Time turned back two hours.

Xuanzang sat quietly in the stone chamber, looking at Lu Luo with a calm expression, and asked, “Miss Lu Luo, would you have me stay or go?”

Boluoye stood to one side, holding his curved blade, watching Lu Luo with cold eyes. Lu Luo paid no attention, staring vacantly into some nameless distance, murmuring: “If you stay, can I keep your heart?”

“Since I entered the monastic life, my meditative heart has been offered to the Great Way of our Buddha,” Xuanzang said softly.

“If you go, will your heart go with you?”

Xuanzang did not answer, reciting Buddhist sutras under his breath.

Lu Luo gave a desolate smile. “Father cares about his reputation for posterity; Fa Ya cares about the politics of the state; you care about the Great Way of Rulai. But for me, all that matters is whether Xuanzang-ge will stay or go — whether he will remain in this world of mortal dust and grow old alongside me. I am a simple woman, incapable of the lofty aspirations the rest of you possess — just as my stepfather cares only for my mother, and my mother cares only for my birth father. We are alike in this. Yet you and I are from two different worlds. Xuanzang-ge, and yet I have fallen in love with you — fallen in love with someone from another world. Tell me, what am I to do?”

“Amitabha, Miss Lu Luo…” Xuanzang wanted to say something but did not know what to say, and could only smile bitterly and recite a name of the Buddha in reply — offering nothing but endless, boundless silence.

“Xuanzang-ge, I lost my father when I was young. Though I know now that he is still alive, in those years he gave me not the slightest warmth or love. Do you know what hardships my mother and I faced after his death?” Lu Luo seemed to be reaching back into her memories. “My mother was a woman of the pleasure quarters. After Father married her, the Cui clan severed all ties with him. After Father’s death, my mother and I had no one to rely on — only the thirty mu of hereditary farmland Father had left behind. But we knew nothing of farming; when we rented it out, the rent we collected was barely enough to feed ourselves. In those days, do you know how frightened I was? Though I was alive in this mortal world, I felt as though I were a single solitary person, standing naked on an open plain. At the time I was nearly ten years old, and my mother told me: a woman’s only path is to marry someone who loves her, to face together all the hardships and sufferings of life. I too was imagining what kind of person I would one day fall in love with. I did not know who he would be, but I knew that he would bring me peace, bring me warmth, and leave me no longer afraid of this world…”

Lu Luo spoke on in her murmur, and neither Xuanzang nor Boluoye interrupted her. Both looked upon her with pity. This girl’s life story, how pitiable — her inner suffering, how intense — neither had imagined it.

“Xuanzang-ge, do you think I am vicious? I tried to murder you three times. You might think me cold and heartless — like some demon woman. Boluoye has always called me his little demoness. But do you know why I wanted to kill you? It was because your face terrified me. Every time I saw you, I was reminded of that terrible night — that strange, sinister monk who came to claim my father’s life. Only by killing you would I feel at peace. How could I have fallen in love with you?” Her face carried a faint smile, as though she had sunk into some sweet memory.

“Do you remember that night, after I killed Kong Cheng and was left dazed and disoriented, burning with a high fever through the night — and you sat at the edge of my bed and recited sutras? It was only then that I truly looked at you up close, and discovered you were not the man who had terrified me at all. On the contrary, your voice brought me peace and drew me in as if in a dream. You seemed to never grow angry no matter what happened, never became anxious, never showed fear. You seemed to see through everything, yet without any arrogance or desire to wound others’ pride. Xuanzang-ge, do you know — I have been waiting for you my entire life…”

Xuanzang glanced at Boluoye and hurriedly cleared his throat to cut her off: “Miss Lu Luo, I am grateful for your kindness, but for me, no love or affection in this world has ever entered my eyes, nor will any leave so much as a grain of dust in my heart. If you are willing, I shall take my leave now.”

Tears sprang unbounded from Lu Luo’s eyes at last, and she choked with grief, unable to speak. Before Fa Ya left, he had deliberately placed Lu Luo’s curved bow within easy reach at her side. But Lu Luo did not so much as glance at it.

