Chapter 1688 — Founding the Seventh Era

After a while, Shen Mu spat out the chaos stone. He had assumed there must be chaos qi within it — back when he first discovered Tai Yi's chaos vein, he had found chaos qi stored inside chaos stones.

When he took out Tai Yi's eggshell, the entire chaos vein had collapsed, the chaos stones had shattered, and the chaos qi within them had spilled out and become the chaos sea of the Ancestral Court. From this one could see that chaos stones were not especially hard; it was only that the cold, silent wind of the Ultimate Void could not dissolve them.

That was why he had believed the obelisk carved from chaos stone must likewise hide chaos qi within it. Yet only after swallowing it did he find that there was not the slightest trace of chaos qi in this stone!

The chaos qi inside it had already been taken away by someone! "I chewed down a slab of rock for nothing.

.

. The writing on the obelisk — it is the Primordial Dao words of the Eldest Young Master of Miluo Palace, written in Primordial runes, used to suppress his enemies.

"

Standing beneath the stele, Shen Mu mused, "Judging by these Primordial Dao words, the Eldest Young Master's mastery of Primordial runes was exceedingly high; he could be called the foremost man beneath the Master of Miluo Palace. So how was the seal he left behind broken open? "

Judging from the door plank and the obelisk that had flown out of the forbidden zone, the seal had been broken in part.

With such transcendent craft, the seal the Eldest Young Master left must have been exceedingly hard to break; the power of the Ultimate Void alone could hardly have brought his seal to the verge of collapse and ruin.

So who had caused the seal to break? "Chaos stones are hard to find. To make this one obelisk, the amount of stone required is already an unimaginable number — and according to Lan Yutian, the obelisks he saw within that gateway were beyond counting.

Where did the Eldest Young Master find the materials for them all? "

His expression turned a little strange as he guessed at the source of the chaos stones. There was only one place with so many chaos stones: the chaos veins of the Ancestral Court, the ones capable of birthing a Tai Yi.

But a single chaos vein could not refine so many obelisks; several veins would be needed.

In other words, the Eldest Young Master of Miluo Palace had likely scoured the chaos veins of several universes to suppress this "enemy of Miluo Palace"!

Shen Mu pondered a moment, then tried to take the obelisk into his divine treasury. The Nascent Embryo divine treasury lay between his brows, but the obelisk was far too long. When he put it in, he found that its tip pierced through between his brows and stuck out, as though he had grown a horn there.

Helpless, he gave it up.

"Imperial Brother says this abandoned place holds many strange things. Since I cannot take the obelisk away, perhaps I can find some other treasure here!

"

A gleam of excitement in his eyes, he abandoned the obelisk and "stood" on the door plank, flying deeper into the abandoned land.

Before long Shen Mu halted the plank and looked ahead in astonishment and doubt. There, in the void before him, a huge head had suddenly emerged!

The head was unimaginably vast.

Flesh had already grown upon it, though it had no skin, and it flew through this abandoned land, its mouth wide open, devouring treasures cast away here. The head was swallowing a tattered book, a book shining with golden light that turned its own pages with a rustling clatter; golden characters rose from the book and imprinted themselves one after another upon the head, striking its flesh and blood until they flew apart!

Yet plainly the tattered book was no match for the monstrous head, and it was swallowed whole. The flesh upon the head writhed and grew anew, becoming a little more complete.

Suddenly the head noticed him, and at once it came flying over in high excitement. Shen Mu's face showed alarm; he set the plank upright and seized his great saber on the spot.

The monstrous head came howling at him.

Shen Mu held his breath and gathered his spirit, and of a sudden the cold, silent wind blew a wrecked ship forward, and with a boom it crashed into the head charging at Shen Mu!

The broken hull bristled everywhere with sharp wooden splinters, and they actually pierced the monstrous head's flesh and hung it there.

The wrecked ship flew past before Shen Mu, and he saw at once a white skeleton hanging upon it — the Dao bones of a Dao-achiever, not dissolved by the Ultimate Void, but nailed fast to the ship.

The monstrous head let out a soundless roar, struggling to tear itself from the ship. Then Shen Mu saw the skeleton nailed to the ship lift a bony arm.

The arm grew longer and longer, and it seized the monstrous head's face and tore a chunk of flesh from it!

The bony arm withdrew and pressed that flesh to its own body; the flesh clung to its frame, and at once it was as though countless tentacles crawled over the bones, crawling and growing as they went. The skeleton reached out its arm again to rip flesh from the monstrous head's face.

The head, enraged, struggled with all its might and finally broke free of the wrecked ship, then rolled onto the deck and charged at the skeleton nailed to the ship's wall.

Nailed there as it was, unable to escape, the skeleton nonetheless stood like an awe-inspiring emperor whom none might violate, every gesture and motion displaying supreme majesty! But pinned down as he was, he could not bring out much of his strength.

The monstrous head rolled to and fro upon the ship, dodging his attacks, then suddenly slammed hard against the skeleton! The wrecked ship shook without cease.

The head drew back and rammed the skeleton again, and this blow was heavier still! Suddenly the ship's cabin was smashed open by it, and through the opened doorway six or seven white skeletons rushed out and pounced upon the monstrous head!

Shen Mu was dumbstruck. Those skeletons were all the Dao bones of Dao-achievers; they rushed forward and, without a word, tore strip after strip of flesh from the monstrous head's face and stuck them onto their own bodies!

Soon the monstrous head's flesh was torn away entirely! The skeletons, draped all over with flesh, were overjoyed — but then a gust of the cold, silent wind blew in, and the flesh scattered away with the wind.

Quiet fell over the wrecked ship.

Neither the monstrous head nor the skeletons beat one another any longer; instead they stood upon the deck like souls bereft, letting the cold, silent wind blow over them. Shen Mu burst out laughing and shook his head.

"These fools. .

.

"

Suddenly the monstrous head and the skeletons all turned their heads to look at him.

Shen Mu knew things had turned bad, and at once he urged the door plank to speed away. Upon the wrecked ship the skeletons and heads grew excited; the skeletons swiftly crawled up the mast, raised the tattered sail, used the cold, silent wind to quicken their pace, and sailed after him.

They rubbed their hands and clenched their fists in extraordinary excitement, plainly intending to rip off Shen Mu's flesh and blood and paste it onto themselves!

And the skeleton nailed to the ship's wall pounded the wall in excitement, urging them to go faster.

Though the ship looked broken, with its tattered sail raised it grew much faster, and it chased him relentlessly, drawing nearer and nearer to the door plank. One skeleton leaped from the mast and pounced at the plank, its hollow mouth wide open as though laughing in delight — but the next moment Shen Mu's Tribulation Sword pierced into its mouth and, with a thunk, nailed it to the wrecked ship.

Another skeleton flew at him and was blasted back by a punch from Shen Mu, hung upon the ship's splinters, flailing its limbs and for a time unable to get down.