Chapter 509 - The High Priest
After a night of drinking, Emperor Xia was still full of vigor. To put it another way, he has not felt tiredness in a long time, as he practically had unlimited energy. Fitness that knew no bounds coupled with a high intelligence made him into the strong person he is today.
Emperor Xia arranged for his carriages and left the main hall. The palace maids and eunuchs were far behind him. Emperor Xia pa.s.sed through a garden and reached a Jade lake. The gleaming waves were like mirrors, and the gra.s.s spanned thousands of acres.
This lake was the biggest in the kingdom. Water from the sky above and the ground below were drawn in. Spiritual vigor was acc.u.mulated. All of this formed the lake. It took 30 years to complete and costed the lives of 20,000 slaves.
The clear waters of the lake masked the immense amount of blood and tears behind its conception.
At the heart of the lake was a pavilion. It was the only thing in this boundless expanse of water. This kind of beautiful scenery could only be captured at its best in the pavilion.
The palace maids and eunuchs could only stay by the lakeside. Emperor Xia took one step and reached the waters. With another step, he was already present in the pavilion at the heart of the lake. Inside the pavilion there stood a person, a thin body as viewed from behind, and shrouded in a black robe. Just like ink, the person"s hair was equally black and gradually reached the waist, like a waterfall that started from the shoulders. The hands that peeked out from the long sleeves were white as jade, with long and beautiful fingers. Both hands were clasped at the back, and the person was looking out at the similarly white waters of the lake.
Emperor Xia exhaustedly looked at the sky, and carelessly muttered, "Ever since I was young, I have never let anyone here. This time you best have a reason for me."
The person slowly turned, and the boundless light that radiated from his back gathered to become a picture, and he was the person in the picture, the main character. He was wearing a green copper mask. The surface of the masked looked like it was covered in a layer of fog. In the midst of the blur, a pair of eyes could be seen. One could clearly see the profound quietness at the corner of those eyes, as if it was the darkness of the void.
His silent gaze landed on Emperor Xia. Faced with the strongest person of this era in the country, his expression and posture was leisurely. Emperor Xia stared at him intently without wavering his gaze.
"The chancellors all said that you were not tolerant and generous towards people. What harm would it be to show that magnanimous side of yours?"
"I do not care at all what others think of me."
"Saying that you do not care just goes to show that you do."
"You being ill does not give you the right to be presumptuous towards me."
The man with the black robe and the green copper mask was the High Priest of Xia Kingdom. No one knew his age. The same could be said of his abilities.
While the strongest man in Da Xia was Emperor Xia, the most mysterious person in Da Xia was the High Priest.
The High Priest coughed and used a silk cloth to wipe his mouth. Blotches of dark coloured blood stained the cloth.
Slight concern could be seen in Emperor Xia"s eyes, and it looked genuine.
"Do not worry. It is hard for me to continue living, and equally as hard for me to die within a short time." Slowly and methodically, the High Priest took out a bright red medicine pill and swallowed it.
Emperor Xia said, "Alright then. You must find a way to keep on living regardless of what happens. Surely the day will come when I am able to find a way to cure your illness."
The High Priest gazed upon Emperor Xia, "It matters not if I cannot be cured. I have lived for a long time."
Emperor Xia coldly chuckled, "No one resents being able to live a long life. Or do you loathe the fact that I may not be able to do it?"
Emperor Xia took one step forward and plainly said, "It is true that I cause people to loathe me. But I want you to live."
Soft came the reply, "But I do not care about my life and whether I live or die. I care about the survival of Da Xia, the continuance of the Xia clan. Do you know that the moment you were born, I immediately understood that you would be the strongest of his sons? And that you would be the last king of Da Xia?"
"Without you even saying it, I knew, and my father knew. That is why he wanted to kill me, for the sole purpose of Da Xia"s continued existence. Perhaps if I was gone, Da Xia could continue existing for a long time," Emperor Xia said.
"When I found out, I killed him," he continued.
The taboo subject came out of his mouth as if it was nothing. The fact that he killed his father sufficed to show how savage he was.
The High Priest"s lips quivered and he sighed, "You need not personally confess to this."
"It has already been done. What is there not to confess? But since you knew of that fact when I was born, why not kill me there and then? Why teach me about so many things and turn me into a person incapable of committing such things?" Emperor Xia coldly stared at the High Priest.
"I thought that if you were strong enough, fate could be changed. And to add to that, you have never let me down. The Xia Dynasty produced so many talents, and yet you were the only one able to surpa.s.s them all. There was even more hope that you could reach the same state as them," said the High Priest.
"This is not your reason. But as you do not wish to say it, I will not force it upon you. Now that I have told you the truth, you can tell me the matter involving the young man with the Daoist name "Qing Xuan"." Emperor Xia changed the subject to that of an earlier time.
"You should know that the world around us is not originally the world of the living. If there were no stars are no sun, the children that were born simply cannot survive for long. It is more impossible then, for them to reproduce and create the many populations of clans we see today," the High Priest faintly said.
"Of course I know that. This world is the world of the dead. Or rather, it could be said that this world originally ought to be the final destination of departed souls," Emperor Xia said plainly.
"You are correct. Furthermore this world has considerable origins in the Xia clan. Its birth was very much connected to the birth of your forefathers and the birth of the first living beings in the Asura Blood Sea. Therefore if there was legitimism in this world, half of it would be the Xia clan, while the other half could be considered as that of the Asura Blood Sea," the High Priest casually mentioned. However this was a secret even the university students of Guan Longzi could not comprehend.
"That is why I wanted to wipe out the blood sea and become the true legitimism of this world. If it were not for the people in the blood sea that cultivated to become swordsmen of slaughter and successfully achieving great Asura, I would have succeeded," Emperor Xia still harbored those troubles at heart. The Great Asura in the blood sea occupied and dominated the home ground, and it was because of this that he had no way of coping with the opposing party.
The High Priest continued, "It is true that combating the Asura Blood Sea is much more important than eliminating the Eastern Barbarians or Yin Shang. I believe that one day you will complete this task. But it only 30 years ago did I understand that fate cannot be resisted. That year, the Asura Blood Sea"s Flower of the Other Sh.o.r.e bloomed.
Once the Flower of the Other Sh.o.r.e bloomed, it signified that the true owner of this world has arrived. Just like there can be only one sun in the sky, the world can only have one owner. Once he comes, it would represent the peris.h.i.+ng of Xia, because the Xia clan is only half of the legitimism of the world. This is one of the things that the new owner cannot be tolerant of, unless you surrender. But surely you will not.
As for the young man, he is probably the person that was released for this situation by the Flower of the Other Sh.o.r.e, and also the last owner of this world."
Emperor Xia coldly replied, "All the more reason we should dispose of him."
"What makes you think you can kill him if you could not kill Tianyi? That is why I have been thinking, that maybe we can come to an agreement with him before everything happens. So in the event that Xia perishes, at least the Xia clan could continue in existence," the High Priest unhurriedly said. This was something he started to prepare for many years ago.
The general trend of fate is that there is no way to resist it. Even so, the tiniest details still contain many changeable aspects.