Chapter 138 — The Debate on Smiting the Gods

Danyang Zi rose to his feet and looked toward the battle between Shen Mu and Daoist Son Lin Xuan; as for the strange beast beneath the mountain gate, half dragon and half qilin, it had long since lost interest in the affair and had gone back to sleeping soundly. "The Daoist Son cannot hold out; he means to bring out his full strength," Danyang Zi thought, and his heart tightened.

Shen Mu's attacks were simply too swift and too overbearing: once he seized the initiative he gave his opponent no room to breathe, hammering away until the man conceded or died.

In vital qi, Daoist Son Lin Xuan could gain no advantage whatever, and in technique too he was pressed into the inferior position; having sealed his own Six Realms Divine Treasury, many of his moves and divine powers were beyond his use, and his only chance now lay in invoking the sect-guarding sword art of the Daoist sect. Only the sect-guarding sword art could alter the shape of things and turn defeat into victory.

But even Danyang Zi did not know whether Lin Xuan, at the Five Luminaries Divine Treasury stage, could bring forth the sect-guarding sword art. The sect-guarding sword art of the Daoist sect demanded an exceedingly high vital qi and consumed a great deal of it, and Danyang Zi judged that Lin Xuan would likely manage only a single stroke of it before his vital qi was drained away to nothing. No sooner had he thought this than the dust-threads in Lin Xuan's hand began to change—a wondrous change it was.

Part of his threads turned black, part turned white, spreading out through the air; black and white flowed slowly, like a scroll of the Taiji diagram surfacing in the sky.

The sect-guarding sword art of the Daoist sect, first form of the Fourteen Dao Sword Chapters: one point pierces and joins the vast movement; within the Two Modes, yin and yang turn back and forth!

① Lin Xuan's arm quivered, and the black-and-white diagram pressed downward! Danyang Zi let out a breath, well pleased: Lin Xuan was a Daoist Son, after all; by virtue of his own deep and mighty cultivation he had brought forth the sect-guarding sword art even at the Five Luminaries stage.

You must understand that of those in the Daoist sect who studied the sect-guarding sword art there were not a few, but few indeed ever perfected it; and of those who perfected it, scarcely one in many could bring it forth at the Five Luminaries stage. The art consumed too much; not to speak of the Five Luminaries stage, even at the Divine Power stage it was hard to perform. Moreover, cultivating this sword art demanded the highest gifts and comprehension, and the greatest of those demands was the arts of calculation.

The Ten Chapters of the Arithmetic Classic alone were enough to give a man a splitting headache, and beyond the Arithmetic Classic there were the deeper and more abstruse texts of that discipline, the Great Expansion Numeric Art and the Jade Mirror of the Four Unknowns.

② Yet Lin Xuan, the Daoist Son, was a talent outstanding among them, thoroughly versed in the arts of calculation; at a very young age he had already reached the highest attainments in them, and with such a foundation he learned the Fourteen Dao Sword Chapters more easily than anyone else.

Of the Fourteen Dao Sword Chapters, each was harder than the last; by the fourteenth, the Dao Sword itself, hardly anyone could perfect it—even the Sect Master of this age had not perfected the Fourteenth Sword. Yet the Sect Master held great hopes for Lin Xuan, believing that one day he might perfect the Fourteenth Sword.

The Sect Master had once even lent the Fourteen Dao Sword Chapters of the Daoist sect to Imperial Preceptor Jingping for his perusal; in Imperial Preceptor Jingping's Discourse on the Sword, where he spoke of the Dao Sword and the Son of Heaven's Three Swords, one might well say the shadow of the Fourteen Dao Sword Chapters lay everywhere. So you may imagine how formidable this single stroke of Lin Xuan's was! Beneath the black-and-white diagram, Shen Mu felt a shock in his heart; the sword art pressing down from above was no longer any mortal sword art.

Yin and yang, the Two Modes, entwining one another, the force it burst forth made him tremble before it had even reached his side.

His fingertips flicked; the move Snapping Fingers Startle the Thunder made every finger discharge a thunderous roar, sharp beyond compare—but even a top-grade combat skill like the Eight Secrets of the Thunder Cry was useless once it touched that black-and-white Taiji diagram; it was like a clay ox plunging into the sea, raising not the slightest ripple. With a rush—beneath his feet the azure dragon soared into the air, and of a sudden the azure dragon broke apart, and countless sword lights came crowding and jostling, falling into his hand and becoming a long sword.

Shen Mu's face turned grave; sword in hand, he advanced to meet the pressing black-and-white Taiji diagram. With the sword in his hand, as though it were the painter's finest brush, the traveler's firmest step, the singer's throat, the dancer's dance, he executed that one sword form the village headman had taught him. Sword Treads the Rivers and Mountains.

May the gods be smitten? It is said: they may!

Beneath his sword the light flickered; light and dark, light and heavy, swift and slow, perfectly joined; the fourteen basic sword forms shifted and changed in his hand in an instant, and there appeared in the air a vast and magnificent landscape!

The Fourteen Dao Sword Chapters of the Daoist sect were no mortal sword art, and neither was the sword diagram the village headman had taught him. This was a sword art for smiting gods!

May the gods be smitten?

He who wields this sword must have no god, no demon, no Buddha in his heart; toward the so-called gods, demons, and Buddhas he must hold the utmost irreverence—he must hold the heart of a god-smiter! Danyang Zi's eye corners twitched, and he rose abruptly to his feet; at the same moment the half-dragon, half-qilin beast beneath the mountain gate woke from its dreams and jerked its head up to look!

In the air the two sword arts collided, a blaze of dazzling white; the black-and-white Taiji diagram fell apart amid the slowly unfolding landscape, and in an instant Daoist Son Lin Xuan was struck by dozens of swords, his body blotched with blood! Suddenly his eyes lit up: "A flaw! " Shen Mu caught his gaze and was startled.

The youth's eyes had fallen upon his left shoulder—and that spot was precisely where the flaw of the Mystic Body Three Elixir Art lay!

"Qi ke duo! " Shen Mu raised a hand and formed a seal: the Demon God's Divine Power Seal!

That seal blocked his left shoulder, while from Shen Mu's other hand sword light surged, stabbing at Lin Xuan!

Shhk—Lin Xuan's sword pierced through his palm, and its tip struck his left shoulder, stopped by the brocade robe Shen Mu wore and not entering flesh and blood—but the sword radiance itself stabbed in, and Shen Mu's shoulder seared with pain. At the same moment Lin Xuan's body gave a great shudder, swaying without cease; in an instant a score and more of bloody holes opened across his body, and he pitched to the ground!

Shen Mu dispersed the sharp sword his vital qi had formed and bowed with his hands: "Daoist Son, I thank you for the instruction.

" Lin Xuan struggled to his feet, the blood holes on his body still bleeding; Danyang Zi rushed forward with a cry, about to apply medicine, but Lin Xuan raised a hand to stop him, straightened his robes, and returned the salute: "I thank you for the teaching.

" That said, he swallowed a pill.