Chapter 443: Only That Path Can Be Taken

Everyone turned toward the sound.

They saw that on a nearby rock, there seemed to be a few stone steps!

Although the edges had been worn round by ice and snow, the upward-extending steps were still clearly discernible.

A guard exclaimed, "There really is a path!"

Xiao Ningyuan looked up following the direction of the steps and saw the narrow path winding upward, disappearing into the higher snow mist: "Great, Tuan Tuan, looks like we can get this easily this time!"

Tuan Tuan was happy: "Second Uncle, let's go up!"

"Good!" Xiao Er examined the stone steps, which were coated with a layer of ice, and said, "Miss, you have to get down and walk yourself; these steps are too slippery."

"All right!" Tuan Tuan was delighted; she had wanted to get down for a while.

Xiao Er untied the cloth strap and set her down on the ground.

Tuan Tuan scooped up some snow from the ground, rolled it into a small ball, and said, "Too bad Yueyue isn't here; then I could play in the snow with him."

Before her words finished, a small snowball hit her shoulder.

Xiao Ningyuan gave a mischievous grin: "Hehe, I'm Yueyue, Tuan Tuan!"

"Big brother, you're bullying me!" Tuan Tuan hurled the snowball in her hand at Xiao Ningyuan.

Xiao Ningyuan deliberately didn't dodge, letting the glutinous‑rice‑ball‑sized snowball hit his thigh.

He cried "Ay—" and flopped onto the snow: "Ouch! I can't move!"

Tuan Tuan rushed over to help him: "Big brother!"

She had just squatted beside her brother when Xiao Ningyuan suddenly scooped up his sister and began tickling her, making Xiao Tuanzi giggle: "Second Uncle! Come quick! Big brother is so nasty!"

A group of people watched the siblings playing together and all laughed.

Lu Qi selected a few people: "Brothers, follow me ahead."

"Young master, follow behind them."

"Xiao Er, keep an eye on the miss behind the young master; don't let her fall."

"The rest, bring up the rear!"

"Yes!"

Xiao Er nodded: "Brother Lu, you've thought of everything."

Everyone stepped onto the stairs and went up step by step.

The stairs were steep and slippery; in some places one had to use both hands and feet.

The cold wind blew snow particles onto the face, stinging painfully.

After walking about half an hour, a muffled "boom" suddenly came from above.

They looked up and saw a large mass of snow mixed with debris pouring down, blocking the sky as it rolled downward.

"Avalanche!" Lu Qi barked, "Get out of the way!"

"To the right! Behind the rock!" Xiao Er, quick-eyed and quick-handed, grabbed Tuan Tuan to his chest with one hand and seized Xiao Ningyuan with the other, lunging toward a nearby rock on the right.

Xiao Ningyuan hadn't reacted yet when he was seized from behind, staggered a few steps, and with an "ah" fell to the ground.

Lu Qi and the others quickly ducked behind nearby rocks.

The snow surge crashed past, and only after a long while did it gradually subside.

Everyone was buried in the snow.

Xiao Er released Tuan Tuan from his embrace, brushed away the thick snow above his head, crawled out, and then fully pushed open the hole he had made: "Miss, Young Master, are you all right?"

Xiao Tuanzi popped out of the snowdrift, her face flushed red but otherwise unharmed.

Xiao Ningyuan shook off the snow covering his head and body, glanced at Xiao Er, and said, "Your reflexes are really fast!"

He looked around and shouted loudly, "Is everyone all right?"

Lu Qi poked his head out from another snowdrift: "No problem!"

"I'm fine too!"

People emerged from the snowdrifts one after another; fortunately they had dodged the mass, and no one was swept away.

But the stairs they had come up on were now completely buried under the collapsed snow.

Lu Qi stared toward where the stairs had been, furrowed his brow, and said, "The road is cut off."

At the same moment, in the camp below the mountain.

Several people dressed entirely in white, with their hair wrapped in white headscarves, appeared like ghosts and swiftly dispatched the guards left behind.

Two of them checked the items in the tent and reported to the leader: "They've gone up the mountain."

The leader in white stepped out of the tent and gazed up at Snow Mountain; faintly visible was the mist rising from the avalanche, like a round mass.

"Restore everything to its original state! They've met an avalanche and won't be able to come down for a while."

"That little girl has astonishing luck; she won't die so easily."

"Let's wait here for them to return and ambush them!"

"Remember, first seize that girl; once you have her, you can interrogate the others about where the treasure is, and they will surely tell."

"Yes!"

On the mountain, Xiao Ningyuan looked around; everywhere was a blank expanse of white.

Not to mention the stairs they had come up on; even many huge rocks were buried in the snow, and the scene before them was completely different from when they had ascended.

"So this is what an avalanche is like—quite an eye‑opener."

Xiao Er looked down the mountain; the path down was also completely buried.

He frowned: "Trouble—there's no way up, and no way down either."

"We can't just wait." Lu Qi gritted his teeth; as an old hand of the martial world, he knew that in dire straits one must not sit and wait for death: "Everyone spread out and look for any passable route."

Everyone immediately scattered into small groups, poking with blades and probing with feet, trudging through knee‑deep snow to search.

Xiao Ningyuan took Tuan Tuan's hand and walked slowly behind, with Xiao Er closely following the two, not daring to stray far.

After a while, they found nothing.

Suddenly, "crack!"

A clear cracking sound came from beneath everyone's feet.

"Not good!" Xiao Er shouted, "Scatter!" He reached out to grab Tuan Tuan and Xiao Ningyuan.

But it was already too late; the two in front plummeted downward.

Xiao Ningyuan only felt emptiness under his feet, heard exclamations all around, and the world spun before his eyes.

He tightly gripped his sister's hand: "Tuan Tuan! Don't let go!"

Immediately after, he landed on a slope, pulled hard, and held Tuan Tuan tightly against his chest.

After an uncontrolled tumble, he crashed onto a flat ice surface, his bones feeling as if they had fallen apart.

He rubbed his sister's small arms and legs: "Tuan Tuan, are you hurt?"

Tuan Tuan shook her little head: "I'm fine! Big brother, how about you?"

When landing, she lay on Xiao Ningyuan's body; aside from feeling a bit dizzy from the roll, she wasn't hurt at all.

Xiao Ningyuan's heart settled back into place, he moved his limbs: "All right, I'm not injured either!"

Tuan Tuan got up, looked around; not a single person from the group had fallen, they were scattered around.

"Second Uncle! Seventh Uncle! Guard uncles, are you all alright?"

Everyone was bruised and battered by the sudden fall.

"I'm fine!" was Xiao Er's voice.

"I'm great!" was Lu Qi.

"My ankle feels twisted!"

Responses came one after another.

After a moment, everyone stood up; fortunately, among the guards only one had a sprained ankle and two had scraped arms.

After the fright subsided slightly, everyone looked around.

This is a huge natural ice cave; the ceiling is high and wide, and they fell in through a crack hanging more than ten zhang above their heads.

All four walls are ten-thousand-year-old ice, emitting a faint blue light; a hazy glow fills the cave, barely enough to see.

Xiao Ningyuan pointed at the crack above: "Who among you has good lightness skill? Can you get out?"

Xiao Er shook his head: "Young Master, everything around is ice, slippery; even with excellent lightness skill you couldn't leap straight up that high from flat ground."

"Oh." Xiao Ningyuan, hearing that, looked around, seeking another exit.

"I've looked it over," Lu Qi pointed to a depression deep in the ice cave, "only that path is passable."