Whenever Shen Lian had something that he did not understand or could not comprehend, he would set them aside.
There was enough to worry about in life, why should one add on to it.
It was a very special experience to walk in the mountains when the sun was about to rise. The grasses were decorated with dews, and they were shaking and threatening to fall. The clear droplet had stars dotted in it, and it was indescribably mystical and magical.
It was in this setting that Shen Lian arrived at the Temple of Killings. The temple was built atop a giant rock and was situated high and far. There was no surrounding vegetation. Not far ahead from its entrance, there was a path that showed the foot of the mountain.
The Temple of Killings was a very simple Daoist temple, and Chen Jianmei’s cultivation attitude could be discerned from it. He did not care much about everything else, with his sole focus being swordcraft.
There were no statues of deities being worshipped at the hall. However, there was a set of calligraphy hanging on the wall, with just one word –”Yuan” on it. The “Yuan” was that of Grandmaster Yuan Qing, or it could mean new beginnings or even some other unknown meaning.
The word was definitely written by Chen Jianmei. Shen Lian could not tell if there was any Dharma hidden within it; in fact, he could not even tell if there was anything special about it. It just seemed a casual writing by Chen Jianmei.
However, when Shen Lian recalled Chen Jianmei’s last move – the Sword of Blood and Ray, and looked at the writing again, he felt that there was something special about it. Each stroke seemed to be a sword on its own. At the pointy end of each stroke, it seemed as though they could break anything, just as the tip of the Killing Sword of Blood and Ray. As Shen Lian made the connections, he felt a sharp pain at his Yin Spirit, as though he had just been poked by a needle.
Besides the calligraphy, Shen Lian could not find anything related to Chen Jianmei.
Shen Lian was convicted that Chen Jianmei had purposefully left the calligraphy behind for him. Otherwise, knowing his behavior, he would not have left anything behind. Perhaps, Chen Jianmei was not waiting for him exactly, it could have been anyone from Qing Xuan, and that person would have served the same purpose as he did.
Shi Daoist was strong, but it was not hard for Qing Xuan to find someone who was stronger than Shi Daoist.
The chief valued Chen Jianmei more than he did Shen Lian. Chen Jiamei might have learned something from the chief that was unknown to others. However, Chen Jianmei did not seem like someone who would have gone and learn anyway. Though, if it was the chief who insisted, that would be a different story altogether.
Regardless, Shen Lian took a liking to the place. He felt that he had a lot of troubles on his mind lately, and could need some peace and quiet. He did not want to think about anything; in fact, he did not even want to cultivate Qi. He just wanted to do nothing.
Human’s heart was like the tides, it rose and fell, but it was the best when it is at peace.
Those who had experienced a lot seemed to prefer to spend time alone sometime. They would just space out and would not think about anything. After some time, they would be a new version of themselves and were ready to face the hardships of life.
Shen Lian’s hardships in life would be the hardships he faced in his cultivation. He seemed to be a step away from attaining the state of Huandan, and this step was in fact, the heavenly moat. It could take either a small step to cross over, or a huge step.
It was a step that only he could take, and no one else could help.
After the fifteenth of October, the weather was getting colder. Half a month later, it snowed. The entire Hanhai Kingdom was waiting for the snow.
The heavier the winter snow, the thicker the accumulation was. When the snow melted into the water the next year, it would serve as freshwater for the people. This was why the people took interest in the snowfall.
Being in the mountains, Shen Lian loved the snow. He derived peace from staring at the white scenery.
As usual, he wore a thin Daoist robe. He stood behind the Daoist temple and was facing a cliff. He watched as the snow fell. The snowflakes were drawn by the gravity and fuelled by the breeze. Between cruising in the world and falling into the grounds, they always ended up melting into the ground full of snow.
This was their fate, and it was impossible to change.
The world had always been a cage; it gave birth to you and raised you, and yet it restricted you.
The greed of the cultivators was such that they tried to absorb the essences of the world, and yet they refuse to die and to return the essences back to the world.
Shen Lian was one of the cultivators. Morally speaking, they were all unscrupulous, and yet they did not have a choice. Underneath the cliff, the strange person who killed back at the Restaurant Guodu in the Hanhai Kingdom appeared again at the faraway spot where the snowfall was the thickest. This strange person appeared in front of Shen Lian for a couple of times now. He loved to ingest snow. He also loved to break the ice away from the rock wall and ingest them.
It excited him, and it helped him to stay sane. Whenever Shen Lian tried to approach him, the man would leave.
His speed rivaled Shen Lian; when he left, he left behind a red line. He was as fast as lightning, and he could accelerate in a shockingly short period of time. This was why Shen Lian could never keep up with him.
Whenever the strange person appeared, he was shrouded in the Qi of blood and devilry. It was different from the Qi of devilry left behind by humans or demons, and it was also a lot stronger.
He probably tried to excite himself with ice and snow because of the confusion he faced after ingestion of the blood and Qi. The state of confusion rendered the excitement necessary, so as to keep him from being completely lost.
