Chapter 1357 — Divine Lords of the Four Extremes
The Herdsman of the Wasteland · Page 1 of 3
The stars overhead grew ever more brilliant, yet with an eerie flicker, brightening only to waver and vanish and reappear, as if they too were leaping to the music of the peach forest, springing from one world to another. The stars were tracking the peach forest, and each time they dimmed and vanished and blazed forth anew they seemed a full circle larger, a fraction nearer to the grove.
And as the notes of the peach forest leapt, the Daoist priests of the Dao Sect, busy binding the people of every city and land, suddenly saw that the giant and the Yuan Tree in the darkness were moving.
Though giant and tree still looked as large as before, as if they had not moved at all, that was only because they moved even as they shrank.
Stranger still, the giant had seized the Yuan Tree and torn it up by the roots, and he stood motionless when the notes of the peach forest leapt, and moved only when the notes ceased.
The leaping of the notes was precisely the moment light kindled above the peach forest, and then, laid bare by the light, giant and tree stood utterly still.
The ceasing of the notes was precisely the moment darkness swallowed the sky above the grove, and then giant and tree vanished into the dark, yet every priest could feel the giant gripping the tree and hastening through the blackness, hastening hither.
And that strange giant hastening with the Yuan Tree in hand was none other than Shenqi Yutianzun, who holds down the Yuan Realm. The priests of the Dao Sect shivered to the bone and flew the faster on every side, bidding all men bolt their doors.
At last the bell of the Dao Sect tolled anew, and the priests flew back one and all, sealed the mountain gate, and each withdrew to his own courtyard or palace and barred the doors.
In the city at the foot of the mountain a child quietly pushed open a window to peer out, and in that instant he beheld a sight of utter terror, a giant of towering frame standing beyond the walls with a tree a hundred zhang tall clutched in his hand.
His face rose higher than the gate tower, his profile looming above it, and as the music of the peach forest leapt, light flared and lit his countenance.
The child gaped, staring dumbly at the sight. His mother rushed over in panic, dragged the wretched boy back, and slammed the windows shut with a bang.
Then came the sound of a spanking and the child's howls, and soon the howls sank to a whimper, as if his mouth had been covered.
Beyond the walls Shenqi Yutianzun had shrunk to little more than a dozen zhang, yet still stood somewhat taller than the gate tower, standing there like a statue of stone.
Suddenly the music of the peach forest dimmed, and the city sank into darkness.
When the music brightened again, the giant already stood at the edge of the peach forest, still leaning upon the Yuan Tree, standing motionless.
A rushing rustle came, a sudden gale springing up and setting the peach forest sighing.
The wind came from nowhere and blew hard, hard enough to stir even the robes of Shenqi Yutianzun.
Strange to say, though the gale could move his robes, it could stir only the peach leaves on the outer fringe of the grove, while not a single leaf deep within so much as trembled.
Shenqi Yutianzun gripped the Yuan Tree and did not move.
And the host of stars above grew ever brighter, their starlight blazing as if they had come to hover not far above the peach forest, and among them forty-nine great stars shone most dazzling of all.
Within the palace of the peach forest the Alchemist urged forth the medicinal power of the last spirit pill, and the great chains of the Dao born of that power bored into the brow of Heavenly Venerable Moon, and in the instant those chains touched the dao patterns of Divine Emperor Langxuan's divine consciousness, they twined like two spirals locked together in a slaughter most bitter.