“Farewell…” Chu He said hoarsely.
His fingers tightened suddenly, and with a crisp crack, the little phoenix’s neck slumped limply to the side.
Zhou Hui’s pupils suddenly constricted, and he cried out, “—Phoenix!”
He lunged forward, but then a figure flashed before his eyes, blocking his path—it was Sakyamuni’s cold, merciless face.
Sakyamuni’s face was filled with the solemn majesty of a Heavenly Dao god, but perhaps it was a psychological effect after knowing his true nature, Zhou Hui only felt an indescribable wickedness emanating from his brows and eyes, as if a venomous snake hissing in the dark, preparing to strike.
Zhou Hui narrowed his eyes, and the next moment, he suddenly raised his hand, his arm transforming into a long blade with a mottled bone-white surface, curved and grotesque in shape. The hilt spiraled upwards around his muscular arm, firmly secured, and the blade was extremely curved and sharp. With one slash, it brought forth a whistling hurricane, cutting straight towards Sakyamuni’s throat!
Sakyamuni said coldly, “How dare a lowly demon disrespect a Heavenly Dao god?!” As he spoke, one hand extended sharply, covering Zhou Hui like a palm fan!
With a thunderous crash, Sakyamuni’s giant hand and Zhou Hui’s blade collided in mid-air, and the pure gold floor tiles of the entire Buddhist hall shattered!
Amidst the tearing sound, a blood-red gash appeared across Sakyamuni’s palm, deep enough to expose bone. Blood splattered in the air, and he quickly pulled his hand back.
“…So that’s it.” Sakyamuni looked at his palm with a slight surprise, then raised his eyes to examine the large blade in Zhou Hui’s hand: “This is your shed beast tooth… I never imagined my Golden Buddha body could be wounded by such a lowly thing. You have truly committed a sin of heavenly condemnation that would scatter your soul.”
Zhou Hui sneered, flicking his blade, scattering a trail of blood and flesh: “Creature of the demonic eye, you dare to call yourself a Golden Buddha?”
No sooner had he spoken than Sakyamuni’s gaze shifted slightly, but it was only for an instant. Then, he actually began to laugh: “You know now. How did you know?—Oh, I was wondering why Phoenix suddenly plotted to seek refuge with the Demon Lord. As expected, he finally guessed my secret and told you, so that you, this monster also born from the demonic eye, could be a pawn to kill me…”
Before he finished speaking, he suddenly turned. Even Zhou Hui didn’t react in time, only seeing him grab the pure azure arrow that had silently attacked him from behind!
“Oh?” Sakyamuni easily broke the pure azure arrow into two, saying nonchalantly, “Even you are turning your blades on me now, little Phoenix?”
Only then did the smoke clear in front, revealing Chu He standing on the cracked ground, breathing slightly. After a moment, he raised his bow and said coldly, “You may leave, Zhou Hui… This is between me and this person, and it has nothing to do with you.”
Zhou Hui sternly reprimanded, “What are you saying?!”
Sakyamuni, however, seemed to have heard something extremely amusing, and said with interest, “Did you hear that, demon? He says it has nothing to do with you.”
“What does it matter if it’s related or not at a time like this!” Zhou Hui ignored Sakyamuni, and only shouted at Phoenix: “Am I supposed to just stand here and watch you die? If it were you, would you be willing to just walk away?!”
“Zhou Hui…”
Chu He was silent for a moment, then slowly shook his head. He drew a second arrow from the void and strung it, loosely aiming it at Sakyamuni.
“I’m sorry, I never told you about this person’s existence,” he said in a low voice.
“This person, Sakyamuni, I once regarded him as my faith. After being abandoned, my entire spirit collapsed. To find something to cling to, I once knelt under the Bodhi tree, chanting Buddhist scriptures day after day for a thousand years. However, Mount Sumeru’s endless campaigns against the four evil realms and its indifferent disregard for the wars in the human realm caused my faith in all the gods and Buddhas to waver greatly… until your appearance, which showed me another possibility.”
