Chapter 187: Ice Essence

Two more months passed, and to everyone's excitement, Leafwhisk, Rebecca had broken through to the Pupa Realm! Leafwhisk was already the strongest member in the group—though due to environmental disadvantage she couldn't provide much assistance on the Snow Lake—if Ayaan was the backbone of the group she was the brain. Without her, they might not have reached this level so soon, or they would have taken much longer than they did. Now Rebecca had also reached such an amazing stage, making everyone grin from ear to ear.

Anyway, the group did not waste their time and used every passing second by cultivating, and if they weren't cultivating or became bored, they would form a team of two or three and go out to harass magic beasts on the lake. However, the number of beasts on the Snow Lake was overwhelming, leaving them no choice but to retreat after exhausting themselves. And this had become a kind of game in the time of boredom. As time went by, they started to hold their ground longer and longer against the beasts. 

After two months they had the strength to hold a pack of beasts on their own. Although they still couldn't defeat these beasts by themselves—in this period of two months, Noor and Isobel had reached the peak of the Larva Realm, only a step away from the Pupa Realm. As for Ayaan, he was only at the high stage of the Larva Realm, as he cultivated, he realised, he needed more energy than other people two cultivate to the same realm, though his strength was still comparable to the people at the higher realm than him, and now he could also use ice element and had the tremendous advantage in this icy environment.

The two little mischiefs had also worked hard and had become high stage Embryonic Realm cultivators. As Akash walked the way of the sword, he could not just increase his strength by spirit stones, he needed to fight and slaughter with his sword to increase his strength, so he would also go out to fight with beasts from time to time and sharpen his sword style. Ifre was a fire elemental cultivator and therefore spirit stones were least useful to her, due to their ice attribute, but they weren't completely useless. That was why she could reach the high stage of the Embryonic Realm in the short time of two months.

Though as their strength increased, the spirit stones slowly disappeared like an illusion. They had literally devoured those stones. And as Ayaan saw little stones, his heart ached. Now he had to cultivate normally, and so everyone else. In front of them was only a single boulder of spirit stones. Ayaan had left it for the very last, as it was the biggest boulder. He exchanged glances with everyone and went to break this boulder as well with his large, sharp fork. 

Rebecca looked in front of her at the large stone and frowned. She had a feeling that something was amiss. Yes, she had increased her strength, and she became stronger, but she still felt unsettled in her heart. She had yet to discover the source of summoning. What called her here and why? She wanted to know. 

"THAK!"

Suddenly a sound of a fork hitting the large boulder sounded, interrupting her train of thoughts. She collected her thoughts and helped Ayaan to dig the spirit stone boulder with everyone else. Thak, thak thak. 

After the hard work of two hours, the group dug out the boulder from the icy ground, and when Ayaan changed the boulder's location something happened. The temperature of the room went down, down and down. Ayaan felt the chill in his entire body and felt like freezing into an ice cube. Not only him, everyone else was the same, while two children had fallen unconscious. 

There was only one person who was standing without a change in her expression—Rebecca. She looked at the White Orb in the pit which had formed after digging the spirit stone boulder. The orb released white pure energy, colder than stone, vicious than a snake, danger than a tiger. That was Ayaan's thought about the stone. However, Rebecca felt only warmth from the stone and intimate feeling from the stone, it was as if her child was asking for her embrace. 

Without realising, she moved towards the White Orb. Everyone saw her action and their faces changed. As Ayaan was about to shout at her, a voice echoed in his head. "Don't stop her, she has encountered something good this time." 

"What do you mean?" Ayaan asked confusedly. He felt pressure from that orb. Until now he had felt pressure from two things, one was the world of Life and Death and the second was the Elementless Pagoda. Now this thing was third. So it was natural that he would be vigilant in front of such a thing and act cautiously.

Before Handsome could answer Ayaan, another exclamation sounded not far away from him. "This is the Ice Essence!" Ayaan looked at the speaker—Leafwhisk, and asked. "What is Ice Essence?"

Leafwhisk took a deep breath and calmed herself down, her eyes shined in excitement. "No wonder there was a spirit mine at this place. The Ice Essence is the source behind it!" afterwards she looked at Ayaan and explained. "The Ice Essence is the pure form of ice." 

Leafwhisk saw him frowning and realised that he still did not understand her meaning. "When ice develops basic awareness of its surroundings, it is called Ice Essence." She paused and continued. "When Rebecca's body evolved in the pagoda, she had Fire Essence with her, but the fire element isn't compatible with her, so the altar, at that time, had destroyed the Fire Essence or it would have interrupted her evolution. Ice Essence is the same as Fire Essence."

Ayaan heard her, and his eyes lit up. So that's how it was. He still remembered that he had found that Fire Essence in one of the fire worlds, though he didn't remember its name anymore.