Chaotic Times and Disasters: I Hunt Down Martial Arts Masters and Become a God

After leaving the ancient city, the group rested for a night on the edge of the desert.

An Sheng clung to his newly acquired silver gun, refusing to let go. He even slept with the gun in his arms, the shaft pressed against his face, snoring loudly.

Xiahou Jun was woken up by his snoring in the middle of the night. He kicked him to make him put down the gun. An Sheng mumbled sleepily, "You can touch me, but you can't touch my gun!" He turned over and continued to sleep with the gun in his arms.

Xiahou Jun gritted his teeth and cursed, "Madman!" before covering his head with his clothes.

Yu Fu folded the last Vajra talisman into a small square, tucked it into the closest place to his body, patted it twice to make sure it was still there, and muttered something under his breath.

"You're all I have left, baby, you can't let me down!"

Yunnan's feet had recovered from the swelling thanks to Suwen's treatment, and she no longer needed assistance to walk. Sitting by the campfire, she tried rotating her feet and couldn't help but sigh.

"Physician Su, your technique is even better than that of the royal physicians of Kang Kingdom."

"The imperial physicians dared not use silver needles to prick the princess's feet, but I dare."

Suwen didn't even look up. She was busy repackaging the medicine bottles that had been shattered by the wind and sand in the ancient city, her fingers flying between the bottles.

Su Xue helped from the side and whispered to her if there were any particularly valuable medicines among the broken medicine bottles.

Suwen picked up a broken bottle and looked at it. "The deworming medicine was already scarce, and now it's all gone."

She tucked the fragments into a hidden compartment in the medicine box, paused, and then added,

"However, his blood works better than the deworming medicine. Hmm... maybe I should take a couple more bottles. He's a martial artist, so his qi and blood recover very quickly."

Su Xue's lips twitched, and she silently mourned for Fu Qing in her heart.

...

The next morning, the group continued their journey. After walking for most of the day, the desert gradually receded behind them. The color of the yellow sand changed from golden to grayish-white, and the sand under their feet became coarser and coarser until it turned into gravel. Further ahead, sparse withered grass and low shrubs appeared.

A vast expanse of white appeared on the horizon ahead.

An Sheng squinted for a long time, then suddenly his eyes widened. "Snow mountain?"

"The desert is bordered by snow-capped mountains—"

Ling Yuxi glanced back at the sand dunes still glowing golden in the morning light, then turned to look at the snow-capped peaks ahead, shook her head with a wry smile, and

"Completely defying the laws of nature, with desert two hundred miles away and snow-capped mountains within two hundred miles, no one would believe this outside, but in the world of painting, anything is possible..."

"It seems that the great master wanted to paint all the scenery he had ever seen into the secret realm before he died. Perhaps the desert was where he fought in his youth, and the snow-capped mountains were probably where he lived in seclusion in his later years."

The group continued on their way and arrived at the foot of the snow-capped mountain. In front of them stood a broken stone tablet, its surface mottled and eroded by ice and snow, but the inscriptions on it were still clearly legible.

The front is engraved with four ancient seal characters – “Trial of the Frost”, and the back has a line of smaller characters:

"Those who reach the summit will obtain the treasures I kept in my lifetime; those who give up halfway will leave on their own, and cannot be forced."

Fu Qing wiped the frost off the monument with his sleeve. "You can only find treasures by reaching the top. If you give up halfway, you've come all this way for nothing. Everyone, cheer up. This snow mountain might be more difficult to traverse than the desert and the ancient city combined."

Everyone nodded and stepped forward.

The snow-capped mountains are much higher and more dangerous than they appear from a distance.

The higher you go, the lower the temperature gets. The snow under your feet gradually goes from ankle-deep to knee-deep. Every step feels like walking on cotton, and it takes a lot of effort to pull yourself out.

The cold wind swept down from the mountain ridge, cutting like a knife against my face, and the white mist from my breath froze on my eyelashes.

On the mountainside, some monsters they had never seen before began to appear—snow-white apes crouched on the icy cliffs, staring at them; their fur was so thick it was impervious to swords and spears, and their forearms were thicker than an adult man's waist...

The ice falcons circling in the air are as fast as lightning, and the wind they create when their wings sweep across the ground can knock people over.

Three snow apes pounced down from the top of the mountain wall. Each of them was at the eighth level of the Meridian Opening Realm. When they landed, they smashed up the snow and cracked the ice beneath their feet.

They are taller than a human, with two forearms as thick as stone pillars, and their fists covered with thick ice armor.

"We've arrived just in time!"

An Sheng charged forward with his gun drawn, saying, "I'll test this beast's strength!"

The silver spear pierced the snow ape's chest, the tip penetrating the fur but only going in less than half an inch before being bounced back by a hard object—it felt like piercing an iron plate.

Before An Sheng could put away his gun, the snow ape slapped him. He parried with his gun, but was sent flying and crashed into a snowdrift.

"Ptooey, ptooey, ptooey..."

He scrambled out of the snow, spitting out a mouthful of snow foam, his eyes wide. "This beast's hide is tougher than my gun!"

Xiahou Jun refused to believe it and swung both maces at the other end.

The golden mace struck the snow ape's shoulder with a crisp "clang," but the snow ape remained unmoved. Instead, it swung its claw back and knocked Xiahou Jun back several steps.

