This Life, No Godhood—Quietly Waiting for the Winds to Rise

The Extreme North. The killing-intent-laden cold wind battered against him, but the youth's eyes did not shift in the slightest; with a calm face, he regarded the one before him. She was a woman of otherworldly beauty. Snow-white hair, pure as frost, cascaded from the crown of her head down to her ankles, and her plain, unadorned gown set off a figure without flaw. Yet for all that she resembled a sprite of the snow, her identity was enough to make even a Titled Douluo turn pale. She was none other than the Snow Empress, foremost among the Three Heavenly Kings of the Extreme North! "Since this is Bing'er's own decision, I won't waste more words. Leave the Extreme North, at once!" The Snow Empress's ice-blue eyes fixed on Huo Yuhao, and, forcing down her fury, she said: "Otherwise, you'll bear the consequences yourself!" The Heavenly Tribulation of seven hundred thousand years was drawing near, and the Snow Empress had no confidence she could survive it. She could only choose to take Human Form and cultivate anew before the tribulation descended. But she could not bring herself to abandon the Extreme North, nor could she let go of the Ice Empress, who was about to face her four-hundred-thousand-year lightning tribulation. So she had meant to lend the Ice Empress a hand before she reincarnated, to help her through the tribulation, and to add another layer of strength to the Extreme North. But who would have thought that when she tracked the Ice Empress down by her aura, what she found was a human! A human who had absorbed the Ice Empress's Spirit Ring and made the Ice Empress into his second martial soul! The Snow Empress looked at Huo Yuhao with cold eyes. Had Bing'er not appeared in person to explain, and had things not already come to this—where killing Huo Yuhao would be the same as killing the Ice Empress—she would never have let him off! Huo Yuhao's expression was grave. If not for the Ice Empress, he would never have agreed to meet the Snow Empress. He had transmigrated to the Douluo Continent and been Huo Yuhao for thirteen years now. Apart from risking one bold gamble to enter the Star Dou Great Forest in pursuit of the two fortuitous encounters with Tianmeng and Electrolux, he had always been cautious. He had joined neither Shrek nor the Sun Moon Empire, but had watched everything from a corner of the continent, keeping far from the core of every conflict. Yet today, on this day of all days—the day he obtained the Ice Empress's martial soul—he had gone against his usual nature and cast his own safety to the winds. He had not left after gaining the Ice Empress, but had deliberately released his aura and waited, all for this very moment! Nearby stood the murderous Snow Empress; from afar came the faint thunder of ten thousand beasts stampeding—the Ice Empress's clanskin and other Soul Beasts, drawn by the Ice Empress's aura. Within his Sea of Spirit, the Tianmeng Iceworm and the Ice Empress were also grumbling without end, urging him to leave. But Huo Yuhao had no thought of leaving. "I'm sorry, Brother Tianmeng, Ice Empress. I can't leave now." Huo Yuhao's firm whisper rang out through the Sea of Spirit. "This is the first step of walking a different path..." As he spoke, beneath the Snow Empress's astonished gaze, he stepped forward until he stood two meters from her, and said, "Snow Empress, I want to make a deal with you." The Snow Empress's expression was cold. "What ability do you and Tianmeng have to make a deal with me? Or are you deluded enough to imagine I'd join the God-making Plan and become your Spirit Ring?" Earlier, to keep her from killing Huo Yuhao, the Ice Empress had held nothing back before her, telling her all she knew. And so Tianmeng's God-making Plan had naturally reached her ears. True, with a Fierce Beast plus a Hundred-Thousand-Year Soul Beast assisting him, and possessing powerful Twin Martial Souls, Huo Yuhao's future achievements would not be low. But compared to such an obviously unreliable God-making Plan, the Snow Empress trusted herself more. A Soul Beast of nearly seven hundred thousand years, taking Human Form and cultivating anew—how could that be inferior to a human cultivating for the very first time? So the Snow Empress said bluntly: "Human, don't be so insatiably greedy! If you don't leave now, I'll freeze you into an ice sculpture here in the Extreme North and absorb the Origin Tianmeng left within your body..." "The Ten-Thousand-Year Mysterious Ice Marrow." Huo Yuhao's soft voice cut off the Snow Empress's vicious threat. "I have a clue to the Ten-Thousand-Year Mysterious Ice Marrow!" The Snow Empress—and even the Ice Empress and Tianmeng within the Sea of Spirit—were all struck dumb. "What are you talking about? The Ten-Thousand-Year Mysterious Ice Marrow?" A moment later, Tianmeng was the first to loose a string of startled cries in the Sea of Spirit. "Yuhao, do you really have word of it?" He was, after all, the one who had lain in the Ten-Thousand-Year Mysterious Ice Cave absorbing