-Tsrr! 『Got it, Dad!』

Just as Cho darted down the mountain to fetch Bini, Sister Seol stepped forward and stopped her.

“Wait a second, Cho. So-ryong, are we supposed to break this thing? Is there something inside?”

“I’m not exactly sure either. It’s dark, and the ice makes it hard to see what’s in there.”

“Really?”

At my answer, Hwa-eun and Sister Seol pressed against the ice wall.

After peering inside, Hwa-eun pointed to a white shape and asked,

“You mean that white thing in there?”

“Yes, Hwa-eun.”

“Like So-ryong said, I can’t make out what it is. It’s too hard to see.”

“Exactly. Between the darkness and the ice, it’s impossible to identify it properly.”

Even after activating Myaoamnight Vision and focusing my mind, I couldn’t make it out, so there was no way Hwa-eun or Sister Seol could.

The back of the cave was dim, and the frosted-over ice obscured the view, so I could only discern the silhouette and its general color.

Myaoamnight Vision allows those with higher internal energy to see more clearly—and my internal energy was slightly stronger than Sister Seol’s.

I had heard she was just on the verge of reaching Three-Bloom Purity.

“What is that thing, anyway? And why’s it just lying there? Is it safe or what?”

Though the situation was urgent, Sister Seol kept trying to confirm what was inside the ice.

I had to get Cho moving to bring Bini back fast, so I explained things to her.

That thing inside looked seriously bad.

I figured she was reacting that way because she didn’t understand the condition it was in.

“Sister, this is urgent. I think that thing’s collapsed in there. Its tongue is hanging out of its mouth...”

“What!? You should’ve led with that!”

“Well, you were the one who—”

Before I could finish, Sister Seol scolded me, then hastily rolled up her sleeves and drew on her internal energy.

“I’ll try breaking it myself.”

“You, Sister?”

I figured the reason she’d stopped Cho was because she wanted to try breaking the ice herself.

Still, I couldn’t help but tilt my head. In Murim, the power of a strike or a palm doesn’t come from brute strength but from internal energy—and if I couldn’t break it, then there was no way Sister Seol could.

Seol caught the implication in my tone and snapped back.

“What? You don’t think your big sister can do it?”

“A-ah, no, not at all.”

Suggesting someone’s weak is a major insult in Murim.

I quickly shook both hands with a dead-serious expression, and Seol smiled, raising her arm.

“See, So-ryong? This is the secret technique of the Beast Palace that lets even those with lower internal energy unleash massive force. It’s called Bear Palm.”

“Bear Palm” referred to a bear’s paw—famous for its overwhelming power. The technique probably mimicked the crushing force of a bear’s forepaw.

Most palms are delivered with a forward thrust like a punch, but judging by the name and the posture, this technique was executed like a bear swinging its paw.

After all, Sister Seol had raised her arm at an angle, just like a bear swipe.

“Bear Palm!”

She called it out with an awed tone—though the next thought hit me.

‘Wait... isn’t Bear Palm also the name of a dish?’

I remembered a recipe from the Central Plains involving bear paws.

But I kept my expression neutral and focused on my sister. Energy gathered in her raised right hand, and a layer of force began to envelop her palm.

-Woooom.

Her right hand gave off a low, thrumming vibration, like a bear growling.

The force covering her hand had transformed into something like a gauntlet.

-Vwoom.

With a whoosh, her hand whipped through the air and struck the ice wall at an angle.

-KWAGWANG!

-CRSSHHHHH.

A massive, ear-splitting crash rang out, followed by dust and pebbles raining down from the cave ceiling.

The cloud of dust that shot up completely obscured our view.

“Cough, cough. Did it work?”

I coughed and asked if she’d succeeded. A short silence followed.

Then Sister Seol’s voice came through the dust.

“So-ryong...”

“Yes, Sister! Did it work!?”

I asked brightly, hopeful that it had—but her next words were... unexpected.

“...Send Cho. Quickly.”

“Sorry?”

“Send Cho! ➤ NоvеⅠight ➤ (Read more on our source) Now!”

