Chapter 118: Jingyue’s Soul Arts
Jingyue was originally a wandering monk of the White Horse Temple in the Western Regions.
One day, while he was traveling through Yongzhou, he suddenly received a message from the temple, saying that the life-lamp of his junior brother Jingchen had gone out.
The so-called saying went, “When a man dies, his lamp goes out.”
Now that the life-lamp was extinguished, it meant that Junior Brother Jingchen had passed away somewhere.
According to the message from the temple, before leaving, Junior Brother Jingchen had revealed to his fellow disciples that his destination was a mountain range near Ningjiang County of Yongzhou.
It was said that his disciple Wuzhen, who had defected from the White Horse Temple, was there and seemed to wish to return to the temple, seeking out Jingchen to discuss important matters.
The White Horse Temple speculated that Jingchen might have been killed by Wuzhen, and they instructed Jingyue—who happened to be in Yongzhou—to investigate the matter. If the speculation was confirmed, he was to capture the traitor Wuzhen along with the Golden Circlet he carried.
Jingyue did not believe that Junior Brother Jingchen would die at the hands of his own disciple, yet his death could not be false.
Thus, Jingyue accepted the task and arrived in Ningjiang County.
Through his inquiries, he soon pinpointed the mountain range where Jingchen was likely to have perished.
Because that incident had shaken the entire region—
The Chief of the Six Gates, Zhu Dongfeng, had lost two beloved disciples during a mission, killed by the Mountain Lord. In fury, Zhu Dongfeng cooperated with the Bureau of Heaven Monitoring, launching a sweeping and grand demon-hunting campaign across all of Yongzhou.
And the very spark that ignited this great upheaval was none other than the mission undertaken by Zhu Dongfeng’s two disciples, Lin Shuang and Su Bing—investigating the case of the Child-Giving Temple causing women to become pregnant.
According to the intelligence later disclosed by the Six Gates, the abbot of the Child-Giving Temple turned out to be none other than the infamous Ear-Splitting Demon Monk, Wuzhen—the runaway disciple of the White Horse Temple.
Moreover, Wuzhen and his master Jingchen both appeared during the incident where the Mountain Lord slew Su Bing and Lin Shuang, and even once joined forces with Zhu Dongfeng to fight against the Mountain Lord.
But later, for reasons unknown, Wuzhen suddenly left the battlefield, returned to his Child-Giving Temple, and was killed miserably by an Earth Rank Anaconda Demon—
This was discovered when Zhu Dongfeng sent men to investigate and arrest Wuzhen at the temple.
They found the Child-Giving Temple had collapsed. Inside the ruins, a female worshipper had been pinned unconscious under a beam.
After the Six Gates rescued and revived her, her testimony revealed what had happened.
The abbot of the Child-Giving Temple, the traitorous monk of the White Horse Temple, Wuzhen—was dead!
Jingyue did not care much about Wuzhen’s death, but what was noteworthy was this: judging by the timeline, Wuzhen had barely escaped the battlefield with the Mountain Lord before returning to his temple, only to be slain shortly thereafter by the Earth Rank Anaconda Demon.
At that time, Zhu Dongfeng and Jingchen had not even finished their battle with the Mountain Lord.
This ruled out the possibility of Jingchen dying at the hands of his disciple.
And since the Mountain Lord, Zhu Dongfeng, and Jingchen were locked in a stalemate where none could defeat the other, Jingchen was unlikely to have fallen to either of them.
Thus, by Jingyue’s reasoning, in those circumstances, the one most likely to have killed Jingchen was none other than the Earth Rank Anaconda Demon that killed Wuzhen at the Child-Giving Temple.
After all, aside from Zhu Dongfeng and the Mountain Lord, it was the only known Earth Rank being in that mountain range.
It must have crossed paths with Jingchen, who had come searching for Wuzhen at the Child-Giving Temple, and conveniently killed him as well.
That was the most reasonable explanation.