Even though his aura got stronger every time Shen Lian saw him, but Shen Lian never gave much thought to this hidden enemy. It was because he could never catch him, and he was also waiting for the strange person to approach him.
He was confident that he could deal with the strange person. Moreover, the cultivators, demons, and monsters who loitered around the Temple of Killings had become the strange person’s victims; to a certain extent, the strange person was doing Shen Lian a favor.
When the strange person left, Shen Lian began his daily practices. His fingertip changed its form, and a red sword aura flew through. He alternated his fingering, and there were Qi of different colors swirling in the air. They were red, orange, yellow, white, green, blue, purple and black. They were solid and swirled around Shen Lian. They slipped past the snowflakes, and yet did not touch the snowflakes at all. In fact, they did not even trigger any sound of the wind.
The eight sword aura was controlled by his thoughts, and from the beginning till the transitions, all of the processes were smooth and easy. They seemed like a school of fishes who were swimming in the air.
Each of the sword auras had their own characteristics. They corresponded to Tian, Di, Shan, Ze, Shui, Huo, Feng, Lei. It was not as simple as multitasking, which was something that could be done by someone of sufficient intellectual caliber. It was difficult to do different tasks with different thoughts at the same time.
Shen Lian lasted for around twelve or thirteen breathes before white steam started forming around his forehead. In this cold weather, he was sweating, and the droplets of sweat turned into ice shortly.
He retracted his spiritual consciousness, and the eight sword aura lost control and disappeared into the void.
The eight Taixu Qi were eight different Manas, and their essences could either be approached from the Five Elements angle or the Yin and Yang angle. His founding master, Zi Ling Fairy chose to walk on the path of Yin and Yang. However, she ended up having dissociative identity disorder due to the wholeness and contrast in Yin and Yang.
Every martial exercise would involve different Dao that remained unchanged in the world. As everything would converge towards the great Way, in the end, one must make one’s choice among the many potential ones in order to continue towards the highest point.
It was only when the convergence happened that one could derive more, and attained the ultimate fruit of Dao.
Huandan was the beginning of the path, also the beginning of cultivation of Dao.
Shen Lian had to make his choice and to pick his path in order to kick-start the process.
Shen Lian did not ponder much about it and chose to drive the eight Qi of Taixu with the method of the Being and Non-Being of Sword Aura. He created sword aura from it and tried to experience the different states through that.
When this step matured, he would proceed to the next, which was “mutual generation”. This was the second layer of abstruseness taught by Mr. Su.
The sword aura contained the axiomatic truth, and Shen Lian felt that even after he had attained the state of Huandan, broke through the Absurd State, and became a land immortal, he would not be able to understand it fully.
He wanted to know about Mr. Su’s origin. Unfortunately, there was no news about him ever since then. Even the loquat tree did not know much about Mr. Su’s identity.
When Shen Lian was thinking, someone came to Xi Huang in the cold.
More accurately, a demon had come to Xi Huang. It was not a local demon, but a demon who came from the sea.
Just as how the demons from the land hated going into the sea, those from the sea would not come to the land. Moreover, the demons from the sea looked down on those from Bei Huang, as they found them poor and unrefined.
At least this was what the Nine-Headed Demon King thought. He did not even bother hiding his nine heads. He flashed all of them out fearlessly.
He still had a few strands of bird feather in his mouth on one of his head. The demonic eagle who had not completely shapeshifted yet tasted horrible. Indeed it was something that came from barren hills and turbulent rivers. Not only that it had a fishy taste to it, its flesh was rough and did not taste as smooth and fresh as those from the sea.
The mountain was called Chui Ping Mountain. In spite of the snow, one could still see the Chui Ping. It looked a lot like a peacock flaring its feathers.
The Nine-Headed Demon King remembered back when he still had not shapeshifted yet, he saw a very powerful peacock. The peacock almost killed an ancient mutant Gold-Threaded Snake that had shapeshifted and ate its snake gall.
The Gold-Threaded Snake was a very poisonous snake, and yet the peacock was unafraid of its poison.
Due to that incident, the Nine-Headed Demon King hated everything in green. This had something to do with the trauma in his heart.
He could tell that the palace he was looking at was an impressive instrument, the best Ruyi instrument there was.
Ruyi instrument referred to an instrument that had the Ruyi Dao restriction being placed upon it by an expert cultivator when it was forged. The final product would be able to change according to the owner’s thoughts due to the Ruyi Dao restriction.
The best example would be Mount Sumeru in Buddhist legends, and the sayings of the Naxumi Yujiezi.
Mount Sumeru could become infinitely huge or infinitely small, and this was something that could only be done by Buddha.
The Nine-Headed Demon King set his eyes on this instrument. Even though he despised the demons and monsters in Xi Huang, he decided to bring away such a good instrument.
After all, Mister Sea was slightly unreliable. In the event that he did not manage to get his hands on the relic, he still had this excellent instrument to make up for it. His trip would be justified then.