“If you wish to kill me, simply send an arrow into my back,” Xuanzang said with a bitter smile. “Killing me would be to save your father — I would not blame you.”

Boluoye gave him a sharp tug, and the two of them walked side by side back toward the tunnel by which they had come.

Lu Luo’s choked voice followed from behind them: “Go then, if you’re going! Do you truly think I could bear to kill you?”

Xuanzang’s steps faltered, and then Boluoye dragged him forward and out. Lu Luo watched the backs of the two disappearing figures, and then suddenly buried her face against the seat and burst into wretched, uncontrollable sobbing.

How long she wept, she could not have said, when suddenly an aged voice spoke: “It seems the person who understands you least is actually your own father.”

Lu Luo’s head snapped up, and she saw Fa Ya standing at her side, his face full of compassion. Lu Luo wiped her eyes and said coldly, “What do you mean?”

“Not everyone in this world is willing to sacrifice the happiness before them for some distant and lofty goal,” Fa Ya said. “Unfortunately, your father’s mistake was that he thought of you as being just like himself. In truth, old monk that I am, I knew all along that you would not be able to bring yourself to kill Xuanzang. He is a man of extraordinary appeal — both for you and for old me.”

“Then why did you still ask me to kill him?” Lu Luo demanded.

Fa Ya smiled bitterly. “Your father was too stubborn — he believed Xuanzang had deceived you and was determined to kill him. But this old monk had been entrusted to keep Xuanzang alive, no matter what. And so the two of us made a wager: we let you decide whether to kill him or not, the choice was entirely your own, and this old monk did not interfere in the slightest.”

“He truly does not know me…” Lu Luo gave a wan smile and said, “Take me to see Father. I have… not seen him all these years.”

“Your father…” Fa Ya hesitated, and after a long moment said, “Your father is at this very moment at the most crucial juncture of his life. If he succeeds, all will go smoothly; if he fails, all will be lost. Very well —” A brilliant light shone from the old monk’s eyes. “Old monk will let you witness with your own eyes the greatest miracle the world has ever seen, and the greatest plan that has ever existed in all of history!”

In that instant, Fa Ya’s breast burned with heat, and he felt as if his whole person were ablaze. Fifty years of meditative cultivation had reduced his heart to something as still as dead wood and solid stone, but now, seeing the grand plan of his lifetime on the verge of fruition, he was filled with exhilaration, and a desire to show it off arose in him. He wanted to take Lu Luo to witness this unprecedented great achievement — this grand scheme, the likes of which heaven and earth had never seen.

Fa Ya immediately led Lu Luo out of the stone chamber and into a tunnel. They followed the steps ascending inside it for several hundred zhang, until they came upon an iron cage large enough to sit in, with thick cables attached to the top. Fa Ya stepped inside, gestured for Lu Luo to follow, then shut the door and shook a bell once. The cables instantly went taut, and the cage began to rise slowly — above was a straight vertical shaft, like the inside of a well. The edges of the cage scraped against the stone walls, producing a sharp, grating screech. Lu Luo could not help covering her ears.

After half an hour of torment, the cage finally emerged from the shaft. They were at the midpoint of a mountain. All around, a chill wind howled mournfully, with strange clouds coiling about. The mountain bore neither grass nor tree — only dripping, dark grey rock on all sides. And right beside them stood four ghost soldiers, wearing grotesque masks and gripping straight-bladed swords!

These ghost soldiers were clearly more capable than those who had guarded the stone chamber below — each one with an icy, sharp gaze, keenly alert. Seeing that it was Fa Ya who had arrived, they bowed, but still kept their eyes fixed on Lu Luo for a long while.

“What place is this?” Lu Luo was deeply puzzled. This place was far too strange.

“The Underworld — Yinshan,” Fa Ya said with a smile.

“What?” Lu Luo was thunderstruck.

Fa Ya looked at her with profound meaning. “You have now left the mortal realm. This is a sacred place of the Underworld. These four are ghost soldiers of the Underworld.”

Lu Luo was completely dumbfounded — it was almost as if she were in a dream. She bit down hard on the tip of her tongue, and terror instantly filled her wide eyes — the tip of her tongue felt nothing. Not satisfied, she pinched her arm hard, and that left her utterly stupefied — her arm felt nothing either.

