Tan Lin sat in meditation within the Hall of Impermanence, silently contemplating whether his strategy would proceed smoothly.
He had added some tranquilizing sandalwood incense to the burner beside him—something he usually used to help himself enter a meditative state more easily. For those unaccustomed to its scent, it would readily relax their guard, drawing them into a cloud-like stupor. During such moments of preaching the dharma, he could easily implant his own thoughts into their minds.
Arousing Wei Xun’s curiosity and keeping him in the hall to recount tales of Chen Shigu served two purposes: first, as he grew frail with age, he truly wished to pass down the secrets of yesteryear to future generations; but more importantly, Tan Lin hoped to convince Wei Xun to convert, achieving the great feat that the eminent monk Jiashiye had failed to accomplish.
The terrifying impression left by that asura years ago had been too profound. Even after forty long years, though Tan Lin had transcended worldly concerns in many matters, he still occasionally returned to that bloody night in his nightmares. If he could bring Chen Shigu’s disciple under his wing, it would perhaps exorcise his ancient inner demons.
Would that blue-robed youth understand his painstaking efforts?
As Tan Lin pondered this, suddenly a thunderous roar shook heaven and earth. The entire Hall of Impermanence trembled under its impact, dust cascading from the ceiling beams.
What was happening? An earthquake? Tan Lin opened his eyes, instantly realizing it was Guan Chuan’s furious roar—the profound technique he had renamed from “Thunder Sound Roar” to “Fearless Voice.”
The Buddha speaks with a fearless voice to subdue all heretical doctrines. Buddhist scriptures often compare the Buddha to a lion for its magnificent roar, which is why the lion’s roar is called the fearless voice. Years ago, he had used this very concept to convince Qiu Jiancheng to take vows and become his disciple. Whether noble-born or martial heroes, empty hearts all needed to find reasons to support themselves in faith.
And he, Tan Lin, needed loyal martial arts masters to guard him against the inner demons born from his imprisonment by Chen Shigu years ago.
Another thunderous, mighty roar resounded. The ground tremors even caused the hall’s foundation to shake.
Tan Lin was greatly puzzled: Was Guan Chuan fighting someone?
The third roar came, its angry tone tinged with anxiety, as if a lion in the wild had encountered some fierce beast’s attack.
On Ghost Festival night, subduing thousands of believers had required only one roar. What enemy could make Guan Chuan feel so challenged? Could it be Wei Xun? But after inhaling those pigments, he shouldn’t still have the ability to move…
Tan Lin desperately wanted to stand and see what was happening, but his legs were too weak to move without assistance.
The lion’s roars grew increasingly urgent. That mysterious fierce beast continued launching rapid attacks, and the lion gradually couldn’t withstand them. Later, the roars even mixed with agonized shrieks, as if he had been injured.
Tan Lin felt alarmed and uneasy. Guan Chuan possessed indestructible bronze sinews and iron bones—even wielding swords, one couldn’t leave the slightest mark on his skin. What ability did the opponent have to breach his diamond-hard body?
The roars gradually weakened, the sounds filled with unbelievable despair. Finally came a prolonged, agonizing howl, so tragic it defied description, yet it cut off abruptly midway.
The area outside the Hall of Impermanence fell into deathly silence.
Tan Lin felt cold sweat soaking through his monk’s robes, panic setting in as he found himself unable to move an inch.
After a long while, from the boundless darkness outside the hall, a shadow silently crept in. A screen blocked his view, making it impossible to see who it was. He could only vaguely make out the beast moving forward on all fours for a few steps before standing upright as it approached the screen.
“Though you’re a powerless old fool with one foot in the grave, you’re the most insidiously dangerous enemy I’ve encountered,” the shadow said in a hoarse voice.
Tan Lin heard Wei Xun’s voice and felt slightly relieved. He was about to quote some profound Buddhist scriptures to distract his attention when the other party threw over something heavy.
The object sailed over the screen, rolling into the lamplight’s range with a gurgling sound—it was a bloody human head. Guan Chuan’s eyes bulged out, his throat torn away, exposing the blood vessels and windpipe. The neck’s severed surface was jagged and uneven, appearing not to have been cut by a sharp blade but rather torn apart by a beast’s claws and fangs.
Tan Lin was shocked and alarmed, wanting to flee but lacking the strength to rise. His body tilted and he tumbled from the lotus seat. He hoped that monks in the temple had heard Guan Chuan’s roars and would come to investigate, but he also knew the Hall of Impermanence stood outside the temple—the sound might not carry that far. More understanding of human nature, after the Ghost Festival night massacre, even if monks heard strange noises, they wouldn’t dare venture out to confirm.
