Alayavijnana

"What?"

Sun Wukong was keen. That was not merely a matter of temperament.

Beyond the five senses lay what people called the sixth — consciousness. He read the currents of feeling the way one reads a passing thread of wind. It was not sensitivity alone. Long life had layered experience and cunning over that native sharpness, and the result was this: the moment something shifted in Dangrang's heart, Sun Wukong felt it, and simply waited.

Dangrang wrestled with himself for a long while before he spoke.

"Your present state, Great Sage, is most peculiar."

"Peculiar?"

"You are, in the strictest sense, a yaoguai in the flesh, are you not?"

That was why his descent from Heaven into the mortal world had caused him no strain. He was no celestial god, but a yaoguai whose body had once lived in the lower realm. The yoryeok flowing through his flesh was proof enough that he existed as a great monster still.

"And yet you commune with Heaven with relative freedom."

"That's because I ate an Inner Core, so... hang on."

Sun Wukong had been answering offhandedly, and then he stopped. The question Dangrang had raised snagged on something in his own mind.

"Ordinarily, the medium by which one communes with Heaven is yeongryeok. It is another form of the daoist power of those who have awakened to the Way, or the dharma power of monks who have grasped the Buddhist law. And yet."

"Yaoguai and yeongryeok are natural enemies."

Sun Wukong's eyes narrowed as he finished the thought. The power that let him summon Teacher Janggyeong whenever he wished was—

"A paradox."

A paradox. Two opposing energies accomplishing something without ever colliding — a paradox in the most literal sense. Sun Wukong's expression grew grave.

"It's not even complete. They have to answer from up there. Teacher Janggyeong only showed because he answered my call."

He could not forcibly drag Teacher Janggyeong down into the spirit-cat. It was not true two-way communion.

"Even conveying your will to Heaven is already far beyond the ordinary."

"Yeah, I know. So what's your point?"

"You have come to possess a most curious form, Great Sage — a great yaoguai endowed with yoryeok, and yet bearing the yeongryeok by which one communes with Heaven."

"..."

"By every law that governs such things, those two energies ought to be tearing each other apart."

Sun Wukong quietly turned his awareness inward.

In his dantian, yoryeok breathed like a sleeping beast. And near the crown of his head, a minute force resonated with a strange, thin hum — the power that had lingered after he consumed Myodu-eung's Inner Core. He had not thought of it at the time, but it was yeongryeok, without question.

The oddness of it struck him only now.

Come to think of it...

Not once in all his long existence had he held both powers at the same time.

When he had set out for India with Sanzang, he had carried yoryeok alone.

When the pilgrimage ended and he attained Buddhahood as the Victorious Fighting Buddha, the yoryeok had vanished without a trace. In its place a vast, luminous energy had filled him to the brim. Yeongryeok.

"So both powers are sitting in this body right now."

Even after eating Myodu-eung's Inner Core, it had never occurred to him to call that residue yeongryeok. Dangrang was right: the two energies could not coexist. They were meant to devour each other, to attack without rest. They had simply settled into their own territories, and so Sun Wukong had never noticed anything amiss.

Dangrang's question sent him searching through himself in earnest. It did not take long.

"...The dantian."

A dry laugh escaped him before he could stop it.

The dantian. A vast coil of yoryeok lay there as if asleep. Sun Wukong's dantian could not be measured in physical size. The vessel was his body itself, and that body was already one with nature — a being that had come into existence of its own accord. A self-existent thing.

The dantian rested near his navel, yet its depth was infinite and its breadth as wide as the sky. Even with every last drop of the great yaoguai Sun Wukong's yoryeok dwelling inside it, the thing was nowhere near full.

He snorted.

To the Sun Wukong of the past, a dantian had been meaningless. When the entire body was already a vessel, why bother ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠fashioning a new one?

Now it was different. The inner energy and martial arts of humankind had caught his interest, and he had learned their methods and followed them. He did not dismiss such things as mere human tricks. When it came to learning, Sun Wukong was so open and so awake it was hard to believe he was the same reckless monkey. If anything, he had been delighted that mere humans had devised something so ingenious, and he had studied it with genuine pleasure.

