A long, long time ago, there were many unknown places, and in those unknown places, there were many unknown people.
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A fireball hung in the distance in the Wilderness at dusk. The red light it emitted was like a huge flame, spreading slowly and steadily. The newly grown moss after the snow on the Wilderness melted, spreading everywhere like a burn scar. It was quiet all around. Only the cries of eagles and the jumping of gazelles could be heard occasionally.
Three people appeared in the empty Wilderness. They gathered under a small tree, which was rare in the Wilderness. They did not greet each other, but bowed their heads at the same time, as if there was something very interesting under the tree that was worth studying and thinking about.
Two colonies of ants were surrounding the light brown tree root, which was exposed on the cold soil. Perhaps it was because it was difficult to find another perfect home like the tree root in this wasteland, so the battle was particularly fierce. After a while, there were thousands of ant corpses left. It seemed to be a bloody and tragic scene, but in fact, it was just a small black dot.
The weather was still very cold, but the three people under the tree were not wearing much clothes. They did not seem to be afraid of the cold. They just watched attentively for a long time. Suddenly, one of them said in a low voice, "What is the Great Way of the Ant Kingdom in the secular world?"
The person who spoke had innocent eyes and a thin figure. He was still a young man, wearing a white, thin shirt without a collar. He carried a thin wooden sword without a scabbard on his back. His black hair was finely combed into a bun, with a wooden fork in it. The fork looked like it could fall at any time, but it was as unshakable as a pine tree growing on a mountain.
"When the chief monk was preaching, I saw countless flying ants bathing in the light."
The person who said this was a young monk. He was wearing a tattered kapok kasaya, and the new stubble on his head was black and sharp. It was as sure and determined as his face and the way he spoke.
The wooden sword youth shook his head and said, "Ants that can fly will eventually fall. They will never touch the sky."
"If you insist on thinking like this, then you will never understand what Taoist Heart is." The young monk closed his eyes slightly and looked at the ants that were scattering their limbs at his feet. He said, "I heard that your abbey dean recently accepted a child with the surname Chen. You should understand that a place like Zhishou Abbey will never have only one genius like you."
The young man with the wooden sword raised his eyebrows and replied sarcastically, "I don't understand why a guy like you, who can't be restrained, is qualified to travel the world on behalf of Xuankong Temple."
The young monk did not respond to his provocation. Looking at the ants scurrying anxiously at his feet, he said, "Ants can fly and fall, but they're better at climbing. They're good at building a foundation for their companions and are not afraid of sacrificing themselves. If the ants pile up one by one, as long as there's enough of them, they'll definitely be able to pile up into a pile that can touch the sky."
A sharp cry of an eagle came from the twilight sky, sounding panicked and terrified. It was unclear whether it was afraid of the three strange people under the tree, or afraid of the non-existent giant pile of ants soaring into the sky, or something else.
"I'm scared."
The young man with the wooden sword on his back suddenly said, his thin shoulders shrinking.
The young monk nodded in agreement, although the expression on his face was still calm and determined.
The third young man under the small tree had a strong body, wrapped in clothes that looked like animal skin. His bare legs were as hard as stone, and under his rough skin, one could clearly see his muscles that contained infinite explosive power. He remained silent and did not say a word, but the little spots on his skin still revealed his true feelings at the moment.
The three young men under the tree came from the three most mysterious places in the world. They were ordered by their masters to travel the world, and they were as dazzling as three stars that traversed the world. But even they felt an irresistible fear in this Wilderness today.
The eagle was not afraid of ants, for in its eyes, ants were just black spots. The ants were not afraid of the eagle, for they were not even qualified to be food for the eagle. In their world, there was no such powerful creature as the eagle, and they could not see or touch it.
However, over the course of thousands of years, it was believed that there would always be a few maverick ants in the ant colony who, for some mysterious reason, decided to temporarily look away from the rotten leaves and shells to the azure sky. Then, their world would be different.
Because they saw, they were afraid.
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The three young men under the tree raised their heads and looked at a shallow trench on the ground dozens of meters away. The shallow trench was naturally not deep, and there was nothing but black in it. It was particularly clear on the mottled surface of the Wilderness.
This trench had suddenly appeared two hours ago and reached the sky as soon as it appeared, as if it had been chopped out by an invisible ghost with a mountainous axe, or drawn by a divine craftsman with a rafter. It was chilling, incomprehensible, and frightening.
The young man with the wooden sword on his back stared at the black line and said, "I always thought that the Motionless Yama was a legend."
"It is said that the Yama had 70,000 children. Perhaps this one is just a stray in the human world."
"A legend is a legend." The young man with the wooden sword on his back said expressionlessly, "It is also said that a Sage will appear every thousand years, but who has really seen a Sage in these thousands of years?"
