There was no doubt!
That day, all of Vulture Peak lay beneath a suffocating pall of gloom.
Within the Great Thunderclap Temple, the echoes of Saint Zhunti's earlier fury lingered long after his outburst.
Buddha light dimmed, and Buddhist chants fell silent.
Even the auspicious wisps of sandalwood incense that usually curled upward seemed stained with a gray, withered hue, turning heavy and oppressive.
The golden Buddha statues within the hall remained majestic, yet somehow, in the eyes of the Buddhist School disciples, those solemn, compassionate faces now held an indescribable melancholy.
Ksitigarbha Bodhisattva stood in a corner of the hall, the Netherworld aura around him restrained and unreleased.
His eyes, which had always held compassion for the common people, were now filled with gravity.
Maitreya Buddha stood with his great belly protruding. The smile that had always graced his face had vanished completely, replaced by a rare somberness.
Even the ever-composed, detached Medicine Tathagata frowned slightly, turning the prayer beads in his hand a little faster than before.
Several core disciples of the Buddhist School gathered in twos and threes, some standing and others sitting, whispering in lowered voices.
"Sanzang... really is dead."
Ksitigarbha Bodhisattva spoke so softly that he seemed to be speaking only to himself.
Yet those words fell into everyone's ears like a boulder crashing into a deep pool, stirring ripples that would not settle for a long time.
Golden Cicada's reincarnation, a personal disciple of the Buddhist School, the central pivot of the entire grand plan for the Journey to the West.
Just like that... he was gone.
"Though Master took away a wisp of his remnant soul, his physical body was shattered and his primordial spirit damaged. To have Golden Cicada reincarnate again, rebuild his physical body, and cultivate once more into the scripture