A Buddha Kingdom in Dreams (I)

"We interrupt this broadcast with breaking news. At seven this morning, a severe natural disaster struck Dahai City. The city is now under lockdown as rescue operations begin, and cities across the country are giving their full support to Dahai City..."

Yang Jian and Zhang Wei had just stepped off the plane and were walking through the vast departure lounge. On the giant television screen at Dachang Airport, live news was playing.

Dahai City was now under a complete lockdown. On-screen, large numbers of rescue troops were heading toward the city, which had already been reduced to ruins.

Headquarters had apparently moved quickly, imposing an information blackout the moment the Dahai City incident occurred.

But no wall in the world was airtight. Some tourists and people who had only recently settled in Dahai City had not been affected by the Substitute Ghost's medium. These people had either escaped on their own or been evacuated by rescue troops.

As these people escaped, all sorts of rumors soon began circulating among the public. Right now, for instance, Yang Jian could hear the people around him talking.

"Hey... have you heard? Aliens have occupied Dahai City. Almost everyone there is dead!"

"Yeah, didn't you see that even the army went in? Something big is definitely going to happen soon!"

"You're right. I need to tell my family right away and buy a few dozen jin of dry provisions to stockpile."

"You lot don't know shit..."

At that moment, Zhang Wei craned his head over and joined the conversation.

"It was ghosts. Real ghosts."

"Ghosts?!" all three said in unison.

"That's right..." With a mysterious expression, Zhang Wei put on an air of profound wisdom and said:

"My buddy is Dachang City's top ghost exorcist. He just fought his way out of there. Even I nearly died inside. My advice is that you'd better not get married anytime soon."

"A Wei! Yang Jian! Over here, over here!"

Just then, Jiang Yan's voice rang out. She stood outside the arrivals exit, waving her arms vigorously at them.

"Let's go, A Wei."

Yang Jian carried a long, narrow body bag containing the shovel Zhang Wei had swiped from the cemetery.

The shovel seemed capable of knocking ghosts whose terror levels were not particularly high into a brief crash state. After dealing with that female corpse, Yang Jian had taken the shovel as well.

"Coming, Brother Leg!" Zhang Wei hurried after him. "I was just educating people, so nobody else gets tricked by A Zhen. As Jesus always said, saving one life is better than building a seven-story pagoda..."

Yang Jian replied, "That was the Buddha..."

Watching Yang Jian and Zhang Wei walk off into the distance, the three whispered:

"Holy shit, what a bullshitter. His story was even more outlandish than ours."

"One look and you can tell he's a swindler. He might come back in a minute to sell us some supposedly consecrated prayer beads."

"Not necessarily..." one of them said quietly.

"Didn't you notice? There was something very wrong with that man with a slit between his brows. I studied medicine. His physical condition was no different from a corpse's. What that guy said might actually be true..."

"Seriously? Then I really do need to buy some consecrated prayer beads to wear."

"Would I lie to you?"

Just as the three were discussing which temple would be best to visit, a bald man in a trench coat happened to walk past them.

But the bald man looked very strange. He wore a heavy trench coat that covered almost his entire body, as though he were trying to conceal something.

As he walked, he made clanking sounds, as though there were many shards of glass hidden inside his heavy coat.

Through the occasional glimpses beneath his coat, they could faintly see what appeared to be many broken mirror fragments, swaying with his steps and reflecting streaks of deathly pale light.

The bald man held a bulky, specially made satellite phone. "Dahai City has fallen. My plane was forced to land in Dachang City. Arrange another flight to DQ City for me."

"Understood," came a sweet female voice from the other end.

After a burst of typing, the sweet female voice continued, "I've contacted Dachang Airport. Your private plane is ready and will depart in ten minutes. Someone will be there shortly to escort you aboard."

"All right."

The bald man continued walking as he spoke on the phone.

Hearing the bald man speak so brazenly, able to arrange even a private plane at will, and seeing the expensive string of prayer beads around his neck, the three immediately gathered around him, rubbing their hands as they asked ingratiatingly:

"Might we ask, venerable monk, do you happen to sell consecrated prayer beads?"

"Venerable monk? Prayer beads?"

The bald man glanced at the prayer beads he wore and immediately realized what the three wanted. He did not mind, taking the beads from around his neck and handing them over.

"If you like them, take them. This is the first time anyone has called me a venerable monk."

"Thank you, venerable monk! Thank you! Your Buddhist wisdom truly knows no bounds, bringing salvation to all living beings!"

The three immediately accepted the prayer beads and bowed to the bald man over and over.

The bald man did not linger and continued onward.

The woman on the other end of the phone asked, "Do you really like being called a venerable monk?"

The bald man rubbed his gleaming head. "Not really. It was just my dream back when I was in school, though now it's become an extravagant wish. Consider it a way of remembering my younger self."

The two chatted idly. Just then, two staff members wearing sunglasses approached.

"Hello, are you Mr. Lin Bei?"

The bald man took out a black person-in-charge ID and waved it. "That's me. Let's go."

Inside Guanjiang Residential Complex.

"Brother Leg, I can't take it anymore. The craving's hit me. I have to go play a couple of rounds."

Zhang Wei dashed upstairs and ducked into his exclusive luxury esports office. Then they heard him shout something about launching something, and before long, fierce gunfire rang out from inside.

Jiang Yan brought Yang Jian a glass of cola. "Yang Jian, are you all right? We all saw the news and were really worried about you."

Yang Jian took a gulp of cola. "Don't worry. I won't be dying just yet."

Jiang Yan came closer.

"If something's weighing on your mind, don't shoulder it alone. We might not be able to help you much, but we can at least be good listeners. Talking about it might make you feel a lot better."

Yang Jian nodded noncommittally and said, "Thanks, Jiang Yan. But a lot of things aren't mine to choose. And sometimes, even talking about the supernatural can get people killed..."

Jiang Yan parted her lips slightly, but the words reached her lips and fell silent. After everything she had been through, she had grown too. She understood that, as an ordinary person, she could not offer Yang Jian much help. When facing the supernatural, she could even be called a burden.

In the end, Jiang Yan swallowed the words in her heart and said instead, "I just wanted to help you feel a little better. There's still a lot at the company that needs someone to manage it. I'll head back there first."

Since she could not help Yang Jian with supernatural matters, Jiang Yan could only pour her energy into his company. This was the only area in which she could help him. Sometimes she really envied Wang Shanshan. At least she still had plenty of common topics to discuss with Yang Jian.

Drinking his cola, Yang Jian went outside and came to the vacant lot at the very back of the residential complex. Yang Jian had renovated the old mansion, and now a modern-style temple building stood there.