Jin Se

Chapter 74

By the end of the month, Shi Wuduan had, after notifying Gu Huaiyang, sent a secret missive to the king of the yao in "General Gu's" name.

It was nearly to the point already, that the victor of this war between humans would be decided by which side of the bench this third party decided to sit their asses on.

After Lu Lu's wedding, Shi Wuduan left Huaizhou once more and appeared for the second time at the Dasheng Sect's Bodhi Mountain.

At first, he wandered around at the base of the mountain, yet didn't ascend it. Bai Li, with his exceptional sight, was able to see that there was a circle of mysterious light closely encircling Bodhi Mountain, and that the spiritual energy that had accumulated at the mountain over thousands of years of cultivation was slowly seeping away southwards through the Sanyang Pass along the severed Dagu Road.

Bai Li was very sensitive towards spiritual energy. The reason the ancients had the saying "spiritual places nurture people of talent" was because everyone, no matter whether they were human or yao, needed a source of spiritual energy in order to cultivate.

Now, the collapse of the Dagu Road had destroyed the three sect's point of confluence, which was something like what one would get if they bunched all a bunch of perfectly functional vessels into one spot. If they were lucky they'd just be paralyzed, and if they weren't, then they'd croak right then and there.

But even with his sight, he wasn't able to tell where the man-made chasm in the Dagu Road was diverting all that spiritual energy to.

As Shi Wuduan gazed at the snowy summit of Bodhi Mountain, he said quietly, "Say, if I climb this mountain, do you think that old fox will kick me off after I'd conned him that time?"

Bai Li was silent for a moment, really not knowing what he should say. He kept thinking that if this guy wasn't dragged out and beaten to a pulp, he'd have more blessings than he could count. A long while later, he reached out and gathered Shi Wuduan's hair, messed up from the carriage ride, off to the side and asked, "Why can't you ever do anything good?"

"I'm always doing good."

"That's not what it looks like to me," Bai Li said bluntly. Even if it was Shi Wuduan, he'd grown too used to being a high-handed demon lord to show a bit of tact, "Aside from your eldest brother, it doesn't seem like anyone else is benefitting from your actions. A lot of people died because of you.

Zou Yanlai's books are all filled with 'benevolence, righteousness, etiquette, wisdom, integrity, magnanimity' and whatnot, but even though some of it is wrong, it at least looks like it's got some sense. You tell me then, which one of those do you have?"

Shi Wuduan glanced up at him and asked crabbily, "Then what're you following me for?"

"Enough," Bai Li cut him off indifferently, "Don't get riled up. I said before that I'm not going to fight you anymore, so I'm not going to fight."

Seeing that Shi Wuduan was glaring at him, Bai Li continued, "It doesn't really matter anyway. I'm just an outsider awaiting your judgment, who saw something they didn't understand and asked a question, nothing more."

Shi Wuduan sighed, nudged Bai Li's arm away, and brazenly pillowed his head on his legs, his face turned slightly to the side. He said wearily, "Let me lay down for a while."