“Didn’t bring tools, so dismembering by hand was somewhat troublesome—made quite a mess,” Wei Xun rummaged in his leather pouch and threw over two more items—two muscular arms.
“Guan Chuan has pigment residue under his fingernails. He’s not a painter and shouldn’t have contact with these things. Ordinary pigments wash off with water, but the oil-based pigments Guan Cheng used are hard to clean—they don’t come off easily in a short time. You’re half-paralyzed, so you had this person poison on your behalf. You call him a lion, but he’s more like an obedient lapdog.”
Wei Xun paused, then said, “However, this should be your second poisoning case.”
“You instructed Wu Guancheng to create new, hard-to-wash pigments, and guided him in developing the illusion performances of ‘water painting’ and ‘spray painting.’ Water painting was harmless enough, but spray painting required holding pigment water in the mouth and spitting it onto walls to form images. Those toxic pigments accumulated in his oral cavity day after day, gradually poisoning and driving him insane. Corpse-viewing, corpse-defiling—when someone’s mind is damaged, they’re capable of anything.
You not only wanted him dead but also wanted him to die in disgrace.
But Guancheng had no intent to harm others. Only when the poisoning deepened and hallucinations became frequent did he accidentally kill Wu Gui’er, then drown himself in the liberation pond, painting the ‘Hell Transformation,’ ultimately leading to the tragedy of believers trampling each other. Though you didn’t act directly, all these lives should be counted against you.”
He pulled out a third human organ from his pouch—a rotted tongue stained with various colored pigments. Then he stepped from the shadows behind the screen into the lamplight. Seeing this person’s appearance clearly, Tan Lin’s entire body stiffened, his soul nearly departing from terror.
The “person” before him was covered in wounds, blood flowing from eyes, ears, mouth, and nose. His crimson eyes radiated a demonic, mad gleam identical to Chen Shigu’s from years past.
“Why poison and murder your own disciple, the orphan you raised with your own hands? I think partly because Wu Guancheng insisted on returning to secular life, leaving your sphere of control, making you feel you’d lost control. On the other hand, it was jealousy.
Just as the aging painting saint Wu Daozi murdered the young genius Huangfu Zhen out of envious hatred, you too felt jealous resentment toward Guancheng’s talent—not only resenting his ability but also his youth, his burst of new vitality while you grew decrepit. Having seen the ‘Nine Aspects Diagram’ he painted, then looking at yours, even an outsider like me can immediately judge the superior and inferior.
That unknown important figure in Luoyang didn’t actually commission you but directly commissioned Wu Guancheng to paint the ‘Nine Aspects Diagram’ for exorcism, correct?”
This blood-soaked asura, like Chen Shigu, appeared terrifying on the surface but spoke with clear logic and exceptional calmness, cutting to the heart like a blade, advancing layer by layer.
Seeing Tan Lin’s ashen face, Wei Xun knew he’d guessed correctly. He grinned with his torn lips, blood flowing as he smiled.
“How pitiful. All those years observing rotting corpses, enduring their foul stench, crafting the image of himself as a virtuous monk, master painter, and otherworldly sage—only to have his thunder stolen by a young disciple in his twilight years. What despair that must have been.
You told me that greed, one of the three poisons of greed, anger, and delusion, is the craving for fame, profit, wealth—all worldly material pursuits. You pursued fame and profit, accumulated wealth without limit, and harbored murderous intent because of it. You could be called greed among the greedy. Yet you’re eloquent and most skilled at bewitching hearts, gilding all your actions.
Resisting such verbal traps is extremely difficult. Even masters like Chen Shigu and Qiu Jiancheng could be deceived by you. Old Chen sparing your life back then was mistake upon mistake.
You excel at weaving the fragments you know into captivating stories, like that ‘Zen Master Converts the Asura’—seemingly containing Zen wisdom but with completely mismatched details. Though I’m Chen Shigu’s first disciple, I never learned the ‘Prajna Confession.’ The inheritor of the heart teachings isn’t me but another youngster. When you read people’s faces and fortunes, speaking mysteriously, it’s all based on this guessing ability, isn’t it?”
He laughed bitterly: “I really should have listened to her words then, not listened to you old monk’s chanting, and I wouldn’t have ended up in this state. She had already figured out all the criminal motives, but I didn’t take it to heart…”
His entire mind thundered with noise. The usually eloquent Tan Lin maintained complete silence. Wei Xun felt suspicious and asked, “Why aren’t you speaking? Your silence is unsettling.”
