Mirror (Prologue Final)

Thousands of bone pieces scattered across the floor. The intact ones were in a depressing position — one of their hands reached towards the exit while the rest of their body lied face down.

Scratch marks were present on the ground at the tips of their fingers... and in closer inspection, most of the skeletons had no lower halves.

"What happened here?" Luo Ling gasped at the sight.

Finally, they reached the end of the path. An entrance stood before them. When they entered, they found themselves in a large room.

The surroundings barely resembled a cave anymore. With chiseled and painted walls, a myriad of stone statues, and a glass roof, it looked more like a hideout.

"Where are we?" Lan Yunhao had no idea this kind of place existed near his territory.

"An underground lair, it seems like."

By the time they got there, Luo Ling got used to the skeletons and used energy to sweep them away. The two searched the huge room amidst the piles of bones that hindered their progress.

Lan Yunhao opened a door, but behind it was a gray rocky wall. He sighed and continued searching.

The same thing happened to Luo Ling. This happened a couple of times more than it should have.

Eventually, only one door hadn't been opened yet. Skeptical about what was behind it, the two didn't get their hopes up.

'I bet it's another rocky wall. What are the chances that the last door would be the one that would lead anywhere?'

Lan Yunhao, filled with impatience, went up to the wooden door and directly kicked it with his leg!

It didn't budge.

'What? How could this door hold up? Even though I didn't use any energy then, my physical cultivation should be enough.'

"Pfft."

Hearing the snort, Lan Yunhao furrowed his brows. This time, he reinforced his leg with an ample amount of Dark energy.

He sent a kick at the door faster than before.

It still didn't budge.

"Your turn is up, it's my turn now."

Luo Ling pushed the angry emperor aside, placed his hand on the knob, and tried to turn it.

Clunk...

It didn't work.

He tried to turn it again, but the opposite way this time.

Clunk...

Still didn't work.

"What are you doing? Open it already."

"What do you think I'm doing?"

Clunk, clunk, clunk.

Lan Yunhao stared at the brat who struggled to open a door. He crossed his arms and tapped his feet.

Confusion and indignation built up inside Luo Ling as he failed to open the door.

An azure glint flashed on his pupil. At the same time, he channeled Frost energy through his arm and into the knob. The wooden mechanism became chilly.

Luo Ling had his eyes closed as he tried to unlock the knob by using his Frost energy. He felt where there were walls and where he could proceed.

A vague reconstruction of the mechanism slowly took shape in the youth's mind. He had an idea of how to unlock the door.

'I just need to hold this thingy here... and push this block... and there we go!'

A smile crept up on Luo Ling's face. He twisted the wooden knob with confidence.

Clunk.

Veins popped out of Luo Ling's forehead. Frustrated with the result of his hard work, he walked away.

After a while...

The door finally opened after all the effort the two put into doing so.

The entire place roared with quakes and vibrations when the wooden door was opened forcefully. Both the emperor and the youth felt an ominous premonition, but they chose to ignore it, walking inside with reckless abandon.

As they entered, the atmosphere suddenly changed. The temperature seemed to rise and fall every second. Being both dark and bright, and being both wet and dry. The two felt a strong wind pushing against them, but they also felt no force acting on them.

Lan Yunhao and Luo Ling looked at each other, and they nodded. Their feet reached further inside the room, and their body followed along.

In the middle of the room was a small pedestal, and an almost shattered glass case with a velvet pillow inside. Lying on the velvet pillow was an artifact.

"The Gemstone Mirror..." Luo Ling couldn't help but utter in astonishment as he looked at the sight in front of him.

Energies of all elements wandered around the room in a deadlock between each other, neither dissipating nor forming. These energies densified to create various colored rays of light pointed towards the mirror. The myriad of hues reflected off the artifact, mixing and matching as the rays met in the air.

And it just so happens that those colors were different types of energies!

The black light for Dark energy.

The bright light for Light energy.

The dark blue light for Frost energy.

The red light for Heat energy.

The green light for Nature energy.

The sky blue light for Wind energy.

The brown light for Earth energy.

And finally, the yellow light for Thunder energy.

These eight fended off and helped one another in existing simultaneously in the small confined space. As a result of their clashes, vision in this place was distorted by the mist.

"I didn't expect to find this so soon!"

Luo Ling covered his body with a Frost energy barrier, but it constantly got interrupted by the wild energies. Nevertheless, he walked step by step with increasing determination as he got nearer to his goal. Lan Yunhao stayed behind, knowing that he would be no match for the violent currents of the flowing energy.

