“Amitabha is still alive” — the moment those words left his mouth, the monkey felt his own blood and energy surge and churn within him. If that were truly the case, even the mere thought of it sent a chill through the bones.

Before them, the light of the Buddha stretched without limit, forged from the minds of all living beings — pure, sacred, flooding the earth in a radiance blazing ten thousand feet high.

“This is merely a thought of mine. Don’t take it as truth. If he were alive, how could anyone else ever succeed in achieving the Dao?” Ye Fan said, though his heart remained clouded with many doubts.

“The Great Emperors of antiquity did not necessarily have to achieve the Dao on this ancient star. Some came from beyond the domain — and even the Great Emperor Amitabha himself arrived from beyond the heavens,” the monkey said, his expression heavy.

This ancient star held within it endless secrets. Since time immemorial, an unknowable number of great and powerful beings had rushed here from afar, all of them pursuing something. And the various ancient clans of the primordial age had likewise all come from beyond the domain.

“That’s a fair point,” Ye Fan nodded, turning the thought over in his mind. Yet he still shook his head in the end. Human capacity has its limits. No matter how powerful a person is, in all likelihood they cannot live for hundreds of thousands of years.

“You don’t believe it? I still feel the Western Desert is the most mysterious of all. No other tradition can gain a foothold here. Every single person reveres the Buddha with absolute devotion — a miracle without precedent in all of history.” The monkey spoke with gravity.

So many people had worshipped the Buddha, as they always had since ancient times — every single one of them reciting the name of Amitabha. It was impossible not to be moved. All of it empowering a single individual — perhaps true immortality was indeed possible.

Before them, this was merely one ancient city, yet already it sent Buddhist radiance blazing skyward without measure. If all the mind-force from across this land, gathered across all of history from past to present, were combined — what would that look like?

The monkey needed only to imagine it for a moment before his scalp prickled unbearably. He couldn’t help but say aloud, “It would make anyone tremble — it sends a chill to the very marrow.”

Amitabha — Ye Fan murmured the name under his breath, and felt at once a mysterious force flowing through him. It was profoundly uncanny. This ancient land of the Western Desert struck him as something utterly beyond comprehension.

“Brother Monkey, most likely only you, I, and those like the Phoenix Void Daoist and Huo Qizi would be able to sense this. Try chanting ‘Amitabha’ and see what feeling arises.”

The monkey tried, and was startled. “In this land, there is a divine power resonating. I believe that if disciples of the Buddhist faith were to regularly chant the four characters of ‘Amitabha’, it would fortify their own cultivation.”

“Exactly so. The Western Desert is unfathomably deep,” Ye Fan said.

“On that basis, I feel ever more convinced that Amitabha is still alive — and has grown powerful beyond all imagining. All living beings chant Amitabha, casting his form into immortality. And in turn, he bestows Buddhist power upon each and every one of them, making the faithful ever more devoted — a terrifying cycle that feeds upon itself.”

“I don’t believe Amitabha is still alive. I simply think the water of the Buddhist faith in the Western Desert runs very deep. We would do best not to probe any further — we might bring great calamity upon ourselves, especially while we stand upon this land,” Ye Fan said, something stirring within his heart.

“Do you mean that whatever we say here might be sensed by some kind of presence?” the monkey looked up at the void, then turned his gaze toward the direction of Mount Sumeru.

Ye Fan murmured to himself, “The last Great Emperor before the Age of Antiquity was Wushi. The last Great Emperor after the Age of Antiquity was the Green Emperor. Both of them should have achieved the Dao on this ancient star. So I would think Amitabha is no longer in this world.”

“But from ancient times to the present — this boundless mind-force, capable of amassing into an infinite sea of Buddhist radiance — where has it ultimately gone? Who received it all?” the monkey pressed.

Ye Fan said, “Every living being, no matter who, will one day be extinguished and cease to be. As for the other Great Emperors — even the most ruthless among them, who were peerless across all ages, who created one world-shaking cultivation method after another, who gave birth to divine embryos and opened an alternative path to eternal life — why did none of them choose the path of accumulated mind-force from living beings? And even Wushi, whose power was such that he could trample over forbidden zones and crush the Great Dao beneath his feet, did not choose this path either — which tells us that true immortality through such means is extremely difficult to achieve. I believe Amitabha likewise could not survive tens of thousands of years through this means alone. This boundless Buddhist light, this infinite mind-force, was not used to cast him an immortal body — it must have been put to some other use.”

“Then you tell me — the entire Western Desert is saturated with this pure and sacred divine power. Where has it ultimately gone? What has it ultimately given rise to?” the monkey demanded, unwilling to let the matter rest.

