Chapter 449 — The Girl on the Wooden Chest

The woman wore black robes and a black skirt, silver ornaments in her hair, and more than a dozen silver bracelets hung at her wrists, each strung with little bells; her bearing was uncommon, and in a moment someone had taken the portrait from her hand and hung it on the notice board. The woman from the True Heaven Palace looked down upon the crowd from on high and said, "The fugitive from the Desolate Ruins is of the utmost importance.

In a few days he will come through the Flame Desert. You must all be on your guard these next days. If you see the man in the portrait, do not raise a cry, lest you frighten him off.

" Xiong Qi'er ran over to look, and Shen Mu hurriedly caught her little hand lest she be lost in the crowd.

Before the notice board the people were a mountain and a sea, packed so tight no water could have passed; Xiong Qi'er tugged at his hand and squeezed to the very front, and Shen Mu looked up and saw that the man in the portrait was himself, and written upon it were the words: Shen Mu, fugitive of the Desolate Ruins. Xiong Qi'er was startled and delighted.

"Fat Dragon," she said, "there's you beside big brother too — only me they've left out!

" The clamor around them had been like a boiling cauldron; now of a sudden it fell to utter silence, and every head turned as one to look at Shen Mu.

Shen Mu seemed not to notice. He looked at the notice board and laughed.

"This is Ban Gongcuo's work — he painted it himself.

Xing An has a portrait of me in his hand as well, also painted by him.

I know his brush.

" Crash — all at once a great space opened around him; the crowd scattered, and the farther from him they got the better.

Shen Mu did not mind. He laughed and said, "The Venerable One still has wide acquaintance, and knows a great many people. A pity he ran too fast; I never got to kill him.

" "Fugitive of the Desolate Ruins, die! " A shout of fury came from behind him, and with a whoosh the tree-man raised its vast foot and stamped down at Shen Mu.

Tree-men are heavy beyond measure and possessed of enormous strength, and since trees are plentiful and cheap, the divine-arts practitioners of the Western Lands often choose a tree-man as their mount and their weapon both. The tree-man this True Heaven Palace woman disciple had chosen was surely a rare breed among trees: branches, trunk, and leaves all crimson as blood, and to judge by its stance it had been tempered by long years of battle, its form strict and disciplined. Shen Mu reached out and seized; a ball of blue light flew from within the tree-man's body, and it froze where it stood — its soul had been snatched away by Shen Mu's hand.

Xiong Xiyu had taught him the Myriad Gods Natural Art, and though he thought it less suited to men than to women, he had still put in hard labor at it. The True Heaven Palace woman was startled.

The silver ornaments in her hair flew up of a sudden and became a silver phoenix that charged at Shen Mu, and the silver bracelets at her wrists came clattering off to slip over his head.

Flame surged around Shen Mu's body; before the silver phoenix and the silver bracelets could reach him they melted, and became a pool of silver on the ground. Seeing the ill turn of things, the True Heaven Palace woman took flight at once, rising and falling several times, and her robes of themselves snapped and flapped in the wind, carrying her aloft — she had no need to learn any spell of flight.

"The Myriad Gods Natural Art is truly marvelous," Shen Mu said, flicking his fingers several times in admiration, "letting one's clothes carry one through the air.

It seems I have underestimated this art after all.

" The woman gave a muffled groan and fell from the sky.

"Calamity!

" The crowd around them fled pell-mell, crying, "A base man is going to kill the Lady!

" Shen Mu looked about him: the street was empty in an instant, every house with doors sealed and windows shut, not a soul to be seen; only Dragon Qilin and Xiong Qi'er still stood at his side, and not far off the True Heaven Palace woman lay sprawled on the ground, knocked silly by her fall. "Do you know the way to the True Heaven Palace? " Shen Mu stepped forward and asked, his face amiable.

The True Heaven Palace woman flipped upright of a sudden, and the hairpins in her hair shot like swords at his eyes, while her body darted swiftly sideways to a house beside the street, where she raised a hand and tore the god-image from the plaque above the door.

Boom — the house rose to its feet of a sudden and became a giant; two small side-rooms became the house-giant's fists, and it smashed down at Shen Mu with a roar. The hairpins halted before Shen Mu's eyes; layer upon layer of array patterns revolved in his pupils, and the hairpins melted, becoming drops of silver that fell to the ground.

Shen Mu looked up, starlight kindling in his eyes, and turned his gaze upon the house-giant that had torn itself from the earth; through the windows he saw the family within, old and young, trembling and not daring to move.

"I knew that god-image was useless.

" Two beams of light shot from his eyes and swept over the True Heaven Palace woman. "As one who wields divine arts," he said calmly, "you give no thought to these common people.

That I hold in contempt. " The two beams grew shorter and shorter, drawing back into his eyes; the madly spinning array patterns in them vanished, and the motes of starlight dimmed one by one.

The house-giant crashed down and became once more a round house, swaying twice.

Shen Mu turned to leave, and the woman on the roof stood rigid, not daring to move a muscle. Shen Mu picked up Xiong Qi'er and leapt onto Dragon Qilin's back.

The woman still stood on the roof; from below came suddenly the sound of a door opening, and the True Heaven Palace woman's face showed panic.

In a low voice she said, "Do not open the door.

.

. " Creak.

The door opened slowly, and the sound shook her; the woman shrieked, "Do not open the door —" Her vital energy could no longer hold her body together.

A line of blood appeared at her neck and another at her waist, and the two halves of her body slid apart from the waist and rolled down into the street; then the two legs below the waist fell from the roof as well.

"The Hierarch is truly merciful. " Outside the small town, Dragon Qilin could not help praising him.

"That woman struck so viciously, and yet the Hierarch.

.

. " He had barely got this far when he heard the woman's shriek from the town behind them, and hurriedly turned his head to look; he saw just the sight of her lower half tumbling down, and could not help a shudder.

Shen Mu said with feeling, "It is not mercy in me. For one who wields divine arts to strike at common folk is a taboo to begin with. We are all human — by what right are you a cut above, free to take lives as you please? In the Kingdom of Jingping and in the Desolate Ruins, when those who wield divine arts fought among themselves, they seldom brought harm on the innocent. Even in my struggle with Ban Gongcuo, we fought outside the city walls.

When Granny Zhu fought the Lord of Crimson Dragon City in Crimson Dragon City, it too was above the city, not a reckless brawl in the streets.

" Dragon Qilin shut his mouth and said no more. He had meant to praise Shen Mu's mercy in not taking the True Heaven Palace woman's life, and had not expected that the woman would die at Shen Mu's hand after all — and that the mercy Shen Mu spoke of was for the common folk.

From childhood Shen Mu had been taught by the Nine Elders of Yincan Village, by word and by example; though he bore the name of Hierarch of the Nether Demon Cult, he drew the line between great right and great wrong very clearly. In this alone he surpassed many a righteous man of the famous sects and great schools.

"Qi'er should know where the True Heaven Palace is, shouldn't she?

" Shen Mu asked.