Chapter 798 — Unceasing Dissection and Study

In the blink of an eye, nearly half of this vast Jade Capital City had been destroyed!

"The King of Destruction... no wonder, when I asked after his reputation in Jingping, everyone who knew him called him Shen the Demolisher..."

Sweat rolled down the scholar's brow; suddenly she said, "Lu Zheng, did you hear what the Outland Heavenly Court's Luo Shendao said just now?"

The donkey nodded, its donkey face utterly grave: "Hee-haw!"

"Luo Shendao said his arm was severed by Shen the Demolisher."

The scholar seemed to be speaking to the donkey, and seemed to be talking to herself. She said in a low voice, "But he also said his arm was severed by the Shanghuang Tyrant Body. That is strange. The Shanghuang Tyrant Body, the Jingping Tyrant Body — can they be one and the same? Then the swordsmanship of the Shanghuang Sword God..."

She stared wide-eyed and shook her head in haste: "Impossible. Absolutely impossible!"

Boom.

The Jade Capital City shook, and another thousand-li mountain range surged up, shoving the rest askew.

The crowd hurried back into the Lingxiao Hall and stared in alarm at the youth standing on the Dragon Qilin's head.

The youth returned the sword to the attendant maiden Feng Qiuyun at his side and said to another maiden, the one with a small sapling in the halo behind her head, "Give me the Six Harmonies Primordial Sword."

A chill ran through the crowd.

Gongsun Yan handed the whisk she carried to Shen Mu. Shen Mu shook the whisk and was about to rouse this treasure when the Ancestral Dragon King said gravely, "Young Master Shen, there is no need to try further! Try again, and the Jade Capital City will cease to exist! These treasures are all supreme treasures of the Earth Mother Venerable God; of that there is no doubt!"

Several other demigods said in turn, "They are indeed the Earth Mother Venerable God's treasures. Pray do not try them again, Young Master Shen!"

Shen Mu was puzzled: "How are they so certain these are the Earth Mother's treasures? I thrust six or seven times just now, and felt no might at all..."

Still, that their doubts were laid to rest suited him well enough.

Shen Mu handed the whisk back to Gongsun Yan, and the Ancestral Dragon King and the other ancient demigods breathed a sigh of relief and said to Shen Mu, "Young Master Shen, you are indeed the Earth Mother's disciple. May we ask where the Earth Mother is? Permit us to pay our respects."

Feng Qiuyun answered without thinking, "The Earth Mother Venerable God suffered a grievous wound; at present she has not yet..."

Shen Mu's expression shifted slightly; he swiftly pressed her hand.

Feng Qiuyun was perplexed, when suddenly Shen Mu's spiritual fluctuation came, bursting in her mind: "Sister Qiuyun, you must not reveal the truth about the Earth Mother! These demigods mean no good!"

A chill ran down Feng Qiuyun's spine, and she looked at the leaders of those demigods.

The Ancestral Dragon King and his fellows were each chieftains of the giant races of the Shanghuang era, their strength unfathomable. In the days when the Earth Mother lived, her majesty lay heavy, pressing the races until they could scarcely breathe.

If the Earth Mother Venerable God were well, they would not dare rebel; if the Earth Mother were dead, they would heave a great sigh of relief.

And if the Earth Mother were gravely wounded, then they would surely delight in finishing her off and casting a handful of earth on her grave!

At this thought, sweat broke out on Feng Qiuyun's forehead: "The Ancestral Dragon King and his kind mean to rebel; they are sounding me out!"

The Ancestral Dragon King asked with solicitude, "Senior Sister Feng, how are the Earth Mother's injuries? We old subjects have had no word of the Earth Mother these many years, and our hearts have truly burned with anxiety. Today, meeting a disciple of the Earth Mother again after so long, we must go and pay our respects and kowtow to her venerable self."

Feng Qiuyun's scalp went numb.

Suddenly Shen Mu laughed aloud: "Ancestral Dragon King, be at ease a while. There is still important business at hand! Does this sister have more to say? Why do you pretend to be the Earth Mother's disciple? What is it you seek?"

He changed the subject, drawing everyone's attention to the girl.

The girl burst out laughing: "A traitor and villain has stolen the Earth Mother's treasures, and now dares to pass himself off as the Earth Mother's disciple to pad out the ranks. Those who do not know the truth have all been taken in by you. Cult Master Shen of the Heaven Sacred Cult is indeed a dragon and phoenix among men."

Shen Mu smiled faintly.

The girl said leisurely, "Yet even if you talk until flowers rain from the sky, you cannot change one fact."

She suddenly bowed and said, "This disciple beseeches the Earth Mother to descend!"

Scarcely had her words fallen than an aura of unimaginable terror, unimaginable solidity, descended!

That aura, heavy as the earth, in an instant enshrouded the whole Jade Capital City: towering, profound, heavy as the continent of the Yuan World, deep as a bottomless abyss.

Everyone was awed by a natural divine power, and felt the space around them grow solid and weighty.

The Lingxiao Hall came apart on the instant; countless tiles flew up with a clatter, and the beams, the walls, the pillars, the very floor, all flew up and drifted into the distance.

In a moment the whole hall had vanished, leaving only the ground on which the crowd stood.

Beneath their feet, mountains rolled and swelled unceasingly, stretching away in every direction.

The peaks were majestic, towering into the clouds.

Yet looking closely, the crowd found that these were not mountain ranges at all, but roots, roots unimaginably thick!

With difficulty they raised their heads, and saw a divine tree beyond measure in age standing between heaven and earth, its roots sunk into the ground of the Yuan World: ancient, vast and dim, the patterns on its bark seeming to be natural dao-lines and dao-traces.

The trunk of this divine tree was so thick that it seemed made of Mount Sumeru, thicker even than Mount Sumeru; and looking upward, all the heavens and all the worlds seemed to float amid the tree's crown.

Such a spectacle dazzled the eye!

Beneath the tree, the girl bowed: "I beseech the Earth Mother Venerable God."

From the crown, a goddess of ten thousand graces drifted down from the tree, her bare feet touching the ground as light as air.

Her dao-rhyme was heaven-made, bearing the thickness of the earth, nurturing all things; she had a bearing no one else could imitate.

And her appearance was exactly the same as the Earth Mother's statue that Shen Mu had seen in the temple of the Earth Mother Venerable God!

The corner of Shen Mu's eye twitched violently. He looked at Feng Qiuyun, then at the girl, then raised his eyes to this Earth Mother Venerable God before him, somewhat at a loss.

Though he had seen the Earth Mother's remnant soul in the underground palace, a voice within him told him that this Earth Mother Venerable God before him was no counterfeit.

"More complicated than I thought... Did we not come to settle a score with the Red Emperor Qi Xiayu? Feng Qiuyun struck at Sister Qi, was killed by Sister Qi, and then I gathered up the treasures and ran. Why has it all turned so tangled and strange?"

Shen Mu's head swelled with a splitting ache; quietly he lifted the willow leaf from the point between his brows.

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