The Land of Ten Thousand Buddhas, an endless expanse of lotuses.
The young little Phoenix knelt before the Buddha, leaned forward to offer incense, and stood up.
His snow-white kasaya trailed on the ground like flowing water, his soft black hair falling to his side. As he rose, a faint, dark fragrance wafted up, like a lotus blooming silently on the water in the dead of night.
From the darkness of the great hall, countless pairs of eyes spied on him. Whispers arose from the void in all directions. Yet the Phoenix closed his eyes, his face serene, his hand gently moving a pure azure lapis lazuli prayer bead.
“A-Huang.”
The Phoenix turned his head. A man stood in the light of the main hall entrance, his face obscured by the backlight.
A shy smile appeared in the little Phoenix’s bright eyes. He turned and walked towards the man, offered him his soft, small hand, and said gently, “Sakyamuni.”
On Mount Sumeru, the lapis lazuli path, the nine-tiered heavenly steps wound down, disappearing into the clouds.
A large figure and a small one walked hand in hand. The Phoenix looked up at the man beside him and asked, “Sakyamuni.”
“Hmm?”
“Venerable Bhadra said that the Phoenix was originally two separate beings, that I should have a brother. Is that true?”
Sakyamuni was silent for a moment, then asked in return, “What do you think?”
“…I don’t know. None of them like me…”
Sakyamuni placed his hands on the little Phoenix’s shoulders, bent down to look directly into his large, clear-as-water eyes, and said softly, “It’s not true. When I found you, you were just an egg.”
The little Phoenix looked back, bewildered.
Sakyamuni said, “Don’t mind what others think. You just need to believe me.”
The little Phoenix of the Thirty-Three Heavens was always alone.
He never spoke to anyone, nor did he pay anyone any mind. Much of the time, he would just quietly look at you, lower his eyes, and walk away alone, passing by without a sound.
Every day, he went to kneel and chant sutras before the Buddha, coming and going alone, as quiet as a wisp of smoke amidst the swirling sandalwood incense.
A mischievous young novice monk once stopped him and asked, “Why are you always alone?”
“…”
“I heard you have an extremely evil form. Is that true?”
The little Phoenix stared at the ground beneath his feet.
His expression never changed, neither speaking nor smiling, like a jade carving. The young monks, receiving no answer, giggled and dispersed. He then continued out of the Buddhist hall, ascending the steps towards the boundless sea of clouds.
The Sages, high on their lotus thrones, sighed with compassion, but no one could hear them.
“There should have been two, but only one emerged from the shell…”
“It is said that the Huang devoured the Feng, thus he was born with an extremely evil form. The moment the shell broke, a heavenly tribulation of nine hundred and ninety thousand thunder seas descended…”
“Is it true? Even the heavenly tribulation of the thunder seas couldn’t blast the extremely evil form to ashes?”
The lotus thrones fell silent for a long while. Venerable Bhadra let out a long sigh.
“The Phoenix achieves nirvana and does not die. Obsessions, resentments, and doubts will follow the inauspicious, extremely evil form, reincarnating forever, lifetime after lifetime…”
The little Phoenix sat at the top of the glass pagoda, his hands cupping his pale cheeks, gazing at the sea of stars below, as brilliant as the Milky Way.
A man walked quietly up behind him, sat down, and placed his hands on the little Phoenix’s shoulders from behind. “What are you thinking about?”
“…Nothing.”
The Phoenix turned and nestled in his embrace, his large, black-and-white eyes, like mercury, wide open. A small blue bruise was visible beneath his loose hair. The man reached out, pushed his hair aside, and asked, “What’s this?”
“…Trailokyavijaya hit me. He tried to talk to me, and when I ignored him, he hit me…” The Phoenix turned to look at the man and asked in a small voice, “Will Trailokyavijaya become a Buddha?”
The man chuckled. “Are you afraid that if he gains great power, he will bully you even more?”
