Chapter 1724 — The Steed Treads the Heavens

Chaos reigned throughout the Heavenly Court's great camp. If the Great Luotian crashed down, the devastation it wrought would leave the Heavenly Court's armies, every camp of them, drowned in dead and wounded.

In an instant, gods and demons beyond counting shot into the air, each driving his divine power, swelling his flesh, transforming into giants whose heads scraped heaven and whose feet propped up the earth, striving to hold aloft the falling Great Luotian. Just as they were about to touch it, a Dao flower suddenly appeared.

The flower spun, growing larger and larger, and it bore up the descending Great Luotian. Taichu's face was ashen iron.

He urged the Dao tree to fly to him; its roots and tendrils stretched out in every direction and drove into the Great Luotian, split in two, seeking to join the broken halves back together. The Great Luotian was the brand of the Great Dao upon the ultimate void, the very manifestation of the Dao.

Shen Mu had made quick work of cracking his Great Luotian open, but he could not yet ruin his cultivation. He needed only to fuse the two halves together again and he would return to the peak of his powers; yet the blow Shen Mu had dealt his Dao heart could not be healed in a moment or an hour.

He had schemed to stab Shen Mu in the dark, and had made his preparations long in advance; but to his vexation, Shen Mu was no longer the Shen Mu of the Jingping Calamity. In wisdom and in method alike, he had long since surpassed him by a great measure.

Back then Shen Mu had been his to knead and mould as he pleased, seething with pent-up fury, like a muddle-headed child. Now everything seemed turned on its head: the stratagem he had brooded over for more than twenty years looked, before Shen Mu, like the antics of a muddle-headed urchin, broken with ease, and himself gravely wounded into the bargain.

Suddenly the Great Luotian split open once more.

Taichu gave a muffled grunt; blood surged up into his throat. He shut his mouth, and the blood came up through his nasal passage instead, spurting from his nostrils.

He was wounded after all. Not only had Shen Mu snatched away the Azure Dragon's soul, he had gravely injured him!

"Retired Emperor, the next time you act, you had best inform me beforehand.

" Emperor Haotian came to stand behind him and said indifferently, "Every failure of yours is a blow to the Heavenly Court's morale.

The Heavenly Court can permit no further failures now. " The muscles of Taichu's back drew taut.

He did not turn, nor dared wipe away the blood running from his nose. In a low voice he said, "Your Majesty's reproof is just; I understand. But Heavenly Venerable Mu must be wounded as well. To strike me from the shadows, he had to summon the Azure Dragon's soul and work his calculations against me at the same time, and had no way to shield himself; he must have been gravely hurt by my divine power!

" Emperor Haotian said with a half-smile, "You think he was truly gravely hurt by your divine power? Retired Emperor, you are as self-important as ever. In all the world today, there is no one left who can gravely wound him by a sneak attack. You are old, and you cannot best him.

All you need do is honestly await my orders, and stop presuming so much. " Emperor Haotian raised his hand; vast magical power poured forth, helping him steady the Great Luotian that was about to split once more.

"That set of tricks of yours is an old thing, and it will not serve against him.

" Taichu fell silent.

After a moment he said, "I believe he was wounded too. " Emperor Haotian said no more.

Having steadied the Great Luotian for him, he turned and left. At the same time, Shen Mu summoned the three souls of the Eastern Emperor Azure Dragon, sealed them within a dragon scale, and handed it to a soldier from Jiangling. The soldier departed at once with the dragon scale, returning to Jiangling through a teleportation gate.

Shen Mu dismissed the altar, withdrew his primordial spirit, and said with admiration, "Taichu is truly formidable; he wounded me.

My estimate of him was a little off.

He must have completed the Seventy-Two Treasure Halls, advanced another storey in cultivation, and grown more seasoned in attaining the Dao through force.

" Ling Yuxiu came forward, fetched medicine and wiped the wound on his knuckles, saying with heartache, "You must not push yourself so hard next time. " Shen Mu nodded.

"My lady's reproof is just. Next time I shall have Lord Shang hold him off.

" Heavenly Venerable Yun stared at the wound on his knuckles and said nothing.

Shen Mu had just been working his rites, summoning the Azure Dragon's soul; while he did so, Taichu's divine power had stolen in without the slightest warning, a perilous moment indeed!

Taichu's divine power followed the vine to the melon, striking straight at the source of the soul-summoning lure; it was impossible to guard against, and even Heavenly Venerable Yun had felt the extreme danger of it.

In that instant Shen Mu had unleashed every method at his disposal, standing upon the altar as divine powers burst forth one after another, blocking and breaking each of Taichu's attacks in turn! And the most terrifying thing of all was that the might of Taichu's divine power had not even managed to travel beyond the altar before it was wholly dissolved. That was what shook Heavenly Venerable Yun to the core. Heavenly Venerable Mu, who had established the Dao through divine power, had attained a mastery of divine power that was past all understanding.

Heavenly Venerable Yun had contended with Taichu many times, knew his mastery of divine power like the back of his hand, and held him in the highest admiration.

Though Taichu had attained the Dao through force, his attainment in the Innate One Qi was exceedingly high; he could be called the foremost man of the Innate One Qi.

Likewise, he was deeply versed in Taichu's Dao; his Dao Realm had been cultivated to profound depths, to more than twenty heavens of the Dao Realm. And yet a being such as this, striking from the shadows, could not push the might of his divine power beyond the altar!

Understand: the divine power of a Dao-Achiever, once unleashed, could likely destroy more than half of the Taiqing Realm of Wuyou Township; yet so immense a force had been confined by Shen Mu to the altar alone! In the end, Taichu's divine power had wounded only Shen Mu's knuckles.

Shen Mu lamented that his own divine power was not yet perfect, but the shock he gave others was without equal. When Ling Yuxiu had finished tending the wound on his knuckles, Shen Mu looked up at the sky, and saw the Lord of Heaven's enormous face hooding the west, countless sun guardians dragging their suns together beneath that face; Xuandu's armies were ready. "The Heavenly Court's power is truly too great.

" He frowned slightly.

The Heavenly Court's forces outnumbered those of Wuyou Township and Jingping tenfold, several tens of fold. At present the Heavenly Court's armies were held in check by Wuyou Township and the battlefield had not yet been spread open; but once it was, Wuyou Township would likely not escape calamity. "By then, even Heavenly Venerables and Dao-Achievers will have to take the field.

" Shen Mu's chest swelled.

What was most perilous was not Wuyou Township, but the Western Lands.

The Western Lands, he feared, could not be preserved at all.

"Before Wuyou Township suffers a great defeat, the powers of the east, south, and north must be put down; otherwise we shall be encircled and annihilated at Jingping.

" The Eastern Sea.

The envoy from Jiangling stepped out of the teleportation gate and hurried to the camp at the Eastern Sea, passing through army after army of Jingping gods and demons. Beneath the tiger tent, the Imperial Preceptor of Jingping, Jiang Baigui, raised his head and saw him.