novelraw Chapter 224
Chapter 224
Chapter 224: Ice White Demon Lord Seori (3)
The scent of tea spread faintly through the air.
A room where books and writing tools were neatly arranged.
Sewoon silently lifted his teacup and drank.
Across from him, Seori sat quietly.
A face pale as snow, silver-white hair without a single strand out of place—together they gave off the impression of a fragile, sickly woman.
After the brief disturbance had settled, Seori had been moved to this private room.
“Ah, it seems she has suffered temporary confusion of memory.”
Serin and the other physicians diagnosed that Seori regarding Sewoon as her beloved was due to the Yin energy that had tormented her affecting even her mind.
They said that the aftereffects of the Yin energy and the shock had caused a temporary confusion of memory.
And yet, for some reason—
Sewoon had brought Seori here and was meeting her alone.
In a silence where not a single word was exchanged.
“…Husband.”
At last, Seori spoke first.
Her delicate appearance, soft tone, and the strange gaze that seemed filled with affection—
It was a look that would have made any man immediately drop his guard.
Clack.
Sewoon set down the teacup he had been drinking from with an audible sound.
“How long do you plan to keep up this filthy little act?”
“…!”
He snapped coldly, shooting her an icy stare.
At his expressionless face, devoid of any emotion, Seori’s body trembled.
“Y-Yes…? Wh-What do you mean by that…?”
“A pitiful display. For someone who once led the North Sea Ice Palace, this is downright contemptible.”
Even though he had pinpointed her hidden identity, her trembling appearance looked almost too genuine.
But—
‘As if I’d fall for that kind of cheap trick.’
Sewoon did not believe her for a moment.
He was certain.
She was acting.
The memories he still held of Seori from before his regression were far too vivid for him to be deceived.
Before the regression, even before joining the Blood Cult, Seori had already ruled the North Sea Ice Palace as an empress-like figure and was a martial artist of overwhelming power.
Someone who had slaughtered countless peak masters of the Orthodox Path had lost her memory?
To the point of calling him “Husband” and mistaking him for her spouse?
‘Even if she lost her memory, she’d never act like this.’
The Ice White Demon Lord, Seori, had possessed such astonishing scheming and poisonous insight that Sewoon had regarded her with as much caution as the Poison Demon Yelü Sheng.
Though he did not release killing intent, the aura spreading through his entire body flowed silently, as if it would swallow Seori’s expression whole.
“You fooled the others, but you can’t fool me. The reason no traces of martial arts can be sensed is thanks to the Ice White Divine Art, isn’t it?”
“….”
The moment Sewoon spoke of the Ice White Divine Art—an art only the Lord of the North Sea Ice Palace could cultivate—
A strange light flickered in Seori’s eyes.
A faint smile slowly spread across her previously frightened face.
A chilling, deadly smile.
“Well then. I suppose I was found out.”
The voice was the same, yet the atmosphere had completely changed.
Seori slowly adjusted her posture.
That simple movement looked strangely alluring.
“Hehe, when Husband glares at me so sharply, it becomes difficult for this humble woman to keep up the act, you know.”
“State your purpose for deceiving me and trying to take advantage of me. Otherwise, you die.”
“Kill me? My, how frightening you sound.”
Seori tilted her head.
Her pale silver hair flowed gracefully, brushing past her shoulders.
“And after taking the Ice Palace’s divine relic from me, you speak quite shamelessly.”
“…!”
Seori already knew that Sewoon had taken her Ice Crystal.
Yet Sewoon replied without the slightest hint of guilt.
“Did you think I’d spare an enemy without demanding a price?”
“Then you should have spared me to the end. Why try to kill me now?”
“Are you asking because you truly don’t know? I spared you, and you start pulling cheap tricks.”
“I simply woke up in the middle of enemy territory and used the strongest tactic I had.”
“…What?”
When Sewoon questioned her, Seori grinned and answered,
“The Beauty Stratagem.”
“…If you keep spouting nonsense, I’ll kill you right now.”
Sewoon spread one hand.
Shrrrk.
At the same time, a cold metallic sound rang out.
Threads of the Heavenly Net connected to Sewoon’s fingertips rose into the air.
The coldly glinting threads were aimed precisely at Seori’s neck.
With even the slightest movement, Seori would meet her death without leaving a trace.
It was then—
Swish.
Seori quietly raised both hands.
“…?”
What shone in her eyes was not fear, but enjoyment.
As a bewildered Sewoon looked at her—
“I surrender.”
“…What?”
“I will capitulate. There’s no need to show hostility toward me. I am no longer the Lord of the Ice Palace.”
“…!”
“Before the war in Shanxi, I had already stepped down. No—more accurately, I was dragged down.”
Dragged down from the seat of palace lord?
A strange light appeared in Sewoon’s eyes as he listened.
She was spilling information he wanted to hear.
To summarize the process by which Seori lost her position and was captured by the three members of the Jecheon Unit—
Just before the war with the Moyong Clan broke out, she discovered spies that had taken root within the Ice Palace.
When she confirmed the existence of an unknown unorthodox cult, they instead revealed themselves openly.
“The Blood Cult.”
“So you already know.”
Those who bore the name Blood Cult tried to entice Seori with every honeyed word they could muster—
And she rejected them without hesitation.
‘…She rejected them? Why?’
Sewoon found her choice puzzling.
