What a joke, do I need to become a Buddha just to beat you? That’s not necessary, is it?
Ayanpuka hastily retreated several steps, his blue eyes slightly narrowing, as a surge of malevolence appeared.
His inner strength surged, causing the leaves of the willow tree at the village entrance to wither layer by layer.
Spiritual energy rippled through the surroundings, the visible dust in the air was pushed into the shape of blades by the thick spiritual energy, and the scorching sunlight distorted them one by one, creating a mirage-like scene as though viewed through water, making it dizzying to observe, and even harder to discern the changes within.
The willow branches, the heat waves, even every blade of grass, tree, stone, and speck of dust all revealed terrifying shapes. They swayed wildly, twisting and rolling back and forth like ghostly phantoms suddenly surging forward, making one feel as though they had stepped into a ghost realm.
“Interesting.” Meng Qi still had the mood to jest, “Doctor, look at this Mojie Temple’s technique. If used to scare believers, I guarantee they’d rake in endless silver in a year.”
Mo Li’s expression darkened slightly as he retreated to Meng Qi’s side and said, “This is the form of the demon Mara. I fear it’s more than just this.”
“Doctor, don’t worry, it’s all just theatrics.” Meng Qi swung his sword, slashing through the oncoming “phantoms” at the waist.
The condensed spiritual energy dispersed, and the “phantoms” there vanished instantly.
However, the surroundings were vast, with spiritual energy far more abundant than in the town, and because it wasn’t encircling them like before, Meng Qi’s attack, which only shattered one area, couldn’t resolve the “illusion.”
In fact, when top-tier experts release their inner strength, it inevitably causes some strange phenomena. The most basic is cracks in the ground, followed by the wild flight of sword energy and blade aura. Ayanpuka’s display was a bit grander, his methods a bit more peculiar, but ultimately it was the same thing, with the additional changes all stemming from the spiritual energy.
Ordinary people, affected by the spiritual energy, couldn’t control themselves, but what would a dragon vein fear?
Unless a true dragon vein appeared.
“Clang.”
The Zhongqing Sword collided with the Bloodbone Mace.
Visible, distorted ripples of light spread in all directions.
These were caused by the uneven, dark red metal ridges on the Bloodbone Mace, reflecting sunlight as it swung quickly.
Compared to the dust storms that blocked out the sky, this scene filled with strange, piercing sounds and everything in sight seeming to melt into a “hallucination” was even more difficult for the mind to endure.
Those caught within, trying to block or strike back, would find that what they saw was not where it actually was, like trying to catch a fish underwater from the shore, their efforts thwarted by displacement.
As the “water surface” didn’t remain in a fixed place, the displaced illusions reflected in many directions, creating seven or eight overlapping shadows of Ayanpuka in an instant, blending the real with the false.
These shadows transformed in sequence, appearing and disappearing like rabbits darting away, fleeting and elusive.
New shadows emerged swiftly, while the old ones had yet to fade.
The most troublesome part was that amidst these, not only were Ayanpuka’s shadows mixed in, but also their own reflections.
Meng Qi simply closed his eyes.
Ayanpuka sneered coldly, trying to discern my position by sound alone?
The Bloodbone Mace swung, the wind passing through the holes on either side of the handle, intensifying the ghostly wails.
Unlike the typical sound of a weapon slicing through the air, when Ayanpuka consciously blocked the holes with his thumb, the sound abruptly disappeared. Coupled with the weight of the Bloodbone Mace and the sound of it being swung, pinpointing Ayanpuka’s location in a short time was extremely difficult.
Mojie Temple’s highest martial arts, its power to disturb the mind was on par with the demon Mara manifesting in the world.
The so-called “Unfailing Truth,” and by truth, it meant “reality.”
All the worlds, the countless dust of the mortal realm, to pierce through to the one and only truth cannot be done with the eyes, nor with the ears.
Under Ayanpuka’s control, the illusions were endless. As long as the illusion wasn’t shattered, he would remain undefeated…
“Rip.”