Fa Ya burst out laughing. “Little girl, don’t be alarmed. Feel your body — does it have any warmth?”

Lu Luo had not noticed her body temperature when she pinched herself a moment ago, but now she reached out to feel it, and immediately wore a strange expression — her body was ice cold. Fa Ya said with a laugh: “What did old monk say and you didn’t believe him? When a living person enters the Underworld, naturally it is only the soul — your physical body is still in that stone chamber. Now then, follow old monk to the summit and have a look!”

Lu Luo followed Fa Ya in a daze, climbing the stone steps along the mountainside. The steps were steep and winding, and though the old monk was advanced in years, his legs were truly strong — he walked with a vigorous step that left Lu Luo far behind. Lu Luo was still in a fog, everything feeling like a dream. After another half hour, they finally scaled to the summit, and suddenly the view opened wide before her. An indescribable force of impact made her whole body tremble — this place turned out to be the interior of a caldera!

The high mountain ridges encircled the entire perimeter, and in the very center of the mountain range was a massive natural crater, forming a circular valley. On the cliffs surrounding the crater, rings of walkways spiraled downward all the way to the valley floor. Though the mountain above was dark, at the valley bottom blazed a roaring concentration of flames, encircling on all sides, making the entire sky above appear to be on fire.

Right at the center of the crater, a massive rotating disc revolved. The disc was assembled from over a hundred interlocking conveyor belts, moving in opposing directions, and bound upon them were countless human beings. Their four limbs were fixed by iron rings, their mouths propped open by four iron frames, and their tongues hooked by iron catches, with the other end fixed to the opposing belt. As the two belts rotated toward each other — with a sickening pop — the entire tongue was wrenched out, blood spraying in all directions, those people shuddering with agony throughout their bodies and screaming with a heartbreaking intensity. On the disc were fully hundreds and thousands of people, their shrieks rising together as thunderously as a crashing storm, shaking the soul.

Lu Luo had never witnessed so terrifying a scene, and nearly fell to the ground.

Fa Ya looked at her horrified expression and said with a smile, “Do you see? What lies before your eyes is the Eighteen Ni Li Prisons of the Underworld. No matter whether people were good or evil in the world above, they will face judgment in the Underworld after death, and those whose crimes are most extreme will be cast into these Eighteen Ni Li Prisons to suffer. The topmost level before you is named the Hell of the Torn Tongue.”

“The Eighteen… Ni Li Prisons…” Lu Luo murmured. “What… what does any of this have to do with my father?”

“Have you not heard that after your father’s death he entered the Underworld and serves there as the adjudicator of the Ni Li Prison?” Fa Ya said with a smile as he looked at her.

Lu Luo was bewildered. “Old monk, I naturally know of that legend — there is even a temple to Father on Huoshan. How could I not know? But… but didn’t you say Father is still alive? How could he truly have entered the Underworld and become some adjudicator?”

Fa Ya smiled faintly. “Little girl, let old monk ask you — where is the boundary between life and death?”

Lu Luo widened her eyes. “That is common knowledge — when a person stops breathing and life ceases, they are dead. If one still breathes and the pulse still beats, one is alive.”

“That is not right.” The old monk shook his head. “Let me ask you — a person who has had no news of you for decades, who has not appeared in your life. From your perspective, is that person dead or alive?”

Lu Luo thought for a moment, then shook her head. “I don’t know.”

“There you have it, then,” the old monk said with a sly smile. “Cui Jue, when he was in the mortal world, you could see him every day, hear him speak — from your perspective, he was naturally alive. When he entered the Underworld and could no longer communicate with the mortal world, from your perspective he was naturally dead. But now that you have entered the Underworld and see him again, he is alive once more.”

Lu Luo was confounded. The logic sounded reasonable, but the more she turned it over the more unreasonable it seemed — yet she could not quite say where the flaw was.