“You don’t believe in anyone, you don’t kneel to anyone, and you don’t need to cling to any ethereal religion. You firmly hold power in your own hands, using it only to do what you want, pursuing the person you want to pursue, living a life that follows your instincts and leaves you with no regrets…”
“I also want such a life. Therefore, I decided to take you as my last faith, to try one last time before I fall into demonhood.” Phoenix paused, a hint of ancient weariness in his voice: “So I was very afraid of being deceived and abandoned again. Fortunately, you haven’t disappointed me, except for that matter with the Snow Mountain Goddess Sakti. If someone like me falls into demonhood, I might become one of the core parts of the Hell Demonic Eye, endlessly drained of energy until I die of exhaustion…”
A chilling look flashed in Zhou Hui’s eyes. He heard Sakyamuni laugh and ask, “Then you are now turning your blade against me, who is a Golden Buddha. Are you not afraid of having your divinity shattered by heavenly condemnation and thus falling into demonhood?”
Chu He calmly gazed at Sakyamuni, and behind him, at the end of the dust and smoke, the little phoenix’s neck was broken, its corpse lying on the ground, its blank eyes wide open, looking in the same direction.
It was truly a scene that sent a bone-chilling sensation from one’s limbs and bones, and even from the depths of one’s soul.
“It doesn’t matter,” Chu He said. “The current me fears nothing. Do you know why?”
Sakyamuni opened his mouth, as if to say something, but his gaze suddenly sharpened!
Chu He’s finger loosened, and the pure azure arrow shot through the smoke, instantly reflecting in Sakyamuni’s eyes!
Sakyamuni’s figure vanished from its spot. The pure azure arrow passed through where he had stood moments before, loudly embedding itself in the white jade wall.
Then Sakyamuni appeared in mid-air, ten feet in front of Chu He. Chu He drew his arrow and strung his bow, aiming the arrow directly, making a frontal attack. However, the next moment, it shot through the air and embedded itself in the wall!
Zhou Hui shouted, “Be careful!”
Chu He was not flustered. He drew seven pure azure arrows, aligning them in quick succession on his large curved bow, and closed his eyes. At that moment, the change in the wind, the flow of the air, and even the direction of every dust particle were imprinted in his mind through his tightly shut eyelids. Even Zhou Hui subconsciously stopped his rush towards him—
A few seconds later, Chu He turned without warning and suddenly released the arrows!
The seven arrowheads were like meteors, tearing through the sky in quick succession. The next second, blood splattered violently into the air!
Succeeded?
Chu He opened his eyes. Sakyamuni’s figure appeared from the void. Not a single one of the seven long arrows was wasted; all of them pierced into his chest, abdomen, and thighs. The remaining momentum pushed him backward until he crashed against the wall with a loud thud.
Chu He was momentarily stunned, then suddenly realized that they hadn’t hit a vital spot!
A skilled archer would have the instinct to hit vital spots. Chu He barely needed reaction time; he immediately drew another arrow and shot it into the air. Sakyamuni didn’t even dodge. The arrowhead, without surprising anyone, pierced straight through his heart.
Blood flowed freely down the white jade wall, dripping onto the hot ground.
Chu He stood there motionless. From Zhou Hui’s perspective, he could see the extremely tense muscle lines from his shoulder to his back and waist slowly relaxing.
However, just as he was about to step forward to check, Sakyamuni, not far away, moved.
Sakyamuni raised his hand, plucked out the last pure azure arrow that had pierced his heart with a squelch, and slowly raised his head, looking at the blood and flesh dripping from the arrowhead.
Then his gaze shifted to Chu He, and he laughed, “Can bones from a demon like Zhou Hui even wound me?”
Chu He’s pupils constricted. For a moment, he was almost frozen in place. At the same time, Sakyamuni stood up from the shattered, collapsed wall. The previous seven pure azure arrows all pushed out of his body, simultaneously turning in mid-air and automatically shooting back along their original path!
Bang!
—Just in the nick of time, Zhou Hui lunged forward. The moment the long arrows struck, he pushed Chu He away with one hand, and with a fierce swing of his giant beast-tooth blade, he simultaneously cut all seven bone arrows in half!