Boom! Heat and Frost made contact with each other, resulting in an explosion right beside Luo Ling. He retreated a few steps toward the side.

Whoosh! A strong breeze pushed him back several paces and disappeared.

Bam! The hard Earth energy struck Luo Ling's abdomen right when he had his barrier down.

Some Dark energy covered his vision, and some Light energy blinded it after.

Luo Ling met with countless troubles on the way to the pedestal in the middle. Even with his Platinum cultivation, he still struggled to make it to the middle.

The youth's hands flashed through the air as the artifact grew closer to getting reached. He pushed himself to the limit, resisting all of the energies that hit him anywhere on his body.

"...There!"

Closing his palms, Luo Ling grabbed the handle of the Gemstone Mirror. A light glowed from his storage ring and sucked the artifact in!

The absence of the artifact immediately affected the environment inside the room.

Since there was nothing to circulate the energies anymore, the clashing stopped and every element exited through the nearest hole.

To cracks on the roof, spaces between the tiles, and holes on the walls, the various energies sought shelter. Luo Ling saw the colored mist sneaking through even the smallest spaces.

Soon enough, the room was empty.

A white light shone through a certain opening on the wall, directly landing on the now empty velvet pillow.

Lan Yunhao stood agape at the entrance of the room from just watching the scene before him unfold.

Unlike Luo Ling who stood still, dazed, the emperor observed the many changes that happened to the room.

Vines started growing out of the holes on the wall at a fast pace. The spaces between tiles got filled with earth, and water droplets leaked from the previously dry ceiling.

"Brat, let's get out of here — the place is gonna flood with different problems soon!"

"Huh?" Luo Ling snapped out and observed the same differences. He nodded and walked out of the room.

"We got the mirror, let's head to your palace. Yueyue is there, right?"

"Yes, my doctors are currently looking into her case."

Lan Yunhao and Luo Ling headed out the room. The latter ejected a chilling frost upwards, making the hard ceiling of the cave fragile.

He then sent a hard punch towards that spot, breaking through immediately. Shards of ice rained down on his face. However, the hole wasn't as deep as he imagined.

Repeating the process, Luo Ling ejected some frost then sent a punch.

"That's gonna take too long." Lan Yunhao watched the inefficiency of the process.

Luo Ling clicked his tongue in response. He didn't want to admit it but Papa Xiao was right.

'How do I make this faster?' The youth pondered for a bit. Thoughts and ideas flowed through his mind.

'Can I do this? No, it's too tedious. How about... no, it's gonna take longer than now — Aha!'

A smile crept up on Luo Ling's face as he looked at the part of the ceiling he punched out. He retracted his fist...

...and punched out, sending some Frost energy simultaneously!

The earth above him got frozen then shattered in succession.

"Hehe, this'll work!" Luo Ling didn't use much of his power then, he just tested the potential of his plan.

Lan Yunhao watched as the brat in front of him took a stance... then both his hands delivered rapid blows to the ceiling! The emperor imagined himself receiving these blows — he wouldn't survive even a single one!

The atmosphere turned chilly as some of the excess Frost energy mixed with the air.

After a while, the duo managed to see a large space from the other side of the hole Luo Ling made.

"We finally got out of there."

"...Wait, where are we?"

Lush green grass surrounded Lan Yunhao's feet. Flowers of all types bloomed around him, their scent reaching his nose.

He looked around, seeing that Luo Ling was gone. Instead, he found someone else.

A womanly figure crouched down, her black hair covering her back. Wearing a blue dress, a basket hung from her arm as her hands picked some flowers and placed them on the basket.

Beside her was a child, about 4 years of age. Her head turned towards the basket as she counted how many flowers there were inside.

"...Little Yue?" The emperor could still remember the face of his daughter before she disappeared along with her mother.

As he contemplated whether to approach the peaceful figure of the two, a voice rung inside his head.

"Stupid old man, we're back at the Caliginous Forest!"

Shaking his head, Lan Yunhao cleared his mind. Suddenly, the scene around him changed.

The flowers wilted in a pace visible to the naked eye, the tall grass burned leaving nothing but ashes, and the two figures slowly got covered in black...

Rage filled Lan Yunhao. 'Twice? You dare do tricks to This Emperor twice?!'

He dashed toward the two figures that sent him illusions and took out his trusty dagger.

The emperor disappeared into the darkness of the forest and reappeared right behind the two black figures.

"Eeaakk-! K!" A screech echoed through the forest, followed by another right after.