The results had been excellent. Controlling his yoryeok had become easier and freer than ever before.

"So this was the answer all ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠along."

A faint smile touched his mouth.

The same was true of the heavy yeongryeok that had flowed in after he consumed Myodu-eung's Inner Core. Ordinarily he would have waited for it to spread through his entire body. He had not. Only those whose upper dantian was awake could commune with Heaven, and he had eaten the Inner Core for that purpose alone. Naturally, he had drawn the yeongryeok straight into the upper dantian.

"So they've each taken a dantian and they're just sitting there, eyeing each other like a cow watching a chicken."

Two powers that should have been irreconcilable, refusing to cross into each other's territory, merely keeping watch across the border. Sun Wukong snorted again.

"Didn't see this coming, either."

"Have you, then, discerned the reason?"

"Yeah."

He nodded, satisfied. Holding both energies in one body was a clear and considerable advantage.

But his eyes settled, cool and still. He was no half-baked amateur who went fluttering after idle possibilities. He saw the limits just as clearly as the gift.

Using this yeongryeok to wield the arts of Heaven is absolutely out of the question.

Even the yeongryeok Myodu-eung had spent a lifetime accumulating was woefully insufficient to wield the power of Sun Wukong, once one of Heaven's highest gods.

If he forced it, it might be possible. But the efficiency was not high enough to justify the risk.

Use that kind of power and the yoryeok will be affected too.

Binding it in the dantian did not mean its savage nature had gone anywhere. One wrong move and the two energies might slam together inside him with a crash.

"This is a problem."

At best, it opened a channel to Heaven. That was the only use he had for the yeongryeok at present. Sun Wukong's brow furrowed. Wasn't this just carrying a fire in his gut? Far too great a hazard for so little return.

"Which is why I may be able to offer you a measure of assistance, Great Sage Sun."

"Help?"

"Have you ever considered how an Earth Deity sees their domain as clearly as the palm of their own hand?"

"Because it's their domain?"

He had never given the question any real thought. Wasn't that simply what an Earth Deity was?

Dangrang shook his head.

"Because they have eyes and ears everywhere."

"Have you ever learned how to just say a thing straight instead of talking in circles?"

Irritation flickered across Sun Wukong's face, and Dangrang hurried on.

"All things possess a soul. You know this, yes?"

"Sure. Even the Tathagata said not to go kicking rocks around for no reason."

"The standing of those souls is vanishingly low. What dwells in this tree, in this boulder, in this cloud — it is paltry. Most cannot even perceive themselves. Whether one ought to call that 'alive,' I confess, is somewhat open to question."

"..."

Sun Wukong's eyes narrowed. He lifted his chin.

"The eyes and ears you're talking about. You mean all of nature."

"As expected, you grasp things quickly."

"Quick, nothing. This is hard to follow."

He looked around. Leaves and undergrowth ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠scattered on the wind. This mountain had a mountain god, so of course the rocks and trees had souls. But he had never once heard their voices.

"Their standing is simply too low to converse with one such as you, Great Sage."

"Too low a standing, huh..."

"No matter how loudly ants chatter and swarm and gaze up at the sky, a human cannot even hear the sound. It is the same principle."

"But it's different now?"

"We ourselves commune with Heaven above. Why should the myriad things of the lower world be unable to speak with us?"

Sun Wukong quietly laid his hand on a fragment of rock beside him. It had tumbled across the ground as if split from some great cliff. A cold, heavy sensation traveled through his fingertips.

His eyes drifted shut.

A faint light gathered at the crown of his head.

How much time passed?

"Huh."

A voice that seemed to drift in from somewhere just beside his ear. Sun Wukong withdrew his hand with a look of deep interest. Dangrang squinted at him.

"Did you hear it?"

"..."

Sun Wukong did not answer. Eyes still closed, he listened as if savoring a flavor. When the silence held, Dangrang nodded without much surprise.

