Chapter 1256
Muksung's eyebrows were white, and deep wrinkles lined the corners of his eyes.
Yet his gaze was clear and serene, like the pure spring water of a deep mountain.
He wore a gray monk's robe, worn and patched in places, revealing a life of frugality.
Moreover, he was barefoot.
The soles of his feet, treading down the stone steps, were thick with calluses, and the tops bore the marks of time.
The most striking thing was his smile.
A faint, gentle smile lingered at the corners of his lips—compassionate and warm, bringing peace to those who beheld it.
—It's the Living Buddha!
The devotees all dropped to their knees at once.
Some shed tears, while others pressed their trembling hands together in prayer.
Muksung walked slowly, gazing at the devotees.
But he did not speak.
He only smiled and nodded.
An elderly woman stepped forward, hunched over and leaning on a cane.
"Venerable Master. My son has fallen ill. Please grant him your blessing."
As the old woman reached for his sleeve, Muksung willingly halted.
He placed a hand atop her head. His lips moved, but no sound came forth—he was silently reciting scripture.
Touched by his kindness, the old woman wept and bowed deeply.
"Thank you, thank you..."
In this manner, Muksung passed by each person slowly.
Sometimes, he patted their heads or lightly tapped their shoulders.
Each time, the devotees were overcome with joy.
—He touched me! The Living Buddha's hand!
—This is the fortune of three lifetimes!
The plaza was filled with a reverent atmosphere.
Bu Eun-seol, who had been silently observing this scene with cold eyes, shook his head.
'Not a high monk of the Buddhist Order... but more like the leader of a heretical sect.'
Though in truth, the most vile and wicked often hid behind the most beautiful facades.
Buddhist Venerable, revered as a holy monk of this era, would never carry himself so ostentatiously before common folk.
The Buddhist Order most feared the idolization of men and blind faith in individuals.
No matter how divine a monk's power, appearing before the masses like this would inevitably lead to deification.
'A living Buddha, the merciful incarnation of the divine.'
Lost in thought, Bu Eun-seol's crimson eyes flashed in the darkness.
Then, unnoticed by anyone, he ascended to the rooftop of the Great Hero Hall.
As the sun dipped toward the western mountains,
the devotees gradually dispersed, and Venerable Hyeonmuk returned to the Great Hero Hall.
By midnight, Mercy Temple was enveloped in silence. The monks had all retreated to their meditation chambers to sit in Zen.
Bu Eun-seol, who had been concealed atop the Great Hero Hall's roof, slipped inside in an instant.
His lightness skill was so profound that not even the rustle of his robes made a sound.
Muksung's meditation chamber was located in a quiet area behind the Great Hero Hall.
A small building with a plaque reading "Hall of Purity", its exterior and furnishings were extravagantly ornate.
'Even the abbot's quarters at Shaolin wouldn't be this lavish.'
Bu Eun-seol peered through the window.
The monk known as Venerable Hyeonmuk—Muksung—sat in meditation atop a cushion.
'It seems the Demon Monk, Buddhist Venerable haven't tampered with him.'
He had suspected otherwise,
but there was no trace of the True Demon's presence, no signs of disguise, not even evidence of martial training.
'In that case...'
Bu Eun-seol gathered internal energy at his fingertips. The air compressed around them, swirling with a faint glow.
Tung.
Flicking his middle finger, he unleashed the Finger Flick Art, sending a needle-sharp burst of internal energy piercing toward Hyeonmuk's Divine Hall Acupoint.
Even the slightest pressure on this point would cause excruciating pain—
and he had just flooded it with enough energy to make even a corpse scream and jolt upright.
Shudder.
For a moment, Muksung's body trembled faintly. But he did not speak.
No—was he actually smiling?
'Is he truly a high monk who has cultivated divine power?'
No matter how great one's endurance, to not even let out a groan under such agony?
Bu Eun-seol hesitated briefly.
'If he is a pure monk, I must not disrupt his lifelong practice.'
If he shattered this monk's cultivation just to save Seok U-haeng—
would that not be accumulating merit, but committing sin? Even for U-haeng's sake, such an act should not be done.
