After Lin Zian and Minyu leave, Kaelan enters retreat once more.
Chaos spreads through the rule network of the world, twisting laws and disrupting comprehension. For most cultivators, this chaos is a barrier. For Kaelan, it is the opposite. The Storm Divine Crystal embedded within the rule network turns the world's disorder into an advantage, bypassing the network's natural defensive mechanisms. Where others struggle, Kaelan sees clearly.
He begins with the Dark Law.
The Corrupt Path yields first. Its structure unfolds smoothly, without resistance. Without pausing, he moves on to the Distortion Path. When comprehension completes, energy surges from the rule network into the divine crystal. The crystal reshapes itself, gaining another face, now eight-sided. Each minor path he fully comprehends adds a new face to the crystal.
With Distortion complete, the remaining Dark paths become easier.
Cold follows.
Then Silence.
Then Oblivion.
Finally, Shadow.
When the last Dark path settles into place, the divine crystal now bears thirteen faces.
Kaelan does not stop.
He turns to the Fire Law. Path after path ignites within his perception, fierce yet orderly. When the final Fire path is integrated, the crystal grows again, eighteen faces now gleaming with layered authority. Distortion, already mastered through Dark, aligns effortlessly here. Though its origin differs, its conclusion is the same, allowing instant resonance.
Wind comes next.
The paths of Wind align swiftly, harmonising with Storm at the crystal's core. When comprehension ends, the divine crystal carries twenty-one faces.
Then Kaelan turns to Earth.
While he remains immersed in law comprehension, the world outside does not wait.
Veena is forced back into the war.
The Wizard Army needs the presence of a third-stage transcend to hold the line, and her realm has stabilised enough to bear the burden. The northern front collapses into full melee. Over the next two years, the battlefield becomes a crucible.
Attempts at third-stage breakthroughs multiply.
Three martial artists succeed, leaders among the nine martial sects. Two others die beneath their tribulations, lacking real spiritual treasures to shield them.
The Night Dynasty produces two new third-stage Heavenly Officials. One demon also breaks through. But the cost is high: two Heavenly Officials and three demons perish in failed ascensions.
On the wizard side, ten attempt to advance to Great Wizard. Only four succeed. One is the leader of the Sound Dolphin Clan. Another is the former sect master of a Qi Refiner faction, now head of the Blood Wizard Academy. The remaining two are innate demons from the Demon Palace.
An unspoken understanding forms among the powers.
Third-stage beings, martial artists and Night Dynasty alike, avoid direct conflict with one another. Instead, they turn their attention toward Great Wizards. At times, former enemies even cooperate, striking together. No third-stage has fallen yet, but all know it is only a matter of time. The battlefield is saturated with blood haze, war madness gnawing at reason itself.
Veena stands on the deck of a flying ship, death energy coiling quietly around her.
Below lies devastation.
Corpses of wizards, demons, and martial artists carpet the land. Broken puppet parts are scattered among them, half-refined limbs and shattered cores glinting dully in the dirt. Veena lifts her gaze toward the enemy camp ahead.
It is sealed behind a towering wall of ice.
The wall is absolute, cold enough to freeze spells mid-formation, thick enough to blunt divine force. It is the creation of Han Xue, a female martial artist of the third stage.
Veena's immediate objective is clear.
Destroy the town.
Her distant goal is even clearer.
Kill Han Xue.
A second-stage wizard steps onto the deck beside her and bows slightly.
"Lord Veena, shall we commence the assault?"
The pale bone mask turns toward him.
Veena does not answer immediately.
Her soul sense spreads outward like an invisible tide, sweeping across the battlefield, the frozen plains, the distant skies. In her perception, formations take shape, flying ships aligned in layered arrays, flying boats hovering in disciplined grids, giant crows circling above them like living shadows. Ten thousand wizards move as one, mana rhythms synchronised, spells half-formed and waiting.
With numbers like this, the destruction of the ice camp is inevitable.
That truth has already been proven countless times. A martial artist, no matter how fierce, cannot match a prepared wizard force in open warfare.
And yet.
Her sense tingles.
Not fear. No hesitation.
Danger.
Veena turns her gaze back toward the ice camp. The towering wall glitters faintly, cold light refracting through dense layers of condensed frost. Beyond it, the martial artists move with grim discipline. To either side of the camp rise two massive ice mountains, unnatural in shape, their peaks sharp and symmetrical, like blades driven into the earth.
She studies them in silence.
Her instincts do not scream, but they whisper. Something is wrong.
Retreat would be the safest option.
But retreat is impossible.
The ice camp blocks the only viable route to the wizard camp behind it, where two third-stage Night Dynasty cultivators are besieging a Great Wizard. If she delays, that Great Wizard will fall. And if that happens, Veena herself will be next.
The other Great Wizards in the north are too far away. Each is locked in their own battle, pressed to the brink.
Her gaze lowers.
Below the ship, the frozen ground is littered with corpses, wizards, demons, and martial artists alike. Some lie half-buried in snow, others frozen mid-fall, limbs twisted, faces locked in expressions of rage or terror. Blood stains the white ground in dark, ugly patches, already crystallising into ice.
A memory surfaces.
Kaelan's voice, calm and distant.
A spell capable of raising death itself.
A disaster of the undead.
At the time, Veena had dismissed it. Such a thing sounded theoretical, impractical, almost absurd. Her own corpse puppet techniques require time, weeks, and months of refinement. Each puppet must be prepared carefully, reinforced, and stabilised.
She does not have months.
She does not even have days.
Her eyes lift again to the ice wall.
Then back to the corpses.
A quiet resolve settles within her.
"Let's try it," she murmurs.
Death mana spills from her palm.
