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Ancient Fragment #31
Silver hair like moonlight, a soul trapped in frost, she sleeps in silence while the world above forgets her story.
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Later that day, the two of them stood before the icy pool again. The layer of ice had formed once more across the surface. Frost crept across the grass around it like pale fingers reaching outward.
"Are you ready?" Hua Qingqing turned to Long Tianyu.
"Are you?" Long Tianyu raised an eyebrow and shot the question right back.
A small smirk appeared on her lips. Without another word she stepped forward and threw a punch.
Crack.
The ice shattered instantly. Large jagged pieces exploded outward. Cold mist rose from the dark water beneath.
Hua Qingqing took a deep breath and jumped in.
Long Tianyu watched her disappear beneath the water.
''She's really crazy sometimes..''
He shook his head, then inhaled deeply and jumped in after her.
The cold hit him like a hammer.
Even with qi flowing through his body, the water felt brutally cold. His qi formed a thin protective layer around him, dulling the worst of it, but it was far from enough. His qi cultivation was still too low to completely resist something like this.
His clothes clung tightly to his skin. The icy water pressed against him from every direction. It was deeply uncomfortable, but not truly dangerous.
Long Tianyu gripped the light crystal Bai Qing had given them and infused qi into it.
A soft glow spread through the water.
Hua Qingqing did the same.
Still, the light barely reached far into the pool. From above it had seemed like an ordinary mountain basin. Down here the rock walls sloped outward, revealing that the cave was far larger than it appeared on the surface.
They began swimming downward.
Hua Qingqing and Long Tianyu both extended their soul sense.
Her soul sense spread far deeper than his.
They continued descending.
Long Tianyu frowned.
Why is it so cold down here?
He had touched the water flowing down from the mountains before. It had been cold, but nothing like this. The chill here was unnatural.
Which meant the source had to be below.
They had already asked the Jin family about the pool.
According to them, it had not existed before. One night a loud explosion shook the mountains. When the villagers came to investigate the next day, the pool had appeared. A deep basin filled with water.
Several adults had tried swimming down to investigate. Some believed there might be treasure hidden below.
None of them stayed long. The cold forced them back almost immediately. It was too dangerous. After that, Chi Diu had warned everyone to stay away from the pool.
Even wandering cultivators had investigated it over the years. Every single one had come back empty handed.
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Long Tianyu grit his teeth.
The cold was getting worse.
It felt like thousands of icy needles were stabbing into his skin over and over again. It hurt badly, but the damage was shallow. His body, tempered to the eighth stage of the Elementary Body Realm, was strong enough to endure it.
Minutes passed as they swam deeper.
Long Tianyu blinked.
Hua Qingqing was already further below him. They were too weak to truly feel it. But inside their body, their their divine bloodlines roared with a protective layer against the cold. A Qi Exertion Realm expert like would have given up by now.
Hua Qingqing extended her soul sense again.
It spread through the dark water like a silent current. The faint glow from their crystals revealed nothing but drifting particles, yet her senses reached far beyond what their eyes could see.
Suddenly she stopped.
She turned around and locked eyes with Long Tianyu.
Then she pointed downward.
She found something!
"There is something below," her voice echoed through his mind.
Long Tianyu nodded.
I feel it.
He swam down beside her and straightened his body in the freezing water.
She pointed again.
"Over there."
Far beneath them, a faint blue light pulsed slowly in the darkness.
They exchanged another look and nodded.
Long Tianyu extended his hand.
His Twin Shadow Blade flew out from Hua Qingqing's pouch and into his grasp. Underwater the weapon felt heavier and slower to control, especially with the cold stiffening his body.
Hua Qingqing drew her own sword.
It was not a mortal graded weapon, but it was still an excellent blade. She had purchased it from a famous forge shop in Moondragon City.
They continued downward.
The water pressed harder against them. Their qi barriers trembled under the pressure as the cold grew sharper with every breath they held.
Hua Qingqing slowed.
A moment later she reached the bottom.
Her eyes widened and her grip tightened around her sword.
At the bottom of the pool lay a natural basin carved into the rock.
Inside it, resting upon a bed of crystalline stones, was a woman.
Her long silver hair floated gently in the water like strands of moonlight.
On her right hand was the source of the light.
A blue ring.
Pale veins of frost colored light spread through the surrounding stone from the ring, pulsing faintly.
Long Tianyu finally caught up behind her. His teeth were chattering uncontrollably now. His body trembled from the cold.
When he saw the scene before them, shock spread across his face.
Hua Qingqing extended her soul sense toward the woman.
Her brows furrowed.
How is that possible?
It felt like nothing.
Her soul sense simply passed through the woman as if she did not exist at all. She could not even tell whether the woman was alive or dead.
Hua Qingqing shifted her attention to the ring.
The blue light illuminated the bottom of the pool. The slow pulse continued, steady and rhythmic.
She did not understand what it was doing. But something about it felt deliberate. Like a signal. Like a message.
Hua Qingqing swam closer and slowly reached out her hand.
The woman's fingers were pale and slender.
The moment Hua Qingqing touched them, a brutal wave of cold rushed through her arm.
She grit her teeth and almost pulled away.
Her eyes widened.
No pulse.
And the cold...
It was coming from her.
Hua Qingqing slowly grasped the blue ring.
"Sorry..." she whispered softly as she slid it off the woman's finger.
Behind her, Long Tianyu tightened his grip on his sword.
Just in case. Just in case the woman moved. Or something else did.
The instant the ring left the woman's finger, the pulsing light stopped.
For a single breath everything went still. Then the ring erupted with light. A brilliant blue glow burst outward like a miniature sun beneath the water.
A wave of freezing energy exploded from it. Even through their qi barriers, both of them felt the cold intensify violently.
Hua Qingqing and Long Tianyu squeezed their eyes shut and raised their arms to shield themselves from the blinding light.
Their soul sense spread outward, trying to see what was happening. But there was nothing. They sensed nothing at all.
What happened?
Slowly the light faded. They lowered their arms and opened their eyes.
Both of them froze. The woman was gone. The silver hair, the body, the crystalline stones. Everything had vanished. Only the ring remained in Hua Qingqing's hand.
She tightened her grip around it.
The two of them exchanged a glance. Neither spoke, but both understood the same thing. This ring was not ordinary.
Hua Qingqing lowered her gaze to the ring and extended her soul sense into it.
The moment her consciousness touched the inside of the ring, her entire body stiffened.
Her hands began trembling.
That woman... This is a storage ring...
Inside the ring, the silver haired woman was floating peacefully.
And she was now breathing.
Hua Qingqing's mind went blank for a moment.
A living person inside a storage ring.
That was impossible.
Storage rings could only contain dead objects.
She had never heard of one capable of holding a living being.
Her shoulders tensed.
For a moment she even considered throwing the ring away.
In the end she clenched it tightly and held onto it.
The two of them quickly began swimming upward.
Their lungs burned as they rose through the freezing water. By the time they broke the surface they were both nearly out of air.
Long Tianyu gasped loudly as he climbed onto the edge of the pool.
"Huuuh..."
He exhaled deeply and stared down at the dark water.
A moment later Hua Qingqing surfaced beside him.
Both of them were completely drenched, water dripping from their hair and clothes as the cool mountain air closed around them.
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End of chapter 31 - Ever Frozen Moonlight