"If you really don't believe it, why don't you dare to step over that black line?"
No one dared to step over that black line, that shallow trench, not even the proud and powerful young men.
Ants could crawl over it, long-limbed insects could jump over it, gazelles could leap over it, eagles could fly over it, but humans could not.
It was precisely because they were humans that they did not dare to step over it.
The young man with the wooden sword on his back raised his head to look at the sky and asked, "If that child really exists, then … where is he?"
By this time, more than half of the setting sun had sunk into the ground, and the darkness of the night was surging in from all directions. The temperature in the Wilderness dropped sharply, and a frightening atmosphere began to envelop the entire world.
"Night has fallen, and he is everywhere. Where can you find him?"
The young man in animal skin broke the silence that had been there for a long time. His voice was deep and rough, unbefitting of his age. It buzzed and vibrated like the incessant rolling of a river, or like the incessant grinding of a rusty sword against a hard rock.
After saying this, he left in a special way.
Several flames suddenly burst out from his two hard and thick bare legs, covering the lower part of the young man's body in a crimson fire. The roaring wind made the gravel on the ground roll rapidly. Then, as if an invisible force had grabbed his neck, his body was lifted more than a hundred feet into the sky, and then he fell down with a whistling sound, smashing hard on the ground. Then he jumped up again, like a stone jumping irregularly into the distance. It looked extremely clumsy, but extremely fast.
"I only know that his surname is Tang, but I don't know what his full name is."
The young man with the wooden sword on his back said thoughtfully, "If we met at another time and place, only one of us could survive. His disciple is so powerful, how powerful is his master? … I heard that his master has been practicing the Twenty-Three-year Cicada Cultivation these years. I wonder if he will carry a heavy shell when he breaks through. "
It was quiet around him, and no one answered. He looked back in confusion.
He saw that the young monk's eyes were closed, and his eyelids were trembling rapidly. It seemed that he was thinking about something troubling. In fact, since the young man in animal skin said those words about the dark night, the young monk had been trapped in this strange state.
Sensing the gaze, the young monk slowly opened his eyes and grinned. The original determination and calmness in his smile had already turned into benevolence out of nowhere. His parted lips were a bloody mess, and it was his tongue that had been chewed up.
The young man with the wooden sword frowned.
The young monk slowly took off the prayer beads on his wrist and solemnly hung them around his neck. Then he started to walk away. His steps were heavy and steady, and seemed to be extremely slow. But in the blink of an eye, he had already disappeared into the distance.
There was no one else under the tree. All the emotions on the young man's face had faded away, leaving only absolute calmness, or absolute indifference. He looked at the shadow in the dust in the north, which kept jumping up and down like a stone, and shouted in a low voice, "Devil."
He looked at the back of the young monk in the west, who was walking silently with his head down, and said, "Heretic."
"Insignificant."
Devil and Heretic are insignificant.
After saying this, the thin wooden sword on the young man's back vibrated and made a strange buzzing sound. With a swoosh, it rose into the air and turned into a stream of light, cutting the small tree in the Wilderness into 53,333 pieces. The branches and trunks were all turned into powder, and the powder fell on the ants who had forgotten about life and death.
"The mute opens his mouth to speak. Put some salt on the cake."
The young man sang and walked toward the east. The thin wooden sword floated in the air a few meters behind him and followed him silently.
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In the first year of the Tianqi era of the Tang Empire, there was a strange phenomenon in the Wilderness. All the World Wayfarers gathered there.
Since then, Qi Nian, the successor of the Xuankong Temple, had practiced the Vow of Silence and no longer spoke. Tang, the successor of the Devil's Doctrine, hid in the desert and disappeared. Ye Su, the successor of the Zhishou Abbey, broke through the Hermetic Training and traveled around all the countries. The three of them had their own gains.
However, the three of them did not know that on that day, when night was about to fall, at the other end of the black ravine that they did not dare to cross, near the direction of the capital city, there sat a scholar, a scholar wearing straw sandals and a tattered coat.
The scholar did not seem to feel the power and sternness represented by the black ravine. He held a scroll in his left hand and a wooden dipper in his right. When he had nothing to do, he would read, rest when he was tired, and drink water when he was thirsty. He was covered in dust, but his face was peaceful.
It was not until the three of them had left and the shallow black ravine on the Wilderness was gradually flattened by the wind and sand that the scholar stood up. He dusted himself off, tied the wooden dipper to his waist, and carefully hid the scroll in his coat. He took one last look in the direction of the capital before leaving.
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There was a long alley in the capital of Chang 'an. On the east side was the residence of the Official of Counsel, and on the west side was the residence of the Xuanwei General. Although they were not the most powerful nobility, they had great prestige. Usually, the alley was quiet, but today it was long gone.