Chu He staggered a few steps, gasping in astonishment, “Zhou Hui, that’s your…”
Shattered bone rained down. In the firelight, Zhou Hui’s firm profile was unclear, only his seemingly deep gaze towards Chu He could be seen.
The next second, Sakyamuni arrived in mid-air. The wound from the long arrow piercing him regenerated and healed at a visible rate. The exposed flesh made him look especially ferocious. In a flash, he pounced on Zhou Hui!
—Clang!
The impact of clashing blades spread out in a circle, sending Chu He flying backward, hitting him squarely in the chest. After landing heavily, he immediately struggled to his feet, only to see a rapidly rotating hurricane enveloping a space more than three zhang in diameter—that was Sakyamuni and Zhou Hui’s combat zone. Because the energy surge excited by the battle was too intense, it presented two colors, bright white and dark gray, strangely intertwined, like a huge bomb that could shatter the world at any moment.
Zhou Hui had expended too much strength in his battle with the Demon Lord. Right now, he was only holding on by sheer stubbornness. And Sakyamuni, after all, was known as the Golden Buddha with boundless magic power. He quickly gained the absolute upper hand. In a moment when Zhou Hui’s large blade’s momentum had waned, Sakyamuni suddenly drew a Vajra scepter from the void and struck Zhou Hui squarely in the abdomen, knocking him to his knees!
—The scepter was thicker than a bowl, weighing over a thousand catties, and glowed with a deep golden light, completely unlike the demon-subduing scepters passed down through generations of Tibetan Living Buddhas like Shen Wan Tiansi’s, embedded with various precious stones. Zhou Hui’s internal organs were injured by this blow. Before he could even get up, Sakyamuni swung the scepter again, instantly eliciting the crisp sound of subtly fracturing bones on his back!
Chu He roared in fury, drawing the twelfth pure azure arrow, and decisively pulled the bowstring taut!
—That was his last arrow, his last phoenix bone.
Phoenix bone was extremely divine, almost usable as a substitute for divinity, and possessed potent demon-breaking properties. It didn’t need to hit Sakyamuni’s vital spot to inflict great harm, but the same applied to Zhou Hui, the hell demon—during the Great War of Gods and Demons, when Zhou Hui arrived from the sky, transcending all others, and Phoenix Wisdom King shot the eleventh phoenix bone from the city wall, Zhou Hui merely caught the arrow shaft with his bare hand, and his entire arm was scorched black, almost spreading to his heart.
Therefore, this arrow absolutely had to hit Sakyamuni, and must not graze Zhou Hui.
Chu He gasped slightly, trembling as he aimed, then his finger suddenly steadied.
—However, at that moment, Sakyamuni struck down with another scepter, and Zhou Hui immediately let out a painful roar.
In a fit of desperation and rage, with no other options, he suddenly glimpsed the Demon Lord’s divinity he had been clutching in his hand, and immediately, by instinct, swallowed it!
Chu He’s arrow-holding finger deviated, and he sharply yelled, “Don’t swallow!”
But his words came too late. Zhou Hui had a strong bestial nature deep in his blood, and beasts act on instinct when cornered. The divinity was swallowed the moment it entered his mouth.
Immediately after, he felt excruciating pain in his esophagus as if it were scorched. His stomach convulsed violently, wanting to expel the substance, but he gritted his teeth and endured, raising his hand to firmly block the Vajra scepter that was striking down again.
With a clang, sparks flew several meters away. Zhou Hui furiously stood up, swinging his beast-tooth blade like a torrential storm. Each attack unleashed dazzling arcs of light, as if from the creation of heaven and earth, forcing even Sakyamuni to retreat repeatedly!
—Cannot stop.
Zhou Hui knew he couldn’t stop.
Although his abdomen felt as if a rotting monster was constantly tearing at him with sharp claws, and the pain was unbearable, like burning fire, he knew he couldn’t let his breath escape, he absolutely couldn’t break this momentum, once broken, he wouldn’t be able to resume.
