Warm soup

The blue haired boy's ice powers exploded all around him.

It didn't discriminate between monsters and people, everything around him was covered in a layer of ice and was completely frozen.

In a matter of mere seconds, he was surrounded by a world of ice. There were many different ice sculptures, some of humans and some of monsters that were scattered all over.

The only things that weren't frozen were the boy and the corpse of his mother.

The blue haired boy ignored everything around him and picked up the corpse of his mother before walking off. Walking all the way, he went back to the apartment that he had lived with his mother in.

Wherever he went, he left a trail of ice behind him.

It didn't take long before the authorities were able to find him.

They had seen what had happened where the portal had opened and they were terrified by the scene. However, they also knew that whoever did this had incredible power, power that would be able to save them from their predicament.

So following the trail of ice that he left, they tracked him down.

However, after what he had experienced, the blue haired boy wasn't in the mood to listen to anything that the government was saying.

The government would have been willing to leave him alone, but they were facing a crisis in terms of the invading monsters from the portals. Not to mention that with the boy's fluctuating mood, he wasn't able to control his powers at all and the area around his home had been thrown into a world of snow and ice.

They already had no choice but to evacuate everyone who lived in this area for their own safety.

So faced with no other choice, they could only call on the help of the international community who sent a S Ranker to deal with this blue haired boy.

The one that they sent was the Swift Flash, Light.

He tried negotiating with the boy and talking to him about his problems, but the boy wouldn't listen to him.

So Light had no choice but to forcefully control his powers by fighting him until he exhausted himself.

Light later said that this was one of the hardest battles that he had fought. It wasn't because the newly awakened boy was powerful, but rather because the matchup between them was bad.

Light controlled light energy to fight with, but that didn't mean that he was able to create heat with that energy. So facing this wave of ice and snow that he couldn't melt away with just his light alone, it was hard for him to take down this blue haired boy.

But before they could finish their fight, there was a portal that suddenly appeared nearby.

The monsters poured out of this portal and they had no choice but to work together to take down this monster wave.

During this fight, those that were able to see the fight were surprised to see the level of coordination between the two. It was almost as if they hadn't been fighting just a few minutes ago and had known each other all their lives.

With their cooperation, it didn't take long for the two of them to clear out the monsters.

But tragedy didn't stop for the blue haired boy.

While he was distracted by the fight, one of the monsters sent a flame that hit his house and burned it down. He had left the corpse of his mother in that house and it was turned into ashes with the house.

Everything that belonged to him and his mother had all burnt away and even his mother was gone.

He really had nothing left in this world.

Exhausted, he started wandering off without any direction, not caring about anyone that tried to stop him.

Light could see the despair in his eyes, so he didn't stop him in the end. He just let this boy wander off, hoping the best for him.

The government naturally wanted to capture him for their own use still, but without the help of Light, there really wasn't anything that they could do. So they could only monitor him as he wandered the world.

There were many reports of the boy's exploits that came in as he wandered around the world.

During these times, there were many dungeon portal outbreaks that appeared all over the world and there was a lack of hunters to deal with them. So many times, the appearance of these portals would mean mass destruction and death.

But as this boy wandered the world, he was lucky to appear where some of these portals appeared.

After what happened to his mother, this blue haired boy was filled with hatred for these monsters. So whenever he encountered these monsters, he would let his power explode and all that would be left were ice sculptures of these monsters.

However, as he used these powers that he couldn't control more and more, they became stronger and stronger. As it became stronger, he lost more and more control of these powers.

So eventually, the coldness seeped into his bones and completely froze him.

His body temperature dropped to the same temperature as ice and wherever he went, he caused the air around him to drop.

It was as if he had become a walking block of ice.

And the most important thing was that this was slowly killing him.

His body was being frozen from the inside from this frost energy and his blood had already slowed down to the point where it had almost stopped flowing. It was getting harder and harder for him to even move, so eventually he collapsed.

As for where he had collapsed, it was right outside of a certain cafe in a new city that had been built in the middle of the ocean.

When the owner of this cafe came out to find the boy lying there, she was shocked.

After panicking for a bit, she still brought him into the cafe.

Back in those days, the cafe was still new and didn't have many customers, so there was plenty of space for the owner to put the boy down.

However, she really was surprised by how cold he was to the touch.

It was almost as if she had carried in a block of ice.

After thinking about it, she finally decided that the best thing to do was to get him a meal first. She didn't know why he had collapsed, but judging by his thin appearance, it was clear that it had been a long time since he had had a good meal.

She called her little brother and left the matter of getting a doctor here to him. Then she went into the kitchen and prepared a bowl of the soup of the day for the boy.

She had actually just finished making this soup and she was quite confident in it.

The boy was roused when the bowl of soup was placed in front of him. This soup smelled like something that he was familiar with and it had roused him from the sleep that had almost led him to the underworld.

When he saw the soup in front of him, the only thing that he could feel was the warmth that was coming from it.

This soup looked just like the one in his memories, the one that his mother used to make for him.

Without hesitation, the boy picked up the spoon and started pouring the soup into his mouth. With each spoonful, the warmth of the soup filled him and melted the icy coldness that came from the depths of his body.

Eventually, his body was able to warm up to the point where it was no longer freezing and was at the same temperature as a normal person.

But the boy didn't care about any of that.

The moment that he finished the soup, he looked around himself, looking for the one that had made this soup.

But no matter how he looked, he wasn't able to find the figure that he had wanted to see.

The owner of the cafe noticed that he was done with his soup, so she walked out of the kitchen. When she had seen the vigor with which he ate the soup earlier, she had gone into the back with a smile on her face and left him to enjoy his soup.

When the boy saw the owner, his eyes started to tear up.

He wasn't a fool, he could tell what had happened just based on context clues. But that meant that the bit of hope that was in his heart had been shattered.

After all, the one that he had wanted to see…was his mother.

But he knew that this was impossible since she was already dead.

When the owner of the cafe saw the boy break out into tears, her heart trembled and she took him in her arms as she said, "It's alright, you're alright now."

The boy let out the first tears since his mother had died that day and he didn't stop until he completely tired himself out.

However, that one act of kindness had awakened him again and had saved his life.

It had also completely imprinted the owner of the cafe into his mind, never allowing him to forget her. She had become the most important person in his life and he would never let anyone take her away.

Though he knew that he was just taking her as a substitution for his mother.

But as the years passed, he slowly came to terms with his own feelings and it was no longer just because of that memory. He had eventually come to fall in love with her wholeheartedly because of the kindness that she showed everyone.

Even after the boy became a famous S Ranker, he still went to her shop every day. It wasn't just for the soup, but rather just to see her and her smile that was for everyone.

That was the first meeting between Alexei and Maria.

As for how the soup had helped him control his frost energy, that was because of Maria's Cooking Skill.

It awakened the potential inside of him and helped him refine his frost energy so that it became a permanent part of him. It was no longer a separate part of him, but rather it had been integrated into his body, fully under his control.

He had the potential all along, it was just that he had never learned how to control it or tap into that potential.

So Maria's cooking bridged the gap and gave him that control.

It had turned that curse that he had been afflicted with into a power that made him a powerful S Ranker.

As for the reason why he froze those roses, it was nothing more than simple jealousy.