Chapter 538

Chapter 160: Long Night’s Hidden Flame – Part Seven

The wind roared in my ears, and my vision blurred for a moment. The man called the Joker, with his cold face adorned with fiery red patterns, instantly appeared before me.

Then, wind and frost exploded toward his face.

At this moment, time seemed to slow down abruptly. Frost and freezing air mixed with sparkling frost burst from within me, surging toward the man with extreme ferocity. His face began to distort; lips and soft flesh trembled like waves. His red hair flew up, streaming towards the back of his head. The tatters of his clothes fluttered out, only to be instantly frozen into ice strands. Sparks diffused in the wind pressure and then extinguished. Everything seemed like a slow-motion scene in a movie, unfolding slowly before my eyes.

Then, a deafening sound erupted.

Boom—!!!

The raging frost wave rose to the sky in the next second, spreading outwards from the ground beneath their feet, creating huge waves of ice. The yellow earth cracked open, dust flying high, massive fissures spreading outwards—not the aftermath of an attack.

In fact, I had not launched my assault yet. It was merely when my emotions surged fiercely that I couldn’t help but condense and compress the order force within my body to its limit. The terrifying pressure released uncontrollably, sweeping around and destroying everything within a diameter of forty to fifty meters in an instant. Small trees toppled, shrubs flew away. The man, in the unstoppable wind and frost, had his face and body covered in white ice, his feet lifted off the ground as he suddenly retreated.

Yet, in a split second, I caught up with him again.

I had never pushed my speed to such limits before.

My steps caused the ground to crack and collapse, but in that instant, I flashed forward, catching up with the retreating Joker. My knee ached slightly from the excessive force, feeling like the impact from jumping from a great height, and my neck was also strained—it was a trivial pain from the earlier injury.

Crack, crack, crack—

The sound of ice compressing came from the wind and frost, exploding from the right palm. The icy short scythe formed, pulling thick white fog, slicing through the air with a sharp whine, suddenly aiming at the Joker’s head.

The speed of this strike was almost impossible to track with the naked eye.

Even with my heightened focus and tension, every picture in front of me moved as if in slow motion. Yet, the slender right arm gripping the ice scythe still blurred into a hazy phantom.

The meat on the man’s face continued to tremble comically, his crimson eyes nearly unable to open, but in the next moment, his hand shot up, catching my right wrist with incredible precision and speed!

A fierce look flashed in my eyes.

Order force surged at full power. The attack was halted for just a moment, and the dense white fog touched the Joker’s left arm, freezing it. Under the impact, it shattered into pieces. The icy short scythe attack didn’t waver, striking from the side at his head. But that brief pause gave the Joker enough time to dodge. His head snapped back, narrowly avoiding the blade, leaving a shallow wound.

His lips seemed to curl upward.

But in the next moment, hidden from sight, I drew my “Dragon Claw” from my waist. As the icy scythe swung past empty, I flipped the handle with my left hand, crossing my arms and stabbing upwards!

Pfft!

A muffled sound, piercing through his jaw and skull, twisting to tear apart the disgusting smile he had barely shown.

The white blade of the “Dragon Claw” emitted a faint cold glow. Frost mist surged from the Joker’s mouth and nose, making a continuous hissing noise. Despite the intense cold, it failed to freeze his head. Instead, the scarlet flames grew fiercer, almost engulfing his torn face. Before the “Dragon Claw” could even be pulled out, the wound began to heal!

“Hah!”

He let out a short, deranged laugh, his flaming right arm grabbing my left. In the next moment, in my dilated pupils, this madman lunged at me—

Bam!

A muffled sound, and the scene before me blurred.

I stumbled backward, feeling a buzzing in my head, stars flashing before my eyes. My consciousness swayed for a moment. The icy scythe slipped from my hand, but the “Dragon Claw” remained tightly gripped. Filled with rage, I twisted the dragon bone short sword, dragging it across the Joker’s face, tearing flesh and blood. Although the man struggled, his physical strength was far inferior to mine, so he released his grip and instead grabbed my shoulder.

At the same time, I swung the “Dragon Claw,” stabbing twice into his chest, deeply penetrating. Feeling the force from my left shoulder, the scarlet flames ignited, burning through his clothes, revealing most of his shoulder and collarbone. But at that moment, what did it matter? In the next instant, I roared, raising the “Dragon Claw” high, sweeping down with frost, filled with fury—

Boom—!!!

The rampant ice exploded in front of me.

Ice frost surged outward in a fan shape, the terrible impact sweeping over the ice-encased earth once more. The bloodied face before me vanished, the Joker’s body pierced by countless ice spikes, swept up into the sky by the fierce cold current!

Immediately after, there was a loud thud as he collided with a solid ice wall that suddenly formed mid-air.

I stood below, sheathing the “Dragon Claw” back into its scabbard at my waist, extending my left hand towards the sky.

