Chapter 265 — Two Heroes of Jingping

Shen Mu laughed. "I will take you to find the Imperial Preceptor of Jingping, and find you something to eat on the way."

Emperor Yanfeng hastily set down his steamed bun, his face grave, and followed silently behind him. After a moment he said: "I wish to ask him where he has been all these days!"

Shen Mu lifted him up and set him on the Dragon Qilin's back, then sprang up himself and stood upon the beast's brow.

The Dragon Qilin trod upon fiery clouds and raced away. Emperor Yanfeng, buffeted by several blasts of cold wind, sneezed again and again; then Shen Mu's whole body suddenly blazed with roaring flame, and only then did the emperor feel some relief.

The Dragon Qilin ran for two days. Shen Mu signaled the strange beast to descend, and they came to a stretch of mountains where the air was thick with heat. Radiance rose from the valley, steaming upward without cease and scattering into the air.

"Divine light!"

Emperor Yanfeng's face was grave. He sniffed the air. "The smell of blood. There is divine blood in this valley!"

Shen Mu led him into the valley, and indeed they saw a lake of blood. Beside the blood lake stood a wooden hut, and behind the hut ran a small river, its water warmed by the divine blood. A woman in a snow-white sable cloak, her belly slightly rounded, stood by the riverbank.

At her feet was a middle-aged man holding a wooden paddle, beating clothes upon a flat stone. Beside him sat a bamboo basket filled with washed garments.

Shen Mu leapt down from the Dragon Qilin's back. Emperor Yanfeng climbed down too, but his footing failed him and he fell flat with a splash, arms and legs spread wide upon the ground.

The man and woman heard the sound and turned to look. Shen Mu, smiling, walked toward them.

"You might have given me a hand!" Emperor Yanfeng scrambled up and hurried after him.

The middle-aged man set down his paddle, wiped his wet hands on his lapel, and rose to stand beside the woman. His face was somewhat pale. He smiled at Shen Mu and the emperor as they approached.

"Imperial Preceptor of Jingping!"

Emperor Yanfeng's steps quickened. He was about to rush forward and demand an accounting, when he suddenly noticed blood seeping from the Imperial Preceptor's chest and his exceedingly poor complexion. His heart was greatly shaken, and tears fell. "My Imperial Preceptor of Jingping, how have you come to such a pass?"

The Imperial Preceptor came forward to meet the emperor, and noticed too that his cultivation was wholly gone. Sorrow stirred in his heart. "Has Your Majesty not come to the same?"

The woman said hurriedly: "You are wounded yourself—do not let your heart be thrown into disorder."

Shen Mu was astonished. The two strongest men of Jingping had both been gravely wounded!

"The Cult Master of Heaven Sacred pays his respects to the wife of the Imperial Preceptor of Jingping," Shen Mu said, saluting the woman.

The Imperial Preceptor's wife, seeing the emperor's head bare and shaven, was puzzled, and said hurriedly: "Do not stand about—come inside and sit."

"After I left Little Jade Capital, I wished to investigate the source of the calamity, and then I encountered a god holding a gourd."

In the little wooden hut, the Imperial Preceptor of Jingping said calmly: "The calamity was released from his gourd. He was wounded; I was wounded more gravely still. And with my wife with child, we have lived here for a time."

He spoke lightly, but one could well imagine that battle must have been perilous beyond measure!

Emperor Yanfeng looked at the wounds upon him, then turned to Shen Mu with a questioning look.

Shen Mu examined him and shook his head. "Wounds left by a god conceal divine intent within. I cannot cure them at the root. To cure them at the root, we must return to the village and ask Grandfather Dan Master to lend his hand."

The Imperial Preceptor said: "I knew you could not cure them at the root, which is why I did not seek you out. My wounds are too grave now; I cannot return to the capital, or I will surely die. I cannot let others know I am wounded. I never imagined that Your Majesty..."

The two middle-aged men looked at each other, and suddenly both burst into laughter together, the Imperial Preceptor laughing until he coughed without cease.

Emperor Yanfeng looked outside. "The blood lake out there?"

"Left by that god. He was very strong; he took only a scratch."

The wound on the Imperial Preceptor's chest had broken open again. Shen Mu applied some dragon saliva, but no sooner was the wound stanched than it was torn open again by the remnant divine power the god had left in it.

Such a wound could no longer be treated by medicine or stone; even a spirit elixir that could call back a soul could not remove the residue of a god's divine power.

Shen Mu pondered a moment, then took out the sword elixir the Silent Craftsman had given him and gently roused it. Blade after blade of sword light grew from the elixir. Shen Mu pressed it forward, driving it into the flesh around the Imperial Preceptor's wound.

The Imperial Preceptor's wife gave a low cry; neither the Imperial Preceptor nor Emperor Yanfeng moved.

Shen Mu extended his forefinger, vital essence swirling at its tip like a cloud turning upon itself, and lightly touched the sword elixir. With a hiss, another blade of sword light shot from the elixir, pierced through the hut, and planted itself in the blood lake.

Boom—

The blood lake shook violently and burst forth with a world-shaking roar, trembling three times over. The sword light was shattered to powder by the shock, and the sword elixir itself shrank somewhat.

"A divine physician, a master hand—truly ingenious beyond measure."

The Imperial Preceptor of Jingping marveled. "To use the power of divine blood to offset the god's lingering divine power."

Shen Mu applied more dragon saliva, and at last the wound stopped bleeding. Shen Mu said: "The other divine powers within your body I cannot draw out. Your Majesty, Imperial Preceptor, there are now two roads before you: one, I send you to the Barren Wastes to heal your wounds; the other, we go to the capital. Choose one."

The Imperial Preceptor looked at Emperor Yanfeng. The two middle-aged men, hearts in accord, said with one voice: "The capital!"

Shen Mu drew the Butcher's Knife, pressed the Imperial Preceptor's head down upon the table. The Imperial Preceptor's wife cried out in alarm: "Cult Master Shen, what are you doing?"

Emperor Yanfeng rubbed his own shaven head. "Madam, look at me and you will understand."

Shen Mu's blade work was deft and swift; in the blink of an eye he had shaved the Imperial Preceptor bald, then took incense and burned several ordination scars upon his head. From the Taotie Pouch he drew a set of yellow monk's robes—his hands moved with the ease of long practice. He laughed. "I made an extra set, kept in readiness for the Imperial Preceptor. Wait a moment—I will paint half his face with a blue birthmark as well..."

When he had finished with the Imperial Preceptor, he looked toward the Imperial Preceptor's wife. The Imperial Preceptor said hurriedly: "Cult Master, my wife is with child, and in this cold of winter, to lose her hair..."

"Then let her be a Daoist nun."

Shen Mu fetched a Daoist robe and handed it to the Imperial Preceptor's wife, then suddenly blinked and laughed. "By the way, would the three of you care to join the cult? In my Heaven Sacred Cult we eat well and drink well, and if you have no skills we can even teach you a trade or two—you will never go hungry."