Having traversed countless realms, can you possibly be as clever as me?

"Okay, you're right."

Dongjiang shrugged. Indeed, all this talk about practicing martial arts or cultivating oneself is just trivial stuff for the weak!

Practicing martial arts? What kind of martial arts?

True masters either come from privileged backgrounds or suddenly achieve enlightenment. Even if they simply take a pill and ascend to immortality on the spot, it's still more orthodox and impressive than cultivating through layers of techniques!

Cultivation is something only people without a background can do! How many of those cultivators who have cultivated their whole lives can match the achievements of the Second Senior Brother? He became Marshal Tianpeng just by eating a golden pill.

"Then what can you teach me? To strike the wooden fish to record merits? Or to chant scriptures?"

Siddhartha didn't speak, but looked at Tsurugi with the eyes of someone looking at a mentally challenged child, then pulled a Diamond Sutra from behind his back and slammed it in front of Tsurugi.

"You want me to find Subhuti to perform a scene with you?"

What's the difference between reciting Buddhist scriptures in front of Buddha and reading the Analects in front of Confucius?

Expecting to achieve anything by reciting this stuff is pure nonsense, or it's the same principle as people who have never read these classics thinking that the names are impressive and the content is incomprehensible, thus believing it to be some kind of incredible cultivation manual.

After all, the reason why Buddhist scriptures sound mysterious is simply because they are directly transliterated from Sanskrit after they traveled across the ocean. If you were to directly transliterate the Bible and have the ancient Chinese read it, it would also be an incredibly mysterious scripture.

Hmm... It seems like someone actually did this. I remember Jesus complaining about it when we were chatting.

It seems that in a Taoist scripture about Lü Zu, there are four sections that are considered to be "incantations" written in Sanskrit, but they are actually not Sanskrit at all. Instead, they are ancient Syriac phonetics. The content of those four sections is actually a hymn of praise from Nestorian Christianity during the Tang Dynasty, which has misled many later Taoist incantations.

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The first half of it is about Laozi's urgent decree, and the second half turns into praise of Jesus...

Of course, you can do the same thing the other way around. If you take Chinese spells to the West, they will probably become 'ancient and mysterious spells' as well.

Returning to the content before him, the famous Diamond Sutra in front of Tsurugi is just like that. To put it simply, its content can be understood as Shakyamuni Buddha and Subhuti, the master and disciple, one playing the straight man and the other the comedian, telling stories and performing a comedy routine...

So how did those martial arts masters who learned martial arts by reading the Diamond Sutra in the Wuxia world, and those who attained Buddhahood by reciting the Diamond Sutra countless times in the Xianxia world, manage to do it?

Can reciting Guo Degang's crosstalk collections lead to immortality? (Deep thought)

Of course, this statement is somewhat biased. After all, if we have to say, the Bible can also be understood as a collection of stories about men with the surname Jesus starting their own businesses.

Myths are stories, and classical texts, as the mediums for recording myths, are essentially no different from fairy tales. The lessons learned aren't gleaned from reading books, but rather from understanding what's within the stories themselves.

"After going through all this trouble, you should at least teach me something."

Tsurugi accepted the utterly useless Diamond Sutra in one gulp, then spread his hands and said...

"All conditioned phenomena are like dreams, illusions, bubbles, shadows, dew, and lightning; thus should they be viewed."

Siddhartha clasped his hands together, a forced smile on his face.

Dongjiang's forehead veins bulged. Was this bastard trying to riddle him or play mind games?

But just as Tsuruga was about to explode, Siddhartha leisurely took out a disc, put it into the DVD player next to him, then found a few comic books, tossed them to him, and pointed to the screen on the television.

"What era are we living in? Who still reads scriptures these days!" Siddhartha twisted open a bottle of cola and handed it to him, adding with a grin.

"As for the parts that the anime hasn't finished, let's read the manga. Isn't that better than just reading the text and imagining it?"

"I hope that you can gain some insight from this anime... Buddhist teachings."

Tsurugi: ......

An indescribable sense of powerlessness made him sigh, and then he obediently began to watch the anime series called "Land of the Lustrous."

......

All senses have been stripped away from oneself

First came the sharp whistling of the sound alloy shattering against the crystal, then the grinding sound day after day, and the soft rustling of powder falling into the porcelain dish.

Next comes the sense of touch; your own fragments are picked up, sorted, and discarded with tweezers, like handling a corpse.

Then came the vision; in his eyes, the world was divided into millions of facets, each reflecting the distorted face of rutile and the long-extinguished obsession in her eyes.

a thousand years

When consciousness is crushed into dust, when memories are shattered into unrecoverable fragments, time is no longer a flowing river, but a stagnant pool.

He occasionally touched upon fragments of memories: Cinnabar's retreating figure standing in the night mist, Antarcticite's final smile as it disappeared, Black Crystal in its pink dress, and...

In the end, everything will be buried in the darkness of fear.

Fear doesn't last long, because even fear itself will eventually disappear.

By the seventh thousand years, it could no longer remember who it hated. By the ninth thousand years, it had even forgotten what "hatred" meant.

