Chapter 957 — The Corpse-Walkers of the Great Void

"Corpses of prehistoric Creators?"

Shen Mu looked up. Those towering corpses walked upon the River of Stars as though treading upon water; each footfall sent strange rings of ripples spreading out.

The River of Stars was Wei Suifeng's divine ability; the slightest touch and its power would erupt. Yet these corpses of Creators could walk upon it without ever triggering it. Most strange.

Stranger still: this was a company of corpses walking through the Great Void!

The Great Void is vast beyond measure, and there is little enough in the void. Yet these giant corpses trudged onward on foot, as though they were ascetics, and the walking of the void were a discipline of theirs.

And yet they were only a band of lifeless corpses.

"What is the origin of these corpse-walkers?" Shen Mu asked Yun Chuxiu at his side.

Yun Chuxiu shook her head. "I do not know. Emperor Yunluo discovered them while exploring the Great Void. These corpses take pleasure in wandering the void and provoke no one. Emperor Yunluo found that they have neither soul nor spirit, and had been dead for I know not how many tens of thousands of years. And the wonder of it is this: walk beside them and the heart is all stillness; even the Great Void cannot sway your inner demons. If you should chance upon corpse-walkers, then you may count this journey a safe one."

The corpse-walkers walked upon the River of Stars, and the tower ship followed beneath the river, keeping pace with them. And indeed, with such corpse-walkers there, no inner demon rose and no strange sign appeared.

Suddenly Shen Mu flew out from the tower ship, skirted the River of Stars and came to the surface of the river, to study the corpse-walkers closely.

"Heavenly Venerable Mu, what are you doing?"

Everyone aboard was startled, their scalps crawling. Yun Chuxiu cried aloud: "Those corpse-walkers are our guardian spirits. Do not be reckless!"

Lian Huahun's eyes flickered; softly she said: "Heavenly Venerable Mu is so bold and willful. Better to be rid of him, and then we may be easy. What say you all?"

Luo Wushuang frowned slightly and glanced at the others. Almost everyone aboard the tower ship nodded, in favor of putting Heavenly Venerable Mu to death.

"It seems Heavenly Venerable Mu has not yet seen it: aboard this ship, almost everyone wants him dead."

A sense of absurdity rose in Luo Wushuang's heart. In name, Shen Mu was the head of this expedition, leading them to join Heavenly Venerable Fire and Heavenly Venerable Void. Yet who would have thought that nearly everyone aboard meant to be rid of him!

Even Luo Wushuang himself had a score to settle with Shen Mu: the debt of a severed arm.

"This journey to the Great Void looks to have been arranged for the sole purpose of doing away with the boy Shen Mu, and not for exploring the void at all," Luo Wushuang thought.

Shen Mu turned a deaf ear to the calls from the ship and went on observing the corpse-walkers.

They were indeed prehistoric Creators, each with a Primordial Divine Stone set in the brow, only they had been dead beyond knowing how long. He could feel no blood moving in them, nor any breath at all.

These prehistoric Creators walked on and on in a single direction, and that direction was precisely the one Wei Suifeng's River of Stars divine ability pointed toward.

Shen Mu flew to the side of one corpse-walker and circled the giant's body, trying to learn how these Creators had died.

Strangely, there was not a wound upon these corpse-walkers, and the garments on their bodies were bright and new.

Shen Mu pondered a moment, then his sword core became a flying sword and cut a corner from one corpse-walker's robe. Curiously, the robe grew back at once.

The robe grew because these corpses' consciousness, through the Primordial Divine Stone, created matter.

"Though they are dead, their consciousness is undying; their thoughts remain in the state they held while alive. Even now that they have died, their consciousness still runs on, and should their flesh be damaged, their consciousness repairs it."

Shen Mu worked out the principle of it. But why these corpse-walkers marched unceasingly toward one place, he had no way of knowing.

Shu Jun's voice came to him: "Let me commune with their consciousness and see what they lived through!"

"They have not even a soul or spirit. Can you still commune?" Shen Mu asked in astonishment.

"Naturally. Among we Creators, death is no bar to communion. So long as one's consciousness is strong enough, one may even draw from the void the knowledge of Creators dead through the ages, gathering the wisdom of all."

Shu Jun said: "You petty creatures must study before you can master the knowledge your forebears handed down, whereas a newborn of our Creator race need only touch its brow to an elder's and all knowledge is had. You see how coarse and backward you are."

Shen Mu said doubtfully: "If knowledge is not studied but simply poured in, how do you correct your errors?"

Shu Jun was taken aback. "Correct errors? The knowledge of our forebears contains no error. Why should it need correcting?"

Shen Mu shook his head. To learn with questions in mind, to discover the mistakes of one's forebears: only so can the Way, the arts and the divine abilities advance. But if knowledge is poured in directly, what is poured into a child's mind becomes truth taken for granted, needing no thought.

And so the errors in the knowledge handed down by one's forebears would never be found.

All reform comes from the foundation.

The Jingping Reforms began with the fundamentals, the fundamentals of the sword, of the saber, of the runes, and went on to change the very foundation of the realms, the Divine Treasury; and as for the daily needs of the people, all were fundamentals.

And the smashing of the god within the heart was, above all, a fundamental of the mind.

If all knowledge came by pouring in, how could the foundation ever be changed?

This way of learning among the Creators was faster, but it easily brought the foundational arts and divine abilities to a standstill, until knowledge hardened.

Shen Mu opened the eye in the center of his brow, and at once sensed Shu Jun's consciousness surging out of the Primordial Stone. Shu Jun's consciousness was strong enough to touch the consciousness of these Creators' corpses.

Following Shu Jun's consciousness, a vast world suddenly opened before Shen Mu's eyes: blue seas, high mountains, plunging waterfalls, white clouds; Creators of enormous bulk walking among the great peaks and towering ranges, wading through jade-green oceans.

Some giants envisioned wings for themselves and flew among the blue sky and white clouds.

Some envisioned plants of every hue, and dense forests sprang up without cease, turning from their imagining into reality.

Some of the stronger Creators flew into the starry heavens, and there many Creators gathered to create the sun, the moon and the stars.

This was a new world they had opened; they meant to withdraw from all strife.

Their clothing was plain and simple, without any ornament of splendor, and thus they lived, unfettered and free.

From the consciousness of these corpse-walkers Shen Mu sensed that the world they had come from could no longer sustain them: besides the killings and quarrels among their own clans, mighty ancient gods sought to wipe them out.

They envisioned a new world. This new world held nothing at all and still needed building by their hands before it could be made perfect.

Suddenly a majestic, looming figure descended upon the world they had envisioned. Terrible waves of consciousness swept the void, and the void began to collapse!

The world the Creators had envisioned and created was not yet stable, and with this one's coming, the collapsing world turned to pure consciousness and struck back in reverse, rushing into the Creators' brains!