Inside the Snow Bear Mercenary Group's camp.
Li Zhexian lifted the tent flap,
letting the frigid wind of the Extreme North rush in,
stirring the fire in the brazier into flickering flames.
Shui Bing'er and the other six were all Spirit Masters,
each cultivating the power of ice;
such chill troubled them not in the least.
"Come, come!"
Li Zhexian strode quickly to the table at the center of the ice-fort, smiling as he called:
"This is the tenderest Icebone Lamb — the marrow's fragrance is the richest. Taste it while it's hot!"
At his urging, the seven girls reached out slender hands,
each lifting a piece of lamb stewed to a creamy-white broth.
Seven pairs of delicate hands raised chopsticks.
The moment the meat touched their lips—
their eyes lit up at once.
Skywater Academy stood in the northern lands;
they had tasted countless northern delicacies before.
Yet somehow, this Icebone Lamb seemed incomparably delicious tonight—
perhaps because within the simmering broth,
there was also the warmth of reunion after long separation.
"So good!"
Shui Yue'er puffed her cheeks, mumbling through a mouthful, a glimmer of oil shining on her lips.
Li Zhexian chuckled softly.
He turned his palm, and a Clear Spring Wine Gourd appeared in his hand.
Amber liquid poured into their cups,
sending tendrils of misty warmth rising even amid the freezing air.
The fragrance of wine mingled with the rich aroma of lamb,
filling the ice fortress with a fleeting illusion of spring.
The fire crackled and bubbled.
Its warmth drove away the snowstorm outside—
and quietly melted the faint awkwardness of friends meeting again after years apart.
"Li Zhexian!"
Shui Yue'er suddenly slammed the table, her cheeks flushed from drink.
"You saw us in the tavern and pretended not to know us—
did you take us for strangers?"
"You… you're such a bad friend!"
Li Zhexian sighed helplessly.
"The tavern was full of prying eyes," he said.
"If I'd greeted you then, the Spirit Hall would've been at the door before we finished our drinks."
"Ah?"
Shui Yue'er blinked, then flushed red.
"Oh—right! I forgot! Sorry, sorry!"
Li Zhexian was just about to respond—
when Shui Bing'er, who had been silent all this time, lifted her gaze.
Her voice was fainter than the wind outside the tent.
"There's something else…"
"When you first came to the North, you sent us wine—
why did you avoid meeting us?"
The smile at Li Zhexian's lips froze for an instant.
The bubbling of the stew suddenly sounded very clear.
The six other girls held their breath, secretly peeking at Shui Bing'er.
What's gotten into her? they wondered.
Wasn't she the one who once said "Li Zhexian carries guilt in his heart"?
Why bring it up again now?
Shui Bing'er's sapphire eyes were calm,
her frost-pure face betraying no emotion.
When Li Zhexian sighed softly,
she continued:
"You had your reasons. I won't press."
"But today we meet again, sharing wine and laughter—
and yet you still wear a mask before us.
Don't you think that's… a bit lacking in respect toward friends?"
Shui Yue'er, Xue Wu, and the others widened their eyes in surprise.
Ah, so this was what their sister had been waiting to say!
Six young women immediately chimed in together:
"That's right, Li Zhexian!"
"You meet us wearing a mask—
don't you treat us as friends?"
Li Zhexian's smile deepened, free and unhesitant.
He turned slightly.
His fingers touched the edge of his jaw.
"It isn't deliberate disguise," he said.
"I've simply worn it too long."
With a faint click—
the mask came away.
Black hair spilled loosely,
a few strands falling to his cheek.
The wind swept through the tent,
lifting his fringe and revealing the face beneath—
Sword-like brows, eyes dark as ink,
and that faint, familiar smile at the corner of his lips—
the same smile from those days in Heaven Dou City,
when he had been a carefree youth calling friends to drink beneath the lanterns.
Li Zhexian raised his cup and stood.
"Zhexian greets his old friends."
Shui Bing'er clinked her cup against his,
her lips curling into a faint smile — cold and elegant, yet warm in its quiet way.
At that moment,
Li Zhexian seemed once again like the young man he had once been in Heaven Dou —
spirited, bright, unburdened by the years of snow that had pressed down upon him.
Snow and wind had weighed upon him for years;
yet he still smiled — letting the snow brush softly across his face.
