Chapter 1028 — The Most Minute of Scales
The Herdsman of the Wasteland · Page 1 of 4
"A visitor from the Worry-Free Land?"
The blind elder and the mute artisan exchanged a glance, and their welcome was nothing like what Kaihuang had expected.
In truth, as far as the Worry-Free Land was concerned, it had always been Shen Mu alone who ached to find the place. To the rest of the folk in the Village of Hidden Remnants, were it not for Shen Mu's sake, they could not have cared less where the Worry-Free Land might lie.
The mute artisan least of all. He was a survivor of the Heaven-Craft God Race, whose ancestors had built the Far Shore Ark and who counted themselves the descendants of Indra, the Heavenly King Buddha Li Youran. Yet at the close of the Kaihuang Era, Kaihuang had taken a band of people and fled to the Worry-Free Land. The Heaven-Craft God Race forged a second Far Shore Ark, but before they could reach the Worry-Free Land, the armies of the Heavenly Court slaughtered them to the last man.
The remnant of the Heaven-Craft God Race was trapped inside a three-dimensional space seal, scraping out a living; by the mute artisan's generation, only he remained.
In the end, on the verge of death, his parents had pushed him—still a child—out through the seal, to face the darkness and the perils of the Desolate Ruins alone.
Of them all, the mute artisan had the least patience for the Worry-Free Land. The Far Shore Ark still lay in the Desolate Ruins; never once had he thought of repairing that great ship and sailing to the Worry-Free Land. However bitter his own lot, the thought had never crossed his mind.
"You come from the Worry-Free Land? A rare guest indeed. In the days before the Jingping Tribulation broke out, we had a visitor from the Worry-Free Land as well—one Celestial Master Zixi, a past master of formations. I learned no small amount from her."
The blind elder went on, "But when the Jingping Tribulation broke out last time, Kaihuang issued a single order, and she took every god of the Kaihuang Era and ran, leaving us to face the tribulation alone. You come from the Worry-Free Land—surely you are not here to deliver some command of Kaihuang's?"
Kaihuang shook his head. "Celestial Master Zixi has gone back to the Worry-Free Land. I heard her speak of the Jingping Reform, and so I came to see it with my own eyes."
The mute artisan drew the blind elder aside, his hands flying this way and that.
The blind elder said, "It is not as bad as all that."
Kaihuang asked curiously, "What does this mute fellow Daoist say?"
"He is cursing Kaihuang. He says Little Shen did a great many things for Indra, the Heavenly King among Kaihuang's Four Great Heavenly Kings: he put down the Heavenly Court's forces across the twenty heavens of the Buddhist realm, he shouldered a monstrous injustice on Indra's behalf, he saved Tian Shu, Heavenly King of the Dark Capital, and settled the old grievance between Tian Shu and the Nether Capital, and he even brought Heavenly King Diyiyue back from the dead."
The blind elder relayed the mute artisan's words: "Little Shen is also the second disciple of Kaihuang's Woodcutter Celestial Master, and two of the Four Great Celestial Masters—the Fisherman and Zixi—are old acquaintances of his, on the best of terms. Little Shen likewise helped the Martial Combat Celestial Master solve the trouble that the warriors of the Douniu Realm cannot become gods without a Divine Bridge; what a favor that was. Even Fengdu was preserved only because Little Shen had such credit with Heavenly Venerable You and Tubo. And yet Kaihuang is a man with no decency: at the Jingping Tribulation he issued one order and pulled every god away, running faster than a rabbit, the worthless bastard..."