“The Eighteen Ni Li Prisons before your eyes — this is the greatest edifice your father has built in his entire life!” Fa Ya said no more on the subject, pointing at the Ni Li Prison underfoot. “And it is the greatest achievement of my entire life as well! In the tenth year of the Daye reign, after the Emperor Yang of the Sui dynasty failed in his third campaign against Goguryeo and the realm fell into turmoil with popular uprisings everywhere, old monk knew that the Sui dynasty’s hold on the realm would inevitably fracture and collapse. Then I traveled across the land, searching for the man who could unify the realm and bring this age of chaos to an end. The following year, I finally found that man — Li Yuan, who at the time served as Pacification Commissioner of Hedong Circuit. Old monk began to plan and assist in raising his troops to seize power and end the chaos. And indeed, my judgment proved sound — within two years of raising the army, we had successfully captured Chang’an and founded the Great Tang. Little girl, tell me — is old monk’s contribution great or not?”

Lu Luo thought for a moment and nodded. “Very great. Your ability to identify the Emperor Taishang from among so many rebel kings was astonishing. For the Great Tang, you are a first-tier founding contributor.”

“Wrong, wrong — completely and utterly wrong!” Fa Ya shook his head repeatedly. He sat down on a rounded stone and gestured for Lu Luo to sit beside him, then said, “Old monk made a mistake! Throughout all the years of my life, I have been known as a scheming monk, and whatever I calculated and measured never failed to come true. But in the single greatest matter of my life, old monk made an error. And that was in choosing Li Yuan!”

Lu Luo was startled. “Why is that?”

“Because his surname is Li!” Fa Ya said in a grave voice. “He is a man of Longxi Chengji — his ancestors were of the Xianbei people, and from the time of his great-grandfather Li Hu, the family claimed descent from the King of Liang, Li Gao, of the late Jin period. After the upheaval of the Five Barbarians, this lineage was difficult to verify, and old monk paid it no mind at the time. But the problem lay right there — after he became Emperor, Li Yuan actually claimed to be a descendant of the ancient sage Li Er!”

“Li Er?” Lu Luo asked in puzzlement. “Which Li Er?”

“Laozi! Old Laozi!” Fa Ya was somewhat exasperated. After a long sullen pause, he said, “Old monk never imagined they would be so shameless — though it is understandable, I suppose. The birth of a Son of Heaven must be attended by auspicious colored clouds, and how could the ancestral lineage not be illustrious? But this created a great calamity for old monk! The greatest achievement of my life became the unforgivable sin of my life!”

Lu Luo stared wide-eyed. “How so?”

She was burning with impatience inside — he was supposed to be talking about her father, yet this old monk kept talking about himself. But to extract secrets from this monk’s mouth, she had no choice but to endure it. Fortunately, this old monk’s manner of speaking was full of suspense, and each thread he pulled was enough to capture her attention — so at least she didn’t find it dull.

“Heh heh.” Fa Ya smiled bitterly. “Because Li Er was the founding patriarch of the Daoist school! If one’s own ancestor was the founding patriarch of Daoism, then how could the dynasty founded by his descendants not honor and uphold Daoism? Old monk had received the commission of Buddhist monasteries throughout the realm to find for this world a king who would end the chaos and bring blessings to all people — Li Yuan and Li Shimin both served this purpose admirably. The sole problem was that old monk had pushed a descendant of the Daoist patriarch onto the throne, thus establishing Daoism’s most formidable rival and creating a calamity of incalculable proportions for Buddhism!”

Lu Luo, even with her slower wits, now understood: the old monk had been entrusted by all the monasteries of the Buddhist faith to find an enlightened ruler who could end the chaos. He had indeed been capable, had found such a ruler, and had successfully brought the era of chaos to a close, establishing the magnificent Great Tang. The problem was that the one he had elevated claimed to be a descendant of the Daoist patriarch and would honor Daoism in return. For Buddhism, this was a case of all the bamboo in the basket being washed away in the river — but worse than that, the real crisis was that they had elevated their rival to an unassailable position, and with one misstep could face utter annihilation.

From Buddhism’s perspective, the crime Fa Ya had committed was enormous.

