Chapter 1865 — The Youth, Lingxiao, and Zixiao
The Herdsman of the Wasteland · Page 3 of 4
In this life, Shen Mu and Shen Lingyun had actually come to the Divine City of Tiandu, declaring that as the most ancient elders of Tiandu City, they must this time help Tiandu City accomplish a feat unmatched in all the world!
The folk of Tiandu City were deeply suspicious and raised a clamor.
Some said he was a spy sent by Miluo Palace; some said he was close to the Old Man of Boundlessness and was the Old Man's spy.
"Young Master Chaos is more like a spy our Tiandu City planted at the side of Miluo Palace and the Old Man of Boundlessness!
" someone said, to shocking effect.
Just then the Lord of Tiandu brought back a girl he had picked up from the Calamity of Destruction, and announced joyfully, "Let me introduce to you all: this is Ling!
A Daoist friend who shares our aspirations! " The folk of Tiandu City rose to their feet one after another.
Ling the Heavenly Venerable's gaze was like a blazing sun upon snow; it swept over the crowd and came to rest on Shen Mu's face. Shen Mu's face was all smiles.
When Tiandu City opened heaven and created the Seventh Epoch of the universe, Shen Mu took no part in it, but watched from the sidelines. The figures of the Lord of Tiandu and the thirty-six Heaven-Openers were eternally branded into time and space, becoming an imperishable scroll, but in that scroll there were neither father nor daughter, nor Tai Yi.
In the Seventh Epoch, Tiandu City wholly overshadowed Miluo Palace and the Old Man of Boundlessness. The Heaven-Openers oppressed Miluo Palace and the Old Man in every way, and Tiandu City gradually changed in nature.
The Lord of Tiandu did not notice, or perhaps even if he noticed he would not have cared. He and Ling the Heavenly Venerable were the same kind of people: apart from the Dao, there was nothing else.
The Seventh Epoch had from the first been a testing ground for him and Tiandu City, and all the living beings of the Seventh Epoch were but appendages within that testing ground. So he believed, and so the Heaven-Openers believed as well.
As Tai Yi walked the world, watching the deeds of his past-life self and the Heaven-Openers, he sighed inwardly, "Teacher, you were right.
I was wrong. . . " In this life, even he could not attain the Dao again.
In every epoch before, he had been able to attain the Dao and cultivate another Dao Fruit; only in the Seventh Epoch could he not cultivate a Dao Fruit. Because the Dao of heaven and earth was wholly in the grip of the Heaven-Openers! Whomever the Heaven-Openers wished to attain the Dao, that one attained the Dao; whomever they wished to erase the cultivation of, that one's cultivation was erased!
The Seventh Epoch's decline and destruction came earlier than expected.
The Master of Miluo Palace visited Tiandu City three times, and on the fourth visit he slew the Lord of Tiandu. At that time Shen Mu was right there, standing beside Lingxiao.
Lingxiao's eyes were bright and sparkling, fixed unblinkingly on the divine art the Master of Miluo Palace employed when he killed the Lord of Tiandu. Shen Mu, however, was watching Ling the Heavenly Venerable.
Her Immutable Mass-Energy had not yet reached great accomplishment, yet she silently rescued Tiandu's primal spirit, and Tiandu was separated from Tai Yi.
War broke out between Tiandu City and Miluo Palace, lasting from the end of the Seventh Epoch all the way to the Tenth. Ling, one of the Heaven-Openers, displayed transcendent battle power, slaughtering so many of Miluo Palace that the dead and wounded were grievous, and was hailed as the shadow of Miluo Palace.
Yet Ling went her own way alone, and moreover was close to Chaos, the seventh of Miluo Palace, and so was cast off by the Heaven-Openers.
From the Seventh Epoch to the Tenth, it could be called a war that swept the universe, exceedingly savage. Lingxiao attained the Dao and cultivated the Lingxiao Hall, but for that very reason was besieged and suppressed by the Heaven-Openers, wounded again and again.