Ten-Thousand-Year Mysterious Ice Marrow, sleeping his way into becoming a Hundred-Thousand-Year Soul Beast—a living Power Bank of a Soul Beast. No one knew better than he how fearsome the Ten-Thousand-Year Mysterious Ice Marrow was; it was a top-grade Precious Heavenly Treasure, the kind that could raise the God-making Plan's success rate by dozens of percentage points! If Yuhao could absorb the Ten-Thousand-Year Mysterious Ice Marrow, then their God-making Plan... huh, wait, what had Yuhao just said? He meant to use the intelligence on the Ten-Thousand-Year Mysterious Ice Marrow to strike a deal with the Snow Empress? In the Sea of Spirit, beneath the Ice Empress's odd gaze, Tianmeng doubled over in despair. "Yuhao, you spendthrift! You'll be the death of me!" If you had word of the Ten-Thousand-Year Mysterious Ice Marrow, why not tell me ahead of time? Why spend it to court the Snow Empress? Now look what you've done—a pack of the old, weak, sick, and crippled like us can't out-snatch the Snow Empress. We can only watch helplessly as a treasure like that is carried off. The Snow Empress shot Huo Yuhao a look of surprise, pondered for a moment, and asked: "Tianmeng told you, didn't he? And this so-called deal is his idea too?" A mere Great Spirit Master like Huo Yuhao, daring to come to the Extreme North—that was surely all the Tianmeng Iceworm's instigation. And now, risking his life to make a deal with her; however you looked at it, it could not be unconnected to the Tianmeng Iceworm. Besides, how Tianmeng had inexplicably become a Hundred-Thousand-Year Soul Beast had always been a puzzle that baffled the many Soul Beasts of the Extreme North. Now, it seemed, she knew the answer. "Yes." Without changing expression, Huo Yuhao nodded in acknowledgment, letting the Snow Empress draw her own mistaken conclusion. "Brother Tianmeng said that you, like the Ice Empress, are not far from your end, and that the Ten-Thousand-Year Mysterious Ice Marrow would be of use to you in passing the lightning tribulation." "..." The Snow Empress was momentarily speechless, her delicate brows knitted tight. Seeing that she had not refused outright, Huo Yuhao relaxed slightly. From what he knew, after the attempt at the Yin-Yang Complementary Spirit Core had failed, the Snow Empress's Origin had been gravely wounded, and no ordinary Precious Heavenly Treasure could make up for it. It had left her powerless to break through the seven-hundred-thousand-year Heavenly Tribulation—which was why she had resolved to take Human Form. But if she could obtain a sufficient amount of Ten-Thousand-Year Mysterious Ice Marrow... never mind the seven-hundred-thousand-year Heavenly Tribulation—the Snow Empress might even dare to challenge the eight-hundred-thousand-year one! Meanwhile, after pondering a moment, the Snow Empress sighed inwardly. This deal—she truly could not refuse it. The Snow Empress withdrew her killing intent and fixed her eyes on Huo Yuhao. "Why make a deal with me? If you kept the Ten-Thousand-Year Mysterious Ice Marrow, the God-making Plan's success rate would climb even higher." Huo Yuhao first cast a veiled glance at the sky, where wind and snow raged, and only then answered the Snow Empress's question directly. "Fortune favors the living; once a man dies, nothing of him remains. And in this world, there are things more terrible than death. "I don't want to be at others' mercy forever, but truly growing strong takes time—so I came to you. I hope to trade the Ten-Thousand-Year Mysterious Ice Marrow for your protection and the friendship of the Extreme North!" As he spoke, Huo Yuhao recalled all he had gone through since leaving the White Tiger Duke's Estate. On his way to seek out a cheat, he had run into a Tang Sect master and his disciple. He had gone to join a small academy to learn the knowledge he needed, only to cross paths with a certain young lord surnamed Wang on the street. While studying at the academy, he had unexpectedly come upon glorious records of the Tang Sect—and then discovered that the academy itself had been founded by a man of the Tang Sect... Every sign pointed to the same truth: even though his way of doing things was now worlds apart from the original Huo Yuhao's, and even though he had steered clear of the heart of every conflict, Tang, the Great Buddha, still had not let him go! Blue Silver Entanglement was still chasing him! But what good was there in realizing it? That one was a Godking, and most of the other Godkings in the God Realm leaned toward his side as well; only Destruction held a different view. But would the Godking of Destruction help him for that reason, or hand him a godhood? Heh. Wishful thinking. Never mind the God of Destruction Position—if he did not pledge his loyalty to Tang San, they would not even hand him the Emotion God Position in peace. Every hard truth was telling Huo Yuhao that even becoming a god could not free him from these chains. The only way out was to remain on the Douluo Continent. This life, he would not become a god—he would wait quietly for the winds to rise!