Chapter 184 — Driving Ghosts and Enslaving Gods
The Herdsman of the Wasteland · Page 2 of 4
" Everyone was in a frenzy of alarm; the black mist was now full of Nine Nether Sect and Corpse Immortal Sect people everywhere. The Corpse Immortal Sect had been wiped out by Yuyuan Chuyu, and presumably its disciples' corpses had been buried nearby as well — this time the Nine Nether Sect had revived them along with the rest.
Clearly the Nine Nether Sect had come prepared this time and had caught Yuyuan Chuyu off guard; if things went on like this, Li Prefecture itself would be in dire peril. Shen Mu thought, "There must be a ruthless, vicious fellow behind the Nine Nether Sect, one who stops at nothing for victory — who would even sacrifice so many of the sect's own disciples!
" They came to Lu Mountain, and indeed there was hardly anyone about, and the black mist had thinned considerably.
Shen Wanyun, Yun Que, and the others gradually relaxed; once they crossed this mountain and left the region shrouded in black mist, they would be safe for the time being. Suddenly a chanting voice, rising and falling in cadence, came from the mountain, and alarm seized them again; they looked to Shen Mu.
Shen Mu frowned slightly and said in a low voice, "That chanting is wrong — it isn't the Soul-Drawing Incantation, but another kind of spell.
" Yue Qinghong and the others could not tell what was different about the singing; they had never studied the Nine Nether Sect's Soul-Drawing Incantation.
Shen Mu, however, had studied that divine art, and he had caught a note of something amiss. "Stay here, all of you.
I'll go take a look!
" With that order, Shen Mu stole noiselessly toward the chanting; as he drew near, his steps grew lighter and lighter, and he saw that in the mountain hollow ahead there was an altar, upon which a dozen or so male and female Daoists were working magic. The altar was built from one skeleton after another, square in plan, some three zhang six or seven in length and breadth, and its surface was paved with skulls; at the four corners, east, south, west, and north, stood a white banner apiece, each bearing runes written in blood mixed with cinnabar. At the center of the altar stood a statue of an eight-armed demon god: one leg crouched, the other folded across the bend of the crouching leg, its eight arms paired palm to palm, with four faces, and each face bearing three eyes.
Each of these Daoists, male and female, was driving a talisman artifact; the talisman artifacts floated in the air, each with many facets, and on every facet a rune. As the Daoists chanted, the runes on the artifacts' facets lit up one after another, and the illuminated runes shone precisely upon the body of the demon god statue; wherever the light fell, a rune on the statue kindled in answer. The talisman artifacts turned without cease, lighting rune after rune upon the statue.
By now, more than half the runes on the demon god statue had been lit. "The Talisman Command over Ghosts and Gods! " Shen Mu's heart gave a jolt.
"The arts of the Hongshan School! These are disciples of the Hongshan School, which was already wiped out!
" These dozen or so Daoists, men and women alike, were all divine-arts practitioners, and by the look of it they had been here driving the secret art of commanding ghosts and gods for some time. Plainly, after the Hongshan School was annihilated, they had plotted revenge and joined hands with the Nine Nether Sect and the Corpse Immortal Sect! And when Shen Mu considered the timing of the Nine Nether Sect's attack — it had come just as the Grand Academy scholars were passing between Li Prefecture and Lu County — it meant that someone had clear knowledge of the scholars' movements, even of the very hour they would arrive.
The Grand Academy scholars sent out for training this time had been chosen as the elite of every cultivation realm; in the future these scholars were to become officials of the Jingping Kingdom, succeeding the present crop of officials who had come out of the various sects and great clans.