The frozen wasteland, the immortal palace nowhere to be found.

After leaving the Star Palace ruins, Nightmare did not stop, galloping north without pause.

His cultivation had now reached the Late-Stage Transformation Spirit, and his mastery over the power of Law was vastly superior to before, making his escape speed astonishingly fast.

Mountains and land retreated rapidly beneath his feet, and within a few days, he had traversed the vast territory of the Central Plains and entered the edge of the Northern Territory.

The further north he went, the colder the climate became.

The land was gradually covered by ice and snow, and human presence became increasingly scarce; the few Cultivators he occasionally encountered were mostly those who Cultivated ice or water-attribute Cultivation Techniques.

According to the Jade Slip map provided by the Black-Robed Person, the Ice Soul Immortal Palace was located deep within the "Eternal Ice Plain" in the far north of the Central Plains.

That was a Forbidden Ground for life, where the "Nine Nether Cold Winds" that could freeze a Divine Soul blew all year round, and powerful ice-attribute Yao Beasts occupied the area; the environment was extremely harsh, and ordinary Deity Transformation Cultivators dared not venture deep inside.

After flying for another ten days or so, the scene before him completely turned into pure white.

The boundless ice plain stretched to the end of the world, and the violent wind whipped up ice shards that filled the sky, like billions of sharp blades cutting through the Void Realm.

The cold here had already condensed into substance, and ordinary Golden Core Cultivators would likely be frozen into ice sculptures in an instant.

The sky remained perpetually gloomy, with no sun or moon, only a grey haze.

"The Eternal Ice Plain, arrived."

Nightmare hovered at the edge of the ice plain, the violent wind whipping his black robe, but it could not shake his figure in the slightest.

The terrifying chill invaded, but it was quietly disintegrated and annihilated by an invisible Annihilation Domain three feet around him, unable to get close.

He took out the Jade Slip recording the route, sank his Divine Sense into it, and confirmed the direction again.

The route recorded in the Jade Slip was extremely complex, requiring him to traverse several huge glacier cracks and bypass several cold Evil Qi vortexes marked as "extremely dangerous," ultimately pointing to a place called "Ice Desolation Valley" in the deepest part of the ice plain.

According to the Jade Slip, the entrance to the Ice Soul Immortal Palace was hidden somewhere in that Ice Desolation Valley.

Without hesitation, Nightmare turned into a faint shadow and, braving the fierce Nine Nether Cold Winds, rushed into this vast and dead silent ice plain.

The environment inside the ice plain was even worse than at the edge.

The wind howled, and what it whipped up was no longer ice shards, but hard hailstones as large as millstones, whose impact was comparable to the bombardment of a Magic Treasure.

The ice surface under his feet looked flat but hid countless bottomless ice cracks, and occasionally, violent ice-attribute Spiritual Qi would erupt suddenly, forming deadly ice storms.

There were also some terrifying Yao Beasts that had adapted to the extreme environment of this place, such as the Ice Chi, which was crystal clear and could hide in the wind and snow, and the Eyeless Cold Whale that lurked beneath the ice and could emit soul-stealing demonic sounds... They sensed the aura of Nightmare, an outsider, and launched attacks one after another.

However, Nightmare was no longer the same as before.

Facing the attacks, he did not even need to move; he simply allowed his Annihilation Domain to expand slightly, and those rushing ice-attribute Yao Beasts would collide with an invisible wall of death, their majestic ice-attribute demonic power rapidly dissipating and annihilating, their vitality fading away, and they would turn into withered ice corpses before even getting close, to be swept away by the violent wind.

He was like a Grim Reaper walking on the ice plain, and wherever he passed, everything was annihilated.

Continuing along the instructions of the Jade Slip, he avoided several huge cold Evil Qi vortexes; the chilling Evil Qi emitted from those vortexes could even pollute and freeze the Divine Soul of a Deity Transformation Cultivator, but for Nightmare, it was merely nourishment for his Annihilation Domain, easily absorbed and converted.

Finally, after traversing an area like a labyrinth composed of countless towering ice prisms, he arrived at the destination marked on the Jade Slip—Ice Desolation Valley.

This was a huge glacier crack, bottomless, with steep ice walls on both sides like knife cuts; the bottom of the valley was filled with thick, impenetrable blue cold mist, and when his Divine Sense probed into it, it was like a clay ox entering the sea, severely weakened and frozen.

The valley was terrifyingly silent, with only the whimpering sound of the cold wind blowing across the ice walls, like ghost cries.

According to the Jade Slip, the entrance to the Ice Soul Immortal Palace was hidden deep within this cold mist.

