A Mortal's Start in the Spirit Beast Mountain

Chapter 307 The Shocking Change of the Snow Silkworm

"Oh no! It's the Azure Ice Flame!" Qingyi Jushi exclaimed in horror.

"Retreat! Retreat quickly!" The bearded man's expression changed drastically, and he shouted sharply, while his body retreated rapidly like a cannonball!

Just a moment before the pale blue flames shot out and the terrifying chill erupted, Luo Ming's keen perception of the icy power through his Qianyang Fire Eyes allowed him to sense the deadly crisis a split second in advance!

"Danger!"

Alarm bells rang in his mind, and almost without thinking, he retreated rapidly like a ghost! At the same time, he unhesitatingly summoned the ancient treasure, the Fire-Separating Pearl, which he had obtained from the Crimson Fire Old Monster.

"Buzz—!"

The Fire Pearl hovered above Luo Ming's head. Under the frenzied infusion of Luo Ming's pure magic power, it burst forth with a ring of fiery red, scorching light, firmly protecting Luo Ming within it!

However, while Luo Ming was able to retreat, his two snow silkworms were unable to retreat immediately due to the pulling of their silk threads!

The moment the cold air erupted, they instinctively sensed the threat of death. Their crystalline bodies trembled violently, and a thick layer of ice armor, shimmering with silvery-white light, instantly condensed on their surfaces, attempting to use their own icy attributes to resist and neutralize the extreme icy power from the outside world.

This was a common response for ice-attribute monsters when faced with an attack. However, what they were facing was the Azure Ice Flame! The most supreme ice-attribute flame in the world! Its icy nature and level far surpassed ordinary ice power!

"Buzz—!"

A flash of eerie blue light!

In the next instant, the originally crystal-clear snow silkworm, along with the space several feet around it, was completely frozen inside a huge block of ice, its entire surface a deep blue, with the snow silkworm's terrified, frozen posture faintly visible inside! The ice block exuded a chilling cold and a deathly stillness, as if even time itself had been frozen within it.

The life force of the snow silkworm suddenly dropped to almost imperceptible level the moment it was frozen, like a candle flickering in the wind, which could be extinguished at any moment!

"Oh no!" Luo Ming's heart sank, and his face turned extremely ugly.

What terrified him even more was that, through the wisp of his own divine consciousness imprinted on the core of the Snow Silkworm's soul, he could clearly sense a strange, cold, domineering, and destructive power that was frantically eroding and infiltrating along the Snow Silkworm's sea of ​​consciousness, its target being the wisp of divine consciousness imprint he had left behind!

As Luo Ming's recognized spirit beast, the divine soul imprint in the Snow Silkworm's sea of ​​consciousness has long been closely integrated and symbiotic with the Snow Silkworm's own divine soul origin.

If this wisp of dry blue ice flame truly freezes and erodes the Snow Silkworm's sea of ​​consciousness along with the divine soul imprint within it, then Luo Ming, as its master, will also suffer damage to the part of his divine soul that is attached to the imprint!

In a flash, Luo Ming's mind raced. What had invaded the Snow Silkworm's sea of ​​consciousness was, after all, only a wisp of the Azure Ice Flame that had leaked out, not its complete form. Although powerful, its total amount was limited.

"We have no choice but to take a gamble. It'll also be a good opportunity to test the power of this Azure Ice Flame. Even if we fail, we'll only lose some of our divine soul."

Without further hesitation, Luo Ming quickly formed hand seals, subtly igniting the wisp of pure Yang spiritual fire in his dantian.

At the same time, within the frozen sea of ​​consciousness of the snow silkworm, Luo Ming's wisp of divine soul imprint spontaneously ignited, transforming into a crimson-gold flame that enveloped the snow silkworm's sea of ​​consciousness.

the other side.

Seeing that one of Luo Ming's snow silkworms was frozen inside a huge blue block of ice by the aftershocks of the pale blue ice flames, barely clinging to life, the expressions of Barbarian Beard, Ancestor Jiyin, Qingyi Hermit, and others all changed.

Although they might not care about the life or death of a mere level four spirit beast, the sudden and incredibly powerful leak of a wisp of dry blue ice flame served as a wake-up call for them—the process of retrieving the treasure was far more dangerous and unpredictable than they had anticipated!

Perhaps most of the power of that wisp of azure ice flame that shot out "drilled" into Luo Ming's snow silkworm body, and was temporarily "accommodated" or "restrained" by his physical body; or perhaps the Void Heaven Cauldron, after losing most of its pull, fell back and suppressed, which alleviated the turmoil of the ice flame below to some extent.

The enormous, dark blue ice flower, formed from terrifying cold air, finally stopped spreading after expanding to a diameter of nearly four zhang. The dark blue light flowing across its surface also dimmed and became more subdued.

This allowed everyone's extremely tense nerves to finally relax a little, but the seriousness and vigilance in their eyes did not diminish at all.

"Be careful, don't let the spirit beast get too close to the cave entrance," Qingyi Jushi solemnly warned Luo Ming, while he himself cautiously approached the frozen snow silkworm.

He did not directly touch the blue ice block that exuded a bone-chilling cold. Instead, he cautiously extended his divine sense from a distance of several feet and carefully scanned the condition of the snow silkworm inside the ice block.

After a few breaths, a look of surprise appeared on his face. He let out a soft "Eh," turned to look at Luo Ming, whose face was slightly pale, and said:

"Young friend Luo, your Snow Silkworm at the peak of level four is truly extraordinary. The cold aura of that Azure Ice Flame just now was powerful enough to instantly kill an ordinary Core Formation cultivator, freezing and annihilating their soul."