Lu Luo looked at this old monk — the one who claimed to calculate all things with not a hair’s breadth of error — and saw him sitting there with brow furrowed, face miserable. She wanted to laugh, but dared not laugh. This was truly…

“And so, old monk had no choice but to try and make amends.” Fa Ya noticed the laughter she was struggling to suppress and smiled bitterly in turn. “After racking my brain for years, I did manage to devise a grand plan.”

“What plan?” Lu Luo’s curiosity stirred. This catastrophic blunder had some means of remedy after all? Could it be that he was going to drag the Li family off the throne and replace them?

“Is not your Xuanzang-ge set on journeying west, all the way to the Bodhi Tree, to the Garden of the Solitary Garden, to seek the true scriptures of our Buddha? But old monk long ago obtained a copy of the true scriptures — and they are the Eighteen Ni Li Prisons before your eyes!” Fa Ya said with a mild smile.

“What?” Lu Luo raised her head and looked at the massive rotating disc in the crater, her face utterly uncomprehending.

“Buddhism has The Scripture of the Eighteen Ni Li Prisons as Spoken by the Buddha, describing all the terrifying scenes of the Underworld. It says that after the living die, they are judged according to the good and evil karma they accumulated in life — those with great good karma enter the higher three paths, those with great evil karma enter the lower three paths, and they will also suffer endless torment in the Ni Li Prisons. The many hair-raising passages therein are enough to make the virtuous quake and the evil-doers lose their souls. The common people, yes — but would the heart of the mortal emperor not also be shaken?”

The old monk smiled faintly and continued: “And so, old monk designed this Ni Li Prison and the entire Underworld, and arranged for the Son of Heaven of the Great Tang to come and tour it. Heh heh — to have him personally experience the sufferings of hell: first, so that he would know the great power of our Buddhist faith; second, so that he would know the great merit of our Buddhist faith in educating and civilizing the people; and third — with fear in his heart, he would be restrained in his actions, and even if he honored Li Er as his orthodox ancestor, he would not dare oppress our Buddhist faith too severely. In this way, the desire to venerate Buddhism would blaze throughout the realm, and all believers’ fates would be overshadowed by the Ni Li Prison — enough to preserve Buddhism’s fortune for a hundred, a thousand years to come!”

Lu Luo was completely overwhelmed. This old monk was truly terrifying. She could not begin to imagine how so frightening, so magnificent, so all-encompassing a plan could have come from within this withered and dried-up old head.

“Now, let us speak of your father.” Fa Ya smiled and said, “Your father is a man who respects Buddhism, yet proud of his own talents, he was determined to make a name for himself in the mortal world, and aspired to accomplish some magnificent and stirring achievement. Yet the world is unpredictable, and after the great victory at Huoyi, he was sidelined there in Huoyi, his grand ambitions thwarted. And so he was persuaded by me to take part in this plan, and to construct Xingtang Temple and this Ni Li Prison. At the outset, the expenditure of funds and provisions was so great that it drew the attention of the court — and since the surface structures were already complete, it was necessary for him to remain stationed underground full-time to supervise the construction. So he faked his death, and these many years has remained here in hiding, overseeing the construction of this Ni Li Prison.”

Only now did Lu Luo understand the circumstances of her father’s faked death, and anger surged within her: “And it was because of building this structure that he abandoned me and my mother, leaving us as mother and fatherless child with no one to rely on? Even if he faked his death, had he privately sent us a word of it, we would not have suffered to the extent we did.”

“Would he dare? What he was doing — if any crack appeared in the plan, it meant death by a thousand cuts and the extermination of his entire family. He did not care about his own life or death, but did he also not care about yours and your mother’s lives?” Fa Ya said with a cold laugh. “Little girl, old monk tells you things and you don’t believe them — look at the walkways of the Ni Li Prison and tell me — who is that?”

Lu Luo suppressed her anger and strained her eyes to look into the distance. Viewed from the mountain above, the faces of people on the walkways were too small and indistinct to make out clearly, but generally still visible. Only two figures were on the walkways, walking side by side, talking as they descended. One glance was enough for her to see that the man in black robes, that figure, that bearing — it was identical to her father in her memory.

“That is my father!” Lu Luo cried out.

