"This is the foremost of the four great palaces of the Deep Blue Hell, the core wonder of the Warm Winter Palace - ’Warm Winter.’"

In the dark deep sea below a thousand meters, a gentle snow was falling. The snowflakes were beautiful hexagrams, slowly landing on the ground and melting. Ash, watching from the side, felt an inexplicable sense of peace.

He reached out to touch a snowflake, and even though he was prepared, he still found himself lost in thought for several seconds, until Death Mad exhaled a smoke ring towards him, bringing him back to reality.

"Refraction Protection didn’t react?" Ash instinctively took a step back from the gentle snowy scene in front of him, "But I clearly covered my fingers with the Holy Domain—"

"But you’ve already touched Warm Winter."

Death Mad crossed his arms, speaking leisurely, "The snowflakes are merely an illusion; the ’mind’ is the true medium of Warm Winter. Once you realize you’re within Warm Winter, you’ll naturally feel its presence. This wonder interprets the mind through Water Magic and is the reason the Warm Winter Palace has stood unyielding in the Deep Blue Hell for thousands of years."

Ash clutched his forehead, "During those five seconds, I was still conscious, but... how to put it, I felt warm, yet empty and void, like nothing mattered regardless of what happened..."

"That’s the sense of peace."

Death Mad said, "Being surrounded by warmth while in a snowy landscape that symbolizes coldness, feeling carefree and fearless... it’s like curling up under a blanket on a snowy day, the comforting warmth eroding all your resistance, making you just want to keep sleeping. Back when we plundered resources from the Warm Winter Palace, Black Demon fled the slowest, fell into Warm Winter, completely sank into sleep, and was captured by the demigod of the Warm Winter Palace."

"The only way to counter Warm Winter is to escape before contact; otherwise, once you’re caught in it, not even the Divine Lord can resist—"

"Wait!" Ash interrupted, "Black Demon was captured by the Warm Winter Palace, then what?"

"Why do you care about that? Hurry up and keep looting."

"You just dropped such a bombshell, it’s hard not to care! Did you later go to rescue her?"

Death Mad glanced at him, annoyed, and said, "Actually, we didn’t want to rescue her. We needed thorough planning to plunder the resources of the Warm Winter Palace; rescuing Black Demon would inevitably trigger a direct conflict—though the Warm Winter Palace has few members, the weakest among them are Triple Prison Wings, and we are merely Double Prison Wings, each with only one or two wonders, so we definitely couldn’t win."

"Besides, at that time, Black Demon already had ten sisters and never communicated with us, always immersed in her own spiritual world. Although we had no friendship to speak of, since she didn’t want to approach us, we naturally wouldn’t go out of our way to approach her."

Ash said, "In the end, did the Observer persuade you?"

"Persuade? Ha." Death Mad let out a cold laugh, "He directly spread the news that the Warm Winter Palace had captured Black Demon throughout the Deep Blue Hell. You must know, Black Demon also had a Supreme Holy Grail, which attracted other forces to swarm in, and then he took the opportunity to loot the treasury of the Warm Winter Palace again with us."

Ash was dumbfounded: "Then what happened to Black Demon?"

Death Mad said calmly, "Even if we didn’t rescue her, she was fine. The Warm Winter Palace, although they coveted the Supreme Holy Grail, at that time no one knew how to seize another’s Supreme Holy Grail... Do you see the pedestals over there?"

Ash turned to look and saw several platinum pedestals around the square, seemingly intended for displaying statues, but now devoid of anything.

"The two most famous wonders of the Warm Winter Palace, ’Warm Winter’ and ’Winter Soldier’, the former can render demigods powerless, while the latter can completely brainwash a demigod and convert them into war machines defending the Warm Winter Palace," Death Mad said. "The Warm Winter Palace was not creating Winter Soldiers for the first time, they were certainly planning to convert Black Demon into a Winter Soldier, whether as an enforcer or a commodity, it was an excellent choice." 𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝐰𝚎𝕓𝐧𝚘𝘃𝗲𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝕞

"But the encirclement by various forces in the Deep Blue Hell left them no time to convert Black Demon. After the Observer led us to loot, he hid one treasure on a demigod member of another force, then actively triggered the trap left in the treasury, setting off an alarm. All the slumbering Winter Soldiers of the Warm Winter Palace awoke instantly and actively attacked the demigod member with the treasure; other forces thought the Warm Winter Palace initiated an armed conflict impulsively, escalating the standoff into a full-scale war."

Ash asked, "Then did you sneak in and rescue Black Demon?"

"No," Death Mad still shook his head, "It was very chaotic at that time, we didn’t dare to enter the Warm Winter Palace, nor did the Observer take us inside. Instead, we returned to a temporary base to wait. I remember the Mirror Demon made a meal, a lobster stew, and when it was done, Black Demon returned."

"She ate with us, and when we were dividing the spoils, she automatically abstained from participating. We didn’t ask her how she escaped from such a situation, and she didn’t thank us either."

"Are you disappointed?" Death Mad sneered, "We’re not some united and friendly crime syndicate."

Ash thought for a moment, shaking his head, "No, although I was a bit surprised, thinking about it carefully, it seems quite reasonable, even a bit cool."

It isn’t about mutual aid, but neither is it complete indifference, rather "offering the troubled a chance to struggle while considering the best interest of most." The personalities, team dynamics, and conflicting interests of the members of the Endtime Five ensured that they could never offer unconditional help to their companions; not adding insult to injury was considered generous, for each individual was primarily responsible for their own life.