Through the ice layer, Evan could clearly see that Shadow's body had shrunk considerably, though the Mystic Ice encasing him was still massive. However, at this point, Evan was able to break away a portion of it, leaving only the ice covering Shadow's body.
Mystic Ice is incredibly tough—if anyone else tried to break it, they’d have a hard time. Luckily, Evan had the Frostbane Divine Sword. With its sharpness plus the immense Chaos Immortal Force in Evan’s body, even so, it still took him half a stick of incense’s time to shrink the Mystic Ice down.
Then Evan kept channeling Heavenfire. As he did, he gathered fire-element particles from the air. In this frozen land, fire-element particles were shockingly scarce—it took him half an hour to collect enough, and even then, that amount wasn’t as much as he could gather in just a few breaths when trapped inside a space domain.
Still, with those fire-element particles, Evan could at least cut down on his own energy use. With a thought, he transformed the particles into flames and once again covered the Mystic Ice around Shadow.
As Heavenfire wrapped around Shadow, Evan rapidly circulated the Chaos Immortal Force inside his body, while also spinning up the elemental orb in his dantian. After so long burning energy, the fire element color on the orb had dimmed a lot.
Hard work pays off—Evan gritted his teeth and finally melted away all the Mystic Ice on Shadow. At this point, Shadow sat motionless on the ground, already in human form but with his eyes still closed.
Evan knew that right now, Shadow was absorbing the power of ice and snow along with the fire element, using the fire’s heat to neutralize the ice and snow energy. That way, he could fully absorb it all.
Evan waited in place for half a day. During that time, he kept recovering his depleted fire element power, and managed to fully restore it half an hour before Shadow woke up. The severe overexertion left him feeling pretty wiped out.
But Shadow was his brother—no matter how tough or exhausting it was, it was worth it. Just then, Shadow opened his eyes and the first thing he said to Evan was, “Big bro, you’ve really been through a lot for me!”
Then he stood up, and Evan just laughed, “You’re my brother—this is what a big bro should do. No need for polite words. So, how do you feel now?”
"My whole body’s overflowing with power, but I haven’t fully converted it yet. This ice-and-snow energy really is strong—it’s a kind of force totally different from anything I’ve felt before. I’ll need to go into seclusion for a while. Maybe when I come out, I’ll be able to ascend to the God Realm." Shadow grinned.
Evan hadn’t expected Shadow might ascend to the God Realm before him. Back when they came to the Immortal Realm, Evan had brought them up directly, and they’d even dodged the tribulation lightning. But this time, the Divine Tribulation for the God Realm would definitely be much harder.
Seeing the hint of unease on Evan’s face, Shadow laughed, “Don’t worry, big bro. If you don’t ascend to the God Realm, I won’t either. I can suppress my realm and wait for you. There are tons of places in the God Realm where I can help you out!”
"Didn’t expect you to get so badass. In that case, I won’t say anything more—strike while the iron’s hot and get back in my body to boost your strength. As for this ice-and-snow world, I’ll keep exploring it myself. Hopefully I’ll find the Heart of Frostflame." Evan said.
Shadow flashed with red light and slipped straight into Evan’s body. Evan soared up, flying farther into the distance. Now, this vast frozen world was his alone to explore—a feeling of powerlessness and solitude crept over him.
Before, even when he was alone, he’d usually have someone like Xuanyuan Yueyan or the Emerald Immortal Empress by his side to scheme and strategize with him. Now, he could only rely on himself. Chu Qing and Chu Tong’s strength was useless here; maybe he’d have to let them enter the Samsara Bracelet for a breakthrough once he got back.
The deeper he flew, the colder it got—even with Evan’s current defenses, it was getting hard to resist. If King Zhao or the Beast King came here, they’d have frozen solid by now.
Only after activating Watershift did Evan finally shake off the chill. He flew across this endless world of ice and snow for nearly a whole day, but didn’t find anything unusual.
There was no day or night here, and the sky wasn’t like the Netherworld’s gloom—instead, it was a completely different world. Evan kept flying as the snowstorm grew fiercer, and every so often, a terrifying chill-glass wind would whip through.
Suddenly, a thunderous roar echoed from far away, making Evan’s heart jolt. The sound had to be hundreds of li off, so he instantly teleported over. When he arrived in the sky, the scene below left him utterly stunned.
On the ground below, two enormous Ice Beasts were brawling, all brute force and raw collision. One Ice Beast looked a bit like a lion—Evan temporarily named it the Ice Lion.
The other Ice Beast resembled a tiger, so Evan called it the Ice Tiger. Both creatures were tens of meters tall, and when they opened their jaws you could see Mystic Ice-like fangs—utterly terrifying.
Judging by the power of their blows, both had to be at least at demigod level—every collision sent snow flying, exposing the Mystic Ice beneath, and the ice shattered in a radius of dozens of meters.
Evan’s Divine Cleave was barely this powerful, and the temperature here made the Mystic Ice even tougher—maybe even his Divine Cleave couldn’t break it, unless he used the Unicorn Arm.
Evan found it strange to see these two behemoths fighting in this frozen land. He instantly activated Light Transformation to hide his presence, since the Ice Beasts had already noticed him.
But as soon as he used Light Transformation, Evan felt a chill—he couldn’t use Watershift and Light Transformation at the same time. That’s probably the only flaw in Ninefold Stellar Transformation, though if he ever mastered it completely, he’d be able to use any combination of transformations at will.
Once he reached God Sovereign level, using all nine transformations at once wouldn’t be a problem—the power would be unimaginable. For now, Evan just watched the two behemoths fight, hoping he might be able to reap the rewards as the fisherman.
The two Ice Beasts were puzzled when Evan’s figure vanished, but soon went back to fighting. Each clash and bite made the whole area shudder—if there were mountains nearby, it would have triggered an avalanche.
Evan spread out his divine sense to check the surroundings. He knew two such powerful Ice Beasts wouldn’t fight for no reason—there had to be some benefit involved. The first thing that came to mind was the Heart of Frostflame.
Just as he suspected, not far from the brawl, a faint energy was radiating from a spot on the ground. If you didn’t look closely, you’d miss it—Evan quietly crept over to investigate.
There, buried in the snow, was a stalk of ice grass with three ice blossoms shaped like hearts. Blue flames danced atop each blossom—Evan instantly realized this was the legendary Heart of Frostflame…