66: Chapter 66 Emerging from the tiger's den, only to fall into the wolf's lair

Xia Lengbai was almost choked with anger by this retort, and the greenish-black color on her right wrist crept up a little further.

Gritting her back teeth, she pressed her left fingers together like a sword and traced a semi-arc in the air, a solid ice shield barely blocking in front of her.

"Me? If I could trigger this shitty Formation, would I still be trapped here with you waiting to die?!"

Before the words left her mouth, the ice claws of the nearest male ice sculpture Puppet had already reached the top of Shen Xiao's ice-encased head with a teeth-grinding sound of tearing wind.

That was no simple physical attack.

The moment the five fingers formed a claw, the frigid, gloomy spiritual energy permeating the Ice Cave gathered frantically toward that palm covered in thick ice armor, like a hundred rivers returning to the sea.

The air was drained of its warmth, emitting a faint "crackle" of freezing, and even the light around the palm twisted and dimmed.

This claw sealed off all space for maneuver in every direction, carrying a dead, silent will to crush the target along with the space it occupied.

The Dark Gold light deep within Shen Xiao's pupils flickered frantically.

The System panel exploded with a scarlet warning in his consciousness: [High-purity Yin-type energy attack detected! Energy Rank: Golden Core Middle Stage (Puppet state)! Threat Level: Extremely High! Suggestion: Evade!]

Evade?

His lower body was still frozen solid like an icicle; how the hell was he supposed to evade?!

In that split second between life and death, the ruthless streak forced out of Shen Xiao by the original plot completely erupted.

A low, hoarse roar escaped his throat; it wasn't fear, but more like the final howl of a trapped beast driven to the edge of despair.

Deep within his Dantian, that slowly rotating Dark Gold Core seemed to sense its host's near-death crisis and gave a violent jolt!

A suction force, far more refined and domineering than when it had swallowed chaotic energy before, burst through his body.

The target was not the ice sculpture Puppet, but the incoming ice claw!

An invisible ripple spread out.

That unstoppable ice claw paused, with an extremely minute, almost imperceptible tremor, in the air less than three inches from Shen Xiao's forehead.

The gathered frigid spiritual energy, like a balloon poked with a small hole, dissipated in wisps and was greedily swallowed by the Dark Gold Core.

That was the pause!

Using every ounce of his barely recovered strength—which was less than that of a Foundation Establishment Cultivator—Shen Xiao twisted his waist and abdomen violently to the right!

Crack! Boom!

The thick layer of ice covering his upper body first emitted an unbearable groan from his chest, then, like glass struck by a heavy hammer, burst with countless hideous cracks from the inside out!

Ice shards mixed with coagulated blood scabs splattered in a radial pattern!

His entire upper body, including his arms and head, finally broke free from the ice and fell heavily onto the cold, slippery ice surface.

And that ice claw grazed past his left shoulder.

The bone-chilling cold instantly penetrated his clothing, leaving five blood grooves on his shoulder that were deep enough to see bone, stained with the greenish-black marks of frostbite.

Even more terrifyingly, the aftermath of the claw's wind struck a piece of protruding ice rock, about half a person's height, beside him.

There was no sound.

That hard ice rock, as if disintegrated from within by an invisible force, silently turned into a cloud of crystalline ice powder and drifted down.

Shen Xiao lay on the ice, coughing violently, each cough bringing up bloody foam mixed with ice shards.

The wound on his left shoulder didn't bleed because the blood had frozen instantly; only a bone-deep cold and numbness were spreading madly.

"Cough, cough... Damn it..."

He cursed under his breath, his voice as hoarse as a broken bellows.

"Shen Xiao!"

Xia Lengbai's shout came from the front-side, carrying a rare sense of urgency.

Shen Xiao struggled to lift his head.

He saw another female ice sculpture Puppet with an alluring posture that had silently appeared behind and to the side of Xia Lengbai, its ice-crystal claws stabbing straight at her heart!

Xia Lengbai was distracted by controlling the ice shield to block the second attack from the male Puppet in front, and her right hand was unable to move due to the poison, leaving her with no time to defend!

