Immortal Ice Empress: Path to Vengeance

25 Days Later

Mira was sitting in a Cultivation Cave in a lotus position gathering an insane amount of Qi. The Cave was even having a tough time keeping up with Mira's consumption as her body greedily devoured the surrounding Qi.

Not only that, but Mira was holding a Mid-Grade Spirit Stone, absorbing the Qi within it.

Her cultivation needed an insane amount of Qi for someone who was only a Mid-Houtian Stage. It was comparable to a Mid-Xiantian Stage cultivator and the gap would only widen when she breaks through.

Right now she was filling up every bone, muscle, organ, blood, and cell in her body with Qi.

When the Qi filled up her body she had to condense the newly-absorbed Qi to the same density as the rest of the Qi in her body.

This is no easy task since Mira's Qi is condensed to the absolute max, so every time she absorbed more Qi, she'd have to condense it to the level it was at when she broke through to the Mid-Houtian Stage.

After an unknown amount of time, Mira had completely filled up her body with super-condensed Qi. She even absorbed a bit more, which caused her body to inflate a bit.

Now it's time to condense everything and finally break through to the Late-Houtian Stage.

Mira willed every ounce of Qi in her body to condense. Doing this is like folding a sheet of paper in half except for both halves get absorbed into each other, but keep the same amount of volume as before.

Mira could stop here and advance to the next realm of power, but this would limit her growth and strength so she kept going.

Hours went by and Mira finally hit a bottleneck. This isn't some bottleneck that can simply be passed with will and determination. No, it's more like if she were to continue condensing then her body won't be able to handle it. But something told her that this is a good thing.

Mira let out a faint smile and stopped cultivating. She opened her eyes, got up, and left the Cultivation Cave. Her strength had now skyrocketed. She guessed that she should be able to have a fair fight with almost anyone under the Core Formation Realm and she could probably fight with a Core Formation Realm Expert and not immediately lose.

Mira doesn't count killing those Core Formation Realm Experts during the war since that was the result of gathering Qi from her new Scythe Art after hundreds of thousands of kills and even more swings. That plus a lot of luck, pressure from her killing intent, and surprise attacks.

Her true strength is nowhere near that perverted but is still pretty crazy.

Mira returned to her room and noticed that nobody was there, but she wasn't too surprised.

Maria has been cultivating like mad and even her Sword Master, Elder Bridget, was helping her out by giving her some pills and a great place to cultivate. It seems that Elder Bridget has taken a real liking to Maria.

Dominique, on the other hand, was given her own training schedule by Mira so she's not at their residence that often.

Speaking of Dominique, she's getting very close to entering the Qi Condensation Realm. Actually, she can enter it whenever she wants to since she's now at the Peak of the Body Tempering Realm, but Mira hasn't allowed her to breakthrough just yet.

This is because Mira wants to train her body to an insane degree for a mortal and she's succeeded in creating a little monster. Even though she has yet to enter the Qi Condensation Realm, her strength is already on par with the average Stage 4 or 5 Qi Condensation cultivator.

Now that Mira has a little under a week left before she leaves, she intends to help Dominique breakthrough to the Qi Condensation Realm which should make her power sky-rocket.

Mira spent her time creating training manuals and techniques for Dominique when she's gone. A few hours later, Dominique came back to the room drenched in sweat.

Before she could do anything, Mira approached her.

"Time to become a cultivator." Mira said and dragged her to the Qi Gathering Array.

Dominique didn't immediately catch on, but soon turned ecstatic! Mira's finally letting me become a cultivator!

After placing Dominique in the Qi Gathering Arra, Mira began to instruct her.

Dominique knew all about breaking through to the Qi Condensation Realm by now since not only has Mira and Maria told her about it. But she's been asking almost everyone in the Sect about their experiences breaking through to this Realm. Most were willing to tell her since they didn't have the heart to decline such a cute little girl. Mira's the only one in the Sect that would torture her so much!

After listening to Mira, Dominique solemnly nodded and began to do what she was instructed. She started to crazily absorb the surrounding Qi into her meridians, then proceed to condense it. Mira told her to keep condensing it until she felt like her meridians might explode. With Dominique's extremely sturdy body, this isn't a problem for her at all and she kept absorbing the Qi like crazy.

Mira was overseeing everything and couldn't help but be a little shocked. When Dominique successfully finished breaking through to Stage 1 Qi Condensation Realm, she noticed she was just as strong as she was when she broke through to the Qi Condensation Realm back at the lava lake.

This will set up an amazing foundation for her and allow her to be a step ahead against cultivators in the same realm as her.

Mira nodded in satisfaction and even had a tinge of pride looking at Dominique. Not proud of Dominique, but proud of herself for being able to forge something like Dominique.

