Chapter 484: Scented Carriage, Plucking Stars
Hercules's combat experience was incredibly rich. He used the shield in his left hand to block Kane's chop, while the longsword in his right hand, like a venomous Viper, darted out from beneath the shield, thrusting directly towards Kane's chest.
Kane's reaction was also swift. He formed a claw with his left hand, and from his five fingers, five streams of Geng Metal Divine Wind emerged. As the five streams of Geng Metal Divine Wind brushed past the longsword in Hercules's hand, the outer layer of the longsword shattered like tofu.
The five divine winds blew over the sword's blade, as if a red-hot dining knife were slicing through butter on a plate. The outermost edge of the longsword instantly shattered into countless thumb-sized fragments, which then transformed into the finest dust in the wind and drifted away. Immediately after, the five streams of divine wind summoned by Kane, mixed with countless Spectral Souls and Malevolent Spirits, blew directly towards Hercules.
The wind was incredibly fast, leaving Hercules no time to reconsider. Unable to dodge, he quickly raised his damaged shield to block.
The Geng Metal Divine Wind howled against the shield. The shield felt as if it were being struck by countless hammers weighing billions of tons, causing his arm to go numb. Rustling powder was scraped away from the shield by the wind, which cut like knives.
Protecting his head, Hercules suddenly felt an unprecedented severe pain erupt from his chest and abdomen. His throat tasted sweet, and large gushes of blood poured from the corner of his mouth. The bones in his chest faintly emitted several crisp cracking sounds, followed by a series of dense, fine cracking sounds! However, the wind summoned by Kane did not break Hercules's fighting spirit. As one of the most famous heroes in Greek Mythology, Hercules possessed an inherently untamed and unyielding nature.
Otherwise, he would not have been able to complete the Twelve Labors.
Although he was blown back like an artillery shell by the five Geng Metal Divine Winds for a full thirty to forty li, staggering, he barely managed to regain his footing.
Nevertheless, he re-donned his Lion Hide Cloak, enduring the knife-like, agonizing pain of the Geng Metal Divine Wind, and charged back towards Kane against the wind. The Lion Hide Cloak Hercules wore was made from the hide of an absurdly large male lion. That lion was born of Typhon and Echidna. This male lion was impervious to saber and spear. Hercules had also relied on his great strength to strangle it to death. Killing this male lion was one of the Twelve Labors Hercules completed.
Later, Hercules skinned the dead lion and tanned its hide into a Lion Hide Cloak. It was precisely because of this cloak that he was able to travel through the Geng Metal Divine Wind.
Hercules switched to a different sword and, fighting against the wind, closed in on Kane. The two began to fight again.
Just as Kane and Hercules were clashing, a shadow silently appeared behind Kane, taking advantage of the moment Kane was fending off the momentum of Hercules's attack.
That flat shadow suddenly materialized from a flat, paper-thin shadow into a Middle-Aged Man nearly two meters tall with an extraordinary appearance!
"Hiss!"
Hades looked at Kane, who had his back turned to him. His eyes, flickering with eerie gray-black mist, showed not a trace of hesitation. He directly raised the single-pronged trident in his hand and thrust it straight towards Kane's back.
This two-pronged trident had been with him for thousands of years, and yet it had been broken by this man before him. This grudge, for Hades, was even more detestable than Zeus seducing his wife.
Seeing the single-pronged trident in his hand about to pierce the man before him, Hades's eyes revealed the pleasure of getting his revenge.
Just as the tip of Hades's single-pronged trident was about to touch Kane's back, an inconspicuous stone fell from the sky. It was as if a child had casually tossed it. It landed squarely on Hades's forehead, on his Heavenly Spirit.
"Bang!"
Under Zeus's horrified gaze, with an extremely dull sound, that inconspicuous stone landed on Hades's Heavenly Spirit. His brother instantly exploded!
Literally! Underworld King Hades's head was directly penetrated by a round stone the thickness of a thumb. His head and body instantly exploded into a pile of sticky gore.
