Things happened too fast and were too unpredictable. Yun Xian and his group looked at the distorted scene in front of them. They knew that this happened eighty years ago, but they still felt depressed.
Even if I wasn't there myself, I still felt suffocated. How much more so was the young Akihito, who was dealing with things for the first time? He must have been extremely aggrieved and panicked.
Jimo Shu was so angry that she almost died: "What the hell! Just let them all die! Save them or not? Who do you owe them?!"
"I really don't know what the Buddhist sect is doing." Ji Rongxue frowned. "Either they don't rescue anyone, or they establish a rule that anyone who dares to cause trouble will be killed without mercy. With the cultivation level of these disciples, it's impossible to protect this group of people, and killing them all is just a matter of raising their hands. By not allowing them to attack, are they treating their disciples as punching bags? Anyone can be hit! It's incomprehensible."
In reality, it was possible to protect this group of people. Even if they could just temporarily stop fighting each other, the Buddhist techniques could perfectly protect them. This was what Mingren had been thinking before she left the mountain. If the militant faction dared to attack the temple, she would definitely protect the wounded. But she never imagined the situation would turn out like this.
"..." Qi Zhiye said, "The premise is invalid. If we truly stand by and watch, not saving a single person, and every disciple cultivates in the mountains, not caring if the people below are suffering or corpses are scattered everywhere, then what kind of cultivation will we achieve? If Senior Mingren doesn't know, it's fine. If he does, his inner demons will still haunt him."
"Yes..." Feng Ye said, "On ordinary days, if the Buddhist sect receives offerings but there is no response at all, the believers will be very desperate..."
Qiao Lingshan said, "The problem started with that man. We were all at peace, but he insisted on revealing his identity and even took the initiative to kill. If I had known earlier, I should have kicked him out before he could express his ambition! Everything that happened next wouldn't have happened!"
But who could have known in advance that he would do this?
Just as no one knew that the fight over field ridges that occurred every sowing season would eventually lead to a war between the two countries, resulting in countless casualties.
One thing led to another, seemingly conspiring to push the situation towards its worst. Had the inexperienced Akihito, a fresh-faced warrior, chosen to suppress the situation earlier, he wouldn't have reached this point where he couldn't suppress anything. Having decisively abandoned the first person wouldn't have ended up with nothing left to abandon. Furthermore, the numbers of the two nations involved were similar. If one side had overwhelmingly outnumbered the other, would the other have dared to challenge them? Furthermore, the man from the Akihito nation who had sparked the incident had, coincidentally, died at Akihito's hands. Everything, like a constantly flowing river, pushed everyone away, unstoppable and unstoppable.
Akihito was impartial and wanted to save everyone, no matter who they were. But in the end, not only did she fail to save anyone, she ended up hurting herself.
Judging from the situation when other disciples came, this kind of thing did not happen in other Buddhist temples, and some even had spare capacity to provide support, but now it was too late.
The body of the man with the big knife lay on the ground, watched by everyone.
Everyone's expressions were different from before.
"...It's too late." Yun Xian paused and said, "The abbot didn't let the disciples fight back because he didn't want them to attack. Swords have no eyes, and it's too easy for a cultivator to kill an ordinary person. A third party that wants to intervene in a war must have no stance. Buddhism must have no stance and must remain neutral. But now, the next abbot of Buddhism has taken action and helped kill a Hongyuan person in the Faxi Kingdom. Regardless of the facts, this is how everyone sees it."
Another sad coincidence.
If Akihito was not the next abbot, but just an ordinary Buddhist disciple, the meaning would be completely different.
Ming Qing's wound was still bleeding, and Mingguang had no time to think about it anymore. He quickly organized everyone to disperse this group of madmen who were crazy about killing. During this time, there was another ugly fight.
In silence, Qi Zhiye curled his lips and said, "This group of people knew they might be beaten, or even killed, long before they came down the mountain. Yet, they didn't bring any weapons, and they didn't fight back. It was their own choice, they did it voluntarily. What can you do to them?"
Even after experiencing such a painful lesson eighty years ago, they still haven't changed. No matter what, they won't change.
But even Jimo Shu couldn't condemn these disciples anymore. Call Buddhism stupid—we're tired of hearing that. Call Buddhism stubborn, refusing to turn back even after hitting a wall. Otherwise, why do people jokingly call them bald donkeys? Stupid and stubborn, it's always been this way. The Buddhist virtues have always been to restrain oneself, not others. All the bitter consequences of this are borne by oneself. They may regret it, but it's always been this way, unchanging.
