Chapter 645 — The Primordial Creation Ring

Shen Mu stared blankly at the great fish — each with three heads and six fins — swimming through the ancient ruins on the seafloor. His mind reeled, and the words burst from him: "You mean these fish are the gods and demons of the Chiming Era?"

"Not only fish. Other sea beasts as well!"

The First Ancestor Human Emperor looked elsewhere, where colossal sea monsters also drifted — three heads, six arms, with great webbed membranes grown between the arms; as they swam, the membranes fanned up and down, driving them swiftly, and they moved through the water with extraordinary agility.

Beyond these sea beasts there were even sea-serpent demons with three heads and six arms — some with the heads of men, some of women — bearing arms and flat serpent tails, also swimming toward the ruins.

Shen Mu also saw walking plants, like coral, or like other sea-trees, each with three crowns, and the branches splitting from each trunk invariably numbering six.

And in the water drifted sea anemones, jellyfish, and other strange things, likewise three-headed and six-armed; some jellyfish even bore faces!

Their roots and tendrils swam, as though they had heard some call beyond all perception, and they came swimming toward the undersea ruins.

"They haven't kept their sentience?" Shen Mu said in astonishment.

These strange sea beasts and great fish paid them no heed, only wandering aimlessly through the ruins, giving out cries now deep and drawn-out, now short and fierce.

They did not take Shen Mu and the First Ancestor for intruders; surely they had not awakened their sentience, but were muddled and dim, come only in answer to a summons.

"They have no sentience."

The First Ancestor Human Emperor led him before one of the great fish. The creature, dull and dazed, measured the two tiny figures before it with its huge eyes, soon lost interest, and swam away with a flick of its tail.

"This is the only way they could escape the Heavenly Court's pursuit and slaughter."

The First Ancestor Human Emperor sighed. "Like those of the Kaihuang Era, they must have suffered a devastating blow, utterly defeated, with no strength left to resist. So they simply turned themselves into sea beasts and sea monsters devoid of thought or consciousness, showing the Heavenly Court that they posed no threat — and thus escaped the calamity."

The gods and demons of the Chiming Era had altered the form of their bodies; their primal spirits too must have been sealed, and they became living things of the sea. Stripped of their divine strength and divine abilities, they naturally posed no threat.

Thus they survived.

Another group of the Chiming Era's gods and demons had gone far away to foreign lands, seeking a place where they might dwell and multiply.

"The one calling them here is Chixi — he has come to this place! Could he have some means to restore these giant beasts of the Chiming Era to their true bodies and awaken their consciousness once more?"

Shen Mu mused, "No wonder he kept saying he had to return to the ancestral land. If all these giant beasts are gods and demons, then in an instant Divine Man Chixi could gather an army of gods and demons tens of thousands strong! Then Jingping..."

He could not help but shiver.

More and more strange beasts gathered in the sea, of every bizarre kind. If all these colossal sea creatures were to transform into three-headed, six-armed gods and demons and come ashore, Jingping would be the first to bear the brunt!

Jingping had no few gods and demons of its own, but since it had risen only recently, their number surely did not yet reach twenty, and at this moment most of them were in Taihuang Heaven warring against the demon race. One could well imagine that if the gods and demons of the Chiming Era came ashore, Emperor Yanfeng would weep and wail to heaven and earth.

Suddenly, rays of light burst forth from the center of the ruins.

Hum—

The sphere of light swelled, and with the seawater it struck Shen Mu and the First Ancestor. Shen Mu vaguely felt as though he had been sifted fine by that radiance; his vital essence and primal spirit, his four limbs and hundred bones, all quivered — a quiver most subtle, yet most profound, as though the tiniest particles of his flesh had been stirred into endless vibration, giving both body and primal spirit a tingling numbness.

Hum, hum, hum!

Ring after ring of light swelled from the heart of the ruins, sweeping over them one after another. The seawater surged, and yet these rings of light pushed the water aside, the spheres propping up a vast barrier; within the ruins not a trace of water could be seen — even the ground was dry!

Bang, bang, bang — one colossal beast after another fell from the air, crashing down into the ruins, some onto the palaces, some headlong into the streets; for a moment the scene was utter chaos.

There was no air inside the sphere of light. The giant beasts gaped their mouths, trying to gulp down breath, and drew in nothing. Some of the three-headed, six-finned great fish shook their heads and tails, working their fins to crawl outward; many sea-trees and plants too moved their roots, striving to break out of the ruins — but the sea beasts ran faster.

Just then a pillar of light shot up from the place where the radiance had burst forth, piercing the sea above and opening a passage; a wild wind came howling through it, pouring into this undersea divine city.

The giant beasts at once found relief, though the great fish still could not breathe and kept crawling outward.

Then Shen Mu and the First Ancestor saw the ground at the place where the light pillar had erupted suddenly begin to quake, and a vast wheel rose slowly. Then came a crack-crack of splitting from within the wheel, and a second wheel appeared inside it, then a third, a fourth...

Upon every wheel appeared rune-structures of the utmost intricacy, and there in the center of the wheels stood the three-headed, six-armed god-demon Chixi, his six arms spread to the four directions.

At once the wheels began to turn, and with Divine Man Chixi as their center, ring after ring revolved; the runes upon them blazed alight, and one brilliant rune-symbol after another flew out, shining in all directions!

Shen Mu immediately saw a rune fall upon a three-headed, six-armed sea beast, and upon that beast's body a rune-mark appeared as well — a mark like a lock of inconceivable complexity, link within link; it must be a seal. As the runes of the wheel shone upon this seal, the lock opened layer by layer!

"Not good! He means to unseal these gods and demons of the Chiming Era and restore them to their true bodies!"

Shen Mu acted at once. He patted the Taotie Pouch, and bright mirrors flew out one after another — mirrors he ordinarily used to tidy his appearance. There were not many, only five or six.

Then Shen Mu brought out the sword pellet. The pellet swelled, and with a hum eight thousand swords assembled into one vast mirror, gleaming with bright light.

The First Ancestor Human Emperor hastily stopped him, puzzled. "What are you doing?"

"Breaking the art!"

Shen Mu spoke swiftly: "Divine Man Chixi is using the runes on the wheels to shine upon these giant beasts and undo the seals on them, returning them to god-demon bodies. I need only let those runes shine upon the mirrors — the runes reflected back will be reversed, and so he will be unable to unseal these sealed gods and demons!"

The First Ancestor Human Emperor stared, eyes wide with astonishment. After a moment he said in praise, "This divine weapon of Divine Man Chixi is a creation divine weapon, and the runes upon it are inconceivably complex. If I wished to break them, it would cost me great effort — and yet you have thought up so simple a way to undo them. You have not only an Overlord Body, but an incomparably clever Overlord brain. Still, there is no need for such trouble. Let him undo the seals."