"Yes!! I'm finally a cultivator now!! Thank you so much, Mira! Now let's spar! I know that you'll kick my ass, but I hope you won't be shameless enough to beat up someone as weak as me! I've been waiting so long for this!" Dominique jumped up and took out her Butterfly Swords.

Mira thought about it for a second then nodded her head. Mira also felt a bit of pity for Dominique because she would be sending her to something akin to hell here pretty soon.

After getting confirmation from Mira, Dominique beamed with joy.

Mira formed an ice rod and took a stance.

"I'll only defend and attack any openings, Mira said indifferently.

Dominique nodded and rushed at Mira, but before she could even land a hit Mira had smashed her ice rod into her side. It wasn't obvious wasn't a full-power hit since Dominique would actually die if she did that, but it sure didn't feel good.

Dominique retreated, tried to figure out what she did wrong, then rushed back at Mira. This time she got a bit closer before getting hit. She could only groan in pain and retreat as she tried to deduce where she went wrong.

After understanding where she went wrong, she rushed back at Mira.

This went on for almost 12 hours before Dominique collapsed from exhaustion.

This time, Mira was actually surprised by how talented Dominique was. It wasn't her talent with the Butterfly Swords that shocked her, but her comprehension abilities. After every hit from her, Dominique would learn and evolve. Her growth during these last 12 hours was astounding.

Mira now felt more assured in her decision. She picked up Dominique and dashed out of the Sect towards a certain hidden area in a little forest.

***

"Huh? Where am I?" Dominique whispered as she woke up to an unfamiliar ceiling.

Mira noticed she was awake and walked over to her.

"I brought you to a certain place that will increase your strength rather quickly. How much your strength increases depends on your own capability and determination. The only catch is that it'll take you 2 years to complete it. But I also have a feeling that it might not take that long so I left a talisman for you. Just crush it and it'll notify me that you're done." Mira explained and Dominique only became more confused.

"2 years? Will you also be here with me during these 2 years? But you have the Secret Realm! No! You're going to leave me aren't you?! No! I don't want you to go!" Dominique screamed as she started to tear up and hug Mira.

"Child, this is something that you have to do without me. I'll come back when you're finished. It's not like I'm just ditching you here. I'll be away for 3 months anyway. Maybe if you work extra hard during this training will you be able to see me sooner? Hehe." Mira gave an eerie chuckle, but Dominique's determination shot through the roof when she heard that. She made up her mind right there that she would do her absolute best during this trial so she could see Mira faster.

Mira nodded in satisfaction, not knowing if that'll happen or not.

"Anyway, here's your surprise." Mira said and took out a book titled 'Dominique's Personal Training Regimen'.

The book wasn't that thick, but when Dominique opened it and flipped through the pages she could only look at it in awe. It was filled up with stances, martial arts, stances, footwork, ways to combine her weapon with martial arts, and all of this was compiled into a fighting style that Mira felt would suit Dominique very well.

This was all custom-made by Mira specifically for Dominique and her Butterfly Swords.

Dominique started to tear up as she looked at it and then looked at Mira like she was a totally different person.

"Try to study that a bit before you start your training. It'll help you quite a bit. Now, I'll show you around." Mira said as she walked out of the room.

Dominique followed and was in awe by this underground city that seemed to lack people. Mira gave her a small tour while also looking for the Caretaker.

After introducing Dominique to everything along with telling her to find the Caretaker whenever she wants to start the trial, Mira also gave her a few words of advice and added a few things to Dominique's space ring.

She spent the rest of the day with Dominique then left. Dominique was, of course, extremely sad to see Mira leave, but she knew that she needed to face this challenge head-on. She immediately went into learning everything in her new training book.

Mira spoke to the Caretaker beforehand and asked a few questions. She wanted to know if he was able to increase the difficulty a bit, to which he answered yes, then proceeded to tell him to make it a bit more difficult for her.

After returning to the Sect, Mira decided to rest and take it easy. She knew that the upcoming 3 months were going to be hard, but she was looking forward to it.

The day before it was time to leave, Maria came back to the residence. Mira noticed that she also broke through to the Late-Houtian Stage.

The two of them were now fully prepared to enter the Secret Realm.

During this month, Rhydian and Vulcan were still sleeping and showed no signs of waking up. Mira could only pray that Rhydian doesn't cause a mess in the Sect or the surrounding cities for that matter.

The day passed quickly. Sect Master Jane had already chosen the last 5 people who will enter the Secret Realm along with everyone else and announced the departure to the rest of the Sect. Soon, all 20 people gathered at the entrance.

"Alright disciples, it's now time to set off to the Secret Realm!"