He firmly believed the Demon Lord’s divinity would work. This strange psychological comfort made him unprecedentedly fierce and swift. A remarkably overbearing and powerful force seemed to circulate in his Dantian, climbing up his arms along his limbs and bones. His next strike actually erupted with hundreds of times the power!
—Bang!!
With a terrifying cracking sound, the beast tooth forcibly cleaved the Vajra scepter into two. The remaining momentum instantly severed Sakyamuni’s entire arm!
The severed arm hit the ground with a thud. The next moment, Zhou Hui’s beast tooth shattered, and he slammed the hilt onto the ground, then vomited with a heaving sound.
The incompatible Demon Lord’s divinity, after a brief effect and immense pain, was finally entirely vomited out by him, wrapped in a pool of blood!
Zhou Hui’s entire body convulsed in pain, trembling continuously, but he still gasped violently, reaching out for the divinity in the glistening pool of blood, attempting to swallow it again. However, Sakyamuni, whose arm had been severed, staggered forward and stepped on the gray-black swirling, glowing divinity, saying coldly, “Ignorant fool, you don’t even know how to use it, do you?”
Zhou Hui reached out to grab it, but then another large mouthful of blood spewed out!
Sakyamuni firmly held the divinity down with his foot. His remaining hand lifted into the air, and the divinity beneath his foot instantly transformed into thousands of gray-black threads connecting to his palm, forming a scorching orb of light.
Within the orb, countless tiny electrical currents seemed to surge. Sakyamuni sneered, and directly threw it down towards Zhou Hui’s head!
—At this very instant, Chu He aimed his long arrow, then released it.
The phoenix bone arrow whistled through the air, piercing Sakyamuni through the chest, nailing him firmly to the wall several meters away!
“Ah—”
Sakyamuni let out a cry of intense pain. The demon-breaking power, centered around the bone arrow, rapidly scorched half of his body black!
This sudden turn of events caught Sakyamuni completely off guard before he was hit. As he flew sideways, the divinity slipped from his grasp and fell to the ground. Chu He lunged forward, simultaneously reaching behind him, intending to draw his Buddhist bone blade.
“It’s over,” he said, staring at Sakyamuni, enunciating each word.
However, Sakyamuni, trembling, grabbed the phoenix bone from his chest, and said hoarsely, “You are mistaken, my dear little Phoenix… it’s still too early.”
Chu He’s fingers had already touched the hilt of the Buddhist bone blade at his lower back. Zhou Hui staggered up behind him, his face suddenly changing: “—Phoenix, get out of the way!”
At that moment, Chu He only heard the ground beneath him shake, followed by a booming sound. A sudden bad feeling arose in his heart. He wanted to leap forward, but it was already too late.
Behind him, a Vajra giant burst forth from the ground, reaching the heavens, and scooped Chu He up in its two massive hands!
—Summon Vajra!
Beneath the Formless Heaven’s Buddhist hall, Sakyamuni had secretly buried a summoned Vajra puppet!
Zhou Hui was about to step forward, but he only heard Sakyamuni say coldly, “Stop—if you dare to advance another step, I will break all of Phoenix’s limbs. Do you want to try?”
Zhou Hui hesitated slightly. He saw Sakyamuni actually gesture to the summoned Vajra. Then, the Vajra’s finger, holding Chu He’s arm, bent, and its elbow joint instantly snapped in the opposite direction with a crack.
Zhou Hui cried out in fury, “Phoenix!”
Chu He’s body hung in mid-air, his face completely drained of color from the excruciating pain, pale as paper and dripping with cold sweat. Yet, he held back any sound, only gazing intently at Zhou Hui.
“I… I’m fine.” After a long moment, he managed to force out the words through his trembling: “I am fine.”
Zhou Hui’s molars ground so hard they almost shattered. He turned abruptly to Sakyamuni, seeing him finally pull the pure azure arrow from his chest and throw it to the ground with a clatter.
“How ironic,” he said hoarsely, “the bone drawn for me back then now points at my Buddha body… truly ironic.”
