Chapter 11 — The Divine Sound Cracks the Wall and Opens the Spirit Treasury

If Granny Zhu or the village headman had been here, they would surely have berated him for his folly, for gambling with his own life.

After all, the divine sound that arose when the wall was broken was not the same as the divine sound the maidens in the ruins gave forth. To use the demonic sound that countered the maidens' divine sound against the divine sound of the wall-breaking was, at best, the wrong medicine for the ailment; the crux was that if the divine sound and the demonic sound should undergo some other uncanny transformation, then it would be no simple matter of losing one's life—he might well be scattered into oblivion, soul and all! But Shen Mu had no one to guide him, and knew nothing of the perils within. No sooner had he learned the demonic sound than he set about testing it.

When his primal qi reached the point between his brows, that divine sound—dim and distant, as though it came from beyond the ninth heaven—rang out again, true to its promise.

His qi, meeting the divine sound, retreated of itself. Shen Mu silently intoned the demonic sound, and at once the divine sound and the demonic sound locked together, clashing and warring, each assaulting the other. Shen Mu seized the moment to drive his qi at the Primal Fetus Wall, but from time to time the divine sound still broke through his demonic sound and forced his qi back.

Again and again he failed, yet he did not falter in the least, but ceaselessly surged his qi against it.

After several hundred failures, his qi at last struck the Primal Fetus Wall. Only, the wall still stood; it had not been broken.

"I was disturbed by the divine sound and could not gather all my qi for a full-strength strike—that is why I could not break the wall.

" Shen Mu briefly took stock of his error, then at once made the next attempt.

After failure upon failure, he at last brought his qi to strike the Primal Fetus Wall a second time. This time too the wall held.

Before long he struck a third time, then a fourth, a fifth.

.

. In the days when he had studied pill-refining under the Pill Master, he had cultivated great patience. Refining pills tested patience, wisdom, discernment, and technique, and of these patience was the foremost; without patience, one could never, by any means, refine a single good pill.

After who knows how many failures, at last Shen Mu suddenly heard a faint crack from between his brows.

That faint sound was as sweet and lovely as celestial music; strong as Shen Mu's composure was, he could not hold down the surge of emotion in his heart.

A crack had appeared in the Primal Fetus Wall—a crack shaped like lightning.

The Primal Fetus Wall was a formless wall, an invisible wall, one that could only be felt; yet when this crack appeared, Shen Mu felt a light shining out from between his brows, like a symbol of lightning. The sensation was wondrous.

When you close your eyes, all you see is darkness, without any light; you cannot see the point between your brows, cannot see the Primal Fetus Spirit Treasury, cannot see the Primal Fetus Wall.

But when a crack is struck into the Primal Fetus Wall by your qi, you can see a lightning-shaped radiance shining through the darkness. Then you can see the Primal Fetus Wall.

Shen Mu saw not only the Primal Fetus Wall, but through that lightning-shaped crack in it he saw the Primal Fetus Spirit Treasury as well. Within the Spirit Treasury the light was dense and swirling, a golden radiance, and abundant, rich qi was spilling from the lightning-shaped crack, unceasingly merging with his own qi.

The qi within the treasury was purer and more powerful, yet this qi, like the qi he had cultivated himself, had no attribute at all.

Shen Mu firmly believed that the qi he had cultivated was the qi unique to the Overlord Body—Overlord Body qi—and so he paid it no mind. Within the Primal Fetus Spirit Treasury there was not only qi; things more wondrous still were hidden there.

But he had only blasted out a single lightning-shaped crack and had not fully broken the wall, so he could not see what else lay within. The lightning-shaped crack was slowly healing.

Shen Mu's heart sank a little.

Plainly the Primal Fetus Wall was not so simple as he had imagined: it had form but no substance, like a thick, sticky fluid—pierce a hole in it, and the hole would close. Only by mustering all his strength in one sustained effort and shattering the Primal Fetus Wall entirely could he open the Primal Fetus Spirit Treasury!

"My cultivation of qi is not yet strong enough, but striking out a crack can raise my qi at flying speed! It will not be long before my qi can break the Primal Fetus Wall open! " Shen Mu's spirits rose.

Suddenly the crowing of a rooster came to his ear.

His heart stirred, and he hastily opened his eyes. Among the strange beasts that had entered the ruins for shelter were several bald-necked roosters, extraordinarily imposing and tall, as tall as a man, with splendid plumage—only their necks were bare of feathers.

The crowing just now had come from those bald-necked roosters.

"The sky is about to brighten. " Shen Mu's heart stirred again. In the eastern sky a dim light had already appeared, showing that the sun would rise before long.

There was no longer time for him to break fully through the Primal Fetus Wall.

Fortunately, he had already grasped how to break the wall. So long as he could escape this place from the hands of Senior Brother Chu and Senior Sister Liu, he would have all the time he needed to break through.

Though he had not fully broken the wall, cracking open even one fissure had raised his cultivation considerably, and he had confidence enough to escape from the two of them!

"The sky is about to brighten," Senior Brother Chu said, with meaning in his voice. Senior Sister Liu said icily, "Three of our junior brothers died to rid the world of the demon.

If this little spawn of evil escapes, would we not have failed the spirits of the dead?

" Shen Mu turned a deaf ear, rose to his feet, and stretched his limbs. In the plaza the maidens were still contending with the darkness, thrust and counterthrust, neither giving way, light and darkness locked in savage slaughter.

Before long another crowing came.

The darkness grew restless; its voice became incomparably loud and heavy, while the divine sound the maidens gave forth grew fierce and shrill.

Divine light and darkness clashed violently, point against point, a sight of awe-inspiring force. Suddenly a third crowing came, and a thread of sunlight pierced the darkness in the east, falling upon the highest peak nearby. At that thread of sunlight, the ink-black darkness at once receded like the tide, fleeing swiftly into the distance.

Swift as it had come, it went faster and faster, and at last vanished beyond the horizon.

The morning sunlight shone down, lighting the gorge. Before the sun's rays had even fallen upon the ruins in the gorge, that pearl hanging on high was seen to descend slowly, and the riot of colored radiance that filled the plaza poured into the pearl.

The radiance vanished, and the maidens in the plaza became once more skeletons sitting cross-legged there, motionless, as though this night of maidens battling the darkness had been only a gorgeous dream. Shen Mu had long since heard the villagers speak of the strange happenings in the desolate ruins; the things that occurred here were bizarre and beyond all reason.

But hearing of them was one thing; to live through such strangeness himself was far more staggering. Whenever night fell and the darkness came creeping, the faces in the dark, the mysterious demonic sound, the painted skeletons in these ruins that turned into maidens each night, and the struggle between light and darkness—each was a wonder past all understanding.

These secrets waited for someone to uncover them. Shen Mu hid his figure among the moving herd of beasts and quietly made his way outward.