Chapter 642 — A Youth's Disdain
The Herdsman of the Wasteland · Page 2 of 4
He would rely on his own true strength to crush this deserter of the Kaihuang era, to defeat this man who had destroyed the life's work of every generation of Human Emperors, to trample this bastard who despised the arts of all the Human Emperors, to break his every glory and stamp on his dignity! His sword light was sharp beyond compare; a flick of the wrist brought Sovereign's Tribulation, a vast tribulation aura joining heaven and earth, splitting the sky open and cleaving the earth apart! This was Lizheng's sword art. Lizheng was the Human Emperor of the previous generation, and in swordsmanship his attainment exceeded that of the Human Emperors by far.
In Fengdu, Lizheng was beaten, yet not one Human Emperor dueled him one on one; they all rushed him at once.
It was precisely because in his old age Lizheng had caught the era of reform, and his sword art advanced another step: one on one, among all the Human Emperors, none but the First Ancestor was his match.
In Shen Mu's hands, the move Sovereign's Tribulation had been fused with the Eighteen Sword Forms, the eighteen foundational sword moves. Compared with Lizheng's sword art he could not yet make it flawless, but the power of the sword art in his hands was greater! His mana was boundless and mighty; to say nothing of divine-ability users of the same realm, even among great experts of the Heaven-Human realm, those whose cultivation exceeded his were few!
Shen Mu's mana erupted; his sword light cut straight through the might of the heaven seal and earth seal, shattered the First Ancestor Human Emperor's myth of being supreme between heaven and earth, and forced him to change his moves! There were plainly flaws in Shen Mu's sword art, yet the First Ancestor could not break in, because Shen Mu's mana was too mighty; his terrifying essence cultivation made up for the flaws.
He held the sword in one hand; with the sword in hand his body moved like a roaming dragon. However powerful the First Ancestor's seal art, he always broke it with the single move Sovereign's Tribulation!
He did not even bother to change his moves! "Pull me out, pull me out!
" Before the Imperial Hall, Emperor Yishan struggled up from the ground, wanting to go behind the hall to see how the battle went. Behind him Emperor Qikang said in alarm, "I am stuck fast by the First Ancestor's seal art!
" Emperor Lanpo and the others struggled to their feet, gathered around Qikang, and together pressed down a seal upon the ground around Emperor Qikang; at last, by combined effort, they broke the First Ancestor's seal art and rescued him.
The Human Emperors helped one another up, passed through the pierced-through Imperial Hall, and came to the rear of the hall.
The Human Emperors' faces went blank.
In the mist two figures moved with the speed of lightning; the First Ancestor's seal art—one seal for heaven, the sky pressing down with the force of heaven toppling; one seal for earth, the earth overturning, mountains shaking—and his figure was like a pillar propping up heaven and earth, holding them so they did not fall. Such a seal art was one that entered the Dao through seals; only one who had reached the highest attainment could have created such a wondrous divine ability!
The First Ancestor's seal art held his state of mind. In the last years of Kaihuang, heaven and earth split asunder and the Kaihuang Heavenly Court tottered on the brink; he too had lived through that tragic and heroic age, and wished to hold up the collapsing edifice with his own strength.
His heaven-and-earth seal art embodied that incomparably intense, incomparably vivid feeling: let heaven and earth overturn, let the sky crack and the earth split, he remained steady and firm, a pillar propping up heaven and earth.