'One more test.'
After a moment of contemplation,
Bu Eun-seol struck again—this time targeting a deeper, more painful acupoint: the Life Gate Acupoint.
Tung.
Muksung's back trembled slightly.
But his reaction was the same. No—his smile had grown even brighter.
'Something's off.'
Bu Eun-seol's eyes narrowed as he sensed something peculiar.
Enduring pain and smiling through it were two entirely different responses.
When a person endures suffering, they grit their teeth, furrow their brows, or sweat.
At first, he thought Muksung had perfected bodily control through asceticism—
suppressing natural reactions and countering pain with a smile.
But upon closer inspection, something was subtly different.
He wasn't smiling despite the pain—
Rather, it seemed he found comfort in it. His smile deepened, and the wrinkles around his eyes softened.
This was an extremely subtle reaction—one only Bu Eun-seol, with his Extrasensory Perception and mastery of human anatomy, could detect.
Not only had his senses reached their peak, but he could discern even the faintest muscle movements.
"'Feeling pain and smiling are the same thing?'
Bu Eun-seol shook his head.
'No human could possibly do that.'
Sensing something deeply unnatural, he unleashed the Finger Flick Art once more—and finally became certain.
'When he feels pain, he instead makes an expression of joy.'
A true Holy Monk would transcend suffering.
But that should come from extreme self-discipline controlling the body or entering deep meditative trance.
Yet Muksung was simply—feeling pain as pleasure.
And forcibly so.
'I need to know why.'
His instincts told him.
That Muksung, too, was deeply connected to the Mad Doctor.
That unless he uncovered the full truth, this matter could not be resolved.
The next day.
Bu Eun-seol began investigating Muksung's past directly.
"Venerable Hyeonmuksung? Ah, what a great man he was."
The tavern owner wiped a cup and sighed in admiration.
"About twenty years ago, he suddenly appeared in these parts. At first, we thought he was just a wandering monk, but he was so compassionate and miraculous that he became famous in no time."
Further inquiries yielded nothing beyond the same story.
Even deploying the Death Soul Squad revealed nothing—as if the man had dropped from the sky, his past and origins untraceable.
'Then the only way is to find where his path crossed the Mad Doctor's.'
Remembering the Poison Lightning Daoist, Bu Eun-seol resumed his search.
—Find where the Mad Doctor's past and Muksung's intersect.
With that order, the investigation accelerated.
Starting near Mercy Temple, it soon stretched through Fujian and into Guangdong.
—About twenty-five years ago, there was a physician surnamed Gwak... A truly skilled doctor, he was. But then bad rumors spread, and he left the village.
From an elderly herbalist in Jojubu, the Death Soul Squad obtained crucial information.
—Talk of messy affairs with women, of failing to treat patients properly... All baseless rumors.
But rumors are terrifying things. They spread like wildfire, regardless of truth.
In tracing the link between Muksung and the Mad Doctor, they had stumbled upon the latter's activities in Guangdong twenty-five years prior.
—In the end, those rumors drove Physician Gwak away.
Later, word went around that the one spreading them was a young wandering monk... but no one knew for sure.
'As I thought.'
With this lead, Bu Eun-seol issued another command.
—Track the movements of the wandering monk who maliciously slandered Physician Gwak twenty-five years ago in Jojubu.
As the Death Soul Squad's search continued, Bu Eun-seol finally found someone who knew the full story linking Muksung and the Mad Doctor.
"That bald monk who badmouthed Physician Gwak?"
An old man, slurring drunkenly, spoke up.
"Think his secular name was Haewon or somethin'? Handsome young monk back in the day."
He downed the bottle of Hundred Herbs Wine Bu Eun-seol offered and continued.
"But that bald bastard took one look at Physician Gwak's lover and fell head over heels. She was a real beauty, see."
Setting the bottle down, the old man shook his head.
"Jealousy drove him mad. He spread all kinds of filth about Physician Gwak and her. Got caught, of course. Physician Gwak confronted him—but the little shit just sneered and called her a loose woman."
The old man chuckled, eyeing Bu Eun-seol.