If it were in a peaceful and prosperous era, such kindness might bring good results, but in this special situation, it would make both sides feel uncomfortable. To put it bluntly, it would be like a shit stirrer, trying to catch both sides but unable to catch either side.
Going back to the beginning, it would have been better not to intervene in the first place. But this is impossible, it is impossible for Buddhism not to intervene.
Mingren stood there, as if all the wind and rain were leaning towards her. The lotus stick fell to the ground, stained with mud, but no hands came to help her pick it up.
The scenes switched rapidly, and Akihito was called back to the Buddhist temple. The abbot turned his back to her and lit incense sticks. The incense curled upwards and enshrined the face of the Buddha statue.
The abbot said nothing, but Mingren asked, "Now, what's going on?"
"Mingren," the abbot said, "since you've returned to the mountain, there's no need to worry about what's happening down there. This is a critical moment, and I'm worried that all your efforts will be wasted."
Akihito still asked stubbornly: "What's going on now?"
The abbot said, "...Alas."
How could he lie in front of the Buddha statue? But seeing that he avoided the question, Akihito already knew that the situation down the mountain was worse than he had imagined.
In fact, she had already heard it from the disciples' words.
It seemed like no matter what we did, no matter how many people we sent, no matter how many beatings we received, no matter what method we used to suppress the rebellion, even begging them to stop, it was all in vain. Once we suppressed the rebellion here, it would rise again there. Food and supplies would arrive from the rear, and troops would begin to gather. This battle would only get more intense, back and forth, like a nightmare repeating itself.
Now, even if the two rulers called for a halt, there was no stopping them. The fight would continue until one side surrendered, but with so many dead already, and such a difficult war to start, who would surrender? Everyone believed they would have the last laugh.
Mingren asked, "Shouldn't I have taken action at that time?"
"I know that's not your intention. How could you possibly kill an ordinary person? This isn't your fault." The abbot simply said, "...Akihito, don't even think about it."
"But." Mingren raised his eyes, bloodshot, "I heard that the Buddhist temple in Hongyuan was smashed."
The abbot remained silent.
"Because I killed the Hongyuan people, they feel betrayed." Mingren said weakly, "But I explained that I wanted to save them. I didn't want to kill the Hongyuan people or the Faxi people. No one believed me. That person is indeed dead, but I really... Abbot, the Buddhist temple in Hongyuan Country was destroyed. What about the injured people in the country? What about the believers?"
At this point, she is more worried about those innocent believers than her own misunderstanding.
Akihito repeated, "If you still want to come..."
Yes.
Many people with great aspirations no longer trust Buddhism. Furthermore, if those belligerents destroy the Buddhist temple, and Buddhist disciples want to take them elsewhere, will the already frightened masses dare to follow them? There's a chance that Buddhism might help those who are happy with their beliefs kill people.
"So what do we do next?" Mingren pressed on. "The temple is full. What do we do next? How do we survive this period? How long will it take?"
Abbot: "How long this battle lasts will be as long as this period of time."
Mingren said, "But you have called back all the Buddhist disciples. There weren't enough people to begin with, so why did you call them all back?"
"Mingren, our identities are sensitive right now." The abbot frowned slightly and said, "To narrow the scope, we can only take into account the towns along the border. I sent people to build wooden warehouses, which are separated in the middle and filled with medicinal herbs and water. Anyone who wants to hide can hide in them. At least it can solve the urgent problem."
Akihito: "Aren't you going to send someone to rescue them?"
"Sister." The abbot remained silent. A young monk beside him said dejectedly, "You've been on the mountain lately, so you might not know. We wanted to save people, but every time, we were either beaten by the Hongyuan people or by both the Hongyuan people and the Faxi people. We didn't dare to save only the Faxi people, as that would only confirm the rumors. Of course, if we could save people, getting beaten up wouldn't be a big deal. It would just be some physical pain. The injuries we usually get from practicing the Golden Bell Cover are much more serious than this. But every time we show up, for some reason, the conflict always gets more intense. There's really nothing we can do. It's better not to show up."
Akihito: "But..."
The words she wanted to say were stuck in her throat, unable to come out or down. But what? But she couldn't just leave it like this? But what could she do? She had only come down the mountain once, and this was the result.