The Phoenix lowered his gaze. His eyelashes were extremely long, casting a fan-shaped shadow on his nose when they fell, like a treasure that would shatter with the slightest touch.
“Will you become a Buddha too, Sakyamuni?”
The man was silent for a moment, then said, “Everyone vows to become a Buddha, to enjoy supreme bliss and boundless life, but a Buddha must also experience a Buddha’s tribulation. By reincarnating as a human or descending in one’s true form, one can resolve the inner demons that grow over a long life, and only then can one return to the lotus throne, to the supreme, formless heaven’s zenith…”
“If one does not become a Buddha, will one’s life have an end one day?”
“Yes.”
The little Phoenix grabbed the man’s sleeve. “Then, will you leave me one day?”
The man laughed and ruffled the Phoenix’s hair, which was as soft and cool as flowing water.
“You are an immortal bird. In the nine heavens and ten lands, only you are indestructible. Even if you return to the void beyond the Thirty-Three Heavens, as long as there is the fire of nirvana, you are an immortal existence.”
The Phoenix opened his mouth, seeming to want to say something, but in the end, he just stared blankly at the man. The brilliant stars of the nine heavens’ river were all reflected in his eyes. In the fleeting light, it was impossible to tell if it was the shimmer of water or a sea of stars.
“I… I don’t need those things. Having Sakyamuni is enough for me…”
The man reached out to touch the corner of his eye, but the Phoenix suddenly transformed into the original form of a young divine bird. His wings were like the lightest silk, his long tail feathers drawing a brilliant arc of light in the Milky Way. Fine stardust rippled across the heavens with the river’s flow, finally landing gently on the man’s shoulder.
“Having Sakyamuni is enough for me…”
“Mm,” the man stroked the Phoenix’s soft feathers and said gently, “You just need to believe me.”
Below Mount Sumeru, it was a world of ice and snow. The eternal, biting wind swirled with white snow, howling towards the horizon. In the vast ice field, Trailokyavijaya stood on a black rock protruding from the snow, looking down at the Phoenix who was kowtowing with every step on the mountain path, moving step by step towards the unreachable summit.
“Making a great vow…” he murmured.
The little Phoenix was covered in snow. His long hair, soaked with snowmelt, appeared even darker, clinging to his ice-white cheeks. He looked so pale and transparent that it seemed he could dissolve into the cold wind at any moment. He took a step forward, knelt and kowtowed, then rose, took another step, and knelt and kowtowed again. This cycle repeated endlessly. Finally, after rising for what must have been the thousandth time, he staggered, about to fall, but was caught from behind by Trailokyavijaya.
“What are you doing?”
The Phoenix remained silent, gently breaking free. He knelt, kowtowed again, rose, and took another step forward.
“Hey!” Trailokyavijaya shouted. “What vow are you making! Didn’t you hear me asking, hey!”
He charged through the snow and stood in front of the Phoenix, but the little Phoenix simply walked around him, knelt again, and continued forward.
In his eyes, there was nothing but this eternal wind and snow.
Trailokyavijaya became furious and rushed forward again, grabbing his shoulders. However, even under the heavy pressure, the Phoenix still took a step forward, slowly lowering his body. Besides the extra slowness from resisting the pressure, even the angle of his bow remained unchanged. It seemed that Trailokyavijaya blocking him was no different from all the other obstacles and karmic hindrances in the world.
“What are you doing! What vow are you making!” Trailokyavijaya grabbed his shoulders with both hands, the force so great that his own face turned red. “The snowstorm is too strong, you’ll never kowtow your way to the summit! Give up!”
His strength was immense. The Phoenix finally couldn’t move and stood there, shaking his head.
“Hey, what do you mean by that, you disagree? How about this, since I’m going to become a Buddha anyway, whatever vow you’re making, you might as well just worship me…”
The little Phoenix raised his hand, grabbed Trailokyavijaya’s wrist that was holding his shoulder, and forced him to let go, inch by inch.
