The Frozen Truth

That day, He Suosi melted a vermilion hairpin, meticulously etching a formation onto a dark slate. Both Little Black and Luo Guanjing were positioned nearby, offering their insights as his advisors.

“Grandpa, I think we should add a bit more fine gold; it would make the color brighter,” Little Black chirped.

Luo Guanjing immediately let out a scoff. “Are we making jewelry now? ‘Brighter colors,’ indeed. If you ask me, simulating the formation is utterly superfluous. Even if you knew how much spiritual energy the formation core provided, could you truly destroy it?”

“And look at your paltry materials,” he continued, his voice dripping with disdain. “What sort of contraption do you genuinely expect to create with those?”

He Suosi remained oblivious to the world outside, a rose pastry held between his teeth. He chewed and swallowed it, a peculiar realization dawning on him.

Ever since Yuan Zhigong had acknowledged him as his “true love,” He Suosi had noticed that everything sent from the kitchen was to his liking. Even things he once believed he would never enjoy now tasted like divine delicacies, leaving him utterly captivated.

‘Could this be the legendary phenomenon—the mouth saying no, but the body being utterly honest?’ he mused.

He Suosi licked the residual powder from his lips, certain that returning to his original body wouldn’t diminish the exquisite taste of the rose pastry. This fondness felt like a forgotten love, something he had once cherished but later lost from memory.

Without dwelling on it, he licked his lips once more, then resumed his work on the formation. He had been inspired by the circuit boards of his previous life. Ultimately, for electrical conductivity, metal was the obvious choice.

Luo Guanjing sat atop the bookshelf, chin raised, looking down at He Suosi. He Suosi found his posture oddly difficult, yet he knew that expressing such a thought would only provoke Luo Guanjing’s arrogant retaliation. Though fearless, He Suosi decided it was best not to invite trouble.

“Even if you manage to create a formation barrier similar to the Guangyu Immortal Sect’s,” Luo Guanjing eventually stated, “isn’t it fundamentally different? Even I, in my current state, could pierce it with a single finger.”

He Suosi gave a noncommittal answer, taking another bite of coconut cake. “That’s precisely the point—you can’t rely on brute force. Since brute force can’t break the Guangyu Immortal Sect’s formation, it certainly won’t break this one either.”

Luo Guanjing merely grunted, still convinced He Suosi was making a fuss over nothing.

He Suosi raised an eyebrow. “Why treat me like an idiot? You’ve gone to such lengths to send people in—and who knows how many more of your people the Guangyu Immortal Sect harbors—precisely because you can’t directly breach the outer protective grand formation, can’t you?”

Luo Guanjing remained silent. Outwardly, he often appeared transparent, yet who could say this wasn’t a facade? If he wished, concealing his emotions would be an effortless task.

He Suosi maintained his composure. “So, you can hope for my success, but I won’t let you steal my research.”

Luo Guanjing’s mouth twitched. “Have you fallen for Guangyu? You don’t want him to get hurt?”

“…” He Suosi nearly choked, spraying pastry crumbs from his mouth. He spun around, rolling his eyes at Luo Guanjing. “How could you possibly think that? Any decent straight man’s first thought wouldn’t be anything of the sort.”

Luo Guanjing was noncommittal.

He Suosi continued, “This is my patented technology, after all. Even if I told you, you wouldn’t understand, but this technology can be exchanged for money.”

With that, he refocused, meticulously drawing his winding circuit diagrams—or rather, formations.

Luo Guanjing soon realized that He Suosi’s words were not a bluff.

Though He Suosi would still release him to bicker with and play with Little Black (Luo Guanjing: ‘There was no bickering! I was disciplining that bird!’), at certain critical moments, he would suddenly return to his spiritual space.

Days later, upon his return, He Suosi would again be drawing, scribbling, and cracking jokes. Sometimes, he would even ask strange, disjointed questions; once, he even inquired about the number of disciples in the Luo Men sect. Luo Guanjing, his face dark, was compelled to answer each question due to being under He Suosi’s control.

Finally, one day, when he emerged again, He Suosi wore a faint smile. “I succeeded,” he announced.

Luo Guanjing sounded skeptical. “You successfully simulated the formation?”

He Suosi shook his head, smiling. “I know how to break it.” His clear eyes curved slightly, and his thin lips formed a contented, self-satisfied smile.

He knew Luo Guanjing would be astonished, for even he himself hadn’t anticipated such swift success.

“How did you do it?” Luo Guanjing couldn’t help but ask.

He Suosi merely smiled, offering no words.