It pours downward like invisible rain, sinking into the frozen earth, seeping through layers of snow and ice, flooding into the corpses below. She does not stop. She continues to release mana, saturating everybody, every broken limb, every shattered ribcage.
The ground darkens subtly.
In her perception, the battlefield changes.
Images bloom in her mind, skeletal structures, torn muscles, shattered bones, frozen organs. Data unfolds with terrifying clarity. She sees each corpse not as an individual, but as a structure. A vessel. A framework waiting to be filled.
Her death mana threads through them like fine black strings.
Puppet strings.
But these strings are not external. They sink deep, replacing what was lost, binding flesh and bone with will instead of life.
Control settles.
Not perfect. Not refined.
But sufficient.
Veena raises her hand.
"Rise."
The snow shudders.
At first, nothing happens.
Then fingers twitch.
A hand bursts from beneath the snow, skin grey and frostbitten, nails cracked and blackened. Another follows. Then another. Bodies begin to move, stiff and jerky, joints grinding as frozen sinew strains under death mana.
Corpses buried beneath the battlefield push upward, breaking through ice crusts, snowbanks collapsing as torsos emerge. Heads loll, necks snapping into place with dull cracks. Empty eye sockets glow faintly with dull grey light.
From beneath the ice wall's shadow, dozens rise.
Then hundreds.
Some wear shattered wizard robes, runes burned half-away. Others are demons, horns broken, claws snapped, but reforming under death energy. Martial artists climb to their feet as well, bones realigning, frozen blood flaking from their armour.
Even those completely buried stir.
The snowfield becomes a sea of movement.
Bodies claw their way upward from beneath layers of ice, dragging themselves free, leaving dark trenches behind them. Some rise whole. Others rise incomplete, missing limbs, torsos split open, but death mana holds them together, replacing structure with will.
They stand.
Silent.
Awaiting command.
The wizard beside Veena stares in horror, breath caught in his throat.
Below, the ice camp reacts.
Shouts rise. Alarms sound. Martial artists rush to the wall, staring down at the impossible sight.
An army of the dead stands beneath them.
Veena lowers her hand slowly.
Behind the pale bone mask, her expression remains calm.
Veena's will descends like a verdict.
The undead move.
They surge forward in uneven waves, bodies dragging through snow, broken legs reforming under death mana, frozen armour creaking as they advance. Some run with unnatural speed, others crawl and pull themselves along, but all move in the same direction, toward the ice camp.
At the same time, Veena raises her hand again.
"Bombard the mountains."
The order ripples through the wizard formations.
Flying ships pivot in unison. Runes flare. Cannons hum as mana condenses, stabilises, and then discharges.
The first barrage strikes the left ice mountain.
Explosions bloom against its surface, fire, lightning, and compressed force tearing into ice. Shards the size of buildings shear away and crash down the slopes, pulverising undead beneath them, only for those same corpses to rise again moments later, reassembled by death mana.
The second barrage hits higher.
Cracks spread like spiderwebs across the mountain's face. Deep, resonant booms echo through the frozen wasteland as layer after layer of reinforced ice collapses.
The right mountain is hit next.
Spells of earth and thunder punch inward, boring tunnels through the frozen mass. The ice does not merely break, it screams, stress fractures racing through it as if the mountain itself is alive and in pain.
Then something moves inside.
The surface ruptures.
From the shattered interior of the mountain, figures pour out.
Puppets.
Divine Puppet Sect constructs spill forth in dense clusters, bodies stitched from metal, bone, and ice, runes glowing as they activate mid-fall. Alongside them emerge demons of the Night Dynasty, beasts with frost-crusted hides, eyes burning with savage intelligence, howls echoing as they leap down the collapsing slopes.
They were hiding inside the mountains.
Waiting.
Veena's senses sharpen instantly.
"So that was it," she murmurs.
The battlefield erupts.
Undead crash into living defenders at the base of the ice wall. Frozen blades slice through corpses, shattering bones, only for those bones to twist, reconnect, and rise again. Martial artists slash and burn, faces pale as the dead refuse to stay down.
Wizard bombardment shifts, targeting the newly revealed enemies, but the camp responds.
A presence rises.
Above the ice wall, a figure ascends slowly into the air.
Han Xue.
Her white hair flows freely, frost forming around her like a crown. The temperature drops sharply as her aura expands, the air crystallising, breath frosting even inside sealed helmets. The ice wall beneath her thickens, layers stacking upon layers, glowing faintly blue.
She looks down at the advancing undead, then up at the flying ships.
Her gaze hardens.
At the same moment, Veena senses another fluctuation.
Not from above.
From below.
From within the snowfield where the undead advance.
The ground trembles.
Snow bulges upward, then explodes.
A massive shape bursts free, scattering corpses and ice alike.
A wolf.
Its body is enormous, larger than any siege beast, silver fur gleaming like polished metal. Frost clings to its mane, and every breath it exhales becomes a cloud of shimmering mist. Its eyes burn with cold intelligence as it plants its paws into the frozen earth.
It lifts its head.
And howls.
The sound rolls across the battlefield like a physical force, vibrating through bone and ice alike. The sky responds.
Clouds twist.
Light dims.
The moon appears, pale, cold, and full, hanging impossibly in the daytime sky.
Under its light, the snowfield changes.
The ice strengthens. Frost thickens. Martial artists straighten, their auras surging, movements growing sharper, faster. Even the ice wall pulses, absorbing the moonlight and growing denser.
Veena's undead slow slightly, joints stiffening as the cold intensifies.
Han Xue floats higher, the moonlight reflecting in her eyes.
The silver wolf lowers its head, muscles coiling, ready to charge.
Veena watches them both in silence.
Then her death mana flares.
The battle for the ice camp truly begins.