Chapter 359 — Worn Down to Death

In a duel to the death, what decides a fighter's strength is by no means only cultivation base, divine abilities, and techniques; it is also the mind, and it is also wisdom.

Of this Shen Mu had learned much from experience.

Many masters among the Daoist sects, when they face a duel to the death, will calm their hearts before the battle, burn incense and bathe; some will even sit in meditation for three days, sweeping every stray thought from their minds, letting no notion encroach upon the wisdom of their fighting, so that their wisdom comes full circle, whole and unclouded. Though Xu Shenghua claimed to have fought his way across the whole of the Heaven Above with no equal at his own realm, duels in the Heaven Above seldom came down to life and death. His experience on that score was pitifully slight; indeed, one might fairly call him a blank sheet of paper.

And the lower world, though in his eyes it was a "filthy" place, teemed with every manner of life-and-death struggle: whether towering figures like Daoist Master Lin Xuan and Ban Gongcuo, or young masters like Ling Yuxiu, Si Yunxiang, and Shen Wanyun, or long-renowned presences like the Imperial Preceptor Jingping and Emperor Yanfeng, every one of them had risen to prominence through the whetstone of life and death.

In the wisdom of battle they left Xu Shenghua far behind. Had it been Shen Mu, he would never have gone to study the structures of the parts and components of the Sun-Shooting Divine Cannon, its array diagrams and veins, on the eve of a life-and-death duel, for that drained the mind too grievously. When Shen Mu designed and forged the Sun-Shooting Divine Cannon, he summoned hundreds of masters of the mystic arts, along with all manner of great craftsmen and talents in the refining of treasures; he very nearly rebuilt the Directorate of Works from the ground up, and he pooled the wisdom of all these people to make the cannon. For Xu Shenghua to plumb the cannon's secrets, he must commit the pooled wisdom of all those men to memory in a short space of time; the drain upon his mental power can well be imagined. And a drain upon mental power must bring a drain upon strength, slowing one's speed of response in battle.

For a master like Shen Mu, even if Xu Shenghua's reactions lagged by a grain of dust, a mote, a shadow of a hair, that alone would be enough to decide victory and defeat.

In the Directorate of Works Xu Shenghua examined one by one the veins and structures upon those parts and components, calculating from them the form and the might of the cannon. The parts and components numbered in the tens of thousands, and the array markings and runes upon each differed from all the rest, the array patterns invoked all different; with no order to guide him, he must rely on his own formidable mental power to deduce and assemble them, which drained his mind the more.

Suddenly his head swam. He came to himself with a start, hurriedly shut his eyes; after a moment he opened them and looked toward Shen Mu. Shen Mu smiled and nodded to him. Shen Mu's smile was sunny, the smile of a big boy with no guile in him at all; yet in his eyes that radiant, sunlit smile looked utterly evil.

"Many thanks, Brother Shen.

I have learned a trick.

" Xu Shenghua steadied himself and walked over. As he walked, he strove with all his might to forget the array markings and runes he had just committed to memory. It was but mending the pen after the sheep had strayed, yet better than doing nothing at all. Shen Mu smiled faintly and walked out of the Directorate of Works, saying in an easy tone, "Does Brother Xu still think it so fine a thing to dwell in the Heaven Above?

" Xu Shenghua shook his head.

"Dwelling in the Heaven Above, never having known true battle, I truly find it hard to grow.

It is the turbid world that makes a man grow. Brother Shen, you grew up in this turbid world, and you are the strongest and most fearsome opponent I have ever met.

" The two walked shoulder to shoulder and stepped out onto the Tu River.

Behind them followed the four girls, Xue Hu'er, Ling Yuxiu, Yu Liu, and Jing Yan, who set foot upon the river's surface as well. And just then a great host of Daoists came out from the Directorate of Works, Daoist Master Lin Xuan at their head, and followed them step for step onto the river.

Daoist Master Lin Xuan's gaze was strange; passing over the four girls, it settled upon Shen Mu and Xu Shenghua as they walked upon the water.

"Daoist Master, both of those youths are very strong! " An old Daoist said in a low voice, "Sect Master Shen is one thing; his methods run deep. But what is the background of that other youth?

" "Xu Shenghua of the Heaven Above.

I met him when I was a guest at the Little Jade Capital with my master.

" Daoist Master Lin Xuan's eyes flickered. "He beat me in five moves.

" The hearts of the many Daoists of the sects were deeply shaken.

Even Shen Mu would not claim he could defeat Daoist Master Lin Xuan in five moves.

In recent years, cultivating under the old Daoist Master, Lin Xuan's attainments in the mystic arts had grown ever deeper, his understanding of the Daoist sword ever more profound.

His strength was in no way inferior to the old Daoist Master in his prime; indeed, he had surpassed it.

Daoist Master Lin Xuan did not slacken his pace.

Leading the host of Daoists onward, he said softly, "His techniques and divine abilities grow strong against the strong; that is the most fearsome thing about them. The stronger the opponent, the more they draw out the power of his divine abilities and his techniques. In the Little Jade Capital he defeated many.

I would very much like to know whether any man can receive his divine abilities, whether any man can force him to break through the limits of those techniques and abilities, until he has nothing left to break.

" "The Human Sovereign, perhaps, may be such a man. " His fighting spirit flared high of a sudden, but he held it in check and let it disturb neither of them. The river waters rolled on and on, and thus do all things pass away. Shen Mu and Xu Shenghua did not halt their steps, but walked on steadily, and soon came to the far bank without ever pausing.

"He is giving me a chance to rest. " Xu Shenghua had learned another trick, and his heart quivered faintly.

"He brought me to the Directorate of Works and made me waste my mental power, seizing the upper hand for himself.

And now he gives me a chance to rest, showing that he does not care whether my mental power is spent or not, because he holds the upper hand throughout.

A moment ago he drained my mind; now he presses me on the spiritual plane, so that in my heart I admit myself a notch weaker than he.

" Though he saw through Shen Mu's design, he had already fallen into Shen Mu's snare and could not struggle free. From the moment Shen Mu met him again and they drank together in the Listening to Rain Pavilion of the Flower Lane, the battle had already begun. From that hour he had entered Shen Mu's rhythm; by now Shen Mu's grand momentum was complete, and should the two come to blows, one might well imagine how overbearing, how gloriously unrestrained Shen Mu's onslaught would be. "The Tyrant Body is truly no common thing.

" Xu Shenghua steadied his mind, his gaze flickering.

"But I too bear a Tyrant Body.

Tyrant Body for Tyrant Body, I will not be weaker than he. " Their steps gradually took on an order of first and second: Shen Mu took a step, and Xu Shenghua followed a step.

Xu Shenghua was like his shadow, and the sight gave one a strange, uncanny feeling.

The four girls behind them saw it all: of the two big boys, one walked in front, showing his back to the man behind him, while the youth behind followed step for step, never seizing the chance to cut him down, but rather seeming tethered by a rope, drawn along helplessly in the other's wake.