"Well, of course you wouldn't hear it. The gap in standing is far too vast. The gods of Heaven, in fact, can never hear such things. An elephant cannot hear the voice of an ant. The principle is the same."

"..."

"But an ancient tree that has lived for hundreds or thousands of years, a boulder that has stood firm in one place for a millennium, a river that has flowed without once running dry — these may be considered spirits in their own right. The voices I hear are theirs."

Dangrang stroked his whiskers with a scythe-like arm.

"Even a worthless rock like that may have something one might call a spirit lingering within it, but its standing is so vanishingly low that even I, an Earth Deity, cannot hear it. The greater the gap in standing..."

"I can hear it."

"...You can hear it?"

Dangrang's pupils trembled violently. The emotions of a being who had lived an immense span of years filled, all at once, with astonishment.

"I can hear it, all right. It just keeps saying the same thing over and over."

"How... how, when the gap in standing is this severe, how—"

Dangrang's voice shook. The rock's voice had been nothing more than that. The voice of a mere pebble, something even he could barely hear — not even a steadfast boulder that had held its place for a thousand years. It held no standing worthy of being called a spirit.

He tried to hide his dismay.

"E-even so, to hear a proper voice, you would need to commune not with a pebble like this but with something worthy of being called a spirit. I shall guide you to— Great Sage?"

The words did not finish.

The moment Dangrang saw Sun Wukong's half-lidded eyes, an intense pressure crushed the surroundings — so overwhelming he could not even open his mouth.

"W-what is this?!"

Dangrang's whiskers trembled. There was not a breath of wind, yet a formless energy swirled and gathered. Pressure, presence — a current that defied description seized everything around them.

And in the midst of it, Sun Wukong alone stood aloof. As if he were the only being in the world.

His half-closed eyes slowly opened.

Two eyes holding a soft radiance of gold mixed with red.

Voices he had never heard poured faintly, endlessly, into his ears.

Fragments of stone, leaves, weeds, mud — all of them murmuring and whispering without cease. Every voice of every thing under heaven that his gaze touched drove itself into his ears. As if each were asserting its own existence, they cried out endlessly.

Sun Wukong listened fully and slowly regulated his breathing.

The mind is composed of six consciousnesses, and these are called the Six Consciousnesses.

Eye. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Ear. Nose. Tongue. Body. Sight, hearing, smell, taste, touch — the five senses commonly known.

And mind. The consciousness that pierces through to the essence of things, beyond the five senses. Further still, the mind that perceives consciousness itself — the sixth sense.

It is engraved deep, as if stored in all phenomena of the universe. From mere beasts to yaoguai, humans, and even the gods of Heaven. Stored in the depths, endlessly transmitted and carried forward.

Beyond the Six Consciousnesses, the eighth consciousness.

A lofty realm that an Earth Deity like Dangrang would never dare even conceive of. A vast strangeness that shared the senses of all creation.

Dangrang could only stand frozen, mouth hanging open.

How much time passed?

The two eyes pouring forth luminous radiance squeezed shut.

"Kh."

Sun Wukong's body suddenly swayed. Only then could Dangrang move his locked limbs — the crushing pressure had vanished as if washed away. He approached Sun Wukong with a look of incomprehension.

The face that was always so full of color had gone pale.

"Ah, this... ain't exactly easy."

The voice grumbled as if complaining, but within it ran a strange heat. Dangrang let out a hollow laugh.

This golden monkey...

What had he realized now?

Suddenly the old fear surged back like a tide. He did not know what had happened, but he felt it in his bones: another, higher world had just unfolded before Sun Wukong.

And this is a golden monkey who already fears nothing in this world.

How far was he seeing? How much was he hearing? Could his world still grow wider? How much further?

In Dangrang's lowered eyes, confusion, fear, and awe mixed together.

Color returning to his face at last, Sun Wukong grumbled,

"Dangrang."

"...Speak."

"You got an Inner Core?"

A faint greed lingered in Sun Wukong's eyes.

Dangrang's face went deathly white.