Chapter 450 — Of Uncommon Appearance
The Herdsman of the Wasteland · Page 2 of 4
" Shen Mu nodded. The woman stepped out of the flower, joined behind by the flower's stamens, and said with a smile, "Young Master, my mistress bids you come.
Please follow me.
" "Someone here knows me? " Shen Mu was startled; he jumped down from the Dragon Qilin's back and said, "Please, miss, lead the way.
" The woman too came down to the ground and led him to the gate of a great mansion.
The place was like a manor, very grand, and the two stone lions at the gate stood up and turned their heads to glance at Shen Mu and the Dragon Qilin, then crouched back down upon their stone pedestals.
Shen Mu followed the woman from the flower into the manor, where a great many youths and maidens came and went in a bustling throng, noisy enough, though most of them were wrought from flowers and grasses and trees and jade, and some from dark gold and dark copper.
"This manor is not in the style of the Western Lands — it is more like the style of Jingping. .
.
Wait.
These dark gold, dark copper.
.
. " Shen Mu started slightly, his gaze falling upon a great cauldron that was walking about; the cauldron held food, and it ran up onto the head of a man of fire and cooked the food itself.
"This great cauldron is a primal soldier! Primal soldiers can take spirit-form as well?
" A sudden clarity opened in Shen Mu's mind, and he could not help slowing his steps, staring blankly, lost in thought.
He had perceived another path of transformation! That was to carry the notion that all things possess spirit, all things possess divinity, into Jingping, and set off another wave of transformation!
If the primal soldiers of Jingping's adepts could also possess spirit, every man's strength would rise greatly!
Not only that: the union of the two systems would give birth to yet more arts and divine powers, more varied still!
Formerly, the "primal soldiers" spoken of by the adepts of Jingping were no true primal soldiers at all, but merely bred out of the spirit storehouse; yet if one took in the ideas of the Western Lands, one could make primal soldiers in the truest sense!
"Jingping's arts put their weight on destructive power, and its wonders and marvels are strange and varied; the arts of the Western Lands are somewhat inferior in attack, and lacking in means of attack as well — but this way of all things possessing spirit can make primal soldiers into true primal soldiers!
The two systems can complement each other!
The difficulty now is how to fuse the Western Lands' art of all things possessing spirit with the cultivation methods of Jingping, so that Jingping's adepts may sense the spirit and awaken the spirit within their primal soldiers.
" He bent his mind to reckoning how the all-things-possessing-spirit might be fused with Jingping's system of cultivation, when of a sudden he heard a voice laugh aloud and say, "The Hierarch Shen of Jingping has come from afar, and I did not go out to welcome him; I beg you will forgive me! " "A man!
" Shen Mu was rather puzzled. This Fangxiu City was plainly a most prosperous city of the Western Lands, and by rights women should hold sway here; how was it that a man occupied high station? He looked toward the voice, and saw a youth of handsome countenance leading a crowd to welcome him. The youth gave him a vaguely familiar feeling, as though he had seen him somewhere, though in truth he never had. The Dragon Qilin stirred abruptly and said in a low voice, "Hierarch, look — does he not resemble the Patriarch somewhat?
" Shen Mu was taken aback, and indeed found a certain likeness, and could not help feeling a touch of goodwill toward him; he made his salute and said, "Shen Mu, Hierarch of the Heaven-Sacred Sect, pays his respects to the master of this place. " The youth returned the salute, and his forms of courtesy were those of Jingping, as he said, "Hierarch Shen, Ge Ke is at your service.