Chapter 1435 — Red Dust Becomes the Dao Path
The Herdsman of the Wasteland · Page 3 of 5
His sage pupils were unmatched; they could see even through to the fragments of Daluo Heaven beneath Yaochi. In an instant he took in all that lay beneath the Taiji mining ground. There, beneath the vast and boundless Taiji Starfield, he saw a fragment of ancient Daluo Heaven gnawing at the starfield and devouring the Taiji mining ground. Below the Taiji mining ground stood a mysterious ruin.
Upon the ruin were strange structures forged of the finest divine gold; though covered in mottled rust, the ripples of the Dao could still be seen flowing across their surfaces. That must have been the ruin of a highly advanced civilization, which had forged a divine city from peerless divine gold in an attempt to survive the great destruction of the universe — to pass through that great destruction and come into the new universe.
Yet Shen Mu saw no living beings there; it was as though all life had been destroyed. But since it was a fragment of Daluo Heaven, it could hardly be so simple. The Empress, however, could not see this, and did not understand the Taiji ancient gods' dread. "Daoist brothers," she said, "since you are locked down and can raise neither your cultivation nor your Dao here, then you cannot emerge complete.
You have halted your growth. What help, then, can you speak of giving me?
" She said coolly, "Forgive my bluntness: profit comes first. If I am to gain no sufficient profit, why should I work with you?
You can do nothing for me; an alliance with you, joining hands against the calamity to come, would be an idle jest. " Shen Mu's eyes flickered. "So then, the two Daoist brothers mean to emerge ahead of your time," he said.
The Empress was startled inwardly; at his prompting she too grasped the crux at once. The reason the Taiji ancient gods had sought her out was, most likely, that they had conceived the wish to emerge early!
If the Taiji ancient gods emerged and left the mining ground, they might indeed become her right arm.
The ancient god in the egg said in praise, "Mu Heavenly Venerable is indeed exceedingly clever — hearing the tune, he knows its meaning.
What a pity your strength is insufficient; otherwise we would surely have chosen you as our ally rather than Her Majesty the Empress.
You guess rightly: we have indeed conceived the wish to emerge.
" The female voice said, "We are trapped here. The mining ground lies before us, yet we can draw no power from it and comprehend no Dao within it, and our heart of Dao has been damaged and troubled by the red dust. Rather than guard the Taiji mining ground forever, we may as well emerge early and walk a circuit through the red dust.
" The male voice said, "The trifling affairs of the red dust have damaged our heart of Dao. We have gained a cunning heart, a fearful heart; we have gained joy and anger, sorrow and delight; we have gained greed, worry, slaughter, plotting, the desire for power, profit, craft, deceit, and scheming — all the base passions that hinder our attainment of the Dao. Since it was the red dust that gave them to us, then we must walk a circuit through the red dust.
" The female voice said, "Only by walking a circuit through the red dust can we see through greed, worry, the desire for power and profit; only so can we cast off the cunning heart and the fearful heart and bring our heart of Dao back to the uncarved simplicity that was before living beings ever came to be — and thereby attain the Dao and be liberated. " The words of the Taiji ancient gods touched Shen Mu and the Empress differently, and each gained a different insight. What the Empress recalled was the time of her own birth, when the Dao of Guixu bestowed consciousness upon her; in those days her consciousness was utterly simple, and in perfect accord with the Dao of Guixu. The heart of Dao is my own heart.