Chapter 84
Chapter 84
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>Translator: Ryuma
>Chapter: 84
>Chapter Title: Bewilderment
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Jingxin was different from anyone Li Huowang had ever met before. Although her appearance was terrifying, the way she spoke was extremely amiable.
But now, Li Huowang would rather face this massive fat woman and have her tear into him with attacks like everyone else. At least that way, he’d feel a bit better inside.
Rather than like right now, with her smiling at him so cheerfully, making it seem like everything she’d said was completely true.
“Could it really be true?” Li Huowang began to panic as his thoughts grew increasingly chaotic and his expression twisted into one of extreme agony.
The air around him pressed in like a solid weight, squeezing him so tightly that even breathing became difficult.
All sorts of images flashed through his mind nonstop, but when the rolls of paper Yang Na had given him that day appeared in his thoughts, Li Huowang latched onto them like an anchor in that moment.
“No! That’s still wrong! A person might imagine an entire complete world, but they absolutely can’t imagine knowledge!”
Everything he’d learned in high school rapidly flashed through Li Huowang’s mind.
The young man in front of her clutched his head and muttered to himself.
A trace of pity appeared on Abbess Jingxin’s face. “Poor soul.”
But no matter what she thought, Li Huowang quickly pulled himself together. Though his face showed fatigue, his gaze had hardened once more with resolve.
“I am Li Huowang! I crossed over from another world—that much is beyond doubt! I’m not some delusional madman imagining this world. I’m a traveler from beyond!! Absolutely!”
“So, you’ve figured it out yourself? Do you believe what I said, or not?”
“Abbess Jingxin, let’s skip talking about your son. Get to the point—tell me straight what a pure heart is.” Li Huowang tried to wrest control of the conversation back.
A fat finger with a cracked nail trembled as it pointed straight at Li Huowang’s chest. “A pure heart is you. It includes the bewilderment in your heart, the karmic obstacles weighing on you, and the cause-and-effect clinging to your body.”
“From the smell of those things on your back, you’ve killed plenty of people too, haven’t you? So you’re no outsider. You should know something about cultivating formless techniques. Every sect has its external tools, but the most important thing is one’s own state of mind.”
“The bewilderment and other karmic obstacles on a pure heart are far purer and more stable than in ordinary people. Some sects use the bewilderment from a pure heart to stabilize their own minds. Even if they don’t need it themselves, they can sell it to those who do and make a fortune.”
“State of mind? Emotions?”
Li Huowang immediately thought of the intense pain required for that red bamboo slip, and the obsessions of the Zhengde Temple monks—whether facing beasts, flesh monsters, or illicit acts between men.
So everything they did followed a method after all. For the first time, Li Huowang gained a preliminary understanding of the other supernatural powers in this world.
“Some people are after you for other reasons, but most want you for the bewilderment you carry. Only a pure heart harbors constant bewilderment like that—something ordinary people can never achieve.”
Through her words, Li Huowang finally understood: in this world, human emotions weren’t some ethereal, intangible thing. They could actually influence reality.
Human emotions could even serve as currency.
“The bewilderment in my heart can actually help others cultivate? But I’m not bewildered at all right now. I’m completely certain that side is the illusion and this is reality. Even if I fall back into hallucinations again, I’ll never mistake that side for reality.” Li Huowang spoke with ironclad conviction.
Abbess Jingxin looked at Li Huowang with a faint smile on her face. “Really? Alright then, if that’s what you think, so be it. This old nun has no interest in arguing with you. Go on, head back.”
“Go back?” Realizing she was kicking him out, Li Huowang snapped to attention. He hadn’t come just to learn about pure hearts—that was only part of it.
“Abbess Jingxin, I came to ask you to perform an exorcism.”
Compared to the troubles she’d mentioned, Danyangzi was far more dangerous. The whole reason he’d come was to deal with him.
He had to stay alive first before worrying about going mad. If Danyangzi took over his body, there’d be nothing left to consider afterward.
“Huh? So you didn’t come asking for a way to resolve your pure heart issue? Then what were you chatting about just now? Why not just get straight to the point?” Abbess Jingxin’s face fell, looking somewhat displeased.
After Li Huowang apologized, he carefully recounted the entire situation to her from start to finish.
“Ascended to immortality? In this day and age, someone actually achieved immortality?”
Abbess Jingxin muttered to herself before pulling two ox-horn-shaped yarrow stalks from under her nun’s hat and beginning to divine while mumbling under her breath.
After studying them for a while, she continued scrutinizing Li Huowang’s face with her two black, eyeless sockets.
Just as Li Huowang started feeling deeply uncomfortable under her gaze, Abbess Jingxin suddenly spoke. “On the day he ascended, you didn’t eat your master, did you?”
“Huh?” Li Huowang was utterly baffled by the question.
“How could I possibly eat him? If I’d had a way to deal with Danyangzi, would I have bothered going down in mutual destruction with him back then?”
“Mmm…” Jingxin didn’t argue, merely nodding quietly.
With a flick of her right hand, Li Huowang instantly felt an unbearable oiliness cover his entire body, along with a sensation of something squirming beneath his skin.
“Don’t wipe it off. Endure it.”
They stayed like that for the time it took two incense sticks to burn before Jingxin finally spoke.
“I have a way to deal with your master, but it’ll consume a massive amount of ritual implements and merit. So why should I help you?”
Li Huowang was momentarily stunned before realizing she was asking for payment.
But this straightforward demand for compensation actually made him find her more trustworthy than the Zhengde Temple abbot’s talk of universal salvation.
He quickly laid out the Heavenly Book, the gourd holding the lifespan, and the red bamboo slip on the ground.
“As long as you can get rid of Danyangzi, take your pick of these.”
To his surprise, after Li Huowang set them out, Jingxin showed extreme disdain for them.
“What is this junk? Take it away! Especially that Great Thousand Record—get it as far from here as possible so it doesn’t taint our Anci Nunnery’s grounds!”
She seemed utterly repulsed by the red bamboo slip. It was the first time Li Huowang had learned its name.
After saying that, an expression of extreme greed appeared on her wrinkled old face. “I smell gold on you.”
Hearing this, Li Huowang immediately got the hint. “No problem. I’ll donate that gold shortly to gild the bodhisattva statue at Anci Nunnery.”
The moment money came up, Jingxin’s demeanor changed completely, losing all her prior amiability and turning into a miserly hag who haggled over every detail.
“Oh, and silver too—I smell silver on you. I want that as well. Besides these external goods, I need you to find something for me too.”
(End of chapter)