Chapter 306 — The Spirit of the Giant Serpent

Ban Gongcuo and his people had at last come before the treasure ship. Along the way another twenty or thirty had perished, slain under the strange and uncanny attacks of the creatures of the Nether Valley.

"Your Highness the Prince, these two white-browed monks are no weaklings in cultivation -- they have very nearly reached the Tathagata realm!

" Shaman King Gongmu's eyes lit up when he saw the two white-browed monks seated on the cliffs to either side. "Their fleshly bodies could be refined into quite decent treasures!

I will go fetch them!

" Ban Gongcuo neither assented nor refused, and Shaman King Gongmu at once led his men up to the niches in the cliff and took away the bodies of the two white-browed monks. Though the two white-browed monks were dead, their bodies still radiated Buddha-light, and Buddha-sounds quivered and shook, contending against the demonic qi surging in from Youdu. Now that their bodies had been taken away, the demonic qi behind the Hive Seal at once churned violently, shaking the seal until it tottered!

The demonic qi bursting from the cracks in the Hive Seal surged abruptly as well; in a single instant of impact many more cracks appeared in the seal, and some of the existing cracks widened greatly. From behind the seal came a faint, deep voice, and then the demonic qi abruptly drew back behind the seal, and that dreadful impact fell suddenly still.

Still to an uncanny degree. "At last I have come to this place -- a ship that can bear my hope of becoming a god!

" Ban Gongcuo gazed at the ship from beyond the heavens; even his mind, calm for ten thousand ages, was stirred, and lotuses bloomed beneath his every step as he walked toward the treasure ship.

The company came aboard and searched in every direction, when suddenly a great shaman discovered the open door and hurriedly reported it. Ban Gongcuo led the others into the room.

Several soldiers went ahead to scout the way and pushed the door open; suddenly the door behind them closed.

Those soldiers opened the door again and looked, but could find no trace of Ban Gongcuo and the rest. The people around Ban Gongcuo searched in all directions, and by degrees there were fewer and fewer of them.

Even though Ban Gongcuo cared nothing for their lives, at this moment he could not help feeling somewhat flustered. "Do not wander about!

" Ban Gongcuo's face was grave.

He examined the doors carefully, then laughed coldly: "The method of interlocking ruts -- space interlocking, layer clasped within layer. I once saw records of this art in Little Yujing; it is an art of the Kaihuang era!

" Shaman King Gongmu had not gone astray.

Hearing this he said joyfully, "Your Highness must know the way to break it! " Ban Gongcuo shook his head. "Little Yujing holds no record of how to break it. But the method of interlocking ruts is a school of spatial calculation arts, and my attainments in the way of calculation are very high -- I may say that even the Dao Lord of the Daoist sect is not necessarily my better.

Working out the way to break it will not be difficult for me! Let us go. I would like to see whether a god's interlocking method can hold me back! " In the treasure ship's study, Shen Mu closed the clan register.

"The last generation of the Kaihuang bloodline was called Shen Fengqing. Can the master of this ship be this Shen Fengqing?

The Shen family of the Kaihuang line, from Shen Ye down to Shen Fengqing, runs back far and unbroken -- this family was indeed a hereditary house. The master of this ship, Shen Fengqing, bears the surname Shen.

Is there some bond of blood between him and me? " He was about to put the register back on the shelf when, as though possessed, he stopped, and thrust the thick volume into his Taotie Pouch. He had just put the register away when he saw the old man from the painting crawl out from somewhere, run onto the desk, and appear upon the paper on its surface.

Shen Mu was about to catch this strange painted figure when suddenly a shadow flickered before his eyes: a young man appeared abruptly in front of the desk and walked toward him. Shen Mu had no time to dodge -- yet the young man passed straight through his body.

He was a phantom.

The man had an uncommon bearing, and his appearance gave Shen Mu a familiar sense of closeness.

Just so he passed through Shen Mu's body and emerged behind him. Startled, Shen Mu hurriedly turned.

The young man in white moved with unhurried ease, made the gesture of opening a door, and then vanished. Shen Mu rushed forward, and indeed saw a doorway.

He opened the door and went in, and again saw the man in white. This was a great hall within the tower ship; suddenly the empty, echoing hall was filled with people coming and going -- many people had walked out from somewhere.

Shen Mu was caught unprepared. Many people ran to and fro, passing through his body, greatly busied; some mishap must have befallen them.

Some of them could not keep their footing and were tossed this way and that by the jolting. It seemed the ship had suffered a collision -- this collision more violent still, so that many people were flung about the hall, and some were gravely hurt, making as if to vomit blood.

The man in white raised his hand, and all were fixed in midair, then slowly set down; though the ship shook violently, they still stood firm where they were. A woman of dignified and elegant bearing walked quickly toward the man in white.

What the two said to each other was unclear; the young man seemed to be soothing her in a low voice, and then walked outward.

Shen Mu's gaze fell upon the woman, and a look of doubt came over him. He felt an inexplicable familiarity; the sight of her gave him only a sense of closeness.

He hesitated a moment, then chose to follow the man in white. The man in white walked down the long corridor, passing through one doorway after another.

He stretched out a hand and beckoned, and a sword flew up and came to rest behind him, following him step for step. Shen Mu was slightly startled.

He roused his own Wuyou Sword; the Wuyou Sword trembled faintly, and seemed the very same sword as the one behind the man in white. The man in white walked to the bow of the ship, raised his head to look at the sky, and said something.

Suddenly the sky shook violently, and there appeared an incomparably vast serpent, its great mouth open. The serpent seemed immeasurably far from them, yet it was enormous; it appeared in the black sky showing only its head and neck, the rest of its body hidden in the darkness.

Upon the serpent's head stood dreadful beings, one after another -- not like humans, but like the god-statues in the temples of the wilderness ruins, except that these were living gods.

They were attacking the ship, and every blow felt as terrible as the annihilation of a world. Shen Mu was drawn in by the man in white's swordsmanship.

That swordsmanship was not like any sword art of the mortal world; it had a wondrous savor.

The savor it gave Shen Mu was like the Dao of which both the Village Head and the Dao Lord had spoken. The difference was that the Dao the Village Head spoke of was swordsmanship approaching the Dao, while the Dao the Dao Lord spoke of was mathematics approaching the Dao.

The path taken by this man in white's swordsmanship was unlike that of either the Village Head or the Dao Lord; another sword-Dao was contained within it, though what exactly it was Shen Mu could not tell.

His eye had not yet reached such a level. He watched, drunk with fascination. In the past, when he learned swordsmanship, he had always been learning -- learning the technique, bringing technique to its utmost, so that his sword art was enough to make him a champion.

But ever since the Village Head had made him succeed to the Human Sovereign and tempered his swordsmanship in the village, he had entered the stage of method, and begun to create sword arts of his own.