Chapter 263 — The Sovereign Lord's Secret Treasury

Once again she was drawn toward the Gate of Heaven's Mandate and toward that book—though the writing in the book meant nothing to Shen Mu either; the only characters he could read were those upon the gate.

Of the Nether Capital's tongue he knew but one phrase, forward and back, and that phrase was the Gate of Heaven's Mandate. For those few words he had nearly been killed by the Dutian Demon King.

"You want to learn it? I'll teach you." Shen Mu said it without so much as a blush.

From Granny Zhu's mouth came Fan Xuanshu's voice, sneering: "As if I need teaching from you. You are a Holy Preceptor of the Cult, and so am I—and your senior besides. If you were to teach me, where would I put my face?"

Shen Mu smiled faintly. "But you do not know the true art of the Star-Suppressing Lord and the Earth Marquis."

Fan Xuanshu choked with fury and shot him a bewitching glare. "I am a Holy Preceptor of the Cult—how could I not know it?"

Shen Mu paid her no heed and steadied his heart; that glance of hers was formidable indeed and had nearly sent his soul spinning. He roused the Ninefold Heaven Gazing Eye Art, and layer upon layer of heavens opened within his pupils. He looked toward the emperor, and saw only one ruined divine treasury after another inside the emperor's body, like so many shattered worlds.

Shen Mu gave a low shout, and the space between his brows split open, revealing a third eye. It seemed no mortal eye of this world, but one that came from some dark and shadowed realm, exuding a heavy, gloom-laden yin aura that made the candlelight in the room dim and uncertain.

The moment that eye opened, the whole room seemed to have entered another world—no longer like the world of men at all!

Shen Mu gazed with that eye, and at once beheld Emperor Yanfeng's soul and Primordial Spirit, and found where the malady lay.

In the Heaven-Man Realm one refines the Primordial Spirit: vital essence and soul combine and transform into the Primordial Spirit—that deity which stands behind every expert of the Heaven-Man Realm. That is the Primordial Spirit, the vital essence and the divine soul.

Emperor Yanfeng's Primordial Spirit stood upon the divine bridge, as though about to step across it straight into the divine realm. But his secret realm had collapsed, gravely wounding that Primordial Spirit; his soul too had taken a grievous blow, its fragments scattered, the Primordial Spirit left unguarded, so that the three souls and seven spirits were no longer a whole. And wave upon wave of terrifying force hammered at his mortal body, leaving his soul unable to keep to its house.

And so, even if Shen Mu revived his body, his soul could not remain within it.

Fan Xuanshu's manner abruptly sank, and she said sullenly: "That eye, now—that one I never learned... Is this truly the Earth Marquis true art of the Great Nurturing Dark Demon Sutra?"

The eye at Shen Mu's brow closed, and he dispersed the form of the Star-Suppressing Lord. Frowning, he paced back and forth. For a while he pondered, while Fan Xuanshu held down her anger and waited in silence.

Shen Mu suddenly clapped his hands and laughed. "What can I see by looking from out here? Better to go inside the emperor's body and examine it properly! Cult Master Li, come with me!"

Fan Xuanshu started, then asked suspiciously: "And how do you propose to get inside him?"

"Simple. In the Great Nurturing Dark Demon Sutra there is an art called the Shadow-Transforming Demon Art, which hides a person within a shadow and conceals the form of the flesh. There is another called the Heaven-Mustard Seed Art, which lets the body grow large or small. Rouse both at once, shrink yourself down, then turn into a shadow and slip into Emperor Yanfeng's body to examine his Primordial Spirit and his divine treasuries."

Shen Mu glanced at her. "You don't know them?"

Fan Xuanshu laughed in sheer exasperation. "How could I not know them?"

Shen Mu stepped back, seized her hand, and dragged her toward Emperor Yanfeng. The two of them roused the Shadow-Transforming Demon Art and the Heaven-Mustard Seed Art almost in the same breath; as they ran toward the emperor their bodies grew smaller and smaller, until they clung to the floor as two black shadows and bored into Emperor Yanfeng's brow.

Emperor Yanfeng stood frozen, unable to move. All five of his senses had been sealed by Shen Mu, yet he could still feel the two black shadows burrowing this way and that inside his body.

Abruptly Shen Mu and Fan Xuanshu halted: they had arrived at the Primal Fetus divine treasury. Standing at its edge and looking ahead, they saw that Emperor Yanfeng's Primal Fetus divine treasury was already in a state of dissolution. The spirit fetus and the spirit platform had both been destroyed; the sky was riddled with holes, and horrifying cracks split sky and ground alike, exposing the snow-white bone beyond.

Blood was pouring back in, flooding into the Primal Fetus divine treasury like so many great waterfalls.

Beyond that, Shen Mu saw a streak of sword light flying to and fro within the Primal Fetus divine treasury, wantonly wrecking it.

"The Dao Lord's Dao sword!"

Fan Xuanshu was astonished. "That old Daoist is no small matter—he has driven his sword intent in here!"

"Can you take in this sword intent?" Shen Mu asked.

Fan Xuanshu giggled. "And why should I help you?"

Shen Mu laughed. "You have watched me perform so much of the true transmission of the Great Nurturing Dark Demon Sutra; some repayment is surely due. And even if you won't help me, tomorrow I can ask Granny to lend a hand, and it will be done just the same."

Fan Xuanshu gave a snort, then leaped forward. She pressed the ten fingers of her hands together, then flung them suddenly wide; at once threads of vital essence linked her fingers, weaving and interlacing until they formed a spatial-seal cage. The corners of that cage joined one another, and within the cage a second spatial-seal cage appeared; within that one a third, and so on again and again, until they were all but endless.

Fan Xuanshu tossed out the sharply angled sphere. It brushed lightly against the sword intent, and the sword intent vanished at once, drawn into the sphere.

Fan Xuanshu reached out and snatched up the cube, tossed it a couple of times in her hand, and looked at Shen Mu, rather pleased with herself.

"The Multi-Faceted Spatial Seal Art."

Shen Mu said in praise: "Clever indeed."

"You recognize it, but that does not mean you can use it," Fan Xuanshu said with a smile.

Shen Mu smiled faintly and casually performed the spatial seal art once through. "My cultivation is weak; I cannot seal away the Dao Lord's sword intent. But I have dabbled somewhat in the arts of calculation, and I too understand how to set a spatial seal—it is only that my cultivation is inferior to yours. You and I are both Holy Preceptors of the Cult; what I know cannot be less than what you know. It can only be more."

Fan Xuanshu gave a snort, utterly feminine—and yet it did not repel; rather, it struck one as charming.

Shen Mu cried out inwardly at how formidable she was, and together they became two slender shadows and left the Primal Fetus divine treasury for the Five Elements divine treasury.

In the Five Elements divine treasury, five great Buddhas sat amid a shattered sky in place of the five luminary stars. Fan Xuanshu flicked her fingers, and five strands of demonic qi flew out as five lotuses, settling beneath the five great Buddhas. In an instant the five great Buddhas suffered the Five Signs of Heavenly Decay; their flesh withered, blazing demon fire broke out, and the five great Buddhas dissolved at once into wisps of flying ash. Fan Xuanshu sneered. "Do you know this one too?"

Shen Mu said: "This is the Red Lotus Demon Heart Mantra of the Great Nurturing Dark Demon Sutra. It is the first time I have ever used such a spell—but I am no worse than you!"