Chapter 425: Primordial Mysterious Ice
Lin Wan took a deep breath. "If that's the case, then speak. What exactly is this promise? What do you need me to do?"
The old man's wrinkles twitched slightly, revealing an awkward expression. "This... what the Sacred Master left for the Sacred Child has now... been taken by the Northern Witch."
He rubbed his bony fingers, his voice growing softer. "Our strength is insufficient, we can only... have to trouble the Sacred Child to retrieve it personally."
Lin Wan was silent.
She was quiet for a moment before slowly speaking. "How long ago was this?"
The old man lowered his head to calculate. "Roughly... it has been over a hundred thousand years, I suppose."
"Over a hundred thousand years?!" Lin Wan's voice suddenly rose. "Could that thing still exist?"
The old man nodded quickly. "Of course! The outer shell of that thing was wrapped in Primordial Ice that the Sacred Master personally retrieved from the Edge of the World. Forget ordinary weapons—even Immortal Artifacts, unless used by an Immortal Lord themselves, couldn't leave even a trace on it!"
Lin Wan narrowed her eyes. "But no matter how hard it is, isn't it still ice? If you slowly roast it over a fire, won't it melt?"
The old man's aura instantly weakened, his voice not as firm as before. "Probably, maybe... it probably won't melt..."
Lin Wan covered her forehead and sighed inwardly. Damn it, these people are so unreliable!
She looked at the ragged but devout members of the Witch Clan before her, momentarily at a loss for how to evaluate them.
Call them foolish, yet it was her own father who made this promise. Call them formidable, yet they can't even confirm if what they're guarding still exists.
"Fine." Lin Wan finally relented. "Tell me who has it, and I'll go retrieve it."
Hearing this, the old man's cloudy eyes suddenly lit up. "That thing isn't on a person! It's in the hollow of the largest ancient tree at the center of the forbidden land—no one can move it!"
Lin Wan frowned, her divine sense instantly spreading out, scanning the so-called "center of the forbidden land."
But in her perception, there was no ancient tree there, only a giant furnace with raging flames, emitting a heart-stopping heat wave.
"A tree hollow?" she subconsciously said. "Why do I only see a furnace?"
The old man's face instantly turned deathly pale.
Lin Wan looked at the old man's guilty expression and sneered inwardly—she had guessed correctly.
The Primordial Ice might be hard, but it's still ice! It might not melt in a day or two, but after a hundred thousand years of roasting, it wouldn't melt?!
Seeing her expression, the old man sighed deeply, his bony fingers tightly clutching his tattered Witch robe. "No matter what... please, Sacred Child, go retrieve it."
A pleading look appeared in his cloudy eyes. "It would also... fulfill the long-held wish of our Southern Witch lineage."
Lin Wan was silent for a moment before finally nodding. She wanted to see just what could make these Witch people persist for so long.
"One last question," she suddenly stopped before turning around. "What's inside that Primordial Ice... exactly?"
But the old man shook his head, his cracked lips tightly pressed together. "The Sacred Child will know... when you see it yourself."
Lin Wan raised an eyebrow and said no more.
She formed a hand seal with her fingertips, and her figure gradually faded away, turning into a wisp of breeze that vanished from the spot.
The invisibility spell enveloped her entire body, perfectly concealing even her aura.
Passing through the winding caves, Lin Wan soon arrived at the territory of the Northern Witches.
This place was completely different from the dilapidation of the Southern Witches. Gemstones inlaid in the stone walls, flat bluestone slabs on the ground, and the fresh scent of medicinal herbs floating in the air.
Several Northern Witch tribe members were refining some kind of elixir, the furnace light illuminating their focused faces.
Lin Wan silently passed through, feeling little hostility in her heart. The Northern Witches' choice seemed understandable to her. Who wouldn't waver after guarding a vague promise for who knows how many ten thousand years?
Following the direction the old man had indicated, she quickly found the massive furnace.
The furnace body was pitch black, its surface covered in intricate runes, its mouth spouting eerie blue flames, the heat waves oppressive.
Lin Wan narrowed her eyes as her divine sense entered the furnace.
The eerie blue flames burned fiercely within, the heat distorting the air. Lin Wan's divine sense swept across, and sure enough, she discovered a huge block of profound ice at the furnace's core.
The profound ice was crystal clear all over, its surface shimmering with a faint silvery light, about as tall as a person, irregular in shape, as if it had been forcibly chiseled from somewhere.
Amazingly, despite being roasted by flames for ten thousand years, the profound ice's surface showed no sign of melting, smooth as a mirror, reflecting Lin Wan's blurry figure.
However, when Lin Wan noticed the size of the furnace, she understood. This furnace was clearly several times larger than the profound ice, meaning that when the Northern Witches took over, the ice's volume was probably more than twice what it was now.
It seemed the Northern Witches' method was indeed effective, but this progress... was infuriatingly slow.
"Truly worthy of being Primordial Profound Ice," Lin Wan sighed lightly.
Her divine sense couldn't penetrate the ice layer, unable to see what was sealed inside.
After a moment of contemplation, she simply drilled directly into the furnace, arriving before the profound ice.
The temperature inside the furnace was extremely high, but for someone at the Immortal Lord realm, it was like a gentle breeze.
The furnace core was empty, apparently the Northern Witch tribe members didn't need to guard it at all times. Who would think someone could silently infiltrate their sacred land?
Lin Wan revealed her form, her fair hand gently covering the ice surface.
The ice's touch was strange. Not as bone-chilling as ordinary ice, nor as smooth as jade, but rather had an eerie suction force, as if it wanted to swallow her palm.
She circulated her immortal essence, attempting to probe the ice's interior.
But just as her immortal force touched the surface—
"Boom!"
The entire furnace violently shook, the runes on its walls suddenly flashing dazzling red light!
Only then did Lin Wan notice that beneath the profound ice were densely packed with Witch tribe runes.
These runes were completely different from the formations in the cultivation world, their twisting lines like snakes, interconnected into a network, emitting an eerie aura.
She had been careless earlier and hadn't realized the function of these runes. It was an alarm system!
"Interesting..." Lin Wan raised an eyebrow.
The Witch tribe's magical system was indeed vastly different from the cultivation world, even she, an Immortal Lord, had misjudged it.
But she wasn't alarmed, nor did she bother to conceal herself again.
Since she had been discovered, hiding would only seem suspicious.
Soon, hurried footsteps came from outside the furnace.
A group of young men wearing magnificent witch robes surged in, their builds strong and complexions ruddy, forming a stark contrast to the gaunt members of the Southern Witch tribe.
The leading man looked about thirty years old, with a golden rune painted between his eyebrows, holding a gem-encrusted bone staff in his hand.
His expression first showed some helplessness, but when he clearly saw Lin Wan's appearance, his face suddenly froze.
Then, as if remembering something, his expression turned to shock.
"Who are you!? How dare you trespass in my Witch tribe's sacred land?!"
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