Before I could say anything else, Cho, sharp as ever, shot off outside. Once the dust settled, we could see the ice—bearing only a faint handprint where Sister Seol had struck it.

For that kind of impact to leave just a palm mark... this ice wasn’t normal.

‘Is this... thousand-year ice?’

***

By the time Cho arrived, I spoke through the group chat.

『“Bini, Big Sis Cho is coming to get you. When she arrives, come back with her, okay?”

-Tsrrt? (Me?)

“Yep. We need your help, Bini.”

-Tsrrrr. (You need my help?)

“Yeah. We have to break some ice, but neither Dad nor Auntie could manage. We think only you might be able to do it. Please.”

-Tsrr. (Ice?)

“Oh, ice? It’s like a cold rock, kind of.”

-Tsrrrr. (Ugh, what a pain... But... well... since you’re asking like that, maybe I’ll come help.)

“Please, Bini. We really need you.”』

The little guy sounded full of himself at being needed for once.

I made my voice sound like I was begging, and he reluctantly agreed to come.

『-Tsrr. (Alright then. Wait a bit. Ah! Big Sis is here.)』

Hwa-eun, who’d been listening in on the chat, chuckled softly.

“Fufu. Bini seems to be in a good mood.”

“Looks like it.”

As we chatted about Bini, she arrived before we knew it.

-Tsrrrr. 『Dad, what’s this? This thing?』

Strutting into the cave like a conquering general, Bini snorted at the ice wall.

-Tsrrt. 『It’s really cold, huh? But come on, it’s not that big a deal.』

Her voice brimming with confidence—like she could shatter it in one go.

That’s when Sister Seol’s voice came from the side.

“A piece of ice that Bear Palm couldn’t break...”

Everyone turned toward the sound. Sister Seol was still touching the ice wall.

It had been a while since she struck it, and she’d apparently been there the whole time, caressing the surface with regret.

She looked utterly disheartened that the wall hadn’t broken.

Now that Bini had arrived, I gently pulled Sister Seol away from the ice and spoke.

“Sister, maybe it’s just that the ice is unusually strong. Now that Bini’s here, let’s leave it to her.”

“No matter how strong it is, it’s just ice... and I used Bear Palm...”

Seriously, what is Bear Palm supposed to be?

After I moved Hwa-eun and Sister Seol away from the ice, Bini declared with renewed swagger:

-Tsrrrrt. 『Move it, Auntie. Bini’s going to break this thing. And you’re just sitting around ‘cause you couldn’t.』

If Sister Seol had understood that, I’m pretty sure there’d have been a fight.

Anyway, I pulled Sister Seol back, and Bini stepped up and tried to bite into the ice.

Or tried to, at least.

-Kkaduk. Kkduk.

She managed to scrape it a little—but her teeth slid right off the surface.

She paused, then latched onto the wall again and worked her jaws.

-Kkaduk. Ppaduk.

-Tsrrt! 『Agh! What the heck?! Why is this thing so hard!?』

But the ice wall didn’t budge.

Now two beings—human and venomous creature alike—were left dumbfounded, clinging to the ice with blank expressions.

“A piece of ice that Bear Palm couldn’t break...”

-Tsrrrr. 『A piece of ice my teeth can’t break...』

***

‘How the hell are we supposed to break that?’

While those two were still frozen in place, I was busy thinking of a way to break through the wall.

There was no way brute force was going to cut it.

If even my sister’s martial arts and Bini’s supernatural teeth couldn’t manage it, then raw strength clearly wasn’t the answer.

And then, as I kept racking my brain...

‘Wait a sec—why is there even a wall like that there? Don’t tell me...’

In the middle of thinking how to break it, my thoughts suddenly shifted to why a wall like that would even exist. Just then, Bini—one of the two stuck in a daze—snapped out of it first.

She’d been biting the ice over and over with a blank look, then finally turned and said her tooth hurt.

-Tsrrt 『Dad, my tooth hurts.』

“What!? It hurts!?”

Startled, I rushed over to check Bini’s teeth. On the outside, they looked fine.

