Chapter 946 — Gazing Into That Abyss

The Dao is a toad.

That one sentence sums up the Dao Ancestor's heart in seeking the Dao.

In the past, when the Dao Ancestor sought the Dao, he gave no thought to the world outside; he could not even manage his own food and clothing, his home and his travels, and had to rely on the Great Brahma Heaven King Buddha for relief. In those years, when Shen Mu returned to the early Longhan era and saw the two of them, it was the Great Brahma Heaven King Buddha who went begging alms and gathered spirit elixirs to keep the two alive.

And the Dao Ancestor then was drunk on the Dao, asking nothing of right and wrong, of truth and falsehood.

The Dao is a toad: he took the ancient gods for the Dao, for toads, and used the arts of calculation to unravel the ancient gods. Through a million years of long ages he pushed the classical arts of calculation to their peak, and with those classical arts he unlocked the great Dao of one ancient god after another, turned that great Dao into runes, and helped the Ten Heavenly Venerables construct the Heavenly Court realm.

He no longer needed the Great Brahma Heaven King Buddha to beg alms for him.

Yet what Shen Mu meant by seeking the Dao from the Dao was that he sought the Dao from the ancient gods. The ancient gods are the incarnation of the Dao; he sought the Dao from them, and the ancient gods' Dao had been there all along. Whether he sought it or not, the Dao was there; of it he had created not the slightest bit.

What Shen Mu also said, that one seeks the Dao from people, meant that people are creative. Before people there was no sword Dao, and people created the sword Dao; there was no Dao of calligraphy and painting, and people created the Dao of calligraphy and painting; there was no Primordial Womb Divine Treasury, and people created the Primordial Womb Divine Treasury; there were no cultivation methods, and people created cultivation methods.

Cultivation systems, whether the Divine Treasury or the Heavenly Palace, were all created by people; they reside neither in the ancient gods nor in toads.

All these years the Dao Ancestor had studied the ancient gods and been drunk on scholarship, and yet he could not leap free of his own scholarship; his achievements fell short of the Ten Heavenly Venerables'.

Still, he must have sensed his own limits, which was why he told those two toads to give him a show of face.

It is not that the longer one lives, the wiser and more intelligent one grows. Wit and talent are five parts inborn and five parts cultivated, and what cultivation yields depends upon one's surroundings.

Shen Mu came from Jingping, had lived through the Jingping Reform, was himself the man who led that reform, and had witnessed the course from reforming the law to reforming the Dao, when the great Dao of heaven and earth was changed thereby.

Of his vision he would not presume to say it surpassed the Dao Ancestor's, but in certain respects his views stood above the Dao Ancestor's.

"I hear Lady Yunxiao went to the Jade Pool and met Heavenly Venerable Mu. Then this visit of yours must be for Heavenly Venerable Yun's box."

The Dao Ancestor took out a wooden box and said, "This old Dao has guarded this box for several hundred thousand years; now at last I may set down the burden on my heart."

Shen Mu took the box and asked, "The Dao Ancestor does not know what is inside it either?"

The Dao Ancestor shook his head. "What Heavenly Venerable Yun entrusted to Heavenly Venerable Mu, how could this old Dao presume to open? Heavenly Venerable Yun's relics were in two boxes: one for Heavenly Venerable Mu, one to be given to Heavenly Venerable Shen. The other box, this old Dao has already given to Heavenly Venerable Shen."

"Heavenly Venerable Yun also left a box for Kaihuang? Yet Lady Yunxiao never said a word of this to me."

Shen Mu was astonished, and said, "What was in Heavenly Venerable Shen's box?"

The Dao Ancestor laughed. "When Heavenly Venerable Shen opened it, this old Dao was at his side. It was a geographical map, of a place called the Great Void. This old Dao did not look closely."

"The Great Void?"

Shen Mu's heart stirred faintly. "I have just now visited Heavenly Venerable Huo and Heavenly Venerable Xu, and heard that there has been strange movement in the Great Void; they took their disciples roaming there. What sort of place is the Great Void?"

The Dao Ancestor shook his head. "I do not know. Only the Ten Heavenly Venerables know what the Great Void truly is. I have merely heard that such a place exists; I do not know what is there, nor where it lies. But back then, after Heavenly Venerable Shen obtained the map of the Great Void, the Kaihuang Tribulation broke out, and Heavenly Venerable Shen went to the Land of No Sorrow. There are rumors that the Land of No Sorrow is in the Great Void. The reason the Ten Heavenly Venerables of the Heavenly Court care so much about the Great Void is most likely that they wish to find where Heavenly Venerable Shen has gone."

Shen Mu pondered a moment. The Great Void, the Land of No Sorrow, and that world the Creators had envisioned and made, was there some bond among the three?

On the reliefs of the Blood Rust Zone he had seen the prehistoric Creators gather their incomparably powerful divine consciousness to create another world within the void, hoping thereby to withdraw from this chaotic world and escape the slaughter of the ancient gods.

Then was that world the Creators made the Great Void?

Was the Land of No Sorrow within the Great Void?

And Qin Hanzhen and Princess Zhen had both said that the Land of No Sorrow held deadly peril. What did that mean?

He could not puzzle it out.

Shen Mu opened Heavenly Venerable Yun's box, and could not help but start. Within lay a tiny altar.

The altar was small indeed, only one *cun* and three *fen* long and some two fingers high; set within the box it seemed utterly miniature.

Shen Mu reached out to take the little altar out, yet as his hand entered the box he saw his own hand dwindle smaller and smaller, and still he could not reach the bottom.

"The space within this box is vast, and the altar is not so small as it appears."

Shen Mu examined the box and the altar closely, and suddenly discovered that there was something upon the altar after all, only that thing was truly infinitesimal.

He urged his magic power, and his vital essence transformed into a hand that reached into the space within the box and took that thing from the altar.

Shen Mu drew back his vital essence, and in his hand was a square, upright treasure seal, a little larger than his palm, so that his fingers could close around it.

"This treasure seal is..."

He could not help but feel doubt. The seal was not large, semi-transparent, forged from some unknown substance, and through it one could faintly see the lines of his palm.

But since it was a seal, there were usually words carved beneath, yet this treasure seal was blank; only at its top was there a complex carving of mountains.

He turned it about a while, then handed the seal to the Dao Ancestor: "Dao Ancestor, can you make out what secret this seal holds?"

The Dao Ancestor studied it closely. Suddenly a third eye grew from the center of his brows, blooming with boundless starlight: the divine power of the Heaven Eye.

After a moment, the Heaven Eye on his forehead closed, and another eye grew, bearing the raging demonic fire of Youdu: the Eye of Tubo.

He dispersed the Eye of Tubo as well, and brought forth the holy pupil divine powers of one ancient god after another, yet never could he find the mystery of this treasure seal.

"I cannot see the mystery of this treasure seal."

The Dao Ancestor shook his head and returned the seal to him. "Since Heavenly Venerable Yun was so solemn about it, insisting that the seal be given to you, there must be a deeper meaning."