Chapter 291 — The Heavens Above
The Herdsman of the Wasteland · Page 1 of 4
The azure face in the sky was immense, seeming to be made of smoke, light and faint, yet as it hung down from the heavens it gradually grew distinct. Fine cold sweat broke out on the Shaman Lord's forehead, and he bowed his head lower still, not daring to raise his eyes to look.
"Heaven Above.
.
.
" A distant, ethereal voice came from the air: "I know. " The Shaman Lord stood bent where he was, motionless.
The golden summit of this divine mountain was bitterly cold, yet the beads of sweat on his brow began to fall, drop by drop.
After a good while he stealthily lifted his eyes and looked up, and saw a blue sky washed clean; the face had vanished at some unknowable hour.
The Shaman Lord let out a breath, then fled down the mountain in frantic haste, putting that place far behind him.
A long while later, the radiance on the golden summit drifted thin and dim, rippling like water. When the radiance stilled, two golden-eyed suanni came driving out of it, drawing a jeweled carriage.
At the carriage's center rose a canopy, from which hung a curtain strung of jewels and precious beads; atop the canopy was a three-tiered golden roof, round and squat, each tier smaller than the one below. Four golden pillars, each the thickness of a forearm and seven chi in height, upheld the canopy, and beside every pillar stood a beautiful young girl, a ring of primal qi behind her head, sashes and ribbons streaming, each clad in a different color - green, red, yellow, white.
The girl in green bore a jade vase on her palm; the girl in red cradled a seven-stringed qin; the girl in yellow held a sword in both hands; the girl in white embraced a pipa. And beneath the canopy, glimpsed through the strings of jewels, a man in purple robes sat bolt upright, of uncommon bearing. The two suanni were wreathed in flowing light, their feet treading auspicious clouds, and they hauled the jeweled carriage with the speed of wind and lightning toward the Middle Land. This carriage was not so cautious as the Shaman Lord: he had shunned the vast Desolate Ruins, whereas this carriage drove straight in, tracing a streak of flowing light across the sky as it raced for the Kingdom of Jingping - those within the carriage seemed utterly indifferent to the perils of the ruins.
Night fell, darkness shrouding the Desolate Ruins, and the two suanni gave off sky-flooding flames that blazed bright even in the dark as they drew the carriage through.
In the darkness surges of demonic qi churned, suddenly taking shape as a black-sunken palm that rushed at the light cast by the carriage and the suanni; wherever it passed, light was devoured, leaving only darkness.
By the time that black palm reached the carriage, no light could be given off at all - and just then the beaded curtain stirred, the girl in red plucked her strings, and the qin rang twice, ding and dong. At the sound, the black palm hesitated a moment, then drew back. "Heaven Above?
" came a hoarse voice from the darkness. The girl in red nodded.
"Star Lord Qiao of Heaven Above. " The demon in the dark withdrew and vanished without a trace, and thereafter nothing monstrous in that darkness troubled the carriage again.
Perilous beyond measure as the Desolate Ruins appeared by dark, at night it was in fact rather clamorous; all manner of dreadful things stirred in the night, and all manner of eerie happenings came to pass again and again. The carriage drove east, neither hurried nor slow, and beneath the canopy Star Lord Qiao looked upon the ruins as they now were and shook his head.
"The remnants are not yet cleansed; the poisoned dregs still linger.
" The carriage flew through the sky, cleaving the darkness, and from the dark ruins below, one looking up seemed to see a star moving neither swift nor slow.