The interior of the Ice Heart Pavilion was a world carved from winter's bone. The corridors were lined with pale blue spirit-crystals that emitted a soft, frigid luminescence, and the air was kept at a temperature low enough to turn a mortal's breath into falling snow. It was an environment meticulously crafted to suppress the heart-fire of its inhabitants, encouraging the cultivation of the Ice Heart Palace's signature technique—the Frozen Soul Art.
But tonight, a foreign element had invaded this sanctuary of cold purity.
It began not with a bang, but with a scent that defied the sterility of the ice. It was a fragrance so subtle that the olfactory senses barely registered it—a phantom hint of blooming night-lotus, heavy with sweet nectar and the damp earth of a summer evening.
The Drunken Lotus Slumber.
