On the back of "Misty Star," a living giant whale drifting through the universe, Jiang Xi guarded the only warmth in Rustfang Hollow: an ice-pop stand on the cloud whale's back. Then the cart was smashed, and Mute Auntie was dragged by Scar Rat into the depths of a mine. An old scar stirred like a hibernating dragon. Jiang Xi crashed into the toxic heart of Blackstone Industries and pulled out a mysterious child with a rotting wrist and a star-marrow ice pop, but Mute Auntie remained just out of reach. Blackstone director Mo Yunqi calmly announced an "emergency evacuation," while cracks along the rim of his bone china cup coiled like a venomous snake. To seize control of the "cold tide" core that had incited the whales to rampage, he touched down on "Requiem" with his fingertip. The countdown to destruction began, its target the Western Seven pressure-relief station where Mute Auntie might be trapped! Mad scientist Uncle Yan and scavenger girl Ai Li tried to avert disaster with the bone-chilling blue liquid leaking from the freezer, only to draw the cold judgment of the Interstellar Audit Bureau. Evidence of pollution leaks and live experimentation was exposed by lances of light. Smiling, Mo Yunqi pressed a button, dragging the audit ship into the countdown to destruction as well! Yet his fingers began playing a secret overture over the public channel. The freezer shook at the cold tide vent, and the rotting child's breath was about to freeze. Jiang Xi chipped away the frost. Mute Auntie's knotted rope box was the only guide through the darkness. The countdown above burned crimson, the auditors' cannons trained on the escape route, and the world-ending energy of the cold tide roared beneath their feet. How could a little ice-pop stand on the cloud whale's back stir up a storm that threatened to engulf a planet? Beneath an old scar, the deadly blade gleamed once more. Could it cut a path through the frozen abyss and find the ice whale that had frozen time?