"So Physician Gwak jabbed his throat with a finger. And what d'you know? The bastard couldn't make a sound—just mimed being mute."
A strange grin twisted the old man's lips as he recalled the scene.
"After that, every time he got hit, he'd make this... weird face. Like a man who just took the most satisfying shit of his life."
At last, Muksung's secret was laid bare.
In his youth, he had coveted the Mad Doctor's beloved.
Failing to have her, he spread vile rumors out of envy.
When the Mad Doctor learned the truth, he demanded an apology—
But Muksung only insulted his lover further.
Enraged, the Mad Doctor had clearly punished him by sealing his acupoints with terrifying precision.
'The skill to strike an acupoint so viciously...'
Even the greatest masters would see such seals weaken over time.
Yet the Mad Doctor's technique had blocked Muksung's meridians for twenty-five years.
'The laughter from pain—it must be the Laughter Acupoint.'
The Laughter Acupoint was a hidden pressure point that transformed agony into euphoria.
But striking it required a needle finer than hair, piercing with impossible accuracy—
Making it virtually impossible to seal properly.
Yet the Mad Doctor had effortlessly struck not just the Mute Acupoint but the Laughter Acupoint, torturing Muksung for decades.
'Then now—'
Bu Eun-seol took a deep breath.
With the full picture clear, all that remained was to make Muksung speak.
Mercy Temple, Serenity Chamber.
Muksung still sat in meditation.
When Bu Eun-seol appeared, the monk slowly opened his eyes.
Though confusion flickered in his gaze, he remained silent.
"Hyeonmuksung... No, should I call you Haewon?"
Instantly, Muksung's face turned deathly pale, and one of his hands began trembling violently.
Bu Eun-seol continued speaking impassively.
"I have not come to harm you, but to remove your shackles."
He slowly stepped closer.
"I will unseal your Mute Acupoint. And the Laughter Acupoint as well."
Muksung pressed his trembling hands together in prayer.
The tears welling up in his eyes revealed just how excruciating his suffering had been all this time.
"Unsealing the Mute Acupoint first would be unbearable, so I'll begin with the Laughter Acupoint."
Hmmmm.
Dark qi swirled behind Bu Eun-seol's back, condensing into needles so thin they bordered on invisibility.
Through the Willful True Binding, he'd created filaments finer than strands of hair.
'The Laughter Acupoint.'
Bu Eun-seol recalled the Meridian Secrets text he'd studied during his Kill-Seeking Unit days.
The Laughter Acupoint was a shadow acupoint absent from standard meridian charts.
Belonging to the Governing Vessel.
Hidden deep beneath the central hairline at the nape's Mute Gate Acupoint, precisely half a chon upward.
Wedged between bone and nerve clusters.
Only accessible by inserting a hair's-width needle at a precise angle.
'The problem is it remains closed normally, opening microscopically only during extreme terror or tension when blood rushes to the brain.'
Fortunately, Muksung's current state of extreme tension kept the acupoint accessible.
Zzziiing.
Bu Eun-seol infused his true qi with not a shred of killing intent, using only the gentlest soft energy to pierce the skin.
'Depth must be exactly one chon and two pun. Any deeper would puncture the brain.'
A fraction deeper meant fatal brain damage; any shallower would nullify the effect.
With transcendent focus, Bu Eun-seol guided the qi-needle's infinitesimal movement.
Pop.
Upon piercing the Laughter Acupoint, agony erupted.
Yet Muksung didn't laugh—only contorted his face in silent torment.
The seal was broken.
Such was the pain's intensity that he writhed violently for minutes.
As the suffering finally ebbed—
Crack.
Bu Eun-seol released the Mute Acupoint.
"Ghk— Kkhhuuuk."
Muksung's throat produced its first sound in twenty-five years.
"Aah... Aaah."
A voice unused for a quarter-century.
"Hhhuuuk."
Clutching his throat, he wept fat, chicken-dung-sized tears.
Decades of enforced silence—punishment for framing an innocent physician in jealous rage.
Years of experiencing pain as pleasure.
Now liberated from that hell by Bu Eun-seol's intervention.