At the same time, a spatial rift the thickness of a thumb was left directly in the Void Space, extending for thousands of li—
Zeus stared blankly at the spatial rift, then glanced at the sticky pool of flesh and blood. Underworld King Hades had exploded, and the blood water splattered everywhere, instantly staining the Void Space within several hundred meters around red—
Zeus's body trembled violently. Following the direction from which the stone had been thrown, he saw that above the patches of white Cloud Layer, a treasure carriage had appeared at some unknown time. Amidst the steaming mist, the carriage was hidden within the Cloud Layer.
Around it were Golden Armored soldiers as Guards, and the carriage was pulled by a three-headed Golden Dragon several hundred meters long. That authority and style made Zeus feel a pang of bitterness in his heart.
One must know, as the third-generation God King of the Olympian Pantheon and the co-lord of the Pantheon, his own travels were not this extravagant! "Bah!"
Zeus spat fiercely towards the carriage in the Cloud Layer that was emitting five-colored radiance. The envious, jealous, and hateful God King momentarily even forgot his original intention.
In the sticky pool of blood mud, a severed hand reached out towards him: "Save, save, save me!"
Half an hour ago, a carriage pulled by a three-headed dragon crossed Dimensions and the Void, entering this Void Space like a rising sun. Wherever the carriage passed, it left behind long trails of Flames.
Above the Cloud Layer, inside the Huagai Yunxiang Carriage, Hela walked around, admiring the luxurious carriage that Tang Song had manifested using the Reality Stone.
The carriage had an ancient and elegant Eastern design, comparable in size to an ordinary palace. The entire carriage displayed seven-colored hues. Hela touched it with her hand; the material was neither gold nor jade, and within it, streaking light flowed across the carriage. Curtains could also be drawn down beside the carriage. The curtains were adorned with Jeweled Curtains, pearls and jade tinkling, inlaid with various Treasure Pearls and beautiful jade, including emeralds, luminous pearls, dust-repelling pearls, fire-repelling pearls, wind-repelling pearls, water-repelling pearls, cooling pearls, nine-curved pearls, face-fixing pearls, mutton-fat jade, celestial star jade, Lantian jade...
There were no less than a hundred items, each with its own marvel, each an Exotic Material! Just these Treasure Pearls and beautiful jade on the curtains alone were enough to make the carriage unsinkable in water, unburnable by fire, and unmoved by the eight winds!
In front of the curtains was a Screen. The Screen was also emerald green, carved with mountains, rivers, and ocean waves.
Behind the carriage was also a Screen, a pair with the front one, carved with flying Immortal maidens. Hela pushed open the Screen, and the light from outside shone on it. The carved waves, tides, mountains, forests, and pine ravines seemed to come alive. The carriage faintly echoed with surging ocean waves and the rustling of a pine sea.
On the back Screen, the flying Immortal maidens also began to dance. Their singing was clear and bright, and their dance was indescribably graceful and refreshing, uplifting the spirit. It is said that only after three generations of officialdom does one truly understand how to dress and eat. Just by looking at this carriage, Hela finally understood the sheer gap.
Their Aesir were considered one of the top civilizations in the entire Universe. On Earth and in the Nine Realms, they were even called Gods. But whether it was their magnificent Heavenly Palace or this "Emperor Gouchen"'s travel carriage manifested by Tang Song!
Hela truly saw what Foundation meant!
Compared to the Divine Pantheon behind Tang Song, their Aesir were more like nouveau riche who had recently risen to prominence and had yet to shed their impetuosity.
Or rather, the two simply couldn't be compared. The Divine Pantheon behind Tang Song pursued Longevity Equal to Heaven and Earth, living as long as the sun and moon, or even Transcendence of the entire Universe. The Aesir, however, still had to endure the suffering of Ragnarök. Even a God King's Lifespan did not exceed five thousand years. Hela pulled back the curtains. On the large green bed, Tang Song was holding a Daoist text in one hand and a bowl of Tea in the other, drinking Tea and reading the scroll with relish.