“Correct.” The old monk smiled. “That is indeed your father Cui Jue. Now look at the one beside him.”

Lu Luo opened her eyes wide and peered carefully. That man was slightly younger than Cui Jue, and his face was not clearly discernible, but on his head he wore an imperial crown, and his yellow robes were woven with golden thread that flickered and flashed in the firelight.

Lu Luo’s face gradually turned ashen. In this world, there was only one person who dared wear such attire — the Son of Heaven of the Great Tang!

“That is… the current Son of Heaven…” Lu Luo said in a trembling voice.

Fa Ya nodded. “It is indeed Li Shimin. Your father is now, in the capacity of adjudicator of the Underworld, accompanying him on a tour of the Eighteen Ni Li Prisons. He believes his soul has been summoned here — exactly the same as you a moment ago.”

“How can he truly believe it?” Lu Luo had long since stopped believing this was really the Underworld, and seeing Li Shimin believe it, she was somewhat bewildered.

“Did you not believe it just a moment ago? Why could he not believe it?” Fa Ya said with a smile. “You pinched yourself and felt no pain; you bit the tip of your tongue and felt no pain; you touched your body and found it ice cold — just that alone was enough to make you believe you were in the Underworld. And old monk put a hundred times more work into Li Shimin than he did into you?”

When he put it that way, Lu Luo had no more doubts. Indeed, it was so realistic — anyone would have believed it.

Just at that moment, Lu Luo suddenly gave a cry of surprise. There, flashing across the mountain path that circled the caldera, were two figures!

They were sprinting downward at great speed. In the light of the Ni Li Prison’s flames, the gleaming bare crown of one of them was unmistakably conspicuous, and the white headband wrapped around the forehead of the other was equally striking. Lu Luo cried out in a startled voice: “It’s Xuanzang-ge and Boluoye!”

Fa Ya also saw them, and his face changed dramatically. He shot up from the rounded stone, his face contorted with a vicious expression: “They’re going to reach Li Shimin! This Boluoye is a secret agent of the Bu Liang Ren — they absolutely cannot be allowed to reach the Emperor!”

Fa Ya had received instructions from Master Xuancheng and truly did not want to kill Xuanzang. Besides, the stone chamber was situated beneath the Eighteen Ni Li Prisons, with tunnels running in every direction — dense as a spider’s web — and key junctions further guarded by armored soldiers. Even if he let them go, they would not be able to reach any critical location. He had planned for every contingency — yet a single moment’s mercy had been his undoing, for he had never expected Xuanzang and Boluoye to possess such extraordinary ability, not only escaping from the area around the Nine Dragon Junction but actually finding their way into the Eighteen Ni Li Prisons!

In that instant, cold sweat drenched Fa Ya’s head. If these two truly reached Li Shimin and laid out his entire plan, a man as intelligent as Li Shimin would have no difficulty seeing through the conspiracy within. The Underworld he had spent ten years building, at the cost of untold funds, provisions, and lives, would collapse entirely. Worse still, how the entire Buddhist faith would pay for this in the Emperor’s fury was something he barely dared to imagine.

“Quickly — go stop them! Cut them down on sight!” Fa Ya summoned the ghost soldiers standing nearby and bellowed the order.

The four ghost soldiers drew their straight swords and sprinted off. But they were too far away, and the mountain paths were rugged and difficult to traverse, while Xuanzang and Boluoye were running at full speed — how could the soldiers possibly catch up in time?

In the midst of his panic, Fa Ya caught sight of the curved bow on Lu Luo’s back. His voice dropped: “Little girl, you know what this moment means. If Xuanzang and Boluoye reach the Emperor, your father and old monk will be lucky if we each die only once — and beyond that, thousands upon thousands of people in this world will lose their heads. Whether or not to kill him rests entirely on a single thought of yours.”

Lu Luo was frozen in place. Thoughts raced through her mind in an instant: Xuanzang-ge… must I truly kill him? But if I don’t, Father’s life’s great plan will be completely ruined. He has labored so bitterly underground for seven years, all for this very day — can I bear to let all his life’s work come to nothing?

