Chapter 51: The Jade Firmament Clears Ten Thousand Miles of Dust (First Update)
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Chapter 51: The Jade Firmament Sweeps Clean Ten Thousand Miles of Dust (First Update)
Killing all the witnesses makes for the perfect assassination!
Therefore, I, Luo Feng, am also the greatest assassin of our time!
After effortlessly wiping out the many exotics of the Eastern Isles, Luo Feng felt a tinge of confidence in his heart.
Among the exotics of the Eastern Isles, for now, there was no force capable of threatening him.
It was time to make a big move!
The three Grand High Priests were only the beginning.
With Luo Feng as the main force and the others following his lead, the extermination of the exotics’ factions across the three provinces began in earnest.
For a time, the exotics of the Eastern Isles were panic-stricken, fearing for their lives at every turn.
If Luo Feng had launched a direct assault, it would have been another matter.
At most, he would have been considered a powerful enemy.
No matter how strong, could one be stronger than cannons and airplanes?
The mighty Empire of the Rising Sun—surely no one could withstand tens of thousands of cannons, thousands of planes, and an army of millions!
However, Luo Feng moved alone, never revealing his figure.
Despite his overwhelming strength, he was exceedingly cautious.
Because of this, the psychological shadow he cast grew exponentially.
Inside an extremely concealed cave, several dozen exotics gathered, their faces grim; many were missing arms or legs.
“Lord Taniko, we can’t go on like this!”
A double-amputee exotic spoke in a low, resentful tone, his voice barely a whisper, as if afraid to draw the attention of some lurking terror.
“He’s right.”
“If this continues, we’ll all die…”
Another one-legged exotic echoed, also whispering.
“Let’s start a holy war!” suggested a half-crippled exotic.
“No…”
At once, the cave broke out in chaos at this suggestion.
Cries in their native tongue burst forth, some cursing without realizing it.
All present were exotics from the Eastern Isles.
“Silence! Such loud voices, and in our language—do you have a death wish?!”
Their leader, Lord Taniko, snapped, beads of cold sweat appearing on his brow.
The exotics in the cave seemed to awaken from a nightmare, chills running down their spines, some barely able to grip their canes.
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“We’re five hundred miles from the battlefield—surely that demon king can’t hear us,” one exotic said cautiously, attempting to reassure both the group and himself.
A heavy silence fell, stretching on and on.
Lord Taniko finally let out a breath of relief. Since so much time had passed without incident, perhaps this time they were safe.
Just as everyone began to relax, a voice filled with amusement echoed through the cave.
“Surprised? Did you expect this?”
At that instant, words like “ice in the veins” or “weak at the knees” were insufficient to describe the terror that seized the exotics from the Eastern Isles.
It was as if they had descended into the legendary lowest hell itself!
No—even hell would pale in comparison!
“Run!”
With a burst of courage, Lord Taniko shouted.
But he quickly realized that only he and a handful of severely wounded exotics remained in the cave.
When facing Luo Feng, there was no need to remind anyone to flee.
It had become an instinct.
As for resisting—well, that would be utter madness.
At that moment, a mocking laugh sounded from the sky.
“You think you can escape?”
Lord Taniko instinctively looked up—and almost had his eyes pop from their sockets.
In the sky, a golden figure of divine radiance, over twenty meters tall, stood majestically, exuding a terrifying aura.
More terrifying still, the golden figure held aloft a mountain hundreds of meters across with both hands!
“Is that even human?!”
Lord Taniko gave up all thought of resistance, staring up blankly at the sky.
In his mind flashed the names of all the great heroes of the Eastern Isles through the ages—none could even come close to this, not even a tenth.
Time seemed to turn back—decades, centuries…
Suddenly, a mythic tale surfaced in Taniko’s memory.
“Thus have I heard… At that time, the World-Honored One adjusted his robes, and with the big toe of his right foot, he lifted a mountain rock to Brahma’s realm. With his right palm he spun it thrice in the air, four zhang and nine chi above the ground, then caught it again. With a flick of three fingers, he blew it to dust, and instantly the three thousand great thousand worlds trembled six times.”
“…Circling the mountain, defining the four directions, the multitudes therein all gained divine power like the great Moggallana, each filling the three thousand great thousand worlds, yet still falling short of the Tathagata’s divine might by a hundred, a thousand, ten thousand, a hundred million, an immeasurable number of times. This is the power of the Tathagata’s divine feet.”
…
Fifty miles away, an old monk known as the Wild Fox Zen Master intoned a Buddhist prayer: “This is the Buddha’s Sutra of the Strongman Moving Mountains.”
The crowd’s expressions were a mix of awe and amusement.
“I have a question, though I’m not sure if I should ask it,” Yang Yunqiang said, glancing at the monks from Shaolin Temple and then at the old monk, asking cautiously, “Are the Buddhist scriptures and teachings actually true?”
To question the authenticity of the scriptures was a grave insult to monks.
Yet all the monks present remained unperturbed, not only due to their high cultivation of mind, but also for another reason.
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A young monk from Shaolin recited a Buddhist prayer, his tone utterly flat: “I’m just a novice monk—what do I know of the Dharma?”
Staring at the divine figure in the sky, the young monk, for the first time in his life, felt the stirrings of anger.
In the end, it was the old monk who gave an answer, speaking with the cadence of legend: “Most of the scriptures are true; no monk would dare to forge them.”
“Yet, there are no true Buddhas in this world.”
The scriptures are real, and the same texts are recited throughout all the heavens and worlds, across the vast universe.
But there are no true Buddhas in the mountains.
Among the exotics, several Taoist priests also murmured: “So it is—so it is with our Daoist scriptures. We recite, but have never seen the Celestial Venerable.”
Who is that in the sky, then?
A Buddha? An immortal?
Thunder roared!
In that instant, the sound truly shook the heavens, and the earth itself opened in rifts.
All was real and without illusion; nothing was false.
This was not the martial ideal of storytellers, but reality—plain and undeniable.
The dust and smoke cleared, revealing the spectacle of mountains moved and seas overturned.
Overwhelmed, Li Yanfu recited a line of poetry: “Heaven and earth are unbounded, all things follow the heart.”
…
When Luo Feng returned, all present bowed in awe.
After some polite exchanges, someone could hold back no longer.
A sword-bearing exotic bowed respectfully and asked with burning curiosity: “Senior Luo, I have a question.”
He was the Sword Immortal Qingming from Shu, whose swordsmanship made Luo Feng envious.
Though Luo Feng too could take a head from a thousand miles away with his sword, his approach had always been crude, lacking in artistry.
Luo Feng nodded and smiled. “Sword Immortal Qingming, please speak.”
Qingming’s face reddened in embarrassment. “I dare not call myself Sword Immortal in your presence, Senior. I merely wish to ask—how is it that you are able to locate the exotics of the Eastern Isles?”
After ten days of battles, the people of the Eastern Isles were on edge, hiding in the most secret places.
Were it not for Luo Feng’s guidance, Qingming and the others would have searched for weeks in vain.
Luo Feng smiled faintly. “I am aided by fate, and my spirit path has advanced yet further.”
“Now I can divide my consciousness; earlier, I split into seventy-two thoughts.”
“Each thought patrolled several miles, allowing me to uncover the whereabouts of the exotics.”
“Fate?”
“Dividing the mind?”
The former question came from the Buddhist and Taoist masters present, the latter from Qingming’s astonished gasp.
Luo Feng smiled. “Let me explain in detail.”
[The author’s been busy these days, so updates are a bit late.]
[There are two more updates; the author will stay up late to write them. Please read them tomorrow.]
(End of chapter)