His fingers were so cold, carrying the icy chill that perpetually lingered in his marrow, as if his veins flowed with unmeltable crushed ice. Trailokyavijaya cursed and gritted his teeth, yanking his hand free. On impulse, he wanted to hit him, but then he saw the Phoenix brush past him and say softly, “The vow I am making is also to become a Buddha. You can’t grant it.”
The voice scattered in the howling wind and snow as soon as it left his lips. Trailokyavijaya froze and turned his head.
He saw the Phoenix stumbling, kowtowing in the snow, moving forward, rising to kowtow again, and moving forward again, step by step into the distance.
That was perhaps the longest, yet shortest, road in Trailokyavijaya Wisdom King’s memory. Many years later, when he recalled it, all he could remember was the swirling snow, the howling cold wind, and the thin, small child ahead, his sleeves fluttering, kowtowing with every step.
At the break of dawn, the Phoenix returned to the Thirty-Three Heavens.
He stood before the great Buddhist hall. On the high lotus thrones, vajras glared angrily, bodhisattvas lowered their brows, and the various sages had different expressions, all looking down at him. The Phoenix, wrapped in an aura of ice and snow, looked up and met the gazes of all the gods and Buddhas. The ice melted into water, dripping from the tips of his hair and the corners of his clothes, forming a small puddle at his feet.
Trailokyavijaya stood outside the hall behind him and stopped.
A Sage asked, “What is your vow?”
The Phoenix answered, “I vow to become a Buddha.”
“For yourself to become a Buddha?”
“May Sakyamuni become a Buddha.”
All the gods were silent. The Thirty-Three Heavens were utterly still.
Standing outside the door, Trailokyavijaya’s eyes widened in shock.
After an unknown amount of time, the Sage’s voice finally echoed from the void: “Only when all sentient beings are saved and hell is empty can your wish come true. If you have this will, then go to the Sea of Blood.”
The Phoenix knelt, kowtowed, and turned to look towards the distant Hell Path beyond the nine-tiered heavens.
There, corpses littered the ground, and there were hells of fierce ghosts. There were endless miserable howls and wails, and there was an eighty-thousand-zhang-deep pond of blood lotuses floating with rotten corpses.
The ice and snow had not yet melted from the Phoenix’s temples. His face was pale and cold as he stepped straight out of the hall.
“—What are you doing? You can’t go!” Trailokyavijaya rushed forward, grabbing him and roaring, “The Sea of Blood has countless top-tier great demons! Even as a Phoenix, you won’t be able to return! Don’t go!”
However, the Phoenix only glanced at him, his eyes frighteningly bright—it was the kind of radiance that comes when one’s spirit is extremely strong after complete physical exhaustion, a light that, once a decision is made, would not be changed even if the heavens collapsed.
Trailokyavijaya had a bad feeling. “Phoenix…”
The Phoenix pushed him away, staggered a couple of steps, and suddenly slipped and fell on the jade platform of the nine-tiered heavenly steps.
Was he finally unable to hold on? Trailokyavijaya strode forward, about to help him up, when a hand suddenly reached out from beside him, stopping him, and then lifted the little Phoenix into its arms.
Trailokyavijaya looked up and saw a man who had appeared from nowhere, staring coldly at him.
That gaze carried an immense, imposing authority, like the wrath of a vajra pressing down. The boundless, vast power forced Trailokyavijaya to retreat several steps, leaving him stunned and uncertain.
The man, holding the little Phoenix, turned and disappeared into the void.
Three hundred years later, the Phoenix descended from the Thirty-Three Heavens, arrived in the Four Evil Realms, and headed straight for the Sea of Blood.
By the time the news reached the Demon Path, Rahu had been defeated, Baḍin had been defeated, Kharaskandha had been defeated, and Vemacitra had been defeated. When the Great Asura King led his forces to the Sea of Blood, he saw only red smoke covering the sky and boiling water flooding the earth. The Phoenix had unleashed his Heavenly Dao form. In his left hand, he held pure azure lapis lazuli prayer beads, and in his right, a silver-white long spear. With one strike of the spear, he cut countless great demons in half!
