The Yuhao Chronicles - Volume 1 Chapter 17
As all the spirit beasts and Yuhao cherished their successes, Amra spoke out, “Ok Yuhao, we are all happy for you and gaining the scorpion empress as a spirit ring, but you should probably leave the area. Even though this is the Snow Empress’ region of the Extreme North, the rest of the Ice Jade Scorpion clan will have finally realised that the aura of their empress has completely disappeared from her last location and will, therefore, all search this location extensively and aggressively.”
The empress scorpion nodded, “Yes, Amra is right. My aura disappearing completely will panic and aggravate them, and while I have been absorbed into you, my spirit bone will be able to be sensed by them if they are very close. Since they don’t know that I am still alive, in a sense, even if my spiritual avatar exits your body they will not believe me and only see you as being my slayer.”
Yuhao panicked slightly hearing this. While he is strong, extremely strong compared to others of his level, he has very little chance of surviving an attack by thousands of angry scorpions in their natural environment.
“You are right; however I can hide your aura using one of my skills. But let’s definitely get out of here.”
Yuhao quickly pushed the makeshift rock shelter to the side and began sprinting back south, out of the Extreme North. While Yuhao was moving, he activated his spirit eyes and used his Spiritual Deception skill to completely hide both his spirit bone and human aura from all spirit beasts attempting to sense him through that method. He also attempted to cover himself with illusions to hide from other senses such as sight, however, the rapid pace and his inexperience with using the skill, caused it to drain his spiritual energy reserves extremely quickly as the illusion kept failing and re-creating itself over and over again. Yuhao decided to just focus on keeping his aura non-existent as he ran.
After approximately two and a half hours of running, Yuhao finally exited the Extreme North and entered into the north-west outer area of the Icebound Forest. During this venture, Daydream, Amra and Kunou had filled in the Ice Empress on the plans that they had decided with Yuhao. As she was already completely fused with his spirit, they had no issue with telling her things. Yuhao found a small clearing and took the opportunity to sit down and recover his energy, after the empress scorpion told him he was now far enough away from her clan that they wouldn’t be able to find him, let alone her clan searching outside of the Extreme North in the first place.
As he sat on the outskirts of the forest recovering his energy, he noticed that while the surrounding temperature was still warmer than the Extreme North where he had just left, it was slowly getting colder and colder.
“Yuhao, you need to get moving NOW!” Daydream and the Ice Empress shouted frantically.
Not waiting to ask why, Yuhao quickly stood up and began running his hardest south, using the energy he just regained to push him even faster. As he ran, even travelling halfway across the length of the Icebound Forest over the next four hours, the ever-increasing coldness kept following him, never getting further away, only closer. As his hope for outrunning and escaping this entity dwindled, Yuhao sought answers as to what it was from the two ice beasts in his mind.
“I can’t do this anymore. It is eventually going to catch up to me. It is just a matter of time before I run out of energy completely and then I won’t be able to put up a fight whatsoever. What is chasing me? I thought you said your clansmen wouldn’t travel out this far, Ice Empress?” Exclaimed Yuhao, while still keeping his composure as he had been in many intense and dangerous situations in his previous life.
Before either of the spirits could reply, Yuhao was hit with a beam of ice energy. Through pure reflex, he managed to avoid being hit on the torso, however, his left arm was still hit, freezing it in a block of ice. The large amount of force behind the elemental beam sent Yuhao flying into a nearby tree, coughing out blood as he slid down the trunk. The ice on his arm quickly spread through his body, seeping into his bones and blood, slowing it down drastically.
“Yuhao!” All of his spirit beasts yelled out in alarm before quickly circulating their host’s power to help him recover and fight off the ice.
While Yuhao was still dazed, the nearby environment grew even colder, to the point where leaves falling from trees were freezing solid, before shattering when they dropped to the ground. A being appeared only a few metres away from his dazed form, holding a solid, light blue sword of ice in its hand, preparing to slash outwards. It had light blue hair that descended past its waist, a blue shoulderless dress touching the fallen snow and snow-white gloves covering its hands.
