Chapter 203 – Winter Snow Maiden

Unit Buildings: Tier 1 corresponds to ordinary 1-star units, Tier 2 corresponds to ordinary 3-star units, and Tier 3 corresponds to rare 1-star units.

The highest tier appears to be Tier 7.

However, there are no records of Tier 7 buildings. Even in the fiercely contested Dragon Court Land, where several major nations station troops and compete intensely, there are only Tier 6 Dragon’s Nests.

In Tier 6 locations, basic recruitment can yield Outstanding 3-star units, with a chance to crit and produce Epic-tier beings.

Moreover, such Tier 6 Unit Buildings can recruit batches periodically, which explains why major nations spare no effort in competing for them.

This is already a matter of national foundation.

For Mu Yuan, he values more the “environmental transformation” and “cultivation benefits” provided by Unit Buildings. Thanks to the existence of the Skull Graveyard, he doesn’t need to invest Soul Sand, yet batches of Little Skeletons gradually advance to levels 6, 7, and 8. The amount of Soul Sand saved is not insignificant.

The boost to cultivation speed is also remarkably significant, nearly doubling it.

In comparison, the most basic skeleton recruitment function seems rather ordinary.

“But Tier 3 Unit Buildings are different. The recruited rare units are at least quite valuable. For instance, units like nuns cost over a hundred Soul Crystals for ten Remnant Souls.”

Mu Yuan only hopes not to get a useless unit type.

The azure glow gradually faded, revealing before him a frozen land with an unfrozen pool at its center, from which faint white mist rose.

Even in its unbuilt state, the model of this Unit Building exuded a chilling aura, instantly dropping the surrounding temperature by several degrees.

“This is…”

「Prompt: You have obtained the Tier 3 Unit Building ‘Icy Spirit Cold Pool’.」

——

「Effect 1: At regular intervals, you can recruit a certain number of ‘Icy Spirits (Rare★)’, with a small chance to recruit ‘Snow Maidens (Rare★★★)’ and a very small chance to recruit ‘Winter Snow Maidens (Outstanding★)’.」

It’s a rare elemental-type unit!

Although rare, they are highly renowned and sought after by countless Lords. Elemental-type units are natural mage turrets, less fragile than human mages, with extremely high elemental affinity. They also possess advantages like immunity to physical attacks, ease of combining spells, and more.

On the market, rare-tier elemental-type units and dragon-type units are priced similarly.

Among elemental types, Light Spirits and Dark Spirits are the most prized.

For example, the Radiant Glory Spirit he had seen before could awaken “Light Flash,” an extremely powerful teleportation skill, making it a bug-level divine ability for assassination or survival.

But Icy Spirits are not bad either.

“A few Winter Snow Maidens developed to their peak can trigger terrifying ice tides akin to avalanches, given the right environment.”

Though not the rarest unit Mu Yuan had hoped for, it is quite suitable for the current Tianyuan Territory.

It allows for the formation of a main artillery corps.

Moreover, with a large number of Slimes serving as “Evolution Point providers,” evolving the Icy Spirits won’t be difficult.”Effect Two: The Icy Spirit Cold Pool will continuously transform the surrounding environment, creating a habitat more suitable for the survival of ice spirit babies. Simultaneously, low-tier material ‘Cold Pool Ice Crystals’ will be generated uninterruptedly within the cold pool. These ice crystals contain a moderate amount of ice elemental energy and can be used for crafting items, restorative products, or as an energy source.”

“Effect Three: Within the influence range of the Icy Spirit Cold Pool, the rank of ice spirit-type units will gradually increase, and the power of ice-based spells cast by ice spirits will be amplified.”

“Effect Four: Within the influence range of the Icy Spirit Cold Pool, the cultivation speed of elemental creatures is enhanced, with a slight increase in breakthrough probability, excluding fire elemental creatures.”

“Note: When certain conditions are met, the ‘Icy Spirit Cold Pool’ can advance to the Fourth Order unit building ‘Snow Maiden Crystal Palace’.”

Emerging from the Land of Trials, Mu Yuan began to wander around the territory, searching for a suitable location to construct the Icy Spirit Cold Pool.

Previously, the Skull Graveyard was located in the west and the Treant Forest in the east, occupying the left and right sides of Tianyuan Territory. However, as the territory’s rank increased and its scope expanded, many open areas had also been developed.

Ultimately, Mu Yuan decided to place it in the northwest part of the territory.

He considered that the South District was continuously expanding. Isloria had future plans for each piece of land there, making it unsuitable for occupation.

Moreover, the Icy Spirit Cold Pool possessed the ability to ‘amplify ice-based spells.’ In the future, it might serve as a significant barrier against monster waves.

And these waves came from the north.

In Mu Yuan’s hand, the unit building representing the ‘Icy Spirit Cold Pool’ slowly drifted out and settled into the ground as he made his selection. It was like a seed taking root and sprouting. The next moment,

Rumble—

The earth trembled slightly, and the entire landscape began to change rapidly before Mu Yuan’s eyes, as if molded from clay. Low-lying terrain rose, pits were filled, hills seemed to melt away like ice water spreading outward, and small, bouncing stones sank into the ground.

In the blink of an eye, the entire land became smooth and level, reflecting brilliant light under the sun.

Unbeknownst to him, the earth had completely transformed into thick, immeasurable solid ice. The frozen land spread out for hundreds of meters, freezing everything in its path.

