Chapter 498 — The Late Emperor's Remnant
The Herdsman of the Wasteland · Page 1 of 4
Shen Mu's plan was settled.
He had come a hundred li away, with Chest and Long Qilin following close behind him. A hundred li was far enough; even if the trap's power proved immense, it could hardly threaten them from such a distance.
Shen Mu scooped up a handful of yellow sand and blew it gently from his palm, and where the sand fell it became a tiny figure three inches tall. The little "Dune Giant" opened its mouth and roared, a monstrous thing to behold; the yellow sand spun beneath its feet as the hill-sized giant charged, reeking of murder, toward the cliff a hundred li away.
Long Qilin was beside himself with anticipation. After a while the fat fellow's eagerness ebbed a little, but he still stared fixedly into the distance, and yet at the cliff nothing happened at all.
Shen Mu sprang up onto his head to look far out at the Dune Giant, which had just crested a dune and was laboring on toward the cliff. Long Qilin yawned, rallied himself, and said, "Sect Master, almost there?
" Shen Mu reckoned it over. "Another hour, give or take, and it will be. " Long Qilin clambered down and muttered, "I'll nap a while.
Wake me when it gets there.
" A little under an hour later, Shen Mu kicked the great hulk awake.
Long Qilin scrambled to his feet, excited.
"Is it there? " "Another quarter of an incense stick and it will be!
" Shen Mu laughed.
"Let us get up into the air first.
If anything goes wrong, we can make our escape. " Chest stretched out its legs and climbed onto Long Qilin's back, and Long Qilin hastily trod the fiery clouds and soared aloft. Seen from afar, a hundred li off, a tiny speck could just be made out, its mouth wide in a roar as it hurried toward the stone stele; even Long Qilin, whose eyesight was keen, could scarcely make it out clearly. Shen Mu, though, saw it perfectly.
The little Dune Giant roared and roared for a long while and at last arrived beneath the stele, brimming with menace. Then the little Dune Giant set to digging at the sand with all its might, roaring as it dug.
Shen Mu was speechless.
Long Qilin opened his mouth to speak, then closed it again and waited quietly, thinking, "If I'm tactless enough to bring this up, I likely won't get dinner tomorrow. " After a moment the little Dune Giant had dug out a small pit, and the writing beneath the stele was revealed at last. Before Shen Mu could make out what it said, the sand in the pit suddenly churned without number, and streaks of yellow sand shot skyward like flying rainbows, swallowing the tiny Dune Giant whole!
Nor was the little Dune Giant alone in being swallowed—for tens of li around, the whole expanse became a terrifying field of slaughter. The yellow sand boiled like a great earthen-yellow cauldron overturned upon the desert, and from within that earthen-yellow sphere came the ringing of blades, again and again! Long Qilin's fur and scales stood on end, bristling straight up, and even Shen Mu could not help but shudder with cold dread. This trap was more terrible than he had imagined.
Thank goodness he had always been cautious, and had proposed triggering it a hundred li away. Within that earthen-yellow cauldron, blade-light flew up and down, left and right, cutting, chopping, hewing, slicing, shifting through every manner of change, all but filling every corner of the tens of li around! "This blade art.
.
. " Shen Mu was briefly startled, and a bad feeling came over him.
This blade art—he had seen it before! Not in Jingping, though, but last night—the last night of thirty or forty thousand years ago—in that youth of the Heavenly Court's Lingxiu Army named Luo Wushuang!
The blade art Luo Wushuang had wielded bore a striking resemblance to the blade-light in that field of slaughter!
"The one-armed youth is still alive?
The Great Venerable said the boy would not live long and told me not to worry. .
.
" Shen Mu laughed, but the laugh stiffened on his face, and before long his expression had gone ashen.