Suppressing the Blood Demon Ancestor Who Plagues the World

The Western Regions, Dayuan Kingdom.

Among the Sixteen Western Regions Kingdoms, Dayuan Kingdom had the largest territory, the greatest population, and the strongest national power.

This was because Lingjiu Mountain, where Esoteric Buddhism's mountain gate stood, lay within Dayuan Kingdom.

With Esoteric Buddhism's full support, Dayuan Kingdom had expanded and developed all the way, becoming the strongest kingdom in the Western Regions.

Most of the Western Regions were covered in endless yellow sands. On Dayuan Kingdom's largest oasis stood its capital, Antioch City.

Buddhist objects could be seen everywhere in the city—meditation staffs, prayer beads, Buddha statues, and countless ascetics who devoted themselves to Buddhism.

Traveling west from Antioch City, one could see a magnificent range of mountains rising from the earth. This was Lingjiu Mountain, the mountain gate of Esoteric Buddhism.

It was dusk. Under the glow of the evening clouds, Lingjiu Mountain's thousand peaks were lush and verdant. Eighty-four thousand Buddhist temples climbed the slopes in tiers. At the summit, violet-gold radiance pierced the clouds—the Sarira Pagoda reflecting the sunset.

Halfway up the mountain, gilded pagodas towered into the clouds. Within the amber-colored gilded halls, smoked by a century of incense, Arhat statues glared like Vajras subduing demons, Bodhisattva statues lowered their brows and smiled while holding flowers, and golden Buddha statues gazed compassionately upon the world.

From the foot of the mountain to halfway up, ten thousand flights of bluestone stairs wound upward. Thousands upon thousands of pilgrims climbed them, kowtowing every three steps.

"Should a good man or good woman receive, read, recite, explain, or transcribe this sutra, they shall gain the merit of twelve hundred ears.

"With these pure ears, they shall hear every language and sound throughout the Three Thousand Great Thousand Worlds, down to the Avici Hell and up to the Summit of