In a flash, Shen Xiao didn't even stop to think.

The Dark Gold Core in his Dantian jumped again, and that invisible suction force, like a precision-guided sniper, spanned several yards to instantly envelop the center of the female ice sculpture Puppet's brow—that glaring, scarlet cinnabar mark!

It was like the soft pop of a bubble bursting.

The red light of the cinnabar mark on the female Puppet's brow visibly dimmed for a split second.

Its lightning-fast pouncing movement also experienced a split-second of stiffness, just like a high-speed machine suddenly catching a screw.

It was just this insignificant moment!

Who was Xia Lengbai?

She was a ruthless character who could entangle herself with the Child of Destiny, Lin Yun, in the original story; her battle instincts were already carved into her marrow.

Almost at the same time Shen Xiao struck in secret, she keenly sensed a trace of uncoordinated stagnation in the wind attacking from behind.

Without looking back, without thinking.

She clenched the five fingers of her left hand, which she had been using to maintain the ice shield!

The semi-transparent ice shield blocking the male Puppet suddenly deformed and stretched, like a living creature. Several ice spikes, as thick as an arm and with tips as sharp as spears, erupted from the back of the shield and, at an incredibly tricky angle, pierced with pinpoint accuracy into the gap in the ice layer at the female Puppet's elbow and shoulder joints, which had been exposed by its stiffness!

Crack! Crack!

The sound of the ice spikes piercing into the body and shattering was clearly audible.

The female Puppet's movements instantly became disorganized, its right arm twisted unnaturally, and the trajectory of its pounce was forcibly diverted, its ice claws grazing past Xia Lengbai's ribs and only tearing off a piece of her clothing.

"Well done!"

Xia Lengbai let out a low cry and used the momentum to slide three steps to the left, putting distance between herself and the two Puppets, though a layer of cold sweat had already broken out on her back.

She whipped her head around to look at Shen Xiao, who was lying on the ground, her eyes complex; this guy was actually able to coordinate with her in this state?

And that strange "stagnation" effect he had just now...

Shen Xiao, however, was not looking at her.

He propped himself up on the ice, half-kneeling, his gaze locked tightly on the hot spring eye bubbling with cold mist, and then swept a glance at the other five ice sculpture Puppets slowly closing in from different directions.

Their movements were still stiff, but their steps were steady, and the distance between them faintly formed a pincer movement, blocking all paths leading to the spring eye.

"Hey!"

Shen Xiao panted heavily, wiped the bloody foam from the corner of his mouth, his voice hoarse but carrying an unquestionable certainty,

"The source of these damn things' power is the frigid spiritual energy in this Ice Cave, right?"

Xia Lengbai, while vigilantly watching the approaching Puppets, quickly replied:

"That's right! Their core is the cinnabar mark on their brow, driven by absorbing the spiritual energy here! I tried just now, ordinary attacks are hard to destroy them; you must simultaneously interfere with the core and attack the joints!"

As she spoke, she glanced at her still greenish-black right wrist, her expression ugly,

"And this Formation is actively absorbing spiritual energy; the spring eye is the Formation eye! But the Formation eye is at..."

Her words came to an abrupt halt.

Because the other three ice sculpture Puppets, which had originally stood quietly in a triangle on the other three sides of the hot spring, were now slowly turning their bodies.

They didn't pounce immediately, but instead took heavy steps toward the edge of the hot spring, finally standing firmly at the rim, firmly guarding the bubbling spring eye in the center.

The three Puppets: one held an ice-crystal longsword, one had arms transformed into giant hammers, and one was wreathed in visible frigid mist.

The cinnabar red light on their brows was blazing bright, and their spiritual energies were faintly linked, forming an invisible barrier that protected the spring eye impenetrably.

Xia Lengbai looked at those three guards, which were clearly more solid and possessed a more terrifying aura than the four surrounding Puppets, then looked at the disheveled state of herself and Shen Xiao, and finally, her gaze fell upon Shen Xiao's jet-black eyes, in which Dark Gold flickered.

She licked her somewhat chapped lips and forced a smile that looked worse than crying:

"...Now, the Formation eye is under their feet."