This Daoist text looked thin, only a few dozen pages, but as Tang Song's gaze swept over it, the text on it was constantly changing.
Within the thin Daoist text, Myriad Phenomena were encompassed. It contained seventy-five thousand volumes, totaling 1.6 billion Methods. Each volume of Methods contained a supreme Immortal Technique!
This Daoist text was precisely a Manifestation of Tang Song's Heart Lake, and its contents were what Tang Song had obtained from the Origin. Techniques like the Tianhe True Method, Nine Cycles Profound Cultivation Method, and Sixteen-foot Golden Body were all included within it.
Hela watched Tang Song reading with such enjoyment. Her eyes darted, then her small body took the Teapot from a Maidservant nearby.
She carried the Purple Clay Teapot to Tang Song and poured him Tea brewed with Moon Well Water.
"Speak! What do you want now?" Feeling the fragrant scent of the Tea, Tang Song raised his head, looking at Hela, who was being unusually attentive. He closed the book, looking at Hela's baby-fat face. After her body became smaller, even her Personality seemed to have changed slightly.
"Can you get me one of these carriages?!"
Hela blinked her eyes, her large eyes full of longing! "Slap!" Tang Song rolled up the Daoist text in his hand and smacked Hela on the head.
"I've only heard of this Huagai Yunxiang Carriage. This is a Replica manifested using the Reality Stone. I don't even have one myself. What are you dreaming of?"
When Hela heard Tang Song say this, her small face immediately puffed up with anger: "Stingy guy, if you don't give me one, I'll make one myself!"
"Heh heh, you'll make one yourself? Do you know how many Manufacturing Materials are needed just for this Huagai Yunxiang Carriage? You've indeed gotten a lot of treasures from conquering those civilizations and those Abyssal Lords over the past few years! But it's far from enough to build a carriage like this Yunxiang Carriage!"
"Really? You're not lying to me?!" Hela looked at Tang Song suspiciously. The treasures in her Slush Fund over the past few years could buy hundreds of Habitable Planets, and yet they weren't enough to build a carriage?
Tang Song reached out and pinched Hela's chubby cheeks: "Did you see those Jeweled Curtains? The curtains of a true Huagai Yunxiang Carriage require silk spun by a Heavenly-Colored Dragon Silkworm mixed with Spiritual Energy-rich Five-Colored Clouds to be woven.
It also needs to be dotted with Star Sand Essence from the bottom of the Milky Way. Mix them together, blend them with Heavenly Unity Mysterious Water, grind it into a liquid, and then draw it into colored threads. For three feet of thread, just extracting the Cloud Layer into silk requires a Weaver Girl to painstakingly Refine it for thirty years!
The Heavenly-Colored Dragon Silkworm is actually a crossbreed of a Five-Colored Flood Dragon and a Mutant Ice Silkworm. Don't let its length of only three feet fool you; an Adult Dragon Silkworm is a Demon Immortal at the True Immortal Level. You might not even be its Rival! It produces one pupa every hundred years. That pupa is only the size of a grain of rice. The silk extracted from it is tough in texture, but the quantity is pitifully small!"
"Every single item On the Vehicle is a peerless treasure, an Exotic Material, and it was crafted by Heavenly Court Craftsmen who poured thousands of years of Lifework into it. The Value of this carriage alone is no less than an Infinity Stone! Are you sure you can build another one?!"
"Hmm, but if you really want one, I can have Heavenly Soldier Valley make a Replica for you. But let's be clear, you have to find the Substitute Materials yourself!"
Tang Song looked at Hela, who was clearly stunned, and patted her head. He mused that if Hela really managed to replicate the Huagai Yunxiang Carriage, it wouldn't be too much for him, as her Master, to borrow it for a few hundred years.
"Utter extravagance! Utter extravagance!" Hela muttered to herself, her face filled with shock, listening to Tang Song's words.