The Sea of Blood shook violently, huge waves rolling to the horizon. Countless great demons from the seabed emerged, letting out terrifying shrieks amidst the severed limbs.
“Ancient Phoenix—!” the Great Asura King roared in a furious rage. “What are you doing? Get out of the Four Evil Realms—!”
The Phoenix swept his spear horizontally. Amidst the heaven-and-earth-shattering chaos, he severed all nine heads of a giant demonic snake descending from the sky!
The Great Asura King manifested his true form, twenty-eight thousand yojanas tall. He stepped into the Sea of Blood, and the water only reached his navel. He then raised his mountain-like palm, covering the sun and moon with a single hand. The earth turned into a dark void, and the cold, bloody water poured back into the sky. The Asura King, with his nine heads and a thousand eyes, spat fire from his mouths, his roar shaking the nine heavens and ten lands. “Ancient Phoenix! Today is the day you die—!”
In the center of the Sea of Blood, the white-robed youth shot towards the sky. In the fierce wind, the prayer beads in his left hand transformed into a huge, magnificent, pure azure longbow. “—If hell is not empty today, then it will be the day I die.”
The youth paused in mid-air, reached into his body, and slowly pulled out a blood-drenched phoenix bone.
The Great Asura King’s eyes widened in astonishment. He saw the youth gasping in pain as he nocked the arrow and drew the bowstring. The bowstring was like a full moon, and the phoenix bone shone with a cold, sharp brilliance.
The next second, he released his fingers.
The bone arrow shot forth like a meteor, tearing through the air, and with one arrow, it pinned the Great Asura King firmly in the Sea of Blood!
With a world-shaking roar, the bottom of the Sea of Blood rapidly cracked open. Countless demons were sucked into the earth’s depths before they could even surface.
The tsunami caused by the earthquake blotted out the sky. The Asuras screamed in terror, running, and countless were pushed into the Sea of Blood. The waves, like collapsing mountains, came crashing down. The nine-headed infant demon that rode the waves shrieked, spread its three thousand dense bone wings, and lunged at the Phoenix in the fierce wind!
The Phoenix’s ten fingers split, and he gripped the longbow tightly.
“Today, I will save all in the eighty-thousand-zhang-deep pond of blood lotuses…”
The youth took a deep breath and, with his bare hands, pulled out a second phoenix bone, still trailing flesh and blood.
Every nerve in his body trembled and shivered from the intense pain, but the fingers holding the bowstring were like ten-thousand-year-old ice, firm and steady, unmoving even as the heavens and earth collapsed.
“—Sakyamuni,” he said in a low voice, “from this day on, in hell, there will be no more Sea of Blood.”
He released his hand. The phoenix bone cut through the wind and waves, and the top-tier great demon, the nine-headed infant, exploded in mid-air into a spectacular spray of blood that stretched for thousands of miles!
The Phoenix pulled out twelve bones in the Sea of Blood. The great demons were all slain, the Sea of Blood was pacified, and the myriad demons of hell bowed in submission.
After the twelfth arrow was released, a golden Buddha light suddenly split the nine heavens and ten lands like a sharp sword, enveloping the Four Evil Realms in boundless Buddhist chanting. Everyone looked up and saw celestial birds flying and lotuses blooming in the sky. At the zenith of the Thirty-Three Heavens, the highest point of the six realms, the magnificent divine image of Mount Sumeru appeared.
It was the glorious light of the Buddhas returning to their positions.
—Someone had become a Buddha.
The Phoenix let out a long, complete breath, swallowing a mouthful of hot blood. He reached up, pushed his blood-soaked long hair behind his ear, and, looking at the boundless Buddha light, broke into a smile.
