Chapter 154 — Breaking the Will

" Libationer Bashan suddenly soared into the air, the radiance pouring off him like a saber a hundred zhang long cleaving the sky, and fled far away; his voice came from the distance: "The people here are of too low a cultivation; I fear that if you and I crossed hands, the shock would kill them.

Come, you and I will fight in the Snow Mountains!

" That middle-aged great shaman looked toward the Shaman Venerable.

The Shaman Venerable rose and said gravely: "Go! " Swish — Golden lights one after another tore into the sky, chasing straight after that saber-light, racing into the Snow Mountains.

Vast stood the high mountains, boundless the white snow, when of a sudden golden light blazed out and burned the great snow to meltwater; within the golden light flashed a snow-bright saber-light. There was a battle that shook heaven and earth — but by the time it reached Loulan's Golden Palace, only the faintest tremor remained. Beneath the mountain gate of the Golden Palace, Shen Mu turned and looked toward Simuluo, descending from before the sacred hall of the Golden Palace.

Libationer Bashan had drawn away many of the Golden Palace's experts, no doubt to make it easier for him to go and seek Zai Fu's lower body; yet before the sacred hall there still remained several elders of the Golden Palace's older generation.

Simuluo's face was grave, but there was a certain excitement in his eyes.

His body too was golden.

Just now, while Shen Mu fought those shamans, he had watched from the side. The reason he had not stepped forward at once was, apart from seeing whether Shen Mu had any flaw, that these shamans' wheel-attacks on Shen Mu would wear down Shen Mu's cultivation and give him a greater chance at victory.

Now he had found Shen Mu's flaw, and Shen Mu had fought more than forty men without pause; his chance had come.

Shen Mu's face was like an old well without waves, calm as though he had not just passed through more than forty vicious battles. Suddenly the two men moved as one; the primal qi beneath Shen Mu's feet burst forth, his speed immense, and in an instant he was before Simuluo, striking out a fist.

Alone in the Eastern Sea, Carrying Spring Thunder! Simuluo took his punch full, yet it burst forth with a sound like a great bell and a grand chime.

Shen Mu at once felt that his fist-force — surging like a great river pouring into the sea — had struck a wall of bronze and iron; not half of it could pass through. Simuluo's body seemed forged of the hardest metal, and of the solid kind at that.

Simuluo's body shook, and suddenly he became a bird-headed man with a human body, twin wings sprouting from his back.

Those wings blazed with golden light, composed of countless golden swords, and the golden swords rang shrilly as they cut forward! Shen Mu's footwork tangled as he fell back, and from the sword-pack at his back flying sword after flying sword came free of its sheath to meet the cutting sword-feathers.

Suddenly he noticed that Simuluo's two wings were no ordinary thing: between each sword-shaped feather ran a thread of primal qi.

His heart quivered, and he knew at once that it was bad. Whoosh — The sharp swords that made up Simuluo's wings suddenly swelled and flew off from the wings, stabbing at Shen Mu from all directions.

On each of those golden swords there grew, remarkably, a black eye, rolling and rolling — eerie, sinister.

Every one of these golden swords held a soul, bound within the blade, turned into a spirit in the sword. Shen Mu's gaze fell upon those eyes, and of a sudden his head swam and his sight blurred.

Knowing it was bad, he shut his eyes at once and reached out to draw his saber.

Night Slash of a Thousand Cities' Wind and Rain! His saber-light was swift, wheeling and flying around him — before and behind, above and below — and a ringing clash of blade on blade came without cease.

The words "night battle" in Night Slash of a Thousand Cities' Wind and Rain already showed that this move needed no eyes to watch the four quarters.

Simuluo's swords were exceedingly strange; let your gaze fall on them and you were struck.

So this move was the most correct choice. "The Shaman Venerable's Louluo Sutra is truly extraordinary — very monstrous and wicked.

" Shen Mu's saber met his opponent's sword, and at once he felt that the strength in the other's sword was less than his own.

The strength of the combat-technique school lay in holding a weapon in hand, able to burst out with all of one's power.

Simuluo's golden swords, driven back by Night Slash of a Thousand Cities' Wind and Rain, returned behind him and with a swish assembled into two golden wings; the twin wings flapped and turned, and with a clash of ringing steel they blocked the sharp swords shooting from Shen Mu's sword-pack. Suddenly Shen Mu let both sabers leave his hands and struck out a punch, like a sun in the sky, shining upon the yang-soul.

Simuluo, shone upon by his fist-intent, had his soul slightly shaken, yet his moves were not disordered in the least; only the eyes on his swords were shone shut, one after another, and the eyes shrieked and turned to wisps of green smoke.

Shen Mu struck backhanded with the Sovereign-Heaven Seal; Simuluo did not stir a hair.

The Shaman Venerable's Louluo Sutra used the souls of others as the stuff of cultivation, refining one's own soul to utter steadfastness. His body too was incomparably hard, so hard that even the Eight Thunderclap Formulas could not shake it.

Shen Mu frowned slightly, then suddenly pointed a finger: the thirty-six flying swords that flew from his sword-pack came together with a clatter, turned into the Drill-Sword Form, and stabbed down at Simuluo in a single sword!