Longzang

Chapter 980 Subtle Words and Meanings
In August of the second year of the Hongjing era, Lu Jiande rallied multiple rebel armies, known as the "Eighteen Routes of Wind and Smoke," with an army of two million, and advanced on the capital of Ji, causing widespread shock throughout the country. The King of Ji issued an edict to the entire realm, summoning loyal troops to jointly resist the rebellion.

Wei Yuan has captured a demon in his heart.

In September, Lu Jiande decisively defeated the 900,000-strong army hastily assembled by the Ji Kingdom and advanced to the foot of Jiebing Pass. Jiebing Pass was the last gateway before the capital of Ji, and its width was only about a mile. The two sides fought a fierce battle at the pass for a month, suffering heavy casualties.

Wei Yuan has captured a demon in his heart.

In October, Lu Jiande's prolonged siege failed, his army's supplies ran out, and he suffered a crushing defeat, his eighteen routes disintegrating. Meanwhile, the State of Ji, led by the Duke of Longguo, pursued with an army of 800,000. Lu Jiande suffered thirteen consecutive defeats before finally shaking off his pursuers. The Duke of Longguo recovered 40,000 li of lost territory, his prestige unparalleled for a time!
Wei Yuan captured one of his inner demons... then another came to rescue him, and they both ended up being captured.

Wei Yuan: ?
Inner demons are supposed to come one at a time, right? How come there are two this time? And what's the relationship between these two? They seem so deeply in love, even willing to live and die together! Speaking of which, do inner demons also have male and female forms? I've studied so many inner demons, how come I never figured it out?
Unable to find answers to a series of questions, Wei Yuan suddenly wondered if it was really as the stories in the novels said: that heterosexuality is only for procreation, while homosexuality is true love.
Wei Yuan tried to establish several disciplines related to inner demons, including but not limited to inner demon psychology and inner demon sociology. Although Wei Yuan had anticipated that researching these would easily result in a large number of useless articles, as long as a few of them were truly inspiring, it wouldn't be a wasted effort.

Once the course was set up, hundreds of ordinary people signed up for the task in the blink of an eye. Wei Yuan then temporarily put the matter aside.

Although the inner demon tribulation seems to have no end in sight, the mental world continues to evolve, and it hasn't hindered my advancement to the Imperial Realm at all.

In any case, the entire mortal realm, along with the three great grotto-heavens, still needs a considerable amount of time to fully evolve. Wei Yuan felt that this was a good opportunity to fight his inner demons and mend the final flaw in his Dao heart. As for what that final flaw in his Dao heart was, Wei Yuan himself couldn't say for sure.

At this point, the battle in the mortal realm had stabilized. Three platforms for transporting cultivators had been built, and a larger platform with combat capabilities had also been completed. Its firepower was equivalent to that of more than ten Dharma Aspect cultivators. This was the first time in the mortal realm that the destructive power of an external object had exceeded that of cultivators.

In addition to the Battle Saint Hall, an army called the Veteran Legion was also established in the human world.

The legion's soldiers were all at the Foundation Establishment stage, mostly composed of cultivators with relatively low cultivation talent who were frustrated in the Battle Saint Hall. Upon its formation, the legion recruited about a hundred Foundation Establishment cultivators from the Battle Saint Hall and then established its first special operations company.

Wei Yuan was happy to see competition, so he didn't interfere and waited to see what would happen.

However, when Wei Yuan saw Fuyao and Lei Ling, who was in the body of Long Wushuang, join the legion, he suddenly became restless.

Wei Yuan had already sensed the various strange occurrences within the mortal realm, and the main source of these was Fuyao. However, Fuyao's existence was of great use to immortal plants, especially in successfully cultivating the Phoenix Blood Longevity Moss, which greatly surprised Wei Yuan.

The Phoenix Blood Everlasting Moss has now grown to cover an area the size of a water basin, and it looks like it's about to develop sentience. This would add another immortal plant to the collection. Although Wei Yuan has some doubts about Fuyao, he'll tolerate it as long as she doesn't do anything too outrageous.

However, the Phoenix Blood Longevity Moss requires the blood of a divine beast to grow, and since there are no real phoenixes in the mortal world, Fuyao somehow tricked the Shadow Dragon into coming over every now and then to sprinkle a drop of blood on it. Now, this patch of Phoenix Blood Longevity Moss is reddish-black, with an increasingly strong aura of the underworld. Its longevity-enhancing effects are waning, while its bizarre abilities are constantly increasing, and it has already transformed into something unknown.

After examining the human world, Wei Yuan calmed down and continued to study the Fourth Grotto-Heaven. Occasionally, when he had an insight, he would write another page of the "Three Realms Auspicious Scripture".

