Enlightenment

Glancing outside, Elder Mingli saw the "high monk" at the entrance to Wula Station, but showed little reaction.

He merely opened the watchtower's window and let the wind blow in.

Beside him stood a wicker chest. He told an attendant monk to bring out the things for washing his hands, and the attendant monk produced a copper basin polished to a brilliant shine.

Elder Mingli washed his hands, solemnly lifted the chest, and went into a room on the watchtower's second floor, where he opened it.

The chest contained no gold, silver, or jewels. What it held was more important than any of those things.

With both hands, Elder Mingli solemnly took out scripture printing blocks wrapped tightly in red cloth. He cast a secret mantra over them again, cut open his palm, and let his blood seep into the red cloth, ensuring that no one but himself could touch them.

Then he began chanting again, taking scripture scrolls, prayer wheels, and the ritual robes pressed beneath everything else out of the chest, and began casting spells over them.

This was work he had to do every day.

He also kept offering incense in his hands, sifting it into fine powder and rubbing it onto his hands. Then he carefully pressed his incense-covered hands onto the outer red silk, muttering all the while. Afterward, he took out the Vajra Bell and began shaking it while reciting secret mantras.

His voice drifted out of the room, now high, now low, now subdued, now impassioned. The monks outside all stopped what they were doing and pressed their palms together in worship.

No one could disturb him here, not even his newly accepted disciple. This time belonged to him alone.

Elder Mingli cast spells over his wicker chest of treasures, cursing anyone who touched them without his permission to suffer the harm of yakshas upon contact.

Those yakshas would pierce and mangle the snooper's heart, liver, and lungs, then cut off their head, hands, and feet to use as ritual implements, suppressing them in the Charnel Ground for generations upon generations.

He prayed to the yakshas, asking them to guard his wealth as they would their own treasuries, keeping it safe from others' intrusion.

He made a Mind Offering to the yakshas, imagining masses of flowers and jeweled trees around him and presenting them with both hands. He set the Vajra Bell on the floor, but it began swaying on its own.

Faint Ghost Resonance flowed from the Vajra Bell at that moment. Countless foul stenches wafted from the wicker chest before him, presumably the smells of the Charnel Ground. Those eerie rhythms became one spell inscription after another, seeping into the chest of Buddhist treasures before him and protecting Elder Mingli's wealth.

Yet there seemed to be a head in Elder Mingli's abdomen, as though it had eaten all his internal organs and wanted to burrow out. Elder Mingli casually glanced down and imagined King Mingzhu right between his brows. King Mingzhu's wrathful flames became a great foot of crimson gold, savagely subjugating the Yaksha King inside his belly!

Trampling him underfoot!

"Ha!"

Elder Mingli abruptly let out a thunderous cry. That terrifying rhythm suddenly appeared within the room. Fierce flames burst from his nostrils like venomous snakes carrying fiery poison, and clouds of fire spewed from his mouth. He stamped his feet hard, each stamp seeming as though the earth were trembling and the Mountain God were raging.

At once, the attendant monks outside brought eight kinds of offerings that could appease King Mingzhu. One monk swiftly donned "armor" and a "mask" meant to please King Mingzhu and, wearing them, danced before "King Mingzhu" in praise of his valor.

They did not even dare glance at the scripture scrolls inside, for a single look at those scrolls would afflict them with eye disease.

The cries of the Malevolent Ghost outside had not made Elder Mingli raise his head.

Amid these songs and dances of praise, Elder Mingli gradually returned to normal. He drove everyone away, sat cross-legged, and looked at the treasures in the wicker chest.

The printing blocks inside the red silk belonged to the Printing Scripture Institute of Zajuben Temple. With these blocks, he could print scriptures without end, but all these scriptures were protected by secret mantras, just as many scriptures in the Endless White Pagoda Temple could not be borrowed.

Those scriptures were all piled like little mountains in the rooms where the high monks practiced. Malign curses had been cast over every one of them. Unless the Sutra Masters were willing to let someone borrow them, a furtive glance would assuredly bring the torment of secret mantras that made life worse than death.

The scripture scroll Lu Feng had read had come from this wicker chest. However, the very act of Lu Feng accepting the scroll from Elder Mingli's hand had broken the secret mantra. Elder Mingli had already learned about Lu Feng before the "empowerment": he came from Ganye Temple, whose Dharma Lineage had been completely severed, and the exalted title belonging to Ganye Temple's venerable one had already been reclaimed by Zajuben Temple.

As for its academy, that too had passed into the hands of other temples. More importantly, the Malevolent Ghost entrenched in Gangcuo Baima had an inextricable karmic connection to Ganye Temple itself. No one was willing to subjugate that Malevolent Ghost, leaving it to wander there.

Gangcuo Baima had become a dead land. Even if Ganye Temple were rebuilt, no one would support it with offerings.

In other words, Yongzhen had nowhere to go except the Endless White Pagoda Temple. Moreover, for reasons even Elder Mingli did not understand, Zajuben Temple had never revoked the abbot's Dharma throne at Ganye Temple: it was still a "Qubilghan" seat. That meant whoever underwent the enthronement ceremony at Ganye Temple could receive the title of "Qubilghan" and be reborn through reincarnation.

Only when he was alone in the room did he close its door and seal the place off. Then he knelt with utmost devotion, prostrating himself with his whole body, and beseeched his Yidam with body and mind as one.

"O King Mingzhu, have I made some mistake in my offerings to you, causing you such fury that you have sent punishment down upon me?"

"O King Mingzhu, I have offered you my fear. I have offered you my body and my soul."

"O King Mingzhu, I have offered you earth and water in the prescribed sequence.

I will soon offer you fire, wind, space, sight, and consciousness."

"O King Mingzhu, were my offerings on your birthday not perfect enough?"

"O King Mingzhu, are my everyday offerings to you not abundant enough?"

"O King Mingzhu, if you are dissatisfied with me in any way, please grant me a revelation. Please show me the direction of the road ahead."

"I have followed your command and accepted a disciple."

"Was going to the Ganing Lineage also your will?"

"O King Mingzhu, did the se I saw today come because of Yongzhen?"

"Your presence draws closer and closer to me, yet I cannot find you. O King Mingzhu, please tell me what I should do."

"O King Mingzhu..."

In the empty room, Elder Mingli respectfully questioned his Yidam, hoping to receive an answer. Outside the watchtower, meanwhile, Lu Feng listened to the monks speaking outside without saying a word.

He took out his butter lamp, lit it, and stood blocking the doorway. In the light of this ever-burning butter lamp, Lu Feng saw that the monks outside were carrying something on their backs!

I overslept. I am guilty.