Chapter 383 — The Bloodline of the Evil Dragon

At this moment, upon the Yong River, besides their own boat, there were fishing boats one after another, treasure ships carrying ore and dark gold, dark iron, and dark copper, merchant vessels hauling goods to and fro, and passenger boats ferrying travelers.

The Yong River's waters ran strong and swift, its fish fat and savory; and so the river was crowded with boats, and the harbors and docks along its banks were many.

Yet now the mountains on both banks were sinking little by little beneath the river's surface, and upon the river there remained only boat after boat gliding over the water. Many vessels halted one after another; who knows how many people thrust their heads out over the gunwales to peer about, not knowing what had happened.

Some divine-ability wielders even flew up from the decks, gazing bewildered at the Yong River.

The Yong River floated in midair. Its waters, tens of thousands of li in length, had not broken apart; rather they still flowed through the sky, shone upon by the early-rising sun and shimmering with a riot of colors.

Splash—

A merchant ship hauling goods failed to hold steady; it burst out of the river's surface and plunged down from the sky, falling helplessly toward the mountains below, growing smaller and smaller. After a while, the ship smashed into a stretch of mountain forest; after another while, the sound of its landing reached the ears of the crowd upon the river—a muffled, faint sound.

The ship's owner leapt clear the moment it fell, and many divine-ability wielders helped rescue the others aboard; the casualties were few.

Some official cargo ships carried officers of the Kingdom of Jingping, who straightway ordered the divine-ability wielders to save lives, rescuing common folk from the other boats and setting them down on the land below; other soldiers and officers flew out of the Yong River, speeding toward the cities beneath to beg for aid, to summon tower ships to the Yong River's rescue.

"It's none of my doing. Don't look at me—I didn't do it."

Shen Mu and the others turned their eyes to the blind elder. The blind elder shook his head, his face grave. "To set the Yong River afloat in the air demands power far more formidable than mine. A man of such magnificent strength is something I have never seen in all my days... Look below!"

Shen Mu and the rest looked down at once.

The Yong River had been lifted up and was flying in the air; the water beneath had parted from the earth. The current had once been somewhat turbid, so that the riverbed could not be seen; but now the mud and sand within the river had vanished entirely—as though, when the Yong River took to the sky, only the water had been borne up and not the silt within it. Thus the river water turned incomparably clear, and the eye could pass through it to the land below.

At once they saw great fish swimming in the water, distinct and plain before them—a wondrous sight.

Because the Yong River had its source in the Desolate Ruins, it teemed with monsters: fish-monsters and water-monsters of every kind lurked deep in the riverbed, and their shapes were grotesque beyond reckoning. Shen Mu had lived by the river since childhood and had seen many of its fish-monsters and water-monsters, yet now he beheld many he had never seen before. Doubtless they had lain hidden deep in the riverbed and seldom risen, and so were rarely glimpsed.

And now he could see everything within the river, with utter clarity.

Just then, a chill of dread ran through them all: a body sleek and slippery, immense and immeasurably long, swayed as it passed beneath their boat, its vast bulk swimming with the river's current, winding away toward the west.

Great scales scraped along the boat's bottom, rocking the little vessel once before it steadied again.

The enormous body swam on without raising the slightest wave; the scales that grazed the hull did the boat no harm, only jostled it a little, as though a swift current had struck it from below.

It was a sapphire-blue flood dragon, vast beyond compare.

Upon the boat, the flood dragons grew feverish with excitement, one after another—some climbed onto Shen Mu's neck, others thrust their heads beneath his arms, craning out to look.

"Maha! Maha!" a dozen or more flood dragons cried at the river.

Splash.

A colossal head rose from the water, studied them curiously, then plunged back in and swam into the distance; wherever it passed, the water-monsters of the Yong River fell back in retreat.

Some great fish, in their terror, fled so fast they burst out of the river, then beat their fins and tumbled down through the air. At once a rain of fish began falling from the sky—a rain that would, no doubt, keep the folk below talking for a fortnight and more.

But what would give them far more to talk about, surely, was the simple fact that the Yong River had flown up into the sky!

"That flood dragon is enormous..."

Shen Mu was shaken to the core. This sapphire-blue water flood dragon was far vaster than the flood dragons on his own boat at their fullest size—more than ten times larger!

The power of this sapphire-blue flood dragon was likely above even that of Lord Dragonkeeper. Whether he had raised it himself or invited it from somewhere, there was no telling.

"This is a water flood dragon that has cultivated into the Divine Realm. Its command of water is exceedingly strong—frightfully strong."

The blind elder's face was grave. Facing west, his voice hoarse, he said, "I see a man covered in scales, of a very strange appearance, commanding this Flood Dragon King God and lifting the Yong River."

Shen Mu started slightly. "Can it be Lord Dragonkeeper of High Heaven, come to subdue the dragon vein? I once saw him work his art of shifting rivers."

The blind elder gripped his bamboo staff tightly, his face anxious. "Such magnificent power is truly formidable. This fellow must be borrowing the Flood Dragon King God's strength to raise his own power to its utmost... No—with only these few flood dragons he could never lift the Yong River. He is borrowing the Yong River's own strength as well!"

Shen Mu roused the Nine Heavens Far-Sight Art and gazed upstream; his art could still be opened only to the level of the Cinnabar Empyrean Eye, and he could not see the middle reaches of the Yong River.

Lord Dragonkeeper must be in the Yong River's middle reaches; to lift the river, the middle reaches were the best place to exert force.

From what Shen Mu knew of Lord Dragonkeeper, the man had not the strength to lift the Yong River himself; he must be borrowing the power of the Flood Dragon King God.

Most likely he had summoned the Flood Dragon King God at the Yong River's estuary to raise the river, while stationing flood dragons elsewhere to stir up wind and waves, lifting the Yong River stretch by stretch.

Lord Dragonkeeper was a master of the arts of dragon veins, skilled at rousing the power of a dragon vein. Besides summoning the Flood Dragon King God, he had called in other flood dragons as well; and most crucially, he had no doubt roused the dragon vein's own power, using the strength of the Yong River's dragon vein to heave this great river, spanning tens of thousands of li, up into the sky.

The Yong River was very ancient. As far back as the Kaihuang era it had been a dragon vein, hiding many secrets; this great river's dragon vein was likely near maturity, on the verge of transforming into a dragon.

The power of the Yong River's dragon vein was exceedingly great; if Lord Dragonkeeper roused the dragon vein's strength, it truly might raise this river up!

"Could he mean to take away the Yong River's dragon vein?" Shen Mu murmured.

The blind elder shook his head. "No. He means to change the dragon vein's course, to turn it into an ominous dragon vein, and thereby alter the whole course of the Kingdom of Jingping's fortune."

Shen Mu started, then hurriedly drew out the Dragonkeeper's Classic and turned to a page, studying it closely.