Chapter 476 — A Floating Life in the Mirror

He had barely thought it when, a dozen li away, a lotus pushed up out of the desert and silently bloomed. Shen Mu rushed over at full speed. His vital essence erupted; he flicked a finger, and the sword core howled forward. He extended his index finger and spun it rapidly. The sword core ahead split apart with a ringing clash, and eight thousand flying swords became a madly whirling torrent, racing ahead of him toward the lotus ten li away!

The Circling Sword Art!

The sword-light was incredibly fast, faster than Shen Mu's own full-tilt run, and in an instant it reached the lotus. The lotus bloomed, and Ban Gongcuo leaped out, suddenly producing a black cloth. He shook it in the wind, then jumped into the cloth. Countless flying swords shredded the lotus to pieces and then engulfed the black cloth, reducing it to powder—yet Ban Gongcuo vanished once more.

Shen Mu landed with a crash and turned to look around. Above his head, the eight thousand swords arrayed themselves in a circle, tips pointing outward—wherever Ban Gongcuo emerged, he would meet Shen Mu's most ferocious assault! Yet the desert around him was utterly still. Ban Gongcuo had slipped into the cloth and seemed to vanish from the world.

In the distance, sandstorms rolled. Xizhou, along with countless sand dragons, hid within them. Lightning flashed and thunder roared; black suns kept smashing out from the storms with power that shook heaven and earth. The shockwaves even reached Shen Mu's position, forming one hurricane after another that whipped up red sand across the sky, making it impossible to see far. And at the head of the sandstorm was the small figure of Imperial Preceptor Jingping.

Shen Mu paid no attention to the battle over there. He suddenly stamped his foot hard; the desert trembled, and a small whirlwind of sand grains formed a dune "giant" only four or five feet tall. The Myriad Gods Natural Art—Shen Mu had learned it too, though not as exquisitely as the disciples of the Palace of True Heaven.

"Where is Ban Gongcuo hiding?" Shen Mu asked.

The little dune "giant" raised a hand and pointed. Shen Mu looked in the direction it indicated but saw nothing.

"The Danxiao Heaven Eye!"

Layers of formation patterns spun in his eyes. He looked again and started slightly—there, standing perfectly straight in the air, was a barely perceptible thin line drifting on the wind, not moving very fast. The wind and sand around them were fierce, yet the thin line did not bend in the slightest—strange indeed.

Shen Mu quickened his pace, reaching the line in a few bounds. It was no line at all, but a mirror so thin it had almost no thickness, a little taller than a man. Ban Gongcuo had used the Shadow Demon-Transformation Art of the Great Nurturing Dark Demon Sutra to become a black shadow and enter the mirror!

Shen Mu stared. He grabbed a flying sword and thrust at the mirror, saying in admiration, "Venerable One, no wonder you've survived this long."

Ban Gongcuo's expression changed drastically when he saw him. He tossed out a rope within the mirror; the rope hung straight up, and Ban Gongcuo grabbed it and began climbing. Shen Mu's thrust pierced the mirror, shattering it—but Ban Gongcuo had already climbed the rope out of the mirror and vanished.

"What divine art is this?"

Shen Mu activated the Danxiao Heaven Eye and scanned all around, but still could not find Ban Gongcuo. A thought stirred in him; he picked up a shard of the mirror and shone it around. As the shard moved, he finally caught Ban Gongcuo's trail once more. Ban Gongcuo had climbed the rope into the sky, and at its end was a hook caught on a white cloud. It seemed he intended to climb into the cloud and hide. Strangely, both he and the rope seemed invisible, as though hidden in some strange space within the mirror—yet that space overlapped with reality, and his rope could catch on things in the real world, so that even the Danxiao Heaven Eye could not see him.

"The Venerable One truly has become a master of escape."

Shen Mu could not help but marvel. Holding the mirror in one hand, he flicked the fingers of the other, and the Carefree Sword howled out, shooting high into the sky to sever the invisible rope beneath the white cloud.

Shen Mu grabbed another shard of mirror and, with a flick of his hand, threw it to where Ban Gongcuo would fall. With a thud, Ban Gongcuo hit the ground and landed right in the mirror, and looking up, he saw Shen Mu outside it.

"Venerable One, shall we talk now?" Shen Mu said with a smile, picking up the mirror.