Nightmare's figure slowly descended, landing in Ice Desolation Valley.

Once he entered the cold mist, the power of the chilling cold instantly surged more than tenfold!

It was also mixed with a strange, eerie power that could erode magic power and freeze thoughts.

If it were the previous Nightmare, he might have needed to expend magic power to resist, but at this moment, the Annihilation Domain operated on its own, annihilating and absorbing all the invading foreign cold forces, turning them into pure energy to replenish himself.

He descended slowly, his gaze like lightning, scanning the ice walls and the depths of the cold mist, while the power of the rule fragment also carefully sensed all spatial fluctuations and energy anomalies around him.

He descended for about a thousand zhang, but it was still bottomless, with only vast blue mist and cold rock walls surrounding him.

Suddenly, the rule fragment transmitted a faint sense—behind an ice wall in the front left, there seemed to be traces of an extremely faint and hidden spatial Formation!

Nightmare immediately approached that ice wall.

The ice wall looked no different from other places, covered with ten-thousand-year ice, extremely hard.

But he stretched out his finger, and the Power of Annihilation flickered slightly, silently melting a large hole in the hard ice.

Behind the ice layer was not rock, but a stone wall as smooth as a mirror, carved with countless complex frost runes!

The runes were profound and ancient, almost blending into the surrounding environment; if not for the keen sensing of the rule fragment, it would be difficult to discover.

The spatial fluctuations emitted from this stone wall were extremely weak and were perfectly covered by a sophisticated illusion Formation.

"Is this the place?" Nightmare carefully observed those frost runes.

This was indeed a corner of an ancient teleportation Formation, but its structure was precise and complex, far beyond that of ordinary teleportation Formations, and it seemed to be in a semi-activated or energy-depleted state.

He tried to input a trace of magic power into the stone wall; the runes on the stone wall lit up slightly for a moment, then dimmed, failing to activate.

He tried a few more methods, even using the power of the rule fragment to stimulate it, but the stone wall remained silent, with only faint spatial fluctuations proving its extraordinary nature, yet it could not be truly opened.

Nightmare frowned slightly.

The situation was a bit wrong.

According to the Black-Robed Person, this should be one of the entrances to the Ice Soul Immortal Palace.

But the Formation before him did not seem to be in a normally activated state; it looked more like... it had been sealed or destroyed from the inside?

He expanded his search range, and the power of the rule fragment carefully scanned every inch of the ice wall around him.

Soon, he found several other similar traces of Formations, but without exception, they were all in a silent and sealed state, unable to be started.

It was as if the Ice Soul Immortal Palace had actively closed all external channels, completely cutting itself off from the world.

Nightmare hovered in the cold mist, his eyes deep.

The Ice Soul Immortal Palace was sealed?

Why?

Was it because of some accident in the outside world?

Or because of... Su Wanqing?

Did the Cultivation of the "Supreme Art of Forgetting Emotion" or the "Profound Ice Path of Forgetting Emotion" require such a thorough closure?

Was the intelligence of the Black-Robed Person wrong?

Or did he deliberately guide him here?

Questions flashed through his mind one by one.

Nightmare would not give up; he once again raised the perception of the rule fragment to the limit, infiltrating the surrounding ice walls, the Void Realm, and even the depths of the bottomless cold mist in the valley like mercury, trying to find any clues.

Time passed bit by bit.

Just when he was almost certain that the entrance here was indeed impassable, the rule fragment suddenly captured a trace of extremely abnormal spatial ripples from the deepest part of the valley floor, in the blue cold mist that had almost condensed into substance!

The ripples were very weak and fleeting, looking more like some... slight leakage caused by unstable internal energy?

A flash of brilliance appeared in Nightmare's eyes, and without hesitation, he immediately sank into the dense mist at the deepest part of the valley floor.

The further down he went, the heavier the cold air and the greater the pressure; the blue cold mist almost became as viscous as liquid, and his Divine Sense was compressed to the limit.

If not for the protection of the Annihilation Domain, a Late-Stage Transformation Spirit Cultivator would be unable to move an inch here.

He descended for who knows how long; all around was a pure, almost suffocating deep blue.

Finally, his feet touched solid ground; he had reached the bottom of the valley.

The light here was extremely dim, barely allowing him to see things.

The bottom of the valley was not flat, covered with craggy ice reefs and dark blue ice.

And in the very center, there was a strange area where the ice was not blue but presented a distorted state like a shattered mirror.

Wisps of extremely faint but extremely pure Taiyin Cold Qi were seeping out from that twisted "mirror" crack!

