In the next few days, the Black Lake Sect's disciples gathered the corpses of the Frozen Spirit Foxes and proceeded to move back towards their sect.

Only the Flame Elder and Andreas knew they had failed their mission, while the other disciples were extremely delighted as they thought they had perfectly accomplished the mission.

​​

Andreas spoke to the Flame Elder, "Elder, I searched for the Moonlit Snow Lotus but couldn't find it anywhere."

"I know. After recovering some strength, I searched for the Moonlit Snow Lotus, but it was all for naught." The elder spoke with a frown.

He then added, "The rage of this Frozen Spirit Fox Race was quite suspicious. They aren't such violent creatures that they would launch a large-scale attack on us. Moreover, their leader was actually willing to perish along with us. If not for the fact that I had some accomplishments in Flame Element, I would have been buried 6 feet underneath the ground."

Andreas nodded his head. He had arrived near the end of the fight and saw how close the fight was.

The Flame Elder asked, "Did you find anyone suspicious in the area while we were in seclusion?"

Andreas thought for quite some time and then spoke, "We found two people. A man and a woman who had come to this Arctic Summit to find some Icy Spirit Flowers. My junior brothers invited them, and they temporarily joined our camp. While we were fighting against the Frozen Spirit Foxes, some disciples saw them running out of the camp."

Those remarks made the Flame Elder scoff. It's absurd to believe that the soldiers they rescued would abandon them when they were needed.

He looked down on warriors like these. However, for surety, he asked, "What was their cultivation?"

"The two were 3 Star Warriors. The male was at peak 3 Star Rank while the woman was at early 3 Star Rank." Andreas replied quickly.

The Flame Elder muttered slowly, "3 Star Warriors only…."

His anger over the two decreased slightly as he believed that having two more 3 Star Warriors wouldn't have changed the situation by a whole lot.

If they were 4 Star Warriors, then that would be a different matter.

Soon, the Flame Elder began speaking with a serious expression, "If my guess is right, someone stole the Moonlit Snow Lotus and sent this Fox Race after our encampment. Considering the rage of these Frozen Spirit Foxes, the thief must have been a human."

Andreas asked with a frown, "What do we tell the Sect Master then? Without the Moonlit Snow Lotus, the sect master won't be able to create the environment to develop the Ice Elemental Cultivation of the Black Lake Sect's disciples. Without the aura released by the Moonlit Snow Lotus, junior sister Martha won't be able to advance to the 4 Star Rank any time soon. She won't be able to participate in the conference held by the Origin Sect."

Those words worried the Flame Elder, but the situation had already slipped out of his hands. What he could do now was to salvage the situation.

"I will inform the Sect Master about this and take complete responsibility for this matter." The Flame Elder spoke with a resolute voice.

"What?! I can't just let you do this. I was at fault as well, Elder." Andreas spoke immediately.

There was a thin, bitter smile on the Flame Elder's face as he spoke, "I am delighted to hear these words, but still, let me take the fall for this one. If you take responsibility for this matter, the sect will lower the resources allocated to you. It will undoubtedly affect your cultivation speed. Just focus on your cultivation and win against the Origin Sect."

Andreas didn't appear to be satisfied. He didn't want Flame Elder to take the fall for him, but he knew how important the Hierarchy Peak Ranking Conference was for his sect.

If he achieved a good result in that conference, their sect would receive more resources, and they could firmly suppress the other sects for the next couple of years.

"I won't let you down, elder…."

The Flame Elder nodded in acceptance as they focused on the road ahead of them.

~~

At the same time, two individuals were roaming in the Frozen Spirit Fox Race's territory. These two were Azaroth and Tiana.

Azaroth had captured a couple of pups of the Frozen Spirit Fox Race and handed them to Tiana.

These pups were the children of the Frozen Spirit Fox Queen. They also possessed the bloodline of the Frozen Spirit Fox Queen, but it hadn't activated yet.

Azaroth planned to forcefully activate it through the use of the medicinal pill he was concocting.

However, before beginning the concoction of the medicinal pill, he taught Tiana about how to leave a Spiritual Imprint on the beasts.

Since these fox pups were quite young, using the Spiritual Imprint would slowly make them familiar with Tiana's presence, and they would get close to her.

Tiana was delighted to take care of these little pups. They were cute and were rather obedient after she used her Spiritual Imprint.

The Spiritual Imprint wasn't used to make a mindless puppet. In fact, the other party would still retain their cognition. However, their familiarity with the user would increase with time.

This technique worked perfectly on creatures with low intelligence.

Azaroth gathered a few more herbs from the area and finally began to concoct the Seven Star Yin Pill.

Azaroth didn't possess any sort of furnace or a cauldron. Instead, he used his Ardor to raise the ingredients and then used his Azure Flames to begin the Seven Star Yin Pill concoction.

This was quite a troublesome pill where the temperature of the flames had to be changed after every 3 seconds drastically, and ingredients were to be fused differently after a couple of seconds.

Most importantly, a lot of patience was required to successfully concoct this pill.

After a few hours of heating the ingredients and fusing them together, he reached a critical moment. A petal from the Moonlit Snow Lotus floated towards the Sphere of Azure Flames.

Azaroth was quite careful since he knew that the rest would be easy once he passed this part.

Soon, the Moonlit Snow Lotus touched the Azure Flames.

And before Azaroth could understand it, he felt a tremendous amount of energy building up inside the Azure Flames, and a great explosion occurred!

The explosion was so loud that it terrified Tiana and the fox pups who were bonding right now.

Even Zena, who was somewhat far away from the area and was fighting against a Violent Ice Bear, heard this explosion. When she realized that it was from Azaroth's direction, she immediately flew towards him.

A few minutes later, Tiana came to Azaroth's location and asked him, "Are you all right, master?"

However, as Tiana reached the location, she saw that the ground ahead of Azaroth was completely charred. It was clear that the explosion had occurred near this location.

And when she raised her head, she saw a large sphere of the Azure Flames.

Soon, Tiana laid her eyes on Azaroth. Azaroth sensed her presence and coldly said to her, "Go away."

However, Tiana remained stood in that spot as she looked at Azaroth's appearance right now.

Currently, two horns on his head were relatively large. But most surprising for her were those pair of bright white wings that had sprouted out from his back.

The aura she sensed from Azaroth felt dominating and gentle at the same time.

This was the first time Tiana had felt so contradictory, and it made her heart beat faster.

Soon, she regained her composure and remembered Azaroth's order. Although reluctant, she obeyed him and left the area.

Meanwhile, Azaroth coldly stared at the Azure Flame Sphere and worked on concocting the Seven Star Yin Pill. As expected, it truly wasn't easy.