The abbot looked at her and said, "Akira, do you remember that in a month, the Four-way War will begin."
The power gap between the four realms has widened. The Western Realm's performance in the last war wasn't great. Buddhism has always refrained from competing for victory, but that doesn't mean it doesn't care about results. Even if it truly didn't care, there are those who would force it to care. Recently, people from the Northern Realm have been secretly planting spies here to gauge Buddhism's strength.
There is no doubt that Akihito is definitely the leader of this war. According to common sense, she must be promoted within a month. The disciples who are going to the war should conserve their energy, retain their strength, and strive for a breakthrough - in any case, they should not be wasted at the foot of the mountain and be beaten by a group of refugees who are red-eyed with killing.
How could I be so unlucky? How could it be so unfortunate? But it wasn't my second aunt who was visiting and left on her own accord when she saw other guests at home. There were external threats and internal troubles. If the Western Territory didn't perform well this time, it might lead to a disaster greater than a war between the two countries, but...
Yun Xian said, "Master Mingguang participated in the Four-way War eighty years ago, right?"
Qi Zhiye said: "...Yes."
Akihito didn't go in the end.
Everyone's faces were heavy, having already known the ending, and looking ahead, their mood became even more dejected.
Mingren was so intelligent, how could she not understand the abbot's meaning? But as she clutched the sachet Fangfei had given her at her waist, she thought of the dire situation facing Nanshan Town and even the entire country. She wondered what had become of her, whether she had escaped, but there were countless girls like Fangfei in both countries. Could she really just ignore them? Could she just leave for the Four Directions Secret Realm in two weeks and return as if nothing had happened and everything was peaceful?
The abbot seemed to see her hesitation and said in a more serious tone: "Mingren, please don't get involved in this matter anymore!"
Mingren's fingertips pressed the sachet tightly, and she lowered her head and said, "...I understand."
With Mingren's personality, saying "I understand" and "OK" were two completely different things. She was only nineteen years old, and the teenager always felt that she could handle any problem, so she secretly took the lotus stick and went down the mountain.
Since she is the next abbot of Buddhism and cannot take action, as the identity of a monk is sensitive and will be misunderstood, then it should be okay for her not to show up, right?
So Akihito went down the mountain and headed straight for the Buddhist temple.
The Buddhists had already evacuated, leaving only a crude wooden warehouse outside the temple, containing clean food, water, and some emergency medicine. People came and went, and occasionally a young monk hurriedly restocked the supplies. It was strange to say that they had come to rescue people, but now they looked like thieves.
The wooden warehouses outside the temple resembled umbrellas, already filled with people. Buddhist disciples had used their spiritual energy to hasten their construction, and they had also cast a protective shield to prevent the people inside from being burned.
The wooden warehouse was small, but at least it provided shelter from the wind and rain, and they couldn't see each other. It was surprisingly much calmer than when the Buddhist disciples had mediated there, though it was only a brief moment of peace. Akihito's mood finally improved, but it quickly fell back.
No matter how many wooden warehouses there are, they can't accommodate even one percent of the population. Can those with mobility issues find their way here? This is only a temporary place to stay for a while. Can this battle really end soon?
Peace is always short-lived. Suddenly, another scream was heard from the Buddhist temple. A man with a bloody head ran to the wooden warehouse, shouting, "Murder! Is there anyone who can help me? Open the door, someone, please let me in!"
It was the same thin man from last time, but his daughter had disappeared somewhere.
But no matter how he shouted, none of the doors in the barn opened. That was understandable; his own life was almost in danger, so how could he have the time to save others? Besides, who knew if he was doing it on purpose, just to hurt people?
Mingren frowned and hid behind the Buddha statue in the temple.
The man had no way to escape and was forced straight into the Buddhist temple. The man chasing him was bloody and silent. It seemed that he was in the same camp as the big man who died at Mingren's hands before. Mingren felt a pain in her heart, but now she didn't care whether this man was Hongyuan or Faxi. She treated them equally and knocked the big man out of the Buddhist temple with a palm!
She didn't kill him, she just beat him until he couldn't move.
The thin man was confused and looked around. There was no one in the temple except the Buddha statue with its eyes lowered and silent.
Another big man rushed over again, and a golden light flashed on the Buddha statue's hand. The big man rolled out again and fell into the same place with the man just now, and they became the Chopstick Brothers.
