Chapter 2: The Fragrance of Frost
The walk back from the Dross Trench felt different. Every step Ye Jun took no longer felt like a negotiation with gravity. The golden spark in his chest, tiny as a grain of sand, radiated a steady, rhythmic heat that seemed to stitch his broken ribs back together with every breath. He kept the rusted cauldron tucked tightly under his arm, draped in a piece of his tattered hemp robe. To any passerby, he was just a beaten dog carrying a piece of scrap metal—exactly as he needed to be.
He avoided the main stone paths of the Azure Mist Sect, sticking to the winding, overgrown trails that skirted the edge of the Frozen Bamboo Grove. He had no home to return to; Han Feng's lackeys would be waiting at the servant quarters to finish the job. For now, the forest was his only sanctuary.
As he moved deeper into the woods, the air began to change. The humid, sulfurous scent of the graveyard was replaced by a sharp, biting cold. It was unnatural, even for this altitude. The bamboo stalks were coated in a fine layer of silver rime, and the ground crunched like powdered glass beneath his feet.
Someone is cultivating nearby, Ye Jun realized, his new senses prickling. And their Qi is failing.
He slowed his pace, moving as silently as a shadow. Through a break in the frosted bamboo, he saw a clearing centered around a flat, black rock. Sitting cross-legged upon it was a woman whose presence felt like a moon fallen to earth.
It was Su Yan.
In the Azure Mist Sect, Su Yan was a figure of myth. She was the youngest Elder in the history of the Alchemy Hall, a woman of peerless beauty and even colder temperament. But the woman Ye Jun saw now was not the untouchable "Ice Phoenix" of the sect.
Her face was as white as the frost surrounding her, and a thin trail of dark, purplish blood escaped the corner of her lips. Her breathing was shallow, and with every exhale, a puff of crystalline blue mist escaped her mouth, freezing the air instantly. Surrounding her were three shattered jade bottles—failed attempts at suppressing whatever was killing her.
Ye Jun stood frozen. He knew what he was seeing: Glacial Rebound. Su Yan possessed the Pure Glacial Moon Body, a rare physique that allowed her to refine ice-attribute pills with ease. But if that ice energy wasn't balanced by a sufficiently powerful Soul Flame, it would eventually turn inward, freezing the cultivator's meridians from the inside out.
She's dying, Ye Jun thought, a surge of panic rising. If the Ice Phoenix falls, the Alchemy Hall will be in chaos.
He turned to slip away—he was just a "trash" disciple, after all—but the rusted cauldron under his arm suddenly pulsed. A wave of warmth flooded his palm, and the voice of the cauldron echoed in his mind, resonant and demanding.
"The First Essence... the Moon that complements the Sun. Save her, and the Second Chamber shall open."
Ye Jun looked back at the dying woman. His golden spark was flickering wildly, as if it recognized a missing piece of itself in her frozen Qi. He didn't have a choice. If he left, she would be a statue of ice by morning.
He stepped into the clearing. The cold hit him like a physical wall, threatening to numb his skin, but the golden ember in his heart flared, creating a pocket of warmth that pushed the frost back.
Su Yan's eyes snapped open. They were a haunting, pale blue, clouded with pain and a flicker of regal fury. "Go... away," she rasped, her voice sounding like ice cracking. "A servant... should not witness... an Elder's end."
"I'm not here to witness," Ye Jun said, his voice surprisingly steady. He walked toward her, ignoring the layer of frost forming on his hair. "I'm here to refine the cold."
"You?" She tried to laugh, but it turned into a cough that sprayed flecks of frozen blood onto the black rock. "You are... the boy from the graveyard. The one with... no flame."
"The flame the sect saw was a lie," Ye Jun replied.
He knelt before her, the distance between them barely a foot. Up close, the scent of her was overwhelming—a mix of cold mountain air and the faint, sweet smell of medicinal herbs. Despite the killing frost, she was breathtaking, her features carved from the finest jade.
"Touch me... and you will freeze," she warned, her eyes widening as he reached out.
Ye Jun didn't hesitate. He placed his hand directly over her heart.
The cold was agonizing. It felt like his arm was being dipped into liquid nitrogen. His skin turned blue instantly, the frost climbing up his wrist toward his shoulder. Su Yan gasped, expecting to see him shatter, but then the change happened.
Ye Jun closed his eyes and reached deep into his dantian. He didn't just light the golden spark; he threw the floodgates of his soul open.
"Burn," he commanded.
A pillar of liquid gold Qi erupted from his palm. The clearing, once a tomb of blue ice, was suddenly bathed in a warm, amber glow. The frost on the bamboo melted into a soft rain, and the black rock beneath them began to steam.
Su Yan's body arched, her eyes flying wide as the golden heat invaded her frozen meridians. For years, she had lived with a permanent chill in her marrow, a cold that bit at her soul. Now, for the first time, she felt a sun rising inside her.
Ye Jun's golden spark wasn't just melting the ice; it was refining it. He was pulling the chaotic, wild glacial energy out of her veins and drawing it into the rusted cauldron sitting by his side. The tripod hummed, its second chamber vibrating as it drank the high-grade ice essence.
Minutes passed. The steam in the clearing grew so thick they were invisible to the outside world.
Finally, Su Yan let out a long, shaky breath—one that didn't turn to ice. The color returned to her cheeks, and the purplish hue of the poison-ice faded from her skin. She looked at Ye Jun, her gaze no longer distant or cold, but filled with a profound, terrifying confusion.
Ye Jun pulled his hand back, his arm trembling. The effort had drained him, and the golden spark in his chest had dimmed to a tiny glow.
"Who... who are you?" she whispered, her voice finally smooth and melodic.
Ye Jun stood up, picking up his rusted cauldron. The "Dud Flame" disciple was gone; in his place was someone Su Yan couldn't begin to understand.
"Just a scavenger, Elder Su," Ye Jun said, his voice tired but firm. "I found something in the trash that actually works."
Before she could reach for him, Ye Jun turned and vanished into the mist of the bamboo grove. He needed to find a place to hide. He had just saved the most powerful woman in the Alchemy Hall, and in doing so, he had tied his destiny to hers in a way that could never be undone.
Inside the cauldron, a second door began to groan, the rust flaking away to reveal a shimmering silver surface.
The Second Chamber: The Moon-Palace of Yin... Unlocking.