Xiahou Jun steadied himself and looked at the white marks left on his mace as it bounced back. "My mace hit it like it hit an iron plate! Are all the monsters here this powerful?"

Fu Qing cleaved back the third snow ape with a single strike. The feedback from his hands told him that there was a thick layer of ice armor under the snow ape's fur, which was impossible to penetrate with normal attacks.

The group was forced to retreat continuously by the snow ape, and An Sheng and Xiahou Jun were pushed into perilous situations.

While dodging, Fu Qing observed carefully and suddenly noticed that every time the snow ape swung its arm to attack, a small patch of thin skin without ice armor would be exposed under its armpit—that patch of skin was light pink and looked very tender.

When he attacked again, he seized the moment when the snow ape was retracting its arm after swinging its arm and stabbed the thin skin with his knife. The tip of the knife pierced through the armpit and came out from above the shoulder. The snow ape let out a deafening scream and fell to the ground with a thud.

"Slap him under the armpits!"

Fu Qing drew his sword and shouted at An Sheng and Xiahou Jun.

An Sheng and Xiahou Jun exchanged a glance and followed suit. The silver spear and the golden mace each found the weak points under the snow ape's armpits, and all three snow apes fell down. Their huge corpses crashed onto the snow, creating three large craters.

An Sheng, leaning on his gun and panting heavily, looked at the snow ape carcass on the ground, which was even larger than him, and exclaimed, "Brother Fu, how did you manage to find this?"

"You need to learn to observe..."

Fu Qing sheathed his sword. "Find their weaknesses when you fight."

Yu Fu squatted beside the snow ape's corpse, took out a small dagger from his bundle, and began peeling away the ice armor, his face full of excitement.

"This is a real gem. The natural ice armor is both light and hard, stronger than any armor I've ever seen in the Jingjing weapons shop. If you thin it out and wear it, attacks from those below the fifth level of the Meridian Opening Realm won't be able to penetrate it at all."

"Don't rush, I'll peel off three sets and give each of you a piece of scrap. When we get back, Han Tie will make armor plates to wear under your clothes."

Fu Qing looked at him in surprise.

"You really know a lot."

The fat man chuckled, "A businessman naturally needs to be knowledgeable and well-informed, otherwise, he wouldn't even know if a treasure slipped through his fingers."

Su Xue used a medicinal hoe to dig open the snow ape's skull, took out several ice-blue crystal cores, and handed them to Su Wen. "Junior sister, there is a very pure cold energy in these crystal cores. See if you can use them in medicine."

Suwen took the crystal core and examined it against the light. "It's fine. A crystal core with the attribute of ice can neutralize fire poison. It can be refined into a pill to relieve heat poison attacking the heart. Keep it safe and deal with it when you get back."

...

As they continued climbing, the group discovered a thousand-year-old ice lotus at the foot of an ice cliff. It was as transparent as crystal, with a thin layer of frost on its petals.

Suwen carefully picked the ice lotus. "It is a top-grade medicinal herb with the attribute of ice, and it is at least 1,200 years old. When refined into pills, it can calm the mind and focus the spirit. This thing has disappeared outside. The records of the Medicine Palace only have illustrations and no real specimens."

Yunnan picked a flower petal, put it in her mouth, chewed it, and showed a hint of admiration.

"It has a cool taste upon entry, and a refreshing sensation in the lower abdomen after swallowing. It is even better than the tributes from the Kang Kingdom's royal palace. In Kang Kingdom, a single ice lotus can be exchanged for a city."

Yu Fu listened with wide eyes, took out his notebook and started taking notes, muttering that he would ask his father to take over the entire ice lotus business in Kangguo.

In the following days, the group discovered even more treasures in various parts of the snow-capped mountains.

At the bottom of the icy pool halfway up the mountain, there were several pieces of cold iron ore, which were of the same origin as the cold iron marrow that Fu Qing had found before, but of slightly lower grade. A piece the size of a fist gleamed with a faint blue light in the sunlight.

An Sheng scooped up the cold iron ore and weighed it in his hand: "This weight is just right for making a knife. Brother Fu, the cold iron marrow you had before was a top-grade material. Although these pieces are not as good as cold iron marrow, they are still excellent."

"When we get back, I'll have the best blacksmith in Jingjing forge you a cold iron sword—light and sharp."

Thanks.

Fu Qing nodded and put the cold iron ore into his bundle.

As they approached the heart of the snow-capped mountains, An Sheng suddenly stopped and pointed to the snow-covered ground ahead.

Two recently deceased demon corpses lay half-buried in the snow. One had a sword piercing its chest, and the other had its throat slit open. The wounds were still fresh, having been there less than half a day.

After squatting down to examine the wound, Fu Qing concluded, "Sword wound. The person who attacked was very skilled with their swordsmanship, killing them with a single blow. The blood of these two demons hasn't completely frozen yet. Judging from the degree of frost on the wound, it hasn't been more than half a day. The person who killed them should be up ahead."

Fu Qing glanced at the trail of messy footprints stretching into the distance on the snow, raising an eyebrow slightly. "Demon race! There are still some!"

He never expected so many demons to come in, but he was now at the ninth level of the Meridian Opening Realm, making him the strongest fighter in this secret realm and fearless of anything.