—The Fragrant Elephant Buddha Land, the endless expanse of lotuses, were all contained in that smile at that very moment.
The Phoenix slowly walked ashore from the Sea of Blood. He suddenly saw, among the scattered remains of the demons, a gray-robed Asura standing on the cracked earth, staring straight at him.
He was a very young Asura, probably of low rank, his face covered in the foul blood of demons, his gaze filled with an undisguised fervor. To the Phoenix, he was not even a threat. The youth’s gaze did not linger on him. He casually transformed the longbow into a pure azure hair ribbon, tied it around his blood-stained long hair, picked up his silver-white spear, and walked into the distance.
However, the Asura suddenly called out from behind, “—Why didn’t you kill me?”
The Phoenix did not answer.
After a moment of silence behind him, the person shouted, “My name is Fan Luo!”
…What does that have to do with me…
The Phoenix thought, not committing the name to memory, and walked away in the wind that smelled of iron and blood.
After returning to the Thirty-Three Heavens, the Phoenix discovered that Sakyamuni, who had accompanied him as he grew up, had completely disappeared.
His figure was no longer in the Buddhist hall, his statue was not on the lotus throne, and his presence could not be found anywhere on Mount Sumeru. The man who had single-handedly raised the little Phoenix, the man who had been his only companion in his boundless loneliness for hundreds of years, had just vanished.
What happened to him? Did something go wrong when he became a Buddha?
Did he return to the void beyond the Thirty-Three Heavens?
The Phoenix trembled all over. Standing in the empty hall, he suddenly got up and ran outside. However, just as he ran down the jade steps, he ran head-on into Trailokyavijaya Wisdom King. In his confused state, he staggered and fell to the ground.
“What’s wrong with you?” Trailokyavijaya Wisdom King said, astonished, and reached out a hand to him.
The Phoenix did not, as usual, ignore him and get up to walk away. Instead, he stared straight at him, his face pale, his lips trembling.
Trailokyavijaya Wisdom King had never seen him like this before. His heart skipped a beat. “—Phoenix? What on earth is wrong with you?”
“…Sakyamuni is gone.” After a long pause, the Phoenix finally spoke. “He… where is he?”
“Who are you talking about?”
“Sakyamuni… the Sakyamuni who raised me!”
Trailokyavijaya Wisdom King looked at him in shock. “You are an ancient divine bird. Who could have raised you?”
They looked at each other for a moment. Trailokyavijaya Wisdom King wanted to say more, but the Phoenix suddenly got up, pushed him aside, and staggered towards the Buddhist hall.
In the Buddhist hall, incense smoke curled. Venerable Bhadra sat high before the lotus throne, his kasaya half-draped, his eyes slightly closed.
The Phoenix knelt on the cold, thick, pure gold floor tiles, his voice hoarse as if he were gargling blood. “Where is Sakyamuni?”
Venerable Bhadra gently moved his prayer beads. The great hall was filled with the clear sound of the beads clicking, otherwise silent. After a long time, the Sage opened his eyes, but did not look at the kneeling Phoenix below. He only said, “The Buddha has returned to the formless heaven.”
—Transcending the Thirty-Three Heavens, where form does not exist, only consciousness remains, this is called the formless heaven.
The Phoenix’s lips turned a faint bluish-white, as if he had lost the very last trace of blood. “But Sakyamuni promised not to leave me… What should I do? I’m… I’m all alone again!”
The Sage let out an inaudible sigh, which slowly dissipated in the distant white mist of sandalwood.
“You have always been alone. Besides you, no one could see Sakyamuni…”
“Your cultivation is too low, Phoenix. An ancient divine bird with an extremely evil form. If you cannot wholeheartedly take refuge in our Buddha, you will surely become the beginning of a Buddha’s tribulation in a future life…”
The Phoenix’s eyes widened. A strand of black hair clung to his pale cheek. His expression was helpless and desolate.
