Chapter 553

There Is No Such Thing As A Free Lunch

In the bedroom, a woman was sitting cross-legged on a couch. Half of her face was human while the other half was skeleton.

Moonless Harmonious Sky was ranked seventh in the seventh layers of Temple of Heaven organization, and had great power and prestige in the entire Heavenly Earth and also the actual ruler of the tens of millions of people of Palace of Heaven… In Wang Lu’s expectation, she should be a heroic overlord. However, what he saw before him was in sharp contrast to what he expected. In the legends about Moonless, it mentioned that in the war against the chaotic world, Moonless received an incurable injury in the battle. Wang Lu initially thought that it was just some eye-catching scars, a medal of honor that she showed off her martial prowess. However, unexpectedly, this Moonless was really thorough, the so-called sacrificing half of her body actually meant the literal thing.

The right half part of Moonless body was completely human, while the left half was pure skeleton bones. Her body was blocked by the dress, but her head was exposed. The right eye of Moonless was tightly closed, but a red light was shining through the left eye socket of the skull, which made it look exceptionally scary… Merely this alone was completely beyond expectation.

For Wang Lu, all unexpected situations were bad news. The opposite party was a Daoist Master of Deity Stage who was a veteran of hundreds of battles, and in theory could see his illusion technique in a glance. Even if she was essentially a creation of the immortal dreamland and thus not as good as the true Deity Stage, a Deity Stage was still a Deity Stage. Before coming here, Wang Lu had combined some rare materials left in his mustard seed bag with the high priced props from Sky City to greatly enhanced his illusion. However, it was still uncertain whether it could fool the eyes of a Daoist Master of Deity Stage. Without Li Yan’s letter, Wang Lu wouldn’t have come here. However, everything was based on sophisticated planning. If there was an unexpected situation… it was very much a test to act according to the circumstances.

Of course, Wang Lu had this ability. Therefore, he calmly entered the room and smiled.

And what greeted him, was the hearty laughter of Moonless.

“Are you two the little kids that Li Yan introduced? Hahaha, come on in and take a seat.”

Such a kind gesture was even more unexpected. Wang Lu even thought that if there was a propaganda commissioner inside this temple of Palace of Heaven. And that as long as the dialogue in the bedroom was recorded, then tomorrow’s record would be published with the content: Lady Harmonious Heaven cordially met with the grassroots people to show the approachableness of Lady Harmonious Heaven.

However, it was clear that there was no other extra person inside the bedroom of Moonless. Even the black dressed maids, which according to the hierarchy of first black, second yellow (The taste of dog meat), as the highest rank maid, could only stay outside, which clearly indicated that this was a very private meeting.

“No need to be reticent.” After waiting for Wang Lu and Liu Li to sit down on their respective futon, Moonless said, “I once had a friendship relation with Li Yan that came about through life and death situation. Although I haven’t seen her for decades. I always remember her friendship. She said in the letter that you two are her new friends. Li Yan never makes friend easily. And since you two can get her recognition, it is equivalent to my recognition. I treat you as my friends so please no need to be reticent, and please take away those gifts, I don’t need them.”

With that, Moonless slightly restrained her smile.

“Li Yan said in her letter that you two have questions about cultivation that you want to ask me? Yes, true, in recent years, fewer and fewer people have devoted themselves in cultivation, and instead, more and more people are obsessed with fame and fortune.”

Hearing this, Wang Lu just wanted to laugh. A standard bureaucrat politician like you have the nerve to criticise others?

Moonless seemed to see what Wang Lu was thinking and slowly replied, “When dealing with worldly affairs, I only use my dead left half of the body.”

Wang Lu froze for a moment and then immediately smiled. “Very well, I will not be polite anymore. First of all, I want to ask… Do you, with what you are like now, want to comprehend the immortal path through life and death?”

Upon hearing this, Moonless opened her right eye.

“No wonder Li Yan thought highly of you in her letter. Those mediocre people just thought that I was merely showing off my scars, but they never thought that, with my current status, who else must I show off? You are right, I am indeed trying to reach immortality through life and death…”

With that, Moonless suddenly laughed, “Besides that, what else can you see?”

“Life and death, yin and yang, black and white… all the contradictions and unity concepts should be reflected in you. There are quite a lot of things on your left half and right half of your body. So it should be said that you are trying to use this method… to make up your natural defects?

Hearing this, Moonless burst into laughter.

“Hahaha, you said it right. No wonder a talented person like you could wander around destitute outside the Temple of Heaven system, that old-fashioned theology could not satisfy you.”

Wang Lu inwardly said, no wonder you and Li Yan are friends in life and death but haven’t seen each other for decades. Compared to the lazy but devout Li Yan, you should be tied and executed on a stake for heresy. But, looking from another perspective, if it’s not so, you wouldn’t have the qualification to control such a big city like Palace of Heaven.

For an organization that is in power, idealists do not have the qualification to be in the high ranking position.

