Chapter 517 — A Detailed Explanation of the Mechanism of Sacrifice
The Herdsman of the Wasteland · Page 1 of 4
After a long day's march, night came again. This time Shen Mu did not trouble to seek out ruins for rest; instead he let the box carry the sleeping dragon-qilin and press on through the night, while he himself walked in the darkness, keeping pace with the box. Once more, in the black of night, he saw many strange and uncanny things: cities that surged into being out of the dark all at once, living beings beyond counting, and battles of vast scale — sights he had never seen when he followed Lizheng into the dark Waste.
And whenever he stepped into the light of the box, the visions in the darkness vanished from sight; the box's divine radiance seemed to carry him back across into the world he had come from. To step into the darkness was to cross over into another world: the dark realm. Strangely, he could feel no world barrier.
That was all but impossible. Between any two worlds there is a world barrier; to pass between two worlds is to be squeezed by the forces of both, and the stronger the traveler, the stronger the pressure.
That there should be no barrier at all between the dark realm and the real world was bizarre indeed.
Shen Mu stepped into the light of the box and sat down upon it, staring blankly, lost in thought.
Then his eyes suddenly brightened and he laughed.
"I know an expert in such matters. Why not call him up and ask him, and then all will be clear? " Eager and full of spirit, he halted the box, jumped down from it, and took a white-bone altar out of his Taotie pouch.
Upon the altar stood the statue of a demon god with four heads and eight arms.
Shen Mu took out a cinnabar brush and drew various runes upon the demon-god statue; then he roused the talisman treasure with his vital essence and performed the rite, unleashing the divine power of the talisman command that summons ghosts and dispatches gods. A short while later the rite was done, and the demon-god statue did not stir. Suspecting something amiss, Shen Mu performed it a second time; still the statue gave no response.
"Elder Brother Dutian, your little brother summons you here in reverent fear, and offers up flesh and blood, a feast most fine. I beg you, elder brother, to deign to move your august feet hither.
" Shen Mu prayed on: "If elder brother Dutian does not come, then your little brother will pray ten times, a hundred times a day, until elder brother descends. Your little brother bows low in fear and trembling.
.
.
" "Shut up! Who is your elder brother?
" Suddenly one face upon the demon-god statue opened its eyes, and the eyeballs rolled swiftly round in a full circle; only after finding no sign of a trap did a wisp of consciousness descend into it. The other three faces came to life as well.
"I never swore brotherhood with you, so don't go claiming kin at random — we are not close!
Pray a hundred times a day and this old fellow will be pestered to death! Cult Master Shen, what have you called me here for? " Shen Mu let out a breath and smiled. "There is a matter that puzzles me. " He recounted all he had seen and heard in the darkness, then said, "Why do the two worlds overlap? Why, when I passed through, did I meet no world barrier, and suffer no repulsion?
" The puppet demon-god statue rose from the altar, pulled up a piece of white bone, put it in its mouth and chewed it like a stick of sugarcane.
"Here I thought you had summoned me for some new scheme or trick. So it is trifling stuff like this.
" Shen Mu, observing the courtesy owed by a disciple, said, "Might I beg elder brother Dutian to instruct me? " The Dutian Demon King shuddered and said hastily, "Don't be so polite. When you are this polite, I always suspect you mean to make things hard for me!
What you speak of touches on the question of a world's energy.