Luo Ling watched as the emperor brutally murdered the two Shadow Beasts pestering him. 'Geez, this old man is too violent.'

He didn't get affected by an illusion since his cultivation rendered the illusion useless.

Soon enough, Lan Yunhao appeared before him. "Let's go."

Two streaks made their way through the landscape, dashing at lightspeed. Shockwaves burst from their backs, dust flying everywhere.

These two became the first people to exit the forest alive and well.

"It's day already?"

Lan Yunhao watched the locations that they passed. 'That's the Sacred Witch Hut, and that's the Abandoned Kingdom...'

As they got nearer the capital, Lan Yunhao felt an ominous premonition.

In the light of day, the heat of the sun didn't reach the two. The scorched earth that was supposed to be dry started getting covered in ice.

A certain frost brushed the emperor's skin.

Luo Ling came to a screeching halt, with the emperor following suit.

"...What happened here?"

Lan Yunhao had wide eyes as he looked at the people of his empire... frozen in place. They carried their belongings with them and was running away from the capital.

However, these unfortunate people didn't make it.

Luo Ling recalled the scene from inside the cave, where the skeletons looked desperate to get away.

The two looked at each other before rushing inside the capital.

The youth broke through the large wooden gate.

As the ice shattered in front of him, frozen heads slowly revealed themselves.

Lan Yunhao gasped — there were much more people behind the gate!

They had a look of despair in their eyes as they looked towards the palace. Their feet kicked and their hands punched against the gate.

Little children and adults alike, all of them frozen in the wasteland. Carriages too large to fit through the small passage got stuck, leaving it and its passenger inside.

The humble buildings in the outer reaches of the capital were all covered in ice, and so were the luxurious ones located in the inner ring.

The duo walked as slow as possible to digest everything that they saw and continued to see.

Everything in sight was frozen. Trees, paths, houses, even the fire inside lamps were frozen!

Luo Ling felt a sense of familiarity with this frost. There was, of course, the superficial similarity that he cultivated Frost energy. However, he felt that it was deeper than that.

Suddenly, a thought struck his mind.

"Old man Lan, where is your daughter located?" With a sense of urgency, Luo Ling asked Lan Yunhao.

Realizing this matter, Lan Yunhao couldn't care less about the fact that he was called Old Man by the brat. He rushed toward the palace, and Luo Ling followed behind him.

The frost got thicker and denser as they got nearer to the center of the capital. Lan Yunhao couldn't endure through the cold anymore and he stopped at a certain distance.

He fell to his knees and finally broke down. His mind couldn't take enormous pressure anymore. Tears flowed down his eyes as he screamed, "Why?!"

Luo Ling squinted his eyes. 'With a mindset like that, how did he get so strong? Giving up so easily.'

"Hey, Old man Lan, if you can't continue, at least tell me where Yueyue is."

Lan Yunhao couldn't respond as his mind was full of turmoil.

The youth couldn't bear watching the pathetic scene before him and continued on his way. Before long, he arrived in front of the palace's entrance.

The frozen stone walls reflected the daylight, giving off a subtle luster. The constantly flapping flags formed a thin layer of ice, suspending it in mid-air. A small moat separated the infrastructure from every other building in the capital. The water-filled moat froze up and ice occupied the space.

Jumping over the moat, Luo Ling broke the door and entered the palace.

As soon as he made it inside, a wave of coldness—which even he, who had a cultivation of 11 platinum-stroked Ice gems, had to be careful of—washed over him. A sharp drop in temperature caused Luo Ling to shiver slightly.

He didn't use his movement technique. 'If I did, I'd probably freeze to death.'

Exploring the palace, Luo Ling got quite lost. The inside was unnaturally dark as if something sucked the light out of it. He had no knowledge of the place, and he couldn't risk surveying with his Frost energy for fear that he might freeze up too.

With doors left and right, Luo Ling opened all of them in search of Xiao Yueyue. She was most likely frozen up, but he couldn't care less. All he wanted was to see her.

Some of the doors he opened had people that lied down on the floor, some had heads lying on their desks, and some had couples having... well, let's not talk about that.

All of these people were frozen, so Luo Ling could only imagine what Xiao Yueyue was going through right now.

As he opened more and more doors, he felt the temperature decrease every step he took towards a certain direction. He decided to head that way.

"Brrr..." His cultivation was useless now. He felt the extreme cold, familiar to when he almost died in the cave.

Luo Ling arrived at the place where the Frost energy was the densest — the source of all of these people's misery.

