Chapter 1524 — I Am the Unfettered Wind

Chengjiang, Dicang, Duiduan, Daying, Jiache, Renzhong, Yingxiang. Shen Mu's feet did not stop; he killed his way upward, striding swiftly, circling the stranger's head again and again, until he reached the Baihui point at the crown, and the final seal fell — the stranger's upper body was completely petrified! Whoosh — Shen Mu raced back down along his body, pressing seal after seal of divine power, marking his legs, his front and his back, all of them with Taiji Evolves, Yin and Yang Move! At last, his final seal struck the stranger's toe, petrifying even that! Shen Mu landed, staggered, his body swaying, barely able to keep his footing. "A being like this cannot be sealed by Taiji Evolves, Yin and Yang Move alone!" He forced up a breath, roused the Domain of the Divine Treasury, and the remnant vital essence within him circulated through the World Tree; frantically driving his arts, he soared into the air and pressed down upon the stranger once more! Tai Su Suddenly Splits the Chaos Bud! Tai Shi's Form and Substance Ask the Azure Empyrean! The two divine powers alternated, striking the petrified gaunt stranger's body until it grew more and more insubstantial, transforming toward a body of energy, about to become an existence with form but no substance! Suddenly Shen Mu's mana was exhausted, and he fell from midair. Long Xiao rushed down from the sky, using his own body as a cushion to catch him; man and dragon slammed into the ground and slid for tens of li before they finally came to a stop. Shen Mu struggled to rise, but swayed and fell again, rolling off Long Xiao's body and tumbling into the dust. Long Xiao's flesh crackled and popped; his body shrank without cease, becoming a strange man with no hands and five heads, a broken tail dragging behind him. He visualized swiftly, visualizing a pair of arms, then a tail; but the dragon scales on his body had been almost entirely devoured by the strange eye behind the stranger, leaving bloody holes all over him. Long Xiao was furious. He seized Shen Mu by the collar and hauled him up, laughing in rage: "Heavenly Venerable Mu, I agreed to do three things for you! But the first nearly cost me my life! The remaining two, I won't do them. If you have the ability, let your brother come and eat me!" Shen Mu raised his head with difficulty, his voice hoarse: "Strike... quickly, smash him..." Long Xiao sneered: "I can smash him for you, but that counts as the second thing. And the third — our pact concerning the Little Earth Lord is wiped clean. What do you say?" "Smash him, quickly!" Shen Mu roared with all his strength: "His eye is the Dao Fruit — the one place that cannot be petrified, the Dao Fruit condensed from the Great Dao! His other half is in the past universe, unpetrified; he is rousing his other half. My divine power cannot hold him for long!" Long Xiao set him down and was about to charge forward and smash the stranger's body, when suddenly the gaunt stranger's body stirred, and from the strange eye at his brow beams of light poured down like flowing water. The petrified body of the gaunt figure trembled; the stone body swayed. Long Xiao was startled and halted his steps. Shen Mu rasped: "Attack his eye! That is his only weakness! Smash his eye and he dies! Though he has the Dao Fruit, the Dao Fruit has not merged into the ultimate void! Now is when he is weakest!" Long Xiao hesitated, then turned his head: "Say what you like — if you are so capable, you go!" He paused, summoned his courage, and leapt forward; suddenly the vertical eye at the stranger's brow blazed with light. Long Xiao's heart lurched; he hurriedly soared into the air, howling skyward, and with a flash of light in the heavens, Long Xiao had returned to the Beast World. His courage had been shattered; he dared not fight again. Shen Mu gritted his teeth, nearly grinding them to powder. He raised a hand and seized Tai Yi's staff, and leaning on it, staggered step by step toward the gaunt stranger, murmuring: "I am the wind..." "The free and unfettered wind!" He panted hoarsely, striving to quicken his steps, and the words that rose from his mouth were those the lame old man of Hidden Maim Village had taught him when he was small. "When my speed is fast enough, when my heart is calm enough, when I feel my body light enough, then I can feel the power of the wind." His steps grew faster and faster, and gradually wind rose beneath his feet. "Then I can catch up to the wind, tread upon its tip, and soar free and unfettered through the sky..." He walked upon the air, faster and faster. "I am the wind, the unbound wind; no one can catch me..." Blood trickled from the corner of his mouth; his skin burst open; he ran on, driving his speed higher and higher. He pointed Tai Yi's staff at the gaunt stranger's brow, at that vertical eye. His own eyes were a blur; his vision grew dimmer and dimmer. "I am the wind, the youth who runs chasing the wind..." He stumbled in the air, yet strove to quicken his pace. Suddenly a gaunt figure came to his side, and an aged yet gentle voice sounded by his ear: "Shen'er, give me the staff." A strong hand took the staff from his grasp. Shen Mu's pupils slowly contracted, his gaze focused, and he saw the lame old man's face. "Don't go." He reached out and caught the old man's sleeve: "Don't go — you will die..." The lame old man pushed his hand away, his steps light, and became a streak of flowing light speeding into the distance, raising the tip of the staff toward the gaunt stranger's brow. Shen Mu's mind was thrown into chaos; his feet could no longer tread upon the tip of the wind, and his body fell helplessly from the high sky. "Don't go—!" he cried with all his strength. The lame old man's blue robe flapped; he left a trail of azure light in the air. In that moment his form broke through space, broke through his own limits. "I am the wind! The unbound wind!" His voice exploded in the air: "The wind no one can catch—" Chi! Tai Yi's wooden staff, together with the lame old man's figure, pierced into the vertical eye at the gaunt stranger's brow. After a brief silence, a terrifying fluctuation suddenly erupted! The gaunt stranger's head burst apart; his body crumbled without cease; chunks of shattered stone fell from the air; piercing light swept out, and a surging wave of qi blasted Shen Mu away. He slammed hard into the ground, tumbling and rolling, and only after a long while came to a stop. Shen Mu struggled to rise, but could not. A staff whirled through the air with a whoosh and suddenly planted itself in the ground before him. Shen Mu looked up and saw red blood running down the staff. He raised a hand and gripped the staff tightly, hugged it to his chest, and the tears in his eyes flowed down together with the blood on the wooden staff. He held the staff and lay there like a child, and for a long, long time did not move at all. That old man could no longer fight him for candied hawthorns; could no longer steal him back.