“As everyone knows, I was born into the Xing family. The Xing family specialized in doing shameful deeds like defying heaven to change fate—the crooked and evil path among fortune-telling and feng shui reading, also called the demonic path.”

The old monk’s light and casual statement shocked everyone’s hearts into pounding, involuntarily thinking of a phrase: going astray into madness.

“My mother began learning the arts of fate calculation at three years old. By ten, she could tell fortunes for people. Reportedly, she was the most spiritually gifted and cleverest person the Xing family had produced in all these years.

Clever people without restraint often bring disaster.

After Mother turned sixteen, the family began seeking a husband for her. She picked and chose—not one met her approval.

One day, a lama passed by the Xing residence and came to the door begging for a bowl of water. My mother took one look at that lama and set her heart on him, wanting to keep him there and make him her husband.”

Li Buyan, who hadn’t spoken for a long while, suddenly interjected: “It must be that the lama was good-looking.”

“Appearance, physique, bearing—all were excellent.”

The old monk’s gaze held a trace of amusement: “But that lama was unwilling. My mother used evil arts, casting a spell on my father. The two became husband and wife.

Since ancient times, good and evil don’t coexist. How could Buddha and demon unite? The Xing family’s fortune fundamentally changed. Originally, using the Xing family’s secret methods, what should have been born was a girl child. Who knew—it was me instead.

The Xing family had committed too many evils. My birth came to terminate the Xing family.

Seeing I was a boy, Mother tried to strangle me. In the instant I was about to expire, I suddenly opened my eyes and smiled at her.

Mother was so frightened she released her grip, spat out a mouthful of blood, and died.

With Mother’s death, my father regained clarity. He believed I carried demonic nature, so he tonsured me and sent me to a temple.

Three days later, Father died suddenly without illness.

Actually, my father only saw one thing, not the second. Besides demonic nature, I also carried Buddha nature. Becoming Buddha or demon lay in a single thought of mine.”

Through the smoke, the old monk’s withered face was very calm, his gaze very light. No one could fathom what lurked behind those eyes as clear and bright as a child’s.

“My entire life I’ve cultivated Buddhism, precisely to suppress the demonic nature. But no matter how I cultivated, that bit of demonic nature always remained.

Those who leave home seek nothing more than perfect merit. But if the demonic nature isn’t eliminated, how can there be perfection?”

The old monk grinned with a ghostly smile.

“The moment I saw the girl, I understood that in the morning divination, the noble person meant not only someone of noble status, but also someone who could help me achieve perfect merit.

So I opened my heavenly eye. I discovered that besides only having one ethereal soul and one corporeal soul remaining, the girl’s body also carried a powerful black energy.”

Fearing they didn’t know what black energy was, the old monk immediately continued: “That is, resentment energy. How great was this resentment energy?”

He rose again and walked to the coffin, crouching down, his palm falling on Yan Sanhe’s face.

Instantly, a massive black fog surged from the coffin, immediately engulfing him.

Xie Zhifei had been standing fine, but when the black fog emerged, his legs went soft and he collapsed into a chair.

Pei Xiao and Li Buyan looked at each other. Their hearts, which had just been pounding fiercely, suddenly stopped beating.

Mother of mine—this black fog was even larger and denser than Lord Zhu’s!

“Amitabha!”

After a Buddhist invocation, the black fog suddenly dispersed.

The old monk smiled self-deprecatingly.

“This black fog doesn’t match even one-thousandth of what appeared on the ninth day of the ninth month. That day when I placed my hand over her, black fog shrouded all of Penglai Island.

The larger the black fog, the deeper the resentment. This showed that though the girl was young, the matters in her heart were not small. So I opened an altar and calculated another divination…”

Pei Xiao asked urgently: “What did you calculate?”

The old monk: “I saw that the girl carried one hundred eighty wronged souls on her body.”

Not calculated.

Saw.

Pei Xiao looked at Xie Zhifei with trembling eyelids: Brother, tell me—just how blind was I before to think this old monk was a fraud?

Xie Zhifei paid no attention. His eyeballs didn’t move, staring fixedly at the person in the coffin.

No wonder she always said those one hundred eighty lives died because of her.

No wonder when Chen Pi died, when the two night watchmen died, each time someone died, she said another life was added to her account.

So—

These ten years, the one hundred eighty wronged souls of the Zheng family had been weighing heavily upon her body all along.

“M-Master.”

At this moment, Pei Xiao’s voice carried a sobbing tone: “One hundred eighty wronged souls—are they Yan Sanhe’s heart demon?”

The old monk: “Yes!”

Pei Xiao’s eyes widened: “Then why didn’t you conveniently help her resolve them?”

The old monk didn’t even glance at Lord Pei, only sighed faintly.

That sigh seemed to say: How did his parents give birth to such an idiot without being angered to death?

“Does Lord Pei know there’s a line in the Diamond Sutra: ‘Though I liberate immeasurable, countless, boundless sentient beings, in truth no sentient beings are liberated.'”

“I know.”

“What does this mean?”

“It means Buddha doesn’t save people—people save themselves.”

After Pei Xiao finished speaking, he froze. “You mean she must save herself?”

“Worldly people don’t know about cause and effect, but has cause and effect ever spared anyone? Every thought and impulse is a cause; what’s currently experienced is the effect.”

The old monk fingered his prayer beads several times.

“Her parents’ merit all fell upon her alone—this is her cause and effect. One hundred eighty wronged souls pressing upon her body—this is also her cause and effect.

People can’t just accept good causes and effects while wanting others to resolve bad causes and effects. Good and bad—she must bear them herself, and must bear them.

Moreover, Buddhist practitioners cannot interfere with others’ causes and effects. These causes and effects—she must seek them herself, resolve them herself.”

“So…”

Xie Zhifei, collapsed in the chair, struggled to sit up. “That’s why she went to help dead people transform obsessions and resolve demons?”

The old monk’s gaze was piercing as he looked at him, not answering but asking instead:

“She transforms dead people’s heart demons—isn’t it also transforming her own heart demons?

She seeks justice for others—isn’t it also seeking justice for herself?

She persuades others to let go—isn’t it also persuading herself to let go?”

Xie Zhifei was struck speechless. After a long while, he asked tremulously:

“Master, her ability to see what dead people thought and wanted before death, to enter the yin realm—did you teach her these things? And those heart demons one after another—did you also arrange…”

“Not so!”

The old monk sighed deeply.

“Her fate structure was already special, surrounded by three energies. Naturally she could see things ordinary people couldn’t see, could also enter the yin realm. These things—I didn’t need to teach her, she already knew them. As for those heart demons…”

The old monk’s gaze sharpened, looking at Xie Zhifei.

“Do you have some misunderstanding about me? I’m just a monk, not an immortal. How could I arrange this and arrange that for her?”

Xie Zhifei hesitated: “…Then it was…”

“Those were her tribulations.”

The old monk: “The heart demons she needed to resolve were her heart knots. Resolving knots means crossing tribulations. Only by crossing tribulation after tribulation could she resolve knot after knot.

Child, this is both her destiny and the path she must walk to recover her two ethereal souls and six corporeal souls. And you all…”

Us?

Everyone in the room had their hearts suddenly suspended.

“Without fate, there’s no gathering!”

The old monk slowly relaxed his brow.

“Among you, some came to form ties with her, some came to conclude ties with her. That’s all.”