After being encouraged by Moonless, Wang Lu frankly said, “We are not perfect creatures. As far as I see it, every living being in this world is divided into male and female, yin and yang. Only we that do not have this sex division. When I asked Li Yan, she only said that this is the will of Heaven, but I don’t think so. So I want to ask Lady Moonless, what are your thoughts about this?”

“The will of Heaven? Unexpectedly, after not seeing each other for decades, Li Yan has learned to deceive herself.” Moonless suddenly sneered. “Where did Human Immortal come from? If other people don’t know then that’s fine, but how could she not know it? More like she doesn’t want to admit it.”

With that, Moonless closed her right eye, and then said in a sinking sound, “You guessed it right, human should have the division of sex, and we are the yin part of that. In theory, the corresponding positive part of us should exist.”

Wang Lu nodded. “Sure enough… but, why does the Temple of Heaven have to deliberately hide this information? Is this not good for the development of Heavenly Earth? We are obviously imperfect, but it is taught that we are perfect. Obviously, we are the yin part in the yin and yang, yet we are taught that we are complete with both yin and yang. This cognitive bias is a great obstacle to cultivation.”

“Do you want to know?” Moonless rhetorically asked back with interest, “Are you sure you want to know the answer? For you, since you have guessed correctly about the division of yin and yang, you would not be affected by the cognitive bias, so why bother to explore the secret behind this?”

“Curiosity is the driving force behind progress.”

“Well said. In that case, I’ll let you see it.” With that, Moonless stood up and clapped her hand.

Wang Lu saw a slender and soft palm clapped with a white skeleton hand twice, and the bedroom door was pushed open by the black dressed maid.

“I want to take the guests to see my collection room, and I want you to lead the way.”

　　——

Moonless’ collection room was built in the underground part of Moon Capital. The group walked slowly through the deep corridor led by the black dressed maid. Along the way, there were countless traps of various kinds. The black dressed maid who led the way used more than thirty kinds of props as keys to avoid those traps one by one, and then finally led the three of them to the collection room.

Normally, no matter how valuable the treasure was, it would not be so strictly guarded like this, and the really important things were usually carried by the cultivators themselves. Thus, when he saw the front door of the collection room, Wang Lu felt that it would not be a good thing to see what was behind the door.

Sure enough, after opening the door of the collection room, the maid who led the way rushed back, as if she harbored deep fear for the things inside the collection room.

In easy-mannered, Moonless entered the room. Behind the door was a spacious and deep hall, and as Moonless entered, it suddenly turned bright, thus allowing them to clearly see the collection inside the room.

The moment he saw those collections, Wang Lu could not help but close his eyes.

This was really… unexpected.

“How do you feel?”

The voice of Moonless came from the front.

“These are the trophies I collected during the great war forty-five years ago. Any one of them was an expert from the chaotic world of lower realm… This is the military medal that is really worth showing off. The scar on my body is only a shame, what is there to show off?”

Wang Lu nodded in silence. Through the light that shone the hall, he could clearly see several dozens of crystal grooves in the hall, and inside each of them lied the corpse of the creatures from the chaotic world.

Each of those chaotic creatures looked fierce, and moreover, each had its own characteristics. Some had protruded fierce fangs, some had an eye at the center of the forehead… But their basic outline was very clear, they were all human. Moreover, their bodies were muscular and have broad bones, all of which were basic characteristics of… male.

“I guess this is the answer that you want. Why does the Temple of Heaven have to hide the division of sex in human? Because we can’t tell the world that their other half is a creature from the chaotic world.”

“So that’s how it is… It is indeed a secret that can’t be made public.”

While carefully observing the corpse in the collection, Wang Lu asked, “Generally speaking, living beings need both their yin and yang parts to reproduce. We have the Heaven to bestow us with new lives. But what about the chaotic world? How can they reproduce? From the corpses of these chaotic creatures, I see that, apart from their basic outline, they often have the characteristics of other animals, such as horn, hooves, horsetail and so on. Could it be…”

Moonless coldly snorted. “When the need for reproduction is overwhelming, they will naturally look for all possible mother’s body. Humph, dirty lower realm’s offal.”

Wang Lu looked at those corpses for a while and then asked, “Strange, these chaotic creatures are all male? Can’t they give birth to female?”

“That’s unclear. For thousands of years, we have never really stepped into the lower realm, every time we immediately stopped once we eliminated all the invaders, the filthy land of the lower realm is deadly to us.”

Wang Lu nodded to show his understanding.

At the same time, he realized in his heart that this immortal dreamland might also hide a tremendous and difficult to solve sub-plot: To help the chaotic creatures from the lower realm overthrow the Heavenly Earth to bring the yin and yang back to normal state!

However, it was not convenient to say out this kind of idea, so he could only think about it in his mind.

And while he was thinking about it, he suddenly heard the voice of Moonless.

“Li Yan spoke highly of you two in the letter, and what I saw today, did not disappoint me.”

Wang Lu cupped his hands. “It’s an undeserved praised.”

“I really like both of you. Therefore, you will now stay in Moon Capital.”

“What?”

“I haven’t expanded my Moon Capital harem for more than ten years, but today, I will make an exception for the both of you.”

“Wait a minute…”