Just wait, like a grain of sand waiting for the wind, like a drop of water waiting to evaporate, like all forgotten things waiting to be completely forgotten.

Then, something changed.

A wave of warmth seeped in from the void, like the first ray of sunlight breaking through the ice. Then came a sound, a long-lost sound, a sound that hadn't been heard for a very long time.

Someone was calling him. No, not "him"—that name hadn't been mentioned for far too long, so long that he thought he was nothing more than a nameless speck of dust in the universe. But that voice stubbornly pierced through the Dead Sea of ​​millennia, through shattering, betrayal, loneliness, madness, through all the weight he couldn't bear but had to bear—

"Phosphophyllite?"

He opened his eyes

Phosphophyllite? Who is Phosphophyllite? Phos? That name, I don't remember it anymore—no, I remember it, I don't remember it, I...

Yes, they're talking about me. I am Phosphophyllite, I am Phosph...

"The time has come, please let us be free."

"Yes, Phos, we forgive you, will you forgive us too?"

"Let's pray for us, Phosphophyllite, as a sacrifice for Antarcticite."

People

Right before him, they stood in rows and rows, kneeling in groups. The white robes of the Lunarians undulated like ocean waves, while the flesh race's curled-up bodies prostrated themselves in the distance. At the very front row was a familiar face that Phos still remembered, even after ten thousand years.

The diamond sisters clasp hands tightly, the yellow diamond smiles and raises its head, the black crystal and the translucent beryl stand side by side, and the cinnabar watches quietly.

No, no, they are no longer Gem People. They were already Lunarians. When they abandoned Earth and went to the Moon, they were all transformed into Lunarians.

"Please."

It was Aegumia, the prince of the Lunarians, who spoke. He knelt at the forefront, his once perfect yet hypocritical face etched with the weariness of millennia of indulgence and pleasure. Behind him were countless Lunarians with their heads bowed.

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Please pray.

He raised his head, his eyes devoid of calculation or scheme, revealing only the hunger of someone who has wandered for too long finally seeing their home.

"Pray for us."

Phos remained silent; He saw Cinnabar. She stood at the very back of everyone, her long, silver hair, no longer crimson from her transformation into a Lunarian, flowing like mercury in the void.

She didn't kneel, but just looked at Phos quietly, her eyes exactly the same as they were on that night ten thousand years ago—lonely, wary, and hiding a trace of unacknowledged expectation.

However, it lacked the tenderness hidden beneath the strength of ten thousand years ago, and instead contained only indifference.

Yes, that's right, that's what you said—

Don't you think you can't do without phosphorus?

"It's precisely because you don't feel like you can't do it that you feel helpless."

Cinnabar, leaning against the railing and gazing at the Earth, said helplessly.

Have you found a job that's happier than night patrol?

The question that had lingered in my thoughts for countless years shattered into dust in an instant, but now floated back from the void.

Where is Antarcticite? Why are you here? Equa told me you were ground into powder and scattered all over the moon, unable to return.

But why did you become a Lunarian, why are you standing here, looking at me with such longing yet such indifference?

Has your winter arrived? Is it now?

Diamond, have you become the dazzling idol you've always longed for?

Black Crystal, now you can focus on studying your favorite jellyfish.

Peridot, are you pursuing your art? Have you unleashed your untapped potential?

And you, Teacher Jin Gang.

You can no longer pray; you have become a lunar person; you have gone from being a machine for human prayer to someone who needs my help to be saved.

Each of you has realized your dreams and lived happily for ten thousand years, experiencing happiness, joy, and pleasure until you became numb.

They stood there, hands clasped together, silently watching Phos, and the words they had spoken on the moon carried to his ears on the wind.

"He'll forgive us, right?"

"Yes, we can be happy."

"Forget all feelings for Phosphophyllite? I'm grateful to him."

“He will forgive us; that’s what he was born for.”

"After you cross the bridge, be sure to burn it down!"

Gold, silver, glass, crystal, giant clam shell, red pearl, agate

Phos sensed the seven gems within his body. Long, long ago, these seemed to be the 'Seven Treasures of Buddhism' as spoken of by humans. Possessing them, he could bring eternal and nihilistic salvation to these souls who had lived long enough indulging in decadence for ten thousand years.

“I could make you all eternal slaves, or I could make solar flares fall and make you suffer endless pain, but… I will not do that.”

"In fact, from the moment I was born, I have always been alone. Ten thousand years later, I am still alone. I am no different now than I was at the beginning."

"The moment I met you was but a fleeting moment in the vast ocean, so—"

Phos gazed at Cinnabar, at those eyes that had finally stopped looking away, and at the people kneeling before him, kneeling in unison, and said softly.

"Therefore, I will pray that your desire to return to nothingness will be fulfilled, which is my shared desire with you."

"We finally understand each other. Goodbye."

His hands were clasped together, about to begin a prayer, but at that very moment...

A hand suddenly appeared from behind him and grasped his hands as he was about to close them.

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722. Land of the Lustrous (X) Avici Hell (√)