Chapter 1376 — Mourning the Great Dao

Shen Mu wept long and without restraint, a weeping that darkened heaven and shook the earth.

Yuchenzi could not help but grow anxious. He slipped away in a fluster to fetch Wei Suifeng, Yu Chudu and the others, thinking to himself, "When has Venerable Mu ever wept? I at least have never heard of such a thing! When a Heavenly Venerable weeps, it is no small matter — I am not the one to talk him out of it..."

He sought out Wei Suifeng, Yu Chudu and the rest, and told them what had happened. Astonished, Wei Suifeng said, "My junior brother wept? Strange. He fears neither heaven nor earth — what could bring tears to his eyes? I will go and see."

Yu Chudu too rose in haste. Yun Jianli's eyes flickered, and he said, "Venerable Mu has wept before. I heard that in the Jingping Tribulation, when Venerable Mu stood against the Heavenly Court, he called on Heaven and Heaven gave no answer, the Lord of Heaven would not aid him; he called on Earth and Earth was deaf, the Earth Lord would not aid him either. Beset on every side, feeling himself powerless against the Heavenly Court and powerless to save Jingping from fire and flood, he gouged out his eyes and wept."

Wei Suifeng felt great tenderness for this junior brother of his, and rising to his feet, he said, "Let us go and see."

When they arrived, they saw Hua Xuanxiu patting Shen Mu on the back and comforting him in a low voice. Yu Chudu's heart warmed; in the years of their flight, when he had been worn to the bone, Hua Xuanxiu had comforted him in just this way.

Though he had always felt she was comforting him rather as one comforts a wounded hound.

Wei Suifeng laughed heartily: "Mighty Venerable Mu, valiant and splendid man of nine chi — why do you weep like a child?"

Shen Mu checked his grief, raised his head, and said with a cold smile, "I weep for your mediocrity and incapacity, for burning timber fit for a great hall as a bundle of firewood. I weep for how many fine men in this world sink into mediocrity, and for men of talent who never find their use!"

Wei Suifeng was angered by his words and sneered, "Enough of your side-talk! You simply feel that Yun Jianli and I did not stay in the Peach Grove to help you, that we owe you a debt, and so you put on this show of grievance to extort us. There was a battle of Heavenly Venerables in that Peach Grove; had we stayed, we would have been of no use whatsoever!"

Shen Mu shook his head and stood up, his gaze settling upon Hua Xuanxiu. "I am not speaking of that. I am speaking of her. If Xuanxiu had truly listened to you and given up her study of the three realms — Mingde, Danfeng and Chengtian — then in days to come Jingping would surely have lost one of its great Heavenly Venerables, one who opens up realms."

He sighed. "She was nearly ruined by a single word from you. To think that had I not asked that one question, she would have spent her years in mediocrity, able at best to keep company with you and contend with you for eminence — and grief rises in my heart. And then I think of how many such prodigies in history have been ruined by a thoughtless word, and I cannot hold back my tears. 'You are wrong; do not do it' — those words wound more deeply than any other."

Unbidden, he thought of Taiyi.

Taiyi had said that in those years, when Shen Mu abandoned his own path and set foot upon the system of the Heavenly Palace and the Heavenly Court, he himself had become a tear in the corner of Shen Mu's eye.

Now Shen Mu understood what Taiyi had felt then.

Wei Suifeng, Yun Jianli and the others were slightly taken aback, and looked one after another at Hua Xuanxiu.

Yun Jianli ventured, "Does the Venerable mean that these three realms exist?"

Shen Mu nodded.

Wei Suifeng shook his head. "We have all tested it. These three realms do not exist. The realms of the Eastern Heavenly Gate, the Western Heavenly Gate and the Northern Heavenly Gate do exist. But these four great Heavenly Gate realms each have their own strengths, and the subtleties within them still require deep and ceaseless study."

"Mingde, Danfeng, Chengtian — these three realms exist."

Shen Mu said, "The cultivation system of the Heavenly Palace and the Heavenly Court was opened up by Venerable Yu. But Venerable Yu only made a beginning and gave it an outline; through the Longhan era it was gradually perfected, and the Heavenly Palace was little by little completed. Only in the present day has the Heavenly Court been gradually completed — yet to this day not one person has truly cultivated it to completion."

Wei Suifeng and Yun Jianli nodded in agreement. Wei Suifeng said, "Then on what grounds do you determine that these three realms exist?"

"On the grounds of the Dao Realm cultivation system."

The others were all startled; Yu Chudu felt somewhat dizzy, unable to keep pace with Shen Mu's thought.

"The Heavenly Palace system lays its emphasis on cultivation, on magic power and strength; it holds no realization of the Dao. That much you have all noticed, have you not?"

Shen Mu spoke without haste: "The Dao Realm system, by contrast, lays its emphasis on the realization of the Dao — one realm, one heaven. So then, does the Heavenly Palace truly hold no realization of the Dao? I believe the four great Heavenly Gates are the gates of entry into the Dao; to pass through the four great Heavenly Gates is to enter the Dao. That is the true marrow of the Heavenly Palace system. But because Venerable Yu died, no one ever uncovered that marrow, and so it took the deformed road of pure emphasis upon power."

Wei Suifeng frowned and mused, "When I tested my primordial spirit passing through the other three Heavenly Gates, I did indeed feel something unusual, a sensation of awakening to the Dao... But at the three gates of Mingde, Danfeng and Chengtian, I felt no such awakening."

"That is because those three gates of the Longhan Heavenly Court are false — they have the form but not the substance."

Shen Mu gathered himself and said, "Not only are those three gates false; even the four great Heavenly Gates, the Southern Heavenly Gate among them, do not contain the true great Dao principles of the four great Heavenly Gates. The true Heavenly Gates are in the Ancestral Court — and the true Jade Pool, the God-Slaying Terrace and the Jade Capital City are in the Ancestral Court as well!"

Yun Juanshu and Wei Suifeng fell into thought.

"If there were one who could fuse the Dao Realm and the Heavenly Palace systems perfectly into one — if such a being is not a Heavenly Venerable, then who is a Heavenly Venerable?"

Shen Mu flicked his sleeve and said coldly, "Of the so-called Ten Heavenly Venerables of the Heavenly Court, apart from Venerable Hao and Venerable Fire, the rest have nothing to their name but great power, and not the slightest achievement in perfecting or opening up a cultivation system!"

"The Heavenly Venerables I speak of are beings like the Seven Heavenly Venerables of Longhan; like Kaihuang, who opened up the Dao Realm; like Xu Shenghua, who created the Divine Treasury of the Heavenly River; like one who opens up the realm of the Ancestral Court — like myself!"

"And such a being exists in the Wendao Academy!"

His gaze fell upon Hua Xuanxiu.

The eyes of all the rest fell upon Hua Xuanxiu as well. She started with fright and stepped back, all but tripping over the thigh bone she had thrown down on the ground.

"Heaven be praised, her thinking, her way of thought, has not been wholly fettered by your ossified thinking."

Shen Mu said without haste, "Had I come a few years later, she would have been lost among the common crowd and become as you are."

Wei Suifeng, Yun Jianli and Yuchenzi were all rather displeased, but they had to admit that they had nearly stifled Hua Xuanxiu's creativity.

Yu Chudu, by contrast, was delighted. He was Hua Xuanxiu's teacher, and in instructing this young girl day by day he cared greatly for her growth.