Chapter 144 — An Encounter
The Sword Questions the Heavens · Page 1 of 8
The catastrophe began in the spring and summer of that year, and even a thousand years later the people of the world would still remember it clearly—that stretch of terrifying, mad days.
In the far south of the Southern Borderlands, amid the Ten Thousand Savage Mountains, countless monstrous beasts and alien tribes had suddenly swarmed forth, beyond all counting, every one of them bloodthirsty by nature, sparing neither man nor woman, old nor young, killing whoever they saw; and many of the vicious creatures were greedy for human flesh, leaving scenes too horrible to behold along every road they passed.
This disaster erupted first in the Southern Borderlands near the Ten Thousand Savage Mountains, then swiftly spread through the whole of the region. The five tribes of the south—the Miao, the Zhuang, the Tu, the Li, and the Gaoshan—rose up in resistance.
But against countless monstrous beasts and alien tribes—and above all against the dozen or so monstrous fiends among them whose demonic power and sorcery were especially formidable—the resistance of the five tribes was no more than a mantis trying to stay a chariot, and they were routed in the blink of an eye. The Southern Borderlands were drowned in blood, corpses strewn across the fields.
Word of this at once shook the world and spread through every land. Common folk of the Central Plains knew no peace, startled afresh each day and living in constant dread. Those living near the Southern Borderlands took their families and fled north by the thousands, hoping only to put as much distance as they could between themselves and the calamity.
Every cultivator under heaven was shaken; even the Orthodox and Demonic paths, forever scheming against each other, now laid down their quarrels for the time being, watching the south in silence and quietly taking stock of their own plans.
The great Orthodox sect in the south, the Flaming Sunset Valley, was fortunate enough to escape the disaster, for its valley master, Yun Yifeng, had just led the great majority of its disciples to Canglan Mountain to pay their respects to the Daoist Sage Daoyan.
Rumor had it that when Valley Master Yun Yifeng, then at Canglan Mountain, heard of the woes of the Southern Borderlands, he beat his breast and stamped his feet in a grief he could not bear, declaring that had he been present he would never have suffered such fiends to run rampant and poison the common people. So profound was his grief and self-reproach that he was minded to take his own life in atonement to the world; but his disciples on either side held him back, and the elders and chief disciples of the Canglan Sect spoke to him with kind words, and at last Valley Master Yun grew calm, and vowed to expend the whole strength of the Flaming Sunset Valley to avenge the blood of the Southern Borderlands!
Before long, Yun Yifeng proclaimed to all the cultivators of the world from Canglan Mountain that this present calamity was in truth the work of a single Beast Demon, whose demonic arts were formidable and whose nature was savage and cruel, and that only the combined strength of all under heaven could withstand him. In view of this, the Flaming Sunset Valley and the Canglan Sect jointly called upon all cultivators of the world to unite their strength and put this beast to death!
The next day, the Brahma Sound Temple, having received the word, made formal reply, endorsing the call of Qingyun and the Burning Incense Sect, and before many days had passed they would send men to join the alliance.
The Orthodox faction threw itself into frantic planning and deliberation, dispatching several groups of their finest disciples south to investigate the nature of these monstrous beasts and alien tribes—for only by knowing both oneself and the enemy could one fight a hundred battles without peril.