The palm emitted dazzling blue light. Above the sky, the ice wall that had blocked the clown’s backward flight suddenly exploded with a loud, ear-piercing sound. Countless fragments of ice, big and small, froze in mid-air at the moment of explosion, then surged towards the clown from all directions like a tidal wave!

“Ugh…”

I shook my head, feeling intense dizziness gradually fade away. My pitch-black pupils burst forth with astonishing blue light as I fully unleashed the power of frost. Accompanied by密集的、冰块压缩的爆响, more ice condensed out of thin air from over ten meters away. Some were fist-sized shards, while most were irregularly shaped ice blocks two to three meters in diameter, floating around the clown, encircling him. They were like cannonballs, carrying a cold current, smashing towards him!

Bam bam bam bam bam—

In the sound like rumbling thunder, the figure in mid-air was instantly buried under countless ice blocks.

There was no chance for the clown to land. Countless pieces of ice enveloped him, gathering in an instant to form a massive, irregular ice ball hovering over ten meters high in the air. The height continued to rise, with flames burning fiercely in the center of the ice ball, as if boiling, making “gurgling” sounds akin to the lamentation of ice. In a short time, several cracks appeared on the ice ball, steam gushing out, only to be blocked again by more ice blocks crashing down.

Crack, crack! Bam! Bam!

Ice was being compressed, continuously compressed. The ice ball suspended in the air seemed like a magnet, attracting ice blocks of various sizes from all directions. Its volume suddenly became huge but kept shrinking under immense pressure. Ice debris fell from the night sky. Two seconds later, the red flame at the center of the sphere dimmed.

But it wasn’t enough…

“Ahhhhh—”

This time, I truly pushed my strength to its limits.

The power within me surged like a raging storm, sweeping outwards. My eyes and ears were filled with nothing but the angry, freezing wind. Frost spread, and the entire view turned pure white. The ice ball above had risen to twenty meters. As the force compressed and condensed, it took on a deep blue color, like the sea. But it still wasn’t enough—

As I extended my right hand while holding my left arm horizontally,

I opened my fingers, then swiftly closed them.

—The Frost World.

For a brief moment, it seemed as if the winds of frost had paused.

It felt like less than half a second, yet also like an eternity.

Then, in this white world, specks of frost silver began to fall.

Blinding silver-white.

There was no frost fog, no cold wind. Only an abrupt drop in temperature, one so intense even I could feel it clearly. Further away, beyond the frost-eroded ground, the blazing fires in the shrubs quietly extinguished. Charred branches sprouted frost, which spread further until reaching the edge of the town, then stopping.

“…Phew—”

I exhaled a breath of white vapor.

My heart was still somewhat uneasy… After such a long time without use, I wasn’t sure how much the range of the Frost World had expanded with my increased strength. But—I could control it.

That range, I could control.

Though it was very difficult…

At this moment, I was almost exerting all my effort, precisely manipulating the power of order. While continuing to compress the ice ball, I ensured the Frost World only spread to less than three hundred meters, preventing the low temperature from affecting the civilians in the town. The blue light in my eyes was unprecedentedly bright, my hair fluttering and standing on end. Above the front, the sphere, under the extreme cold, grew larger and deeper blue. Inside the sphere, the burning red flame finally began to rapidly weaken.

And then it went out.

Still feeling it wasn’t enough…

I continued to drive the power of order.

The ice ball stopped rising, but the condensation of ice never ceased. With “crack, crack” sounds, its temperature and density were being drastically compressed. Its volume was shrinking, turning a deep blue… One second, two seconds, ten seconds passed. Finally, I halted the release of the power of order, the blue light in my eyes fading, my hand lowering. I panted heavily.

Is it enough now…

The uncontrolled ice ball fell with a loud boom, smashing into the ground ahead, scattering countless frost particles… The person inside should have been crushed into a pulp long ago.

But I didn’t let my guard down.

I always felt the clown wouldn’t go down so easily…

Creak.

Suddenly, a crack appeared in the ice ball.

!!!

My heart skipped a beat. I raised my hand to continue applying force, but the next moment, the ice ball exploded into fragments with a loud boom. Countless ice shards flew everywhere, and the red fire reignited. A blood-red giant hand emerged from between the ice, slamming towards the ground!

Bam—

Intense flames erupted where the arm struck, instantly melting the frost and spreading.

I was extremely shocked and enraged.

Just kidding…

In front of my vision, amidst the shattered ice, the distorted, no longer human flesh, like wriggling, disgusting maggots, crawled out slowly.

Above the maggot-like body, a withered giant hand, seemingly without skin and burning with hellfire, rose. At the moment it slammed into the ground, a conspicuous, scorching red light lit up in the distant night sky.

“Let… us…”

A hoarse, distorted voice, not quite human, echoed from that body.

“Play… an… interesting…”