She handed the Teapot in her hand to the Angel Maidservant attending outside and plopped down beside Tang Song. She asked curiously, "You said those Immortals, Heavenly Venerates, and that Emperor Gouchen you mentioned, are so utterly extravagant. Aren't they afraid of the people below rebelling?"
Tang Song shook his head and smiled, "The Ancient Demon Court was destroyed, and the Ancient Heavenly Court no longer exists. They all failed. However, the reason for their failure wasn't a rebellion by the people below, but because they touched upon the interests of those on a higher level. The reason the Demon Emperor and Haotian failed was due to the Conflict of Dao!"
"Your Blood Scripture has already cultivated the Great Asura True Body. How strong do you think Daoist Styx, who created the Blood Scripture, is?"
Hela held the Tea bowl and pondered for a moment: "Unfathomable. I cannot gauge his Strength, just like Insects that can only live in the summer have no way to describe what Ice and Snow are like!"
"That's called 'a summer insect cannot speak of ice'!" Tang Song rubbed Hela's head hard, annoyed: "Once they reach that level of Cultivation Base, they are truly indestructible through Myriad Phenomena. Each of them can open up another Universe! Resources are not much to such Existences. What they pursue are Things on an even higher level!"
Saying this, Tang Song spoke with some longing: "That is a World even more magnificent than the entire Marvel Multiverse and DC Multiverse combined. That is the true center of the World!"
"Is that your Purpose for forming the Heavenly Court and scouring for resources everywhere?!" Hela looked at Tang Song: "You want to go back?"
"People must have some Pursuit. Cultivators pursue Immortality. Immortals pursue Longevity Equal to Heaven and Earth, Eternal and Undying. Those Great Principle Immortals seek the Dao. As for those few Heavenly Venerates and Dao Ancestors, they seek Transcendence!"
Tang Song said leisurely: "Human Desire is like this expanding Universe. Only at the moment of its Destruction will Desire disappear!"
"So your Desire is to go back to that World and show off?!" Hela looked at Tang Song with Mockery.
Tang Song used great force, rubbing Hela's hair into a messy tangle, like a chicken's nest: "That year I was eighteen, I was just a nobody. I finally managed to make something of myself. You don't expect your man to keep his achievements hidden, do you?"
"Hmph!" Hela slapped Tang Song's large hand away: "Is that all the ambition you have?"
"Heavenly Emperor Tang!"
"I don't have grand ambitions. While I still have some semblance of humanity left, I should go back and visit home!" Tang Song smiled, gazing at the Void above his head. His gaze seemed to fall upon that Sea of Chaos. He didn't know where his Homeland was anymore.
He also didn't know what his home looked like after so many years. Having lived three lives, his Cultivation Base had reached the Golden Immortal level. Plucking Stars and Seizing the Moon was child's play for him.
But for some reason, the faces of his parents from home were becoming increasingly blurred. Perhaps it was because of Time. Several hundred years were enough to fade many Things.
Perhaps this was also the Reason why those Old Relics who had lived through immeasurable eons had lost their humanity. They were more like divine statues placed high up, cold Old Heavens looking down upon the world! Tang Song reached out and grabbed. Space-Time seemed to undulate before him. Near Saturn, a giant palm suddenly appeared above a small Asteroid.
The hand, with clear palm lines, and as large as half the size of Saturn, grasped this Titan that had just experienced the Flames of War! The next moment, it disappeared!
On Asgard's Rainbow Bridge / Bifrost, Heimdall, who clearly saw this scene, rubbed his eyes hard. Looking again, he saw that the place where Titan had been was now completely empty.
He wasn't seeing things. Just moments ago, a hand that large suddenly appeared and plucked a Planet away! Heimdall's Adam's Apple bobbed. He swallowed hard. Wiping away cold sweat, he strode towards Asgard's Golden Palace Great Hall.
Inside the Huagai Yunxiang Carriage, a yellowish-brown round stone silently landed in Tang Song's hand. Tang Song weighed the stone in his hand, then flicked it with his finger. This inconspicuous stone, whose Density was compressed to billions of times that of Steel, shot out.
(end of chapter)