荒墟牧神 - 荒墟少年非善類 - 雲海書庫

Darkness crashed over Shen Mu's eyes. When awareness returned, he was aghast to discover that his consciousness had somehow taken up residence inside the stone statue! "What happened?" He opened his eyes and tried to roll his eyeballs, only to find with a jolt that "his" eyes would turn. He tilted his head, and found that his consciousness had grown a head. He looked down and saw that he and the "stone statue" had fused into one: the statue's arms and legs had become his own! Consciousness is formless, yet now his had taken on a shape. The whole thing was far too strange for comfort. He sensed that this "stone statue" was some kind of spirit: part energy yet not energy, part soul yet not soul, queer past all reckoning, impossible to explain in clear words. "The Divine Court of the Spirit-Soul... the Divine Court of the Spirit-Soul... Could it be that the statue is my spirit embryo, and that my consciousness had to enter it before the embryo could awake? Is this what the Divine Court of the Spirit-Soul means?" Shen Mu's spirit embryo blinked, and in that single instant a great many things became clear. The human body hides seven great divine repositories, and the Divine Court of the Spirit-Soul is the first of them. That repository, however, is sealed; ordinary people cannot open it, and so naturally they cannot wake the spirit embryo within. The repositories of a spirit body, by contrast, stand open by their very nature, so all one needs is the matching spirit blood to guide one's consciousness into the embryo along with it and rouse it to life. The spirit embryo: this is the vessel that houses consciousness. The divine repositories: could it be that the gods never bestowed the spirit embryo upon mankind, but deliberately sealed it away? No sooner had he thought this than a surge of primordial energy came flooding in from outside and poured into the sea of light. Thread by thread it was drawn into the little spirit embryo's body, wisps of it drawn in and breathed out at his nostrils, a thoroughly pleasant sensation. And with every breath the embryo drew, his primordial energy grew that much purer. More than that: Shen Mu found the spirit embryo drinking in the golden light of the sea of light as well, the gold passing in and out of him along with the energy, speckling it with motes of gold whose purpose he could not guess. He tried to make the spirit embryo stand, but the tiny infant could not rise, let alone move. "How is a spirit embryo supposed to move? Hmm, I will ask the village headman and Granny once I get back." While he was still thinking, his consciousness snapped back into his body and he opened his eyes. A racking cough was coming from the temple: the monster had not died. It lay sprawled before the Buddha statue, coughing blood, spewing great mouthfuls of it into the air. Shen Mu considered a moment, then stepped through the temple door. Seeing him walk into the ruined shrine, the monster hardly knew whether to quake or rejoice, and scrambled to struggle upright. Shen Mu strode toward it, chanting as he came: "Kikedo Samaya! Prajna, Prajna, Samaya! Kikedo, Prajna, Samaya!" "Abomination, you still dare presume!" The monster's blood ran cold. Behind it the golden Buddha began to sway again, blazing with light; the chains clanged and rattled, wrenching it down onto its knees once more! "Om mani padme hum!" The Buddha's voice roared, and the monster was refined until it vomited blood, all but spent. Shen Mu broke off his demonic chanting, and the golden Buddha's voice, having sounded for only a single line, fell silent too. Panting heavily beneath the statue, the monster was gathering itself to rise when demonic syllables issued from Shen Mu's lips again. It shrieked and dove behind the statue, only to find that Shen Mu had uttered a syllable or two and then stopped. "You are a demon..." The monster poked its head out timidly, staring in terror at Shen Mu as he walked into the great hall, its voice hoarse: "You are th