Chapter 440
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Translator: Ace
Chapter: [Unknown]
Chapter Title: The Fall of Guang Ming
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At this moment, all sounds had ceased.
"Ah?"
Guang Ming stood frozen in place, his mind flashing through all his experiences up to now. Cold sweat instantly poured down uncontrollably.
'What have I done?'
He had become the Buddha's Heir, taking charge of the Pure Land, scheming across the world and the four realms. The winds and clouds of the world were all in his grasp—but was this really him?
'This isn't me!'
Guang Ming knew himself better than anyone: he was just an ordinary guy with no grand ambitions, content to live a simple life without worries about food or shelter. How could he ever risk everything for some world-shaking affair? Yet over these years, he hadn't sensed anything wrong at all!
'What the hell am I doing?'
Guang Ming stared blankly at his hands. The plump, golden body of flesh he usually had now looked like nothing more than a thin layer of human skin.
'Ah.'
Guang Ming looked up at Perfected Being Demon-Quelling standing directly ahead. His eyes shone brightly, dazzlingly, but the final expression they held was not rage or hatred.
It was resignation.
'I see. I'm already dead.'
He was different from the others. They weren't the [Buddha's Heir]; once their connection was severed, they could return to their true selves. But his life had long been entrusted elsewhere.
When Perfected Being Demon-Quelling severed the link between him and the World Venerable, it was like cutting off his roots. Now, he couldn't even utter a single word. He could only clasp his hands together, letting the Buddha light weave across his body, stall, disintegrate, and finally scatter into golden dust filling the sky.
Then, a soul drifted lightly into reincarnation.
Guang Ming was dead.
Yet the Buddha's Heir did not vanish. Behind him, the majestic [Victorious Will Generating Brilliance Dharani Heaven Worldly Manifestation] stirred for the first time.
"Amitabha!"
A grand Buddha chant echoed through the Pure Land, but it drew no chorus from the Buddhist cultivators. Each one now gazed around in bewilderment.
'Demonic obstruction... demonic obstruction!'
Finally, an old Arhat with white hair and beard moved. His face was full of shock and fury, like a fledgling suddenly beholding the vast sky after a life in the nest.
"How dare you? How dare you do this!?"
He pointed at Perfected Being Demon-Quelling and roared,
"You've ruined the foundation of our Pure Land... you've ruined our Pure Land's foundation! Great Demon! What a world-shaking great demon!"
"Kill him!"
In the past, the old Arhat's words would have barely fallen before the crowd of Buddhist cultivators surged forward. But now, they all reacted differently.
The next second—
"Boom!"
A newly promoted Arhat suddenly squeezed his eyes shut, then exploded with a thunderous blast. A soul drifted lightly into reincarnation!
The old Arhat whirled around in shock. "Why!?"
Falling into reincarnation to cleanse the soul—and in this moment of severed connection with the World Venerable... this was a complete severance from the Pure Land!
"What utter folly!"
The old Arhat trembled with rage. "The World Venerable's compassion shines upon us lowly ones, granting this paradise in the western reaches. Why entertain thoughts of departure?"
He couldn't comprehend it.
So he could only blame it all on Perfected Being Demon-Quelling's actions, convinced this demon had corrupted the Pure Land's purity and bewitched the monks.
Seeing this, Perfected Being Demon-Quelling suddenly smiled.
Great Hero Precious Hall.
The rising and falling clamor gradually faded into the distance. Perfected Being Demon-Quelling came back to himself, only to find a young man had appeared before him at some point.
His features were utterly ordinary, commonplace. Perfected Being Demon-Quelling even felt a vague familiarity, yet couldn't place where he'd seen him—as if all the features from faces across the world had been gathered and shaped into this one. And now, the young man watched him with keen interest.
The next second, the youth spoke.
His voice was soft and gentle, like a graceful woman's, yet carried a masculine edge; like a dying elder's, yet full of a child's vitality.
"Amitabha."
With that single Buddha chant, Perfected Being Demon-Quelling's expression turned grave. He stared intently at the youth before him, hardly able to believe it.
The World Venerable?
"You disappoint me, benefactor."
As if reading Perfected Being Demon-Quelling's thoughts, the youth shook his head. "I am not the World Venerable. He is far too lofty to come personally to meet with a fellow Daoist."
Perfected Being Demon-Quelling's mind raced, and he understood. "I see. Fellow Daoist is... that dharma manifestation."
[Victorious Will Generating Brilliance Dharani Heaven Worldly Manifestation]!
With that realization, Perfected Being Demon-Quelling frowned again. "Why does Fellow Daoist wish to see me?"