"Young friend Luo, your Snow Silkworm at the peak of level four is truly extraordinary. The cold aura of that Azure Ice Flame just now was powerful enough to instantly kill an ordinary Core Formation cultivator, freezing and annihilating their soul."

"Your snow silkworm withstood such an impact head-on, being frozen inside, yet it didn't immediately perish, its soul and life force extinguished? It even managed to maintain a barely perceptible life force and a connection to its soul… Tsk tsk, truly remarkable. It seems this silkworm's resistance to cold and its vitality far surpass those of its kind."

He paused, his tone shifting to regret and certainty: "However, being directly eroded and penetrated by the primordial cold energy of the Azure Ice Flame, even if one is not dead at this moment, one is merely clinging to life."

His meridians, internal organs, and even his sea of ​​consciousness have likely been severely damaged and eroded by the icy power. Without a supremely yang treasure or a heaven-defying elixir to save him in time, dispel and refine the icy flames within his body, he probably... won't live much longer. What a pity, what a pity.

His words both highlighted the "special" nature of the Snow Silkworm and sealed its fate. In Qingyi Jushi's view, a mere fourth-level spirit beast had no chance of survival after being invaded by the Azure Ice Flame.

On the other side, the Yin Ancestor's face was also extremely ugly. He had personally experienced the terror of the Azure Ice Flame! Back when he came here to explore for treasures with the Xuan Bone Demon, he had witnessed a companion in the late stage of Core Formation being careless and swept by a wisp of leaked ice flame cold air, instantly turning into a lifelike ice sculpture!

When they finally managed to break the ice sculpture and try to save the person, they discovered that the person's soul had already been burned, frozen, and completely annihilated by the icy flame will contained within the cold air, making him utterly dead!

The scene still haunts him to this day. Therefore, when he saw Luo Ming's snow silkworm frozen in ice, his first thought was—this snow silkworm is finished, beyond saving.

"Hmph! Useless!" The Extreme Yin Ancestor squeezed out two words through gritted teeth, it was unclear whether he was cursing the Snow Silkworm or the accident that caused this change.

His face was gloomy as he glanced at the Blood Jade Spider, Luo Ming's other intact Snow Silkworm, and his own two somewhat damaged Fire Pythons, his brows furrowing deeply.

"Right now, Han Li's Blood Jade Spider escaped in time and wasn't affected by the cold air; Luo boy still has one Snow Silkworm left; my Fire Python, though damaged, can still barely contribute." He quickly calculated, his tone tinged with resentment and ruthlessness, "The four spirit beasts are much weaker than before. To lift the Void Heaven Cauldron again, I'm afraid... we're not up to the task."

He turned his gaze to the bearded man and said in a deep voice, "Brother Man, for now, I'm afraid we can only trouble you one more time to use your berserk technique on the remaining spirit beasts to forcibly unleash their full potential for one last gamble! Otherwise, this treasure hunt may truly be in vain!"

"Berserk Technique?!" Han Li's heart skipped a beat upon hearing this. Although he didn't know the specifics, he knew from the name that it was definitely not a benevolent technique and would surely cause great harm to spirit beasts.

"Well, that's all we can do." The bearded man nodded solemnly.

The Heaven-Supporting Demonic Art he cultivated contained a powerful secret technique that could temporarily unleash potential and greatly enhance a creature's strength and ferocity. However, this technique came at a great cost, usually involving burning the essence blood of a spirit beast, depleting its own resources, and even damaging its soul. Afterward, the spirit beast would either die or be crippled, rarely recovering fully. He would not use it lightly unless absolutely necessary.

"Everyone, control your spirit beasts and retreat further back! Get as far away from the cave entrance as possible!" the Extreme Yin Ancestor commanded sternly, his cold gaze sweeping over Luo Ming. "We must never let that incident happen again!"

After saying that, he took the lead in controlling his two mutated fire pythons to slowly retreat two zhang (approximately 6.6 meters) away, further away from the still chilling cave entrance where ice flowers bloomed.

Luo Ming controlled another intact snow silkworm, which was terrified by the fate of its companion, and slowly retreated two zhang. Han Li also ordered the blood jade spider to retreat as instructed.

Luo Ming glanced at the snow silkworm, which was encased in a huge block of blue ice and whose fate was unknown. His expression was complicated.

He could sense that although the life force of the snow silkworm inside the ice block was weak, it was still there. Moreover, deep within its sea of ​​consciousness, the supreme yang essence fire transformed from his own wisp of divine soul was in a delicate stalemate with the pale blue ice flame, temporarily protecting the snow silkworm's sea of ​​consciousness.

Due to its strong adaptability to cold, the snow silkworm's body, even when frozen, showed no signs of necrosis in its flesh and blood vessels. Instead, it seemed to be in a state of "deep hibernation" or "extreme cold suspended animation".

"Perhaps... there's still hope?" A thought flashed through Luo Ming's mind, giving him a sliver of hope.

He knew that if this snow silkworm could survive the erosion of the dry blue ice flames, its body and bloodline might undergo some unpredictable positive mutation due to the tempering of this extreme cold! Just like steel that has been forged through a hundred trials and tribulations, it can often be reborn!

Of course, the hope was extremely slim, and the risk was enormous. But no matter what, he couldn't give up this carefully nurtured spirit beast that had also "protected" him from disaster.

Luo Ming frowned slightly, reached out, and a gentle yet irresistible magical force swept out, carefully taking the huge, translucent blue ice block, along with the snow silkworm frozen inside, into the space within the Five Spirit Bracelet.

Just as Luo Ming put away the Frozen Snow Silkworm, the Bearded Man shouted, interrupting everyone's thoughts.