The melting of spring brought danger with it. From beneath layers of thawing rivers and caverns, beasts stirred awake, their hunger sharpened by months of slumber.
Hunters spoke in hushed tones of sightings deeper in the forest. Tracks larger than wolves. Scales glinting in fragments of snow.
An **Ice Serpent**.
Though not the strongest of spirit beasts, even a fifty-year-old serpent was dread for a village like Coldwater. Its venom could paralyze cattle, its coils could crush a man.
Elders ordered a cautious watch. Hunting parties went doubly armed. Yet still, food grew scarce, game too frightened by the serpent's scent to linger close.
Desperation pushed the men forward — and Tian went with them.
---
The forest was eerily silent that day. No birds, no wolf howls. Only the crunch of boots and the whisper of steel sliding quietly from sheaths.
Tian's Frost Veil pulsed faintly, chilling air around him. His senses, sharpened through cautious training, pulsed with unease.
"Something's wrong," he whispered to his father ahead.
The words had barely left him when snow exploded ten paces forward.
A scaled body thicker than tree trunks lunged outward. Its head was triangular, icy mist fuming from fangs. The **Ice Serpent** surged with terrifying speed, eyes glowing faint blue in bloodlust.
"Scatter!" the elder roared.
Men dove, spears clashing, arrows fired. But the serpent weaved fluid as river water, its tail lashing two hunters aside, its fangs snapping dangerously close.
Tian froze for a heartbeat. Strength screamed in his mind—*you are too weak!*—yet something deeper answered: *if you do nothing, all die.*
---
His Frost Veil erupted desperately.
Air crystallized, serpent's slither slowed just enough for spears to graze its flank instead of breaking on air.
It turned with hiss, tail striking where Tian stood. The boy rolled in snow, shoulder wound tearing open anew. Blood flashed scarlet. Agony surged, but his eyes still blazed.
With desperate thought, he dragged his meager crystallized frost into spear shaft, and thrust. Not at flesh—it would never pierce thick scales—but at the serpent's eye.
The point struck, sliding short, but enough to make beast recoil and thrash sideways. Hunters seized chance, stabbing, cutting scales, retreating with precious breaths.
Yet exhaustion drowned Tian's body. His legs collapsed, wounds pouring. The serpent's tail swung again, smashing him into frost earth. A cry ripped his throat, blood filling his mouth.
The last he saw was Yuexin's horrified scream before darkness swallowed all.
---
When he awoke days later, fever blazed his veins. His body weak, shoulder near shattered, bandages across ribs. Yuexin lay by bedside, eyes puffed red from sleepless nights.
"Tian…" she whispered, grasping his hand as tears fell. "Don't leave me."
With painful breath, he forced a faint smile. "I… still breathe. Frost does not melt easily… remember?"
Even broken, he endured.
Leng Tian was no hero who felled the serpent. But without his Frost Veil slowing its strikes, the hunters would not have returned at all.
---
🔥 End of Chapter 11
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