Chapter 1058 — The Deep Recesses of the Peach Grove

Inside the hall, the Celestial Venerable Moon remained behind the screen, showing no sign of herself, and spoke through it: "How do you know that I can keep watch on every stir in the great heavens of the Primal Realm? I am a cripple now, my heart as dead as ashes; even if I had the ability, I would have no energy left to keep watch over the myriad heavens and the Primal Realm. " Shen Mu looked at the shadow upon the screen and gave a grunt of "Oh? ": "Truly?

" The woman behind the screen sighed: "False, of course.

When you went to the Heavenly Court, I asked the Southern Emperor, the Vermilion Bird, to carry my peach blossoms there and make my position clear. The Southern Emperor meant to use death to slip free this time, and he told me as much; naturally I could not truly have gone into seclusion and turned my back on the world. " Shen Mu said: "If the Celestial Venerable truly turned her back on the world, then your peach grove would not link the tens of thousands of heavens of the Primal Realm. " "Indeed.

My divine power is the art of space. I had already laid my plans long before the Celestial Venerable Yun fell in battle; in those days my power was not yet great, my art of space had not reached its summit, and it could link only a dozen or so heavens.

" The Celestial Venerable Moon behind the screen said: "But by the end of the Longhan era, my peach grove linked more than a hundred heavens, and by the end of the Shanghuang era, the peach grove had joined the tens of thousands of heavens of the Primal Realm into one. Cripple though I am, by now the Heavenly Court, Xuandu and Youdu, even the Four Pole Heavens, all lie within the perception of my divine power. What I have never broken through are the forbidden zones formed at the birthplace of the ancient gods, and Guixu.

" Shen Mu said: "You are unwilling to accept it. " "Of course I am unwilling. " The Celestial Venerable Moon's voice was very calm, yet hidden beneath that calm surface was a profound unwillingness: "The Five Elders of the Heavenly Alliance aimed to win the human race the right to survive, to let the people live better lives. Yet the Heavenly Alliance has rotted; the founding purpose of the Alliance is long gone; the Alliance has become a place that shelters filth and harbors corruption, a place where demigods and ancient gods and even the Creators carve up their interests! Of course I am unwilling. " Shen Mu watched the shadow on the screen in silence, and the Celestial Venerable Moon went on: "When the Heavenly Alliance was first founded, the Celestial Venerable Yun laid down its first principle: one must not be too good to the wicked, nor too harsh to the good.

Yet how hard it is to put into practice.

People are always too harsh upon the good, holding that a good man must never make the slightest mistake; once he errs he is no longer good, he is beyond salvation, he must be struck down and trampled underfoot.

And people are too good to the wicked: let a wicked man do a thousand evil deeds, so long as he does one good deed he will be praised, all but lauded as a sage! Celestial Venerable Mu, we failed to achieve it. Can you? " Shen Mu mused, then said: "It is very hard. But I am trying.

There was once a man, steeped in wickedness, who, to resist Jingping, did not scruple to release poison upon the grasslands and killed ninety percent of the people there; later, amid the tribulation of Jingping, his conscience stirred and he died saving others. Though I had the power to revive him, or to summon up his soul, I did not revive him, for I felt that if I did, I would have no face to meet the people of the grasslands who perished there. " "Then how will you face the ancient gods? " asked the Celestial Venerable Moon. Shen Mu's heart and spirit were shaken to the core. The Celestial Venerable Moon's words truly struck at his soul. The wicked man he had spoken of was the Great Venerable, who had used witchcraft poison to kill the vast majority of the herders on the grasslands, a crime beyond pardon; even if he had done one good deed, Shen Mu could not on that account forget his ruthlessness. But what of the ancient gods?

In the Longhan era, and even in the dark ages before it, the ancient gods fed upon the living creatures born after heaven and made offerings of all beings; now Shen Mu needed their strength, needed to join hands with them against the Heavenly Court, and so it could be said the ancient gods were doing a good deed. Could the ancient gods be pardoned on that account? Be not too harsh upon the good, be not too good to the wicked. How simple the saying, and yet how hard this simple principle proves to carry out! "Sympathy is immeasurably cheap, yet a heart of harsh censure is shameful too.

" The Celestial Venerable Moon's voice came from behind the screen: "I have already found the three people you spoke of.

They are in Yuhua Heaven, and they mean to rob the lair of Meng Yungui, the Second Heavenly Master among the Heavenly Court's Four Heavenly Masters.

I will bring them here.

" The Primal Realm, Yuhua Heaven. This heaven was the ancestral land of Heavenly Master Meng. He had risen from Yuhua Heaven and soared in fortune all the way to becoming the Heavenly Court's Second Heavenly Master, one of the rare Emperor-Seat powerhouses under heaven.

Once he had gained power, Heavenly Master Meng began to build up Yuhua Heaven, plundering wealth from the other heavens and sending it there.

This Heavenly Master had no other pastime, only a love of wealth, and so Yuhua Heaven was exceedingly rich; some even said his riches surpassed those of the Ten Celestial Venerables. Yet this Heavenly Master was a master of formations, the foremost formation expert in the Heavenly Court, and all his wealth was guarded by killing formations of every kind, exceedingly well fortified. At this moment, the Lame Elder and Old Master Huo had already slipped into Heavenly Master Meng's treasure vault, and with them was an honest, simple-faced youth: Lan Yutian.

The Lame Elder had always preferred to go his own way, but ever since Granny Zhu picked Shen Mu up by the river, he had taken a liking to the work of minding children.

Granny Zhu, vexed that little Shen Mu wet the bed, would give him away to others, and every time it was the Lame Elder who stole little Shen Mu back. Later, when he came out into the world again, the Blind Old Man, the Silent Craftsman, the Pill Master and the rest all had countless matters to see to, and no one kept him company; Shen Mu did not often come back either, and running about by himself, robbing tombs and dropping in on other heavens, was dull work.

Then one day it came to the Lame Elder that Shen Mu had a younger brother, Lan Yutian, and so he ran to Youdu and stole Lan Yutian out of it.

It happened that Old Master Huo had resigned his post as the Tathagata and left Mount Sumeru, so the Lame Elder asked this one-time divine constable to instruct him in his craft, calling it, for fair appearance's sake, advancing together. Old Master Huo could not bring himself to refuse, and he also feared for the safety of the Lame Elder and Lan Yutian, so he had no choice but to follow them and clean up after them. "Heavenly Master Meng's formations are indeed formidable.

His formations are not merely killing arrays; they also leave traces of those who intrude.

Take this formation: these mirror surfaces are for capturing images, and anyone who breaks in will be recorded by them. " Old Master Huo looked about him, his gaze coming to rest on the books within the formation: "That scroll is like a Book of Life and Death, one body with the mirrors.

Once an image is taken, the scroll will use it to discover the thief's identity. Tucked into the book is an echo bug that mimics the thief's voice. . .

And the jade box over there holds no treasure, it is a trap. .

. " The Lame Elder was full of admiration.