He staggered to his feet, appearing somewhat off balance due to his missing arm, a sight both terrifying and absurd. Zhou Hui watched all this with cold eyes, and said, “Back then he loved you, but you only deceived and used him. Now he loves me, so he wants your life for my sake. What’s wrong with that?!”
Sakyamuni, however, laughed, saying leisurely, “Do you know how I was born?”
Sakyamuni’s face was covered in dust and black ash. The bloody hole on his shoulder where his arm had been severed was still gurgling blood, but he seemed utterly unconcerned, casually brushing his hand over the wound, and the bleeding naturally stopped.
“Tens of thousands of years ago, the tectonic plates of Hell shifted, and Mount Buzhou was struck, forming a deep chasm. When the tremor reached the Formless Heaven through Mount Sumeru, the Phoenix Jade Embryo was dislodged and fell near the Demonic Eye of Hell, shattering upon impact. The Buddha saw all of this through the Mirror of Karma and did not wish for Phoenix, the King of Ten Thousand Birds, to be born in Hell. Thus, he immediately descended from the Formless Heaven to Mount Buzhou, opening a direct path from the Formless Heaven to Hell.”
“At that time, the Buddha’s light was boundless, all creatures cried out, and the demon beasts of the sea of blood all prostrated themselves. The Buddha descended before the Demonic Eye, and just as he was about to pick up the jade embryo, he saw that the embryo had shattered and the phoenix chick was born. Instantly, clear celestial melodies resounded, divine music filled the air, and five-colored divine light illuminated the Nine Heavens and Ten Lands with extraordinary grandeur.”
“When the phoenix chick spread its young wings and let out its first clear cry, the Buddha’s mind stirred, and affection arose within him. His unwavering faith was thus compromised, and I was born from his eighth consciousness as a result of that karma.”
Sakyamuni smiled, but Chu He’s face, restrained within the Vajra giant’s grasp, was filled with shock.
“So you… Are you a heart demon born from the true Buddha’s affection?” Zhou Hui was somewhat confused. He paused, then asked, “Then how did you manage to hide from all the gods and Buddhas after returning to the Formless Heaven?”
Sakyamuni laughed, “I was born from the Buddha’s eighth consciousness, occupying the Buddha’s divine consciousness and golden body. Naturally, no one suspected anything after I returned to the Formless Heaven… except for Venerable Bhadra, who ascended to the Formless Heaven with the true Buddha millions of years ago from Mount Sumeru. Do you understand now, demon? Your attack on me is disrespectful to the true Buddha. Although there won’t be heavenly lightning in the Formless Heaven, you will naturally face heavenly condemnation once you leave.”
“After you die,” he said, meeting Zhou Hui’s gaze, “the hell energy cycling from the demonic eye will belong to me alone. From then on, all the gods and Buddhas will no longer be my match. I will transcend Mount Sumeru and even the Formless Heaven, becoming the sole master of karma and life and death…”
Perhaps it was due to his absolute certainty of victory, but Sakyamuni finally, for the first time in history, showed a look of triumph—the false mask of majesty and peace finally vanished completely from his face, replaced by unconcealed chilling ambition.
He took half a step forward. With this movement, Zhou Hui’s eye twitched slightly, and he subtly shifted his foot towards the fallen Demon Lord’s divinity not far away.
“—Don’t move,” Sakyamuni immediately said coldly, “do you want to see Phoenix suffer again?”
Zhou Hui’s movement stopped immediately.
“However, I won’t completely kill Phoenix,” Sakyamuni said leisurely. “After all, he’s the child I raised, unlike you… It is said that after Phoenix undergoes nirvana, he becomes a jade embryo, and after hatching again, he completely loses the memories of his previous life. So, what does it matter if I strike at Phoenix or not?”
He looked up at Chu He in the Vajra giant’s palm and smiled slightly, then walked over to pick up the Demon Lord’s divinity, weighing the gray-black orb of light in his hand.
At this time, half of Sakyamuni’s body was scorched black, one arm torn off, yet the divinity in his hand rapidly condensed into a terrifying current, like millions of surging snakes; not far away, Zhou Hui was exhausted from continuous severe injuries, his weapon shattered, his hands empty, his face almost covered in blood, barely able to stand.
