Secret Transmission of the Dharma

The shouts outside reached the temple's interior, and the swirling black wind and sand battered the entire temple.

Like mountains collapsing and seas surging.

All five of Lu Feng's senses returned.

He looked at the headless sheep carcass on the ground.

He remained silent.

Even Lu Feng could not tell what had happened in such a bizarre situation.

Faced with strange situations he did not understand, Lu Feng had always adhered to the approach of "if you can stay still, stay still," quietly watching for changes. He raised his head and looked ahead. The Human-Skin Ancient Scroll against his chest was hot enough to brand a person's chest like a branding iron, but Lu Feng said nothing.

He silently endured the pain. It was precisely this pain that still kept him lucid.

"Elder Mingli" looked at Lu Feng, who kept his mouth shut, and an extremely unsettling thought suddenly arose in his mind. Under this sort of empowerment, a disciple would absolutely never lie to his Yidam Lama.

This was called taking refuge in the Yidam.

By now, they had actually reached the final step of today's empowerment: having the disciple visualize his Yidam Lama, then transform the Yidam Lama into the Yidam, follow the Yidam's teachings, learn from the Yidam, and finally become the Yidam. What he had done just now was make Lu Feng ignite the Tummo within his body.

Then, through Tummo visualization, he would advance to the next step: Visualization Yidam practice rooted in conduct and observance.

Only much later would he reach the practice of great awakening through perceiving emptiness, which required further empowerments. The supreme Great Mudra method that "Elder Mingli" had transmitted to Lu Feng advanced gradually, step by step. It was not like the highest "Prostration to the Supreme Light Great Mudra" of the "Temple of the Source of All Dharmas"; it was not so exalted.

The "Prostration to the Supreme Light Great Mudra" was a method of sudden enlightenment, administered by a Supreme Prostration Lama-the pool of candidates for such a Lama was generally extremely narrow, because even across the entire Secret Dharma Region, only a scant few could be called Supreme Prostration Lamas. Such a person was very likely a highest-ranking grand monk who had attained the Supreme Stage-by-Stage Degree.

Such a supreme grand monk would administer a single sudden-enlightenment empowerment to a disciple suited to the practice. Thus, the disciple could attain Buddhahood in a mere instant.

Even the Endless White Pagoda Temple did not possess such a Great Mudra method. The same was true of Zajuben Temple, reputed to be the foremost temple in the north: it had neither this method nor a Lama capable of transmitting it.

The Endless White Pagoda Temple had no such eminent monk, so one could only cultivate upward stage by stage. "Elder Mingli" had already empowered Lu Feng with the Tummo cultivation method. Now Lu Feng needed to "visualize his Yidam Lama," but when he closed his eyes and opened them wide again, there was still nothing before him.

Before the dilapidated main hall were the dead, headless black sheep, the open wicker chest, and "Elder Mingli's" voice-only the image of his Yidam Lama was missing.

"Elder Mingli" fell silent as well. He simply lowered his head and looked at Lu Feng, trying to see just what was in Lu Feng's eyes, but he saw nothing in them.

His eyes were very clear. They reflected the main hall, the sutra banners, and the dead black goat.

Only he was absent.

So he reached out, slowly drawing closer to Lu Feng, and said, "Yongzhen, Zhasa, can you see my appearance clearly? What am I like before your eyes?"

Lu Feng could not defy this question, so he pressed his palms together, bowed respectfully, and said, "There is no Lama before my eyes. Everything is unreal, like dreams, illusions, bubbles, and shadows, like a dream beneath the southern bough."

His eyes were clearly looking at "Elder Mingli" before him, and Lu Feng even adjusted his focus according to the direction of the voice. Yet beneath that gaze, there truly was nothing before him.

Nor could he possibly deceive the person before him.

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So "Elder Mingli" revealed an expression that was exceedingly difficult to describe, as though both crying and smiling.

"So it is?"

Before he had finished speaking.

His fingers, which were about to touch Lu Feng, began rapidly withering, crumbling, and weathering away.

In the end, they turned to sand and earth, blown clean away by a gust of wind.

It seemed that because of this one sentence from Lu Feng.

He had no foundation for existence.

"All is like emptiness, like dreams, illusions, bubbles, and shadows, like a dream beneath the southern bough."

"So be it, so be it. Zhasa, recite the Diamond Sutra for me, pray for my blessings, and chant mantras for me for fifteen years."

"Do not speak recklessly of today's Dharma, do not judge yesterday's affairs rashly, do not spread today's words heedlessly, and do not discuss the causes of bygone days carelessly."

"Elder Mingli's" voice vanished. What finally reached Lu Feng's ears was an aged and weary voice.

Lu Feng seemed able to make out certain things. He saw "Elder Mingli" before him rapidly turn into windblown sand, then swiftly re-form from the sand and earth.

An aged and weary voice came from "Elder Mingli's" mouth.

"I once used this Great Mudra method to subjugate King Mingzhu. Today I pass this method to you, in the hope that one day you may cultivate both methods and once again subjugate the earth deities of the six directions and the mountain god of one domain...

"If you have no image of the Yidam to visualize, you may go to Zajuben Temple. Zajuben Temple has the Treasure Tent Protector Mandala, where you may complete your Yidam practice.

"There is just one thing: remember today's four prohibitions."

The voice gradually faded into the distance.

Elder Mingli appeared before Lu Feng. He knew nothing of what had happened. Looking at Lu Feng, he tapped him on the head in satisfaction and said, "Stand up, Yongzhen. From today onward, I shall be your Yidam Lama. You must honor me, respect me, and love me according to the principles of the Yidam. Can you abide by this?"

Lu Feng said he could.

But the words Elder Mingli spoke to him carried not the slightest binding force.

Lu Feng immediately understood.

Everything just now had not been dreams, illusions, bubbles, and shadows.

Nor was Elder Mingli his Yidam.

Because Lu Feng's Yidam Lama was not him at all.

"I once used this Great Mudra method to subjugate King Mingzhu."

If "Elder Mingli" had not lied, then the person who had truly transmitted the Dharma to him and empowered him should have been the Venerable in this temple who bore the title of "Great Scholar," or who could be called a Dharma Venerable!

It was the Abbot Dharma Venerable!

In theory, every current Abbot Venerable was a reincarnation of this Abbot Dharma Venerable.

"Was it because I made an offering of myself in the abandoned Mandala?"

"Zajuben Temple, foremost in the north."

"Why was it so?"

Lu Feng had not expected the Abbot Dharma Venerable's transmission to involve this temple as well. He sat cross-legged on the ground, and Elder Mingli did not tell him to stand up. After all, much of the information that followed needed to be comprehended and digested by the disciple himself.

He walked out and saw the wreckage outside, while Lu Feng slowly closed his eyes. Beneath his Navel Chakra, within the lotus dais, two petals of the lotus dais had opened. More importantly, another force had taken up residence upon his chakra.

That was "Tummo."

In other words, the power within his body.

He straightened his back and sat according to the prescribed observances, guiding the Tummo within his body to arise beneath his chakra, burn, and surge upward, then emerge from the Life-Generating Palace and flow throughout his body.