Chapter 526: Mortals… Are Ultimately Nothing but Grass and Dust (Two in One Chapter) |
Wang Shenghan turned around and looked at Xiao Mochi with a smile.
"Mochi… you still came back after all."
"Shenghan… what in the world is going on?"
Xiao Mochi looked at the friend he had once shared his days and nights with. His brows furrowed, his expression heavy with a solemn weight.
From Wang Shenghan's body, Xiao Mochi felt an extremely ominous aura.
It was the same kind of feeling he'd sensed earlier—from the Lord of Black Hawk City.
"It's nothing," Wang Shenghan sighed softly. "I merely left myself a few contingencies. If I hadn't done so, we'd all be dead. It's just… I didn't want you to see them."
"What contingencies? Shenghan, that pill in your hand—is it…?"
Xiao Mochi stared at Wang Shenghan, cold sweat already beading on his forehead.
Wang Shenghan opened his palm, and a golden pill slowly floated upward from his hand.
"This pill is exactly what the Black Hawk City Lord and the Rouge Sect Master wanted to refine. Since so many of Black Hawk City's citizens are already dead… then naturally, I can't waste their lives.
Even if they died, then they should die with value.
So I simply went along with it and refined them into a pill.
Mochi… do you think I did something wrong?"
His tone was so matter-of-fact, so natural, as though it were the only reasonable thing in the world.
"But those civilians weren't all dead! A lot of them could've survived!"
Xiao Mochi's eyes trembled. He felt as though his entire worldview—his values—had been violently shattered.
As if, in that very moment, he no longer recognized this friend of his at all.
Shenghan had become terrifying.
Wang Shenghan only smiled faintly.
"Mochi… although what the Black Hawk City Lord did was monstrous, there's one thing he said that was right. Ordinary people… and people like us… we are no longer the same kind of being.
When sacrifice is needed, it must be made.
Otherwise, it's nothing but softhearted foolishness."
Xiao Mochi clenched his fists tightly, refusing to believe his friend could say such words.
"Shenghan! Do you even hear yourself?! Have you fallen into demonic ways?!"
"I haven't," Wang Shenghan shook his head. "This… has simply always been the real me. I've always thought this way.
You, Xiaoliu, Wenmo… the three of you are far too idealistic.
But this world… isn't as simple as you imagine it to be."
He drew in a deep breath and lifted his gaze to the vast sky overhead.
"A few years ago, when I went to White Deer Academy to study, you must've wondered why I arrived so late, didn't you?
Back then, I truly did encounter something.
Before I reached White Deer Academy, I traveled the world. I passed through a city.
And I met its lord.
It wasn't a big city—not even as large as Black Hawk City.
That city belonged to no dynasty. It ran a business.
A business of selling the people inside it."
Most were sold to sects.
Those with talent were accepted as disciples, stepping onto the path of cultivation.
Those without talent were taken by sects to be used as medicinal catalysts for pill refining… or as slaves for labor… or as offerings in sacrifice.
In the eyes of those sects, mortals were no different from pigs, cattle, chickens, or ducks.
Only these "livestock" could speak.
And they were worth more.
They could also give birth to more valuable "livestock."
"At that time, I wanted to save them," Wang Shenghan continued.
"That city lord's realm wasn't even high—about the same as mine. And I had plenty of treasures on me. Killing him… wasn't difficult.
And I did it.
I killed the city lord. I gave the people their freedom.
But guess what happened."
As he spoke, helplessness curled into the corners of his lips in a bitter smile.
"Do you think I saved them?
I didn't."
His voice carried an immeasurable emptiness.
"I told them the city lord was dead, that they were free.
But they hated me.
They cursed me for meddling, for destroying their livelihood.
Later, I finally understood why.
That city was so remote, surrounded by forests filled with demonic beasts. Nearly all supplies had to be transported from outside.
For them to leave and buy supplies on their own…
was a journey of nine deaths and one life.
So they chose this path willingly.
They were willing to become livestock for immortals."
Wang Shenghan looked at Xiao Mochi.
"Tell me—were they right or wrong?"
"…"
Xiao Mochi had no answer.
In such a matter, who could truly say what was right or wrong?
Wang Shenghan didn't seem to expect an answer anyway. He only sighed and continued.
"As a person, of course they don't want their flesh and blood used to refine pills.
Of course they don't want their family sold off to sects as slaves.
But as a person…
they want to live.
They only want to live.
