Chapter 1434 — The Age of Great Strife Approaches

"How strange. Even the Creator knows nothing of a place called the Land of Taiji, and all that can be found is a false Taiji mining ground. How did Her Majesty the Empress ever find her way here?"

Doubt gnawed at Shen Mu. The ancient gods of the Land of Taiji were exceedingly strange — a pair of twin ancient gods. Every other divine egg had been dug out; only these two had escaped the purge.

And these two ancient gods were exceedingly clever. Back when Shen Mu had found this place by way of Taisu, he had displayed such extraordinary mastery of divine arts that the mining ground could do nothing to him, so the two ancient gods had come straight to terms with him, giving him a hundred Taiji divine stones and a single Taiji primal stone, and telling him the whereabouts of the Great Black Wood.

For the Empress to have found this place, she could not possibly have managed it without the guidance of an ancient god. Only an egg-born ancient god could find the Land of Taiji.

Then who had guided her — the Goddess Taisu, or Xiao Heavenly Venerable?

"Taisu is helping Hao Heavenly Venerable; she would never turn around and guide the Empress. Xiao Heavenly Venerable and the Empress are sworn enemies; even if Xiao were willing to guide her, the Empress might not be willing to come to this place. Taishi is with me, and Taiyi would never show himself to meddle in worldly affairs. Then the only one who could have guided the Empress here is..."

Shen Mu's face turned strange. "Only the Taiji ancient gods themselves. Taisu found Hao Heavenly Venerable to be her helper in contending for the world and seizing back the Taisu lode, to help her attain the Dao. The Taiji ancient gods' lode is still whole, and the reason they would court Her Majesty the Empress is most likely that they too wish to find a helper among the Ten Heavenly Venerables — a helper to contend for the world. These two ancient gods are not so detached, not so indifferent, as they claimed."

He quickly reached his judgment: "The one making trouble is not Lady Yuanmu, but the Taiji ancient gods! These two must have seen the Ten Heavenly Venerables throw the Ancestral Court open, and known that their lode could hardly be preserved — that at any moment it might be discovered. So they prepared early. They mean to enter the world."

At that moment, Lady Yuanmu's divine artifact Yutianzun was watching Jue Wuchen; Qiang Heavenly Consort was watching her; and Shen Mu was watching all three of them at once.

Jue Wuchen seemed oblivious, and went on toward the Taiji lode. Gradually Shen Mu sensed something amiss, and hastily looked around.

"The path Jue Wuchen is walking is not the one that leads to the heart of the Taiji lode. Walking as she does, she will only stray from the mining ground, never enter the true one... Yes — the Taiji ancient gods sensed that someone was following her, and made a false mining ground!"

Shen Mu understood at once: "These two ancient gods are masters of forgery above all! And Her Majesty the Empress has more than Jue Wuchen's body to employ — she has her true body as well!"

He stopped trailing Qiang Heavenly Consort, Jue Wuchen, and the divine artifact Yutianzun, withdrew without a sound, and went straight for the true mining ground.

The Taiji mining ground was familiar ground to him. The last time he came here, he had needed the Taisu divine egg to stir the power of the Glazed Azure Heaven Banner before he could pass through the incomparably perilous Taiji star domain. This time, he had mastered the four great daos of Taichu, Taishi, Taisu, and Taiji, and going deep into the Taiji star domain held not the slightest danger.

Shen Mu followed the mining ground the whole way, and after a long while he suddenly turned his head — he had long since left the continent of the Ancestral Court and come into a vast starry sky.

He turned back, and before him was still the great desert, still the Ancestral Court.

Such was the strangeness of the Taiji star domain.

"These two ancient gods have vast powers, and the Tai Emperor and Lady Yuanmu are old hands of the Ancestral Court as well. But if they want to find the Taiji mining ground, I fear they too will have a great deal of trouble. And with Jue Wuchen leading them to another false mining ground made by the Taiji ancient gods, I doubt they will ever see that it is false."

Shen Mu shook his head. Just then, he saw Her Majesty the Empress.

As he had expected, the Empress was now driving her own true body, striding through the black-sand desert. The flying black sand was countless stars; the wind blew with savage force, and the black sand danced in the air, dense beyond measure, denser than a rainstorm.

These grains of dust were stars. When the gale rolled up the black sand and hurled it, it struck a person with the weight of countless stars falling upon them. To withstand it by one's own strength alone made the crossing of this desert all but impossible.

Shen Mu's form turned insubstantial, becoming the Taishi state — possessed of shape but not of substance — and let the black sand come at him, crash against him, pass through his body without injuring him in the least.

Strangely enough, perilous as the black-sand desert was, the road the Empress walked was utterly calm. On either side the black wind howled and the black sand whirled, but before her lay open ground.

"Truly, the Taiji ancient gods are guiding her," Shen Mu thought.

He examined his surroundings carefully. The Taiji ancient gods had probably not discovered him; the black sand that passed through his body was no denser than elsewhere, and was not aimed at him.

Had they discovered him, the two ancient gods ought to have been able to work further changes in the Taiji star domain to target him. They could not have killed him, but they could have kept him from finding the mining ground.

At last the Empress came to the center of the Taiji star domain, where a mountain range like a dragon's veins ran through the whole domain, dividing it in two.

— To Shen Mu, this was a star domain; to her, it was only a stretch of desert.

What her eyes saw was desert.

The Empress climbed the mountain range, and saw peak after peak move of themselves ahead of her. Some peaks abruptly turned from lifeless stone into colossal beasts of flesh and blood, rising of their own accord to make way for her; some valleys heaved upward of themselves into level roads.

"Those two ancient gods still play favorites. When I came here last, they obstructed and blocked me at every turn; but when the Empress comes, they fawn and grovel shamelessly."

Shen Mu could not help shaking his head, and followed the Empress into the mining ground.

The Empress walked on and entered the mining ground, looking all around. The matter of the mining ground shifted in ways beyond reckoning, and even she could not help marveling.

Though she too was an ancient god, she did not possess the Taiji ancient gods' kind of power. As one of the goddesses of Guixu, mother and Empress of all under heaven, she was nonetheless deeply envious of the Taiji ancient gods' abilities.

At last she came to the center of the Taiji mining ground, where a natural Eight Trigrams altar stood, seven Taiji primal stones guarding a single ancient god egg, giving off a tranquil radiance of the Dao, in harmony with the mining ground, exceedingly serene.

The Empress bowed once to the ancient god egg on the altar, then gracefully took a seat, saying, "Brother Dao, your place here is indeed quiet, free of disturbance. Might I ask why you summoned me?"

The Dao-sound in the egg rippled and became a voice, now male, now female, and it laughed: "I asked little sister to come so that we might scheme great matters together."

The Empress smiled faintly, and did not take up his words at once. She looked around and said, "Brother Dao, quiet as this place is, it seems someone has been here before — even your primal stones are one short."