There was a new child in the Official of Counsel's residence. The midwives were busy going in and out. However, from the master to the maids, the joy on everyone's faces seemed to be mixed with some other emotions. No one dared to laugh out loud. The maids who hurried past the corner with water basins in their arms occasionally heard the sounds coming from outside the wall, and their faces showed even more fear.
The Xuanwei General, Lin Guangyuan, who was known for his bravery, was no longer brave because he offended the bravest general of the empire, Xiahou. He was accused of colluding with the enemy country, and after months of interrogation by the Prince, there was finally a result.
The result was clear, and the punishment was simple: the execution of the whole family.
The door of the Official of Counsel's residence was tightly shut. The housekeeper leaned against the crack of the door and looked at the General's residence, which was also tightly shut. He could not help but tremble when he heard the sound of heavy objects chopping into pieces of meat and the sound of watermelons rolling on the ground.
The two families had lived in the same alley for many years, and he was familiar with everyone in the General's residence, from the housekeeper to the doorman. Listening to the horrible sounds, he seemed to see countless sharp podaos cutting open the necks of familiar people, and the heads with familiar faces rolling on the bluestone slabs and hitting the door, gradually piling up into a small hill …
Blood flowed from the door of the General's residence. It was dark and sticky, like glutinous rice slurry mixed with cinnabar, and there were some tendons that looked like purple potatoes. The housekeeper stared at it with a pale face, and could no longer control his emotions. He leaned against the door and began to vomit.
Suddenly, there came the hurried sound of horse hooves, scolding, and then the sound of rough knocks. He could vaguely hear curses, as if someone in the General's residence had escaped. A family general of the Prince's residence rode on a horse and shouted, "Not a single one is missing!"
There were a few scratches and bloodstains on the wall in the garden behind the Official of Counsel's residence.
"Young master, listen to me. You can't go out. Let Chu go, let him go …"
In a woodshed not far from here, a housekeeper of the General's residence was covered in blood. He looked at two boys of four or five years old in front of him, and his dry lips moved slightly. His voice was extremely hoarse, and his wrinkled face was full of despair and struggle. He struggled until tears came out of the corners of his eyes.
It did not take long for the Yulin Royal Guards to break into the Official of Counsel's residence to find this woodshed. Seeing the two corpses in the woodshed, the captain reported loudly after an examination, "Not a single one is missing. Not a single one is missing."
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The simplest way to interpret the words "Unworldly Sublime Being" was that sublime beings usually lived outside the mortal world, and those who lived outside the mortal world could easily be sublime beings. There was actually some truth hidden in this nonsense. What they feared was something mortals could not touch, and what they were happy about was something mortals could not understand.
Therefore, the mortal world did not know what happened outside the mortal world, and the people outside the mortal world would not care about the scenes of life and death or the joy of new life that were happening in the mortal world. They would not care about the Butcher's scale losing weight, the Drunkard's cellar being eaten by rats, the Xuanwei General of the imperial court dying, or a civil official giving birth to a daughter.
The joys and sorrows of the two worlds were never connected.
If they could be connected, they would be sages.
There was a high mountain on the outskirts of the capital Chang 'an. Half of the mountain peak was hidden in the clouds, and a figure was slowly climbing between the cliffs to the west of the back mountain. The man's back was extremely tall, and he wore a black overcoat over his unlined shirt. He was carrying a food box in his hand.
Swaying against the wind, he walked to a cave and sat down. He opened the food box, took out his chopsticks, picked up a piece of ginger and put it into his mouth, chewed it carefully, and picked up two pieces of mutton. He sighed with satisfaction and praised.
Under the setting sun, the capital Chang 'an was gradually shrouded in darkness. Dark clouds of rain were faintly floating in the distance.
The tall man looked at somewhere in the capital and said with emotion, "I seem to see you in the past."
Then he looked up at the sky, holding the chopsticks in his right hand, and said, "As for you, what's the use no matter how high you fly?"
Obviously, the two sentences were meant for two different people.
After a moment of silence, the tall man picked up the rice wine beside him and drank it in one gulp. He raised the empty bowl and looked around the capital, saying respectfully, "The wind rises, the rain falls, and the night is coming."
When he said that, a gust of wind came from outside the mountain, causing his clothes to flutter. The old trees between the rocks shook violently, and the mountain rocks fell. When he said the word "rain falls", the rain clouds that floated above the capital city suddenly darkened. Countless drops of rain turned into a pillar and poured down in the last of the twilight. When he finished speaking, the night sky just happened to occupy half of the vault of heaven, and the darkness was like the eyes of the Lord of Hades.
The tall man put down the bowl and angrily muttered, "It's so damn dark."
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