His vision blurred, he staggered closer until within five paces, only then seeing clearly that the old monk’s lips had actually been moving constantly.
Wei Xun was stunned for a moment, then raised his hand to touch his ear. Fresh blood joined the dried blood on his hand.
“Oh, so Guan Chuan deafened me… That’s fine. This way I can’t hear your nonsense.”
Persuasion, excuses, threats, evasion, pleas for mercy—in barely half an incense stick’s time, Tan Lin had tried countless survival tactics, but Wei Xun remained unmoved. Seeing him approach with that ghastly tongue, Tan Lin’s vision filled with the scene from forty years ago by Lingshui River—heads flying in chaos, blood flowing like waterfalls, Chen Shigu advancing toward him with a bloody sword.
This younger asura slowly recited: “At dusk, mist and waves darken the river islet… It’s touching how you’ve remembered this poem for decades. Chen Shigu is dead, so I’ll use the Dusk Mist Wave Palm to send you on your way.”
Wei Xun drew close to Tan Lin, raised his palm, and suddenly smiled: “People say true Buddhas and Bodhisattvas emit divine fragrance. You’re truly a false Buddha—you only smell of a dying old man.”
His palm descended gently, like scattered heavenly flowers, pressing against the old monk’s skeletal chest.
The second enemy had been eliminated.
His mind muddled and confused, one command still vaguely remained: destroy the murals. Wei Xun kicked over the lamp stand, oil splashing onto the screen as flames quietly climbed the wooden frame.
Dragging Tan Lin’s corpse, Wei Xun stumbled toward the rear hall’s covered chamber. After directly withstanding Guan Chuan’s lion’s roar at close range, he not only bled from all seven orifices but had lost his sense of balance, occasionally needing to run on all fours.
Throwing Tan Lin’s body into the lime pit, Wei Xun stuffed the evidentiary tongue back into Guancheng’s throat. After thinking, he pried open Tan Lin’s jaw and extracted his three-inch imperishable tongue. Though the man’s entire body was withered and decrepit, only his tongue remained bright red and full, appearing very vital.
He said to Guancheng: “Now you can voice your grievances and take revenge on your master. I’ve pulled out his tongue—he can never deceive anyone again.”
Before leaving, Wei Xun passed the soul-calming mirror on the wall, catching a glimpse of a terrifying evil spirit within. The demon-dispelling lion’s roar had torn away his final disguise. Now he had finally devolved into his true nature—a filthy, savage asura from beneath the dark river.
The flames in the Hall of Impermanence gradually spread. Wei Xun threw Guan Chuan’s remaining body parts into the fire, then noticed the donor statue in the corner. After the screen collapsed, this wooden sculpture faced the “Fresh Corpse Newly Dead” painting directly, as if perpetually gazing at the beauty in that giant mural.
He toppled the wooden statue and crushed the last monk’s head in the hall with his foot. Beneath the statue’s base, several small lines of text were revealed: “Sun and moon constantly gaze upon each other, turning but never leaving the heart. Seeing where you walk and sit, it’s like fire burning the body.”
Soon after, these inconspicuous lines were consumed by real flames.
Leaving the blazing Hall of Impermanence, Wei Xun raced back to Chanming Temple’s main compound. In the darkness, he leaped across corridors and rooftops, searching through meditation chambers one by one.
His vision had blurred, his eyes filled with crimson; his hearing was also lost, his mouth full of bloody taste. Of the six consciousnesses and five senses, only his sense of smell remained. He would occasionally crouch on rooftops to sniff, trying to catch the slightest trace of a particular fragrance in the breeze.
On Ghost Festival night, hell’s gates stood open, wandering souls roamed the mortal realm. Some were trapped in nightmares, others couldn’t sleep. No one ventured out—only the mysteriously beautiful murals on the walls moved like spirits holding candles in nocturnal procession.
A wounded blue-green ghostly creature silently prowled the ancient temple, searching for its lost moon.
Where was she? Where was she hidden?
One enemy… still remained.
Author’s Note:
Inner ear vestibular damage can cause loss of balance, vertigo, and abnormal gait.
Flashback scenes show that Bao Zhu had already (unknowingly) penetrated all criminal motives.
“Sun and moon constantly gaze upon each other, turning but never leaving the heart. Seeing where you walk and sit, it’s like fire burning the body”—This is an anonymous love poem copied on the back of a volume of the Lotus Sutra excavated from Dunhuang, carrying a sense of fateful forbidden love.
The content about Wu Daozi and Huangfu Zhen comes from “Miscellaneous Morsels from Youyang.” It’s not found in other historical records and can be considered a supernatural story created by author Duan Chengshi.