Chapter 29

Lin Du’s malicious nature was something Li Dong had experienced firsthand. He knew that pretending to be weak to earn a woman’s sympathy was actually a cunning trap set with malicious intent.

But at this moment, when he was desperate for help, Li Dong could only lower his voice and plead, “Lin Daoist, you are the direct disciple of the number one sect in the righteous path. Surely you wouldn’t stand by and watch us die?”

This was a classic case of moral coercion, and Lin Du turned to leave.

“I don’t have parents, so I don’t have any morality.”

They were asking for trouble by trying to make her stay. After all, this was her Floating Life. Wherever she went, the Floating Life would follow, as long as she wished it.

But clearly, neither of them realized that Lin Du was connected to the bizarre frost appearing in the desert. They called out loudly.

“Lin Daoist, Lin Daoist, please wait!”

“Lin Daoist, one hundred spirit stones! If you save me, I’ll give you one hundred spirit stones.”

Usually, when people mentioned spirit stones, they meant low-grade stones. Only when referring to high-grade or mid-grade stones would they specify.

Lin Du stopped in her tracks. “One hundred?”

Ni Si gritted her teeth, “One thousand. To save two people, that’s all I can offer.”

She still remembered Li Dong.

Lin Du said, “Alright then.”

As she spoke, she lightly flicked spiritual energy through the air. The ice that had spread to Ni Si’s neck shattered with a crackle.

Indeed, it was thin ice.

If it had been Luo Ze’s millennium-thick ice, she would have needed to use her fists.

She had pondered this for a long time and realized that the solution was not in the Floating Life fan but within herself.

“Is that all? So simple?” Ni Si, realizing she could move again despite still feeling numb, asked, “Will it freeze up again?”

Lin Du disliked foolish people. She stood there and said, “It’s done. The money?”

Ni Si’s eyes darted. “For just this, one thousand spirit stones is too much. Lin Daoist, you’re a direct disciple of the number one sect. Surely you don’t lack such petty cash?”

Lin Du despised those who tried to take advantage of her. She nodded, “I do need it. My father isn’t the sect leader.”

Ni Si was taken aback.

Lin Du glanced at the still-frozen scumbag, her thumb lightly rubbing the middle finger of the hand holding the fan. She then turned to face the two of them.

“This fellow Daoist, I have two choices. One, wait for you to give me one thousand spirit stones. Two, I handle it personally and take everything on you, including the one thousand spirit stones. Choose one.”

Ni Si felt a bone-chilling cold and couldn’t help but shiver.

Although the young man before her was smiling, she keenly sensed something was wrong.

Ni Si was the sect leader’s daughter, a refined figure cultivated from a young age with the best resources. She could see that beneath Lin Du’s smiling face was a cold, murderous intent.

But how could this be?

A disciple of the Unparalleled Sect couldn’t possibly be this kind of person.

【Host, if you erase the bias before the task is complete, the task will be considered a failure.】

Lin Du’s hand holding the fan paused, and she lowered her gaze, letting out a light sigh. “What a pity.”

She said this casually, without the usual telepathic reply.

Just this one line made Ni Si’s hairs stand on end, and she took a step back.

“I’ll give it, I’ll give it.”

Li Dong, still frozen, quickly shouted, “Si Si.”

Ni Si snapped back to reality and hurriedly took out one thousand spirit stones. “You have to save him. I’ll give the stones once you’ve saved me.”

Lin Du’s eyes slowly shifted to the frozen scumbag.

Then, her smile grew wider. “Alright.”

She raised her hand and walked step by step towards Li Dong.

In just a few steps, Ni Si and Li Dong held their breath as if they had endured some form of torture.

Until Lin Du suddenly acted. Two streams of energy struck Li Dong’s back, targeting either side of his spine.

The ice cracked open, and Li Dong, who was numb from the cold, didn’t immediately notice anything wrong.

Lin Du waved her sleeve, taking the one thousand spirit stones, and turned to leave.

She walked steadily, but in a single step, she reached the end of the frost.

Ni Si was stunned by this scene and exclaimed in disbelief, “How could a cultivator in the Qin Heart realm teleport instantly? What kind of footwork is that?”

Li Dong still felt cold, as if the chill was seeping from his internal organs, specifically from his waist, icy and piercing.

The elders observed everything.

Ju Yuan looked expressionlessly at the scene behind him. To be honest, there were too many small sects; he didn’t know which sect the two children were from. Thankfully, the Heavenly Eye could only see their actions, not hear their conversations.

From the back, it seemed that Lin Du deliberately moved to the back of the male cultivator and struck near his third vertebra, likely targeting his kidneys.

The kidneys were closer to the back; otherwise, Lin Du had no reason to go behind him to break the ice.

Ju Yuan glanced at the male cultivator’s face and vaguely remembered he was the narrow-minded young man Lin Du had intervened with on the day of recruitment.

As he thought about it, he felt a slight chill in his own waist.

Lin Du was a pure ice elemental root. Having spent her time in the coldest place, Luo Ze, if there was a trace of such extreme cold in his kidneys, it would truly take three to five years of warmth to recover.

It was a thoroughly insidious method.

But thinking that he was the disciple of that person made it seem almost normal.

Lin Du wandered through the desert, feeling quite bored. She even thought her life might need some background music, like “Let It Go” from *Frozen*.

If she sang it out loud, would the Heavenly Eye cut it off for copyright issues?

After all, what she had just done, though it might not seem significant to those directly involved, would be recognized by higher-level cultivators for its subtlety.

Ice elemental roots are mutated, and Li Dong didn’t have them. With her spiritual energy infiltrating his kidneys, even if he wasn’t crippled, he wouldn’t last long.

For a man, this is probably more unbearable than death.

Lin Du was walking when he suddenly felt something was wrong.

The desert was off.

After she put away her fan, she stopped using spiritual power to reinforce it, and the thin ice that had initially formed had melted.

But it melted in a particularly strange way.

The areas that melted first were crisscrossed and orderly, with a clear pattern.

Lin Du didn’t notice at first. It was only when she extended her spiritual sense to confirm that those ominous things hadn’t followed her that she noticed this strange phenomenon.

It was as if… beneath the desert, there was something.

Something man-made.

It was as regular as water pipes and electrical circuits laid out during construction.

Lin Du’s mind worked quickly. This desert was full of unknowns, but considering it used to occupy such a large area of this small world and was a collapsed small world, the books she had read mentioned that such collapsed small worlds often yielded more ruins of cultivators. However, this small world had very few ruins on the map, mostly spiritual plants and demonic beasts.

What if, in the desert, there were ruins of cultivators?