The contrast was so stark, it was almost tragic.
“Just now Phoenix said it was over. I said it was too early.” Sakyamuni walked towards Zhou Hui, saying condescendingly, “Now is the true end.”
He raised the divinity high. The halo of light transformed into a dagger, coursing with lightning, reflected in Zhou Hui’s constricted pupils.
Zhou Hui gasped slightly, taking half a step back, subconsciously looking up at Phoenix.
—Then, in his eyes, a burning fire was reflected.
“Get out of the way…” Chu He said tremblingly in the firelight, then yelled with all his might, “Zhou Hui, get out of the way—!”
Sakyamuni suddenly looked up, his face instantly becoming very confused.
Phoenix’s entire body suddenly burst into flames out of nowhere. The golden-red, high-temperature flames burned off one of the puppet Vajra’s giant hands, which crashed to the ground. At the same time, flames flew and materialized in the void, forming a gigantic, brilliant phoenix shape.
“Phoenix’s true body?” Sakyamuni said in astonishment, “—How is that possible? Phoenix’s true body has already been scorched to bone by heavenly condemnation!”
However, the next moment, the puppet Vajra’s other mountain-like giant hand also slammed down with a roar. Amidst the shattered rocks, Chu He arrived in mid-air, his figure enveloped in the flying phoenix illusion, instantly appearing above Sakyamuni’s head.
“Not… not entirely scorched bone,” Chu He’s voice, though trembling and gasping, his profile in the firelight was very calm: “I buried the remains under the giant mountain ranges of the human world, guarded by the Golden-winged Great Rec for hundreds of years, precisely to prevent this day…”
Zhou Hui suddenly realized something and rushed forward, grabbing Chu He’s shoulder: “Wait! What are you doing?! Didn’t you say to leave it to me?!”
Chu He looked at Zhou Hui, then slowly extended his cold fingers in the fierce fire, brushing them across the man’s handsome, disheveled, furious face: “You… if I turn into an egg… would you pick me up?”
Zhou Hui let out an utterly enraged roar. Then the ground beneath him shook violently, throwing him and Sakyamuni both to the ground with a crash!
—It was the Himalayas.
The abyss of the Himalayan mountain range in the human realm finally produced its first earth-shattering tremor, shaking the Nine Heavens and Ten Earths, under the violent impact of the phoenix’s remains.
Hell, Mount Buzhou Demonic Eye.
Maha’s foot slipped, and he quickly steadied himself by grabbing onto a rock. He asked, surprised, “Did the Himalayas collapse?”
Not far from him, Jia Louluo sat cross-legged in the valley, turning a string of Buddhist beads in his hand. He said calmly, “No, the phoenix bones are about to emerge.”
“…Phoenix bones?”
Maha was stunned for a moment, then suddenly realized something: “—Wait, what does ‘the phoenix bones are about to emerge’ mean?”
Jia Louluo closed his eyes, silently reciting scriptures, ignoring his elder brother. Maha then strode over, snatched the Buddhist beads, forcefully pried open his brother’s mouth and stuffed them in whole, then grabbed him by the neck and asked, “I’m asking you a question, what exactly does that mean?!”
“Cough, cough, cough!” Jia Louluo choked from the constriction, and after a while, finally managed to fish the Buddhist beads out of his mouth. He took a breath and said, “Why do you think I was staying in the Himalayas?”
Maha was stunned.
“I worked as a guide on the snowy mountains. When an avalanche occurred, I would tell people to pray towards the phoenix remains. This way, I would save their lives. The prayers of people at the brink of death are the most sincere. I collected such vows for hundreds of years, which allowed me to maintain the divinity of the remains from disappearing…”
Maha couldn’t help but interrupt him: “Why exactly did you do that?”
Jia Louluo, held by his brother’s collar, showed no sign of distress, only calmly met Maha’s exquisitely beautiful yet sinister gaze.
“It’s simple,” he said calmly, “if even the remains completely decay, then what would undergo nirvana?”
