Inside the ruins, a middle-aged man clothed in dark purple received some news.

"Elder, a disciple found a dying man close to the entrance of the northwest fort."

The bringer of the news wore the same sect's cloth but just lighter in color.

He looked overly tired but still quickly did his job.

"Was it done by our disciple or the assassins?" the man asked.

"The body is old. No shows of attack or poisoning. Overly exhausted. But we found clues around that could be from the Young Master."

The report was short and precise.

This teacher and the group of disciples running around searching were all tired. But they didn't dare to neglect the mission.

They could never dismiss an emergency call for a dangerous task, even if they were young and weak.

Unfortunately, they were the only ones to arrive so far. So, the search had been slow. Not because of a lack of will, but due to a lack of skill.

They spread thin and far, ignoring the risks. Everyone's priority was to find the Young Master. And to make as much noise as possible if encountering anything suspicious, like an enemy. It was then the Elder's job to kill the adversary if feasible.

For the young, their only hope was to find their target as soon as possible. Then, work together with the Elder and their teacher to avoid total obliteration.

"We've seen the assassins less lately. So, lead the way. I need to confirm it. Maybe Lil Matt went to the outskirt area, and they followed."

"Are we adjusting our coverage right now?"

"Can your students wake the man up?" The Elder asked.

In a powerless tone, the teacher responded. "No. The man is not only very close to dying but also very old. No one in our group has the aptitude to wake him up from such a critical condition."

"So I must go there and retrieve the information." The Elder replied.

'The more we do before reinforcements arrive, the better it will be when they eventually do. Even if we fail to find Matt, we ought to pressure the assassins enough to allow him to stay hidden.'

The Elder wasn't being neglectful, either. He tracked their target, killed the enemies, oversaw this group, and helped with the search. But, he knew that any random sequence of mistakes could lead him to lay his life here. Despite being more powerful, the assassins would succeed given the opportunity. And by then, saving their sect's successor would be a pipe dream.

---

When the Elder's group arrived at the northwest fort, they found a group of disciples trying to stabilize the injured man's condition.

The Elder immediately confirmed the traces around.

'They didn't even clear it... They're running out of time. Having courage is one thing. But the possibility of dealing with the consequences without succeeding must be driving them crazy.'

He found tracks of both their targets. He noticed how the assassins must've arrived here after their target left since they acted in such a hurry.

Having confirmed Matt's new whereabouts, the Elder immediately ordered a search coverage change.

After dealing with what was urgent, he finally went to the body lying on the ground.

"I will wake him up. Move aside."

"The body is falling apart. I couldn't do much more than supply it with some medicinal QI. It wasn't that effective either, and I could not come up with any way to save him." The disciple reported while moving aside.

"Who said anything about saving? I will temporally wake him up and get the information needed. Finding Matt is our priority."

Without further ado, the Elder crouched down, putting his hands on the dying man's chest. After initiating some technique, energy invaded the unconscious person without mercy.

Ben's heart began beating fast as the blood left on his body sped up. The hyperactivity caused life to come back to his face. But his blood began leaking out from all his cavities as he started sweating tremendously.

The Elder used a skill to keep the waking up man's oral cavities open.

'Ah, the bastard companion!'

Ben instantly recognized the similarities in their clothing. But, he soon went into amazement due to the 'treatment' applied to his body.

'So fucking ingenious, but so fucking evil... amazing!'

The Elder was ready to begin to extract all the information he could, no matter what means he needed to employ. But before that, the injured already talked with much struggle.

"Forest. Blue sky. Metal poison. Third step."

While uttering those few words, his body kept crumbling down. His veins started to pop as he began to bleed from his skin pores.

Ben became a total mess, falling back into unconsciousness.

'Demoniac? Not accurate. Such a weird one. His body wasn't compatible.' the Elder frowned as he observed the body in the ground.

Unfortunately, he didn't have the time to check further, as the Elder felt the presence of the one in the run.

"I got a signal from Matt! Send the order that everyone must gather together! Let's move now!"

They moved fast. But before leaving, the Elder noticed the unconscious body aura swaying weirdly.

"After securing the first disciple's safety, send a few of your students to retrieve that body," he ordered as the teacher caught up to him.

'Unfortunately, experimenting will have to wait. The successor must be my priority. Such bad luck, I'm losing the best time to study it.'

Once succeeding in their mission, they could not find the body. However, the Elder found tracks to something even more critical, the monster nest.

---

Ben's half-sleep state perceived waves of violent Spirit coming from some battle. Every vibration made his body crack. But he couldn't hear it, nor could he even feel it. He only felt a deep coldness.

His overcautiousness imprinted in his body made him clutch to every bit of consciousness. But he felt stuck in some sleep paralysis state.

The coldness stung every thought he instinctually wanted to have.

However, every wave of Spirit dispatched his way allowed him to slowly make sense of his surroundings, like paper pieces falling into a small fire.

'Cold. Where...? How long...?'

Ben tried to repair his body enough to move. But he failed.

Even the technique he copied from the Elder clad in purple failed. There was nothing else he could suck out of his body that the coldness couldn't hold back.

Ben focused with all his might on his chest, abandoning the rest of his body to the cold.

He tried and tried. But only after dozens of tries did Ben succeed in lighting a spark in his chest.

The concentration of energy initiated an ominous process.

Deep dark runes sprouted from Ben's heart, spreading around him randomly.