Wei Yuan knew that writing this scripture was inappropriate, but it was the way of heaven and earth that he had come to understand, and it was necessary to record it for future generations.

Moreover, Wei Yuan had not seen the true meaning contained in this path in other Buddhist scriptures of the Great Treasure Flower Pure Land, so he always felt that something was missing.

The general outline of the scriptures has now been written to its final section, which is exactly the part that Wei Yuan felt was missing from the Buddhist canon.

Wei Yuan spread out jade paper in his study, dipped his brush in water, and began to write. In reality, the paper only showed watermarks, not writing. But in the mundane world, writing appeared on the paper accordingly:

"There are two aspects to Buddhism: one is self-cultivation, and the other is helping others..." As he wrote this, Wei Yuan suddenly felt his pen vibrating slightly. He looked around in confusion and realized that the entire study was shaking. Then, a thunderclap sounded, and a torrential downpour began.

During this season, strong winds and torrential rains are common, and most of the boundary stones in the county have been uprooted. Winds, rain, thunder, and lightning are even more frequent, and various natural disasters occur constantly. Spring is often dry, and floods occur in late summer and early autumn. Late autumn is marked by thunder and hail, causing immense suffering to the people.

Having witnessed countless heavenly tribulations, Wei Yuan paid little attention to ordinary natural disasters, and thus continued writing:

However, if the sea of ​​suffering persists, there is no way for people to cross it completely...

Before he could finish writing that sentence, the pen in Wei Yuan's hand suddenly exploded into ashes, and the entire study burst into flames! The temperature of this azure fire was extremely low, almost freezing Wei Yuan, yet it could burn anything, and in an instant, the entire study was reduced to ashes!

Wei Yuan finally snapped out of his daze and immediately used the power of mortal life to counterattack. However, mortal life was also experiencing multiple tribulations! At this time, mortal life was undergoing a tribulation of inner demons, and those extraterrestrial demons unintentionally shared a lot of the lightning tribulation.

These demons have extremely strong resistance to heavenly tribulations. A single lightning strike couldn't even kill a demon in its Dharma form. As a result, most of the lightning tribulation power was redirected to the demons outside the heavens, making this tribulation very easy for Wei Yuan to overcome.

With the tribulation about to strike, Wei Yuan knew he couldn't write anymore for the time being, otherwise he would easily attract a new tribulation. If multiple tribulations were to overlap, who knew what kind of tricks they would pull?

Wei Yuan now knows that you should never try to provoke the bottom line of the Great Dao of Heaven and Earth. Once you do, you will find that Heaven and Earth have no bottom line at all.

Wei Yuan shook his head, looked at the study that had been reduced to nothingness, and used the power of his cave to extinguish the remaining blue flames.

At this moment, his subordinates noticed the abnormality and rushed over. Wei Yuan waved his hand and said calmly, "It's nothing. I just had an epiphany and went through a tribulation. You don't need to worry about it."

All his subordinates were full of admiration. The Realm Lord was indeed a god-like being, and passing the tribulation was as easy as eating and drinking.

Wei Yuan composed himself; he couldn't write the scriptures for the time being, but he had many other matters to attend to. For example, the newest floating airship, after months of flight, was almost there. Zhang Sheng was escorting it this time; there shouldn't be any problems... right?

……

In a serene Taoist temple, a young immortal was meditating. He wore a plain white Taoist robe, its hem flowing like clouds, and his body seemed shrouded in a faint, ethereal aura. Before him sat two incense burners, their wisps of smoke coiling like snakes, forming a unique array. A wooden pendant floated and rotated within the array, slowly rotating on its own. The wooden pendant was extremely complex, its surface amber in color, carved from ten-thousand-year-old spiritual wood. It was engraved with the sun, moon, stars, the Five Elements, and the Eight Trigrams. Each tremor was like the breath of a living being, as if all things were compressed into a single space, a simulation of the workings of heaven and earth.

However, at that moment, a beam of intense light suddenly shot out from the formation, and a piece of the wooden frame burst forth with flames, instantly burning to ashes! A gap appeared in the entire wooden frame!
The young immortal was greatly surprised, then black energy filled his face as he roared angrily, "Ah, my immortal artifact!! How can there be a heavenly tribulation? Who is undergoing tribulation at this time? Who is it?!"

His voice pierced through the void and echoed throughout the celestial realm. Several immense wills nearby responded, but all indicated they were unaware.

The young immortal did not get the result he wanted, so he could only try to deduce it himself.

However, heavenly tribulations are inherently difficult to predict, and even immortals have little chance of success. This particular tribulation is the extremely rare Netherworld Azure Fire Tribulation, far exceeding the abilities of a young immortal, and therefore will likely yield no result.

This enraged the young immortal even more. Although he knew that anger was useless, he was determined to be angry anyway.

(End of this chapter)