Chapter 1786 — The Elder of No Bounds

In the Chaos Long River of the Sixteenth Epoch, within Jade Capital City, two tongues of fire suddenly came racing along the lute strings. The Fourth Young Master, Zixiao, paled slightly and hastily flicked his hand, but the flames had already reached his fingers.

The Fourth Young Master blew out a breath, trying to extinguish the fire on his fingers, yet the flames abruptly turned savage beyond measure. At the mere puff of his breath, they burned him until his skin split and his flesh gaped, and in an instant two of his fingers were charred away to bare white bone.

Crack. Crack.

The white bone too was burned to nothing, reduced to ash, and the flames used those two fingers as kindling to set his other fingers alight.

The Fourth Young Master raised his hand and severed his right hand at the wrist. With a sweep of his sleeve, the severed hand flew into the Chaos Long River, where it blazed furiously and was soon burned to a handful of ash, ceasing to exist.

The Fourth Young Master, Zixiao, darkened and said with a flick of his sleeve, "The old thing beneath the World Tree has actually escaped."

Within Great Black Mountain, Shen Mu stirred inwardly. "So this man is an old acquaintance from my past universe. Of course, I have not yet returned to the past universe—he is an acquaintance from my future..."

To him, meeting the being beneath the World Tree who could contend with the Fourth Young Master was a thing of the future, yet to that man, it had already happened.

"Still, I was not so utterly wretched in the past universe. At least I had friends."

Shen Mu smiled and walked toward the World Tree. Along the way, many black mountains stood like insect cocoons already split open, and the prehistoric powerhouses parasitic within them were breaking free of their chrysalises.

The forces of Great Black Mountain were far greater than the Five Elders of Fengshu entrenched in the Heavenly Court. Those prehistoric powerhouses emerging from the black mountains were still very weak, each drawing upon the spiritual energy and power of heaven and earth. Between their breaths, the stars in the sky tottered on the verge of falling, and the starlight grew much dimmer.

As Shen Mu walked over, he saw two or three stars snuffed out by these prehistoric powerhouses' plundering, becoming dead stars.

"Perhaps they may not be friends after all..."

His expression gradually darkened. Along this entire journey, he had felt a profound hostility.

The vast majority of the prehistoric powerhouses entrenched in Great Black Mountain radiated intense hostility toward him.

"If I were truly a close friend of that being beneath the World Tree, how could these stowaways show me such intense hostility?"

Shen Mu's face was as calm as still water, yet sweat beaded at the nape of his neck. He thought, "This time it may not be a visit to an old friend. It may well be delivering myself to my own death, goods delivered to the door..."

The original Great Black Mountain had long since grown lush and verdant with the World Tree's revival, becoming an enviable holy land. But now these prehistoric powerhouses had stowed away here, devouring the spiritual energy and power of heaven and earth to replenish what they had spent in the Calamity of Destruction, reducing this place to utter desolation once more.

Shen Mu frowned slightly.

The World Tree ahead, by contrast, grew ever more verdant and vigorous, displaying its towering, upright posture that held up the myriad heavens and worlds.

"Lush, lush the ancestral tree, each year withers and flourishes. Chaos cannot burn it through, past the calamity it springs anew."

Beneath the World Tree, that aged voice sang. The song suddenly took on a tone of resentment, and in an instant killing intent surged: "Taiyi felled my tree, Tiandu burned my roots! Yet spring came to tend me, and returned my brocade city!"

Shen Mu ignored the hostility of the others and walked forward to meet the song. Ahead beneath the tree appeared a pond, not large, in which a white-haired old man was bathing, both hands pulling a white towel back and forth across his back with vigorous effort.

Shen Mu was dumbfounded.

The water of this pond brimmed with spiritual energy. It was unmistakably dao dew and Hongmeng essence dripping from Taiyi's Dao Tree, mixed together by this old man to make his bathing pool.

Taiyi's Dao Tree should still appear at night, dripping the dao dew used to repair the black mountains.

After Xu Shenghua left this place, the remaining dao dew should not have been enough to make such a large bathing pool, but the quantity was still considerable. Such treasures, and this old man was using them to bathe!

Not only was he soaking in dao dew and Hongmeng essence, he was even scrubbing himself in it—truly a waste of heaven's gifts!

The white-haired old man stood in the pond water brimming with high spirits. Catching sight of Shen Mu's arrival, he laughed and said, "Old Seven of Miluo Palace, come down and wash with me!"

Shen Mu shook his head and said, "I possess a Hongmeng Body, spotless throughout. I no longer need such treasures."

"Is a Hongmeng Body so remarkable? I doubt it!"

The white-haired old man laughed heartily and rose from the pond. Shen Mu turned his gaze away to look at the World Tree, while the old man walked openly to the pond's edge, picked up his clothes, and dressed himself neatly. He said, "Old Four of Miluo Palace I beat and drove away. Even Zixiao would suffer a loss against my divine ability. Old Seven of Miluo Palace, you owe me a favor."

Shen Mu brought his gaze back and settled it on the old man's face. He smiled and said, "Daoist brother, you severed the Fourth Young Master's lute strings only to save the three elders of Fengshu. That favor is not owed to me—it is owed to the three elders of Fengshu."

The white-haired old man shook his head and said with contempt, "What are the Five Elders of Fengshu worth, that they deserve my favor? These five old things know nothing but digging holes beneath the tree day after day, terrified they might lack the opportunity to live to the next epoch. Truly loathsome. This epoch, they intended to entrench themselves here again. I found them utterly tiresome, so I drove them out."

Shen Mu saluted and said, "May I ask, Daoist brother, how you are called? What is your origin?"

The white-haired old man looked at him with a half-smile and said, "Old Seven of Miluo Palace, you still do not know my origin? When you came to see me in years past, you saw through my origin at a single glance and were exceedingly reverent, saying you owed me a great favor—you even wrote me an IOU."

Shen Mu opened the vertical eye at the center of his brow and looked, yet could not discern the old man's roots. He could only see a vast divine light shrouding his true body, and his brow's vertical eye could not penetrate that radiance.

"In years past, the master of Miluo Palace paid me homage. Later, Taiyi felled me. Fortunately, to prevent those little wretches from stowing away through my roots, he had to fetch the Dao each day and pour it over my roots, keeping a breath in me. I took advantage of Miluo Palace's unsealing to revive from death, and with great difficulty put out a sprout—and then you borrowed Taiyi's axe to cut me down."

The white-haired old man glanced at Shen Mu and said, "After you saw my sprout, you planted it in your own divine treasury. Who would have thought you actually managed to grow it? Truly a bizarre affair!"

Shen Mu stared at him wide-eyed, stammering, unable to speak.

"It was only then that I suddenly understood why you said you owed me a great favor and even wrote me an IOU."

The white-haired old man shook his head and said with a sigh, "I had thought I had taken advantage of that slippery, ever-scheming Seventh Young Master. I never imagined it was not an advantage at all, but in truth a gaping pit!"