The icy creek water soaked past Igor’s knees, the piercing cold clearing his foggy mind somewhat.
Igor looked towards the place where the ice spirit had vanished.
At the bottom of the clear stream, a snow-white pendant carved in the shape of a phoenix lay quietly upon the white sand and pebbles.
After a moment’s hesitation, Igor cautiously reached out and slowly picked it up.
The sensation in his hand was very peculiar.
It was a feeling of warmth that carried a profound chill within it.
That feeling…
It was as if he wasn’t holding an inanimate object, but the core of a slumbering ten-thousand-year-old glacier.
Igor carefully lifted the pendant from the water.
Water rolled off the phoenix’s lifelike wings, refracting the dappled sunlight into brilliant, breathtaking rainbows. Around the pendant, tiny ice crystals slowly orbited like stardust, emitting the same icy aura as the ice-silver radiance.
“This is…”
Igor’s heart involuntarily skipped a beat.
Drawing on his discerning eye from years as a mercenary traveling far and wide and seeing many rare objects and treasures, he instantly concluded this pendant was no ordinary item!
Whether it was the material he had never seen before, or the fluctuations of what seemed to be mana naturally flowing upon it, both pointed unmistakably to one thrilling possibility—
This was most likely a lost ancient relic!
The kind of treasure, mentioned only in bard tales and ancient scrolls, that contained primordial power!
However, at this moment.
Something attracted his gaze more than the pendant itself… it was the ball of ice-silver radiance that reappeared as the pendant left the water…
That free ice elemental lesser spirit!
It emitted pure, cold elemental fluctuations, its form nimbly shifting, at times like a leaping ice-flame, at times like a miniature star.
Its light was condensed and pure, even… more dazzling than the elemental spirit he had once caught a distant glimpse of during an Orion family celebration, the one the family treasured as a priceless heirloom!
An elemental spirit!
An elemental spirit without a contractor!
The starting point of all transcendent power, the foundation of magic!
If he could successfully contract it, he would become an Elementalist wielding mana, possessing the power to contend with the Orion family!
Igor’s breathing grew involuntary rapid, and he almost couldn’t resist reaching out to grasp that radiance.
Yet, the moment this impulse surged, he suddenly froze again.
The method to contract an elemental spirit… he didn’t know it.
Yes, he did not know.
How to communicate with an elemental spirit, how to guide its power, how to ultimately forge an unbreakable Spirit Contract…
This set of methods had always been the strictly guarded, never-disclosed core secret of every noble family, the foundation maintaining their power and authority.
It was said to require complex rituals, specific incantations, even precious magical mediums to significantly improve the chance of success.
But him.
Igor.
An illegitimate child not acknowledged by his family.
A mercenary who could only struggle on the family’s fringes for survival, eventually swept out like garbage.
How could he possibly have access to secrets of this level?
For a moment, the light that had ignited in Igor’s eyes dimmed again.
Free lesser spirits rarely stayed in one place for long.
And if an energy-based elemental spirit wanted to leave, even an Elementalist could not stop it.
Was he to just watch this chance to change his fate slip through his fingers?
No! There must be a way!
Igor stared fixedly at the ball of ice-silver radiance still hovering above his palm, his mind operating at an unprecedented, frenzied speed.
He forced himself to calm down, recalling the miscellaneous books, notes he had flipped through in the past, and the various half-true, half-false rumors heard in taverns while drinking.
In that instant, his heart stirred. He recalled an ancient concept he had once heard mentioned—Natural Resonance.
Natural Resonance!
It was said that before the great noble families established their perfected contracting rituals, the very first Elementalists did not contract with elemental spirits through complex chants and ceremonies.
They relied on long-term companionship, sincere communication, fulfilling the spirit’s needs, ultimately forming a bond with the spirit, achieving a deep spiritual resonance, and thus naturally accomplishing the Spirit Contract!
The perfected contracting methods developed later by the various families essentially just improved the efficiency and success rate of generating this resonance.