The rule fragment clearly sensed that behind that twisted mirror, it was connected to an extremely unstable Small World entrance!

The entrance seemed to have suffered a huge impact, was on the verge of collapse, and was constantly self-repairing and tearing apart!

This was by no means a normal entrance; it looked more like... a damaged boundary crack!

Through those tiny cracks, Nightmare could vaguely feel the Dao charm filling the Small World on the other side of the crack, which was the same source as the "Supreme Art of Forgetting Emotion" but even more vast and cold!

That was where the Small World of the Ice Soul Immortal Palace was located!

But the entrance was damaged!

And extremely unstable!

Forcing his way through carried huge risks; he could be torn apart by chaotic spatial power at any time, or be swept into an unknown Spatial Turbulence.

Nightmare stared at the mirror crack that was constantly twisting, shattering, and merging, his eyes calm.

The Ice Soul Immortal Palace really had a problem.

Was this damaged entrance caused by an attack from a strong enemy?

Or did an accident happen inside?

Su Wanqing was inside there.

No matter how high the risk, he had to go in.

He took a deep breath, the Power of Annihilation slowly enveloped his whole body, the rule fragment hummed in his body, adjusting his own fluctuations, preparing to forcibly pass through this unstable spatial crack.

However, just at the moment he was about to set off—

Whoosh!

A flash of extremely obscure but sharp ice-blue Sword Intent shot out from the dense cold mist behind his side without warning, stabbing directly at his back!

This sword was tricky and vicious, the timing was grasped to the pinnacle, and it was perfectly integrated into the extreme cold around it, silent, and only erupted with murderous intent when it was close behind him!

An ambush!

Cold light flared in Nightmare's eyes; he did not dodge or evade!

The ice-blue sword light pierced into the Annihilation Domain three feet around him, and the terrifying ice Sword Intent and majestic magic power contained within it disintegrated, collapsed, and annihilated at a speed visible to the naked eye!

Like ice and snow thrown into a furnace!

In the end, when the sword light was still three inches away from his back, it dissipated completely without a trace!

"What?!" An uncontrollable exclamation of shock came from the dense fog.

Nightmare turned slowly and looked in the direction from which the sword light came.

He saw the thick, impenetrable blue cold mist surge, and a slender, graceful figure slowly emerged.

She wore a long dress of ice silk, her face was beautiful, but cold as frost, as if carved from ten-thousand-year cold jade, without a trace of worldly aura.

She held a long sword as transparent as ice crystal, and her whole body exuded the powerful aura of an Early Spirit Transformation Stage, only at this moment, her beautiful ice-blue eyes were full of unbelievable shock and vigilance.

"To be able to sneak in here silently and block my 'Ice Soul Heartless Sword' strike... who exactly are you?" The woman's voice was like ice beads falling on a jade plate, crisp but bone-chillingly cold.

Nightmare's gaze fell on the woman, and the rule fragment felt an aura from her that was the same source as the one behind the crack, but slightly more immature.

A Disciple of the Ice Soul Immortal Palace?

He did not answer, but asked coldly: "What happened to the Ice Soul Immortal Palace? Why is this entrance damaged?"

Upon hearing this, the woman's face became even colder, and the ice crystal long sword in her hand flashed with sharp sword light again: "How can a matter of the Sect be probed by an outsider! Those who trespass in the Forbidden Ground, die!"

Before the words fell, her figure flickered, and she turned into dozens of ice shadows that were difficult to distinguish between true and false, attacking Nightmare from all directions at the same time!

The sword light was like a waterfall, carrying the extreme cold that froze everything, instantly submerging Nightmare!

Nightmare stood in place, motionless, just gently lifted his foot, and then slammed it on the ground!

Hum!

An invisible Annihilation wave spread out violently from him like water ripples!

The ice shadows and sword light that attacked from the sky shattered and annihilated one after another when they touched this circle of fluctuation, like bubbles under the sun!

Puff!

The woman's true body was hit hard, flew backward violently, hit the ice wall in the distance, spat out a mouthful of blood, the ice crystal long sword in her hand almost fell out of her hand, the blood on her face disappeared, and her eyes were full of horror and despair.

"Law... Domain?! You... who exactly are you..." She struggled to stand up, but found that her pure ice-attribute magic power was dissipating rapidly, her Meridians were in severe pain, and she had already been seriously injured.

Nightmare took a step and appeared in front of her like a ghost, looking down at her, his cold eyes devoid of any emotion.

"This Sovereign will ask one last time."

"Ice Soul Immortal Palace, what happened?"

"Su Wanqing, where is she now?"