Chapter 1830 — The World-Opening Great Bell
The Herdsman of the Wasteland · Page 2 of 5
The reason I could return is that the Two Ancestors attained the Dao, and the pressure on me eased greatly.
" "The Two Ancestors attained the Dao?
" Zhu Santong was baffled.
"Who are the Two Ancestors?
" "The two founding patriarchs who created the Ancestral Court Dao-realm system have attained the Dao.
" Shang Jun said, "Lan Yutian and Xu Shenghua have attained the Dao, and their battle strength is above mine; that is why I could steal a little leisure and come back to teach my Dao arts and divine powers and seek inheritors.
Heavenly Venerable You has attained the Dao as well; he came back with me and has gone on to Youdu. " Zhu Santong was dumbstruck. Even he could only marvel at the profundity of the Ancestral Court Dao-realm system; for these two old patriarchs who had founded it to attain the Dao, what fearsome achievements must be theirs?
As for Heavenly Venerable You, he had heard only the legends of the man and had never met him. "And the Seventh Young Master?
Has he attained the Dao?
" Zhu Santong pressed.
Shang Jun's face turned strange, and he shook his head. "His case is rather particular.
If he attained the Dao through primal chaos, then he would be the Seventh Young Master of the legends, but to this day he has never managed to attain the Dao through primal chaos.
" "The old scoundrel has his day too! " Zhu Santong roared with laughter, mightily pleased; Dong Yang, Jun Xieyu, and the others did not know what they were talking about, but seeing him laugh so heartily they joined in with a laugh or two.
Shang Jun's face was strange. "Though the Seventh Young Master has not attained the Dao through primal chaos, his attainment through Guixu and through the World Tree has grown deeper and more far-reaching.
" Zhu Santong was dumbstruck again.
Shang Jun went on, "His Guixu lotus throne has already reached the sixth grade of the Dao, and on the World Tree there have bloomed dao flowers and formed dao fruits, and not merely one flower, nor one fruit. " Zhu Santong was dumbstruck yet again.
He scratched at the pig bristles behind his head and said doubtfully, "That cannot be right. The Ancestral Court Dao-realm system is not cultivated that way.
.
.
" "He is not in the basket," Shang Jun said. It was as though thunder rolled through Zhu Santong's mind, and at once he understood.
The one who fills the basket of the Ancestral Court Dao-realm system is a genius; the one who creates that basket is a founding patriarch; but the one who leaps out of the basket early on cannot be measured by any basket at all! Shen Mu was the first to leap out of the basket, and before Lan Yutian and Xu Shenghua and the new generation of Heavenly Venerables had even made the basket, he had already leapt beyond it!
There are many baskets in this world: the Miluo Palace's method of attaining the Dao is a basket, the Heaven-Openers' method of attaining the Dao is a basket, Elder Wuyai and the other prehistoric beings have baskets great and small, and the Ancestral Court Dao-realm system of Lan Yutian and Xu Shenghua is a basket as well! But Shen Mu is in none of these baskets! No basket can hold Shen Mu!
He could attain the Dao by the Guixu method, or walk the Miluo Palace's Dao-realm system, or attain the Dao through the World Tree; he is even well versed in the Heaven-Openers' art of opening the heavens.
Yet none of these roads is the road he means to walk.
His road is one alone: attaining the Dao through primal chaos. Shang Jun rose to leave.
"Having seen you all, my mind is at ease.
I go to pass on my Dao arts.
" Zhu Santong hurried after him.
"Shang Jun, may I go to the Ancestral Court?
" Shang Jun halted and looked him over. "Only when you have cultivated to the point where you are one step short of attaining the Dao may you go to the Ancestral Court. The Ancestral Court today is exceedingly perilous; with your present strength, going there would be no more than throwing your life away.