As long as they try to enter the Buddhist temple, they will be kicked out without mercy.
The door of the wooden warehouse finally opened. First one door, then another. The frail man kowtowed before the Buddha statue in ecstasy, shouting, "It's working! The Bodhisattva has shown His power!"
Finally, a glimmer of hope appeared on everyone's numb faces.
Akihito seemed to have found a way to make her feel more at ease.
These days, whenever she has time, she patrols the various Buddhist temples. Whenever she sees someone killing someone, she uses this method to stop them. Regardless of their nationality, whoever strikes first will be punished by the "Buddha statue appearing."
The effect seemed to be quite positive. People began to believe that the temples were guarded by spirits that observed sin, and that no one was allowed to wield weapons there. Gradually, more people began to move into the temples, some even carrying their beds and blankets to the feet of the Buddha statues, remaining there all day.
A precarious home was no longer a home, but at least it gave them a sense of security. Some even withheld their own food rations, placing them on the altar before the Buddha, and then taking them back to eat when they were about to spoil.
This gradually helped Mingren to cheer up from her depression. She even wondered why she had thought these people were not worth saving before? Obviously, as long as she treated them well, they were all good people.
Good intentions will bring good results, that's how it should be.
She was so excited that she put all her efforts into protecting the people in the temple, and even ignored the abbot's repeated warnings to her not to interfere in the matter again, until one day, she found an extra piece of gold on the altar.
In times of war, gold is the most valuable currency. Why would it be placed here? Akihito paused in confusion at the temple. Could it be that he believed there were gods protecting it? Leaving it on the table, it could easily be taken.
So Akihito stayed here, but instead of seeing all kinds of faces, he saw the thin man again.
He is now in high spirits, and keeps telling people how he saw the "appearance of the Bodhisattva". However, the "daughter" who follows him has changed, and she is also a confused young child.
Akihito sensed something was wrong.
The man said with great enthusiasm, "I've already told you that Buddha needs to eat too! You offer vegetable leaves and rotten steamed buns here every day, but who wants to eat them? Who likes to eat them? If you want to offer something, offer something good, then Buddha will help you."
Others said, "The Buddha is compassionate, how could he have discrimination?"
"No discrimination? Look at the Buddhist disciples before you say that." The thin man lowered his voice and said mysteriously, "You don't know, do you? When the fight just started, the abbot of the Buddhist sect went to the king and discussed the matter with him."
Mingren, who was standing behind the Buddha statue, was startled and felt a chill all over his body.
No… No! How can you say such nonsense?! We can’t let him say that anymore!
Before her spiritual energy could be released, she grasped it back in her hand.
If she takes action now, she will definitely be exposed!
The man was brimming with pride and announced his belief to the world: "Our king has promised that if you cooperate, he will donate a twenty-meter-tall golden statue to Buddhism! Twenty meters, do you have any idea what that means? Even if your entire family of peasants worked tirelessly digging in the ground for generations, they wouldn't be able to dig out even half a little finger!"
This has exceeded the imagination of the refugees.
Their yearning for the life of the people in the imperial city was limited to the Empress Dowager Donggong making pancakes. How could they imagine how much money a 20-meter golden statue would cost and how many lifetimes it would take to earn it?
"So that's how it is..."
"No wonder. I was wondering about those bald donkeys who usually sit on the mountain and don't care about the world. How could they be so kind now?"
"That's normal. No reward without merit. The 20-meter golden statue is made up of a lot of our taxes and grain sales. The abbot must be filthy rich. Haha! Helping us is only natural. If you don't help us, you'd be heartless!"
Mingren felt she couldn't bear to listen any longer. She left quickly, heading back up the mountain. On the way, she passed the bungalow with the Luban stool in front of the door. The door was still closed. A figure swayed inside and landed at the window. The family was fine.
I'm glad you're okay.
She suddenly wanted to go in and take a look, but she didn't.
Space stagnated once again. Mingren now had two choices: one, return to the temple so she could hear the next words, and perhaps things would not turn out the way they did; the other, go in and take the family away.
But she still ran towards the long steps of the Buddhist temple without looking back.
The spinning wheel was still creaking, and the man continued triumphantly:
"Why did I get rescued twice? I look poor. Stupid, right? There are so many things in this world that can't be bought with gold!"
