Volume 4, Chapter 51 – On the Dao

In Lüe Province, within a manor belonging to the Hantian Sword Dao, Tao Shuohua was supporting an old man as they walked through the courtyard.

The old man’s face was gaunt as dead wood, and all his hair and beard looked like withered grass. Though he wore a loose, broad robe for concealment, one could still see how thin his frame had become. After walking only a short while, he would already need to stop and rest. His whole body was steeped in an air of decay.

If Bai Xiang were standing here at this moment, she would surely be shocked by the old man’s appearance. For this man was none other than Tao Muyun, the Hantian Dao Lord who had once spoken with her by the banks of the Jing River.

The last time he had met Bai Xiang, Tao Muyun had at least still looked like a man with white hair and a youthful face. To have become like this in the blink of an eye was all thanks to Blood Soul Heaven.

“Stop sighing.” After sitting down to rest once more, Tao Muyun looked up and saw the worried look in his daughter’s eyes. With a faint smile, he said, “It is not entirely a bad thing. His dirty trick ruined years of my cultivation, but in return it freed me of my attachments and let me devote myself fully to researching the new method.”

That sounded nice, but was the new method really that easy to cultivate?

Tao Shuohua could not feel happy at all.

When it came to Bai Xiang’s innovation, the Shenming Qi-Refining Formula, Tao Shuohua knew more of its background and inner details than most others. She also suspected that Bai Xiang’s astonishing rate of progress in cultivation was, in all likelihood, due to the many marvels of this Path of Qi method.

As for the contents themselves, Tao Shuohua had read and studied them too. Her conclusion was that this method leaned toward the Daoist branch and fit the Hantian tradition extremely well. If Tao Muyun, who had fallen victim to a hidden scheme, could successfully switch over to cultivating it, not only would his hidden injuries be purged, he might even gain a chance to prolong his life and seek a higher realm in the future.

That was what she thought. But after learning of it, Tao Muyun had also looked over the method and firmly declared that now was not yet the time to switch cultivation.

This had truly made Tao Shuohua anxious. The backlash of demonic power was no joke. If he could not switch to the new method while he still retained his reason, then once that chance passed, what was she supposed to do, feed Tao Muyun one of the court’s “Saint-Transition Pills”?

“I will never take either of those two pills.” Tao Muyun’s expression remained calm. “If I fail in switching cultivation, then kill me on the spot. Do not burden yourself with worries about being ‘unfilial.'”

“But if you keep dragging it out like this…” Tao Shuohua shook her head. She truly could not understand what there was to wait for in a matter like this.

“You don’t understand.” Tao Muyun shook his head and said calmly, “That Jiang Taiping not only had demonic power with extremely strong penetrative properties, but every move he made could even stir up my ‘heart-demons.’ This is already another path entirely. It is not even quite the same as those Dao-Void Methods.”

Tao Shuohua said nothing.

She knew her father’s condition well enough. To put it plainly, the demonic power that had long been suppressed within him was surging back up. Every so often, it would try to seize his mind and trigger a full loss of order in the demonic power inside Tao Muyun’s body.

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If that demonic power succeeded, Tao Muyun’s fate would be bodily mutation, turning him into a hideous demonic Yaosui.

That would be an extremely dangerous outcome. At that point, Tao Muyun would not merely be as good as dead. That Yaosui monster, no longer recognizing kin or blood, might slaughter its way across more than half of Lüe Province. And as things stood, no one in Hantian could suppress such a disaster.

That was why she had stayed by Tao Muyun’s side these past days, serving him the whole time.

It was not only out of worry, but also as a precaution.

Yet Tao Muyun had his own reasoning. Through several episodes of demonic disorder, after personally experiencing them, he had suddenly gained a mysterious insight. He felt that somewhere in the unseen, there was something waiting for him to fully comprehend, and that once he succeeded, he would obtain enormous benefit.

It was something deeper than a mere cultivation route. Moreover, it seemed impossible to grasp without experiencing the upheaval of demonic power itself. That was why he was in no hurry to switch over to the Path of Qi. Instead, he was waiting, waiting either to understand it fully or to burn out completely.

This was a risk, and more than that, a wager with his life. But Tao Muyun had no choice.

Lüe Province was not the same as the lands of Qi. Distance meant that Lüe Province could not attach itself to that Shenming Dao Lord, so the Hantian Sword Dao could only rely on itself.

“Don’t keep looking so downcast.” Tao Muyun looked up at his daughter. “Why don’t you tell me about things outside? Let me see just how much more chaotic this world can still become.”

“It’s nothing but the same old stories.” Tao Shuohua was in no mood.

By “the same old stories,” she meant the great disasters breaking out all across the Nine Provinces, a state of affairs in which one catastrophe was constantly being put down only for a new one to arise again.

Then there was the war on the northern frontier. It was said that the Blood Sea Heavenly Gate had already fallen. Although the two Sword Lords had fought fiercely in defense and slain countless demons, they could do little against that boundless blood fog, formless and intangible as it was, and could only temporarily withdraw from the Heavenly Gate fortress.

