Chapter 1155: The Fortunate Little Daoist
The kite string had already been tied to the chariot shaft, the painting hanging in the sky.
The little Daoist didn’t dare look at the brutal battle scenes around him, covering his face with both small hands. Occasionally, he would steal a glance, only to tremble in fear.
The carriage curtain had been drawn open, and Shang Xingzhou sat at the edge, his feet resting on the ground.
If Chen Changsheng were here at this moment, he would have noticed that Shang Xingzhou had aged far more than he had in Luoyang, his hair now completely white.
He held a fan in his hand, slowly waving it, his white hair gently drifting in the breeze.
His eyes were closed as he listened to the sounds of slaughter on the plains and the splatter of blood in the air. There was no disgust in his expression, nor any intoxication.
He was calm. Before the true end, everything he had done and everyone he had met were merely part of the journey.
He understood perfectly why the Demon race was going all out to kill him.
Of course, he wouldn’t leave.
What he wanted was to draw out the Demon main force while simultaneously providing them with some kind of evidence.
It was a fog that both sides needed.
He also wouldn’t send any information to the central command—the more silent the central command remained, the more the Demons would want to kill him. In such a situation, if he died at the hands of the Demons, many soldiers and priests would develop strong grievances against Chen Changsheng and Xu Yourong, and the human army on the front lines might even split apart.
He knew Chen Changsheng would bear immense pressure, but he didn’t care at all. If he couldn’t even withstand this much pressure, what right did he have to be his student?
From dawn until the autumn sun hung high in the sky, the vanguard of the Demon Wolf Cavalry finally broke through the heavy defenses of the Black Armored Heavy Cavalry and arrived before the small hill.
Yet those bloodthirsty giant wolves, drooling and panting heavily, couldn’t take a single step onto the hill before they were all shot dead by thousands of Holy Light Crossbows.
With the number of Holy Light Crossbows dwindling, such a massive volley was already a rare sight on the battlefield.
It could only be said that whether it was Peng Shihai or any other officer or soldier of the Eastern Army, they all regarded Shang Xingzhou’s safety as more important than the heavens.
Corpses and wounded lay everywhere around the small hill.
The human cavalry, having re-encircled the hill, carried out a brief cleanup. They naturally finished off any wounded Demons with a single strike, while carrying their injured comrades up the hill, temporarily laying them on the slopes, waiting for a lull in the battle so that the priests of the Li Palace and the teachers and students of the Green Shade Thirteen Division could treat them—hoping only that the wounded would still be alive by then.
The soldiers placed the wounded on the slopes, said a few words of comfort, and then had to leave.
Of course, before leaving, they wouldn’t forget to kowtow a few times toward the small carriage.
The little Daoist parted his fingers, revealing his dark, glistening eyes as he looked at Shang Xingzhou.
Shang Xingzhou didn’t open his eyes, saying, “If you can’t cure them, don’t bother me.”
The little Daoist happily hummed in acknowledgment, took two grass ropes from his sleeve, tied his wide Daoist sleeves tightly around his wrists, and then ran toward the slope.
The slope was full of wounded soldiers, so naturally, no one stopped him.
But he hadn’t brought a medicine box, so no one knew how he planned to treat them.
The next moment, the little Daoist removed a golden needle from his finger and began to apply acupuncture to stop the bleeding for the wounded soldiers, his small face utterly serious.
Moving from one wounded soldier to another, his face flushed red from the heat, his forehead covered in sweat.
One wounded soldier wore a felt hat, uncommon on the battlefield, which covered most of his face. The exposed parts showed a faint bluish tint.
Looking at that soldier, the little Daoist scratched his head and said, “Poisoned? I don’t know how to treat that.”
After saying this, he had to temporarily abandon that soldier and first stop the bleeding for the others.
When he finished, he returned to the carriage, looked at Shang Xingzhou with a sweet smile, and called out crisply, “Ancestor, I’m back!”