But the final initiative to contract or not always rested with the elemental spirit itself!
In other words, as long as he could spend a long time with this lesser spirit, earn its trust, gain its recognition, and ultimately achieve spiritual resonance…
He might be able to forge that most ancient, most pure Spirit Contract!
This was a clumsy method, a method gambling on probability.
It required time, patience, and a little bit of luck.
However, the Blackwood Forest was fraught with danger.
He was carrying an infant in need of constant care. His internal injuries, though healed, left him utterly weak.
How long could he last in this seemingly temporarily safe stream valley?
And what about the Orion family’s pursuers? Would those mercenaries track their trail here?
How long would this lesser spirit be willing to stay with him?
Igor did not know.
He lowered his head, looking at his daughter who had, at some point, fallen quietly asleep again in his arms.
That small, warm body nestling against him was his only warmth at this moment, and the responsibility he absolutely could not abandon.
Taking a deep breath of the forest’s cold, damp air, the young man’s gaze grew firm once more.
There was no way back.
He had to try.
Even if the chance was one in ten thousand, he had to grasp it with one hundred percent effort!
“Oh, messenger of ice…”
Igor spoke softly to the ball of ice-silver radiance, though he knew the elemental spirit might not understand human language:
“I… need your help.”
“I will do everything within my power to meet your needs, to become a worthy contractor.”
Having made his decision, Igor forcibly suppressed his inner unease and quickly began to act.
Wanting an elemental spirit to contract naturally was absolutely not a matter of one or two days.
The immediate priority was to solve the survival issue, especially food for the child. He himself could survive on wild fruits and stream fish, but an infant could not.
Fortunately, as an excellent mercenary, he naturally had his own methods.
He first found a relatively dry, wind-sheltered rock cave near the stream to serve as a hiding place for himself and his daughter.
Then, relying on his rich wilderness experience and following subtle traces, he located a herd of wild goats drinking nearby.
With his excellent skills, it didn’t take long for him to successfully capture a lactating nanny goat using hand-twisted vine ropes.
After carefully feeding the infant girl by dipping clean cloth strips into the goat’s milk, the young man finally freed his hands to begin his contracting journey—
His target was that aloof and beautiful ice-silver spirit!
Igor did not know the ritual or incantation for contracting.
He could only return to the most primal instinct.
He fetched the clearest, sweetest spring water from the valley, placing it on the smooth stream stone the lesser spirit most liked to orbit, using broad leaves as a vessel.
He picked the freshest wild strawberries and unknown berries from the forest, though he knew elemental spirits likely didn’t need food to sustain their existence.
During the quiet nights, he would speak softly to that ball of radiance, growing even colder under the moonlight, narrating his own story.
He spoke of his birth, his childhood.
Old Bolo’s teachings, the passion and sweat of the mercenary corps, the warm smile of his beloved.
The Lady’s framing, the mercenary corps’ destruction, his lover’s tragic death, the Orion family’s ruthlessness.
He spoke of the hatred in his heart, and… the heavy yet inseparable responsibility and hope this child in his arms brought him.
“I must survive, I must gain power… not for myself, but for her, for my little Elena, and for all those who died because of me…”
Igor’s voice was hoarse.
The ice-silver lesser spirit, most of the time, simply hovered there, quietly emanating its radiance. It seemed indifferent to all his actions, maintaining a near-aloof observation.
Sometimes, it would suddenly vanish, hiding near the Phoenix Pendant for a whole day, refusing to appear, giving no response no matter how Igor tried to communicate.
Sometimes, when Igor’s inner anxiety made him show a trace of impatience, the spirit would even retreat immediately, its light flickering unsteadily.
A sense of defeat, like a clinging bone-festering disease, constantly gnawed at Igor’s confidence.
“Have my methods been completely wrong from the start?”
“Does it simply look down on my paltry elemental affinity?”
“How long can we last like this? The Blackwood Forest… how long can we hide?”