...
After the Snowbear Mercenary Group tallied their losses
and arranged the burials of the fallen,
Li Zhexian prepared to leave the Extreme North.
On the night before his departure,
the Snow Bear Mercenaries held a farewell feast in his honor.
Though the group had been gravely wounded by the battles,
with the other three major Mercenary Groups in the North now destroyed,
the Snowbear Mercenary Corps' future looked brighter than ever.
That night—
there was no Li Zhexian, only Li Ji.
Snow Bear said that the greatest genius on the continent should drink the finest wine.
But Li Ji insisted on drinking the strongest burning liquor instead.
The few surviving brothers of the Snow Bear Mercenary Group soon collapsed one by one, drunk beyond sense.
Oscar threw his arm around Li Ji's neck, laughing and crying all at once:
"Brother Ji… You'll always be my Brother Ji…"
Not far away,
Shui Bing'er and the other six quietly turned away,
watching the bare-chested young man drinking under the wavering firelight.
The next time they met would be five years later.
...
The following day,
Li Zhexian left the Extreme North.
In his Wishful Hundred Treasure Purse, he carried a small handful of northern snow.
His destination was clear — the Slaughter City.
His Chasing Wind Horse shattered wind and rain beneath its hooves,
crossing Frost Leaf Town on the border of the North,
then the Scarlet-Mist Marsh that marked the frontier of the Star Luo Empire.
The landscape gradually shifted from silver frost to shades of green.
Even the wine in his gourd changed with the lands he passed through.
...
A month later,
on the post road outside a dusk-colored frontier town,
there rode a black-cloaked traveler astride a Chasing Wind Horse.
The liquor at his hip was no longer the North's burning spirits,
but this region's mellow plum wine.
Li Zhexian could already smell it—
that faint trace of blood carried by the evening wind from the desolate plains ahead.
His destination was near.
He had no plans to delay.
He was going to head straight into the Slaughter City.
But then—
he heard travelers on the roadside murmuring:
"Did you hear? A new storyteller's come to Twilight Town…"
—
Spirit Hall.
Within the Angel Temple,
Qian Renxue knelt upon the nine hundred and ninety-seventh step of the divine stair.
Gold-streaked scarlet blood seeped from her cracking skin,
scorching the white jade beneath her knees.
"Just… two more steps…"
Her body trembled; she was on the verge of collapse.
Lifting her pale, exquisitely beautiful face,
golden blood dripped from her lips as she stared upward
at the final two steps that seemed both within reach and impossibly far.
She raised one foot—
and took a staggering step.
Boom—!
A pressure vast as mountains and seas
crashed down upon her.
Her long golden hair whipped wildly,
her frail body buckling beneath the power.
Her bones cracked under the strain,
and behind her, the radiant feathers of her Angel Wings fell away one by one.
Beneath the divine stair,
six Worshiper exchanged looks of pain.
"Xue'er…"
"Xue'er has gone mad!"
"Is that boy Li Zhexian really worth all this?!"
"Grand Worship… this is too cruel!"
Under their trembling gazes,
Qian Renxue crawled onto the nine hundred and ninety-ninth step.
Boom—!
The colossal Angel Statue, towering over a hundred meters high,
suddenly spread its pure wings wide,
and gently gathered the dying Qian Renxue into its glowing palms.
An endless divine radiance
flooded the entire temple.
Beneath that light,
a hazy, ethereal figure
slowly unclenched its fist.
—
A day later,
Qian Renxue turned into a streak of divine brilliance,
rising from the Angel Temple
and streaking toward the Slaughter City.
—
The wind over the Twilight Wasteland was coarse and dry,
scraping against the skin like sandpaper —
utterly unlike the bitter cold of the North.
Li Zhexian led his Chasing Wind Horse
through the gates of the border town known as Twilight.
The town was small,
its yellow-clay walls cracked by years of sandstorms.
Few people walked the streets;
those who did wore headscarves and hurried along, eyes down.
As he asked along the way,
he turned into a narrow, shadowed alley.
From the street corner came the rhythmic clack of wooden blocks.
"Now then," a raspy old voice recited,
"that day, in the Spirit City, the boy in white…"
At the sound of that voice, so achingly familiar—
Li Zhexian's steps came to a halt.