Chapter 233: Meeting in the Buddha Land

Chapter 233: Meeting in the Buddha Land

A starless night pressed down upon the pedestrian street, icy rain driven by a cold wind whistling through the thoroughfare.

Before the shops, lanterns of Former Ming vintage swayed in the dazzling glare of neon signs, gilding the passing crowds in hues of red and blue.

Despite the late hour, despite the heavy rain, neither could stop men and women of appetite and lust from seeking pleasure here.

Sweet-tempered lovers leaned against each other beneath a single umbrella, steps light as they walked toward a budget inn marked with 'Half Price'.

A drunk reeking of alcohol stared with blank, hollow eyes, fumbling at the back of his skull, trying to plug the newly bought Desire Realm chip into his spiritual aperture.

And opposite him, a rag-clad scavenger crouched under the eaves of an alley, waiting with anticipation for him to enter his Yellow Millet Dream.

In this surging crowd were labor slaves clocking in for shifts, pariahs unable to hold an iron rice bowl, fierce gangsters, cunning peddlers, and arrogant Followers of the Order.

Those selling bodies and those selling 'gods' secretly vied; those gambling money and those gambling lives competed against each other.

Among these people were Ming folk, and Yi folk. Not just men and women, but those neither male nor female.

As for age, that was an enigma indistinguishable to the naked eye.

Longtu wore compassion on his face, pity in his eyes, palms joined at his chest, like a deity descended to dust, walking amidst the blindly foolish, sensual mob.

In his eyes, these surrounding pedestrians had no distinction of beauty or ugliness, only the difference in the scent upon them.

The rust of machinery, the steam of food, the fumes of alcohol, and some indescribable fishy stench.

These scents all shared a common trait: they were all born of desire.

And blazing desire was the finest medium for conversion, the best vessel for the unfolding of the Buddha Land on Earth.

"No wonder they struck at me first; turns out you didn't run."

Longtu's gaze pierced through the dense heads, looking toward the other end of the pedestrian street.

A dark red lantern; a tall, slender woman stood there holding an umbrella, her arm gripping the handle tattooed with witch patterns.

Raindrops pattered on the umbrella surface with a *dada* sound; the passing wind lifted her waist-length hair.

Yuan Mingfei narrowed her affectionate phoenix eyes, her smile bewitching: "All my years of effort ruined in an instant; if I don't ferry you to salvation, how can I swallow this grievance?"

Though clearly separated by dozens of zhang, their spoken words rang clearly in each other's ears.

"Hiding in Chongqing Prefecture these years, your guts have grown quite a bit."

"Hiding?"

Yuan Mingfei smiled gently, "A clay puppet; even if you gild its face, it won't become a Buddha. It's you who dared not come to Chongqing Prefecture; when did I ever hide?"

Longtu said indifferently: "I'm here now; you should return the stolen Buddha Land Mainframe."

"Right here."

The woman patted her own abdomen, "If you have the guts, come take it."

Just as they spoke, a drunk about to brush past Longtu suddenly stumbled, his bloated obese frame instantly losing balance, listing crookedly toward the monk.

Right at that moment.

From a slant, a petite figure rushed over at extreme speed, throwing her whole body to crash into the drunk, both tumbling to the ground.

The drunk's eyes embedded in folds of flesh, and the girl's eyes blocked by wet hair, calmly met for a split second.

*Puchi!*

"Without Buddha's Decree, harm not my Lord!"

A shattered liquor bottle and a sharp hairpin pierced the other's neck almost simultaneously, spraying blood rapidly dissipating on the street.

A bizarre scene enough to make ordinary men pale, yet it did not earn a single cold glance from Longtu.

He lifted his foot over the corpse, continuing forward.

"You turned your own body into the Buddha Land Mainframe; no wonder Gong Qing died by your hand. But doing this, aren't you worried you'll never have a chance at Nirvana again?"