But when I touched them, they were ice cold.

It seemed the constant gnawing at the ice had chilled her teeth, and she was interpreting that cold pain as “hurting.”

Well, it was her first time seeing ice, after all.

“Hold on.”

I wrapped both hands around her teeth, and she relaxed immediately.

She looked pleased as I warmed them with my palms, gently tapping my head with her antenna.

-Tsrrt. 『Warm... Dad.』

We were finally having a peaceful, happy moment for once—until Sister Seol’s voice cut in.

“Hey... it’s kinda cold over here, you know?”

I turned my head and saw Sister Seol hugging her shoulders.

It wasn’t exactly freezing, just chilly. She must’ve been feeling it more because she’d been touching the ice the whole time.

“Must be the cold seeping out of the ice.”

“Should we start a fire or something?”

As I asked whether we should light a fire, Sister Seol clapped her hands.

“A fire? Ah! Right! If we light a fire, won’t the ice melt? Let’s catch an animal and use Hyang’s poison to light it!”

Honestly, not a bad idea.

We couldn’t break the ice, but it was slowly melting. If we raised the temperature, it’d probably melt faster.

But I shook my head.

“No, I don’t think we should light a fire.”

“Why not?”

The thought had occurred to me earlier, while Bini and Sister Seol were clinging to the ice.

And by the end of that thought, I was sure—

“We can’t break that wall.”

“What are you talking about? We can’t break it?”

-Tsrr?

Bini and Sister Seol both turned to me, faces full of disbelief.

After all the effort we’d gone through, I was suddenly saying we shouldn’t even be trying to break it?

Yeah, no wonder they looked at me like I’d lost it.

But I was serious. We shouldn’t break it.

That was the conclusion I’d reached after all my thinking.

I didn’t know exactly what kind of creature was in there, but I figured it must be one that lived in cold climates.

Which meant that wall... was probably...

A sort of natural refrigerator.

It was likely keeping the internal temperature stable and low—like a cooling mechanism.

Maybe the reason the creature looked in such bad shape was because the ice was starting to melt?

Or maybe... it had collapsed, causing the ice to start melting.

“It’s probably some kind of cold-dwelling creature. I think it was trying to stay in there until winter came—but now that it’s collapsed, the ice is melting.”

“Huh... that actually makes sense.”

“Yeah, I think you’re right, So-ryong.”

-Tsrrrr.

Sister Seol, Hwa-eun, and Bini all nodded at my explanation.

Then Sister Seol asked, her tone full of worry,

“But So-ryong, if we can’t break it, how do we get the little guy out? Or wait... we’re not supposed to take it out, right? We’re supposed to go in. So how do we get in?”

She was asking how to rescue the obviously sick creature without destroying the structure.

I smiled.

“Well, we just don’t go through the wall.”

-Tap tap.

-Tsrrrrr! 『Ohhh, I get it!』

I tapped the ground, and Bini chirped brightly.

She immediately got ready to start digging down.

“Wait, Bini! Not there—up at the ceiling, dig through there instead.”

-Tsrrt! 『Got it!』

If she dug through the floor, all the cold air would escape.

And if this thing really was a cold-weather creature, that would be the worst thing we could do.

Cold air sinks, after all—it would just leak right out through any hole in the floor.

We had to go through the ceiling.

That way, only the warm air would leave, and the cold air would stay trapped inside.

‘Just like a traditional kimchi jar in winter... or a modern kimchi fridge.’

-Kkadeudeuk. Kkadeuk.

Bini climbed up the wall and started digging through the ceiling, and we quickly followed her in.

The inside felt like a proper deep freeze. Ice-cold and still.

And right there in front of us... was a ridiculous creature, lying unconscious.

Sister Seol looked at it with bright eyes full of expectation and asked,

“So-ryong, if we treat this one... I get to keep it, right?”

She must’ve assumed that since it wasn’t a reptile, insect, or arthropod, I’d hand it over to her.

But I answered with an apologetic expression.

“Sister Seol. That one doesn’t have fur.”

That made it fair game for me.