Chapter 50 — The Fox-Spirit Maiden Enters the Wasteland Trap

Shen Mu was filled with gratitude. He bowed low with hands clasped and said, "Many thanks for your guidance, Senior. This junior will hold it in his heart."

Gu Lihan laughed. "If you know gratitude, then cultivate with all speed and slay the soul of the Dragon Mother! And if anything puzzles you, speak up and ask me."

Shen Mu at once roused the Crimson Heart Art. The Crimson Heart Art required one to regard the dantian as a field: to plow it with the blade, plant the seed of fire there, and then let ten suns rise together above the dantian to nourish that seed, until it grew strong and became a furnace within the dantian, blazing with leaping sacred flame!

Only when one had achieved some small success did the Cinnabar Heart at last begin to form.

Once the Cinnabar Heart had achieved a small success, one then controlled the sword, and the sword would follow one's thought; where the mind arrived, the sword arrived.

Easy to speak of, hard to do. To summon the sacred flame was no easy thing, and to refine the Cinnabar Heart was harder still, and so it was divided into nine turnings. If Shen Mu but refined it to the first turning, his qi-driven flying sword would far surpass what it had been before, and overtaking the soul of the Dragon Mother would surely be no great matter!

"Eh? Your foundation is excellent!"

Gu Lihan was startled. In the space of a brief moment, Shen Mu had already plowed his dantian with the blade, planted the seed of fire, and brought ten suns forth above his dantian to begin nourishing it.

This showed that Shen Mu's cultivation was deep indeed. With an ordinary martial artist, ten suns rising together aside, even planting the seed of fire would likely have been beyond him; he would have needed to swallow elixirs and wonder drugs without cease to replenish his yuan qi, and only so could he plant enough fire seeds.

Yet Shen Mu, needing no elixirs at all, had in one breath filled his dantian with fire seeds and turned his yuan qi into ten suns shining upon it. Among martial artists of the Spirit Fetus realm, such cultivation was rare in all the world!

"At such a terrifying speed of cultivation, perhaps ten days will not be needed, nor even two. Tomorrow he may master the first turning of the Crimson Heart Art, slay the soul of the Dragon Mother, and set me free!"

Gu Lihan's eyes flickered. "A young genius so outstanding — truly, I am loath to kill him just like that."

He sighed inwardly. "But the Wasteland is a place forsaken by the gods. Never mind the people who live here; even an insect is guilty and must die. And besides, I am hungry. For over fifty years I have eaten nothing..."

The time Shen Mu took to master the first turning of the Crimson Heart Art was even shorter than he had imagined. Night had already come; outside, the sky was slowly brightening, and the light spilled through the waters of the Surging River onto the Dragon Palace beneath them.

Shen Mu rose to his feet. At the slightest stir of his thought, yuan qi abruptly wrapped itself around the Chubao Sword; with a swish it pierced layer upon layer of mist, coming and going like light and lightning, swift beyond measure!

Chi, chi, chi—

The sound of the Chubao Sword cleaving the air came without cease; in an instant Shen Mu drove that precious blade through a hundred-odd thrusts, enough to dazzle the eye.

He knew no sword techniques, only the plain, simple motion of the thrust — and yet he was more terrifying than Qianxun of the Lanjiang Sect, heir to a whole school of swordsmanship!

This Crimson Heart Art was truly extraordinary!

Shen Mu bowed once more to Gu Lihan in thanks and said with utter sincerity, "Many thanks, Senior, for passing on the art. This junior will never forget it all his days."

Gu Lihan laughed heartily. "Your talent is exceptional, and that is why you could comprehend it so thoroughly in so short a time and master the first turning of the Cinnabar Heart. That little fox beside you did not cultivate so fast as you. Quick now, wield your sword and slay the Dragon Mother!"

He was overjoyed; his release was at hand, and even a great master such as he could not help but feel his heart waver, anxious over gain and loss.

"This boy saved me, and his talent is so high. Truly I am a little reluctant to kill him..."

Just then Shen Mu turned and walked away, carrying the Chubao Sword with him out of the Dragon Palace, his figure vanishing into the thick mist.

Gu Lihan was stunned. Before he could collect himself, Shen Mu had already taken the Chubao Sword and Hu Ling'er out of the Dragon Palace, not pausing even a moment as he headed outside.

"Get back here!"

Gu Lihan's roar came after him, sharp and fierce: "You little wretch! You go back on your word — I passed you the art, I gave you the sword; why will you not slay the Dragon Mother?"

Outside the palace, Shen Mu's voice came from farther and farther away: "Senior, the Dragon Mother did indeed use the dragon pearl to kill many martial artists who came into this place — but the dragon pearl only turns them into dried corpses, walking dead. Yet there are many skeletons in the Dragon Palace that did not die by the dragon pearl. They did not become dried corpses; they became skeletons."

Gu Lihan started. "You little wretch — when did you notice?"

"When I first entered the Dragon Palace, I noticed."

Gu Lihan ground his teeth and said coldly, "Are you truly only twelve years old? Can a boy of twelve see such things? Can he reason out such matters? And turn a trick back upon the trickster without ever changing his countenance?"

"This junior will not be twelve until this autumn — he is eleven now..." Shen Mu's voice grew lower and lower, until at last it could not be heard.

Instantly a stream of furious curses burst from the Dragon Palace, loud and ringing, carrying all the way to Shen Mu and Hu Ling'er, already far off.

Hu Ling'er poked her head out from his bosom and asked, puzzled, "Young Master Mu, how did you know he meant us harm?"

Shen Mu said, "When we first arrived and I used the monk's staff to drive back the mist, many dried corpses fell out of the air. Did you notice that besides the dried corpses there were many bare bones as well?"

Hu Ling'er nodded; she had noticed. Some of the bones had been crushed by the falling dried corpses, and the skeletons still wore garments.

"The clothes those skeletons wore were official robes."

Shen Mu went on: "Gu Lihan said he brought many of his disciples into the Wasteland to temper themselves, and found this Dragon Palace beneath the water. Those disciples of his were killed by the dragon pearl — but those killed by the dragon pearl should have all their blood and qi drawn out and become dried corpses, not skeletons. Since they were not killed by the dragon pearl, then how did they die?"

Light dawned on Hu Ling'er. She said hurriedly, "In his other hand Gu Lihan held a black banner, very sinister! His being sealed in ice was a process — he must have used that black banner to kill his disciples."

"When he was sealed by the dragon pearl in the dark ice, he could not break free, and he knew in his heart that he would be trapped here a long while. In officialdom men trample one another over and over; his disciples bore the name of disciples, but they were all officials of the State of Yanning, and where no bond of teacher and student remains, such men might well not inform the court to come rescue him. After all, an empty seat as the Crown Prince's Junior Guardian would be to everyone's advantage."