Immortal Ice Empress: Path to Vengeance

In most Spirit Stone mines, regardless of the faction or affiliation, the ones doing the actual mining are nothing more than glorified slaves. They do hard, back-breaking work and get paid 'peanuts' for it. Sometimes, they don't even get paid.

For example, in the mine Mira's group is raiding, the actual miners are those in the Foundation Realm or below with their cultivation sealed. They didn't wish for this job. They were taken from their homes and forced into this situation because they were weak.

To make matters worse, if they dared to resist, death would be preferable. Unlike those from the Orthodox Faction, who would, at worst, just kill them for disobedience, the Unorthodox Faction is much more devious.

The punishments they receive include but are not limited to torture, r*ping their wives or children in front of them, torturing their loved ones, crippling their cultivation, etc.

Therefore, nobody ever thought about resisting and could only put their heads down and slave away, hoping.

Hoping one day, someone would come and set them free.

*Shing!*

*Spurt!*

Mira's dagger severed a weak old man's throat, threw his dead body to the side, and moved on to the next person, her eyes still as a lake. She knew she had just potentially killed an innocent man, but from her indifferent eyes, one could see that she didn't care.

Leaving that old man alive was a potential risk to the mission and their lives. If she needed to kill people who have been treated like dogs and would die sooner or later all in order to survive, she'd do so without hesitation!

Nova, Eden, and the others all felt chills run down their spines, seeing Mira dropping bodies like cattle entering a slaughterhouse.

Even Rayna and Maria weren't entirely numb for this scene.

She was killing innocent people who were no different than mortals! As warriors part of the Orthodox Faction, they felt… wrong looking at this scene.

Seeing that they were standing around doing nothing, Mira glanced over her shoulder and said, "What are you standing around for? We have a mine to take over!"

"...Why?"

Mira stopped and turned around to look at Nova with a raised eyebrow, "Why what?"

"Why? Why are you killing them? These people are clearly innocent!!" Nova shouted, and the others around her nodded in agreement.

They all had lines they wouldn't cross, and killing innocent mortals was one of them!

Instead of answering them, Mira motioned with her head to follow her.

Soon, they appeared behind a middle-aged man and a young man, probably under 18. Their eyes were unfocused, dull, and lifeless. Their bodies had all kinds of scars, ranging from sword slashes to whips to burn marks.

They lifted their pickaxes as if they were robots and struck the Spirit Stones with such little force that they didn't even make a crack.

Mira appeared in front of the middle-aged man, whose face paled and eyes opened wide upon seeing her.

He shakily pointed his finger at her and muttered, "Y-You… W-what… N-no… How did you get… here?"

Mira ignored his question and took out a dagger from her storage space.

"If you kill that young man, you can leave this place. Nobody will hunt you down. Nobody will chase you. You'll be free."

"Freedom…!" The man's eyes regained a bit of clarity at the word, and he entered a state of deep contemplation.

However, Mira wasn't about to sit here all day, waiting for his dumbass to come up with an answer, "You have three seconds to decide. If not, I'll give the same offer to the young man."

Suddenly, the young man's eyes lit up, and he stared at the middle-aged man hungrily as if he wanted to tear him apart.

Upon seeing this, the middle-aged man's expression firmed, and he glanced at the knife. Hesitantly, he reached his hand out and grabbed it, then stared at the young man and muttered, "I-I'm… I'm sorry. P-Please, forgive me-!"

"NO-!" The young man screamed, but it was already too late.

The middle-aged man had already stuck a dagger through his heart, killing the young man instantly.

Mira formed a Qi Blade around her hand and sliced at the middle-aged man's neck, severing his head.

Nova, Eden, and the others had their mouths wide open with horrified expressions, but Mira just shrugged.

"Those two probably worked together for years, going through all kinds of hardships with one another. I'd even bet that they probably thought of each other as family. Yet, their hearts changed with just a few words."

Mira began walking away and left them with a few more words of wisdom coming from someone who had seen the dark side of life, "Right and wrong. Innocent and guilty. None of that exists. There is only life and death. Kill or be killed. That guy wanted to live, and in order to do so, he had to kill the youngster. His natural instincts kicked in, and he chose to live. At our core, humans are no different from beasts. Now, stop being sheep and get to killing!"

The others stood there rooted on the spot, dazed by what Mira had just said. It was from this moment that they began to understand what kind of person Mira was.

***

Despite their attitude toward Mira's actions, they still did as she said. They were forced to by their circumstances. At least, that's what they chose to believe.

If one of those 'slaves' were to get out and someone from the Unorthodox Faction were to capture them, they'd be able to extract information about them. It didn't need to be said just how bad that could be for Mira and their group.

After that, it didn't take long for Nova and the others to kill and conquer the mine. There weren't many more guards in the Nascent Soul or Soul Transformation Realm after they killed all the ones outside. And since the Elder was dead, nothing was stopping them from taking over the place.

In under a day, Mira's group had the whole place under their complete control. They then proceeded to loot the place dry. Hell, they even mined the Spirit Stones from the wall as well.

The Sect Master had given Maria a device similar to a jackhammer, except much more powerful.

When the jackhammer struck the cave walls, it would create a spider web of cracks, and after a few hits, the entire wall would burst apart, allowing one to pick up the Spirit Stones easily.

In under two days, they could conquer the entire mine and loot 80% of the Spirit Stones still in it.

Of course, this was only possible because the mine was incredibly small, but it would've taken them weeks or even months of effort if they had to sit there and individually mine each stone.

Still, such an achievement was commendable, especially since they were able to take down an Elder!

Unfortunately, they couldn't take all 100% as they needed to leave to move on to the next place before someone caught onto their trail.

***

Somewhere in the Ancient Beast Mountain Range, a large, muscular, burly man was relaxing under the sun with a slight smile on his face.

However, his relaxation was disturbed when he sensed someone flying toward him.

"Faction Head! It's an emergency! Elder Dan's Life Tablet, the one guarding one of our newly discovered Spirit Stone Mine, broke!" A lanky man with thin eyebrows descended before the muscular man, otherwise known as Faction Head, and bowed.

"Oh? When did he die?" The Faction Head asked lightly, not the least bit bothered by this information. He didn't care much for both the mine or the Elder, though he felt it was a pity that Elder Dan was dead, as he was in the Mortal Shedding Realm.

"I-It seems he died a few days ago."

"..."

The Faction Head stared at the man before him with creased eyebrows, and a formless pressure began to exude out of his body. The man couldn't help but tremble, and a layer of cold sweat formed over his body.

"Was nobody watching the life tablets? Why did we get the information so late?"

"I-It seems like the guards had too much to drink and weren't in the right mind while they were on duty."

*Crack!*

The Faction Head slammed his fists, cracking the mountain he stood on!

"Imbeciles! What if someone that actually mattered died, and we only knew about it two days after?! No! Those guards can't be allowed to live! Go! Kill them right now!" The muscular man roared.

The lanky man trembled, but somehow he still managed to eke out, "I-I've already taken care of it, Faction Head."

Suddenly, the intense pressure coving the mountain disappeared, and the Faction Head began laughing.

"Hahaha! What a good assistant you are! You already know what I want before I even ask!"

The Faction Head then waved, "Alright, that's enough talk about this nonsense. Just dispatch another Elder to go check out the situation."

The lanky man smiled bitterly and wanted to say something else, but since the Faction Head had spoken, who was he to disagree?

"Yes, Faction Head."