel the silence waning over them, like a thick cloud that suffocated them.
For the past four days that was how the house was.
Soulless even with souls inhahiting it.
The large oak doors parted and at the entrance, holding a dufflebag over the shoulder was a woman with soft features—she had long flowing snow white hair, icy blue eyes and a round face. She wore loose fitting white robes that showed her well-endowed asserts, the robes hugged her hips and on one end had a split that revealed her creamy thigh and leg to the world.
Her icy blue eyes lost their iciness and a smile crept up on her face.
Lian'er was happy to be home, a rosey blush appeared on her cheeks as she thought about the one person she adored in the whole world.
Her little brother, Yuanchen.
"Little brother! You would not believe what I encountered in the mountains!" She chirped as she strode into the house closing the doors behind her.
The banging of the doors unsettled Lian'er, she dropped her bag and looked around the empty living room. Her eyebrow rose, that was odd. It was unlike her brother to leave the house this early, normally whenever she returned from her journeys across the world, she would find him fiddling with his designs or exercising.
She walked room to room looking for him but there was no sign of Yuanchen anywhere. Her heart quickened, and her breathing became heavy. What if something had happened to him? Lian'er hovered over the stairs and found herself facing the doors leading to Yuanchen's room, her hand held the door handle and she pushed the doors wide open revealing an empty room.
The bed sheets looked like they had been untouched in days.
Lian'er's eyes darkened, the icy nature of them returned and she turned around, coincidentally coming across one of the maids who had heard the slamming of doors—the maid didn't know what happened as everything happened in a blink and she found herself pinned by Lian'er on the opposing wall.
Lian'er looked at the maid. "Where is my brother?"
"Master...Qingye and master Baihan were in the courtyard teaching the disciples."
Lian'er's grip tightened around the maid's throat, ice starting to form where her hand was. "One last chance, where is my brother!?"
"I don't know... Mistress."
The croaking of pain from the maid temporarily brought Lian'er back to her senses and she dropped the maid on the floor—she knew the maids knew absolutely nothing when it came to the cultivator side of the Sect. Clicking her tongue, Lian'er left the house looking for her two elder brothers.
~~
Large chunks of ice and explosions echoed throughout the Sect alerting the higher Cultivators including Qingye and Baihan to go and investigate.
Lian'er stood at the center of all the destruction, surrounded by chunks of ice that had pinned down disciples, and complimenting the ice chunks were bodies of unconscious disciples and she stood at the center like the picasso she was, waves of frost rolling off her body. She raised her eyes meeting the gaze of her brothers and the other Cultivators.
Her icy gaze shook them, frosting their core.
Baihan and Qingye and everyone else knew what made her angry, and they also knew that they would have to fight her if push comes to shove. Her obsession with Yuanchen bridged the boundaries of family and common sense.
Qingye's black robes flattered against the frostbite as he stepped forward—his dark hair starting to turn white from being in the vicinity of the frosting winds. "Sister calm yourself."
His words added fuel to a burning fire.
"Calm myself?" Lian'er chuckled dryly. "Where is my brother?"
"I am standing before you aren't I?" Qingye answered.
Lian'er gritted her teeth. "Don't mess with me, where is Yuanchen? I can't find him, I can't detect his presence. Qingye where is my brother?"
"...."
Lian'er's hands settled to her side, the fists she had made unfolding. "So that's how it is going to be." She closed her eyes for a moment and snapped them open releasing a wave of Qi from her implants.
The Qi chilled the air and made sheets of ice which shot to Qingye and the rest but the ice shards were stopped by a roaring wall of fire from Qingye melting them in their path.
Qingye could barely respond as Lian'er closed the gap between them and swept his legs from underneath him causing him to lose his balance—She placed her hand on his ankle, casing it in ice and ran to the backline behind Qingye.
Baihan seeing his sister approach, placed his hands together and ash shot from him covering the entire yard, limiting her vision. "Sister, fighting is not gonna bring him back."
Wrong choice of words.
Bring him back? Those words replayed like a tape to Lian'er—they hurt her little brother, they hurt him. The psychopathic voices in her head cried out, feeding the negative thoughts to her heart and she let out a gutteral, bloody scream which was followed by ice shards coming out of the ground knocking some of the unexpecting Cultivators out while those that had anticipated the attack managed to evade it but not before suffering from the effects of the ice touching them.
"Ice Age!" Lian'er said to herself as the Conduits within her body exhausted more of her Qi from her inner core and brought forth a chilling breeze that caused temperatures to drop not for the yard but the entire Heaven Archive Sect, turning everything into an icy domain.
The Ice did not settle there, it crept through doors, windows, freezing everything and everyone unsuspecting.
"Stop this now Lian'er." Tiang's stern voice came from above and he landed on the ground between Lian'er and Qingye and Baihan. His dark eyes looked at his daughter and he removed the robes he wore exposing the golden armor that was underneath.
"Father! Where is my brother?" Lian'er asked as she took a step forward.
"Your brother is gone, he was banished, he was involved in the murdering of the guards and leaking the Guardian Scripture to other Sects. His Conduits data was found in the archive system records."
"That can't be, my lovely younger brother would never!" She yelled.
"Well he did! And there's nothing you can do about it daughter. Undo the technique and we can talk."
Lian'er saw red and threw herself at her father—she threw a high kick which got blocked by the gauntlet on Tiang's arm.
However, despite Tiang blocking the attack, he grimaced at the force richocheting through his body. He knew among his children, his daughter was the most powerful but the extent of her power? He did not know until he felt her kick.
While preoccupied by his thoughts, he failed to see another kick which struck him on the chest, knocking the air out of his lungs and it pushed Tiang back.
Tiang was forced to shield himself as shards of sharp ice flew in his direction bombarding him—the shards chipped away at the gauntlet's defensive shield and he knew if he allowed that to proceed, there was a likelihood that Lian'er was going to overpower him and win.
Tiang opened his guard and pointed two fingers at Lian'er.
"Guardian Scripture first form: Guardian press."
A tremendous amount of force drawn from the leylines within the city acted upon Lian'er and she was forced to drop on all fours. The pressure of the force cracking the ground as she tried to fight against it.
Her will not wanting to yield into the suppressive force of the technique applied.
Tiang was astonished, he knew she was a prodigy but her resisting the technique even at 10% power was shocking—He walked upto Lian'er and placed his fingers on her forehead. "Sleep."
The light in her eyes dimmed and she slumped to the side as the sleeping technique took effect.
Tiang caught her and lifted her into his hands. He turned to his disciples and children. "Tell the elders that I won't be joining them today."
With that, he retreated to the main house.