If Baihe said she wasn’t worried, she would have been lying. Her eyes focused on the ice wall ceiling, trying to make out the dim silhouette of the Phoenix blocked outside. She continuously attempted to communicate with him through their telepathic connection, but had not received any response from Qian — not a word of his usual sarcastic retorts nor a sound of his familiar grumblings.

A bad premonition submerged from her gut feeling. Something was terribly wrong. To her knowledge, Baihe knew the bird was supposed to be like an out-of-order machine, currently out of commission. Yet, here he was — miraculously out in the open — saving her with god knows what methods he used to pop out.

“Kill that slut before the phoenix breaks in!” Ming commanded to his warrior snow mermaid.

The warrior snow mermaid didn’t need the additional prompt from her master; she was already stalking toward the weak woman lying flat on her back. She approached slowly— not because she didn’t want to immediately send Baihe to the underworld, but because she wanted Baihe to suffer for her transgression.

Every step the warrior snow mermaid took, the ground turned to frozen ice, leaving behind an icy trail like those ice-skating rinks as the mermaid slithered across the slippery surface. The temperature within these ice walls dropped harshly. Realizing that Baihe was still persistently staring above at the ice ceiling instead of squirming in fear like she’d expected, anger flared in the warrior snow mermaid’s heart and she quickly slid toward her prey.

On the surface, Baihe was still zoomed in on the dim outline of the phoenix, but from her peripheral vision, she had long saw the enemy coming. Although Baihe knew she was in a precarious situation, she refused to die without fighting till her last dying breath.

Three shimmering strings from her guqin were on stand-by, awaiting the fast approaching mermaid, but how effective would it be against her enemy? Baihe had no clue, but it was her last resort and better than doing nothing except wait to be rescued. Whatever the stupid bird was up to, she didn’t want it. Not because Baihe was opposed to being saved, but because she was afraid Qian would suddenly disappear.

As the warrior snow mermaid reached close enough to her, Baihe threw the three shimmering guqin strings toward her enemy. The threads looped around the mermaid, but instead of cutting through the mermaid flesh like Baihe expected, they were frozen upon contact.

Sparing Baihe a ridiculing gaze, the warrior snow mermaid raised her chin in a prideful manner. What a foolish girl! A mere Early Dao Stage 2 human wants to harm her with some strings? She was the best warrior trained by the mermaid king himself! Simply outrageous!

Visible to the eyes, the warrior snow mermaid graced Baihe with a smirk before the frozen threads coiled around her body snapped. The crackling of shattering ice was soon followed by the sound of Baihe’s three frozen guqin strings fracturing into pieces.

The rebound caused Baihe to spurt out a mouthful of blood, her complexion ghastly pale. Surprisingly, the three strings had reassembled themselves back into one piece before returning inside her space. Luckily, these mystical strings had the ability to self-repair, but the cost of it being destroyed was apparently Baihe suffering a backlash. Nothing she couldn’t handle, better than her weapon being gone forever.

Baihe wanted to use the three shimmering threads again, but her spiritual energy was depleted and her physical body might as well have been a sack of potatoes at the moment. She could neither use cultivation nor fight with physical strength.

Knowing Baihe was incapacitated, the warrior snow mermaid launched a sharp icicle drill toward Baihe’s head. The ice drill spun with great velocity, swiftly spinning toward Baihe, but — someone was even faster.

Chucks of ice dropped from the collapsing ceiling. A massive ball of fire came crashing down from above. Upon a closer inspection, it was actually the majestic phoenix swooping down from the sky. The edges of his fire aura burned the ice spikes along the way.

Opening his beak, Qian released a flamethrower at the ice drill heading for Baihe, evaporating all the icy spikes in its path. Upon contact with his sacred phoenix flames, the ice drill was instantly swallowed by the fire.

Staring at the stupid bird charging in like some sort of hero saving beauty scene, Baihe didn’t know whether to laugh or cry; but she definitely felt a part of her moved. Or, it could be her mind playing tricks on her. After all, Baihe had long carved out her heart and threw it away. Where would there still be a heart left for her to even feel moved?

Yet, Baihe could not deny that this was the first time in her life she was being saved — that there was someone stupid enough to deem her worthy to be saved. The rims of her dark eyes turned a little red, but Baihe quickly attributed it to the cold and not because she was being sentimental.

By sheer will, Baihe forced herself up from the ground.

On the sideline, the warrior snow mermaid watched as the two enemies of her master were about to reunite. With a loud agitated cry, she released a breath of frosty mist to cover the area in murky haziness. The warrior snow mermaid hid herself within the frosty mist, preventing the enemies from noticing her movements.

Upon locating the phoenix, shards of ice galloped through the air on all sides to converge on Qian. As if detecting danger, Qian rapidly spun in a circular motion — creating a fierce fire tornado — deflecting the incoming ice shards with ease. Rising out from the top of the fire tornado, Qian sped down toward the warrior snow mermaid once more.

Peeved that her enemy escaped from her attacks, she manipulated the four ice walls to break apart and consolidate itself to create an icy barrier around Baihe.

Did the warrior snow mermaid suddenly had a change of heart? Of course not!

Inside the icy barrier, it was so cold that Baihe had grown numb to the pain coursing through her and she could no longer feel her nerves. Puffs of cold mist could be seen coming out of her nostrils and mouth. Outside the icy barrier, weird spikes were laced all over. These were different from the ones rooted on the arena platform. Who knows what effect they would have if you touched them, but it can’t be anything good.

Following that, the warrior snow mermaid slammed her tail on the ground and launched herself into the air. Simultaneously, her hands sucked in the frosty mist she’d released earlier to coalesce the cold energy into a glacial bow paired with icy arrows. Condensing her raw energy into the weapon, the warrior snow mermaid shot a glacial arrow at Qian, followed quickly by another one toward Baihe.

Baihe carefully examined the strength of the arrows heading in both directions. They were stronger than any of the abilities used by the warrior snow mermaid previously and the menacing arrow making a beeline for her was packed with more force and speed than the one shooting upward toward Qian.

At once, Baihe understood. This was a psychological attack — a choice to choose between saving Baihe or himself.

And the warrior snow mermaid didn’t give him much time to choose. She opened her mouth and a barrage of snowballs came flying toward Qian like bullets.