Before the regression, she had offered up the Ice Palace simply because it sounded amusing—before the Blood Cult had even made a better proposal.
And yet after the regression, for some reason, she had rejected them outright.
He pondered it carefully, but no reason came to mind.
“Still, the very next day after I rejected them, that bastard Vice Palace Lord showed up with Demonic Practitioners I’d never seen before and launched a rebellion.”
“Why did you swallow the Perennial Ice Crystal?”
“That? Because what those Blood Cult bastards wanted from the Ice Palace was the Perennial Ice Crystal. I couldn’t just hand it over easily. Wouldn’t it be better to taint it a little and make it harder for them to take?”
“……”
…She was still a lunatic.
Sewoon shook his head slowly.
But Seori was only just getting to the point.
“Anyway, to sum it up, I need a place to stay now.”
Seori slowly leaned both elbows on the table and clasped her hands together.
Then, with a subtle smile on her lips, she whispered softly,
“This place is quite nice. Aside from the weather being a bit warm.”
“……”
“You should be grateful. The rightful master of the Ice Palace will help you.”
Swoooosh!
The moment her words ended, a powerful aura began to spread from Seori’s entire body.
She was no longer hiding her true martial might.
It wasn’t to fight Sewoon to the death.
It was to prove her worth.
Shraaaa!
As the Ice White Divine Art unleashed its full power, Extreme Yin Energy seeped out from her body.
Watching the snowstorm-like aura blanket the entire room in an instant, Sewoon spoke.
“You’ve crossed the wall of the Manifestation Realm.”
“Hehe, sharp as ever. Yes—thanks to you, Husband, I became even stronger.”
Astonishingly, Seori had gone beyond the Manifestation Realm.
In truth, it was all thanks to Sewoon.
He had taken the Perennial Ice Crystal from her, so it seemed impossible at first glance.
But—
‘Did I absorb the excessive energy of the Perennial Ice Crystal, leaving her with only what she could handle?’
As if filtering out the excess, Sewoon had acted as a sieve.
Seori absorbed only the energy she could endure—and in doing so, crossed the wall of the Manifestation Realm.
That meant a Manifestation Realm martial artist had effectively joined the Tang Clan of her own accord.
In the great war against the Blood Cult that was yet to come, a Manifestation Realm martial artist would be an unparalleled asset.
However—
“Are you done talking? Then it’s time for you to die.”
“!!”
This time, even Seori was genuinely startled.
She clearly hadn’t expected her proposal to be rejected.
Sewoon’s reason was simple.
‘Seori is an utterly unpredictable madwoman and witch. If I spare her, there’s no telling how things will spiral.’
Objectively, she possessed outstanding martial prowess—but she carried an even greater danger with it.
Scrape.
Sewoon slowly rose from his chair.
Killing intent glinted sharply in his eyes.
Yet Seori did not rise from her seat.
Even in this hair-trigger moment, with death right before her, she merely looked at Sewoon with eyes full of interest and curiosity.
“Hehe, I never expected to be rejected like this for the first time.”
As if she liked him even more for it, vitality returned to her face, and a reddish hue bloomed on her lips as she parted them.
“Then I’ll have to offer something new.”
Seori smiled gently.
In her gaze lingered composure, certainty, and a deliberate hint of madness.
Wooooong! Wooooong!
At that moment, violent energy began to whirl through the Heavenly Net suspended in midair.
It felt as though it could tear everything apart.
“No matter what you bring out now, I have no intention of sparing you.”
Sewoon’s words were resolute.
He had heard everything he needed to hear.
There was no reason to let her live.
Yet Seori smiled as if she were enjoying even that.
“Hehe, I wonder if you can keep that attitude after hearing everything I have to say.”
Tilting her teacup slightly, Seori began to speak.
Step.
Even as Sewoon advanced step by step to take her life, she continued calmly.
“My ultimate goal in life was always twofold.”
Step.
“One of them was to achieve the ultimate extreme of Ice Arts. Not merely completing the Ice White Divine Art, but obtaining absolute power—power enough to freeze the entire world into ice with a single move.”
Step.
“The martial artists of the Central Plains may not know this, but in the history of the Jianghu, there was only one person who achieved the extreme of Yin-Cold Qi Art that I dream of and ascended to the realm beyond Heaven—someone born from the bloodline of the North Sea Ice Palace.”
Sewoon’s brow twitched slightly.
It sounded familiar—yet alien.
“Born with a heart of ice, but stolen by the abyss of the Demonic Path.”
The Demonic Path?
Sewoon flinched and came to a halt.
A being who belonged to the Demonic Path and had reached the extreme of Yin-Cold Qi Art?
There was only one such existence.
Don’t tell me…
An absolute being whose traces he had planned to pursue soon surfaced in Sewoon’s mind.
Scrape.
Without realizing it, Sewoon stopped his advance, which had been meant to execute Seori.
Seeing that, Seori wore her usual alluring smile, as if she had expected this reaction.
Their gazes met in midair.
Then Seori lifted her chin proudly and completed her final words.
“Born as a despicable, abandoned bloodline of the North Sea, rose to the seat of a Great Demonic Grandmaster, and was ultimately called the god of demons.”
“……!”
Thump! Thump!
Sewoon’s heart pounded violently.
At that moment, Seori uttered a single line—
“And that being was the Heavenly Demon.”
—proving that Sewoon’s suspicion was correct.