"Break your vow of silence. Live freely."
"My... benefactor."
Suddenly remembering something, Muksung dropped to his knees.
"This cannot be. Please reseal my speech."
"What nonsense is this?"
"Countless devotees believe this humble monk to be the Living Buddha. Should I speak, their faith would shatter."
"So you'd pretend muteness again?"
Bowing deeply, Muksung whispered:
"For twenty-five years I've lived falsely, yet their belief was genuine. I cannot betray that faith."
Bu Eun-seol studied Muksung's eyes—filled with authentic repentance and anguish.
'His atonement is sincere.'
Though not the life he'd chosen.
Through twenty-five years of silent asceticism.
Praying sincerely for all beings, washing away his sins.
'In this gilded sanctum.'
Though Mercy Temple's halls outshone all others in opulence, he'd only ever sat in meditation.
Had he been a pleasure-seeking charlatan, nights would've brimmed with debauchery.
Instead, through silent zazen and mantras, he'd blessed the people.
"Very well."
Bu Eun-seol nodded decisively.
"Then I'll grant you freedom without disappointing them."
"Freedom...?"
"Naturally."
Baring white teeth in a smile:
"Though the Living Buddha myth will fade gradually. Yet their faith shall remain eternally in their hearts."
Muksung blinked in confusion, but meeting Bu Eun-seol's phoenix-like gaze, he bowed again.
"I entrust myself to you."
Days later, Mercy Temple hosted an extraordinary gathering.
The monk known as Master Hyeonmuk—Muksung—would break his silence to preach.
—The Living Buddha will sermonize!
As rumors spread, thousands flocked to the temple.
The courtyard overflowed with devotees craving their living saint's wisdom.
Creeeak.
When the main hall doors opened, Muksung emerged serenely.
Today his countenance held transcendent calm, as if floating above worldly concerns.
Reaching the courtyard's center, he slowly pressed his palms together.
Thousands mirrored the gesture.
Then Muksung closed his eyes.
His lips moved in whispered sutra recitation.
When—
Whoosh.
His feet left the ground.
—Wha—?
The crowd gasped.
Muksung's body began ascending—slowly, ever so slowly—toward the heavens.
"Look, look at that!"
"The Great Monk is ascending to the heavens!"
Muksung's monk robes fluttered in the wind. His face was filled with a benevolent smile.
One zhang. Two zhang. Three zhang...
Higher and higher he rose.
"It's Ascension as Immortal!"
"The Living Buddha is ascending to the heavens!"
The devotees fell to their knees.
Some prostrated themselves in worship, while others clasped their hands together, tears streaming down their faces.
"Namo Amitabha!"
"Namo Amitabha!"
The sound of Buddhist chants resonated across the land.
All the while, Muksung's body continued to rise. Ten zhang. Twenty zhang. Fifty zhang.
Now, he was but a tiny speck in the sky. Yet the gray hue of his robes was still faintly visible.
"Is he truly undergoing Ascension as Immortal?"
Among the devotees, many were martial artists.
"...A figure from the Buddhist Order?"
But even if one were to perform the legendary Land-Flying Technique, it was impossible for a person to rise endlessly into the sky like this.
A hundred zhang. A hundred and fifty zhang... Watching him ascend without limit, it truly seemed as though he was achieving Ascension as Immortal.
Flash!
Then, a dazzling, multicolored radiance began to bleach the entire world white.
The light was so intense that, for a brief moment, even the sky itself seemed to vanish.
—He's gone!
When the light receded, Muksung, who had been rising into the heavens, had completely disappeared.
The plaza fell into silence.
Then, moments later, explosive cheers erupted from all directions.
"We witnessed Ascension as Immortal!"
"The Living Buddha has truly become a Buddha!"
People embraced each other in joy. They wept, laughed, and danced.
The miracle of that day spread throughout Zhejiang, then all of Jiangnan... and soon, the tale reached the entire world.
—Nonsense.
Most who heard the rumors shook their heads in disbelief.
In Buddhism, the term used is entering nirvana—the goal is to shed the physical body and escape the cycle of reincarnation, achieving liberation.