Countless negative thoughts churned in the young man’s mind.
The occasional low, distant howls of unknown magical beasts from deep within the forest acted like death warrants, constantly reminding Igor of the perilous environment he and the child were in.
But he knew he couldn’t rush.
The spirit could sense his emotions.
He had to be more patient than ever before.
Waiting and attempting, time flowed quietly.
In the blink of an eye, Igor had spent seven days in this isolated stream valley.
During these seven days, he barely sustained himself and his daughter on fish from the stream, whatever wild fruits he could find in the forest, and the milk from that wild nanny goat.
He dared not wander far, his range of movement confined to the vicinity of the stream and the relatively safe area around the rock cave.
The nights in the Blackwood Forest were always filled with the hair-raising howls of distant magical beasts.
Yet this small stream valley remained exceptionally quiet, like a patch of pure land sheltered by an invisible force, with even large beasts rarely approaching.
This gave him precious time and space.
But it also made the anxiety in his heart grow with each passing day.
He knew this peace could not possibly be eternal.
On the seventh night.
The moonlight was exceptionally bright, its cold silver glow bathing the stream valley, draping everything in a dreamlike veil.
As usual, Igor sat by the smooth boulder by the stream.
The ice-silver lesser spirit slowly orbited not far in front of him, absorbing the mana within the moonlight, emitting a soft, cold glow.
After seven days of companionship, the spirit seemed less wary of him than at the beginning, allowing him to come a bit closer.
But that sense of being neither here nor there still remained; that intangible barrier seemed indestructible.
Igor looked at it, his heart filled with an indescribable complexity of emotions.
Hope was within reach, yet seemed as distant as the horizon.
The repeated setbacks of recent days plunged him into deep confusion and pain.
He no longer deliberately controlled his emotions or organized his words as he had in previous days.
Tonight, he only wanted to pour out his heart.
Facing the spirit, in a hoarse, low voice, he began to murmur to himself, more like a complete release of the emotions long suppressed within:
“Bolo, that old fellow is always half-drunk, yet who cared for me more than anyone… the look in his eyes at the end was telling me to run…”
“He used his body to block that fatal strike from the superhuman mercenary…”
“Ella, my Ella… she didn’t even get to see Elena one last time…”
“That woman… and my so-called father!”
“What gives them the right to decide others’ life and death?! To take everything from me?!”
“Just because I carry blood they deem dirty?”
“Just because of that laughable talent they look down upon?!”
“I’m not reconciled! I truly am not reconciled!”
Igor’s voice trembled with agitation.
But the next moment, his gaze fell towards the direction of the rock cave, and his tone instantly became incredibly tender:
“But, looking at her… at little Elena who knows nothing…”
“I know I cannot think only of hatred.”
“I must take her away from here, I must let her survive, grow up safely, let her live a happy life… This is what I promised Ella, and it is the meaning of my survival…”
“For this, I am willing to pay any price, bear any cost!”
At this moment, Igor’s spirit was wide open, completely unguarded.
Utmost sorrow, heart-scorching rage, deep love, and responsibility heavy as a mountain…
All these emotions surged forth like a tidal wave, without any concealment, impacting the surrounding intangible domain.
He was not deliberately trying to guide communication.
Yet, precisely at the moment his emotions surged to their peak—
He clearly felt the ball of ice-silver radiance, which had been orbiting with a constant rhythm before him, suddenly pause!
The Phoenix Pendant in his embrace emitted a faint light, then shone as brilliantly as a cluster of stars.
And in the next moment, he heard an ethereal, otherworldly female voice slowly sound within his heart:
“You… are truly willing to pay any price?”
Igor’s body shuddered.
“Yes! Of course I am willing!”
He didn’t even think about where the voice came from, almost instinctively blurting out the words.
And immediately after, Igor felt an irresistible, icy and immense suction force abruptly act upon his consciousness…
In an instant, the world spun around him.