Chapter 295 — Second in All the World
The Herdsman of the Wasteland · Page 4 of 4
After a long while, the crowd gathered around Shen Mu, watching him use primal qi to draw diagrams, sketching in the air the new structure of the great furnace, the mechanical structure for forging and casting, and several three-dimensional diagrams of humanoid mechanical structures. The others hastily took notes, then fetched the needed materials.
The Superintendency Works was a scene of seething activity. The deafening sound of forging rang out. Shen Mu, while forging, explained his forging methods to those beside him, and the Ministry of Works officials nodded continuously.
After a long while, Shen Mu and the others produced the first forging machine—a humanoid mechanical puppet with eight arms, its chest a large pill furnace that could be fed with medicinal stones to drive the puppet. The upper half of the puppet was of molten composite dark gold and dark copper, constantly flowing over its surface. When the composite gold-copper flowed to the hands, it could transform into a great hammer or a steel drill, pincers, and the like, and its strength was immense, capable of exerting a pressure of several hundred thousand catties.
The person operating it beside the pill furnace felt only slight heat, still bearable. Operating from there, one could manipulate the mechanical puppet to forge gold and copper into shape.
The runes and mechanisms employed in this puppet were extremely complex. When Ling Yushu saw that Shan Youxin and the others had recorded thick stacks of books, piled together half a man's height, he could not help but be awed.
He stepped forward and leafed through them, filled with admiration. The books were mostly runes transformed from divine powers. Shen Mu had taken divine powers and dharma arts that could be found anywhere and applied them to forging. The phrase "learning in order to apply it" had been brought to its fullest expression by him!
"This Hierarch deserves the word 'sage.' He is not like the wicked sort such as Fan Xuanshu!"
Ling Yushu's heart was full of emotion. Seeing Shen Mu resting to one side, he walked over and smiled. "Hierarch, if I were to join the Heavenly Sage Sect, what position could you give me?"
Shen Mu looked up, surprised. "Were you not worried that if you joined the Heavenly Sage Sect, the emperor would become wary of you?"
Ling Yushu was somewhat stirred. "He has his Imperial Preceptor of Jingping. I too need my own Imperial Preceptor of Jingping! If I ascend the throne in the future, you shall be my Imperial Preceptor Shen of Jingping!"
Shen Mu rose and shook his head. "Jingping is not my homeland. I am a man of the Wasteland—does Your Highness still remember? I am one of the gods' abandoned people. I cannot be your Imperial Preceptor of Jingping. Do you have the courage to defy the gods' command and make the people of the Wasteland your subjects as well?"
Ling Yushu was struck dumb.
"You are not your father. He dared."
Shen Mu patted his shoulder and walked toward Shan Youxin and the others, saying, "He dared to brave the world's great condemnation and carry out reform. The first time he met me, he no longer regarded me as one of the abandoned. You can only preserve what is. Even now you still think of me as an abandoned person from the Wasteland. Your Highness, if you have the emperor's ambition, then I will be your Imperial Preceptor of Jingping. But—do you?"
Ling Yushu thought of Emperor Yanfeng's words and deeds, and cold sweat broke out on his forehead. He knew he could not do it.
It was not that Ling Yuxiu was unworthy of such a man—it was that he was unworthy of an Imperial Preceptor of Jingping like Shen Mu.
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