Chapter 301 — The Gloomy Dark Valley

Clatter — the red apples suddenly flew down from the trees, leaves swirling; who knew how many red apples came flying at him. The practitioner was indeed formidable: his blade light poured down like a torrential rain and split open who knew how many apples, and in an instant the ground was strewn with apples cut in half, the fragrance of fruit filling the air.

Yet one apple rolled in along the ground, dodged the blade light, pounced onto his leg, and bit.

The Mandi practitioner felt a numbness in his leg, and the whole leg went dead, then half his body; he was about to swing his blade to cut the apple off his leg, but then his head was numbed too, and all his curved blades clattered to the ground.

The other apples flew up with a rush and hung on the trees again, and one by one they turned their heads to look at the practitioner lying on the ground, smiling eerily. The practitioner could not move; his heart pounded violently, and he felt his face itch terribly.

Then he saw another face growing out of his own.

That face squeezed its way out of his, with nose and mouth; it opened wide and panted, and laughed: "Got you, got you!

" The face writhed and grew outward, and in a moment a whole head had grown, joined to his neck; then an upper body grew as well, and it crawled forward. The practitioner felt a tearing agony and opened his mouth to scream, but no sound came; and the man the apple had become was crawling out with both arms, dragging his body along, crawling with astonishing speed, while more and more body grew out of him.

At last the two were wholly separated.

The man who had grown out of him was identical to him, but stark naked; he picked a curved blade up off the ground, drove it into his chest, then stripped off his clothes and put them on. "Heh heh, free at last —" The apple man grabbed the blade-orb and went bounding away; the other apples slowly turned their faces, watching him with envy.

Wretched screams rang out one after another from the forest; the Mandi divine ability practitioners who had entered the Nether Valley woods met with perils of every kind, beyond all imagining.

Among them, some encountered strange insects, translucent as jade, that could flit nimbly through the air; with a zip they would dart into a man's nostrils, take up residence in his brain, and take command of his body to slaughter the others.

There were also leeches on the trees, hidden in the dewdrops on the leaves, exceedingly small.

When one practitioner passed by, a dewdrop fell on him; at first he felt nothing amiss, only that his body grew heavier and heavier, his head swimming and his eyes blurring.

On his back, a huge leech clung to him, writhing and sucking blood; after a moment the leech grew a face and limbs, still clinging to him, and it came to look exactly like him, as though he were carrying a man on his back. And the practitioner's vital blood was drained utterly dry; he fell dead, and the leech man ran off wild with joy.

For a time, this silent forest bristled with deadly traps; with the Mandi army's intrusion, those traps were triggered, and one after another the men who had entered the forest met their deaths! Mighty as the Mandi divine ability practitioners were, here no power, however great, could guard against every danger!

Shen Mu walked through this forest in the utmost vigilance, using the Bodhi Swaying True Body to shield himself and Long Qilin, and his way had been peaceful enough.

Just then he saw a monk sitting beneath a tree, seated cross-legged; he had been dead no one knew how long, yet his corpse had not decayed.

The tree behind him was a bodhi tree, a treasure tree streaming with radiant color, plainly the transformation of some rare treasure.

"This eminent monk's Bodhi Swaying True Body was stronger than mine, and yet he died. The Thunder-Cry Mahayana Sutra cannot hold back the perils of this place!

" Shen Mu's blood ran cold. He at once dispersed the Bodhi Swaying True Body, spread both hands flat before him, interlaced his fingertips, and made a light stroke — one hand raised to the sky, one hand pressed toward the earth!

First Form of the Dao Sword: One Point Pierces the Vast Motion; the Two Modes Reverse Yin and Yang Within! Vital essence from his two hands turned to threads and became swords; calculations of immense complexity unfolded, and the sword light became two taiji diagrams, one above and one below, guarding him and Long Qilin in the middle!

The sword light flashed without cease, the taiji diagrams revolved, yin and yang shifting back and forth, and then from the edges of the two diagrams streamed down blade after blade of light!

"The stupid ox isn't so stupid after all.

" The bodhi tree rustled; the two white bats hung upside down from the crown, their bodies covered in wounds.

One of them coughed blood, spat out bloody phlegm, and said in a faint voice: "That bald donkey broke in here more than ten years ago, trusting in the blessing of the Buddhist dharma, thinking he could come in safely — and the tree worms did him in.

" "Tree worms? " Shen Mu was slightly taken aback.

"They're the seeds of a kind of tree.

The seed is a lively, hopping worm that lurks underground; when it meets a man it burrows into him, and its roots grow in his muscles.

The muscles inside this bald donkey have all been eaten away, leaving only skin; the tree worm has already taken root and sprouted inside him.

" The other white bat stretched out a claw and made a cut on the eminent monk's head; at once a burst of green broke through the monk's scalp with a pop and became a small crown of foliage.

"That's the tree worm — though it's nearly grown into a tree now.

" The cleverer of the two bats blinked and said: "Stupid ox, we're wounded.

If you can protect us, we can point out the way and let you avoid the perils here! " Shen Mu smiled. "Fellow Daoists, as it happens I am also an alchemist, skilled in healing.

How about I heal your wounds, and once you're well, you protect me?

" The two white bats exchanged a glance and dropped from the bodhi tree, astonished: "An ox-headed doctor? Since when do you Yinghuo folk play physician?

Aren't you lot always sticking your ox noses in the air, setting fires and spitting flames at people wherever you go? " Shen Mu turned his ox nose to the sky and shot out two jets of fire.

"So, what do you say to my proposal?

" "Agreed! " The two white bats agreed readily, thinking to themselves: "Once the ox-headed doctor has healed us, it'll be time enough to turn on him!

" Shen Mu's eyes flickered, and he thought: "While I'm healing them I can slip in some poison, and then these two will have no choice but to obey me and protect me!

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