Chapter 1739 — The Paradise Offers Its Sword

It was just as Xu Shenghua had said: through the first half of that night Great Black Mountain lay utterly still, and only beyond Black Mountain did the terrible spectacle of a cosmos in total ruin still hold sway.

Shen Mu no longer took the Dao Dew himself; he let Xu Shenghua drink it, while he bent his own strength to healing Xu Shenghua's wounds.

He did this because Xu Shenghua had one more great battle ahead of him — in the second half of the night, the prehistoric powerhouses would come probing, and if Xu Shenghua lacked sufficient strength, he would never hold against that wave of invasion. At last a riven mountain range began to quake, as though some dreadful demon-monster beneath the earth were struggling to walk out from within the mountain.

Xu Shenghua rose, walked down from the World Tree, and set off toward that place.

Shen Mu gathered up the Dao Dew and drank it himself.

By the time dawn came, Shen Mu had recovered six or seven parts of his cultivation, and so he too came down from the World Tree.

Xu Shenghua was in the midst of burying those few prehistoric powerhouses who had died at his hands; Shen Mu came to his side, and saw that he meant to raise a grave for Lingguan as well. "If you cannot hold them, then withdraw," Shen Mu said.

Xu Shenghua lifted his head.

"You as well.

" Shen Mu turned and walked away, his voice carrying back from far off: "I have no road left to retreat.

" Xu Shenghua was struck dumb, and only after a long moment did he go on building the grave and setting up its stele.

Shen Mu pushed his speed to its utmost, burst out of the Ancestral Court, and made for the Yuan Realm. Anxiety still gnawed at his heart: he had lost a night in the Ancestral Court, and even at full stretch, the road from the Ancestral Court to the Yuan Realm would take him five days.

By then, would Cloud Heavenly Venerable still be alive?

Could he hold on until that moment?

The Yuan Realm.

At the very moment Shen Mu had left the Yuan Realm for the Ancestral Court, the Ancestral God King had just led the Xuandu host across the Sorrowless Land and was being entangled by Moon Heavenly Venerable and Lang Wan.

The Ancestral God King wielded the mortal frame of the Heaven Lord; countless Xuandu Sun Guardians and Moon Guardians dragged wheel after wheel of suns and moons along, the suns scorching the earth, and from those suns countless fire-crow god-people flew out and slew toward Jingping, while from the moons three-legged, toad-headed, six-eyed god-people leapt forth and stirred their divine abilities; the whole sky was filled with six-eyed monstrous eyes, and from those eyes shot beam after beam of light that hammered down upon Jingping below! This was a spectacle of sheer apocalypse. Moon Heavenly Venerable and Lang Wan blocked them in person, yet they could hold back only the Ancestral God King; they could not hold back so vast a Xuandu host. Against this Xuandu host the Sorrowless Land had no troops left to bar the way, and Jingping's forces were far fewer than the Sorrowless Land's — hard pressed indeed to stop a Xuandu host that poured down like an ocean filling the sky.

In one divine city of Jingping after another, the Sun-Shooting Divine Cannons were brought to life; among hundreds of divine cities stood more than a thousand sun-shooting cannons, whose blasts left dark trails across the heavens — one shot, and a Sun Guardian came falling, or a sun in the sky was pierced clean through by the cannon light!

Even so, the host of gods and devils of Xuandu was unstoppable.

Countless fire-crow soldiers rushed down; three-legged fire-crow god-people beat their wings and flew at the divine cities of Jingping; from the battlements of those floating cities true-essence cannons were thrust out one after another, and countless beams of cannon light flew to meet the fire-crow god-people. At once the sky began to rain fire, and yet the flood of fire crows pressed ever nearer, nearer to the walls!

Beyond that, Moon Guardians led the six-eyed star-toad god-people; monstrous eyes spread across the heavens, and from them shot divine light that smote the true-essence cannons upon the divine cities and shattered gun after gun! First to bear the brunt was Kang City in the west: the first wave of fire-crow god-people crashed against Kang City's walls, clamped the stone with their three feet, and raced upward — some charging for the top of the wall, others swarming beneath Kang City, seeking to break through from its far side or to dig in from below. Cannon light could no longer shoot them dead.

Upon the walls, god-people pushed out flying chariots; the sword towers opened, and countless sword pellets streamed forth and cascaded down the walls.

As they fell, the sword pellets broke apart without cease, becoming sword after sword that stabbed in every direction, weaving through the air like shuttles! At the heart of Kang City stood Jingping god-people clad wholly in divine mail and divine armor, sealed so tightly that even their helms revealed only eyes and mouths; some bore divine weapons of every kind on their backs, others gripped long spears and great swords in their hands, and many of them were going to war for the first time, staring with frantic dread at the ground that shook without cease.

The ground at the city's heart trembled more and more violently, and then, with a sudden thunderous roar, the earth melted, molten gold and bronze liquid gushed into the sky, and Kang City's floor was burned through!

Out of that molten gold and bronze flew countless fire-crow god-people, like insects swarming up from beneath the earth, slaying in every direction! Doo-doo — Upon Kang City's gate-tower, someone blew the West Emperor's divine artifact that Jingping had copied, swelling the blood and spirit of the defending soldiers; yet even so they were swallowed in a bloody battle, and men fell wounded and dead without cease.

And Kang City was only one of many divine cities in the west; the other divine cities fared little better. The Xuandu host grew greater and greater, and one after another the Jingping divine cities in the sky were surrounded; below those divine cities lay the many towns and villages of western Jingping, where mortals and power-wielders lived — if the divine cities were broken, nothing would await those mortals and power-wielders but a massacre! "Heaven Lord, brother of the Dao, wait no longer!

" Achou Tubo said in a heavy voice. "The Ancestral God King will not show a flaw for some while yet; at this moment you alone can stir the supreme treasure of the Heaven Dao and hold back the Xuandu gods and devils! " The Heaven Lord lifted his head and stared fixedly at the Ancestral God King locked in slaughter with Moon Heavenly Venerable and Lang Wan; then of a sudden he clenched his teeth, roared aloud, and stirred the supreme treasure of the Heaven Dao, the Heaven's Net Dao Soldiers; one supreme treasure of the Heaven Dao after another rose and slew toward the Xuandu gods and devils in the sky.

Achou Tubo let out a breath, and the two of them charged out side by side. Both were existences of the Heavenly Venerable rank; entering the battle, they at once blocked the Xuandu host of gods and devils and made it hard for them to descend!

At that very moment, the hundred thousand gods and devils of the Left and Right Dragon Martial Guards charged forth, formed their battle arrays, and rushed at the two of them! And in the Sorrowless Land, the day was already lost.

Di Yiyue, Yan Yunxi and the rest began to lead their hosts in a breakout, cutting their way out from one heaven after another.

The campaign across the Sorrowless Land's Thirty-Three Heavens was savage beyond all imagining; each single heaven was all but a war of attrition, the hosts of gods and devils on both sides piling the corpses of their own and the enemy's soldiers into mountains, blood dyeing heaven after heaven of the Sorrowless Land red.