When the flourishing finally stopped, those tick twigs structures filled the room.

'Was I put in a freezer for years?' Ben could finally think at a usual pace again.

The dark runes started slowly absorbing any energy they could. From the coldness itself to other bodies and treasures it found on the floor.

'They're all dead.'

Ben could finally have a good read of the situation.

He was at a monster nest. His body was frozen alive. He couldn't wake up since the situation back then wasn't that good either. He was technically alive, but most would consider him dead.

Furthermore, he didn't know how he got here, but he could guess. The Elder moved away for one reason or another. And then he became another victim of the monsters that the sects wanted to kill.

'Very likely, this is a few months later since the fight happening should be from the main force. No way this is just the vanguard. But I'm surprised those monsters can even put up a fight.'

Ben felt unsure if the freezing was good or not. While it allowed him to recover and abuse what he learned last time, this was pushing his luck too much. He could become some creature's food supply anytime.

'Luckily, I was at the bottom. So I survived. But that doesn't change the fact that running away this time will be bothersome.'

Ben calculated what he found around in this freezer-like structure.

Fortunately, this wasn't the first time his body shut down. But the fact he lacked preparation terrified him.

Confronting death wasn't scary, but doing so while cornered was.

Ben had no life energy left. Before, he had barely enough to finish his preparation and enter hibernation in a few months. However, dealing with the poison and this place depleted most of what he had then.

'So even if I have nukes inside me, I'm not courageous enough to open and use them as batteries. Having such a limitation on my path makes me angry sometimes, but not like I would've lived otherwise. If the worst comes, I can still blow myself up. But I don't feel like firing all my one-use trump cards due to giving up yet.'

His choices were worth it, but it was risky.

Cornered, he could only work to absorb whatever he found around him. The treasure and Spirit stones that felt from the victims, and whatever remained from their cultivation in those dead bodies.

But that wouldn't be enough, so he could only mix that with the surrounding cold, despite the energy being too violent.

It was so fierce that no one ever tamed it. That was the main reason why the world abandoned The Sunset Empire Ruins. No one could pay the price to deal with something that brought them no benefit. They tried, but this place always pulled them down.

Even while fearing the results, Ben still looked around carefully. However, he was a bit out of practice. It had been a while since his life was this eventful.

He was often just bored.

He was bored by people's silly routines.

Likewise, he was bored with his slow preparations.

He was bored about his body slowly decaying.

Bored but still clutching to life. He was okay with boredom since he had time.

How many powerhouses had everything? Power, love, land, and riches were at their disposal. And even if not, they could fight for it. They could scheme for it. Or, they could trade for it. However, they always ran out of time. They all despaired, confronting their mortality.

How much would they salivate at Ben's current state? That was the biggest fear which pressed down on him. What if those fighting outside got in here now?

All alarms sounded in Ben's head as someone tried to open the door to this room.

They couldn't. Since the runes made sure that was not an easy feat. But a sense of dread still fell upon Ben.

'WHY Am I TAKING THIS LONG?'

There were legends of immortality but no factual reach for eternity. People on Spirit could easily live a couple extra hundred years. If at the top, they could reach for thousands. But not much more.

There were no beautiful legends of ascendancy, either. Just a few crazy people broke into space-time on their search for anything. But that could well be them choosing to die on a fancy grave since no one heard of them after. Nor did their legacy stay strong over time.

But Ben understood them. Cornered, people took risks.

He was no different.

The surrounding runes shook again.

Slimmer runes branched out as he reached for what he needed with no more hesitation.

'Found it!'

Ben located an artifact he could use as a furnace.

The runes pierced anything with energy left, not leaving a single piece behind.

They were all brought up to the made-up furnace. A little box artifact used to burn Spirit Stones to help cultivate.

'I need to counter the chilly energy in my body. A basic dual technique should be enough if I suppress it later inside my chest.'

The box floated above his chest. It was constantly fed materials, while the runes created a seal around it.

Ben cracked his chest open, revealing two hearts. A normal-sized frozen one, and a half-sized black heart.

Two bigger black runes sprouted from his black heart.

One bound with the furnace. And the other created a small sphere that absorbed some coldness from the surroundings.

They eventually fused and created something that resembled a duality symbol.

'This should be enough.' Ben thought after leaving the core at a slight imbalance. Once fused with his body, it would slowly suck the rest of the cold energy from it to reach equilibrium. But more important, he would fill his body up with warmth, which would allow him to move.

A ticking bomb would then be inside him, but that was for him to deal with later.

While Ben did this, the energy oscillation was enormous, but the first runes created a camouflage effect.

People from outside were confused that the door wouldn't open. But they couldn't have a good read of the inside, either. So, they didn't notice the procedure happening, which was fast, brutal, and precise.

Ben didn't take his time either. He finished as soon as he could, ignoring everything else.

First, the cold and hot Spirit sunk close to his black heart.

Soon, runes covered both, leaving just the frozen heart visible.

The dark chunk of matter then kept absorbing runes without changing volume.

And ultimately, only his open chest and frozen body were left.

The fighting sounds from outside rhythmically broke the silence in this cold room. Yet, here, on the floor, Ben didn't move for a while. He didn't think, either.

But that eventually changed as both his heart began beating furiously.

In seconds, his whole body repaired itself and warmed up.

'GET OUT!' Ben opened his eyes.