“Go back, little Phoenix. When you have cultivated great wisdom and great merit and can be conferred the venerable title of Wisdom King, then come to the summit of Mount Sumeru to see all the gods and Buddhas.”
Venerable Bhadra waved his sleeve. The Phoenix felt the wind whistle in his ears, and in an instant, he had been moved out of the Buddhist hall. The magnificent golden gates, towering to the ninth heaven, boomed heavily and slowly closed before his eyes.
From that day on, the Phoenix began to kneel and chant sutras, closing his doors and disappearing from the Thirty-Three Heavens.
No one saw him again, and no one heard any news of him again.
They said the Phoenix was cultivating under the largest Bodhi tree, kneeling year-round, never rising. They said his hair grew to the ground, his snow-white robes spread to the water’s edge, and with every chant of a sutra, a beautiful lotus bloomed on the water’s surface.
Over time, it became a celestial realm of lapis lazuli, surrounded by endless lotuses.
Everyone yearned for it, but it was a forbidden land in the Thirty-Three Heavens.
—How is that Phoenix now? Trailokyavijaya Wisdom King would sometimes wonder.
That arrogant, indifferent, and stubbornly pitiful… Phoenix, how is he now?
Month after month, year after year, time flew like a shuttle, years passing in the blink of an eye.
The eighty-thousand-zhang-deep pond of blood lotuses in hell filled up again. The stench of rotting flesh filled the air, and demons roared in the Sea of Blood, their cries audible even before the Buddhist hall on the summit of Mount Sumeru.
Venerable Bhadra went to save all sentient beings. On his way back, he passed through the Hell Path and dropped his precious vase into the Sea of Blood. Because the vase sealed countless great demons from the Sea of Blood, the Sage asked the bodhisattvas, Wisdom Kings, and arhats, who could retrieve the precious vase from the tumultuous waves of the Sea of Blood?
The arhats tried first, but all returned in failure. The Wisdom Kings went next, but they too failed. The Sea of Blood had become a vast ocean, with countless vengeful ghosts and spirits wailing and roaming within it. Finding that small precious vase was harder than finding a needle in a haystack.
The other sages then suggested that since the Phoenix had once cleared the Sea of Blood and slain all the great demons, why not have him descend to the Hell Path to try?
Venerable Bhadra hesitated for a long time, but finally ordered Trailokyavijaya Wisdom King to summon the Phoenix.
After thousands of long, seemingly endless years, Trailokyavijaya Wisdom King once again saw that arrogant, proud, and stubborn little Phoenix.
He walked into the forbidden land of the Thirty-Three Heavens. A small river like crushed jade surrounded a huge Bodhi tree. Under the tree knelt that familiar figure. After so many years, his hair had fallen like a waterfall to the ground, his snow-white robes spreading out in all directions, like a water lily that had been blooming for a thousand years.
How terrifying, he thought.
Unchanged for a thousand years, a beautiful face unaffected by time. It was less a gift from the heavens and more a sinful form that lured moths to a flame.
“Venerable Bhadra’s precious Dharma instrument, the vase, has fallen into the Sea of Blood…” Trailokyavijaya Wisdom King simply explained his purpose, carefully watching the Phoenix’s expression. In truth, nothing could be seen from that indifferent face. For a moment, he even wondered if the Phoenix could still hear others speak, or if he had already completely become a Buddha, a part of this Bodhi tree.
However, he did not have to wait long.
The Phoenix opened his eyes. A watery brilliance flowed beneath his lashes. He slowly extended a hand towards him. “Lend me a knife.”
Trailokyavijaya Wisdom King was stunned, but still untied the jeweled dagger from his back and handed it over. He watched as the Phoenix drew the blade, grabbed his long hair with one hand, and cut it off with a backhand motion.
“…You!”
The Phoenix stood up, casually tied his half-long, cut hair, and said, “Let’s go.”