"I thought about it later, and it might be like this. The girl I was taking care of back then had her head broken in the temple. That blood, the essence of the five elements... Don't worry, I'm telling you, that's no ordinary girl. She's one of the Yin element. I don't know how long I searched before I found her! So many high-ranking officials in the imperial city were vying for her, saying she could help them get promoted. Even though she's disfigured now, I've turned a disaster into a blessing... Am I kidding? I told you, even Buddha needs to eat!"
“…”
Within a few days, precious calligraphy and paintings appeared on the altar of the only remaining Buddhist temple in Hongyuan Country.
Jewelry. It was stained with blood, and I don't know who pulled it from.
Gold, silver.
Offerings to Buddha require cleanliness and tidiness, and courtesy. Even if you are just offering wild fruits picked from the roadside, it is good enough and has nothing to do with pomp and circumstance.
Akihito began to panic.
The abbot eventually discovered the matter and sent people to investigate the rumors. This was the first time he got so angry at Akihito.
But Akihito didn't know whether he was angry with himself or with something else, because the abbot said the most often, "You are not wrong, but..."
She didn't understand what she had done wrong, but it seemed like she had done something wrong.
Buddhism began to close down Buddhist temples, leaving only wooden warehouses open, refusing any offerings from believers, forbidding Emperor Mingren to go down the mountain, and recalling all Buddhist disciples, but to no avail.
The statues no longer "appear" and no longer protect believers, and people in both countries feel that they have not given enough.
What? The Buddha has no discrimination? Bullshit! Then why did the Buddhists want to help Faxi in the first place? Wasn't it because of that 20-meter golden statue?
If you don’t have enough gold and jewelry, then go and rob them.
Mingren was so anxious that he couldn't practice, and he always felt like there was a fire burning in his heart, but that day finally came.
Some people followed suit and found children who were said to be of the yin element, took their blood, and placed it outside the Buddhist temple.
This is a monstrous insult to Buddhism! What kind of offering requires flesh and blood? Why is it placed outside a Buddhist temple?! These people are so obsessed with victory that they're ready to think of anything!
Refusal was useless, strict prohibitions were useless. Even another king secretly came to the Buddhist temple and promised to produce a golden statue taller than Faxi. When he was kicked out by the abbot, he still didn't believe it: "Just tell me how much you have. It's okay. I can afford it! Thirty meters? Forty meters? I can build the entire temple with gold! If you can win, all the gold produced in half the country next door in ten years will be yours. Isn't that enough?"
It’s not enough, still not enough. Without further ado, this is the “Buddha” they believe in.
No one blamed Mingren, but she sat on the lotus pedestal in a daze, not knowing for how many days had passed. She had done it wrong again, it was her fault again. She kept wondering, what was going on? Had she killed someone again?
No. She wants to go down the mountain.
She was going down the mountain now! This time, she did nothing, she just watched, she would not do anything.
She was going down the mountain, running desperately, and no one could stop her. The abbot lowered his head helplessly amid the shouts of astonishment.
Everyone followed Mingren, the wind howling on both sides. Young Mingren's tears fell in the wind, as cold as rain. She arrived at the Buddhist temple in Xishan Town and was met by another group of people slaughtering people. Skulls tumbled to the ground. No matter how many times she told herself she would do nothing, Mingren still couldn't bear to watch someone die like that. She subconsciously struck the man out of the temple.
The rescued person looked at the Buddha statue. After a moment of silence, he uttered a voice of ecstasy that was not human: "The bet was right!!! I told you!!! I told you, this will work!! Look!!!"
The people around him also cheered: "Really! It's true!!"
Yun Xian looked at the cloth bag in his arms and his breathing suddenly stopped.
...In the cloth bag lay a person's eyeballs and a pair of calloused hands.
A bloody mess.
Mingren looked at the cloth bag with bloodshot eyes, and his whole body was almost frozen.
No, she doesn't want to hear it. She doesn't want to see it, don't say it, don't say it!!
"This is the town's sharpest-eyed embroiderer and the most skillful carpenter!" The familiar, frail face was filled with pride as he exclaimed, "It's just that daughter who's so difficult to deal with. Doesn't she want to kill them?"
Akihito closed his eyes in pain, tears streaming down his cheeks.
Who did she save? She saved, saved this person. This evil person! From the beginning, once, twice, three times. He should have died long ago, but he survived her hands again and again, and now, now... he killed one, two, countless people.