A burly Western barbarian in a shirt rushed out of an eatery, muttering incomprehensible barbarian tongue, drawing a thin sharp sword from his Civilization Staff, charging straight at Yuan Mingfei standing under that dark red lantern.

"Nirvana in, Nirvana out, who knows what monsters crawl out of the cycle!"

Yuan Mingfei couldn't be bothered to turn her eyes toward the thin sword about to pierce her face, cursing disdainfully: "If my genes weren't incompatible with other Sequences, I'd have switched sects long ago; why would I covet your dogshit Nirvana?"

*Clang!*

The thin sword was blocked by a rust-stained bone-scraping knife.

The scavenger sprinting from under the eaves stabbed the knife into the Western barbarian's waist, the momentum twisting a circle in his kidney area.

But before the ferocity on the scavenger's face could fade, his throat was pierced by a thin sword stabbing from who knows where.

"Yuan Mingfei, don't forget you are also a Buddhist!"

A trace of anger finally flared in Longtu's indifferent eyes, "Spewing such heretical words, you shall have your tongue ripped out!"

*Bang!*

A sharp gunshot exploded in the street; the bullet flying toward Longtu was caught by a face suddenly stretching out horizontally.

Viscous brain matter sprayed from the shattered skull rear, splattering on the ground the monk had just passed.

And the gang member who just fired, now surrounded in the crowd, his spraying blood splashing on numb face after numb face.

Such a scene was but a corner snapshot of the chaos at this moment.

In reality, similar scenes were playing out non-stop on this pedestrian street.

Not long ago a bustling lively street, now a slaughterhouse filled with chaos and killing.

Labor slaves killed pariahs, peddlers killed shopkeepers, boyfriends killed girlfriends, the armed were besieged, Followers of the Order drowned in the sea of people.

Whether acquainted or strangers, at this moment their eyes held only the rage born from the heart, the fury of facing mortal enemies.

The only distinction was those protecting Longtu, shouting fervent Buddhist chants from their mouths: "Without Buddha's Decree, harm not my Lord!"

"Look at these people you bewitched into dying for you; you dare call yourself Buddhist, still want to rip out this old lady's tongue?"

Longtu frowned and countered: "How are you different from me?"

"Vastly different; this old lady stopped doing this deceitful, damned swindle long ago."

Yuan Mingfei smiled broadly, extending two fingers—index and thumb—interlocked and rubbing together, "This old lady uses money now, dumbass!"

What did that mean? Could it be these people weren't converted by Yuan Mingfei?

If not, then what was her Buddha Land Mainframe doing...

Longtu's heart suddenly sank; he suddenly felt his vision begin to distort, the whole world spinning and shifting.

"You bald donkey took the bait, right? Next, our protagonist will entertain you."

The woman's laughter carried the pleasure of a scheme succeeding and the relief of a great grudge repaid.

At the instant Longtu's vision was about to darken, he saw a tall figure holding a black umbrella appear at the end of the long street.

The umbrella tilted slightly, revealing a section of a cold, hard, angular jaw, and a corner of a mouth curled in a murderous cold sneer.

"We'll meet in the Buddha Land!"

At the same time, that half of the crowd converted by Longtu's Buddha Land suddenly fainted to the ground.

The otherhalf, the Sparrow members "converted" by Yuan Mingfei with precious banknotes, vanished swiftly into the wind and rain once their business was concluded.

The slaughter in the long street fell abruptly into silence, as sudden in its cessation as in its eruption.

The wind and rain had not ceased for a moment, yet another upheaval erupted anew!

A crimson figure burst forth from behind Longtu, swift as a streaking scarlet thread, piercing toward Yuan Mingfei in the blink of an eye.

Just as the woman was about to be torn asunder by the crimson line, at that critical juncture, a pale staff-shadow slammed out beside Yuan Mingfei's temple!

*Thud!*

Not far off.

Master Ma, clutching that "Zhaodan" pole, stood beside Li Jun, clicking his tongue: "Master fights master, guardian deity fights guardian deity—damn it all if it ain't the very picture of fairness!"