Lord of Winter: Beginning with Daily Intelligence

In the midst of this scorching standoff, Louis always stood at the center of the team.

He could feel that something was taking shape deeper within the Holy City.

The aura instinctively filled him with disgust, yet it precisely triggered the resonance of the Primordial Heart.

Louis murmured to himself: "Sure enough... everything here also extends from there."

He stepped forward, directly crossing the edge of the shield that Weir was desperately maintaining.

A brief confusion arose at the rear of the line.

"Lord Louis!"

Weir turned abruptly, the Fighting Energy shield violently oscillating: "It’s too dangerous up ahead, I..."

"You stay here." Louis’s voice came through the protective mask, with no emotional fluctuation.

He just calmly took that step, walking out of the absolute defensive circle that the crimson shield could cover.

Weir’s pupils contracted suddenly: "My Lord—!"

Several giant stitched creatures lurking at the edge of the shield immediately sensed this isolated target.

They let out an excited and piercing shriek, as three bone scythes the size of doors slashed toward Louis’s head from above, the left, and the right.

But Louis did not dodge, nor did he even lift an eyelid, not noticing the danger at all.

He merely tilted his head slightly, and a molten gold vertical slit glowed in those originally deep eyes.

It was the gaze from the primordial era, the absolute overlooking of a top predator at the apex of the food chain upon lesser lives.

Louis’s lips moved slightly: "Scram."

An invisible ripple spread out with him at the center.

The soul-level impact descended at this moment, and the movements of the three giant stitched monsters pouncing midair instantly froze, then their bodies exploded into a foul stench of green bile.

They were not hit by any physical attack.

It was just their nervous systems, unable to withstand this fear from the depth of instinct, that overloaded and self-destructed.

"Plop."

The three massive bodies, like puppets with cut strings, fell heavily at Louis’s feet, akin to dolls drained of will.

Louis ignored it and continued moving forward, with each step he took, that circle of invisible golden aura pressed forward one more step.

The swarming, bloodthirsty stitched creatures ahead, like a horde of rats meeting a natural predator.

They let out low, broken whimpers, scrambling to retreat to both sides.

The slower ones disintegrated directly under the pressure, their internals exploding, turning into an unshapable pulp.

The originally congested corridor was forcibly parted.

A straight and broad passage formed under Louis’s feet.

Behind him, Weir’s hand maintaining the shield froze in midair, and that layer of crimson Fighting Energy screen seemed unprecedentedly redundant at this moment.

He looked at that figure ahead, the nonexistent airflow around Louis slightly swayed, driving all monsters back in his path.

The surrounding Red Tide Knights also stopped their actions, gripping and releasing their weapons subconsciously.

Sacco muttered under his breath, his voice almost completely swallowed by the helmet: "...What exactly is our Lord?"

Weir took a deep breath, forcibly suppressing the surging emotions in his chest.

"Don’t stop." He steadied the shield again, his voice returning to its usual cold hardness, "Push forward, follow Lord Louis’s path."

However, even though the Red Tide Guard was giving their utmost to advance, even though Weir’s crimson Fighting Energy shield remained steadfast as ever, the distance between them and Louis continued to widen.

It was not a difference in speed but in level.

The place Louis was heading to was never a battlefield they should set foot on.

......

Before stepping into the Holy Hall, Louis briefly paused.

From afar, it was a massive structure composed of white and gold, standing in the heart of the entire city.

The towering dome still existed, yet layers of intertwining golden thorns tightly ensnared it.

The thorns squirmed slowly, climbing along the once precise architectural lines, accurately replicating the ancient symmetrical aesthetics of the Holy Hall.

This cold, restrained religious aesthetics had not disappeared but was transplanted entirely into flesh and plant.

Louis’s gaze lingered on that architecture for a moment before turning away.

He reached out and pushed open the door before him.

The door that was once the most immense white stone gate of the Holy Hall was now thoroughly alienated, covered by countless white bones and chunks of flesh.

The touch was warm, with a regular pulse, as if responding to the touch, as though the entire door was still performing some sort of welcoming duty.

This holy sanctuary, once renowned for its white stone columns, platinum arches, and infinitely extensive dome, had utterly lost the concept of architecture, collapsing into a vast living chamber instead.

Not a metaphor—the entire grand hall was breathing.

Through the membrane, one could even see murky golden blood flowing within.

The liquid circulated along established pathways, with shadows occasionally flitting deep within, like yet-to-be-awakened organs reflecting.

Louis’s gaze moved along the sides of the hall.

The spot where the Holy Order and doctrine reliefs once hung was now thoroughly transformed; most distinctively, like dolls displayed on a store counter, twenty-four desiccated corpses were neatly nailed to the flesh wall.

They wore Magic Robes symbolizing authority, whose gilded embroideries had long lost their luster, yet the patterns that once represented power and glory could still be discerned.

Numerous glowing green thorns grew from within the flesh wall, piercing their limbs, securely fixing the corpses midair.

These people were evidently long dead.

Yet their facial muscles had not relaxed.

Every face was frozen in the same expression—extreme pain and overwhelming jealousy that couldn’t be suppressed.

These were the frozen emotions left by failed candidates at the last moment, permanently preserved by this living sanctuary.

Louis’s gaze bypassed these collections, landing at the end of the hall.

Where the white throne was supposed to be.

Now, there was only a twisted golden tree growing from the ground.

The trunk was robust, covered in a morbid golden sheen, as if forcibly plated with a holy exterior.

Beneath the sheen, countless dense thorn-shaped patterns spiraled along the trunk.

These thorns contracted at an extremely slow pace, with tips occasionally oozing light green sap, seemingly conducting some internal circulation.

In the gaps between the thorns, one could see golden liquid coursing along fixed pathways, maintaining absolute synchronization with the whole hall’s neural network.

Eduardo was in the center of the tree; Louis took a moment to recognize his formerly somewhat plump brother.

His lower half had vanished, his body from the waist down now entirely transformed, broken down into numerous slender golden thorns, growing backward into the tree trunk.

His upper half still retained a humanoid form, yet appeared extraordinarily fragile.

Fine golden veins spread along the thorn paths, resembling forcibly attached wires interlocking with the tree trunk’s pathways.

Atop his head, that Golden Thorn Feather Crown was the core of the entire Holy Curtain Hall.

Its roots had long pierced Eduardo’s scalp and skull, embedding deep into his brain, completing the final integration with the hall’s countless golden nerve fibers.

The thorny wings opened and closed at a sluggish frequency, each motion causing a synchronous tremor throughout the entire chamber.

His eyes were open, yet unfocused, and what flowed from his eye sockets wasn’t tears, but slowly seeping golden pus, trailing down his cheeks.

The whole grand hall fell into an oppressively suffocating stillness.

Only the sound of the flesh membrane’s pulsation, the low hum of the nutrient liquid flow, and the continual and patient growth of that golden tree.

Louis stood in place, observing it all.

Suddenly, the Golden Thorn Feather Crown burst into brightness!

A blinding emerald green poison light erupted from the depths of the crown, causing the entire living hall to contract violently.

The twenty-four corpses nailed to the walls suddenly opened their eyes wide!