If someone wants to live, what wrong is there in that?"
"The so-called cultivators seem to give them a chance to survive.
But in truth, if those sects wanted to clear out the demonic beasts in the surrounding forests—would it really be difficult?
What they wanted was only to use a place like that to raise humans…
like raising livestock."
"Mochi, this world is filthier than you and I ever imagined."
As his words fell, Wang Shenghan swallowed the crimson pill in his hand.
The instant he did—
his aura erupted, surging violently as if it would tear the heavens apart!
The sky split open like ripped silk. Dark clouds churned like an inverted sea, and nine tornado-like pillars of cloud descended from the void. Gale winds mixed with thunder tore through everything, uprooting trees and grass for miles around.
Those pillars were no ordinary vapor.
Within each flowed ancient golden runes, as though they were draining every thread of spiritual energy from the entire sky—condensing it into liquid streams of spiritual radiance that poured downward in a heavenly deluge!
Wang Shenghan's blue robe billowed like a battle banner. His three thousand strands of hair stood on end beneath the storm of pressure.
As the ninth pillar slammed into the crown of his head, golden light exploded from every pore in his body.
The flagstones beneath Xiao Mochi had already been ground to dust.
In the swirling vortex above, a massive palm emerged—hundreds of feet wide—its lines and creases filled with flowing liquid thunder.
"Shenghan! You're trying to kill me?!"
Xiao Mochi was shocked to the core.
That earlier strike—
it had been aimed to kill.
Wang Shenghan's lips curved upward.
"Mochi… I want to kill you. Isn't that obvious?
I've refined this pill, but it still needs the completion of a Confucian scholar's righteous qi.
So, Mochi—
you'll have to sacrifice yourself."
"And besides… what I've done can't be known by the Headmaster and the others.
If you hadn't seen it… perhaps I wouldn't have made a move on you.
Why did you come back?"
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
As his words fell, Wang Shenghan struck again and again, palms crashing down toward Xiao Mochi like collapsing heaven.
Xiao Mochi dodged desperately—more than once he nearly had his soul shattered on the spot.
Thunder roared across the sky.
Lightning flashed through the clouds like mad serpents, and bolts rained down on Xiao Mochi in a frenzy.
Wang Shenghan's Dao-voice rolled in his throat, condensing into substance in the air—each word transforming into a massive palm seal of black ice, ten meters wide.
Seventy-two layers of palm shadows surged forward, bearing baleful killing winds.
The stone ground cracked into countless ice crystals as the freezing tide swept past, and those floating shards—driven by law itself—turned into soul-chasing prisms, refracting endless frost-white sword qi!
Xiao Mochi raised two fingers like a sword and slashed across his brow.
Each shattered afterimage exploded into blood-red starlight, and in the storm of ice prisms he tore open a path of survival by force alone.
Above, nine rings of thunder detonated.
Purple-gold lightning struck like an ancient flood-dragon reaching down with claws.
Those thunderbolts twisted into rune-shaped prison sigils midair, transforming into thirty-six pillars of thunderfire that formed a cage, trapping Xiao Mochi within a ten-meter radius!
Wang Shenghan formed the Taiyi Thunder Seal with his hands.
Under the pressure of a Jade Purity Realm cultivator, the tribulation lightning carried the Dao-rhythm of heavenly punishment—something that belonged to the Transcending Tribulation stage itself.
Xiao Mochi clutched the Collection of Heavenly Questions, and seventy-two phantoms of sages rose behind him.
When he recited, "A gentleman remains at ease and awaits fate," the remnants of his righteous qi condensed into golden hexagrams, hovering around him and carving out a three-meter sanctuary within the thunder prison.
But every bolt that struck made a thread of golden blood spill from his lips—
his meridians, long since overdrawn, were cracked like drought-stricken earth.
Wang Shenghan stepped down from the thunderclouds.
Behind him appeared the unique "Heaven-and-Earth Furnace" phenomenon of a Jade Purity cultivator.
Within that bronze cauldron that seemed to swallow sun and moon, liquid spiritual energy poured like a galaxy, casting him in the likeness of a god.
Xiao Mochi's sage-lit brilliance, by contrast, flickered like a candle in the wind.
Every shattered hexagram came with the brittle sound of bones cracking.
After the battle with the Black Hawk City Lord and the others, Xiao Mochi's spiritual energy had already been nearly drained.
But Wang Shenghan had entered the Jade Purity Realm—
a brand-new realm, overflowing with boundless power.
