Chapter 1521 — The Tall, Gaunt Stranger
The Herdsman of the Wasteland · Page 3 of 5
He went to meet Wei Suifeng and Shu Jun, and saw that the two of them wore grave faces and hurried looks, flying in fast, thoroughly travel-worn.
It seemed the two had journeyed a great distance and had spent every last ounce of strength on the road, never resting once.
Puzzled, Shen Mu caught sight from afar of a wooden cane in Wei Suifeng's hand and wondered inwardly, "That looks like Tai Yi's cane. How does Tai Yi's cane come to be in their hands?"
"Mu Tianzun, Tai Yi has been seized by the master of the Miluo Palace and cast into the Chaos River of the Jade Capital City."
Shu Jun could run no farther, but his divine consciousness was still mighty. From afar it burst out and carried the message to Shen Mu, swiftly telling him everything: how they had been trapped in the Jade Capital City of the Ancestral Court, how they had chanced upon Tai Yi, how they had followed Tai Yi across the river, and all the other inconceivable things they had lived through, down to the last detail.
To pass word by divine consciousness is far swifter than speech, and more complete, missing neither the great nor the small. Shen Mu felt as though he had lived through their experiences himself, and his body shook violently, disbelief written across his face.
Wei Suifeng, stronger in cultivation, took Shu Jun on his back and came flying with a howl. "Tai Yi left this cane behind," he said in a low voice, "and said something about seeking him by a map. But he left no map at all. I do not know how to save him."
Shen Mu caught the two of them lest they collapse from exhaustion, but his heart was sinking by degrees.
Tai Yi had fallen.
From the images Shu Jun had passed to him by divine consciousness, those Chaos Rivers of the Jade Capital City were not truly rivers at all, but the chaos qi formed when universes are destroyed. Those beings who strove to break through the Chaos Rivers and come ashore were the powerhouses of the various universes, forcing their way toward the present world to escape the fate of perishing along with their own.
With divine arts and means beyond all imagining, the master of the Miluo Palace had opened passages through one destroyed universe after another, forming the wondrous sight of sixteen cosmic eras joined to the Jade Capital City of the Ancestral Court.
By casting Tai Yi into one of those great Chaos Rivers, he had cast Tai Yi into one of those cosmic eras.
"Tai Yi has fallen into the fourth cosmic era..."
The corner of Shen Mu's eye twitched. He gripped the cane tightly, and when Wei Suifeng and Shu Jun had steadied themselves, he suddenly turned and strode away. Wei Suifeng was taken aback for a moment, then hurried after him. "Junior Brother, do you know where Tai Yi's map is?"
Shen Mu did not answer. His divine consciousness suddenly burst forth, becoming a terrible wave that swept across the hundred thousand great mountains, and he shouted, "Hear my command, all of you. Today you must leave the Great Black Mountain. Do not linger even a moment."
"All of you, hear my command. I am Shen Mu, Imperial Preceptor of Jingping, Mu Tianzun. All of you must leave the Great Black Mountain today. Not one of you may stay."
His divine consciousness became a voice that echoed back and forth, sounding again and again over the hundred thousand great mountains.
Xu Shenghua was mending a riven Black Mountain; hearing it, he hastily raised his head and looked toward Shen Mu. And at the heart of the Great Black Mountain, beside the World Tree, Lan Yutian, Granny Zhu, Wen Yuan and the others showed astonishment, and all turned toward the source of the voice.