Chapter 498 - Carving
Shen Lian was currently at Xicheng, West Town, where traders and diplomats from other countries gathered. With the crowd, it had a thick air of the secular mortal world.
He strolled around the streets and listened to the hawkers crying their wares. There were all kinds of people in the restaurants, discussing what was happening in their respective countries. The messages all went by his heart. He could manage the messages in his surrounding better now.
Despite being able to read everyone"s mind, in the face of all kinds of odd thoughts, he could still be an impartial observer and could predict what would happen to everyone in the next moment.
This was not to deduce the designs of nature but to perform an accurate a.n.a.lysis.
He did not even spend much effort, as it was conducted by his enormous Primordial Spirit subconsciously.
The ancestral hall of Xia Kingdom where he was at before was protected by a mysterious power. Shen Lian did not have the intention to discover further.
On the other hand, he was touched by Ming Luo"s demonic blade, which in turn caused some mild changes in his temperament. It was because of Yanxu"s Sky Demon Method.
During the bier discourse of Dao, Yanxu was, in fact, dead, but the key message of Sky Demon Method and Dream Heart Sutra was to turn everything in life into an illusion until eventually, one woke up from it, it would then be transcendence.
As such, the meaning of death did not mean death to Yanxu who was an expert. Even though countless clones of Yanxu and his egos were destroyed, he too planted a seed of himself in Shen Lian during the few encounters. If one day Shen Lian decided to let go of the boundaries and to be reckless, Yanxu could then make use of his shadow to reincarnate himself.
This generation of Shen Lian had a minor difference with the one from before. He did not realize before that he actually shared a similar personality with Yanxu, but the main difference was that Shen Lian had his boundary and Yanxu did not.
If others took note of it, they would perhaps be paranoid, and try out all the methods to eliminate the shadow of Yanxu, but after Shen Lian was made aware of it, he just laughed it off.
He knew how he was like and there was no definition to it. Shen Lian felt that he was like water which took the shape of the environment it was in.
A stream of water falling from the cliff would lead to the formation of a grand waterfall, but if it flowed downwards slowly, it would then become a clear and beautiful stream. Hundreds of rivers gathered and then the sea would be formed. A puddle would be formed if water flowed inside a pothole.
Because he understood it, Shen Lian could then live freely and easily.
Ming Luo was still alive, but he did not live in a complete way. He stood quietly outside the ancestral hall. The blade in his hand was filled with demonic characteristics. The soldiers who followed him to the ancestral hall all went mad and dropped dead, because the demonic characteristics of the demonic blade lit up the acc.u.mulated Qi of devilry within themselves, and messed up their thoughts.
Emperor Xia visited the ancestral hall himself, and he saw how Ming Luo look, and the demonic blade in his hand. The blade had become something that could absorb the essence of sun and moon by itself, and it could even swallow the essence of living beings. To some extent, this blade had become a demon.
Emperor Xia took away the demonic blade and took away Ming Luo"s body. His most devoted dog had now lost his spirit, and only his body remained.
The chancellors thought Emperor Xia would try every method to find the murderer, and it was clear to everyone that the murderer was the person who moved the mountain in the morning, but Emperor Xia did not do anything, everything was business as usual.
The chancellors were nervous in the beginning, as even Ming Luo was killed by that person. They all wondered who would be next.
As Emperor Xia was so calm, the chancellors all felt more relaxed subconsciously.
For ten days, nothing happened in Diqiu.
The undercurrent which was previously rising and falling began to subside. The school became busier.
Guan Longzi"s knowledge brought a lot of surprises to the students. They did not obtain any concrete cultivation methods from Guan Longzi, but they had a clearer understanding of the principles of the law of heaven and earth. They too learned about the source of power.
Yin and Yang, the five elements, and the birth of all beings were all taught by Guan Longzi.
Wuding and Fei Zhong were the two that benefited the most. Significant improvements were observed, as their breathing increased day by day. The two were surprised by the speed of their improvements.
To Guan Longzi, it was due to the reason that they had great potentials that led them to an opening. It was akin to the saying that if you understood one theory, you could understand everything, and with that you would become a Buddha or Celestial.
On the other hand, what Lei Jing was learning from Shen Lian was much simpler. She was still at the first level, whereby she was learning to stop breathing through the mouth and the nose, but instead make use of the pores of her body to take in the air.
This was a continuous and lengthy process, and this period could penetrate through a large part of her subsequent life.
Lei Jing enjoyed this period of time a lot because it was pleasant. Anyone who had spent some time with Shen Lian would not dislike him. He was not cold, but he too was not overly pa.s.sionate. He was never far or close, but he always seemed to know what was the most appropriate distance.
Sometimes Lei Jing felt annoyed with Shen Lian"s teasing, but as Shen Lian understood her well, he could easily resolve her annoyance.
It was easy to get along with Shen Lian, but it was extremely difficult for one to get close to his heart. Lei Jing really wanted to get close to Shen Lian"s heart to know who he truly was.
This had nothing to do with love, but an inborn curiosity of human.
From three days ago, Shen Lian liked to visit the stream, where he would sit next to it, focusing on carving a fresh tree branch he picked up with a sharp knife.
The knife was the one Lei Jing saw when Shen Lian went to request one to be made by a normal ironsmith in the city. The material and quality were commonplace.
When Shen Lian was carving the wood, he would enter a selfless state, and the wood would slowly turn into a knife. The knife had a larger curve than most knives. It looked like the crescent moon in the sky.
The wooden knife had a natural flow, like that of the water. In three days, Shen Lian carved three wooden knives, and each of them looked the same, but Lei Jing felt there were some slight differences.
The wooden knife on the first day was not as alive as the one on the second day, and the wooden knife on the third day was more alive than the one on the second day.
Lei Jing did not understand why she would use "alive" as a description, but it was probably because she could not think of other adjectives.
Every time Shen Lian was done with carving the wooden knife, he would throw it into the water. This time was no exception.
Lei Jing would pick up the wooden knife stealthily, although she did not know why she would pick it up, as it was something thrown away by Shen Lian. She was the Eldest Young Lady of Prefect Grand Usher. It was embarra.s.sing for her to do something like that.
This time Lei Jing predicted wrongly. After Shen Lian was done the carving, he pa.s.sed the wooden knife to Lei Jing. The back and the blade of the knife were natural but traditional. The body of the knife carried vitality as a whole like it was about to come alive anytime.