Embers Ad Infinitum

After taking a step forward, Jiang Baimian realized that the gray-robed monk was about to bring them to the seventh floor of Sikhara Temple. This is the place where the Crystal Consciousness Church’s Buddha’s Nirmanakaya is sleeping. If we enter rashly, we will die a strange death!

Jiang Baimian’s abdominal muscles tensed up as she forcefully pulled her extended right foot back. At the same time, she shouted in a deep voice, “Stop!”

Shang Jianyao reacted almost at the same time as her. His back arched slightly as he looked at the gray-robed monk with dark and deep eyes. Corny Person!

He immediately used Corny Person.

Upon receiving Jiang Baimian’s reminder, Long Yuehong and Bai Chen subconsciously wanted to stop, but they couldn’t overcome their inertia and stumbled.

At this moment, Jiang Baimian—who stood on one foot and managed to retain her balance—stretched out her left palm.

A ball of silver-white lightning expanded rapidly, piercing through the air and landing on the gray-robed monk’s torso.

However, the gray-robed monk’s expression remained wooden; he didn’t even flinch. There were no vicissitudes in his eyes as though he hadn’t been electrocuted.

Similarly, Shang Jianyao’s Corny Person failed to leave any traces on the monk. He maintained a silent and stiff attitude, half-turned his body, and stood there without doing anything irrational.

In an instant, the gray-robed monk’s green eyes lit up with a strange glow. It was as if two bodhi seeds with condensed Destiny Connection were embedded in his face.

In a daze, Long Yuehong found himself back in the company and married a woman according to the results of the marriage assignment. After that, he was transferred elsewhere internally. He worked diligently to support his family consisting of one male and two females.

His body gradually deteriorated as he grew older, but the effect of genetic enhancement prevented him from needing frequent visits to the hospital. After 70 years of age, he truly experienced aging and the fear and helplessness of approaching death.

What made him even sadder was that his wife and eldest daughter eventually contracted the Heartless disease one after another, and all he could do was watch helplessly.

All kinds of pain left marks on his body. He couldn’t help but wonder: As a human, am I always accompanied by suffering my entire life?

On his deathbed, he saw a world shrouded in glazed glass. There were dense bodhi trees and tall towers. Gold, silver, crystal, amber, and so on were everywhere, dotting the many buildings.

It was serene, peaceful, and free of hunger and pain. Long Yuehong felt that this was everything he wished for, so he took a step toward that world.

Shang Jianyao transformed into a beast. He sometimes howled and sometimes bit other animals, spending a short life in a daze.

The old him was finally hunted by other beasts and became their meal. Amidst the pain of being bitten, a voice seemed to say in his mind: “Is this form what you want?”

In his daze, Shang Jianyao saw a classroom—children and the sound of a lecture and recital.

He couldn’t help but sing: “Bai Suzhen under Mount Qingcheng, cultivating this body for a thousand years in the cave, ah, ah~ Cultivating diligently to attain the Dao, so as to transform into a human[1]…”

At this moment, the teachers and children in class seemed to be stunned.

Shang Jianyao then walked in.

Bai Chen stood in the wilderness, holding an Ice Moss and United 202 in each hand. She kept running and shooting, taking down the wilderness bandits, nomads, and Subhumans who tried to attack her.

Blood gushed out and dyed the ground red. A strong stench drilled into Bai Chen’s nose.

Such a life seemed eternal. Day after day, year after year, Bai Chen was always in combat and killing. This filled her with anger and exhaustion until she was shot due to a moment of carelessness.

Bang!

Bai Chen felt intense pain in her body and also felt the joy of finally being liberated. However, she had a vague idea that she would come back to life and continue to escape and kill.

No… At this moment, she saw a city.

It wasn’t big, but it was serene. There was also sufficient order here, and people stopped their mad slaughtering of each other.

Bai Chen pursed her lips and rushed in impatiently.

Jiang Baimian found herself back in a laboratory. She was busy experimenting every day and was happy with the results that were produced.

There was no hunger.

She was also never under the weather, nor did she suffer fatigue in her life—there was only focus and detachment. But all of a sudden, she started to age.

Her body became unclean, and she became restless. There was no way to escape this state until she was on the verge of death and about to fall asleep in that eternal darkness.

She struggled with all her might, not wanting to lose consciousness just like that and lose all sense of the world.