Seeing this figure and what it was about to do, both Daydream and the Ice Empress released their spiritual and mental energies to form spiritual avatars outside of Yuhao’s body, directly in between their host and the attacker.
The Ice Empress screamed out at the attacker frantically, “Wait, Snow Empress!!”
The now identified Snow Empress, paused briefly in her actions at seeing her best friend and somewhat of a soul-sister, Ice Empress, in a spiritual form, as well as the Daydream Ice Worm that they had both been annoyed by in the past. However, not even a second later after noticing Yuhao slowly recovering on the floor, she grew angry once again knowing that they were dead, and this human boy was the culprit. She launched another beam of ice energy at her dazed target. Just as it was about to harm Yuhao, a fire-attributed barrier of spiritual energy appeared and defended against the attack. As it formed, the Snow Empress thought she saw a massive golden lion curling around the human, but when she blinked it was gone. The barrier completely stopped the attack, before dimming and shattering soon after.
“Don’t harm him Snow Empress! It is not what it looks like!” Yelled out the Ice Empress.
Still angry, the Snow spirit replied, “Tell me then. To me, it looks like you are dead. I don’t know why you still have your spiritual energy or are protecting this human, but I can sense your spirit bone and ring on him, and I will take revenge on your behalf.”
Daydream decided to cut in before the angry spirit attacked again, “While her physical body may be seen as dead, her consciousness is very much still alive. If you do kill him, you will also kill her, myself and the two other spirit beast he is hosting.”
Hearing this, the Snow Empress’ anger heightened, “How can I help you escape from him then? How can I save you?”
Both conscious spirits shook their heads in unison, “You can’t Snow Empress. Ice Empress and myself have joined this human, who is called Yuhao by the way, willingly.”
The Ice Empress scoffed hearing this, prompting Daydream to look in her direction seriously. She continued, “Some more than others but even Bing Bing, in the end, saw the purpose and benefits of following through with it.”
The Snow Empress’ anger diminished greatly, “But you still haven’t told me what ‘it’ is.”
“We have become Yuhao’s spirit rings. Conscious spirit rings to be more exact. I did it so I could escape those bastards in the Great Duo Forest and help my host not only take revenge on my behalf but also ascend to godhood, to allow us to both get infinite lifespans. Bing Bing, on the other hand, I convinced to join us as she was nearing her next tribulation and she had a very small chance of surviving it. This way she can stay alive longer than she would have before.”
The Snow spirit nodded in hearing this. She completely understood the life-threatening danger that tribulations possess. That was why she had sought out the Life Goddess’ Spirit Orchid to allow herself to be reborn as a human embryo with incredibly vitality and potential. This herb had many heaven-defying uses. The one most treasured by her, was its ability to allow her to be reborn and cultivate as a human even though the one-hundred-thousand-year crossroad had passed. It would also provide her with a greater potential to ascend to godhood, avoiding the rank 90 bottleneck, that many of her predecessors encountered upon deciding this route. She had finally found it, not three months ago, and had been preparing to consume it until she sensed not only an imitation of her own aura, but the Ice Empress travel to a certain area. Wanting to say her final goodbye to the Ice Empress, before being reborn as a human, she had been travelling to the area for over two hours leisurely, before noticing her friend’s aura disappear. This spurned her to speed to the area where she noticed in the distance, a human carrying a small fraction of her friend’s aura in his body running away at rapid speeds. She angrily followed him in an attempt for revenge, until now, finding out that her friend in a way, died willingly.
The Ice Empress nodded at Daydreams words, “Yes, this was willing. Daydream tricked me at first, but only to allow her enough time to explain why I should go through with it. So please, don’t harm Yuhao anymore than you have.”
“Hmph. Very well.” Upon saying this, the Snow Empress vanished, only to reappear next to the downed human. This initially startled the spirits as they didn’t believe she would go back on her word and had, therefore, dropped their guard, but they soon calmed down when they realised that she was removing the ice that had appeared around Yuhao’s arm and spread through his body from her first attack. After doing so she turned back to the two ice spirits and began asking more questions. This human was the host of her best friend and soul sister, so she wanted to ensure he was actually able to take care of himself.