Chapter 990: Shuhuo Takes the Lead

The girl is barefoot, her soles hovering half an inch above the ice.

Her ash‑white long hair is no longer a tangled cascade; it seems to have its own will, each strand drifting slowly in the air, the tips melting into the surrounding teal Bubbles.

Her skin is excessively pale, almost translucent, and beneath that layer of white something is moving.

Fine bluish‑gray threads trace along her neck and arms, like roots slowly wandering beneath the skin.

They are not chaotic; instead they form orderly patterns, winding down from the sides of her neck and blooming into clusters of golden flowers on her shoulders.

The buds pierce her skin, their petals as thin as cicada wings, edges shimmering with a jade‑like sheen.

They open silently, as if she were born to be this way.

Her attire changes along with it.

The ash‑white dark‑shadow robe remains, but it has been rewoven with countless tiny gold‑teal blossoms.

At the center of each petal hides a slowly rotating eyeball.

Some of those eyeballs are open, some half‑closed, like hundreds of tiny moons embedded in the fabric.

Each time she breathes, the eyes blink in unison, and the whole robe ripples like a sea of flowers brushed by wind, sending out an indescribable wave.

The lower edge of her skirt no longer shows any fabric edge; it has become translucent golden roots, linking with the Bubbles beneath her feet, like a tree growing together with its fruit.

A teal bell hangs from her ankle, mingling with the newly formed golden flower stems; each passing breeze makes it emit a soft chime.

The girl's face shows no decay; even the previous gloom of the dark‑shadow body has vanished completely.

Her features are still Qingque's, but her aura has been entirely transformed.

Her emerald eyes are so clear they seem inhuman, pupils like two drops of resin soaked in moonlight.

The outer corners of her eyes are haloed with a faint gold, the corners of her lips bear a smile, Calm that makes the hair stand on one's neck, as if a deity suddenly learned to show mercy to mortals.

Her ash‑white long hair floats gently in the air, a few strands winding to her forehead, covering half an eye, the eye behind the hair shining.

The most striking feature is the golden five‑petaled flower on her chest.

It no longer hovers beside the Lock, but has sunk into the center of her thorax, as if sprouting from the heart's location.

The petals open and close slowly, shedding fine specks of light.

The light dust lands on the surrounding Bubbles; the Bubbles instantly emit a light "bo" sound, and golden patterns quickly surface.

The entire Bubble ocean seems to respond to her, tens of thousands of Bubbles simultaneously tilting slowly toward her, like myriad living beings bowing their heads to a single tree.

Fu Xuan's throat moves, but no sound emerges.

She sees the girl slowly lift her face, her gaze passing through the sky‑full of Bubbles, landing on the Star Chariot.

The Divination Eye on her forehead sears with intense pain, everything deduced within it screaming.

The girl steps forward.

Her bare foot lands in empty space, instantly spawning a ring of golden ripples beneath.

The Bubbles automatically gather at her feet, then disperse as she takes the next step, as if even the air willingly yields for her.

The ice surface beneath her foot continuously blossoms, tiny golden vines sprouting from cracks, climbing her shadow and spreading forward.

"I am Shuhuo,"

She speaks, her voice like wind exhaled simultaneously from countless flower pistils, soft yet resonant.

The voice lands in each person's ear, sounding different for each.

What Fu Xuan hears is a gentle summons, like a mother calling her name from far away in childhood.

What Jing Liu hears, however, is a gust sweeping from ruins, bone‑chilling cold.

Yan Qing's sword buzzes in its scabbard, he is about to draw it, but the fatigue in that voice presses his wrist.

The girl halts, tilts her head slightly, as if listening to something.

She raises one hand, fingertip pointing toward the air.

Countless Bubbles rise along the direction of her finger.

The girl flicks lightly; all the Bubbles burst simultaneously, shards of light raining down, yet not a single drop reaches the ground, all drawn into her palm.

That hand clenches within the light, the light spilling from between her fingers, illuminating half her face with a bright, golden hue.

"Since then, I have met you again."

Shuhuo's eye corner lifts, smiling with merciful indifference, "How nice, this time I have new branches, new flowers."

Jing Liu says nothing.

Her figure vanishes abruptly from the Star Chariot, and when she reappears she stands less than three steps before the girl.

Cold air wraps her robe's hem and bursts outward, shattering all nearby Bubbles.

From her hand the Ice Sword slices horizontally; where the blade passes, the air ripples like torn gauze, emitting a sharp screech.

A fan‑shaped frost‑white blade of light spreads forward, hundreds of meters wide, sweeping across the ice; where it passes, a layer of ice is stripped away, shards and frozen snow lifted by the gust into the sky, like a white dragon erupting from the ground.

Shuhuo tilts her head slightly, her bare foot stepping lightly to the side by half a step, just avoiding the most intense part of the blade.

Yet her robe's hem is still grazed by the sword aura; several gold‑teal buds drift from her sleeves, freezing mid‑air into transparent slivers by lingering cold, then "ding" and shatter on the ice.

She lifts her hand, gently tapping the hollow of her own earlobe with her fingertip.

"Long time no see, your sword is still this cold."

The girl's voice falls from the wind, languid, as if this blade that could cleave half a mountain is merely an afternoon breeze outside the window.

Jing Liu does not answer, a foot crushing the ice beside his body, the whole person using the recoil to surge forward, the Ice Sword lifting from below upward.

Boom!

The sword tip darts through the air, carving a white line.

Shuhuo leans back, her ash‑white long hair rising like mist, a few strands brushing the blade and being cut into two pieces.

The severed hair flips in the air, then "pa" bursts into several golden flowers, drifting toward Jing Liu's face.

Jing Liu swings his sword directly; the light powder scattered as the petals shatter adheres to his sleeve, then, as if alive, it drills into flesh.

She flicked her wrist, the cold instantly wrapped the whole forearm, freezing the glittering powder together with the cuff; she flicked her hand again, the icy shell peeled off and fell to the ground with a "crack".

"Do you hate me?" Shuhuo said.

She didn't retreat further, instead stepped a small step forward, tip of her foot touching the ground; from beneath the ice surface dozens of golden vines silently shot out, clinging to the ground and winding toward Jing Liu's ankle.

The vines' surfaces were covered with rice‑grain‑sized eye spots, each rotating in a different direction.

Jing Liu didn't even glance, swung his horizontal sword, the sword aura like an inverted ice wall, crushing all those vines.

Amid the flying debris, her figure flashed, appearing behind Shuhuo again.

Ice Sword rose in a vertical slash, the blade streaking straight down from mid‑air, as if to cleave the heavens themselves.

Shuhuo merely turned her face to the side, not even looking back.

She lazily lifted her right hand, two fingers gently pinching above her head, and the Ice Sword, forged from extreme cold, was steadily held between her fingers.

The blade was only an inch from the top of her hair; cold surged along the sword into her palm, yet she seemed unaware, instead humming, as if savoring the centuries‑long hatred sealed within the sword.

"Your sword is sharper than it was back then."

Shuhuo slowly turned, her fingers still holding the blade, the motion as effortless as pinching a willow leaf.

Her ash‑gray long hair floated behind her, countless tiny golden‑blue blossoms poking out from the strands, their eyes turning.