Chapter 342 — Heart-Piercing Pain

Linxuan Daozhe was the first to collect himself. He raised a hand to stay Shen Mu and said, with utter sincerity, "Sect Master Shen must not leave! You came bearing the golden book, and this is plainly no simple matter of letting a poor Daoist read it for three days—you are baiting a hook for me! Since you have already cast the bait and I have already taken it, why not sit down and talk it through in full?"

All those old Daoist priests and Daoist nuns nodded and said as one voice, "Talk it through! There is nothing we cannot talk through!"

"We are all cultivators of the Dao, all qi-refiners—there is nothing we cannot discuss!"

"The righteous path and the demonic path are both the Dao. One family!"

Linxuan Daozhe invited Shen Mu to be seated, and at once an old Daoist nun went to brew tea and served it to them. Shen Mu drank and said with a smile, "Fine tea—only a little beneath what Heaven drinks. What tea is this? Might I be given some?"

"Given!" The old nun grinned, baring the few teeth she had left. "This is our sect's Sky-Blue Precious Fragrance. Only tea plucked from bushes growing by the Jade Void Spring may be called Sky-Blue Precious Fragrance. There are but three bushes along the spring, and a year's yield is no more than a few catties! How many catties does Sect Master Shen want?"

Shen Mu set down his herb basket, invited the headman out, and poured him tea. "Grandpa Headman, does it suit your taste?"

"Sky-Blue Precious Fragrance is light in fragrance but its aftertaste lingers long—of course it suits me!" The headman laughed. "Even the emperor never gets to drink this tea! Then let's start with one catty, and when spring comes next year we'll drink the new leaf."

Shen Mu said to the old nun, "Wrap up a catty so I can taste it. The pre-Qingming picking."

The old nun hurried off and returned in a moment carrying a large package of tea.

Shen Mu put the tea away, looked around, and said, "This Daoist sect is rather poor, it seems."

An old Daoist priest said hastily, "Not poor! We had some private wealth once, it is true, but it was stolen later on. Sect Master Shen, this golden book of yours, this precious scroll..."

"Oh, that's my old Shen family's."

Shen Mu laid the golden book and precious scroll to one side. "There was some friction between me and the Daoist sect from the first. I have long meant to come up the mountain and make amends, only I never managed it. I have come today, first, to let Daoist Lord Lin read the book, and second, in the hope of dissolving that old grudge."

"Sect Master Shen need say no more!" Linxuan the Daoist Lord said gravely. "Grudges can be dissolved, but the contention over doctrine cannot be dissolved. Even if the grudge is settled today, in days to come a quarrel will rise again over doctrine, and fresh grudges will pile upon the old. Let Sect Master Shen speak instead of this golden book."

Shen Mu marveled inwardly at how clearly the man saw. "Daoist Lord Lin, your gaze goes deep as an abyss; Shen admires you. Then let us speak today of this golden book and precious scroll. Recorded within it are three sets of methods—the Magpie Bridge, the Mystic Guiding, and the Spirit Crossing—methods for joining the seventh divine treasury, the Spirit Bridge treasury. Why I brought this book here, you should all be able to guess."

"So it is indeed a method for repairing the Spirit Bridge!"

The old Daoists and nuns were shaken to the heart, stirred beyond all composure.

To repair the Spirit Bridge, break the final shackle, and become a god—that was the long-cherished wish of who knew how many, and the lofty ones of the Daoist sect were no exception!

What the Daoist sect called cultivating immortality was no more than a convenient pretext.

—Immortal is the language of Little Jade Capital. The lofty ones of Little Jade Capital and the lofty ones of the Daoist sect have long visited one another; they name themselves immortals, men within the mountains, untouched by worldly affairs, purer and loftier even than the Daoist sect.

The instant these old priests and nuns set eyes on the golden book and precious scroll, they were shaken by the Magpie Bridge method written there, and at once understood it to be a way of repairing the Spirit Bridge, exquisite to the final degree. That was why they had gone three days without sleep, without food, without rest.

Now Shen Mu had made plain that this golden book and precious scroll was a method for repairing the Spirit Bridge and joining it to the heavenly court, and it nearly stirred in them once more the urge to seize it by force.

But one glance at the old man beside him, limbless yet still able to drink tea, and every one of them cooled again.

Three days before, that old man who had crawled out of the basket had given them a single look, and in that look they had seen the uttermost limit of swordsmanship.

At the time, meeting the old man's eyes, they had seemed to see a sword come driving at them, leaving them nowhere to dodge, no way to evade, no guard to raise, no opening to break; and so, one by one, they had turned their eyes from the old man's gaze.

They were renowned elders of the Daoist sect; though not beings of the old Daoist Lord's caliber, they were figures of sect-master rank, supreme in swordsmanship—yet this old man made them feel that if they moved to snatch the book by force, they would surely die with no ground to be buried in.

Linxuan the Daoist Lord's eyes flickered, his vital qi surged, and in the air he laid out a model of the stars of the celestial cycle, arts of number hidden within it. "Sect Master Shen, solve it, if you please."

Shen Mu smiled faintly, knowing the man was testing his mastery of the arts of number. If Shen Mu knew nothing of such arts, the Daoist sect could sit and raise its price. Only if his command of them proved exceedingly high, so that the sect understood it could be done without, would they be willing to help him.

"This is the art of the Great Celestial Cycle's star-lattice chess transformations."

Shen Mu's fingers moved, tapping here and there among the stars of the cycle. "The Great Cycle has three hundred and sixty-five stars, and hidden among them is a three hundred and sixty-sixth—the throne of the Jade Emperor, Lord of Heaven. You did not mark the Jade Emperor, so that I would work out the Jade Emperor's star number. Is that not so?"

As the words left him, Shen Mu traced a star among the celestial cycle with his vital qi. "Here is the Jade Emperor's star number!"

Within the Jade Void Temple, the old priests and nuns were shaken to the core. They exchanged glances. "The Nether Demon Sect Master's mastery of the arts of number is exceedingly high, and he solved it so swiftly! If he works out the Jade Emperor's star number this easily, then reckoning the methods in the golden book will likely be no difficulty for him—only a matter of time."

Linxuan the Daoist Lord dispersed his vital qi and said, wary, "Since Sect Master Shen can solve it himself, why come to our Daoist sect?"

"I can solve it alone, but it would take a very long time, and I cannot wait so long." Shen Mu said gravely, "And I also need the Daoist sect's masters to help me compute the spatial-numerical model of a divine cannon. Both undertakings require many adepts of the arts of number. If the Daoist sect aids me, then the three methods for repairing the Spirit Bridge and the spatial numerology—the Daoist sect may keep a copy of each!"

Within the Jade Void Temple, all drew a long breath, and yet the air fell silent.

Shen Mu put away the golden book and precious scroll and rose. "If the Daoist Lord is so inclined, come and wait for me at the Imperial Academy in the capital. I must make a trip to Little Jade Capital and bring back several adepts of calculation from there. Oh—Daoist Lord Lin, might you gift me a copy of the Dark Maiden's Canon of Calculation?"

"Trivial." Linxuan the Daoist Lord ordered it fetched and gave it to Shen Mu.