Small crystals of ice danced in the air around the weak looking pair. With a movement that didn't awaken the young newborn, Sheng Wang moved quietly and seamlessly. His figure turned into a shadowy blur that slid between the sharp and cold fangs that threatened to turn his body into bloodied shreds.
"A bunch of cute puppies." The old man sighed softly as a somber smile flashed on his wrinkled faces.
The five spiritual beasts felt their heavy paws and fangs crush the empty air, the satisfying sensation of executing their prey left their hearts hanging in their chests. Even with their control over the ice elements, the movements they released during their attacks caused the snow around them to form into twirling clouds that blocked their visions.
Time seemed to slow down as the rotation of the snowflakes came to a slow stop. The entire scenery seemed to have been frozen inside of a single frame.
The Icewolfs' figures stood still. Due to the creatures' sentience, they couldn't help but sense that the situation had taken a bad turn for them. Usually, a pair of weak looking individual shouldn't have caused them any problem. But now, the pack communicated their anxiety and nascent fear with low growls that could only be heard by them.
However, the fact that their attack was a failure wasn't enough to stop them in their tracks. Lifeforms weren't easy to come by in the vast chain of frozen mountains, with the Dire Icewolf being a spiritual beast that still relied on the consumption of other beasts for their own growth.
Far and few were the type of beasts that solely relied on the absorption of elements, with those that did ending up being spiritual beasts that had lived through thousands of years. Legends and myth even spoke about near divine creatures that were said to have grown past the million year mark. These reclusive divine creatures rarely interacted with other lifeforms and usually spend their times in deep hibernation.
Thankfully, the Dire Icewolf that had attacked Sheng Wang were but a few hundred years old spiritual beasts as the pair of grandfather and baby were only traveling in the outskirt area of the forbidden valley. The experienced man had swiftly evaded their attack, disappearing from the dire beasts' sense at the same time by cutting his aura from leaving his body.
The instant he reappeared, his right hand was forming a knife stance and was in the middle of falling on the neck of the muscular creature. The dense fur that surrounded the Dire Icewolf turned into the softest material as the old man's palm strike connected with the beast.
No flash of light appeared around the old man's movement as the attack he delivered didn't release even a single wisp of spiritual energy. Although he wasn't afraid of the few hundred years old creature that surrounded him, he was still apprehensive toward the other spiritual beasts living inside the frozen valley.
The body of the wolf he palm-slashed turned soft jelly with its entire body flattened on the hard ice under their feet. Half of the creature's body had been buried under the blue-silver snow with only a shivering paw appearing out of the pile of white fur and snowflakes. The right hand of the old man was tightly clenched around the creature's large neck, his finger digging deep in the skin as he grabbed the Dire Icewolf like a bag filled with random groceries.
"Sit!" Sheng Wang quietly ordered. The swift attack plus the authoritative tone in the old man's voice caused a sporadic fear to spread among the wolf pack.
The threatening growls had swiftly turned into fearful yaps and woofs that were accompanied with an intense shivering. None of the hundred year olds spiritual beasts dared to take a single movement as they couldn't help but come to the conclusion that they had chosen the wrong prey.
Sheng Wang couldn't help but flash a satisfied smile as his gaze landed on the four other beasts. Even when injured and forced to escape from his destroyed home, his old bones were still able to take care of a few creatures without using any spiritual energy. The pack of deadly ice-cold spiritual wolfs had turned into docile dogs that were hiding their eyes with their large furry ears while hiding under their shaking hind legs.
The shacking Dire Icewolfs seemed to be on the brink of running away. The tension traversing their stressful bodies seemed to be bowling, Sheng Wang understood that the sole reason that stopped them from fleeting was that he was holding the life of one of them in his hands. He couldn't help but respect the pack of savage creatures for that reason as the smile on his wrinkled face turned softer.
The old man's clenched fist relaxed, his arm snapped and flicked the Dire Icewolf's heavy body toward his kin. All the action he had done were executed in a smooth fashion that didn't seem to awake the baby he was holding on his chest.
A plethora of noises left the throat of the pack of Dire Icewolf. Sheng Wang felt the relief in their vocal communication, he couldn't help but too feel the tension he held on reduce slightly as the embrace on Tim's baby body tightened slightly.
The old man's weary mind relaxed shortly as the pack of savage creature expressed their emotions through their yaps and woofs that barked out of their excited snouts. In the middle of the peaceful scenery, Tim dug deeply in the old man's embrace as he snuggled himself further more in a comfortable position.
Behind the old man, the sun continued rising with a new day basked the sky of the elevated chain of mountains.
The transmigrated drunkard basked in the comfort with no idea of the strange scenery happening around him. His soul was still in a state of intense confusion as it seems the body he had moved into had problems prior to his reincarnation. Just the fact that the newborn body wasn't rejecting the old soul was a sign that he had been completely reborn in a new body.