Suddenly, a barely audible tearing sound.
The back of the straw hat was torn.
Ayanpuka was shocked and instinctively tilted his head.
He didn’t know how this strike had come? Was it Meng Qi and Mo Li playing the same trick again?
No, that wasn’t right. Even though Meng Qi had distracted him earlier, making him overlook Mo Li’s presence, at this moment Ayanpuka was surrounded by multiple layers of spiritual energy barriers. Although they weren’t completely impenetrable, they were formless and invisible, with some areas even overlapping. Even if a fly were to fly in, it would be like entering a dense fog, with every drop of mist hindering its progress.
Not to mention that this fog was under someone’s control.
So how did Mo Li get close to him?
Ayanpuka was suspicious. Even if the dragon vein could subdue spiritual energy, those illusions weren’t just for show.
The break in the straw hat was on the left side, at the back of his head.
There was a tear in the front and back, making it impossible to wear anymore. The torn straw even left a bleeding wound on the back of Ayanpuka’s head.
Of course, it wasn’t the straw hat that had injured him, but the sharp sword energy left behind by the blade that had just pierced through the hat.
The sword energy had passed through the hat and lingered on the torn straw.
Fortunately, Ayanpuka had tilted his head in time, because the hat, split in two, had flown not far before turning into dust.
Ayanpuka turned his head, staring intensely at Mo Li.
Mo Li had just revealed his secret. He had been born with a defect, first thought to be the offspring of a foreigner from the Western Regions due to his unusual appearance. Later, the elders of the Fei Ting tribe declared him to be the child of a demon wolf, a perfect sacrificial offering to the Celestial Heaven.
Those old fools had long since died, and the people of Xiliang no longer believed in such things.
Or rather, Ayanpuka’s followers were dazzled by the titles of “Disciple of the Lord of Mysteries,” “Mojie Temple’s Highest Martial Arts,” and “Descendant of the Xiliang Royal Family.” They assumed Ayanpuka’s eyes were the result of secret cultivation techniques. The smartest among them only suspected that his mother might have been a songstress from the Western Regions.
Xiliang had flourished for a time. When the Chu army attacked, the nation’s power hadn’t yet declined, and the capital was still quite prosperous.
In the imperial harem alone, there were countless beauties from the Western Regions, and many more from Tianzhu, Dali, and Ceylon.
On the grasslands, the child of a slave was considered a slave, regardless of who the father was. But in the heavily Sinicized capital of Xiliang, even if one’s maternal lineage was humble, the children of the royal family always had a place in the palace where they could settle down. They would be listed in the royal records, though they had no right to inheritance and were often looked down upon and ridiculed. However, with the fall of the kingdom, these things became irrelevant.
As Ayanpuka’s martial arts grew more profound, and the power of the Xiliang restoration faction strengthened, fewer and fewer dared to meet his gaze directly.
… There was no one left who would expose him face to face.
But “no one” didn’t mean “none.”
Being exposed made Ayanpuka furious. He decided to make Mo Li and Meng Qi suffer, to show them what the true form of the Heavenly Demon’s ego was. Anyone who dared to mock him for his natural defect would be trapped in this “Unfailing Truth” illusion, where nothing they heard was real and everything they saw was false. Their ears would be useless, and their eyes a waste.
And yet—
Ayanpuka was both shocked and furious. He glared at Mo Li and asked, “How did you see through it?”
Although the martial arts of Mojie Temple claimed to pierce through all illusions of attachment and achieve Buddhahood, it was merely talk. Ayanpuka had never believed anyone could treat these mind-disturbing illusions as though they were nothing.
Upon hearing this, Mo Li’s eyelid twitched.
A fish living in the water, with sunlight shining through the cave roof, into the deep pool of spring water. What rain, mist, ice, or snow accompanied by surging spiritual energy, sunlight, moonlight, or starlight, refracting or reflecting, hadn’t it seen before?
The pool was only so big. If it didn’t swim up and down in circles, how else could it move?