The Phoenix descended into the Sea of Blood for the second time. The Four Evil Realms shook, the Asura clan scattered, and the waters of the Sea of Blood were churned into a boiling cauldron by the countless great demons rising from the depths.
However, the Phoenix stood by the Sea of Blood for a long time without drawing a weapon.
He walked straight in.
Everyone in the Thirty-Three Heavens was shocked. Then, just as the tip of the Phoenix’s foot touched the bloody water, a snow-white lotus suddenly bloomed beneath his feet!
Rotten corpses shrieked, monsters ran rampant, and mountain-sized demons crowded the sea’s surface. But the Phoenix walked towards the center of the Sea of Blood. With every step he took, a lotus bloomed beneath his feet, carrying him across the vast, red-misted sea.
Behind him, a long path of lotuses bloomed in the deepest hell of the Four Evil Realms. Ahead lay a more treacherous and uncertain future.
“—It’s actually lotuses blooming with every step,” in the Thirty-Three Heavens, Trailokyavijaya Wisdom King heard someone behind him exclaim. “This, this is clearly the sign of becoming a true Buddha…”
For some reason, Trailokyavijaya Wisdom King suddenly felt very displeased.
He looked away, forcing himself not to make a sound.
The Phoenix walked to the center of the Sea of Blood, picked up the precious vase, and turned back to the shore. He treated the myriad great demons of various forms around him as if they were nothing. He returned to the Thirty-Three Heavens, handed the precious vase to Venerable Bhadra, his expression calm, and stepped aside.
But Venerable Bhadra looked at him, silent for a long time, and asked, “Has your obsession still not changed?”
The Phoenix said, “I want to see the Buddha.”
The Sage let out a long sigh, the echo of which seemed to linger in the air for a long time before he said, “Then come.”
The gates of the Buddhist hall, closed for a thousand years, finally opened for the Phoenix again. However, as he stepped over the threshold, he felt a daze, as if he saw his younger self from thousands of years ago, still kneeling in the swirling sandalwood incense, his heart pure, his face pious, holding a string of lapis lazuli prayer beads that had become warm and translucent from constant rubbing.
He was a little confused and stopped in the empty great hall.
The golden statue of the Buddha was still there, looking down on all sentient beings in the six realms with a compassionate yet majestic expression, unchanged for tens of thousands of years. In the past, he had knelt before this statue countless times, full of reverence and submission, never daring to look up carefully at the Buddha’s face. But today, he stared without blinking, as if he wanted to carve even the finest contour into his mind.
After a long time, he looked at the golden statue and called out softly, “Sakyamuni…”
Footsteps finally came from behind him. A familiar voice that had accompanied him as he grew up said, “You finally understand, A-Huang.”
The Phoenix turned his head, his movements trembling with stiffness.
Sakyamuni stood one step away, his face and attire exactly as he remembered, as if a thousand years had not passed, as if all the blood, tears, and separations in between had never happened.
The Phoenix opened his mouth, and when he spoke, tears instantly welled up. “—Why?”
Sakyamuni raised his hand and pulled the Phoenix into his embrace, gently stroking his hair, just as he had raised and accompanied that child all those years ago.
“Do you remember? I once told you that a Buddha must also experience a Buddha’s tribulation. By reincarnating as a human or descending in one’s true form, one can resolve the inner demons that grow over a long life, and only then can one return to the lotus throne, to the supreme, formless heaven’s zenith…”
“The Buddha’s tribulation befalls a different object each lifetime. Sometimes it’s an object, sometimes a person, sometimes even a demon or an animal. But regardless, besides this time, never before has a Buddha’s tribulation befallen the same person multiple times in a row.”
The Phoenix shook his head in disbelief. “Impossible, could it be me—”
“It is your extremely evil form,” Sakyamuni said. “For the next thirty thousand years, all of the Buddha’s tribulations will fall upon your extremely evil form.”
The Phoenix finally staggered and collapsed, kneeling on the pure gold floor tiles.
