Chapter 1206 — Interception at the Ancestral Gate

The many disciples beneath Xiao Heavenly Venerate's gate all felt their eyes light up. A moment before, Human Sovereign Qi Kang had unfurled three heavenly palaces, his momentum like a rainbow — formidable, to be sure — yet Shen Mu had slammed him into the earth with a single palm, and that palm had laid bare the truth of this great hulking brute: strong without, hollow within. Among the disciples of the Heavenly Court's ten Heavenly Venerates, one who had cultivated only a single heavenly palace was reckoned merely mediocre in talent; only with two or three heavenly palaces did one count as having entered the gate, and many disciples possessed three or five, while some had even cultivated more than ten.

For the disciples of the ten Heavenly Venerates, laying hands on Imperial Throne-level arts was no difficulty; the arts of the Imperial Throne that the ten had gathered numbered two or three hundred kinds.

To cultivate the Heavenly Court realm, what mattered was not how many Imperial Throne arts one had, but how many kinds: only thirty-six arts of the Imperial Throne from thirty-six different systems, fused together, mastered through and through, and unified within a single system of cultivation — in theory, that was enough to attain the Heavenly Court realm.

Yet to find thirty-six Imperial Throne arts of thirty-six different systems was far too hard, and to fuse them was harder still.

"I will take one of the soft ones," said a young god, stepping forward with a laugh. "Senior brothers, leave him to me. My skills are nothing much; he is just the right match for me.

" The instant the two crossed hands, Gao Huaitong and the other disciples of Xiao Heavenly Venerate all changed countenance.

A moment before, Human Sovereign Qi Kang had been driven into the earth by a single palm from Shen Mu, which had made men look down on him; but now the fighting strength Qi Kang displayed was terrifying beyond measure — in his clash with that young god he not only failed to fall behind, he held the upper hand by far.

Human Sovereign Qi Kang walked the road of entering the Dao through martial arts, and what he cultivated was boxing: he made his own body a volcano, made his vital essence and primal qi its fire, opening wide and closing wide.

Later he was reborn through transmigration, and Shen Mu sent the Martial Combat Heavenly Art of Zhuo Cha, Heavenly Master of Martial Combat, to the various academies and schools — the Human Sovereign Hall received a copy too — and with the First Ancestor Human Sovereign opening the treasure vault of arts in the Yuming Palace, a vault that held the myriad arts and divine powers of the Kaihuang era, Human Sovereign Qi Kang and the others advanced by leaps and bounds. Qi Kang pressed on along his own road of entering the Dao through martial arts. His gifts had always been high — after all, the inheritance of the Human Sovereign Hall passed to one man alone in each generation, so nearly every Human Sovereign was the man of highest aptitude and talent of his day.

He had been the Village Head's teacher, the Village Head's guide; his talent too was exceedingly high, and on the road of entering the Dao through martial arts he had gone further even than Shen Mu. His boxing's explosive power was especially dreadful: he drove that young god back step by step and shook his primordial spirit to pieces.

Seeing how ill things went, Gao Huaitong decided at once and said in a low voice, "Junior brother, you have already lost. Step down. " Suddenly a great crash rang out, and the young god was shaken until blood spurted from all seven apertures; he dropped to his knees with a thud.

Human Sovereign Qi Kang drew back his fist and laughed with a heh-heh: "I win. Old man, you are next — don't go losing face for me!

" Human Sovereign Yishan cursed him roundly and came forward, swearing as he walked: "I am your master, for goodness' sake — what do you mean, losing face for you?

" He was short and stubby, and though he was Qi Kang's master, the road he walked was utterly different from Qi Kang's: he had entered the Dao through divine powers.

Yishan stepped up before the array, yet did not challenge Xiao Heavenly Venerate's disciples at once; he looked at Shen Mu instead, cast him a glance of arrogant contempt, and said with a cold laugh, "Beating these Heavenly Venerate disciples is no fun.

If I am to fight, I fight the strongest.

Come down —" Shen Mu said apologetically to Gao Huaitong, "My elders are lacking in discipline.

Let me go teach him a lesson first.

Friends, kindly wait a moment.

" Gao Huaitong and the others wore strange expressions: "Have they come to blockade our gate, or to beat their own old men? " Then they heard Shen Mu's furious shout: "Old man, you are awful cocky, aren't you?

Three days without a beating and you tear the roof off to climb on it!

How about you old fellows all come at me together — I will settle you nice and obedient first!

" Gao Huaitong and the rest looked at one another. Over there, Shen Mu's hand rose and fell, and a single move — the Great Luotian Gathering into Perfection — nearly flattened Human Sovereign Yishan into a sheet of no thickness at all hanging in the sky, and only then was Human Sovereign Yishan convinced.

"This short fat man looks awfully weak.

. .

" Looking at the dust-covered, ashen-faced Human Sovereign Yishan, the same thought rose in everyone's mind at once: "Can they be playing a two-man act?

This short fat one deliberately loses a move to Mu Heavenly Venerate so that we look down on him, and then he strikes with all his strength when we least expect it and defeats us? " But in this they misjudged Shen Mu and the various Human Sovereigns. Whether Yishan or Qi Kang, when facing Shen Mu both had used their full strength; it was not that they feigned weakness before the enemy, but that Shen Mu's strength was so dreadful that they still lost in a single move.

And as for challenging Shen Mu before fighting Xiao Heavenly Venerate's disciples, that had to do with the rules of the Human Sovereign Hall.

By the rules of the Human Sovereign Hall, a disciple did not learn his master's arts; he must strive to walk a road different from his master's, and the disciple must be stronger than the master. Hence masters cheating disciples, and disciples beating masters, happened often.

The Human Sovereign Hall had also formed a peculiar tradition: affection skips a generation.

Master and disciple would start fighting the moment they met, yet toward grandmaster and great-grandmaster they were most affectionate. By Shen Mu's generation the rules had changed again: Shen Mu had beaten his way from Qi Kang all the way down to the First Ancestor Human Sovereign, and the Human Sovereigns naturally were not reconciled; whenever they found the chance they wanted to teach this fellow a lesson, yet every time it was he who taught them.

Each Human Sovereign who stepped up to challenge either won or lost; the winners celebrated, and the others mocked the losers roundly. Yet every one of them, before he challenged, must first call Shen Mu out and take a beating from him, and only then, elated, go challenge Xiao Heavenly Venerate's disciples.

Xiao Heavenly Venerate's disciples looked at one another, unable to tell whether these men had come to blockade the gate or to be beaten by Shen Mu. Yet the disciples of Xiao Heavenly Venerate saw, too, the strength and strangeness of these Human Sovereigns.

The Human Sovereigns had cultivated few heavenly palaces, and by rights should not compare with them; yet whether in the surging abundance of their vital essence or in the subtlety of their divine powers, these Human Sovereigns were in no way inferior to them — even stronger! Such were the benefits brought by the Jingping Reforms.