"I sense doubt in your heart."
The youth clasped his hands, speaking plainly. "Benefactor's sword intent is unparalleled, cleverly borrowing the yet-to-form [Sword Dao Fruit Position] to unleash that strike."
"But it is ultimately water without roots."
"Apart from those Buddhist cultivators who have chosen soldier's dissolution and entered reincarnation, once you perish, the connections between the cultivators and the World Venerable will swiftly restore."
"If so, what meaning is there in all you've done, benefactor?"
"Is that so." Perfected Being Demon-Quelling wasn't disappointed. Instead, he smiled.
"How could there be no meaning? Didn't Fellow Daoist say it yourself? A few cultivators have already entered reincarnation. I've saved those people, at least."
"That is meaning enough."
The youth's expression remained unchanged as he pressed on. "Benefactor denounces our Pure Land as an evil path. Yet you carry countless heads in your sack, deciding the life and death of multitudes on your own whim. Is that not another form of Pure Land? To deny the Pure Land—is that not, at root, denying yourself?"
At these words, Perfected Being Demon-Quelling laughed even more heartily.
"How could they be the same?"
Those simple five words left the youth stunned in place. Only after a long pause did he shake his head with a wry smile. "I nearly forgot. Benefactor hails from the Sword Pavilion..."
Even so, he was unwilling to yield.
"But what of the Sword Pavilion? You've endured its constraints your whole life. Do you truly harbor no resentment?"
"Of course I do."
Perfected Being Demon-Quelling nodded without denial, a smile playing on his lips. "That's why I left the [Non-Killing Sword Intent] and the sword arts with the Ye family."
The [Non-Killing Sword Intent] was a target of the Pure Land. How could they not covet the related sword art inheritances? To obtain them, they'd have to entangle with the Ye family—the longer, the deeper the karma. Perfected Being Demon-Quelling had deliberately left [Non-Killing] but withheld [All-Slaying], precisely to screw over the Ye family!
Sneaky as hell!
"I've learned from you." The youth clasped his hands and sighed. "It seems benefactor's true wish is fulfilled. No more attachments—you intend to sacrifice yourself to the sword."
Perfected Being Demon-Quelling's fate remained unchanged.
He would die in the end. Without his death, without his sacrifice to the sword, the [Sword Dao Fruit Position] could not manifest. This outcome was not to be altered.
Here, the youth's expression held deep regret. "I had thought that in your final moments, benefactor might waver somewhat. With Guang Ming dead, I lack a vessel. If you chose not to die but to merge with me, rebirth was not impossible."
Yet Perfected Being Demon-Quelling refused.
"Crack!"
The surrounding scene shattered inch by inch—the illusion on the verge of collapse, returning to reality. It meant Perfected Being Demon-Quelling's end was imminent.
Even so, the world's greatest sword cultivator wore a serene smile.
He had upheld non-killing for nearly his entire life, and even up to his last breath, he refrained from a massacre, choosing instead to save lives.
The next second, all phenomena shattered.
Lu Yang's sword dao avatar looked up to find Perfected Being Demon-Quelling's figure gone. Only the [Non-Killing Sword] hung quietly in midair.
On its blade, an inscription gleamed brilliantly:
"To give one's body for righteousness is to value righteousness above one's life."
"Thus it is said: Nothing is more precious than righteousness."
In an instant, countless sword qi converged. Between heaven and earth came what seemed like a sword cry, muffled and unfulfilled—as if stuck at the crucial final step.
"This is..."
Lu Yang, close at hand, looked astonished. He instantly saw through Perfected Being Demon-Quelling's final arrangement before death.
'He's bound the formation of the [Sword Dao Fruit Position] to the Pure Land, nailing its foundation to the Pure Land's unity of hearts!'
Perfected Being Demon-Quelling had severed the Pure Land's unity of hearts, thereby establishing the [Sword Dao]'s foundation.
But once the Pure Land restored that unity afterward, it would overturn that foundation, causing the [Sword Dao] image to collapse instantly...
'What a guy!'
In that moment, Lu Yang was utterly awestruck.
Unity of hearts was the Pure Land's foundation, while [Sword Dao] was the Sword Pavilion's must-have prize. Perfected Being Demon-Quelling had forcibly turned the two into mortal enemies.
Want [Sword Dao], Sword Pavilion? Then keep undermining the Pure Land's foundation.
Want to maintain unity of hearts, Pure Land? Then destroy [Sword Dao].
Who says good guys don't scheme?
Perfected Being Demon-Quelling was too damn good at scheming!
He just didn't usually—saving it up. And now this one scheme trapped both the Pure Land and the Sword Pavilion!