Chapter 1763 — Far Journey to the Primal Realm, Heroes Every One

Haotian's face darkened. The two primordial spirits fought with utmost ferocity, while the assault upon their bodies was dazzling to behold. Haotian could plainly see Shen Mu's wounds widening and the havoc wrought by the Dao-wounds growing fiercer, and yet Shen Mu's Divine Treasury never once collapsed into nothingness as he had foreseen!

Shen Mu's World Tree forced itself to hold up the Thirty-Three Heavens of his Dao-realm; his Heavenly Court and the other heavens and myriad worlds still tottered, but had not crumbled to dust.

The World Tree remained the crux of this war between Haotian and Shen Mu. Unless it were severed, Shen Mu could not be laid low!

Yet as Shen Mu's Dao-wounds erupted, the World Tree had to bear up the myriad heavens and worlds and the Thirty-Three Heavens, and the pressure upon it mounted ever higher, which let Haotian see hope!

Had Shen Mu been at his height and Haotian likewise, Haotian could not have withstood ten moves at Shen Mu's hands. But now Shen Mu, gravely wounded by the Third Young Master, had only one or two tenths of his strength left, and Haotian too was not at his height, so for a time the two of them could not decide the issue between them.

At the same moment that Shen Mu withdrew his Divine Treasury domain, the army of the Land of No Sorrow found itself encircled. Without Shen Mu's treasury domain and World Tree, that army was a lone leaf adrift on a vast ocean, able only to huddle together and meet the foes surging in from every side, and in that short while its losses were grievous.

As for Jing Ping's hosts, whether it was the Village Headman, the Steward, the Deaf Elder, or the First Ancestor and Granny Zhu, none had yet fought their way to the Heavenly Court's main camp. Wei Suifeng's Feathered Forest Guard and the Northern Emperor Xuanwu's army were pinned down by the Heavenly River Navy, while the Western Emperor White Tiger and Dragon Qilin's host had only now reached the rear of the Heavenly Court's camp, and there, face to face with the Divine Division, foremost of the Heavenly Court's three divisions, they were locked in bitter fighting!

Within the Nether Capital, the Nether Heavenly Venerable and Shen Fengqing each attended to their own tasks, hunting down and slaughtering the Dragon and Martial Guards, and had no hands free either.

Around the Woodcutter Wen Tiange the officers and men grew fewer and fewer; even the Woodcutter Sage now took up his axe and went into the line himself. In this battle there were almost no soldiers left for him to command; most had already died in the fighting!

Now, sage though he was, he must go to the front himself and kill his enemies with his own hands!

Around them the enemy surged in like the tide, enough to drive one to despair, and yet the Woodcutter and the others had eyes shining bright, for what they saw was hope.

The longer they held out, the greater their hope of victory in this battle!

The Woodcutter looked about him. Blood flowed without cease from Di Yiyue's severed arm; this generation's Opening Emperor too had come to the hour when the lamp falters for want of oil. The ribbon that bound Yan Yunxi's hair had at some point snapped; her black tresses fell loose, revealing a woman's face. The old farmer Zhuo Cha leaned at her back, plainly having recognized the sweetheart he had secretly loved so long.

Tian Shu's Imperial Gate Divine Saber was broken halfway up; he was cradling a cracked wine jar and trying to pour out a single drop, but the wine had long since run dry.

Yama's Fengdu had shattered too; the last divine city had been stormed, and the ghosts and gods killed or wounded beyond counting.

Old Man Qinghuang lay on the ground, alive or dead none could say; a demon-god weapon was lodged in Indra's chest, and he dared not draw it out.

The Land of No Sorrow could hold out no longer.

Suddenly the army of the Shence Right Guard came surging in. With this host's arrival, the last hope of the Land of No Sorrow was cut away.

The officers and men of the Land of No Sorrow roused their spirits and gripped their divine weapons tight. Someone, no one knew who, began to sing, impassioned.

"See our will to level Heaven! Enter our hall that equals Heaven! Lift our coffin of clear light! Ascend our mountain of the mystic womb!"

Yan Yunxi sang softly in answer: "Contemplate the birth of all things; in great peace, together in joy. Climb high and gaze at the far shore; creation unfolds the starry sky. Come into our Land of No Sorrow; shun the world and its vexations."

The Martial Celestial Master Zhuo Cha, fervent and ardent, his voice ringing with force and piercing to the heart: "One morning the great dream ends, and we return again to the road of home! Tread we the perilous path of heaven's course! Fight we the wicked jackals and wolves! Bury we the souls of our heroes! Inter we the bones of our righteous men!"

The maimed and wounded soldiers of the Land of No Sorrow laughed aloud and took it up: "Wind and frost may age us, we do not fear! Sword and blade may wound us, we are not dismayed! Let them grind our bodies to dust! Let them scatter our souls to the winds!"

"All who go from here to the Primal Realm are righteous men! In the True Void, everywhere is home!"

The Woodcutter Wen Tiange laughed. "In my life I have had three disciples. The eldest loved to wander the wide world; the second became the Shepherd Heavenly Venerable; and the third alone will inherit my mantle and become a true sage, the first sage in this world. My life has come to its full circle, with no regret left in it."

The people of the future might be very happy.

He thought in his heart: perhaps the future would be the golden age of his ideals, an age steeped everywhere in the convictions he had held all his life, when men no longer knelt to gods, but gods served men.

In men's hearts there would be the conviction that man can conquer heaven; each would give full play to his talents, every person skilled in his own way, exercising his gifts in the field he loved.

The Great Dao between heaven and earth would no longer be merely the innate Dao of old; with their wit and wisdom men would open up many and many a new Great Dao, and they would become new gods, pathfinders, bright lamps lighting the dark road ahead.

Perhaps he would never see any of it.

Yet his heart was filled with contentment, for he knew there would be those who would bring it all to pass for him.

The Shence Right Guard came charging in, and suddenly an illusion burst forth. Lang Wan, leading the remnant of the surviving Creators, had at last cut through the encirclement and arrived, and with boundless divine consciousness forcibly dragged the Shence Right Guard into the thirty-fifth layer of the Void.

Standing upon a visualized bridge of the Void, Lang Wan cried in a loud voice: "Hold fast, Land of No Sorrow! Relief is almost here!"

Around the soldiers of the Land of No Sorrow the enemy still surged in countless numbers, endless to kill. Their formation could hold no longer; the last array diagram had shattered.

At that very moment a battered phoenix ship came flying, and upon it a burning nine-headed phoenix spewed holy fire in every direction, setting the gods and demons of the Heavenly Court alight.

Qi Xiayu descended, and her one body divided, splitting into nine, joined the battle, and guarded the others.

Jing Ping's relief force was at last drawing near. The shouts of Jing Ping's soldiers came from beyond the Heavenly Court's camp, and far off one could see tower ship after tower ship of Jing Ping tilting their cannon-fire.

The Yanfeng Emperor, leading his host, had already come close!

And in the divine city far away, the Blind Old Man stood behind Ling Yuxiu, working out formations of every kind together with Jing Ping's formation masters, while Ling Yuxiu used the Three Primal Spirit Convergence Art to send each formation into the minds of Jing Ping's marquises of the various armies, shifting the arrays at any moment.