Chapter 388 — Metamorphosis into Adulthood
The Herdsman of the Wasteland · Page 2 of 4
" Si Yunxiang said in astonishment, "Has the Cult Master's attainments in divination reached such a height? " The difficulty of this art was no less than that of the Daoist school's Dao Sword.
To use Teleportation, one's spatial calculations had to be cultivated to the utmost; otherwise, at best a miscalculation would send one to some perilous place, and at worst — dreadful to think of — it would fuse one into stone, flesh and rock made one.
Yet most terrible of all was a slip that would scatter a man, whole, into the void of space. The hardest part of all: Teleportation demanded that countless transfer nodes be calculated in a single instant, not one of them wrong, with the calculations continuing ceaselessly the whole way through — a volume of computation, and a precision, that were well-nigh impossible to achieve. In the history of the Nether Demon Cult, no few mighty men had been crippled, killed, or simply lost by practicing Teleportation, and the number of the strong who had been scattered apart was great as well.
More frightening still, every one of those mighty ones had possessed terrifying attainments in divination.
Shen Mu read the classic and calculated without pause, testing one spatial node after another. "Dao Lord Lin Xuan gave me the Mystic Maiden's Classic of Calculations some months ago, and these months I have studied it without letup; the Grand Mystery Classic of Calculations, too, I have all but mastered entire.
The Daoist school's attainments in divination may be called the finest under heaven; with the two classics joined, the secrets of Teleportation can be unraveled. Set your mind at ease — tonight I shall master the Mystic Maiden's classic through and through, and at first light tomorrow, when the darkness of the Desolate Ruins withdraws, I can depart by this art.
When Blind Grandpa sees that I am gone, he will not make things hard for you.
" Si Yunxiang's face turned complicated, and she said softly, "Why must you drive yourself so? Blind Grandpa did seize us by force and force us to marry you, and you think only of us — but have you ever asked whether we were willing to marry you? " Shen Mu stopped his calculations and raised his head in surprise; under the lamplight the Holy Maiden Xiang seemed to refuse and yet to invite. "Sister Xiang, are you willing to marry me? " Shen Mu asked, eyes wide. Si Yunxiang's eyes fell; she bowed her head in shyness, the pearls of her phoenix crown swaying faintly, shimmering in the candlelight with a jewel's allure.
"I don't believe it. " Shen Mu bent his head to his book and read on.
"Just now you had a dagger hidden in your sleeve, waiting for me to come to your side so you could run me through.
I don't believe a word of it.
" Si Yunxiang's two fists clenched until the knuckles cracked, her teeth ground audibly, and all at once she whipped out the little dagger and hurled herself at Shen Mu.
Shen Mu laughed aloud, sprang up, dodged the blade and flicked it with his finger; Si Yunxiang spun round and round, the red robes and wide skirts of a new bride turning like a red lotus, cold gleams flashing in her hand as she attacked him madly.
In the bridal chamber came a crackling din, and every kind of furniture was smashed to splinters.
"What a racket.
" Blind Grandpa set down his wine cup, his ears twitched, and utterly unruffled he asked Feng Xiuyun, who was keeping him company over the wine, "Has General Feng married? " Shen Mu fought Si Yunxiang a while, and at last gained the upper hand: he seized the dagger, flipped the Holy Maiden onto the bed, and smacked her bare bottom several times over — settling the score for her plundering of his private coffers — then went back to his book.
Si Yunxiang, fuming, burrowed under the quilt and turned her back on him.
Unnoticed, the sky began to pale, though the world of the Desolate Ruins remained in an unutterable darkness.
Shen Mu had read the whole night and was still full of vigor.