Polar Day And Polar Night

The invisible glacier crashed down! Not a physical blow, but a conceptual *annihilation*—stripping all that was "active," "chaotic," and bound by "time's flow" from this eternally anchored sanctuary!

Lu Chen's thoughts instantly bogged down! Each notion grew heavy, sluggish, as if wading through congealed air for millennia. The agonizing cycle of light-fire, extreme cold, and shadow-magma within him, under this absolute "Stasis" field, was like a forge plunged into an ice sea—instantly guttering out! The Abyss-Devouring Flame in his palm flickered and flared wildly, its outer azure ice groaning under strain, the etched runes of dark crimson and pitch black writhing violently, threatening to unravel!

Tang Xiao on his back convulsed! The writhing azure ice on his face surged with renewed vigor, threatening to consume his last shreds of human skin! The Abyssal Taint on his left cheek, under the skeleton's cold gaze, emitted a silent shriek—the dark crimson veins within the obsidian pulsed and struggled frantically, yet were trapped like insects in amber, their struggles rendered almost imperceptible by the pure "Stasis"!

Upon the dais, the skeletal head was fully raised. Two points of azure flame burned steadily in the empty sockets—cold, pure, utterly emotionless, like eternal polar stars. Its jade-like finger bones slowly settled onto the hilt of the massive crystalline greatsword embedded in the black ice before it.

*HUUUUM—!*

The greatsword resonated with a bass note that could stop a heart! The hairline fractures on its blade ignited with azure light, like waking veins! A wave of "Stasis," vaster and heavier than before, erupted from the sword like a tangible tide!

The air solidified completely! Even the low hum of the Source-current's lament was forcibly "smoothed" into dead silence as it neared the dais!

Lu Chen felt his bones creak! Tang Xiao on his back felt like a mountain; the smooth ice beneath his feet seemed like clinging mire, each step backward agonizingly slow! The Abyss-Devouring Flame's light was compressed to a flicker, barely illuminating a foot around him. The azure core sputtered; the pale flame teetered on the brink!

***"DE...PART..."***

A voice resonated directly within Lu Chen's soul! Not carried by air, but like the oldest echo from the ice's heart, bearing the weight of millennia and implacable authority. It acted on consciousness—cold, flat, devoid of inflection, yet carrying an absolute will to freeze thought!

***"This... is the... Stasis... Sanctum... Chaos... shall... return... to... stillness..."***

The skeleton—or the will inhabiting it—tightened its grip on the hilt.

The azure veins within the embedded greatsword flared blindingly bright!

*Danger!* Lu Chen's pupils contracted to pinpoints! Crushing peril stabbed his spine like an ice dagger! The guardian was unleashing its true attack! That sword's swing wouldn't bring a physical cut, but a conceptual "Stasis" judgment! It would render him, Tang Xiao, and the chaotic power within them into eternal, static specimens within this sanctum of frozen bones!

*Retreat?* No retreat! The Stasis field was quicksand! *Resist?* His power was suppressed nearly to death; the Abyss-Devouring Flame was dying!

At this desperate precipice—

Tang Xiao, on Lu Chen's back—his body almost consumed by azure ice, his aura fading to nothing—exploded with a surge! Weak, yet impossibly pure... the last ember of his life's essence!

Not his cultivated cold, not the shadow corrupting him, but the purest essence of *life itself*, blazing forth from the heart of endless cold just before its final extinguishment—Tang Xiao's final spark!

This faint, warm ember struck the three forces within Lu Chen—crushed nearly to death by Stasis—like water on hot oil!

Light-fire, extreme cold, shadow-magma—these forces, compressed in agony, ignited by the foreign spark of life, detonated like a powder keg! Yet, the explosion didn't turn inward. Instead, with a savagery Lu Chen had never imagined, almost instinctual, they surged towards the Abyss-Devouring Flame in his palm!

*BOOOOOOM—!!!*

The Abyss-Devouring Flame surged like a shot of adrenaline! Its volume exploded! The azure icy core spun madly, deep as a light-swallowing void! The pale flame lost its cold stability, erupting with blinding, violent radiance! The etched runes tore free from the flame's surface, lashing like living chains! An aura—cold, chaotic, insatiably greedy—mingled with the faint warmth of Tang Xiao's final spark, coalescing into a twisted torrent of grey-white and azure. It blasted from Lu Chen's palm, slamming headlong into the oncoming tide of pure "Stasis"!

*SKREEEEEE—!!!*

No thunderous crash. Only an abominable, soul-rending shriek, like the friction of two cosmic laws annihilating each other!

The chaotic grey-azure torrent collided with the pure azure tide of Stasis!

At the point of impact, space visibly warped! Time-sense shattered—one moment frozen for eons, the next fast-forwarded millennia!

The chaotic torrent of the Abyss-Devouring Flame, infused with Lu Chen's rampant power and Tang Xiao's life-spark, didn't try to freeze or annihilate the "Stasis." It acted like a ravenous void-beast, savagely *biting*, *devouring* the seemingly impervious "Stasis" concept! Azure ice shattered and reformed in the devouring; pale flame twisted, dimmed, and flared; the crimson-black rune-chains coiled like constrictors around the "veins" of the Stasis tide, trying to assimilate, to corrupt!

