Chapter 65

Chapter 65

I didn’t know when Jin Wuya had regained consciousness.

Or perhaps, he had never truly been unconscious at all!

At this moment, his hands were gripping my Red Rope tightly, keeping me steady in mid-air.

Master Yinxuan gave a cold laugh, no longer hiding his true self. “I have lived for ninety-six years. Do you know what the one thing I regret most is?”

No one answered him.

He didn’t need an answer, either. He continued immediately, “My greatest regret is that twenty-odd years ago, on that mountaintop-the one where Jin Chengyang was buried-I felt a moment of pity for the child dressed in mourning clothes!”

That child… was the sixteen-year-old Jin Wuya!

It turned out that when Jin Wuya was holding the funeral back then, Master Yinxuan had been watching him from not far away!

He had brushed past death itself.

“I underestimated you,” Master Yinxuan said. “A teenage brat who lost the master he depended on for survival… what kind of waves could he possibly make? Heh, who would have thought that twenty-odd years later, you would appear in my sight again with such an identity. Jin Wuya, you brought this death upon yourself, so do not blame me!”

He turned the Prayer Beads in his hand and paced over to the Former Abbot’s physical body, staring at the Golden Scale.

“You are just as self-righteous as your master!”

“Did you really think I didn’t know the difference between Albino Loach Skin and Century-Old Snake Slough?”

“One is extreme Yin, the other is extreme Yang-they are worlds apart. But so what?”

“Anyone who dares to plot against me must pay the proper price for their actions!”

I felt the force pulling the Red Rope around my ankle suddenly tighten. Jin Wuya roared, “So back then, what exactly did you do to my master!”

“What did I do to him?” Master Yinxuan said. “Naturally, I used his Yang Fire to supplement the Yin energy of the Albino Loach Skin! Don’t worry, it will be your turn in a moment.”

So that was it!

Every person has three Yang Fires: two on the shoulders and one on the top of the head.

Yang Fire is almost synonymous with one’s lifespan.

Using a person’s lifespan to suppress the Yin energy of Albino Loach Skin… Master Yinxuan’s methods were beyond insidious.

No wonder Jin Chengyang fell gravely ill after returning from Jiyu Temple and passed away soon after.

He was destined to die!

Jin Wuya finally knew the true cause of his master’s death. His entire body trembled with rage as he screamed hysterically, “You Old Bald Donkey, how dare you! You are a member of the Buddhist order, yet you commit such cold-blooded murder. Are you not afraid the Buddha will condemn you and cast you into the Eighteen Layers of Hell?!”

“The Buddha’s condemnation? Haha!”

Master Yinxuan laughed maniacally, as if he had heard an incredible joke.

He pointed at the Former Abbot’s body and said, “If the Buddha truly protected those who devoted their hearts to him, why would he be dead?”

“If I hadn’t turned the tide, do you think Jiyu Temple would still exist today?”

“Oh, I forgot. This place wasn’t called Jiyu Temple back then. Do you know what it was called?”

“It was called Yanling Temple!”

Master Yinxuan paused, his eyes gradually filling with fury. “Three years! This region suffered a drought for three years!”

“For three years, the fields yielded nothing. The people suffered beyond words. Yanling Temple gave out the last of its grain to provide relief to the commoners, and what did we get in return?”

“They said the years of drought were because the ‘Yan’ in Yanling Temple’s name brought fire, suppressing the Dragon vein beneath the temple and ruining the local feng shui. So, they wanted to smash Yanling Temple to pieces and tie us monks up as sacrifices to the heavens! Haha, sacrifices to the heavens!”
“Sacrifice to the heavens? They were just after the hot spring in the temple!”

Hot spring?

I understood immediately.

There was indeed a hot spring in the temple, fed by mountain springs. We had even soaked in it before.

During those years of relentless drought, when food was scarce everywhere, how did the then-obscure Yanling Temple still have vegetarian grain to distribute?

It seemed the hot spring in the temple had never run dry.

And this source of living water was regarded by the people as a Dragon vein.

If Yanling Temple had simply closed its gates and lived its own life back then, refusing to distribute grain to the surrounding villagers, it wouldn’t have invited such a catastrophe!

Human nature is truly the most incomprehensible thing in existence.

“This was my senior brother, the Abbot at the time. He was on the verge of achieving great enlightenment, but when the local villagers swarmed into Yanling Temple to pillage and loot, he met with disaster and died!”

“Haha, he died just like that. Don’t you think it’s hilarious?”

“Tell me, where was the Buddha then?!”

As Master Yinxuan spoke, he violently hurled the Prayer Beads in his hand at the Former Abbot’s physical body, his face twisting into a hideous mask. “What was I supposed to do? Die like him?

“No, I had to protect myself. I had to survive!

“I haven’t become a Buddha or a god yet, so how could I die?”

“The people were willing to kill for a few bowls of grain. If I only need six girls to bring a downpour and save thousands of lives, then my merits outweigh my faults. I am doing this for the people, for all living beings, am I not?!”

“The Buddha said, ‘If I do not enter hell, who will?’ Since he was already dead and already in hell, why couldn’t he be used by me one more time?”

Hearing this, my entire worldview was shattered. “So, you used your deceased senior brother to weave a massive lie!

“You changed the temple’s name, created the gimmick of the ‘Supreme Lot,’ and selected six girls as Sacrificial Offerings. You directed and acted out a grand play where the Abbot, unable to bear the suffering of the world, sat upon the altar to sacrifice his physical body to the heavens to pray for rain for the people.

“So, when that rain-seeking ceremony began, your senior brother, the Former Abbot, had already been dead for at least half a month!”

“Wrong! It was a month!” Master Yinxuan laughed. “Do you know how much effort I put into keeping his body from rotting?

“The physical body you see is nothing but an empty shell!

“I personally scooped out his internal organs and filled him bit by bit with incense ash from the temple. This ensured he wouldn’t rot so quickly and allowed him to emit a thick scent of incense, making those foolish peasants believe it was a manifestation of the Buddha. They knelt and worshipped with such sincerity… I am practically a genius!”

“You’re a lunatic!” Jin Wuya spat, cursing in rage.

“A lunatic?” Master Yinxuan’s laughter suddenly froze. “Being mad is good. Only by being mad can one be free from the shackles of etiquette and rules, and finally do whatever one desires!”

As he spoke, his right hand suddenly flicked. A single bead from his Prayer Beads shot out, flying straight toward the space between my eyebrows.

At the same time, the Six-Petal Lotus beneath the Former Abbot began to rotate counter-clockwise. As it turned, the other five girls began to writhe and twitch, their bodies convulsing as they let out agonizing, shrill screams.

It was the most desperate cry of a soul being torn from its physical body.

A Yin Wind billowed up, and the surrounding air gradually turned a murky gray.

Dark clouds rolled overhead, and in the distance, the faint sound of muffled thunder rumbled.

Over by the Altar, the sound of the Wooden Fish and the chanting of sutras continued without pause.

The Autumn Sacrifice had officially begun…