Chapter 236 — The Land Without Sorrow
The Herdsman of the Wasteland · Page 1 of 4
Daoist Lingjing's face changed drastically, and he retreated again and again; the Demon King Dutian and the Dragon Qilin, driven back by Shen Mu's aura, kept falling away — a thousand zhang distant from Shen Mu and still unable to steady themselves. And beneath Shen Mu's feet, the Moon Guardian's face had been trampled by his soles until it sank utterly into the Soul Boat.
He had been clinging to a last breath; now he was stamped down until he fused wholly with the Soul Boat, becoming part of it — body dead, Dao extinguished.
The old Moon Guardian was dead.
Daoist Lingjing was shaken, though the old Moon Guardian's fate weighed nothing on his mind — the man had always been a madman.
What held his attention was this: flesh and blood were growing over Shen Mu's body, breaking through the fetters of the Realm of the Dead!
Once one entered the Realm of the Dead, even a being such as himself was left with nothing but bare bones, not a scrap of flesh remaining.
When Shen Mu had entered the Realm of the Dead with him, he too had been reduced to a skeleton, and so had the Dragon Qilin; only the Demon King Dutian, no creature of flesh and blood, had remained unchanged.
And now Shen Mu had not only regained his flesh — his form was growing larger and larger, like a living god of heaven, divine light wreathing his body, his aura beyond compare! He had now replaced that last of the Moon Shepherds, the Moon Guardian, and become the new Moon Guardian.
The power he commanded was too great; it broke through the limits of the Realm of the Dead, so that even the laws of that realm could not constrain him!
This was all but impossible.
Daoist Lingjing had come to this Soul Boat many times, had examined everything here over and over, had touched these giant pillars more times than he could count — and never had any change so terrifying as Shen Mu's occurred.
He believed that only certain extraordinary Moon Shepherds possessed such an ability, and only those among them of a rather special constitution.
The human body is a great crucible; an ordinary Moon Shepherd could never contain the Soul Boat's dreadful energy. Only a special constitution among the Moon Shepherds could possibly receive energy so vast.
The Moon Shepherds ought to have been extinct, leaving only the one old man aboard this ship — and he too had sunk into the Soul Boat, his survival uncertain from one moment to the next.
Shen Mu commanded the Soul Boat and the power within it. Could it be that he was a Moon Shepherd — and one of that special constitution?
And yet Shen Mu was no Moon Shepherd.
To grip the giant pillar was a perilous act for anyone else, Moon Shepherds included; yet he did it with perfect ease, as though his body could naturally bear this power, naturally yield to it and let it remake his flesh and his soul.
"What tremendous power!
" Shen Mu was astonished and delighted. The power within him had reached an inconceivable height; the strength he had once possessed was, before this power, a single drop in a vast ocean — utterly insignificant! It was as though he could remake heaven and earth with a lift of his hand — alter the laws of heaven and earth, command the laws of heaven and earth!
Shen Mu was draped in halos of moonlight; ring upon ring of lunar radiance flowed down from the crown of his head like water, down to the soles of his feet, and there vanished into the Soul Boat.
The tops of his feet had already begun to sink into the Soul Boat; his soles had fused with it. This was the Soul Boat's backlash.
Shen Mu had once seen such a backlash upon the Sun Guardian of the Dawn Boat.
The Sun Guardian was Yan Jingjing, a Sun Shepherd. When the sun of the Dawn Boat was extinguished and Yan Jingjing took command of the Dawn Boat, gaining its vast power, she also had to bear its backlash, burning up her own life — the longer she steered the Dawn Boat, the faster she died.