The azure flames in the skeleton's sockets flickered violently! Its emotionless "gaze" registered the barest tremor—astonishment? Or fury at this law-defying chaos?

Its skeletal fingers clenched the hilt!

*HUUUUUUM—!!!*

The greatsword resonated higher, heavier! The entire black ice platform shuddered! The azure veins on the blade blazed like enraged ice dragons! A vaster, denser wave of "Stasis," bearing the will to judge all existence, crashed down like a celestial river! It sought to erase this profane chaos, to return it to eternal stillness!

The grey-azure torrent was instantly crushed! Its volume shrank drastically; its light dimmed; the rune-chains groaned under the strain, fracturing! Lu Chen felt as if struck by a hammer! Blood mixed with ice crystals streamed from his nose and mouth. He staggered violently, nearly buckling! Tang Xiao on his back slumped; his last wisp of breath flickered like a dying candle!

As the chaotic torrent teetered on the edge of total freezing and annihilation—

Anomaly!

At the torrent's core, that spark of warmth born from Tang Xiao's life-ember, under the crushing pressure of absolute Stasis, did *not* die. Instead, it ignited like a stellar core, erupting with unprecedented brilliance! Not heat, but a penetrating, truth-revealing... *Light of Clarity*!

It illuminated the heart of the chaotic torrent and the depths of the surging "Stasis" tide!

Lu Chen's consciousness was pierced! In that instant, through the clash of chaos and stillness, he *saw*!

He saw that within the greatsword's depths, it wasn't pure Stasis! At the very core of the azure radiance, coiled threads—fine yet foully viscous—of... *shadow*! They burrowed like maggots into the blade's fractures, twisting, eroding the pure Stasis force! It was these shadow-threads that lent the bone guardian's power a subtle... *lag* and *taint*!

***"It's... corrupted?!"*** The thought struck Lu Chen's chaotic mind like lightning!

Simultaneously, the Light of Clarity born from Tang Xiao's final spark, guided by the chaotic torrent's impact, stabbed like a surgeon's blade into a dense, core knot of shadow-threads within the sword's azure radiance!

*SKREEEEEEE—!!!*

A shriek, sharper than any before, tore through the sanctum—the sound of a soul being flayed!

The bone guardian's fingers on the hilt jerked! The azure flames in its sockets flickered violently! Its timeless, icy will transmitted, for the first time, unmistakable agony and... *rage*!

At the point on the greatsword struck by Tang Xiao's life-spark, the azure radiance *dimmed*! The foul shadow-threads coiled there writhed as if doused in acid, twisting, disintegrating, vaporizing! A hairline fracture, sharp and real, snaked across the blade with a piercing *CRACK-SNAP*!

The entire black ice platform shuddered violently! The all-encompassing, absolute "Stasis" field flickered—a brief, infinitesimal, but undeniable... *weakness*!

*NOW!*

All the suppressed power within Lu Chen, guided by Tang Xiao's spark-ignited Light of Clarity, surged like a dam burst in that moment of weakness! It poured recklessly into the Abyss-Devouring Flame in his palm!

***"DEVOUR—THE—ABYSS—!!!"***

Lu Chen roared, a guttural, animal cry! He didn't direct the flame at the tide, but slammed it down with every shred of his being—onto the smooth ice at his feet! Aiming for the junction between the black ice platform and the surrounding, ordinary ice!

*CRRRRUUUUNCH—!!!*

The devouring power of the azure core was pushed to its limit! The pale flame tore at space itself! The crimson-black rune-chains drilled down like adamantine augers!

*RIIIIIP—!!!*

The supposedly indestructible edge of the black ice platform, forged of the mystical obsidian ice, yielded! Torn open by the all-consuming, desperate power of the Abyss-Devouring Flame was a fissure—yards long, bottomlessly dark!

The instant the fissure opened, a lament a hundred times clearer, a hundred times vaster, saturated with endless agony, chaos, filth, and the ancient Source-current's raw essence, roared up from the depths! Like a volcano suppressed for millennia!

*OOOOOM—!!!*

The Sanctum of Frozen Bones trembled in agony! The supporting pillars groaned! Upon the dais, the bone guardian lurched upright (though it was only bones), the azure flames in its sockets flaring wildly, "staring" with unprecedented shock and fury—and a trace of violated, primal wrath—at the violently torn fissure!

Lu Chen stood bathed in blood, power nearly spent, yet his eyes burned with mad light. He cast one last look at Tang Xiao on his back—breath gone, body cold and hard as ancient glacial rock. He looked at the fissure spewing chaotic Source-essence. He looked at the enraged bone guardian on the dais.

No hesitation! Summoning his final dregs of strength, he dragged Tang Xiao's body and flung himself into the abyssal fissure torn by the Abyss-Devouring Flame—the chasm leading to the core of the Source-current's lament!