"Faster!"

Silas Hawthorne’s usually composed expression contorted. A frigid wind, like a thousand icy needles, blasted them, seeping through every fiber of the rope.

The extreme-cold alarm at his waist shrieked, its red light flashing manically, stretching their already frayed nerves to the breaking point.

Sue Lawrence had already cast aside all thoughts of life and death. Even in her thermal suit, she could feel the cold seeping in. ’This thing’s supposed to be cold-proof, but we’ve been out in this freeze for two days!’

Before Silas Hawthorne could react, she gritted her teeth, wrapped her arms tightly around his waist, and roared with all her might, "Let go!"

Silas Hawthorne froze.

He was suspended in midair, staring down in utter disbelief at the woman clinging to him.

Below them was a bottomless ice chasm. By his estimate, the snow-covered ground was at least seven or eight meters down.

In the extreme cold of this post-apocalyptic world, the accumulated snow was frozen harder than steel, harder than any glacier. Jumping would be suicide. Even with their Superpowers, neither of them could survive the impact. Not to mention the terrifying temperature, which could flash-freeze flesh and bone in an instant.

"At this temperature, the rope won’t hold!" Sue Lawrence’s voice held a faint tremor, but her tone was resolute.

Silas Hawthorne’s heart plummeted. He instinctively looked up.

A thick layer of white frost was visibly crystallizing on their safety rope—a specially modified, supposedly indestructible line. Icicles spiderwebbed across its length, and the once-tough fibers, now frozen brittle, were emitting faint, sharp CRACKING sounds.

The alarm’s readout was still plummeting. The temperature had probably already shattered the lowest recorded on Glacius!

"Are you insane?!" Silas Hawthorne rasped.

"Let go!"

Sue Lawrence’s command was absolute, a final, non-negotiable bark that cut through the wind.

Seeing the desperate gamble in her eyes, with only a split second to decide, Silas Hawthorne gritted his teeth and released his grip on the rope.

The next second, the world spun.

Clinging to him, Sue Lawrence launched herself from the ice cliff—a drop of more than ten meters—like an arrow shot from a bow!

It was a display of Jumping Power far beyond human limits, impossibly graceful. Silas Hawthorne’s pupils contracted. He was flabbergasted. ’What kind of insane Jumping Ability is this?!’

But before he could process it, their bodies slammed hard against the smooth, vertical ice wall. 𝑓𝑟𝑒𝘦𝓌𝑒𝑏𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝘭.𝒸𝘰𝑚

SCREEECH—

The sharp, grating sound was deafening. The ice wall was as smooth as glass, offering no purchase as their bodies plunged downward in an uncontrolled slide.

Silas Hawthorne’s face went deathly pale. ’If we slide all the way down, the impact will kill us for sure.’

Sue Lawrence’s brow furrowed, and beads of cold sweat formed on her temples.

She activated her gecko Superpower, her fingertips desperately gripping the ice wall to slow their descent. But their combined weight was too much for her. Her climbing Superpower was barely holding, and while their slide slowed, they were still falling fast.

Just as they were two meters from the ground, Sue Lawrence pushed off again, activating her cricket’s powerful jumping Superpower. With a mighty kick, she managed to shed most of their downward momentum.

Silas Hawthorne reacted instantly, tightening his core and executing a clean forward roll to absorb the landing. They stumbled into a shopping mall, collapsing in a heap on the frigid floor.

"Move!"

On pure reflex, Silas Hawthorne hauled Sue Lawrence to her feet. Ignoring his own scrapes and bruises, he pulled her toward an escalator—long since stopped and now coated in a thin layer of ice—and they sprinted down it with abandon.

Behind them, a terrifying frost pursued them like a living beast, freezing the very air where it passed with a sinister HISS.

They didn’t dare to stop, hurtling downward with every ounce of their strength. The mall’s floors blurred past as desperation and the will to live battled within them.

Fortunately, the bottom level of the mall connected to an underground parking garage and, more importantly, to the deepest subway hub in Stellaport. In that moment, the dark maw of the subway entrance was their only hope.

They sprinted and stumbled down to the fourth basement level before the pursuing frost was finally cut off by the thick concrete walls. The piercing hiss of freezing air fell silent.

Leaning against the icy wall, they gasped for breath, their chests heaving. The sweat on their skin evaporated from their residual body heat, only to be immediately chilled by the frigid air. A wave of exhaustion, the kind that only comes after cheating death, washed over them.

With a trembling hand, Silas Hawthorne checked his temperature alarm. The flashing red number on the screen made both their hearts clench. Outside temperature: -96°C.

A temperature cold enough to flash-freeze any living thing into a solid statue of ice.

Sue Lawrence scanned their surroundings. The dim subway tunnel was deserted. Tracks, platforms, and train cars were all encased in a thick layer of solid ice. It was dead silent, save for the sound of their own ragged breaths echoing in the vast emptiness.

"I wonder where Theodore Frost and the others are..." she said, her voice hoarse and her eyes filled with worry.

Silas Hawthorne, however, remained focused. His expression was as hard as frozen steel. He scanned their surroundings, a faint chill already coalescing at his fingertips. His voice was steady, but held the unquestionable weight of a command. "Forget the others. Our priority is to survive. Sue, start breaking up the ice. We need to build a shelter!"

Sue Lawrence understood his plan immediately.

Ice is a poor thermal conductor, making it the best natural barrier against extreme cold. Here in this frozen subway station, a sturdy ice shelter was the only way to insulate themselves from the terrifying negative ninety-six-degree temperatures and survive this cataclysmic freeze.

She watched as Silas Hawthorne pulled a dagger from his pack and began furiously chipping away at the ice.

’But it’s too slow. The ice is incredibly hard, and the blocks are massive. By the time he chisels enough out, we’d be frozen solid long before the shelter is finished.’

’Fortunately, however, I have my Ice Control Skill.’

Ice Control meant she could manipulate ice at will. She immediately channeled her Superpower, a burst of frigid energy erupting from her palm as she aimed it at the ice-caked wall.

The solid ice suddenly behaved like modeling clay. Before Silas Hawthorne’s astonished eyes, sheets of it peeled away from the floor and walls, drawn together under Sue Lawrence’s command. As if shaped by an invisible hand, the ice molded itself into a small shelter, perfectly seamless except for a single, small entrance.

Silas Hawthorne was utterly speechless.

’Sue Lawrence is a walking treasure chest of surprises. Even if everyone else in the world froze to death, she’d probably find a way to survive this, wouldn’t she?’

"Quick, inside!"

Sue pulled him inside, then produced a small, stockpiled briquette stove from her spatial storage and immediately lit it.

’As long as we can keep it warm in here, we’ll be safe!’

Just as the stove caught fire, a faint, almost imperceptible sound echoed from the ice-caked subway tunnel.

"Who’s there?"