Chapter 828 — Proud Steeds and Carved Chariots, Fragrance Filling the Road

"Flowers that are not flowers, mist that is not mist.

It comes at midnight, and at dawn it goes.

. . " Shen Mu was lost in thought, savoring the verse again and again.

A million years ago, at the grand feast by the Jade Pool, he and Emperor Kai had once studied alongside Ling Heavenly Venerable a divine power that could keep matter unchanging, neither increasing nor decreasing; their time together had not been long, yet even so they had groped their way onto a vague and shadowy road. Ling Heavenly Venerable, of course, had been the driving force of that research; he and Emperor Kai were only her assistants, helping her make deductions and imparting to her the art of creation.

Even so, Shen Mu knew Ling Heavenly Venerable's findings inside and out.

It was then that the foundation of her divine power was laid; through the long ages that followed, it was she alone who deduced and perfected that art.

From the ghost ship, it was clear that when Ling Heavenly Venerable wielded this divine power she had not yet perfected it, and so she left behind a flaw: the unchanging constant, thirty-six.

Each time this ship resets space and time, it leaves behind a flaw, and that flaw produces three outcomes. First, it fuses the living and the nonliving aboard the ship into monsters neither human nor thing — which is why so many who boarded have grown fused into the ship's very hull.

Second, the divine power fuses with the ship, and the ship fuses with life, until the power and the ship have become a strange living entity.

This entity wanders through thirty-six different eras, and it attacks any among the boarders capable of threatening it.

Third, the ship cycles through thirty-six different eras, and that cycling turns the boarders to Void, until at last they become neither living nor dead, invisible, imperceptible. To the boarders this was an eerie, terrifying divine power; but to Ling Heavenly Venerable it was the result of her own imperfect art.

To them, uncanny; to her, a flaw — and not one she had intended. The time when Ling Heavenly Venerable left this poem must have been in later years, when she boarded the ship again, sensed the imperfection of her art, and left the poem behind, speaking in verse of the flaw within her divine power. The boarders' hope for survival does not lie in comprehending Ling Heavenly Venerable's divine power, but in seeking life from the very flaw in it — and breaking that power!

Shen Mu dimly grasped a direction for breaking this divine power, but the feeling was too hazy; for a moment he could not think it through. Suddenly, a dreadful throb came from behind the hall.

They raced around the great hall and saw the Scarlet Bright Divine Son locked in battle with the two attendants of Prince Qiuming! The bodies of the Scarlet Bright Divine Son and those two divines were already half turned to Void; flesh and primal spirit alike were hazy and indistinct, as if unreal — yet their fighting strength remained utterly terrifying.

After Shen Mu imparted to him the Scarlet Emperor's Three Primordial Spirits' Undying Divine Consciousness, the Scarlet Bright Divine Son at last made good his weakness; his primal spirit too was cultivated into a three-headed, six-armed form, and paired with the Bright Emperor's Flawless Creation Mystic Art, he was simply slaughtering gods before him and Buddhas behind him.

Yet the two divines who had come with Prince Qiuming were no trifling matter either, and one of them, whose silver rope suspended the moon, had left a deep impression on Shen Mu. The silver rope was a hundred thousand li long, hanging down from the moon; once it touched the ground, that divine had gathered it into his sleeve.

Now he stirred the silver rope — though it was no longer a rope but a whip. The silver whip lengthened and shortened at will, with techniques of shake, chop, uplift, sweep, coil, circle, loop, and thrust; and its transformations did not end there.

Now the whip's head became a silver dragon, rampant with claws and fangs; now it became a silver spear, lunging and stabbing — endlessly varied. The other divine was likewise formidable, and joining forces with the first to besiege the Scarlet Bright Divine Son, they smashed towers and palaces one after another into ruin.

Li Zheng said abruptly, "Their strength is far weaker than before — their cultivation must have dissolved into Void along with them. It seems the stronger one is aboard this ship, the more one is whittled away.

" Shen Mu nodded. Just then, the three of them felt their hairs stand on end, pinned in place by an incomparably terrifying aura; they dared not move a muscle.

It was a dragon might, dreadful beyond measure. Li Zheng's voice was hoarse: "The Ancestral Dragon King! " Shen Mu whirled around.

The Ancestral Dragon King was charging toward them, already within a hundred paces behind them. The old dragon of the Lingxiao Realm had a head of immense size; its jaws opened in a mouth that could swallow the heavens, about to gulp them down in one bite!

Yet in the instant Shen Mu turned to look at him, the Ancestral Dragon King's body abruptly turned to Void, becoming a hazy, dim shadow!

His strength was extremely high, only a notch below Feng Qiuyun, and his state was much the same as hers. Feng Qiuyun had grown into the mural of the ship's great hall, her body turned so faint with Void that it could scarcely be seen. The Ancestral Dragon King was somewhat better off than she, but not by much. Had Shen Mu not forced his way past the suppression of the dragon might and turned, then he would have remained unobserved and would not have turned to Void; but under Shen Mu's gaze, his body and primal spirit dissolved swiftly into Void, leaving him with barely any strength.

The Ancestral Dragon King fled through the void at once; his speed was tremendous. The next moment he appeared behind Shen Mu — but Li Zheng's and Lord Dragon-Raiser's gazes fell upon him.

"Crafty little devils! I'll let you off!

" The Ancestral Dragon King raced wildly away. The next moment, the Scarlet Bright Divine Son, still battling the two Heavenly Court divines, suddenly shut all three of his heads' eyes; the Ancestral Dragon King's figure appeared behind the silver-whip divine and tore him apart alive!

The Scarlet Bright Divine Son tumbled back; the other Heavenly Court divine immediately fell to the Ancestral Dragon King's venomous hand, smashed to pieces by a single staff blow!

Suddenly all three of the Scarlet Bright Divine Son's heads opened their eyes.

The Ancestral Dragon King had already come before him; under his gaze, this Dragon King's body instantly turned to Void. The Scarlet Bright Divine Son struck ruthlessly. The Void-turning Ancestral Dragon King had lost most of his strength, and within a few moves he was vomiting blood and fleeing in panic.

Unable to catch him, the Scarlet Bright Divine Son called out clearly, "Ancestral Dragon King, struggle no longer. You cannot last beyond the next cycle before you turn to Void.

Were I you, I would hide myself honestly and wait until I had wholly turned to Void and become another form of life, rather than throw my life away. " He turned, looked toward Shen Mu, Li Zheng, and Lord Dragon-Raiser, and strode toward the three of them. Li Zheng gripped the Carefree Sword tightly, his gaze fixed on the other's advancing steps, and said mildly, "Scarlet Bright Divine Son, if you wish to escape the fate of turning to Void, there is no way but to rely on the one Overlord Body in all the ages to solve the riddle of the ghost ship.

If you kill us, you will never return to see your people. " The Scarlet Bright Divine Son halted, his gaze settling on Shen Mu, and said softly, "For Shen Overlord Body's wisdom and talent I have always held deep admiration. But to make me abandon my one chance on the strength of a single phrase about the Overlord Body — that is a little too childish.