“The Buddhist faith cultivates the life to come — it is the most mysterious of all traditions. We had best not speculate recklessly about it. The water of the Western Desert runs far too deep. It is not something that the likes of us, at our present level, can afford to wade into,” Ye Fan cautioned.

The monkey fell into contemplative silence and nodded. For he had within him the bloodline power of the Battle-Victory Sacred Buddha, and standing here now in the Western Desert, he truly felt this hidden force — a secret power. If they were truly to pursue it further, who knew what they might stir up.

A look of worry crossed his face. He gazed toward Mount Sumeru. That place was the very center of the Western Desert. From ancient times to the present, endless mind-force had all converged upon that point. His concern was genuine.

“You need not be troubled. I believe your uncle has long since perceived something there. He sees it more clearly than we do, and perhaps it is precisely that which drew him to that place,” Ye Fan said, offering what comfort he could.

“I hope so. If nothing is amiss, I would rather never return to the Western Desert — not unless the day comes when I have achieved sainthood,” the monkey said. His golden eyes blazed, shooting out brilliant streaks of divine light.

The two of them continued on their way. The monkey was heading for the Great Thunderclap Monastery, while Ye Fan was making inquiries in many directions, searching for which ancient monastery An Miao Yi might be found at — for the time being, they were still traveling the same road.

“The Buddhist faith believes in the life to come — in cultivating the fruits of the Dao in the future. Do you think Amitabha might one day appear in some future age?” the monkey pondered for a long while as they walked, and then asked.

“Who can speak clearly of what is yet to come?” Ye Fan gave a rueful smile. He had thought of this as well, but he was unwilling to speak of it here in the Western Desert. For every time he chanted the four characters of “Amitabha,” a mysterious breath would stir and permeate the air, and he had no wish to become entangled in whatever cause and effect might arise from that.

“And would Shakyamuni truly have some connection with the Buddha? Could he be the demon shell of Amitabha, or perhaps linked to the concept of a deity’s thought?” the monkey muttered to himself.

“Stop right there. We’ll discuss this when we’ve returned. Say no more of it while we’re in the Western Desert,” Ye Fan cut him off.

The monkey gave a dry cough, and that line of discussion came to an end.

Ye Fan set out to find An Miaoyi. Before their departure, he hoped to see her one final time. But the Western Desert was blanketed with temples everywhere — like searching for a needle in the sea — and after many days of searching, there was no trace of her.

He reasoned through what An Miaoyi’s cultivation path required and investigated further. After several more days, he began to find some clues and could roughly deduce where she had gone.

The Buddhist faith, when it came to desire and emotional attachment, had undergone a process of transformation and rebirth — evolving from the most primitive suppression and abstinence of emotions, to using the full spectrum of feelings and desires as the very basis of cultivation.

Ye Fan surmised that since An Miaoyi had come to the Western Desert, she would certainly seek out the source and root of this tradition — tracing the evolution of this particular approach to its origin. Most likely she would have started with the “Sravaka Vehicle,” which represented the most ancient Buddhist attitude toward “emotional attachment.”

To trace it back to its source, one would need the Agama Sutras — the most fundamental scriptures of the Buddhist faith, containing the foundational cultivation methods of the Buddha himself. If An Miaoyi wished to go further on her path, she would inevitably begin from the very beginning.

Several days later, he learned through inquiry that there existed in the world an ancient monastery called the Agama Monastery, which housed the true meaning of the Agama Sutras — but it had been destroyed ten thousand years ago, and could no longer be found.

Even this was enough to illustrate just how deep the Buddhist faith’s waters ran. Though all sects revered Amitabha, there were nonetheless many different streams and schools of thought, and in the course of doctrine’s evolution, there had even been points of conflict.

As they continued westward, they drew ever closer to Mount Sumeru. In these days spent in the Western Desert, Ye Fan’s experiences and observations had been a constant stream of revelations.

This truly was a glorious age. The Western Desert stretched vast and boundless, yet held only a single religion. It could be said that the power of one faith here was a match for the combined power of every tradition in any other domain.

In the present world, calling the Buddhist faith the foremost great religion under heaven would not be the least bit excessive. Ye Fan and the monkey visited many ancient monasteries and encountered some reclusive and profoundly mysterious divine monks.

Ye Fan dimly sensed that the entire Western Desert was something extraordinary — as though it did not quite belong to this world, as though it might one day simply fly away.

“It is said that the Feathered Transformation Divine Dynasty once sought to ascend as an entire faith, and was ultimately reduced to ashes. Might this land of Buddha have similar intentions for the future? After all, the mind-force accumulated here is immense — it is the very root upon which their tradition rests,” Ye Fan murmured to himself.

