Chapter 653 — The Heavenly Lord Trapped in the Seal

Shen Fengqing suddenly grew excited again, clapping his hands and running toward him on his little short legs, his voice milky and childish: "You hide, I seek. When I catch you I'll tear off your arms and legs! You can grow them back, so we can play for a long, long time!"

"The Heavenly Lord's radiance will cover the light-traces left by the tower-ship. That way we needn't worry about being noticed by the Heavenly Court."

Chi Xi looked behind him and let out a breath of relief. "Now the pursuers should be unable to track our movements."

Ban Gongcuo could not help but doubt. "Are there really pursuers?"

The First Ancestor Human Sovereign nodded. "This is a grand opportunity to find the remnants of the Chiming Divine Dynasty; the Heavenly Court will certainly not let it slip. When we left Luofu Heaven, we were already marked. Your cultivation is somewhat weaker, so you did not sense it, but I felt a gaze fixed upon us. Only when we entered the Heavenly Lord's Xuandu did we shake off that gaze."

Chi Xi said, "The one tracking us must be the Great Sun Star Lord."

The First Ancestor Human Sovereign was surprised. "Him? I do not know much about this Great Sun Star Lord, but I have heard that in the outer Heavenly Court, the Great Sun Star Lord is exceedingly swift, and that countless gods and demons serve under him. If it is he who tracks us, I fear we will find it hard to shake him off."

Chi Xi once more stirred the star chart. "If we avoid the suns along the way, we should be able to shake off this Star Lord."

Shen Mu's and Ling Yuxiu's primordial spirits danced together in the air. Shen Mu's primordial spirit said curiously, "I have seen the Sun Star Lord; his strength was not much to speak of — my Grandpa Tu cut him down with a single stroke. What sort is this Great Sun Star Lord?"

The First Ancestor Human Sovereign explained patiently, "The Great Sun Star Lord is not the same as the Sun Star Lord. The Sun Star Lord was merely a pawn, an ordinary deity of the Kaihuang Heavenly Court in those days, a god of the Sun-Herding clan, who later betrayed them and became a running dog of the outer Heavenly Court. The Great Sun Star Lord, by contrast, is said to be a god born from the sun itself, incomparably powerful. In this world there are the golden-crow spirit body, the fire-dragon spirit body, and the fire-crow spirit body — all cultivated in imitation of the Great Sun Star Lord's form. Once one becomes a god, one manifests a battle form, primordial spirit and flesh merging into one — that is the form of the Great Sun Star Lord. The Sun Star Lord's form, too, should be the form of the Great Sun Star Lord."

The two withdrew their primordial spirits, each returning to its body. Shen Mu's heart gave a small jolt, and he blurted out, "Like the Saturn Star Lord — an ancestral god?"

The First Ancestor Human Sovereign said, "You know the Saturn Star Lord? The Saturn Star Lord is one or two levels below the Great Sun Star Lord; she does not count as an ancestral god, and is neither as ancient nor as mighty as the Great Sun Star Lord. The Great Sun Star Lord is a titan of the outer Heavenly Court, whereas the Saturn Star Lord can only be counted a titan of some locality."

Shen Mu and the others half understood.

After the tower-ship left the Heavenly Lord's eye, they saw rays of light come racing along the light-traces left by the ship, rushing into Xuandu — but once there, the traces left by the tower-ship vanished.

"These fish that slipped through the net are truly cunning."

The light halted and transformed into a deity with bird wings and a human body: a bird's head with three eyes and three feet, a vertical eye on its forehead containing endless fire, as though a sun were hidden within that eye.

Its feet bore dragon scales; its wings were black phoenix wings, folded against its body like a long black robe hanging down to its feet.

This deity was immense, yet beside the Heavenly Lord it seemed utterly insignificant. Raising its head to look at the Heavenly Lord's eye, it said in a loud voice, "Heavenly Lord above, may I ask whether a ship has passed this way?"

The Heavenly Lord in Xuandu was very busy, overseeing the movements of the stars in all the worlds. After a long while, a mass of starlight suddenly welled up and became a figure of light whose face could not be made out, its voice rolling like thunder: "I oversee the stars and constellations of all the heavens, and I have not seen it. Upon the many stars of my Xuandu there are soldiers and generals of the Heavenly Court; go and ask them."

The Great Sun Star Lord begged pardon: "I have disturbed the Heavenly Lord. Forgive me." With that he beat his wings and departed.

The figure of light likewise dispersed.

Not long after, all at once the stars upon the Heavenly Lord's body blazed with light, and tens of thousands of gods and demons flew out from those suns. The many suns seemed strung into lines by the divine light given off by the gods in flight, as they searched in every direction for the tower-ship's whereabouts.

"Caw — caw — caw —"

That was a sky-blotting host of fire-crow god-men: crow heads on human bodies, fiery red crow wings sprouting from their backs, each carrying a quiver of arrows, each gripping a great vermilion gourd in his hands, three bird claws clutching great bows — and their speed was extraordinary.