Chapter 1611 — The Crimson Rope Weaves a Talisman
The Herdsman of the Wasteland · Page 2 of 4
Suddenly a sharp pain stabbed his back; looking down, he saw a single white hair piercing through his chest.
He looked down and saw strand after strand of white hair coiled around the dao chain, growing steadily upward—the white hair of the Second Young Master of Miluo Palace! Shen Mu reached out, grasped the Empress's ankle, and squeezed hard.
From the back of the Empress's head, Madam Yuanmu's face emerged. She looked down and immediately saw that Shen Mu's situation was dire.
The woman hooked her legs around the chain, hung down inverted, severed that white hair, then gathered Shen Mu in her arms and lifted him above her.
Her strength was greater; from the rear she could fend off the attacks of the Second Young Master's white hair. The two continued to climb. Suddenly strands of white hair locked around the Empress's legs.
Madam Yuanmu at once seized the leg of Shen Mu's trousers. Shen Mu turned his head and looked down, saw the Empress's predicament, and slowly retreated downward.
He lay flat against the Empress's back, drew the Tribulation Sword, and exerted himself to unleash Tribulation-Breaking; stroke after stroke of sword light cut into the white hair and severed it. Madam Yuanmu gazed at him with resentment, while the Empress's body went taut, plainly flustered and uncomfortable.
Shen Mu struggled upward, away from the Empress's body.
Helping one another along the way, after an unknowable length of time, they finally reached the red ropes. There were six red ropes in all, tied to six dao chains.
The ropes interwove and knotted into a strange seal. They climbed onto the red ropes.
The place where the ropes formed their seal was utterly still, and not large—only a zhang or so across.
Everywhere else, the tides surged and spouted with terrible violence. Above their heads hung the calamity of an entire universe's destruction, as if it might come crashing down at any moment—a soul-shaking sight.
Shen Mu lay on one of the red ropes, panting hoarsely.
He rested a long while yet still did not recover. The Empress and her sister were likewise limp and unable to move, their bones and sinews aching; one body with two faces, both gasping for breath.
The white hair had followed them to the red ropes as well, but the instant it touched them it shuddered as if electrocuted and fell away.
Shen Mu rolled his eyes feebly; only upon seeing this did he set his heart at ease.
After another long while, he rose unsteadily to his feet, stepped along the red ropes to the center of the seal, and studied the strange knot with curiosity.
Suddenly the Empress said coldly, "Lord Mu, if you dare attempt to untie the knot, I will swallow you alive on the spot!
" Shen Mu's body went rigid; he sensed the killing intent at his back.
Nor was it only the Empress who harbored murderous intent—Madam Yuanmu's was even fiercer than hers!
"I won't untie the knot," Shen Mu said, turning around with a smile.
"I was only looking at it. The shape of the knot moved me somehow. " "Dearie, what kind of feeling?
" Madam Yuanmu studied the knot curiously. It was exceedingly intricate, seeming to conceal strange and profound principles within, yet she could not fathom them either.
Shen Mu explained patiently, "Look at the shape of this knot.
Doesn't it somewhat resemble the dao patterns that burst from the dao chains? " The Empress and Yuanmu examined the knot closely, then looked at the dao chains one by one, and shook their heads.
Yuanmu could not help saying, "How are they alike? " Shen Mu smiled.
"The inner runes are very much alike.
I think this knot is not truly a knot at all, but a seal technique left behind by the Master of Miluo Palace, merely manifested in the form of a knot.
In other words, five of the ropes stand for his five fingers; this knot and these dao chains are the equivalent of his hand pressing the Second Young Master of Miluo Palace beneath his palm!