Chapter 876 — The Sword Leaves a Faint Fragrance — Please Vote

"Besides the Undying Consciousness, there are also his divine abilities in the Dao of the Sword, in Creation, and the like.

" Great Black Heaven went on studying the Sword-Bearer Painting, a bemused smile on his face.

The black sun behind his head had black qi flowing in and out of it, and that black qi was the source of the darkness for ten thousand li in every direction around Great Black Heaven.

"Yet what is strange is this: beings of the divine realm cannot trigger his Undying Consciousness, nor do they sense his attainments in the Dao of the Sword or in Creation. His divine abilities are aimed only at those who wield divine abilities. We cannot sense his Daoist arts at all; we can only look on with the naked eye, and so it is hard to grasp the essence of his abilities. " Great Black Heaven smiled and yet did not smile, and said in praise: "This Jingping Overlord Body does indeed have a trick or two about him.

Smashing his missive is easy; undoing his divine ability is hard. " Within the Great Black Palace, the gods of the various Northern Heavens looked at one another.

Before the Jiangling Academy, Shen Mu had used his sword for a brush and space for paper, and with swift strokes — shua, shua, shua — painted out his sword diagram and made of it a challenge missive.

When Shen Mu painted, it had been easy and free; but now that the sword diagram had come here, it left even them, lofty gods that they were, feeling utterly at a loss.

"Each of you return to your own heavens and select the most outstanding wielders of divine abilities, no matter what their cultivation. " Great Black Heaven closed the challenge missive and said, "Gather these people and send them here.

The one and only condition for being sent to me is this: they must have entered the Dao.

Young ability-wielders who have not entered the Dao — sending them here is sending them to their deaths. " The gods of the Northern Heavens looked at one another again. One god-devil mustered his courage and said, "How hard it is to enter the Dao!

Our Northern Heavens number more than three hundred, each with billions of people, and yet to pick out a single ability-wielder who has entered the Dao — I fear you ask the impossible of us. " Great Black Heaven said blandly, "Why does Jingping have so many ability-wielders who have entered the Dao? " "That.

.

.

" "War!

" Great Black Heaven rose to his feet. The black sun behind his head seemed to send out countless threads to link with the darkness; as he walked, the black qi welling from the great sun was like satin, full of texture, dragging the darkness along behind him so that it moved with the movement of his steps. "Jingping has known eight hundred years of war.

The people who live on that little pellet of land had no choice but to think of every possible way to raise themselves up. Their divine bridges were severed, so they could not ascend to the heavenly palaces, and they could only seek breakthroughs in every other direction. " Great Black Heaven said in a low voice, "And war became the finest crucible to forge their breakthroughs!

The Northern Heavens have been at peace too long, so long that these little fellows loll about drunk with dreams, and not one ability-wielder who has entered the Dao has been seen in ten thousand years. Let them fight, let them kill — like rearing gu: put them in one basin and let them slaughter until only one or two worms remain; the survivor is the most venomous of them all. " The gods of the Northern Heavens shuddered. That ox-headed god-devil said cautiously, "Under the gate of Great Black Heaven there are many powerful disciples. .

.

" Great Black Heaven glanced at him, half-smiling: "You hid it from me and swore the pact of the Little Tubo with that troublemaking Heavenly Master of Wentian Pavilion.

You could not take him down, and now you want me to wipe you clean. Who are the masters of the Northern Heavens — you or I? Get down there and go select honestly. In one month, I want to see the strongest gu worms you have reared!

" The gods departed, each returning to his own heaven.

The Frost Heaven: ice and snow everywhere. In a vast basin, countless divine-ability wielders lurked, hid, and slaughtered one another in that world of snow and ice. The snow had once been lovely to look upon; now plum-blossom stains of blood appeared one after another across the snowy scene.

Snowflakes drifted down through the air and slowly covered the red.

And besides this ice valley there were other ice valleys, likewise with ability-wielders slaughtering one another, and in each valley the ability-wielders all stood at the same cultivation realm. To select the most outstanding of them, the gods of the Frost Heaven gathered tens of thousands together and set them to killing one another like gu worms, all to pick out the strongest, forcing them to enter the Dao amid battles of life and death.

This was only one heaven in the north. In the north of the Yuan World there were more than three hundred heavens, great and small; some had many people, some few, but the smallest had several hundred million and the greatest as many as tens of billions. In the space of a month, the ability-wielders of several hundred heavens suffered grievous losses — yet the results were striking, and many powerful ones were selected out.

Among them were also more than ten who had entered the Dao, of formidable strength.

The gods of the Northern Heavens brought those they had chosen to the Great Black Palace at the appointed time, to seek audience with Great Black Heaven. More than three hundred ability-wielders stood in neat ranks outside the Great Black Palace, every one of them the elite of the elite, brimming with killing intent and fighting spirit, possessed of matchless confidence.

"Those who have not entered the Dao are still too many. " Great Black Heaven did not let them into the palace, but sent out an order: "To let these people look upon the challenge missive of the Jingping Overlord Body would only make us a laughingstock.

Do you mean for the yokels of Jingping to mock me?

Let them go on killing one another, until only those who have entered the Dao remain.

Even if it yields one more who has entered the Dao, that is good. " At the command outside the palace, the three hundred-odd ability-wielders erupted all at once; divine abilities burst forth and lit up the darkness all around!

In every flash of light that tore the darkness, an ability-wielder fell and went down to the Yellow Springs!

A long while later, Great Black Heaven's will came again from within the palace: "Stop! " The surviving ability-wielders halted and looked at the Great Black Palace blazing with lamplight. Now only seventeen remained.

These seventeen were demigods among demigods, their bloodline power incomparably fierce, and every one of them a master who had entered the Dao, with matchless keenness and fighting spirit!

"Great Black Heaven!

" A god-devil bowed and said in ringing tones, "Our three hundred and sixteen Northern Heavens hold billions of ability-wielders, and from them we have chosen seventeen who have entered the Dao!

One selection has left more than a million corpses!

For the sake of reading the challenge missive of the Jingping Overlord Body — is it worth it? More than a million ability-wielders could flatten the kingdom of Jingping several times over!

" "Good-for-nothing ignorance!

" Great Black Heaven's voice came from the palace, icy cold: "I am saving you! Had you not sworn the pact of the Little Tubo with Wentian Pavilion, destroying Jingping would be the work of a finger-snap! You made that pact with him — and now, to say nothing of a million dead, even ten million dead would not suffice, but die they must!