"Mochi," Wang Shenghan sighed, "these years with you all… I truly was happy.
But you… are too naive.
Wenmo being naive is one thing—she's a flower that has never seen storm and rain.
But you, from the Wu Kingdom… and Xiaoliu, with his miserable background…
how can you still be so naive?"
Thunder gathered in Wang Shenghan's hand, forming a long whip.
With one lash—
each strike carried the might of lightning.
Xiao Mochi dodged. The whip carved deep scars into the ground, and within those scars flowed dark-blue liquid thunder.
The strikes Xiao Mochi couldn't evade slammed into his body.
The pain made him grit his teeth, brow tightly knit. Even before blood could flow, the flesh had already been scorched black.
Wang Shenghan raised his right hand high, thunder whip held aloft like a spear, pointing straight into the sky.
Lightning surged endlessly into his grasp.
"Mochi… if you can withstand this one whip strike,
then I'll go back with you and accept the Headmaster's punishment."
The whip grew brighter and brighter, like a thin line piercing into the clouds—lightning solidifying into a filament, as if condensed into a stream of silk.
BOOOOM!
Another thunderclap exploded—several times louder than before.
It felt like heaven and earth themselves were about to shatter from the sound!
Xiao Mochi stood on the ground, his profile lit starkly by blue-white thunderlight.
A fine rain began to fall, dampening his clothes and hair.
He looked at Wang Shenghan, knowing he had no choice left.
If he wanted to bring him back to the academy…
he had to defeat him.
And Xiao Mochi understood even more clearly—
with his current condition, the chance of victory was nearly nonexistent.
"Hah…"
Xiao Mochi took a deep breath.
The Collection of Heavenly Questions opened in his hands.
He reached into its pages—
and drew out a golden longsword!
The blade blazed with dazzling radiance.
Xiao Mochi slashed down at Wang Shenghan!
At the same time, Wang Shenghan's thunder whip cracked downward.
Xiao Mochi knew he was doomed.
Whether in realm, or in spiritual reserves…
he was far, far behind Shenghan.
BOOM!!!
Golden light and blue thunder collided.
Dust and sand from the ruins surged several meters high.
And when the haze finally dispersed—
when the world became clear again—
Xiao Mochi stood there, stunned, eyes shaking, staring ahead in disbelief.
His golden sword had pierced straight through Wang Shenghan's chest.
Wang Shenghan's thunder whip had carved a deep wound into the earth behind Xiao Mochi—
yet it hadn't harmed him in the slightest.
The golden radiance faded.
The golden sword vanished.
And on Wang Shenghan's lips…
was only a faint smile.
Wang Shenghan stepped closer to Xiao Mochi, one step at a time.
At last he stopped before him, lifted a hand, and gently tapped Xiao Mochi's forehead.
Xiao Mochi wanted to resist—
but his body wouldn't move at all.
He only felt righteous qi and the fortune of literary Dao pouring ceaselessly into his body.
"Shenghan, you—!"
Xiao Mochi finally understood what he was doing.
After swallowing that pill, Wang Shenghan hadn't fully refined it.
Instead, he used his own righteous qi to wrap it, cleansing its evil backlash—
and then passed it into Xiao Mochi!
"After the battle with the Black Hawk City Lord and the others," Wang Shenghan said with a smile, "I didn't have much life left anyway.
If I gave you the pill directly, you would never accept it.
So instead… I'll refine it to the end myself.
And then give it to you."
"You truly have talent," Wang Shenghan continued softly. "You may not know this, but many times when I helped the Headmaster with tasks, he would sigh and say—
you might be the most gifted Confucian cultivator in many years."
"But Mochi… everything I said earlier…
they were all from the heart."
"Tell me—what kind of world is this?
What are mortals, really?"
"Don't be naive anymore."
"Mochi… this is the way of the world."
"A world where mortals are like dogs…
and cultivators are gods."
"You're too kind."
"But Mochi… the world is not kind."
"I don't know what path you'll walk from here."
"But Mochi… no matter what, no matter what—
don't do anything foolish."
"Mortals… are, in the end, nothing but grass and dust."
In the imperial capital of Wu—
Xiao Mochi lifted his head.
The brush and inkstone floated beside him, forming a barrier of lightning.
"Shenghan…
if you truly believe mortals are nothing but grass…"
Xiao Mochi swept his arm out.
Above the skies—
rolling heavenly thunder descended in full.