Blue mist occupied the space in front of Luo Ling. Xiao Yueyue was in the middle of the room, covered in a cocoon of ice. The frost induced numerous cracks in the walls that couldn't break.

Gritting his teeth, Luo Ling walked in the room. Another drop in temperature went through Luo Ling's body.

Suddenly, he realized something.

'This purity... There's no doubt about it, this is the Frost energy of the Sapphire Flower!'

Luo Ling's eyebrows shot up as he looked around the room to find the culprit.

'That damn flower, showing up everywhere!'

However, he saw no sign of the flower being anywhere near this place. This left him confused.

'...Well, even if I do find the flower, it won't help me.'

Luo Ling sighed as he walked closer to Xiao Yueyue's body.

This was definitely weird.

Other people only had a layer of ice cover their body, whether it be thick or thin. In Xiao Yueyue's case, a large ice crystal encased her body, trapping her deep inside.

"Yueyue, I'm here..." Luo Ling looked at Xiao Yueyue's figure full of peace. Fog came out of his mouth as he spoke every word.

Inside of the ice, the girl's body regained its former vitality. Every sign that she almost died already disappeared, such as the large gash on her pearly white skin.

As he observed her body more, he noticed one peculiarity. The black gem on her ring was mostly gone.

'That's... the pair of the ring she gave me.' He looked at his own ring, which shocked him. It was in a similar state. 'Since when...?'

Luo Ling didn't know what happened to both their rings when he recalled a faint memory.

As Xiao Yueyue gave him the accessory, she muttered something in a small voice. "I- if you're in trouble, this ring will help you, so don't remove it!"

Hearing her concern, Luo Ling laughed it off.

Right now, those words had a different meaning to him.

He always found it weird how the Sapphire Flower already wilted next to him. He clearly remembered that the flower was still full of energy as it sent out batches of pure Frost energy like it was nothing.

'Thinking about it now, there's also the fact that even if I had the complete 15 platinum-stroked Ice gem set, it wouldn't have been enough for the flower's tenacity. There must've been another output...

Wait! How did I wake up in the first place?'

This matter didn't bog his mind much since he already brushed it off as nothing short of a miracle. He thought that his body circulated the energies while he was unconscious, thereby promoting him to platinum. As implausible as it was, it was the only explanation that he could think of at the time.

Now he had more information to go on. 'For me to recover completely, I would have needed to first take care of the flower's abundant supply of Frost energy. After that, I would need to heal myself in any way possible, and the most accessible is Light energy. Still, that measly amount left before I fainted wouldn't have been enough...'

Adding on the fact that the palace had almost no light, forcing him to use some Light energy to even see anything inside, Luo Ling drew a conclusion.

'...This ring sensed that I needed to get rid of Frost energy and receive a supply of Light energy...'

Luo Ling turned around, looking at Xiao Yueyue's miserable state. 'It's all because of me...'

The youth fell into desperation. A flash of light came from his ring and out came a mirror.

The surrounding Frost energy fluctuated violently as soon as the mirror came out of the storage ring. Breezes flying left and right, ice building up faster and quicker than before.

The blue mist didn't dissipate, it got thicker. The fog swirled around the youth as he placed his hand on the crystal of ice.

Luo Ling thought in his mind, 'Don't worry, Yueyue... All will be over soon...'

Suddenly, 3 gems disappeared inside his body. Blood spewed from his mouth. He clutched his stomach as he barely stayed conscious.

The mirror lit up, a blinding luminescence coming from its elegant frame. Three circles formed on the glass, wildly spinning around wildly.

The corners of Luo Ling's mouth curled up as he pointed the mirror towards the frozen girl.

All of Luo Ling's Light energy condensed as a large ray of light emanated from the glass mirror. Fractures started to appear on its surface.

Zinggg!

The ray of light hit the ice crystal...

Luo Ling turned hopeless. The excitement and eagerness in his eyes changes into depression and despondence.

"Why...? Why?!"

From outside the palace, Lan Yunhao watched as the whole palace emitted radiance for a split second, before a blinding column of light struck through the roof of the palace.

Even the outer edges of the continent could see a faint line piercing through the clouds on the horizon.

Inside the room, Luo Ling fell silent, tears flowing out his eyes. The droplets froze the second they separated from his body.

The room stayed as cold as ever, but Luo Ling felt colder...

Xiao Yueyue remained in the same state — frozen in place by the ice crystal. The ray of light was deflected in all directions, but not once did it pierce through the thick ice.

Luo Ling placed both his hands on the crystal before he exhaled a breath of blue.