541 The Nurturing Heart Sutra

The moment he said 'master' the eyes of Mudan similarly glowed in a red light too. Shaoyan Qianyu though looked at them with a cold face. Internally she felt strange about this all. She had heard about this 'master' that the supreme elder and the patriarch had met before.

This master was willing to become the backing of their sect and was said to be an expert. They were even sending a lot of resources to this master. In fact, a lot of the resources that they were supposed to send the master were included in the vaults that were robbed.

'No way… could it be?' Shaoyan Qianyu remembered Wu Lian's words.

She decided to excuse herself from the meeting as the patriarch and Yi Deng went alone to someplace. Shaoyan Qianyu didn't like what had happened with the sect's condition, but the actions of Mudan and Yi Deng unnerved her too.

"Oh Ancestors… what is this beast? And who is that man? Why has our sect suffered such tragedy?" She muttered to herself.

***

The culprit behind this was currently unconscious and lying in a cave somewhere. He was laid against a wall and had a still face. A large beast laid at his side but it seemed to be extremely tired. Its fur had lost its shine and its aura seemed to be weak too.

This was of course none other than Lin Mu. He had passed out after he got onto Little Shrubby's back and when the beast ran away at great speed. Little Shrubby had run for a day and night, only after which did he stop.

He knew he was being chased by Mudan and thus didn't stop, even if the distance between them was quite large. Little Shrubby could smell the man and that was how he could tell he was being followed.

Only after the scent got very faint did he pick a good enough place to hide. It had found a random cave at the side of a mountain and entered it before putting down Lin Mu. By this time all the flames on his body had already been extinguished and his size had returned to normal as well.

Unknown to both the man and beast, a change was happening between them. Little Shrubby's aura flickered like a flame in a storm and Lin Mu's was similar, both of their auras intermixed before becoming synchronous. Then suddenly the mysterious ring on Lin Mu's hand started to hum.

Lin Mu who had been unconscious the entire time, woke up but found himself in front of the ethereal altar at the center of the ring.

"Huh? Why am I here?" Lin Mu wondered as he looked around.

"Senior? Senior Xukong!" Lin Mu called out, but received no response.

He then tried to contact him using his link, but found it to be blocked. He could tell that the link still existed but was unable to do anything to it.

"What is happening?" Lin Mu questioned as he tried to remember.

He recalled being paralyzed from the tribulation lightning and then being chased by the elders and patriarch of the Tri Cauldron peony sect. Finally, little Shrubby had come to rescue him and he had fallen unconscious after that.

"A lot happened huh… though my body… is it fine or not?" Lin Mu questioned.

~humm~

As if responding to him, the ethereal suddenly started to glow as mystical runes started to appear on it. Lin Mu's attention was instantly pulled by it as he felt a calling in his mind. It told him to come to the altar.

Lin Mu faced the altar and walked towards it before halting at its front. He lifted his hand before placing it on it, fully expecting something to happen.

~shua~

Lin Mu's vision went dark as a streak of runes started to appear out of the Ethereal altar. These runes entered Lin Mu's head and were like an endless river. Lin Mu felt memories starting to appear in his mind as he felt his body becoming numb.

When his vision returned, he found himself in a strange place. He was standing on a platform that floated in the middle of the sky. Below him, he could see massive forests, frozen glaciers, dry and scorching deserts, colossal volcanoes that spewed out dark smoke and an abyssal ocean that extended wherever his eyes went.

He looked closer and saw that each of these areas had something in common. There were beasts in all of them. These beasts were of various types, some could fly, some crawled, some walked and some swam. They were of various sizes, from the size of a dust particle all the way to the size of a mountain.

All these beasts were also staring at Lin Mu from their locations. The ones that were on the ground looked up at Lin Mu while those flying the sky stared down at him. Lin Mu felt unnerved by their gazes and felt fearful.

But this was merely the start of it. Soon the beasts started to let out their cries. They roared, growled, screeched, cackled, clicked, chattered, chittered and howled. Their cries all mixed up to become an ungodly noise that assaulted Lin Mu's ears.

"Argh!" Lin Mu cried in pain as he covered his ears.

Their cries were only increasing in volume and made Lin Mu kneel on the ground as he lost strength in his legs.

Time passed by and the cries of the beasts never stopped. Lin Mu was now curled up on the ground, half unconscious. He was just about to pass out when he heard a different voice among the cacophony of cries.

Unlike the other beastly cries, he was able to understand this one. He focused on this voice as he found it to be a lot better than the beast's cries. But then he realized more and more such voices appeared.

One by one, the cries of the beasts disappeared, and replacing them were coherent voices that spoke words which Lin Mu understood.

They were all chanting the same thing, and Lin Mu finally grasped it. All the voices then merged to become one massive voice, which boomed in his ears.

"Open thy heart to the world, embrace its creations and become one with them! - Behold, The Nurturing Heart Sutra!"