A chill swept over him.

Standing here, Mu Yuan felt as if he had entered a frozen wasteland. Yet, once he stepped outside the influence range of the Icy Spirit Cold Pool, it was merely a cool autumn day.

A line of ice separated two worlds.

This was the marvel of unit buildings.

The deeper he went into the frozen land, the lower the temperature dropped. At the very center was a small pool, only seven or eight meters in diameter, shrouded in dense white mist but miraculously unfrozen.

“Prompt: The current number of recruitable units is 30. Thereafter, 10 units can be recruited every month, with a maximum storage of 100 recruitable units.”

“Prompt: Proceed with 30 recruitments? This recruitment will consume a total of 1500g of Soul Sand.”

“Yes!”

One and a half Soul Crystals stored in the territory’s Warehouse quietly burned away and were depleted.

At the same time, within the depths of the cold pool, one shadowy figure after another solidified under some great force and slowly emerged.

The first to appear were the ice spirits.

At first glance, they resembled large ice crystals, floating above the ground. Chilling mist swirled around and intertwined with the crystals, forming a roughly humanoid outline.

In terms of appearance, they were far inferior to the neighboring spring spirits, which had elegantly defined contours.Next to take the stage was the rare three-star contestant, ‘Snow Maiden’.

Compared to the Ice Spirit, the Snow Maiden had a much more distinct humanoid silhouette. She wore a light blue gown, with light blue long hair, and even the hands beneath her wide sleeves were light blue. Her eyebrows were light blue, her eyes were light blue, and her entire face was light blue.

She looked like a snowman sculpted from ice and snow.

Or rather, she was a snowman.

The last to appear was the SR general obtained from the initial recruitment critical hit, the outstanding one-star contestant ‘Winter Snow Maiden’.

Her features were more refined, and the colors of her body had more variation—a light blue gown and milky white long hair. But that was all.

「Winter Snow Maiden」

「Rank: Zero Tier Level 1」

「Talent: Winter’s Power」

「Skills: Blizzard, Ice Shard, Ice Blade, Ice Tornado, Ice Armor」

Her skills were more numerous than expected. Although the additional ones were basic skills that could be learned later through training, it still showed the exceptional talent of this Winter Snow Maiden.

Not bad.

Promising future.

After some thought, Mu Yuan realized that evolving from Outstanding One Star to Outstanding Three Stars only required 625 Evolution Points, and he currently had a plentiful supply of Evolution Points in the elemental category—meaning it wasn’t enough to evolve Dolai, but he had no other pressing needs—so he pointed a finger.

This Snow Maiden, born with innate advantages and already possessing self-awareness though still quite naive, received a treatment that many of her seniors had longed for but never obtained.

「Prompt: Your unit ‘Winter Snow Maiden’ has bathed in the Miracle Light, undergone transformation, and evolved into ‘Winter Maiden (Outstanding ★★★)’, awakening the talent ‘Frost Heart’ and mastering the advanced skill ‘Frost Tide Funeral’.」

「Prompt: Your unit ‘Winter Maiden’ has gained some insight during the evolution process and learned the field skill ‘Frost Sky Snowfall’.」

Starting with a fully maxed-out configuration—that’s exactly what this was.

As the evolution glow faded, the form of the Winter Maiden was revealed before Mu Yuan. Compared to her previous snowman-like body, the changes were significant. She wore a light blue gown that draped to the ground, with a full figure and waterfall-like hair. The hands extending from her sleeves and the collarbones visible above her neckline were delicate and fair, appearing no different from human skin.

However,

the Winter Maiden was still an ice elemental life form, not human.

Theoretically, newborn elemental life forms have no gender, but why do their higher-tier units evolve with distinct differences?

The higher-tier forms of Spring Spirits and Ice Spirits are clearly female in appearance.

The higher-tier form of Molten Spirits is commonly referred to as ‘Fire Man’, and as the name implies, only has a male form.

The higher-tier form of Earth Spirits also only has a male form.

In contrast, the higher-tier forms of Light Spirits and Dark Spirits possess both male and female forms. Moreover, male Light Spirits and female Light Spirits often have some differences in their awakened skills.

A theological research expert once proposed a theory.

They claimed that the evolution and development of elemental life forms are influenced by the deities who hold authority over their respective elemental forces at their source.

However, this theory is too Xuanhuan and cannot be verified.

As soon as he stepped out of the Frozen Land, Isloria hurried over to meet him.

“Lord, I heard you recruited some Ice Spirits and Snow Maidens.”

Her eyes were filled with fervor—a kind of… well, the kind of fervor one has when seeing research subjects.

Isloria was the top-performing worker in Tianyuan, but in her previous life in the Eagle Kingdom, she was a ruthless person who dared to experiment and modify even herself.Mu Yuan wanted to protect the newborn Snow Maidens, lest their innocent hearts be harmed too soon, so he asked,

“Is all the work finished?”

“87% completed. Currently, my three Starlight Avatars are handling it. The final planning for the new district is expected to be fully arranged by 2:30 AM tomorrow.”

She reported at an extremely fast pace, chattering away.

What could Boss Mu do? He could only let the Snow Maidens fend for themselves.

At most, he could build the Intermediate Mage Tower to provide a relatively secure research environment. But since there was already an Intermediate Mage Tower and precious materials, Isloria would probably… be able to research some valuable results.

First update…

(End of chapter)