The more he thought, the more complex it became. His thoughts spread ever wider, touching in an instant upon many pivotal things. He found himself thinking inexplicably of the fact that this was a great age — and the Buddhist faith seemed to have prepared for it most thoroughly of all.

Then he snapped back sharply and asked quickly, “Brother Monkey — when all the various primordial ancient clans awoke in this age, was it planned out by the ancient emperors of old? Or did the various clans make this agreement themselves, and simply happened to make the same choice?”

“It was passed down through word of mouth among the elders of places like Shencan Ridge, the Blood Phoenix Mountain, and the Huo Lin Cave — and it could also be said to be the result of calculations made by the ancient emperors of old,” the monkey said with great seriousness.

“That’s it, then. The people of that time had already found their way here. As for this current age — with the ancient clans awakening one after another — calculating it out, the most critical moment has already been pointed toward…” Ye Fan murmured, and then his eyes blazed with a sharp and piercing divine light. “The most world-overturning transformation in all of history will occur in this age!”

In the span of an instant, he had seen through to the essential nature of many things and thought his way through a great number of previously unclear questions. This ancient star was absolutely extraordinary. Why had it drawn the Great Emperors of antiquity to come here? Why had the ancient emperors sealed their own sons and daughters away to awaken in this very age?

For those who stood at such heights, perhaps only achieving immortality could serve as any kind of inducement. What else could it possibly be? In the future, a world-shaking transformation of staggering proportions would occur.

“The Great Emperors of antiquity mostly came from beyond the heavens — the ancient emperors perhaps likewise. From this, one can roughly estimate the number of Great Emperors across all of history, and even how many ancient stars bearing life there are…”

Ye Fan’s thoughts ran on further and further, in continuous chains of deduction.

“Without daring to speak of the entire universe — for it is truly vast beyond all reckoning — at the very least, with this ancient star as the center and the range it can radiate outward, the number of life-bearing ancient stars and the number of Great Emperors within that span could be estimated.”

“And furthermore — the ancient star path through the void is another key point. Is it a road within the zone this star can radiate, or does it hold some more particular significance? Hmm… that part seems to be incorrect. The Old Master and Shakyamuni pursued it onward without stopping…”

Half a month later, Ye Fan finally learned from a Buddhist disciple some clues about the Agama Ancient Monastery — it had already been rebuilt and stood on the Ayu Plateau, neighboring the heavens.

By this point, Mount Sumeru was only a little over a hundred thousand miles away. Ye Fan was deeply shaken. Even at that distance he could feel an immeasurable divine force ahead — a presence of vast and sweeping grandeur.

In a trance, he seemed to see ten thousand feet of Buddhist radiance blazing skyward, flooding the entirety of heaven and earth before him. The pure mind-force accumulated from ancient times to the present had all poured into that place — sacred and majestic beyond words.

At last, Ye Fan and the monkey parted ways, each setting out to attend to their own affairs.

The Ayu Plateau — its elevation was breathtaking, surpassing even the great mountains of other lands. For over half the year it was blanketed in snow and ice, bitterly cold. Now, however, was the brief season of warmth and blossoming — the shortest spring of the year. The plateau was bursting with life; grass shoots were pushing through the earth, flowers bloomed in wild abundance, and the breath of living things filled the air.

Suddenly, from a great distance, Ye Fan sensed a mysterious force summoning him — sacred and tranquil, guiding him forward. It was like bathing in immortal radiance, the entirety of his body eased and comforted.

“What is happening?” he murmured to himself, gazing ahead into the distance.

Not long after, his heart gave a violent jolt. He sensed the power of Dao dissipation — a saint was undergoing the final dissolution of their existence.

“Benefactor who has come from afar — this old monk has been waiting for you for a very long time.”

Ahead lay a broken stone platform. An aged monk sat cross-legged upon the ground. One could not say how many years he had lived. The flesh and Dao-bones of his entire body were burning — he was about to dissolve into the Dao. This was, incredibly, an ancient holy monk from a distant era, who could also be called a Buddha.

“Holy Monk — you know who I am?”

“You come from the far shore of the starry sky. This old monk, in the moment before passing into seated dissolution, perceived a glimpse of the future — and has been waiting for you ever since.” The ancient withered Buddha, now burning away, spoke these words.

“You…” Ye Fan was greatly astonished.

“Before that — this humble monk will first borrow the power of Amitabha to help you eliminate a thread of mind-force left upon you by an unsurpassed being from beyond the domain.” The old monk said.

No sooner had his words fallen than, within the ruins of the ancient battlefield of great saints beyond the heavens, an ancient ship gave off a soft sound — “dong” — as though it had sensed something. A voice murmured from within, “Amitabha… has also come to this world?”