If she hadn't intervened in the first place, hadn't saved him, would everything that happened later have never happened? Wouldn't things have turned out this way? It was her fault. She was wrong! It was all her fault. She shouldn't have. She should have let him die a long time ago!
Yun Xian watched Mingren open his eyes, watched as a golden light flashed past her, and numbly killed the man with one blow.
Then I watched her turn around and run towards the familiar bungalow.
"Don't go!"
"Turn back!"
Unable to tell where the sound came from, Mingren ran into the bungalow. The Lu Ban stool had already overturned and the loom was covered with scattered bloodstains.
The embroiderer and carpenter inside the house had become the same as when Yun Xian first saw them. In just how long had the war been going on, their hair, once only slightly frosted, had turned completely white. Their faces were filled with fear and pain. Fang Fei hung from the beam, already dead.
There was also a small wooden Buddha statue on the table. The sachet was half torn off, and the flowers and plants that Fangfei had picked inside were leaking out and were trampled into a mess.
Mingren stood outside the door and didn't dare to go in.
She was on the verge of collapse.
Because the Buddha taught us to be impartial. So she saved the wicked who had murdered countless people, and killed innocent, simple-minded people. Along the way, those villagers died, some fled, and the ones who survived the war, the ones she saved, were all... no, maybe not. But she couldn't tell the difference anymore. Because the Buddha taught us to be compassionate. So, no matter how she was slandered, she had to save people. But no matter what she did, the result was always the same. She was wrong. Die! It was obvious that only those who participated in the war deserved to die, only those who brutally killed their own kind deserved to die. Why, in the end, were all innocent people killed?
Akihito wiped away his tears and buried the bodies of the three men.
The entire inner demon space had become blurry and distorted. Everyone saw Fang Fei's face pale as she said to Ming Ren, "This isn't your fault."
Akihito said, "Do you blame me?"
Fang Fei: "There's nothing you can do."
Akihito: "Do you also think that if I hadn't taken action in the beginning, you wouldn't have died?"
Fang Fei quickly said, "No. No, Mingren, don't think like that. I was killed by that person, not by you."
Everyone watched Fangfei's mouth opening and closing, but no sound came out. Finally, they only heard a faint and weak voice saying, "But it really hurts."
Mingren went up the mountain and saw the abbot again, but she couldn't see the abbot's face clearly, nor could she see anyone else's face clearly. They all seemed to have a painful expression on their faces, and she couldn't tell them apart.
Akihito said, "I was wrong. I was wrong."
"Akira," the abbot said, "In this world, not everything can be categorized as right or wrong. You're not wrong, but... this matter ends here."
It's this sentence again.
She was wrong, she was clearly wrong, she was extremely wrong.
Akihito asked, "Was it right to stand aside and watch from the beginning?"
The abbot said, "It's not right. But it's the best. Mingren, do you understand what I mean? In the future, you will lead the entire Buddhist community. The choice you make may not be the right one, but it must be the best one."
Akihito: "But..."
"I was wrong. I shouldn't have let you get involved in the first place. I shouldn't have let you go down the mountain. The worst thing I should have done was try to stop you." The abbot interrupted her for the first time, his voice trembling. "Akira, we're running out of options."
Mingren finally saw the abbot's face clearly. It was a face of age, weathered and ravaged, its eyes almost cloudy. The abbot's lifespan was drawing to a close. At nineteen, she had seen the weakness in his face for the first time.
"How can you prevent a war that's bound to happen?" the abbot said. "Just like you can't stop a mountain from collapsing. You can clean up the mess, but you can't stop it from happening."
"But, but..." Mingren said in panic: "□□, this is a man-made disaster! If I hadn't taken action and killed that Hongyuan man. Or, if I hadn't gone to the Buddhist temple and pretended to surrender, or if, at the beginning, when those two families were fighting over the land, that man hadn't swung that hoe, there were clearly many opportunities, but..."
The abbot just shook his head slowly.
He lamented, "Akihito, stop thinking about it!"
When these words fell into Akihito's ears, they took on a different meaning, a codeword that would change her life from then on.
"Akira, do you want a better way?" the abbot said:
"If you can't think of it, then it's your fault."
