Chapter 71
As she pulled out a small jade vial, Lee Seol-hwa asked,
"Have you ever been in ice-cold water before?"
"Yes."
"It's good that you have some experience."
"?"
"The test you are about to undergo is the North Sea's traditional ordeal, the Trial of Ice (氷寒試煉). To put it simply, it's like staying in ice water and enduring for as long as possible."
... Enduring in ice water for a long time?
That's simpler than I thought.
Jaseong, who had expected something grander, like a duel against the North Sea Ice Palace Mistress, felt the test was a bit underwhelming.
"But is there an ice lake in Hubei suitable for submerging yourself?"
"Of course not."
"?"
"Drink this."
Lee Seol-hwa gestured to the jade vial in her hand.
Inside was a clear liquid so cold that the air around the vial was faintly freezing.
"What is this?"
"It's Heavenly Ice Spirit Essence(氷魄天精). It's the purest essence, brimming with North Sea chill, brought from the cave of the Thousand-year Ice Crystal."
"......!"
The Thousand-year Ice Crystal was a mysterious ice that did not melt for ten thousand years, a sacred object possessing its own will.
To have brought it from such a cave meant the cold it contained was unimaginably powerful.
"As you might expect, if a regular person drinks even a single drop of this essence, their heart will freeze solid and they'll die within half a quarter hour."
"......!!"
"It's nearly the same for martial artists. Those who haven't reached a certain realm of cultivation will have their hearts freeze and die."
The essence infused with the North Sea's chilling energy.
So, she was going to make me drink it...?
I thought it would be simple, like being submerged in ice water, but it was indeed not an easy trial.
"If you endure for fifteen minutes after drinking this, you will have passed the first stage. Half an hour is the second stage, and forty-five minutes means you've completed all three stages."
"......."
"Even clearing just the first stage gives you the right to be a guest of our North Sea Ice Palace. But, if you want a close relationship like Lord of Black Blood Hall Do Unjang, you must reach the final stage. As I said before, even he couldn't make it through the last, third stage."
A fleeting tension crossed Jaseong's face.
'Do Unjang... Even an expert at the late peak couldn't endure for forty-five minutes? Even someone with such immense internal power?'
At that moment, Lee Rin cautiously spoke to him by sound transmission.
[Great hero. Please don't overdo it. Heavenly Ice Spirit Essence is truly dangerous. If you force yourself too much, you could really die. If you want a close relationship with the North Sea Ice Palace, I can try to persuade my mother for you instead....]
Lee Rin's worried face showed she clearly knew how perilous a test this was.
Unlike her, however, Lee Seol-hwa regarded Jaseong with eyes full of intrigue.
"Are you afraid? You can stop if you want. In fact, this Heavenly Ice Spirit Essence trial is an internal power test for experts in the North Sea who have cultivated internal energy for decades. It's not a test that a young genius like you should attempt...."
"No. I'll do it."
After briefly staring at the jade vial, Jaseong swiftly uncorked it.
The biting cold nearly made his palm freeze on contact.
But Jaseong didn't hesitate and immediately tossed the Heavenly Ice Spirit Essence down his throat.
Swooosh—!
As the essence slid down his esophagus, a shock as if his organs were all freezing at once surged through him.
It was like tens of thousands of icy needles surging through his veins.
'Ugh...!'
Jaseong instantly summoned the internal power of Heaven Evading Soul Transformation Formula to drive out the cold.
Golden true ki surged from his dantian and clashed against the fierce chill of Heavenly Ice Spirit Essence.
But then—
'?!'
The chill of Heavenly Ice Spirit Essence devoured Jaseong's golden true ki.
His very dantian was beginning to freeze white.
'What an incredible, overwhelming chill...!'
It was only natural.
This was the essence taken from the cave of the Thousand-year Ice Crystal, the North Sea's sacred object.
It contained cold accumulated over tens of thousands of years.
As a result, Jaseong's lips grew increasingly bluish.
His entire body seemed to be slowly freezing, sensation withdrawing from his fingertips.
Seeing this, Lee Rin hastily sent a sound transmission to Lee Seol-hwa.
[Mother! If he keeps going, he's going to die! Mother, shouldn't you help him?!]
While Lee Rin's face was full of concern, Lee Seol-hwa simply watched in silence.
'Hmm.... Was this too much after all?'
In truth, Lee Seol-hwa had held out hope.
Jaseong's internal power was enormous for his age, but it still wasn't quite a full 60-year cycle's worth.
And with that level of internal power, he could not pass the Heavenly Ice Spirit Essence trial.
Yet she had permitted him to take the test because of the question she'd experienced when she first met him.
—His internal power is only at the level of a rising star of the Nine Great Sects, so how can he emit such incredible aura? What kind of cultivation method has he mastered...?
Lee Seol-hwa was a supreme expert who could read the depth of one's internal power, cultivation method, and spirit just by looking.
Yet even she couldn't fully read Jaseong.
He was like a bottomless well, his depths unknowable.
Thus, she granted him the right to take the test to glimpse his hidden strength....
'Is this really your limit...?'
As Lee Seol-hwa silently regarded Jaseong,
Inside him as well, a sense of impending defeat was growing ever stronger.
* * *
'... This is impossible.'
Even Samadhi Eyes was useless.
This test had nothing to do with martial talent, only pure measurement of one's internal power.
Only if your internal power is strong enough to expel the chill of Heavenly Ice Spirit Essence can you endure.
... Perhaps it's better to give up and request a different test.
Given the North Sea Ice Palace Mistress's gaze just now, she seems to view me favorably, so it wouldn't be an unreasonable request.
