Chapter 285 — The Temple of the Gods
The Herdsman of the Wasteland · Page 1 of 4
At that, Si Yunxiang herself fell into a daze. "Could this place once have been land?" she murmured. "No, that cannot be. There is no record in the history of our Holy Cult of any geographical change so absurd..."
The Nether Demon Cult had existed in this world for twenty thousand years, which counted as an exceedingly long span; yet through all those twenty thousand years the Eastern Sea had remained the Eastern Sea, and never once had there been any claim that it had formerly been dry land.
As for the history of the Kingdom of Jingping, it was far shorter still, and even less could it know when the Eastern Sea had undergone its changes.
"This stretch of sea is extremely deep. Even divine-power wielders of the Six Harmonies realm like us can scarcely endure it when we swim this far. I fear it must be at least a thousand zhang deep."
Shen Mu came to the side of that great cauldron, extended a single finger, and sent out a thread of yuan qi that rose straight upward. After a moment he withdrew his yuan qi and said gravely, "Deeper than I expected. One thousand six hundred and fifty-two zhang. Since he is a mountain god, there must be a mountain; this temple must have been built upon Mount Qu. A mountain worthy of enshrining a god must be a thousand zhang at the least..."
Si Yunxiang and Ling Yuxiu understood his meaning at once: the place where the temple of Mount Qu stood must have been Mount Qu itself, and all around it must have lain a vast expanse of land.
Then the cataclysm had come, and the land had become the sea!
And the land where Mount Qu stood had surely sunk two or three thousand zhang to the bottom of the sea!
Just imagine it: if the whole Kingdom of Jingping were suddenly struck by an earthquake, sank three thousand zhang, and was drowned beneath a deluge of water, what would that look like?
And the continent where the temple of Mount Qu stood must have met with exactly such a horrifying fate.
Shen Mu looked around. Judging by this absurdly large cauldron, the master of this place had been refining pills when the cataclysm struck, and he had not even had time to collect the spirit pills within the cauldron.
Shen Mu peered into the cauldron and saw that there were still some broken fragments of metal inside, surely the remains of shattered weapons.
He jumped back into the cauldron to examine it. The weapons within were shattered beyond recovery, and he found nothing of use; but the patterns on the cauldron's walls caught his attention. These patterns were runes, yet unlike any runes he had seen before, possessed of a strange and alien beauty.
"This cauldron is not a thing of this age. It resembles the runes in the ruins of the Wasteland, though there are differences as well."
He examined it a while longer, then leaped out again.
Shen Mu dried the water from his body and strode forward first, saying, "Long Jiaonan has taken every yuan weapon we carried. Without proper weapons, I fear we may meet danger. Everyone, be careful."
Ling Yuxiu and Si Yunxiang followed him. Ling Yuxiu said, "The Six-Universes Divine Treasury gestates yuan weapons, and they fit the hand better than anyone else's. If we can forge Six Harmonies yuan weapons, we should be able to protect ourselves."
Shen Mu was slightly taken aback. "How does one gestate a yuan weapon?" he asked.
He had once heard Qi Xia'er, that great demon, speak of this matter. Qi Xia'er had said that yuan weapons were treasures gestated by the Six-Universes Divine Treasury, but he had never understood how a divine treasury could gestate a yuan weapon.
He still knew far too little about the Six Harmonies realm.
Si Yunxiang said in surprise, "Cult Leader, you do not even know this? The Abbess Hongfa of the Six Harmonies Hall lectured on how the Six-Universes Divine Treasury gestates yuan weapons."
Shen Mu shook his head. "I have been to the Six Harmonies Hall only once, and I had scarcely arrived before I was driven out to stand in the corner with you."