Chapter 1377 — Two Generations of Hierarchs Confront Each Other

Wei Suifeng coughed and coughed. He was the founding patriarch of the Heavenly Sacred Cult, and on the matter of installing a new Hierarch, the cult, high and low, had indeed told Shen Mu nothing.

Shen Mu stared at him. Wei Suifeng coughed for a long while, coughed until he was nearly spitting blood, and still could not bluff his way past it, so at last he could only say, "Your authority was never usurped. Aren't you still alive and well?

" Shen Mu glared at him, his face black. "I am barely seventeen, and I am already the old Hierarch?

When exactly did you depose me? The least you could have done was give me a word! " Yuchen Zi shut his mouth at precisely the right moment and said no more, thinking, "The Heavenly Sacred Cult has always carried on like a pack of demons. They installed a Hierarch without even informing the old one.

In any other sect, that alone would have split it apart long ago!

But this is their own internal affair; it is not for me to stick my nose in.

" Shen Mu said in a fury, "But I am still alive. Before installing a Junior Hierarch, should you not have informed me first? " "Who was to know whether you were alive or dead? Who was to know where you were? " Wei Suifeng's temper rose as well. "After you became the Sacred Hierarch, you ran wild in every direction. If you were not courting death, you were on the road to courting it!

When did you ever come back to the Heavenly Sacred Cult? While you were gone, everyone was guessing.

They said there was a fifty-fifty chance you lived and a fifty-fifty chance you were dead.

Only when you appeared and they could observe you were they able to determine whether you lived or died! Surely we could not wait until after you were dead to install a Junior Hierarch? " Shen Mu muttered, "Install him, then.

Why lose your temper? Only, you might have given me some notice .

.

. " Something stirred faintly in Shen Mu's heart.

Wei Suifeng sent men to invite Granny Zhu and Wenyuan. A short while later Granny Zhu came walking over, leading a youth with red lips and white teeth, handsome and elegant beyond compare. Shen Mu hurried forward to salute him.

"Patriarch, it has been a long while.

" The youth Wenyuan laughed. "Hierarch, please, no such ceremony. I am the Junior Hierarch now, and you are the Hierarch.

In name, I am still your disciple! " Shen Mu stood dumbstruck, frozen like a wooden rooster.

This youth was none other than the Heavenly Sacred Cult's Youthful Patriarch, who at some unknown time had reincarnated, been reborn as a youth, and become his disciple in name!

Granny Zhu blinked her eyes and smiled.

"Wenyuan is doing quite well these days, and he is outstanding at the Academy of Hearing the Dao.

Of course, I am Shen'er's teacher, which makes me his patriarch as well. " She felt rather pleased with herself. In those years Wenyuan had been her patriarch, and because he always wore the appearance of a youth, he was called the Youthful Patriarch. Now the wheel of fortune had turned, and she had become the patriarch of Patriarch Wenyuan! The group reminisced for a while, and then Granny Zhu said, her words heavy with meaning, "Wenyuan, strive to finish off the old Hierarch as soon as you can, and you will be the new Hierarch! " Shen Mu laughed.

"I'm afraid there is no hope of that in this lifetime .

. . " Granny Zhu shot him a ferocious glare, and Shen Mu hastily shut his mouth.

Yuchen Zi cleared his throat. "Everyone, let us continue. " He paused, then went on. "Granny Zhu, Wenyuan, and Crown Prince Youming studied the matter for a long while, and concluded that the problem lies in the process of crossing from the Heavenly Palace into the Southern Heavenly Gate. So they began to experiment, attempting to send their primordial spirits through the Northern Heavenly Gate. After their primordial spirits passed through the Northern Heavenly Gate, they comprehended a great deal of the Dao, and then employed the Northern Emperor's divine arts, and at last entered the Dao Realm without hindrance.

Granny, Wenyuan, is that not so? " Granny Zhu and the youth Wenyuan nodded. "We told the others at the Academy of Hearing the Dao about this, and so many of them began to experiment, developing the uses of the Four Heavenly Gates little by little," Granny Zhu said.

Yuchen Zi said, "By now the system of the Four Heavenly Gates has been developed by the gods of the Academy of Hearing the Dao into a nearly complete whole. There is only one oddity: many can comprehend the Dao while passing through the four gates, yet they cannot enter the Dao.

The odds of entering the Dao are very low; among a hundred-odd gods, one or two would already be reckoned extraordinary.

In the end, it still comes down to natural talent. " Shen Mu paced to and fro, deep in thought. The realm of the Four Heavenly Gates had not been opened up by Granny Zhu and Crown Prince Youming alone; it had been founded jointly by the geniuses of the Academy of Hearing the Dao.

Granny Zhu, the youth Wenyuan, and Crown Prince Youming were the forerunners, who built upon the original Southern Heavenly Gate and made up for its deficiencies.

They could not be counted as even half a Heavenly Venerable, yet to have achieved such a pioneering feat was already no small matter!

The people of the Academy of Hearing the Dao had great prospects; Granny Zhu and Crown Prince Youming could be reckoned geniuses who had integrated the Dao Realm with the Heavenly Palace system, and they were destined to leave a heavy mark upon the cultivation systems of the future. Their contribution to the cultivation systems of the future was no weaker than that of the Dao Ancestor or the Great Brahma. "What the Academy of Hearing the Dao lacks is vision.

" Shen Mu halted and suddenly raised his head.

"Hua Xuanxiu, Granny Zhu, Wenyuan, Crown Prince Youming, and everyone who has contributed to the realm of the Four Heavenly Gates, come with me to the Ancestral Court this time!

" Wei Suifeng's eyes shone bright as snow; he itched to move, hard put to contain the excitement in his heart.

Shen Mu shot him a glance and sneered. "Has our eldest senior brother made any contribution to the realm of the Four Heavenly Gates? " "I have! " Wei Suifeng chuckled. "I founded the Heavenly Sacred Cult.

Si Youyou was the former Holy Maiden of my Heavenly Sacred Cult, Wenyuan is the patriarch who transmitted the arts, and Hua Xuanxiu is my disciple's disciple, though my disciple is a bit of a dullard. If I had not founded the Heavenly Sacred Cult, then to say nothing of a Heavenly Sacred Maiden or a Heavenly Sacred Patriarch, there would not even be a Heavenly Sacred Hierarch! " Shen Mu's momentum dropped half a head below his at once, and he muttered, "Go if you're going.

What are you dredging up all that moldy old sesame and rotten grain for? Our Heavenly Sacred Cult has always honored the old and cherished the young. At worst, the new Hierarch finishes off the previous Hierarch .

. . " The group packed and made ready to depart.

The Yuan Realm was stable now, and there was no need for these experts of the Academy of Hearing the Dao to remain here forever; to follow Shen Mu to the Ancestral Court and see something of the world was, in itself, a thing worth getting excited about.

But Shen Mu did not set out with them at once. He waited several more days, until at last the Headman returned from Heavenly Venerable You, and brought the Alchemist back with him. "Heavenly Venerable You investigated nearly every soul in Jingping; that is why it took so long. " The Headman tossed a booklet to Shen Mu.

"These are the results of Heavenly Venerable You's investigation.

In it are all the divine-arts practitioners and gods of Jingping who might be the reincarnations of the ten Heavenly Venerables of the Heavenly Court, from the Jingping Calamity down to the present!