This test was never truly possible for me to pass....
Jaseong's eyes kept threatening to close, as if about to freeze to death on a snow mountain.
But at the very moment his eyelids drooped—
Crack!
Jaseong suddenly bit the inside of his cheek.
A gush of red blood burst inside his mouth.
This made both Lee Seol-hwa and Lee Rin's eyes widen.
But his strange actions didn't stop there.
Crack!
'What a loser's thought to have.'
Crack!
'Didn't I promise to pull out the limbs of the bastards who killed Big brother and my sister-in-law and annihilate them all?'
Crack!
'Giving up and asking for another test? Did I think I could become the World's Greatest with such weak resolve?!'
Crack!
'Endure! If you kneel to a mere test like this, you'll never be the World's Greatest, even in death!'
With deadly resolve burning in his eyes, Jaseong chewed his inner cheek to keep his consciousness.
Then he forcefully roused the internal power of Heaven Evading Soul Transformation Formula even higher.
Whoooosh!
As if responding to his determination, the energy of Heaven Evading Soul Transformation Formula surged explosively.
Within his energy channels, where cold clashed with internal power, it was as if a battlefield had erupted.
Of course, outwardly, Jaseong still looked ashen.
He seemed on the verge of stopping breathing, and cold sweat trickled down Lee Rin's back in anxiety.
Even Lee Seol-hwa hesitated, wondering if she should step in and help neutralize the cold inside him.
But curiously,
'He's still holding on...?'
Although just moments ago Jaseong had seemed on the brink, he wasn't succumbing to the chill of Heavenly Ice Spirit Essence.
The secret behind his astonishing endurance was—
'I don't have enough internal power to fully expel this cold. In that case... I'll just hold out so my energy channels and dantian don't freeze. I'll make my golden true ki as thin as a thread....'
In the slowed time of Samadhi Eyes, Jaseong meticulously controlled his true ki.
He drew it thin, sending thread-like streams through his body's energy channels.
Although the chill flooded his energy channels, he did not let them freeze.
His golden true ki, stretching like threads, acted as heat lines that prevented freezing.
This feat naturally came with excruciating pain.
It felt as if his organs were entirely frozen.
And because Samadhi Eyes slowed time, the duration he had to endure that pain became even longer.
Whenever the pain surged, Jaseong bit his cheek and endured.
How much time had passed like that?
Crack!
The chill condensed around Jaseong's body shattered like an invisible barrier.
Fifteen minutes had passed, and he'd cleared the first stage of the Heavenly Ice Spirit Essence trial.
"Great hero!"
Seeing this, Lee Rin's face brightened with relief.
Even Lee Seol-hwa's face was full of admiration.
"Fifteen minutes have passed. You can stop now."
Saying so, Lee Seol-hwa extended her hand,
Intending to drive out the chill still circulating in Jaseong's body.
But at that moment,
"... Not yet."
Something unexpected happened.
Even after passing the first stage of the trial, Jaseong didn't stop.
"What...?"
"Since I've started... I'll see it through to the end."
He spoke.
His face was now bluish-white, frost coated his eyebrows and lashes, but his eyes glowed golden.
Seeing that fierce determination, Lee Rin covered her mouth with both hands.
Lee Seol-hwa watched him calmly, though under the table, her fist trembled slightly.
Crack!
How long went by like this?
It was at that moment, one that would make even the Four Heavenly Kings beyond the Wall shudder, that suddenly a voice resounded in his mind.
〈Your persistence... is truly extraordinary.〉
It was the voice of an old woman, yet it carried the weight of endless ages.
〈I am the Thousand-year Ice Crystal. The spirit that governs the essence of the North Sea.〉
"......!"
〈For centuries, many have attempted this trial, yet none have faced me with such pure perseverance as you have.〉
Suddenly, the frozen chill in Jaseong's body began to change into a warm energy.
〈I acknowledge your perseverance. Go, and keep your promise.〉
Whoooooosh—
The chill of Heavenly Ice Spirit Essence dissipated completely, cleansing Jaseong's energy channels instead.
At that instant, Lee Seol-hwa jumped to her feet.
'What is this...?'
The dignified air of the Outer Four Heavenly Kings was gone; her face was utterly shocked.
'The chill of Heavenly Ice Spirit Essence... vanished completely?'
Not only had the cold disappeared, but there was now a strange warmth rising from Jaseong's body.
Shwak!
Startled, Lee Seol-hwa darted forward and took Jaseong's pulse.
A gasp of disbelief erupted from within her.
'Impossible... Not only is the chill gone without a trace, but his internal energy has been purified and become even more refined....'
Struggling to suppress her astonishment, she slowly withdrew her hand from Jaseong's pulse, wearing a look of utter incredulity.
Never in her decades as Ice Palace Mistress of the North Sea had this ever occurred.
"Mother, what's going on? Why did the chill of Heavenly Ice Spirit Essence disappear...?"
Lee Rin, equally dazed, asked.
Instead of answering, Lee Seol-hwa just looked at Jaseong.
Where once Jaseong looked like a "well with unknown depths," now, in her eyes, he had become an "immeasurable abyss."
[... Lee Rin.]
[Yes, mother?]
[How did you feel traveling with him?]
[Of course... it was very enjoyable. But why do you ask, all of a sudden....]
[Then keep traveling with him.]
[What?]
[And....]
[?]
[I've decided to make him a member of the North Sea Ice Palace.]
[What????]
-------------= Clacky's Corner -------------=
Mother-in-law!
「✧*｡٩(ˊᗜˋ*)و✧*｡」