In that single instant, the young woman’s mind turned through thousands and thousands of revolutions, and at last she gave a sorrowful laugh: “Enough. Enough. I will kill him and then follow him in death — that is still better than enduring the endless suffering of this mortal world. And if there truly is a Underworld after death, I will spend all of eternity at your side!”

She reached out her arm, drew the curved bow from her back, fitted a steel-headed arrow to the string, and slowly drew back the bowstring…

They say even the wisest make mistakes in a thousand schemes, just as Fa Ya was known as a scheming monk who calculated all things with not a hair’s breadth of error — yet he had only thought to inquire about the Li family surname after already elevating Li Yuan to the throne. The wonderful, strange workings of the world sometimes truly are dictated by a kind of invisible fate. Fa Ya had been certain that the network of tunnels throughout the Nine Dragon Junction area was too intricate and complex for Xuanzang to possibly escape, let alone find his way to any critical location. What he did not know was that when Xuanzang had once slipped into Kong Cheng’s meditation room, he had obtained a scroll titled The Engineering and Construction Record of Xingtang Temple!

At first, things had indeed proceeded exactly as Fa Ya anticipated — after leaving that stone chamber, the two of them wandered like headless flies, quickly losing themselves in the maze of crisscrossing tunnels. But then Xuanzang suddenly remembered the scroll of The Engineering and Construction Record he carried on him, and in a flash of inspiration took it out. The two of them studied it carefully. Having spent some time in the underground space, they were reasonably familiar with the general layout. The Nine Dragon Junction was the power hub of the entire underground complex, and naturally it was shown in detailed diagrams in the record. The environment of this place was distinctive, and they located it quickly enough — yet the eighteen disc-shaped structures above the Nine Dragon Junction were beyond their comprehension. But since they were above the Nine Dragon Junction, there had to be pathways leading upward. And so the two searched and groped their way through the dense tangle of solid lines, dotted lines, and curved lines in the diagram. No one could say how much time they spent or how many wrong turns they took — Boluoye had also knocked out seven or eight guards along the way — but at last the two emerged from a concealed passage. And the moment they stuck their heads out, both were stunned into silence — they found themselves on the side of the mountain, halfway up.

And then came a fear that cut to the very marrow, combined with utter awe.

The structure before them was simply too immense. It had filled the interior of the entire caldera almost to the brim, and the vast rotating disc seemed to extend without limit — standing beside it, one felt no larger than an ant. Only now did they understand what the iron pillar above the Nine Dragon Junction had been for: to drive the rotating, layer upon layer of discs inside the crater!

“What is this place?” Boluoye asked, his ears filled with screaming. The people strapped to the conveyor belts, being subjected to the punishment of having their tongues torn out, were screaming in heart-rending agony, and even this court secret agent felt cold to the bone.

Xuanzang stared in horror. What horrified him was not only the miserable state of these people — his learning was deep, and he almost instantly matched what he was seeing against the descriptions of the Eighteen Ni Li Prisons in Buddhist scripture. In the single instant he saw Cui Jue and Li Shimin, Xuanzang understood the core of this entire plan: intimidating the emperor and controlling the human heart!

“Damn it — so that’s why we ran into so many prisoners in those cages. They were being tortured to death here all along!” Boluoye seethed with rage.

Xuanzang’s heart was also filled with fury. Fa Ya and Cui Jue were truly deplorable — could they really consign all these people to be tortured to death for the sake of some mad scheme? The ultimate goal of the Buddhist faith is to deliver all sentient beings, and even if the plan could truly achieve its aims, sacrificing so many innocent lives for that goal is contrary to Buddhist teaching and a negation of human nature. What difference, in the end, did they have from demons?

The two of them burned with indignation, and seeing Li Shimin and Cui Jue making their way further down the walkway, Xuanzang could not help but call out in a loud voice: “Your Majesty, do not go further down—”

With those words, the two began to sprint down the mountain. The terrain was steep and they no longer cared — they simply let themselves roll and tumble, and in no time their clothes were in shreds, their heads cut open and bleeding. Li Shimin and Cui Jue stood stock still, staring at them.