Luo Guanjing realized his lapse in composure. He cleared his throat softly, then clasped his hands behind his back, feigning indifference. “It might not necessarily succeed. After all, we haven’t even left yet.”

Yet, deep down, he was eighty percent convinced, knowing that He Suosi would not speak without reason. “With that,” he said, his eyes glowing, “we are one step closer to freedom.”

Mid-month, a light rain fell. The night was starless, shrouded by thick clouds, making the entire world appear enveloped in a dense, dark mist, even to the eyes of cultivators.

Tonight was the day He Suosi had chosen to leave the Guangyu Immortal Sect. Every night at the Hour of the Rat, the patrolling guards would change shifts at the main gate. Most of these guards possessed only Foundation Establishment or Golden Core cultivation. More often than not, their purpose was to detect—and serve as cannon fodder for—any enemy incursions.

In other words, if He Suosi wished to escape right under their noses, it was highly probable. Coupled with the dark, windy night and He Suosi’s thorough preparations, leaving without alarming anyone was not impossible.

Despite nearing freedom, He Suosi felt an inexplicable unease. He couldn’t pinpoint its origin, only that since the afternoon, his heart had been racing, his breathing shallow. In the depths of his being, he felt a constant pull, as if something was calling to him.

Yet, upon closer inspection, the sensation would vanish as quickly as mist under the sun. ‘It must be an illusion,’ He Suosi told himself.

However, as his steps led him toward the central courtyard, that ethereal feeling grew increasingly potent. It was undeniably more than a mere illusion.

‘Any sensation a cultivator experiences holds value.’ His master had impressed this upon him at the very beginning of his cultivation journey. Over countless years, He Suosi had encountered numerous fortuitous events precisely because he trusted these instincts.

He finally halted his steps.

‘Go and see,’ he told himself. ‘Just a look.’

Following the feeling guiding him, he walked in an unfamiliar direction.

The fine rain pattered on the tiles and leaves outside, creating a rustling sound. The croaking of frogs and the whisper of the wind intertwined, converging in his ears into a sound like crashing tides.

He Suosi walked through the long corridor, feeling the deepening darkness and the intensifying cold. He soon realized this was no illusion, for the further he ventured, the more the rainwater on the ground had frozen into a thin sheet of ice.

It was as if the area ahead was an open ice cellar.

He Suosi’s intuition told him that whatever called to him ahead was profoundly important, yet another sensation urged him to flee. This latter feeling, however, lacked the urgency of a life-threatening crisis, failing to compel He Suosi to turn back.

He finally approached step by step, discerning a room. The door was not locked, merely ajar, perhaps left so in the owner’s haste.

His heart pounded violently.

‘It’s fine,’ he reassured himself. ‘My own invisibility talismans are foolproof. No one, save perhaps Yuan Zhigong himself, could detect me.’

‘Just one glance,’ he decided.

He finally pressed close to the door crack, peering inside.

However, as he gazed through the narrow opening into the dimly lit room, he was struck as if by a bolt of lightning, frozen in place.

Within the empty room, only a single bed occupied the center, surrounded by layers of solidified ice. The motionless figure lying on the bed, no matter how one looked, was clearly not alive.

Perhaps due to the extreme cold, the person’s skin had taken on a frozen texture. The long, slender eyelashes above tightly closed eyes, and the soft, flowing hair spread across the jade pillow, were all adorned with tiny ice fragments.

His thick, sword-like brows, with a slight upward tilt at the ends, hinted at an imposing aura when his eyes were open. Yet, his tightly sealed lips were utterly bloodless, and even beneath the faint blue veins on his neck, blood seemed to have ceased its flow.

Though covered by a dark robe, his robust and slender physique was still discernible. At this moment, he resembled an all-too-lifelike statue, and no matter how one argued, the only conclusion was a complete absence of life.

But—

‘That’s my body.’

‘One hundred percent, it’s He Suosi’s own body.’

He was utterly certain, for that body called to him with an intense sensation. He could even feel the abundant power and supple texture within it once more. If only he could return—if only he could return—he would immediately reclaim everything that should be his: power, status, scenery, and his most steadfast beliefs.

Like waves crashing against his body and soul, he almost uncontrollably yearned to immediately grasp the body lying so still before him. He wanted to seize an arm, or a thigh, anything. As long as he could touch it, as long as their skin met, everything would end, and he would instantly return to his own body.

This thought surged with such ferocity that He Suosi felt himself on the verge of madness. He didn’t know when he had entered the room, nor when the ice and snow had enveloped him.

Only when he snapped back to reality did he see thick layers of ice pressing down on him, bringing with them an oppressive chill that made him tremble.

‘Damn it, I’ve entered the formation.’