As a fish, Mo Li swam quite quickly, completely unaffected by the sunlight and moonlight reflecting off the spiritual energy.
See through what?
The changing scenery of the light in the spiritual spring pool at Qimao Mountain was the only view Mo Li had. He didn’t have continuous memories and didn’t know how many years a fish had spent in that cave pool before its transformation. It must have been a very long time.
“Ha.”
Meng Qi, having retreated to a distance, laughed without mercy.
Ayanpuka glared at him.
“If not for the dragon vein today, do you think you could walk away unharmed?” Ayanpuka said coldly.
“Your martial arts, while undoubtedly strange, are far from invincible. It’s an exaggeration to say otherwise. Given enough time… or stepping outside the trap to clearly see the barriers you’ve constructed from spiritual energy, it’s not worth mentioning.” Meng Qi stood with his hands behind his back, glancing at the overlapping images of Ayanpuka, and smirked, “Besides, those who underestimate the doctor will pay for it.”
Meng Qi knew his own limits. He was a dragon vein, and though he hadn’t trained for eighty years, he had trained for about fifty.
Mo Li was different. He had been taught by a renowned master, and had “trained in martial arts since childhood.” His state of mind perfectly aligned with the “Tao” that Old Master Qin had imparted, so he had not strayed from the path in terms of martial arts mastery or technique. In just twenty years, his martial arts had reached great heights.
However, due to his lack of experience and encounters with others, and the inherent “hidden edge” of the blade techniques he had learned, Mo Li’s skills weren’t as earth-shatteringly remarkable as Meng Qi’s—unless he met an evenly matched opponent and both fought with all their might.
There were probably few in the world who knew the true extent of Mo Li’s martial prowess, and Meng Qi was likely one of them.
With a smile, Meng Qi watched as Mo Li fought Ayanpuka amidst the sea of illusions.
He didn’t give Ayanpuka any opportunity, lightly swinging his sword to break through two of the outermost spiritual energy barriers.
Before Ayanpuka could direct the spiritual energy to patch them up, Meng Qi leaped into the air, pointing his sword southeast. The purple soft sword traced a jagged arc, descending fiercely towards the most glaring point of sunlight.
“Bang.”
The spiritual energy scattered like a breached dam.
One after another, the barriers made of spiritual energy collapsed, the energy receding wildly, and the illusions were swept away completely like debris in a tide.
Ayanpuka was caught off guard, suddenly realizing that the secrets Meng Qi and Mo Li had been hiding were likely even greater than he had imagined.
However, his trump card had already been played.
With the Mara form shattered, his invincible foundation was lost.
In terms of martial arts mastery, even if Meng Qi and Mo Li joined forces, they might not be able to take him down in a short time, but Ayanpuka found that escaping wouldn’t be easy either. This was the awkward nature of a confrontation between top-tier experts.
Ayanpuka began to contemplate retreat. He hadn’t come here to fight Meng Qi to the death.
“Wait, don’t you want to know about the dragon vein?” Ayanpuka wasn’t the kind of hero or warrior the martial world admired. He wouldn’t stubbornly cling to his pride and insist on winning back face through martial prowess. Though he couldn’t figure out how they had seen through the Mara form, given the situation, he had to come up with a different plan.
“A hundred miles ahead is Mount Feihe, which is the destination of your journey, is it not?”
“…”
Meng Qi didn’t reply. He narrowed his eyes, sizing up Ayanpuka.
The latter stared intently at Mo Li, clearly more concerned about his reaction.
Ayanpuka spoke slowly, enunciating each word: “Mount Feihe has a dragon vein. But no one has ever seen it. You seek it, and so do I.”
Author’s Note:
Ayanpuka: Behold the supreme martial arts of Mojie Temple, the Mara Form. Unless you transcend the mortal world and attain Buddhahood, you’ll never escape it! *holds a wuxia/xianxia script*
Mo Li: …Isn’t it just light refraction and reflection? Do I need to become a Buddha to beat you?
Meng Qi: Break the barriers made of spiritual energy, and without mirrors, there’s nothing left.