The next moment, the smile on the little Daoist’s face turned into a look of near tears, clearly extremely nervous, and he silently mouthed a few words.
At some point, Shang Xingzhou had already opened his eyes.
He nodded calmly.
The little Daoist nimbly crawled into the carriage and hid behind him.
Shang Xingzhou looked toward the wounded soldiers on the slope, his gaze following the little Daoist’s finger pointing from his shoulder, finally landing on one soldier.
It was the soldier with the felt hat and the bluish face.
Shang Xingzhou stared quietly at that soldier.
A faint wrinkle gradually appeared at the corner of his eye, deepened by the wind.
Suddenly, an extremely bright light appeared in his eyes.
Several dozen yards away, a spatial rift silently appeared at the throat of that wounded soldier.
Spatial rifts were the sharpest things in the world, capable of leading directly to the underworld.
Blood beads emerged from the bluish skin, then slowly split open.
That wounded soldier suddenly opened his eyes, and his body sank into the ground like a sugar figurine falling into water.
The spatial rift followed him into the ground.
The soldier’s body turned into a cloud of mist, seeping out of the soil and spreading across the slope in all directions.
Shang Xingzhou suddenly closed his eyes.
The giant painting hanging from the kite in the sky was the Burning of the Garuda Monastery.
Suddenly, a young Daoist appeared in the midst of the blazing ruins.
That Daoist had handsome features, exactly like a young Shang Xingzhou.
He looked around the plains, his gaze sharp as a blade, as if he could see through every hidden realm.
In the painting, over a dozen bright lights appeared in the young Daoist’s clear eyes.
In the carriage, over a dozen deep wrinkles appeared on Shang Xingzhou’s face.
Sssshhhh!
Several sharp cutting sounds echoed around the small hill.
The spatial rifts gradually faded away.
The Black Robe revealed his form.
The human cavalry uniform he had worn had long since turned to shreds, blown away by the wind.
Even the black robe that had protected him for a thousand years now bore several tears.
Bright red blood flowed from some of those tears.
The legend was true—the Black Robe was indeed a human.
…
…
“I never expected that you would succeed in ambushing me.”
The Black Robe looked at Shang Xingzhou in the carriage and said.
His voice, penetrating the hood, was somewhat low and sinister, but now carried a hint of emotion.
As he had said, he had taken a great risk today, disguising himself as a human cavalryman to approach Shang Xingzhou, intending to assassinate him.
Who would have thought that Shang Xingzhou would see through his disguise in advance and nearly counter-ambush and kill him instead.
“Back then, your student used this same trick to kill my student, and now you use it again. Such repetition is truly disappointing.”
Shang Xingzhou’s voice carried no emotional fluctuation, as cold as if the other party were neither the Demon strategist nor an old acquaintance.
He was naturally referring to the incident over a decade ago, when the young Demon Lord disguised himself as a severely wounded formation master, allowing Chen Chou and An Hua of the Song Mountain Military Prefecture to carry him to the Snow Ridge to find the owner of the Cinnabar Pill.
The Black Robe said, “At that time, His Majesty wanted to kill the late Emperor. It had nothing to do with Chen Changsheng.”
Shang Xingzhou replied, “Regardless, it’s still an old trick. No wonder even my student saw through it.”
The little Daoist listened intently behind him, completely unaware of how significant this statement was for himself.
Over the past two years, many people knew that a little Daoist had appeared at the Luoyang Changchun Temple, serving at Shang Xingzhou’s side, and they had taken note.
But Shang Xingzhou had never made clear what this little Daoist was to him.
Until today, in front of the Black Robe, he had spoken such a sentence.
What were the benefits of being Shang Xingzhou’s student?
You only needed to know that his first two students had become an emperor and a pope—that was enough.
Even the Black Robe couldn’t help but glance at the little Daoist twice.
Although his plan today wasn’t particularly novel, it actually had a high chance of success. Who would have thought that a child would see through it?
What they called deep fortune and profound blessings probably meant something like this.