“You… you knew I would go to clear the Sea of Blood,” he trembled, every word filled with disbelief. “You thought I would die there…”
“No, you are an immortal bird,” Sakyamuni said. “I only thought the Sea of Blood could consume your extremely evil form, but I didn’t expect you to use a more decisive and thorough method.”
He bent down and embraced the Phoenix’s thin, trembling body, as if the person before him was still that lonely, helpless, and dependent child from long ago. “How did it feel to pull out your bones? Did it hurt?”
The Phoenix couldn’t speak, his shoulders trembling from suppressed sobs.
The next second, Sakyamuni reached into his own chest with his bare hand, pierced the flesh under his left rib, and pulled out a golden Buddha bone.
The Buddha bone immediately transformed into a small sarira upon leaving his body, emitting a strange and brilliant golden light in the Buddhist hall. Sakyamuni threaded it with a red string and gently hung it around the Phoenix’s neck like a pendant.
“You keep it.” Sakyamuni held his shoulders, carefully examining the pendant from left to right, then looked at his own chest. “…So this is what it feels like.”
The Phoenix couldn’t control his violent sobs. He covered his face, large tears rolling down between his fingers, and let out a desperate cry.
Sakyamuni stroked his face one last time, then stood up and walked towards the golden Buddha statue. But he heard the Phoenix’s broken voice from behind him. “But… but I love you! You’re the only one I have!”
Sakyamuni’s steps paused for a moment.
“Don’t leave me, I don’t want to be alone…” the Phoenix curled up in pain, murmuring, “I don’t want to be alone…”
“So it’s true that a chick will treat the first being it sees after hatching as its closest kin,” Sakyamuni sighed. “But you still have a long life ahead of you… you will learn to distinguish the difference.”
He walked towards the golden Buddha statue. As the Buddha light in the void brightened layer by layer, his figure finally disappeared into the light.
The Phoenix collapsed on the floor.
The youth was in a wretched state, his face streaked with tears, his throat so hoarse he almost coughed up blood. If anyone had seen him like this, they would have been so shocked they’d think their eyes were playing tricks on them. But the Phoenix was oblivious. He didn’t even care how sad and desperate he looked, like a defeated general retreating helplessly before a lonely city. “I won’t. I will never… never love anyone again, as I loved you…”
At that moment, the golden bell outside the Buddhist hall rang, a full eighty-one times. The sound echoed through the six realms, and the majestic reverberation of the Buddha’s voice shook the nine heavens and ten lands. “Ancient Phoenix, savior of all sentient beings, pacifier of the Sea of Blood, master of the Buddhist Dharma… For his compassion and loving-kindness, he is conferred the title of Phoenix Wisdom King!”
—No one knew that at the moment the Phoenix was conferred the venerable title of Wisdom King, he was actually crying.
His tears fell in the solemn great hall, leaving tiny, insignificant wet marks on the heavy golden bricks. Soon, these wet marks would dry, disappear, and like water vapor evaporating in the sun, no one would ever know of that secret past.
Just as no one knew of his young and naive vow.
I will never love anyone again, as I loved you.
In the Thousand-Degree Mirror World, Zhou Hui struck out in a furious rage, shattering the countless heavy mirrors!
Fragments of the giant mirrors rained down. A wisp of crimson phoenix soul drifted out from the mirror surfaces, desperately snatched by the Snow Mountain Goddess, Shakti.
She gave a mocking sneer, seemingly about to say something, but before the words could leave her lips, she saw Zhou Hui let out a roar of extreme fury. The distant alternate dimension couldn’t withstand this hurricane of rampaging energy and completely collapsed with a deafening boom!
“—Feng Si!” Zhou Hui’s eyes were blood-red, his demonic form fully revealed. Amidst the heaven-and-earth-shattering chaos, he transformed into a ferocious, giant demonic beast, a roar filled with a bloodthirsty desire erupting from his fangs. “Feng Si—!”