“The current situation is already fairly clear. That Blood Sea should be under someone’s control, and it is itself a passage leading to the void-chaos.”

Tao Shuohua’s tone was full of worry, and as she spoke, she shook her head lightly. “The fact that those people forced the old Sword Lord to retreat from the fortress already proves they could capture Dai Province, or even march straight from Dai Province into Yujing. I don’t understand why they haven’t done so.”

“That only proves you underestimate those two.” Tao Muyun let out a cold snort. “Let me ask you this… how is the situation in Huang Province right now?”

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Tao Shuohua shook her head. “Qingping Sword Lord is holding the line there by himself, but something seems to have happened to him. He has remained guarding that place for more than ten days and ten nights without moving.”

“And what about Dai Province? Has there been any word that Wu Mengzi was injured?”

“That… I have not heard.”

“Then that proves it.” Tao Muyun nodded. “If my guess is right, Wu Mengzi may have some hidden method. And as for Chu Weiping…”

At the mention of that name, a sharp light flared in his eyes. “He is very likely doing the same as I am. No, more precisely, he probably began contemplating this thing even earlier than I did!”

“Father?” Tao Shuohua was startled. Wasn’t that conclusion a bit too arbitrary?

“It can’t be wrong.” Tao Muyun struck his cane hard against the ground.

“Over thousands of years, how many calamities have there been across the Nine Provinces?”

“From so many disasters and such tides of history producing men of greatness, how many Sword Lords have there been in total?”

“There is nothing wrong with those people’s talent and gifts. It is this rigid sword path that has shackled them instead!”

“Just wait and see.” He bared his teeth in a grin. “I am certainly not the only one doing this.”

“They all have their pride.”

“When heaven and earth are pacified, when mountains and rivers are set right once more, then look again upon this world.”

“Who would willingly remain depressed and live forever beneath another?”

…

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At the same time, in Yujing.

Within a temple on the outer mountain, a black-robed cultivator with a longsword at his waist was just stepping out. He stood in the woods and looked up at the sky.

“The stars are shifting, and demonic aura is boiling over.” Li Huiran’s eyes flashed sharply. “These people are truly bold. They actually dare ignore the Sacred Court’s prohibition?”

“What elegant leisure, Patrol Warden.” An old voice came from behind him. “To think you still have the leisure to come here and take in the scenery.”

“Stay away from me.” Without turning his head, Li Huiran said, “I am not in a cooperative relationship with your lot. We merely happen to be traveling together for this stretch of time.”

“This old woman never meant to trouble Patrol Warden Li much anyway.”

The newcomer wore a plain brown-yellow robe. She was the same old woman who had spoken with Li Huiran at length in the side chamber last time. Smiling amiably at his back, she leisurely cast out a question.

“Since Patrol Warden Li has ‘cast off darkness and turned toward the light,’ then you must surely understand the Demon Court’s Dao methods deeply.”

“May I ask how Patrol Warden Li views the sword path, and how you understand this new Path of Qi?”

“Order and loss of order are a pair of twins.” Li Huiran closed his eyes and said coldly, “A solitary Dao cannot endure. That which is sustained too long must perish. All things in this world follow the same principle. We merely act in place of heaven and earth’s will. There is no real ‘understanding’ to speak of.”

“But if you are asking me about crude imitations…”

At this point, he gave a mocking smile.

“Your path amounts to nothing more than clamping onto this imperial dynasty and feeding off its support like parasites. You vainly try to create your own momentum and imitate the rules by which heaven and earth operate.”

“My advice to you is this: beware the backlash.”

“And the Path of Qi?” the old woman pressed, rather unwilling to let it go. “How does Patrol Warden Li view the Path of Qi?”

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“The Path of Qi…” Li Huiran had in fact been avoiding this question all along. Now, it seemed he had finally been irritated by it, and impatience showed on his face.

Yet his pride seemed unwilling to let him keep dodging forever. He could only settle his thoughts, consider it for a moment, and then exhale as he said, “This method follows the route of turning the five qi into dragons and refining the Three Flowers into qi. From that angle, it can indeed be called a proper orthodox method of the Profound Gate.”

“But…” He changed direction mid-sentence. “It is unlike Dao-Void Methods, which contain the interplay of yin and yang and are a transformation of root methods between order and loss of order.”

“This method is too correct.”

“It is itself the greatest loss of order!”

After saying that, he could not be bothered to spare the old woman another glance. With a sweep of his sleeve, he returned to the side courtyard and slammed the main gate shut with a bang.

“The greatest loss of order…”

Watching his figure disappear, the old woman softly repeated that assessment to herself.

“You judge it to be ‘when the utmost correctness turns into its opposite.'”

“But I still want to ask you this. Do you know that in this world there is also ‘when the utmost reversal turns into correctness’?”

“Enough, enough…”

“So many principles. Who can truly explain them clearly?”

Shaking her head as she sighed, the old woman turned and slowly disappeared into the woods at the side.