Becoming a Buddha (seongbul) means attaining enlightenment, not flying into the sky like an immortal.
For a Buddhist monk—not even a Taoist priest—to soar into the heavens and become a Buddha was something unheard of in history.
—Why can't a monk achieve Ascension as Immortal?!
The eyewitnesses spat in frustration, insisting that Muksung's Ascension as Immortal had truly happened.
But most people refused to believe it, and soon, the tale of the Zhejiang monk's ascension gradually faded from memory.
Deep in the mountains, thousands of li away from Mercy Temple.
Muksung and Bu Eun-seol descended to the ground.
Using the Wind & Cloud Divine Qi and his immense internal power, he had lifted Muksung into the sky.
And by unleashing Harmonization, he had momentarily dazzled the eyes of thousands.
"As you said, Great Hero, they did not believe in the teachings of the Buddhist Order—they were deifying me."
On the way here with Bu Eun-seol, Muksung had repeatedly encountered rumors that Great Monk Hyeonmuk had achieved Ascension as Immortal.
"Now I understand why you chose Ascension as Immortal."
Only then did he realize why Bu Eun-seol had lifted him into the sky in such a manner.
This way, even his devoted followers would eventually realize something was amiss.
That they should never deify a human being again.
"Now that you have found your freedom, live in peace."
At Bu Eun-seol's words, Muksung bowed deeply to him.
"I will never forget this kindness in my lifetime."
"Where do you intend to go?"
"I wish to journey to the Western Regions."
He gazed toward the west.
"I want to practice there—truly, with a sincere heart, free from falsehood."
Bu Eun-seol smiled.
Though he had been forced into decades of silent asceticism by the Mad Doctor's machinations, Muksung had, in truth, become a genuine disciple of the Buddhist Order.
"May you achieve liberation."
As Bu Eun-seol bowed respectfully, Muksung also pressed his palms together and returned the gesture with equal reverence.
Then, he soared into the sky and vanished toward the west.
The moon rose in the night sky.
Bu Eun-seol stood there for a long while, gazing at it.
Now, all that remained was to return to the middle-aged man and uncover the Mad Doctor's whereabouts.
Upon returning to Zhejiang, Bu Eun-seol made his way back to the hut where the middle-aged man who treated animals resided.
Surprisingly, the beasts that had once filled the barn were all gone.
And the middle-aged man sat there calmly, no longer in dirty clothes but in clean attire—
As if he had been waiting, knowing Bu Eun-seol would return after completing everything.
"Welcome back."
For the first time, the middle-aged man smiled.
It was a smile of gratitude—for fulfilling his request even more perfectly than expected.
"You handled everything I asked for splendidly."
"Are you the Mad Doctor's disciple?"
The middle-aged man nodded and spoke in a low voice.
"My name is Gwak Mu-su."
The middle-aged man—Gwak Mu-su—spoke plainly.
"I am also his nephew."
"Please speak freely."
Bu Eun-seol bowed.
"I owe a debt to the Mad Doctor. Even in terms of seniority, he is of the same generation as the head of this hall—so to me, he is like an elder."
In truth, as the successor to the Demon Hall's leadership and effectively the Pavilion Lord of Langya Pavilion, his seniority surpassed Gwak Mu-su's.
But the Mad Doctor had saved his life—even if it was under the Demonic Heavenly Emperor's orders—so he chose to treat this much older man with the respect due to an elder.
"Very well."
As if understanding his intent, Gwak Mu-su naturally accepted his courteous demeanor.
"Our Gwak family has practiced medicine for generations. It's just that my uncle was the one who gained exceptional renown."
Gwak Mu-su's expression darkened.
"If he had continued living quietly as a recluse, as he always had, he would never have suffered such a fate."
Originally, the Gwak family had lived in seclusion, away from the world.
But because the Mad Doctor made his name known, their existence was exposed to the various factions of the martial world. And—
The Mad Doctor, too, seemed to believe that his encounter with that woman from the martial world had led to his unfortunate final years.
"Shall we go see Uncle now?"
Shaking his head, he began leading Bu Eun-seol up the mountain, not too far from the thatched hut.