Chapter 1770 — Audience with the Noble Lord in the Thatched Cottage
The Herdsman of the Wasteland · Page 1 of 4
The Golden Ship of Salvation sailed into the Ultimate Void. Shen Mu stood at the prow; the golden ship drifted quietly on, bearing along the course he held in his heart.
"Forty-two years is very near now. You should be appearing soon as well."
Shen Mu stood at the prow and did not look behind him. Behind him a figure had appeared, dim and hazy; if any eye should fall upon that person, that person would vanish.
Shen Mu did not look at him, but spoke to himself: "The war with the Heavenly Court is nearly over. In this war Wuyou Township was destroyed; of its soldiers and officers only a little over two thousand remain. But its common people were preserved. They live now in Jingping and live well. They have come into contact with the Jingping Reforms, and soon they will accept the reforms and throw themselves into them."
He laughed aloud. "I know that if you were still here, you would say with never a smile that all these sacrifices were worth it. Yet seeing old friends depart one by one would still grieve you, though you would never show it."
At his side, the man gazed far into the boundless void and stood silent.
"I did not resurrect them. I did not try to resurrect anyone."
Shen Mu went on: "The Wheel of Reincarnation has now been established, and within the wheel all beings are equal. Tubo will reward or punish them according to the good and evil they did in life. If a man has done too much evil, the fire of karma will burn him to ashes. But after they pass through the wheel, those reborn will not remember their former lives."
He smiled slightly. "I will promote a new system of Dao realms for the Ancestral Court. The old systems will all be cast aside. In this way, perhaps the great calamity of destruction may be resolved. You may well be the last Dao-attainer of the old system."
The man's eyes were deep; he did not speak.
"After this defeat, Hao Tianzun will return to the Ancestral Court."
Shen Mu continued: "Along the way he has lost soldiers and officers, his vitality gravely wounded, his followers deserting him. Whether he will still have a million troops left when he reaches the Ancestral Court is unknown; at most he may have only a few hundred thousand. He can no longer stir up the storms of the world, but he will not resign himself to it. The Dao-attainers of Miro Palace will seize the chance to descend; the Third Lord and the Fourth Lord will not give up. Hao Tiandi has thrown himself wholly into their camp, and may even join hands with the stowaways of the World Tree."
He smiled slightly. "When you return, there will be much to do, and you will not be idle. We will fight shoulder to shoulder again, against all the perils of the Ancestral Court. Yet I am glad at the thought of the war with the Ancestral Court."
He laughed aloud: "The Dao-attainers of the prehistoric age, the stowaways, stole the spiritual qi and spiritual power of heaven and earth and took up far too much of the universe's energy. It is well that they have come. Kill them, return their power to this universe, and this universe may live the longer. Lord Shang killed Tai Chu and brought blessing to the Yuan Realm; if these Dao-attainers die in the Seventeenth Era, our universe will keep on growing, and it may live as long as the First Era did, three hundred billion years. Three hundred billion years is a long time."
His gaze reached far. "This will be the most glorious of all the eras. You will see it all."
The Golden Ship of Salvation drifted on, unhurried, ever faster.
"The reason I must go to see Tai Yi is that the first counterblow of the Third Lord and the Fourth Lord will surely be ferocious beyond measure, and I may not be able to withstand it. Our situation looks excellent, yet it is as precarious as a heap of eggs."