Chapter 605: Lu Wu, you've crossed the line!

Jiang Feng felt a bit doubtful.

Here was clearly already the mountaintop, at least the highest place he could see.

Going further up, there was only light and clouds; nothing else could be seen.

But that senior said they hadn't yet reached the summit.

Jiang Feng opened his mouth, but before he could speak, the man's figure had already become blurry.

The gray robe faded in the golden light, bit by bit disappearing.

"Senior?"

Jiang Feng shouted.

There was no response.

"Senior!"

He shouted again, his voice louder, producing an echo off the cliff.

Still no response.

The man's figure vanished completely, taking with it that oppressive feeling, that breath‑stealing majesty, disappearing cleanly.

Only Jiang Feng remained on the platform; he stood there, brows furrowed.

Jiang Feng raised his head and looked again at the golden cliffs. The patterns on the cliffs still glowed, the light soft, warming his face.

Just because he couldn't see a path didn't mean there wasn't one.

That senior wouldn't deceive him, and had no need to.

Jiang Feng took a deep breath.

He stepped forward.

At the moment his foot touched down, the whole world changed.

It was as if someone had torn open a painting before him, revealing the reality behind the canvas. The pleasant, golden mountaintop vanished.

In its place came a bone‑piercing cold that drilled into his marrow.

A blizzard.

A blizzard filling the sky.

The wind was so strong it felt like countless hands were pushing him, making it hard for him to stand.

The temperature plummeted.

It wasn't a gradual cooling; it was like being snatched from warm water and tossed straight into an ice cellar, cold enough to shrink his lungs and make his blood feel like it would freeze.

Jiang Feng instinctively circulated his true qi, hoping to use it to shield his body against the bitter cold.

This was an instinctive reaction honed from over twenty years of cultivation.

But this time, nothing happened.

His elixir field was empty.

Like a well drained dry, not a drop of water left.

He sensed no true qi, no flow of power, nothing that a cultivator should possess.

Jiang Feng froze.

He tried again.

His mind sank, his divine sense turned inward, examining meridians, elixir field, acupoints…

All were empty.

It wasn't suppressed; there really was nothing.

It was as if he had never cultivated at all—clean, utterly empty.

"Holy shit!"

Jiang Feng couldn't help but blurt out a curse.

"Where is my cultivation?"

"What's going on?"

No matter what, he was a half‑step Martial Ancestor, a Kunlun Descendant, a strong cultivator of over twenty years.

Even if his divine soul had been wounded by Dongfang Jue's Soul Melting Technique, his cultivation shouldn't have vanished.

"Where did it go?"

Jiang Feng stood in the blizzard, his mind in chaos.

He was now just an ordinary person.

No, he was worse than an ordinary person.

Bone‑chilling cold surged from all directions.

It wasn't a slowly seeping cold; it was like someone dumped a bucket of ice water from head to toe, then tossed him into a freezer.

His clothes were already ragged and couldn't block the wind at all.

Snow crept into his cuffs, collar, and pant legs, clinging to his skin, making his whole body shiver.

Jiang Feng's teeth began to chatter, clacking loudly enough to hurt his ears.

His fingers quickly lost feeling, turning stiff and unable to bend.

His toes went numb; stepping on the snow, he could no longer tell whether he was stepping on stone or ice.

He knew clearly that if he didn't leave soon, with his current ordinary constitution, he would quickly die of hypothermia here.

Jiang Feng gritted his teeth, turned his nearly frozen neck, and looked around.

Everything around was white.

There were no reference points, nothing recognizable.

The blizzard covered everything, leaving only white between heaven and earth, endless white.

He remembered the direction in which the man had disappeared.

He remembered that the man had vanished in a golden light, upward, deeper into those rock walls. That direction was clear in his memory, but in this blizzard, direction had lost all meaning.

Up, down, left, right were all white; he could not even tell which way was up.

But he had to keep going.

Staying here meant death.

Jiang Feng stepped forward.

The snow was deep, so deep that when he stepped, his entire lower leg sank in.

Each step required great effort, each consuming the little stamina he had.

It was not from fatigue, but from cold.

Cold enough that his lungs felt frozen, each breath like inhaling shards of ice, cold and painful. His throat constricted, his trachea spasmed, and breathing grew ever more difficult.

He did not stop.

He could not stop.

Stopping meant he would never get up again.

He pressed on against the wind and snow, step by step.

He did not know how long he had walked.

Here time had no meaning; there was only walking, nonstop. His body began to show signs of hypothermia...

First came violent trembling, shaking his whole body, even his bones rattling.

His consciousness began to blur.

It was not the blur from injury‑induced unconsciousness before, but a gentle, even somewhat comfortable blur.

He began to feel not cold, even somewhat warm, as if he had slipped under a thick quilt in a cold winter, his whole body wrapped up.

Jiang Feng knew what this meant.

It meant he was nearing his limit.

At a certain point of hypothermia, a person loses the sense of cold and experiences a false warmth.

If he closed his eyes now, he would never open them again.

His steps slowed.

The blizzard howled in his ears, a sound so loud it seemed like countless people screaming.

But those sounds grew farther and more muffled, as if someone were slowly turning down the volume on a small radio.

His vision also narrowed.

What he could see grew ever less.

All the white blended together, becoming an infinite white wall.

Bewildered.

More frightening than the cold was the bewilderment.

He did not know which way to go, what lay ahead, whether he had walked the right direction after all this time, or how much longer he had to walk.

It seemed as if only he remained between heaven and earth.

Jiang Feng's steps grew ever slower, slowing to almost a stop.

His body leaned forward, but because he was moving so slowly, he lacked even the strength to fall.

His eyelids grew heavier.

That warm, comfortable, sleep‑inducing feeling grew stronger.

A voice spoke in his mind...

Sleep, just sleep and it will be fine.

He knew that was death speaking to him.

But he was truly exhausted.

So exhausted he had no strength left to protest.

His eyes slowly closed.

Just as his consciousness was about to disintegrate, he heard a voice.

"Roar!"

It carried a strong emotion.

Urgent, and caring.

Jiang Feng's ears twitched.

He heard it.

He knew what it was.

It was Lu Wu's voice.

Jiang Feng forced his eyes open.

He could not see clearly; everything before him was white, white as a huge curtain that hid everything.

But he made out a shadow.

That shadow was not far ahead, crouching there, looking at him.

Golden large eyes.

Jiang Feng recognized those eyes.

His lips moved, wanting to call out Lu Wu, but his mouth was frozen, able only to utter indistinct, unintelligible syllables.

He cannot die Here.

Jiang Feng clenched his teeth and shifted forward the leg that could barely move a step.

Then another step.

Another step.

His eyes kept fixed on that golden shadow, staring at those eyes.

The blizzard continued.

Snow was still falling, wind still howling, and between heaven and earth it was still a vast white expanse.

But Jiang Feng did not stop again.

And at some unknown distance away, a man stood There.

The blizzard howled around him, but could not reach him.

Those snow and wind seemed to flow around him, but at a point three feet outside his body they were blocked by something invisible. He stood with his hands behind his back, his gray robe motionless.

Before him was a huge Light Curtain.

A thing covered in snow, with tattered clothes, barely recognizable as human, was trudging with difficulty across the snow.

Lu Wu crouched beside the man's foot, his golden eyes also fixed on that Light Curtain.

It looked for a moment, then suddenly let out a low growl.

The man lowered his head and glanced at Lu Wu, his brow slightly furrowed.

"Lu Wu."

His voice was not loud, very calm, but carried an undeniable authority.

"You have crossed the line."