The scenes that followed grew increasingly chaotic, making it impossible to discern the beginning and the end, the sequence reversed, and stained with a bloody hue. A demon whispered in her ear, "Without the sea of suffering, how could there be Buddha?" "Has your faith collapsed? No, it doesn't need to collapse, you just need to correct it." "I have a way, it just depends on whether you are willing to learn." She injured thirty-three disciples and defected from the mountain. She captured many people, including the two kings. She returned to her parents' home and began to try to extract the evil from the hearts of the great villains, leaving only the good in them; she would make them die suddenly if they had the intention to kill. The first time, she failed. The second time, she failed. The third time, she failed again.
But for some reason, all those who failed disappeared. She clearly didn't deal with them, so why did they disappear?
Never mind, it doesn’t matter.
Just like in war, it doesn't matter to her who wins or loses.
The days of failure seemed to last a long time, yet also seemed to go by very quickly. Akihito put all of her talent into combining the two techniques, and finally, after nearly a dozen people failed, she succeeded.
She was overjoyed and sent the man with a changed temperament back home, but sending him back home did not mean the end. He had already committed a blood debt and must die at the age of thirty.
Her elderly parents looked at her with complicated expressions.
That night, Akihito heard the voices of his parents outside the room, neither far away nor near, and vague.
"We can't go on like this..." "Where's Runqing?" "He must die..." "There's no other way..." "Kill him..."
The mother's footsteps sounded like thunder in the cultivator's ears. She stared blankly with her eyes open, feeling the pillow pressing down on her face in the dark room.
Then, both parents died. Akihito's next experiment also failed, but this time she discovered that none of the three bodies disappeared.
It turned out that those people had been dealt with by their parents before.
She remained standing there, watching. After a while, she suddenly said with certainty, "This is a punishment from heaven."
"I didn't kill them. I wasn't killing anyone, I was saving them. I was trying to find a way to save everyone. Why don't you understand? Why, why do you want to kill me?! I told you, I told you!! You can't have any murderous intentions, you can't!!! Didn't I tell you that a long time ago?!"
"This is a punishment from heaven. It's not me, not just anyone, but everyone."
"I treat everyone equally. I treat everyone equally, so, so, I must..."
Black air emerged from behind her, and blood-red branches squirmed like a blood-red lotus.
Finally, it was beyond recognition.
The inner demon space, which had already begun to collapse, suddenly began to tremble violently, returning to one node after another that could have been chosen before. However, Mingren seemed to have walked through this path countless times over the past few decades. No matter what choice he made, no matter how he tried to escape, the final result was still the same, like an inescapable fate. Yun Xian and his group were almost thrown directly out of Qi Xingye's spiritual platform. Yun Xian hugged Ji Rongxue's thigh, who was as steady as a rock, and said in pain: "How come no one noticed?! And who is that demon?! Saint, do you recognize him?! What a great sin!!"
Although Mingren was bound to go astray, if that demon hadn't been fanning the flames, she wouldn't be where she is now! And the previous events were too coincidental; it would have been impossible without that demon stirring things up!
Qiao Lingshan was almost crying: "It's so tragic, Senior Mingren...Ah!!"
Feng Ye burst into tears: "Wu ...
Xue Lingxiu looked up at the sky and blinked hard.
The women were silent and the men were in tears. Although Yun Xian felt so choked up that he could barely speak, he still had important things to do. They weren't here to pry into Senior Mingren's privacy; they were here to have a real fight!
In order to force Senior Mingren out of Qi Zhiye's body, they must intensify the chaos of her inner demons and make her collapse directly from the inside. If they can injure her, that would be the best. If not... they can only close the door and release Master Mingguang!
Akihito—No, the current Smiling Buddha must not be allowed to stay!
There was no room for further confusion. Yun Xian saw the inner demon's core in the expanding blood mist and shouted, "Jimo Shu! Qi Zhiye! Hurry up!!"
Jimo Shu summoned her life-defining magic weapon, forming seals with her hands. A torrent of black light suddenly emanated from her. It took her a while to react: "...Who told you to call me by my full name?"
Qi Zhiye followed closely behind, his lotus fully extended. Neither of them knew what Yun Xian was going to do, but as soon as she called out, they subconsciously attacked. Yun Xian rushed forward as if the floor was burning his feet. Only then did he realize it was a naked little blue man. The corners of his lips twitched, and he didn't know whether to look or not.
Although there's nothing fancy about it, it's just a stick figure with short, round limbs.
"Brother Qi, what's that expression on your face?" Yun Xianjiang
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
