Chapter 804 — Mists Shroud Longhan; a Giant Fish Bears the Woman Away

Long Qilin stared at him in suspicion, and all at once a bitter ache welled up in his heart, and grief came with it: "Sect Master, you lied to me. I thought you meant to give your life for the cause, to shield us and let us slip away. But you used us as bait, to draw off these little ladies..."

Shen Mu decided on the spot: "I will give you an extra meal."

Long Qilin's grief ceased at once, and he said to Yu Tianzun and Gongsun Yan, who stood there utterly bewildered, "The Sect Master is brilliant and martial, luring the tiger down from the mountain, capturing this little lady to trade for our return — a masterful stratagem."

Shui Qilin rolled his eyes and thought, "This fellow's shamelessness far exceeds my own; with a few words he has wrangled himself a meal. Truly the most brazen of creatures. By the way, what was that scripture scroll of his called? I must curry favor with him, borrow it and study it, and in the future I too might earn an extra meal..."

He had been wounded protecting Yu Tianzun, but the worst hurt of all was Gongsun Yan's.

The girl had been beaten miserably, and her whisk had been seized by Yan Qiling's maidservants.

Yan Qiling's maidservants were formidable in cultivation; one of them stood at the Lingxiao realm, and the others at the Yujing realm. Gongsun Yan, though a true god — a demigod born of the kernel of an Earthly Origin Dao Fruit — and though she commanded the Six Harmonies Primordial Sword, could not bring out much of its power.

After a bitter fight she had been wounded and captured, and the little sapling in the halo behind her head had been beaten limp and withered.

Seeing that the others were unharmed, Shen Mu was relieved, and said with a smile, "Sister Yan, the situation is clear enough now. You have fallen into my hands — so what shall we do now?"

Yan Qiling mustered all her strength to suppress her injuries, her breath like a thread, and said with the utmost difficulty, "Let them go."

The women hesitated a moment, then did as they were told and released Yu Tianzun and the others.

Yan Qiling's eyes were swollen to slits, her former beauty wholly gone. She said in a low voice, "What now, Mu Tianzun?"

Shen Mu pressed several spirit pills into her mouth and said, "These are medicine for your wounds. Have no fear, they are not poisoned."

Yan Qiling held the pills in her mouth but dared not swallow.

Shen Mu smiled faintly. "Swallow them. I still have questions to ask you."

Yan Qiling kept her mouth shut and said nothing.

Suddenly Shen Mu pressed a finger to her throat; with a gulp Yan Qiling swallowed the pills, cold sweat beading on her brow and back.

Yet the moment the pills fell into her belly, she felt the thousands of wounds all over her body begin to itch, the wounds slowly closing.

"These pills I refined from Long Pang's spittle, together with several other ingredients," Shen Mu said with a smile. "Ordinarily one pill sells for ten thousand Da Feng coins."

Long Qilin was thrown into a panic and whispered, "Sect Master, it is dragon saliva! Dragon saliva! If you say it is my spittle, no one will ever buy it."

Yan Qiling gave a cold snort. Her wounds had stopped bleeding, freeing a portion of her cultivation, and she said indifferently, "What do you want to ask?"

"First, return the Six Harmonies Primordial Sword," Shen Mu said.

Yan Qiling looked at the women and said, "Give him back the whisk!"

One of the women came forward bearing the whisk. Yu Tianzun said hurriedly, "Give the whisk to me!"

The woman hesitated, then handed the whisk to Yu Tianzun, who carried it forward and gave it to Shen Mu, saying in a low voice, "Brother, these women are formidable. I fear she may take the chance to ambush you."

Shen Mu took the whisk and praised him: "Well done, worthy brother."

"You come from the Heavenly Court Beyond the Realm?"

He turned to Yan Qiling and asked with concern, "Is the Heavenly Emperor well?"

Yan Qiling said coldly, "The Heavenly Court Beyond the Realm is nothing but a court founded by rebels and traitors. Is it worthy of my loyalty? You have guessed wrong — I have not the slightest connection with that court. I never imagined that the Mu Tianzun whose name shook the Heavenly Court a million years ago would be a man of this age. If the Heavenly Emperor knew of it, he would be utterly astonished. I am curious: how did Mu Tianzun travel to a million years ago? And Shen Tianzun, who came with you — is he the young Kaihuang of those days?"

Shen Mu smiled. "I ask you questions, and you turn around and pump me for answers. Sister, you are a naughty one. What was it you said just now — Dao One, Dao Twenty-Two? How are these divided?"

Yan Qiling's color had improved somewhat. She said, "The great daos of the world are divided according to what they belong to. Yuandu has thirty-six daos: the first great dao is Dao One, the second is Dao Two, and so on. Youdu has sixty-four daos, Xuandu seventy-two, and the stars of the heavens three hundred and sixty. Each of these daos has its own number. Whichever dao's principle a divine ability contains, that is the dao the ability belongs to. For example, when you unleash heavenly fire, it belongs to Xuandu Dao Two."

Shen Mu pondered, musing, "This way of dividing things reminds me of the Dao Sect... Do you know a slovenly Daoist?"

"You mean the Dao Ancestor of the Dao Sect?"

Yan Qiling shook her head. "I have heard the name, but never met him."

Shen Mu studied her expression closely and pressed on: "Have you ever seen the Dao Ancestor of the Dao Sect?"

Yan Qiling said, "I have not... I have seen the Dao Ancestor of the Dao Sect! What did you feed me?"

A look of alarm came over her. Her thoughts and consciousness were scarcely under her own control; she had clearly meant to say she had never seen the Dao Ancestor, yet under Shen Mu's second questioning she could not help but speak the truth.

"Long Pang's spittle."

Shen Mu's face was kindly, his voice gentle: "With a few other ingredients added — a sovereign remedy for wounds. Only, this sort of spirit pill has a drawback: it affects the consciousness and the thoughts, so that the taker's mind follows another's against its will. And if one then applies certain demonic arts of Youdu to affect the taker's soul, it makes for a very fine interrogation. Was it the Dao Ancestor who helped you establish these numbers for the great daos?"

Long Qilin was smug. He said to Shui Qilin, "That is what dragon saliva is good for."

Shui Qilin was filled with admiration. "Brother, when you have time you must teach me!"

"It is a gift. You cannot learn it!" Long Qilin grew smugger still.

The cold sweat on Yan Qiling's brow turned to beads the size of beans, mingled with golden blood running down her cheeks, but she shut her mouth and would not speak for dear life.

"If you will not say it, I know it was him all the same. The Dao Ancestor loved the arts of number, and held that the essence of all things in heaven and earth is mathematical. If the Heavenly Emperor invited him to rank the great daos of every realm, he would surely have gone gladly."

Shen Mu's voice grew gentler still as he pressed: "Was it the Dao Ancestor who compiled the various great daos for the Heavenly Emperor? You have read all the dao arts he compiled, have you not? Then — where is the Dao Ancestor of the Dao Sect now?"

Yan Qiling clenched her teeth, her face flushing red, her body trembling — plainly fighting the demonic voice that assailed her soul.

Shen Mu frowned slightly. Yan Qiling would not speak, and there was no way to force her mouth open.

This woman's spirit was powerful, and she was versed in the dao arts and divine abilities of the three realms of Yuandu, Youdu, and Xuandu; to control her soul was no easy thing.

"You said just now that the sword dao is Dao One, and the martial dao is Dao One — what did you mean by that?" Shen Mu asked.