He was far from being used to it, with every sleep session he went through, he could feel his synchronization with the newborn physique rising. The acceptance of the news was far from easy, but Tim felt that the mystical event was an opportunity for him to finally turn the page with his past life. On top of that, he felt an intrinsic trust toward the bearded old man that seemed to be part of his relatives in this world.
He didn't know if his parents were alive, wasn't aware of the situation here and to top it off didn't know that the body he had inhabited was one that was linked to a mountain of karmic calamities. A mountain of problems that might leave the reincarnated drunkard in a depressed mood.
On the other hand, if he had been awake, he would have definitely been amazed by the way the old man had managed the pack of fierce looking beasts. Sadly, he was too occupied by the comfortable fatigue that washed his body as he instinctively fell in a deep recovering sleep.
Currently, Sheng Wang had just separated from the pack of creatures. He was watching them dart in one single direction with a soft smile that hung tightly on his usually placid lips. A few seconds after the last Dire Icewolf left his vision, he couldn't help but think that he should have kept one.
"Traveling on one of these puppies would definitely be easier than on my old weary bones…" he joked as he regretted his benevolence. His will shut down the idea of following the beasts as he didn't want to go back on the silent promise he did when he let the pack of spiritual Icewolf escape.
"I'll find a better mount later." He concluded as his feet resumed their endless walk. Before long, he noticed several tracks that appeared on the piled up hardened crystal that made up the silver-blue ground of the frozen valley.
Nonetheless he ignored most of the beast marks as he could see through the marks than none of the beasts were suitable to be used as a mount.
The area surrounding the pair made of a sleeping baby and weary old man changed continuously as Sheng Wang's feet never came to a stop. Sometimes, when his senses didn't pick on any lifeforms around him, he would raise the speed of his walk. Sometimes even dashing through the silent frozen sceneries of the chain of mountain when the terrain made it possible.
He never dropped his guard, always making sure the area around him was safe before moving further down the no man's land. His stamina expenditure seemed continuous but his bodily reserve made it seem as if the old man had an infinite amount of energy hidden inside him.
By the end of the first day inside of the frozen valley, they finished crossing half of the path that led to the other side of the vast no man's land where the majority of the Spiritual Beasts lived.
The dangerous journey needed to arrive to the end of Sheng Wang's escape plan would have been a challenge for anyone else. Not even when the person crossing the danger zone was traveling with a newborn. On several occasions, he had to stop on his way to prepare a small nutritive concoction for the newborn baby that didn't seem to be bothered by the bad taste of the beverage.
After but one sip of the strange mixture, a groggily awoken Tim couldn't stop himself from consuming the entire portion prepared by the old man. The beverage made out of spiritual beast's fresh milk combined with some herbs foraged on the way seemed to contain everything the newborn needed. Sheng Wang didn't expect the strength of life existing inside the revived baby and was pleasantly surprised by the news.
He couldn't stopped repeating Good, Good, Good! When watching his grandson take large sips one after another. He didn't even scold the trembling figure that greedily licked the content of the small glass he served to the newborn baby.
"Good! Good! Good!" kept repeating Tim, too, but kept the commentary in his mind as the young body he was currently in wasn't capable of speech. Every time he had tried, the strange gurgling sounds he ended producing would force the old man to gently shush him and comfort him. The dangerous journey was but a long comfortable cycle of sleeping and eating for the weak baby that seemed to be spending most of its time developing mid sleep.
After a few hearty meals, the pale color that had taken hold of his body after a severe injury inside of the Shenjian's royal palace[MD1] [JS2] started disappearing. Although the physical damage had been healed instantly by a healer under the Sheng Clan, the attack had also damaged the soul with a rapidly maturing curse that took the life of the newborn young price.
The experienced old Wang had definitely sensed the life slip out of the baby's body when he stepped inside of the cursed forest Porcupine Tree, he couldn't believe his eyes and senses when he saw the fragile cold body start moving again and breathing. He didn't question that reality, resuming the escape through the dangerous no man's land with newfound vigor.
By the end of the second day since the start of their escape, Sheng Wang left the vast chain of mountains on top of a weak hundred year old beast that was named the Iron Tusked Mammoth. Contrary to its name, the spiritual beast's shape followed the shape of an ox and was chosen by the old man for the rest of their secretive journey in the desolate lands.
The Iron Tusked Mammoth was a spiritual beasts that specialized in long distance travel as it was far from being the type of beast that relied on sedentary isolation to grow their cultivation. The endurance of the large four legged creature made the rest of the journey far easier on Old Wang's knees, however that didn't mean that the experienced man had dropped his guard as he continued redirecting the beasts when it strayed on dangerous paths.