Wang Ye had also made guesses about the matter of avatars.
That was why he had acted like a rogue, pawing all over Maitreya.
There was also a fundamental logic behind it: only if the one present was Maitreya's true body would the Buddha's trap be triggered and imprison him.
With all that considered, Wang Ye no longer doubted that Maitreya was an avatar.
But who could have expected that Maitreya, that old schemer, had hidden his true body within an avatar? It fulfilled the prerequisite for the Buddha's trap and was, in truth, a huge gamble.
If Wang Ye had truly turned and left back then, or if he had not pieced together the crux of the matter only after Maitreya's several prior meetings, repeated foreshadowing, and arrangements, as well as more than twenty hours of deliberation, this plan could not have succeeded.
If he had truly been trapped inside for a year or half a year, Maitreya would have been finished.
That even after getting out, Wang Ye would choose not to kill him because of his value...
Every single step had been within Maitreya's calculations.
Only now did Maitreya reveal his own fangs—the terror of one of the Ancient Three Great Strategists.
"After pretending to be stupid for so long, the whole world probably thinks... that I, Maitreya, am unworthy of the Three Great Strategists."
"Or perhaps they think the Buddha's pressure has affected me, turning me into a madman."
"Very nice."
Maitreya smiled leisurely, calm and composed. In barely twenty minutes, he had returned to the desert. He looked at the distant pit and Wang Ye's avatar above it, its eyes tightly shut.
"I have to admit, Benefactor Wang is quite cautious."
"If he had been born in ancient times, he might not have ranked among