Finally, her hand touched a door.

Behind this pair of black doors that opened outward, the earth was abundant, and the sun shone brightly. There was no famine, no monsters, no infection, no sickness, and no aging.

Jiang Baimian alternated her hands and tried her best to crawl through the door.

“Six Realms of Rebirth and Existence!”

The Six Realms of Rebirth and Existence descended at the same time! The suffering of humans, the lack of intelligence of animals, the killing of Asuras, and the decline of Devas.

The four Old Task Force members took the same step in different manners and ascended the stairs to the seventh floor. They walked up step by step and soon stepped into the quiet and empty corridor on the seventh floor.

At this moment, Shang Jianyao’s mind twitched. His thoughts skipped as he switched personalities.

He seemed to gain some clarity and subconsciously turned around to look at the stairwell.

The gray-robed monk stood there, his face purple and his tongue out—he had died of suffocation at some point in time.

Thud!

The gray-robed monk fell heavily on the stairs and rolled two or three steps down.

With his death, the Six Realms of Rebirth and Existence’s effects vanished.

Jiang Baimian, Long Yuehong, and Bai Chen stopped in their tracks in confusion and cast their gazes at the source of the noise. Then, they saw the corpse.

They saw the gray-robed monk—who had brushed off Corny Person’s effects and the high-voltage electric shock—turn into a corpse.

On the surface of the corpse, other than the many charred marks caused by the electric current, there were only signs of suffocation.

At this moment, the first thought that flashed through Long Yuehong’s mind was: Oh no, he’s using suicide to frame us…

As for why it was suicide, it was because nobody else was around.

Reeling in shock, Jiang Baimian looked around and blurted out, “This is the seventh floor?”

“Theoretically, yes. Unless we walked another floor up and reached the eighth floor,” Shang Jianyao replied.

However, there was no eighth floor in Sikhara Temple.

We reached the seventh floor? We unknowingly reached the seventh floor? Long Yuehong’s body suddenly tensed up.

The seventh floor of Sikhara Temple wasn’t a good place. Except for a few people, all those who entered would die mysteriously and silently!

The gray-robed monk who led them to the seventh floor had already suffocated to death in the well-ventilated corridor!

Bai Chen was also tense as she directly said, “We must leave now!”

As soon as she finished speaking, a gust of wind blew through the corridor.

Amidst the whooshing echo, a room close to the Old Task Force creaked.

Thud!

The corresponding door opened backward and slammed into the wall.

Under the dim light at both ends of the corridor, the area without corridor lamps was a diffused flurry of shadows.

Jiang Baimian saw that the already open door was deep and dark as though it could devour all light.

“From the left, this should be the third room.” Shang Jianyao revealed his observation.

Sikhara Temple, seventh floor, third room… Isn’t this where the door knocker hinted at? Long Yuehong almost gasped. He didn’t know if it was too late to escape, but he felt that this was the only choice.

Bai Chen was the same. She felt that it wasn’t appropriate to stay here for long.

In the blink of an eye, they seemed to have felt some kind of summoning.

There seemed to be something summoning them in that room, and this clearly wavered their will to escape. They didn’t rush to the stairwell immediately and stayed where they were.

“Come over…”

“Come over…”

“Come over…”

A drawn-out voice sounded indistinctly in the four Old Task Force members’ hearts.

“Uh-uh, no way!” Shang Jianyao used Corny Person on himself. He didn’t forget to influence Jiang Baimian, Long Yuehong, and Bai Chen so that they could resist the summoning.

“I’m staying here. I’m not going anywhere!” Long Yuehong shouted. In his corny state, he was neither willing to respond to the summoning nor wanting to escape.

Jiang Baimian’s reaction was similar to Shang Jianyao’s. She composed herself and ordered in a deep voice, “Retreat to the stairs.”

Before she could finish her sentence, the open door seemed to be pushed by an invisible force, trying to close.

The howling of the wind increased in pitch, and the closing of the door slowed down significantly.

Just as the dark-red wooden door was about to close completely, a hoarse voice that seemed not to have spoken for many years sounded with difficulty. “Holm… Holm…”

Bang!

The door was completely closed, blocking out all stirrings.

[1] From Bai Suzhen Under Mount Qingcheng, original singer Zhuang Huiru.