Chapter 156 — A Dangerous Notion Stirs

"A strange ward.

" Danbaro looked at those vicious little figures, and his heart gave a leap; each of them seemed to have been refined from the soul of a mighty being, immensely strong, knowing nothing but slaughter. And these bizarre cubes together formed a lock of incomparable complexity, runes mirrored upon them; only when the forms of the runes were right could the lock be opened — otherwise it would release these little figures!

The translucent cubes were beyond counting, vast in number; when the runes cast forth by the talisman treasure fell upon a cube, that cube would retreat of itself and vanish. "The steps to unseal it are so complex — without this talisman treasure, it would be near impossible!

" The talisman treasure spun without cease, and the runes reflected from its fourteen faces shifted through endless variation, so that the cubes before them kept retreating. The talisman treasure drifted forward; the Turtle-Back Guardian strode on, and Danbaro hurried to follow him step by step.

They passed down a long passage, and suddenly the view before them opened wide.

The interior of the golden hall was a world of its own; seen from outside, the hall was not large, but viewed from within it was at least ten times larger, with pillars standing in row upon row, and beyond them golden altars great and small, each altar bearing treasures of strange form.

The Turtle-Back Guardian led Chu Baojian onward and laughed, saying, "A treasure of such weight must be placed in the deepest, most honored place. My magic power is not enough to seal it; only when the Shaman Venerable comes may he seal it himself.

Danbaro, you have won great merit — even I am most envious! " Danbaro hastily laughed: "I took more than one treasure from that Jingping man, and also a small jade bottle; most likely a sacred medicine lies within. I took a sniff of its scent, and it was wonderfully sweet, as though I were about to become an immortal.

. . " He drew a small jade bottle from his sleeve.

At the sight of it the Turtle-Back Guardian's eyes lit up; he snatched it from his hand and laughed: "Danbaro, you have won great merit, and the Shaman Venerable will surely reward you richly. I brought you here ahead of time to choose treasures — how could you not show me a little filial respect?

The sacred medicine in this jade bottle is mine! " A look of agonized reluctance crossed Danbaro's face. Seeing that look, the Turtle-Back Guardian laughed: "So stingy.

" With that he unscrewed the bottle, held it beneath his nose, and took a sniff.

"So swee—ee—ah—nnngh—eet.

.

.

fra—grance. . .

" The satisfied smile still hung on the Turtle-Back Guardian's face as he toppled straight backward.

Holding his breath, Danbaro hastily snatched the jade bottle from his hand and stoppered it, not daring to draw a single breath.

After thinking a moment, he took out another jade bottle, gathered the surrounding air into it, then prised open the Turtle-Back Guardian's mouth and set the open bottle between his lips, letting him hold it there.

"This way he will not wake for a while yet. Phew—" Danbaro exhaled a breath of foul air, then began to shed his skin; from Danbaro's husk another person burrowed out — none other than Shen Mu.

"Now I suppose I too have used the methods of the demonic path. " Shen Mu glanced at the skin bag on the ground and shook his head.

Granny Zhu could wear another's skin and change into a thousand forms, but he still felt a certain shadow in his heart over it.

Shen Mu took back the Chu Bao Sword, then searched the Turtle-Back Guardian's person, found the talisman treasure and tucked it into his breast, and gathered up a few odds and ends besides.

He rummaged about but found nothing else of use, and had to give it up. "Lingxiao Heaven Eye, open!

Qingxiao Heaven Eye, open! " Within Shen Mu's pupils the Shenxiao Heaven and the Qingxiao Heaven opened; dense ranks of runes formed two heavens in his eyes, and as he looked around, everything here at once became distinct in its layers. Every golden altar here was thick with seals, like the cubes he had seen before; within each cube hid a vicious-looking little figure, its features twisted together, its hair in wild disarray, its claws and fangs sharp — yet without the Heaven Eye one could not see them at all.

Shen Mu picked up the talisman treasure and examined closely the runes upon its fourteen faces, compared them, and shook his head: this talisman treasure was not the key to undo the seals of the golden altars; it could likely only open the golden hall itself. He walked forward, examining the golden altars one by one; he had to make haste.

Outside, Ling Yuxiu should still be holding the door, but Ling Yuxiu's abilities were a notch below his own, and though he had studied the Basha Libationer's fusion of battle arts, he likely could not hold out much longer. The treasures upon the altars differed one from another; many were treasures unique to the Golden Palace of Loulan, refined in most bizarre fashion — human skin flayed to make paintings inscribed with runes, bowls made from human skullcaps, drums made from human skin, as well as White Bone Banners, Thousand-Poison Soul-Devouring Banners, and White Bone Shrines — all instruments of demonic and heretical paths. But besides these there were no few fine things, shining with golden light, seemingly treasures refined by beings of the Shaman King's level.

Shen Mu also saw treasures not of the Shaman Cult placed here — a Thousand-Banner Pagoda and sarira relics, which must be great treasures of the Buddhist order, as well as a sword pellet the size of a grape, an ancient zither with one end scorched, and a broken sword. Suddenly Shen Mu stopped, unable to move on. On this altar stood a stone slab carved with a fragmentary diagram of cultivation; one glance told him it was a diagram of the Three-Cinnabar Art of the Mystic Body — though not the diagram for the Six Harmonies realm.

In his haste he could not tell at all which realm it belonged to.

"Move, move — go find the legs! " Shen Mu urged himself on, racing like the wind toward the depths of the treasure vault.

After a moment he had swiftly traversed the whole place, then stopped before a golden altar. He had already looked at this altar once, yet in the end he had come back to it. Upon the altar rested the lower half of a human body — only the portion below the waist — yet it still stood, steady and square.

Yet Shen Mu was certain this was not Zaifu's lower half.

This half-body shone with golden light; even its blood seemed molten gold, and its bones too were gold. The body gave off a fearsome aura, mightier even than the Shaman King's.

"The Shaman Venerable's body?

" Shen Mu blinked, measured it against his own waist, then carefully recalled Zaifu's body.

Zaifu's body seemed as though it might fit perfectly upon this half-body.

"The Shaman Venerable destroyed the sect that stole Grandpa Tu's lower half and carried it off, then cut off his own lower half and placed it here — and yet Grandpa Tu's lower half, which ought to be here, is gone.

.

. " The corner of Shen Mu's eye twitched as a dreadful possibility came to him.

The Shaman Venerable had cut off his own lower half and grafted Zaifu's lower half onto himself! "With my medical skill, this could certainly be done.

The Shaman Venerable should be able to do it as well!

" His scalp prickled with numbness.

To cut off one's own lower half and join another's to it — what did the Shaman Venerable seek?

"Perhaps he believed Grandpa Tu's fleshly body was even more formidable than his own golden body, beyond anything he could attain in his whole life, and so traded away his own lower half.

But there is another possibility as well — that the Shaman Venerable refined Grandpa Tu's lower half into a two-legged primal weapon. . .