Of course, the Six Gates could not possibly have disclosed such details in full.
Some of these clues were uncovered by Jingyue himself after infiltrating the Six Gates during their “Locust” campaign, where he discovered records concerning Wuzhen and others.
For example, after rampaging through the Child-Giving Temple, that Anaconda Demon vanished without a trace.
Even though the Six Gates and the Bureau of Heaven Monitoring searched for it during the “Locust” campaign, they never encountered it again—despite running into the elusive Mountain Lord twice and even attempting to kill him twice.
It was as if the Anaconda Demon had evaporated from the mortal world.
After deducing that the one who most likely killed Jingchen was that “suddenly appearing” and “suddenly vanishing” Anaconda Demon, Jingyue arrived at the ruins of the Child-Giving Temple.
The remaining structures had already been cleared away by the Six Gates, leaving only a trace of ruins to show that something had once transpired there.
Jingyue formed a seal with his hands:
“Om Mani Padme Hum...”
Following a low Buddhist chant, more than a dozen vague souls slowly rose from the ruins of the Child-Giving Temple.
If Mo Lin were here, he would have immediately recognized those faces. These were precisely the souls of those who had died the day he slew Wuzhen!
Jingyue waved his hand gently, scattering the souls like smoke, leaving behind only a single dazed one.
It was Wuzhen.
Jingyue furrowed his brows.
“Strange... why does this soul seem so incomplete? No, rather, why does it seem like only this tiny fragment is left?”
“Judging by the time that has passed, Wuzhen’s soul shouldn’t have been reduced to just this much.”
“Not only Wuzhen, but even the souls of the other worshippers who died here are severely fragmented... what is going on?”
After thinking for a while without any clue, Jingyue shook his head and instead asked:
“Where is the Golden Circlet?”
The fragmentary soul of Wuzhen could not answer, still drifting as if ready to dissipate at any moment.
Jingyue frowned.
“Too complicated?”
He rephrased the question:
“Was the Golden Circlet lost?”
This time, Wuzhen’s soul nodded.
“Is it in the hands of the Anaconda Demon that killed you?”
Another nod.
It seemed that retrieving the Golden Circlet would be impossible for now. Jingyue waved his hand, ready to disperse Wuzhen’s soul.
But then, he changed his mind, producing a Buddha Pagoda and storing Wuzhen’s soul inside.
Afterwards, Jingyue set off in the direction where Jingchen had fought, still chanting Buddhist verses along the way.
At one spot, a drifting soul appeared—it was none other than the slain Junior Brother Jingchen.
Compared to Wuzhen, Jingchen’s soul was much more solid, but as a cultivator of the Earth Rank, his soul was naturally stronger than Wuzhen’s Profound Rank.
Yet even so, relative to his original strength, Jingchen’s soul was but a small remnant. Jingyue’s brows furrowed once again.
“Who killed my junior brother here?”
Fortunately, unlike Wuzhen’s evasive soul, Jingchen’s responded clearly, one word at a time:
“An... con... da... Demon...”
Indeed.
The Anaconda Demon had achieved the feat of killing both master and disciple.
“Where is your body, Junior Brother?”
“An... con... da... Demon...”
Was it swallowed by the demon?
But even if the body had been devoured, the soul should not have been reduced to this extent.
If he had arrived a day later, perhaps the souls of both Wuzhen and Jingchen would have completely dissipated into the heavens and earth, never to be found again.
Carrying his doubts, Jingyue stored Jingchen’s soul into the Buddha Pagoda as well. Then, forming another seal, he chanted:
“Om Mani Padme Hum...”
In the next moment, the Buddha Pagoda rose from Jingyue’s hand, floating into the air and drifting off into the distance. Jingyue followed closely behind it, leaving the ruins behind.
And the direction in which the Buddha Pagoda flew... was the very path Mo Lin had taken when he left here, entering the river and heading toward the Yongzhou Chamber of Commerce.