Chapter 88 — The Heavenly Demon Horde
The Herdsman of the Wasteland · Page 1 of 4
"The Village Head was dragged into the vortex by that monster — could it be that…
" A grim thought took shape in Shen Mu's mind. He looked back.
He stood close to the gate of Fengdu; the mist had not yet drowned the gateway, but if it kept rising, he would lose all track of it.
"The Village Head's powers are so great — surely nothing will happen to him!
I must get away from this place first, and not become a burden to him! " Thud.
Thud. Thud.
Grey mist lay everywhere, and the footsteps within it were in wild disorder — some came from behind him, some from his flanks, some planted themselves squarely on the road to Fengdu's gate.
Shen Mu steadied his heart, then charged straight at the gate of Fengdu.
He ran with flying speed, drawing ever nearer to the towering mountain gate of Fengdu, when suddenly a great gurgling boom came from ahead, and a dark shape came rushing at him head-on out of the grey mist. Without a word Shen Mu thrust out his sword-finger.
Behind him the Chubao Sword, borne by the fish-dragon, leaped forth and spat out the precious blade, which cut open the grey mist and struck that dark shape like lightning.
Whoosh — A mad wind howled, and the Chubao Sword carried that dark shape hurtling backward; then came a soft thud — it slammed into a stone pillar and was pinned fast there.
Shen Mu surged forward at a run. Passing the pillar, he beckoned backward with his sword-finger; the Chubao Sword flew back and was swallowed into the mouth of the fish-dragon behind him.
The dark figure's corpse dropped to the ground: a hideous, savage thing, its body covered in fish scales, its hands and feet webbed like a frog's.
The monster's qi had not yet dispersed; it coiled about the body like a blood-soaked serpent, and Shen Mu caught a foul reek of rot.
His head swam, his vision blurred, and he stumbled — plainly this was a divine art laced with deadly poison! Then he felt the diagram the Deaf Elder had drawn on his skin in dragon's blood begin to burn hot, and the poison vanished in an instant.
"A divine arts user?
I actually killed a divine arts user? " Shen Mu was dazed for a moment — and then it came to him: when he had roused his qi and ridden the flying sword, the great furnace the Silent Artisan had hidden in his chest had blazed up, and his qi had soared a hundredfold, a thousandfold at a stroke!
It was the Silent Artisan's furnace that had made his cultivation explode, raising it to the level where a single sword thrust could kill a divine arts user! Stranger still, the furnace multiplied his qi only while he was spending it; the moment Shen Mu withdrew his qi, his cultivation returned to its everyday level.
That way, the burden on his body was not great. It was like water in a vat: a vat holds only three buckets, and if you pour in ten, seven must spill over.
But the human body is no vat — there is nowhere for the excess to spill, and commonly a man is burst apart and dies. The wonder of the Silent Artisan's furnace was that it lent Shen Mu a hundredfold qi, and when he was not using it, that qi went back into the furnace and did his body no harm.
Shen Mu raced on, his mind spinning fast: "So then — with the cultivation I have now, I can bring forth divine arts? Then even against the Heavenly Demon Horde, I am not without the strength to fight. " The furnace the Silent Artisan had planted in his body gave him a hundredfold qi; such a mighty flood of qi was more than Shen Mu had ever dared imagine.
Before, his fist arts had been merely fist arts and his blade arts merely blade arts; but now he felt he could spend a hundred times his own qi and unleash fist-art divine abilities, blade-art divine abilities!
The skills Lord Huo and Zai Fu had taught him — once he broke through into the divine arts, what power would they hold?