As they ran, Boluoye suddenly heard a sharp whistling sound behind him in the air. He spun around, and his heart nearly stopped — a bolt of lightning seemed to streak through the air and shoot toward Xuanzang’s back!

“Dharma Master — look out—” Boluoye bellowed, and flung himself bodily forward. That lightning bolt arrived in an instant and struck Boluoye heavily in the back. Such a steel-tipped battle arrow — how could its force not be devastating. With a sickening thud, the arrow almost shot clean through Boluoye’s body!

Xuanzang, knocked down by Boluoye’s tackle, sent both of them rolling down the slope, where they struck heavily against the rocks of a level outcropping. Xuanzang’s head was cut open and bleeding, but he had no time to check his own injuries. He looked at Boluoye and was instantly stricken — the arrow had entered from Boluoye’s back, lodging directly in his heart.

“Boluoye—” Xuanzang cried out. His bond with this Tianzhu servant he had “picked up” along the road ran very deep — the two had been together for more than half a year, nearly inseparable. Boluoye had cared for Xuanzang in every detail. Through him, Xuanzang had also learned a great deal about the customs and conditions of the Western Regions and Tianzhu, and had even learned Sanskrit to a considerable degree. Even later, when Xuanzang discovered Boluoye carried secrets, he could not bring himself to expose them. And now, to save him, this court secret agent had willingly given his life — how could Xuanzang not grieve?

“Dharma Master…” Boluoye lay in his arms, and yet a smile came to his face. “I am going to… die… aren’t I?”

His halting, broken speech suddenly brought to Xuanzang’s mind memories of their earlier days. At that time, to conceal his origins, Boluoye had always spoken this way; it was only after his identity was exposed that he began to speak fluently, and Xuanzang had actually found it somewhat hard to get used to. But this time, he was no longer pretending.

“No, no you won’t! You won’t!” Xuanzang began to tear open Boluoye’s clothing in a flurry of motion, trying to staunch the bleeding. When his hands touched the wound, the blood welling out soaked them instantly.

“I know… I am going to die…” Boluoye was gasping with great heaves of breath, and yet a look of tranquility came over his face. “Dharma Master… do you know… the thing I am most guilty about… in my entire life… is that I deceived you…”

“No, no!” Xuanzang wept freely, holding him tightly and sobbing. “You acted according to your mission. I never blamed you for a moment.”

“But I… I deceived a monk… After death I will go to… the Ni Li Prison… I will be… reborn in the path of animals…”

“You won’t! You won’t! We are friends, and I wanted you to deceive me — I was glad you did,” Xuanzang wept. “I will recite The Sutra of the Great Vows of Ksitigarbha Bodhisattva every single day, so that you will not suffer any pain at all, and in your next life you will be reborn as a human being, return to your homeland, and become a high-born Brahmin!”

Boluoye’s eyes flashed with light, then he countered weakly: “I do not… want to be… a Brahmin. I want to be… a Kshatriya…”

“Very well, very well — we shall be Kshatriya!” Xuanzang’s heart ached with grief as he murmured, “On my journey west to Tianzhu, when I meet your King Harsha, I will ask him to restore your father’s honor and let your family gain glory through you!”

“Truly?” Boluoye’s spirit lifted, and he gripped Xuanzang’s hand tightly with both of his, his eyes filled with hope. His family had originally been Vaishya merchants of Central Tianzhu, but they had been falsely accused of privately trading with South Tianzhu and selling weapons to the enemy state. King Harsha flew into a rage and had the entire family stripped of everything, reducing them all to lowly commoners. Boluoye’s father had taken him and fled in a long journey, coming to the Central Plains via the Western Regions.

Though his father had died of illness, the bitter fate of his family was an eternal thorn in Boluoye’s heart. He knew that Xuanzang was going to Tianzhu, and had even greater faith in Xuanzang’s personal power. Now that this promise had been made, how could he not be glad?

“I entrust you with this, Dharma Master…” Tears slowly welled in Boluoye’s eyes, and he gripped Xuanzang’s hand tightly, unwilling to let go.

Xuanzang wept freely. The light in Boluoye’s eyes slowly faded, and suddenly his hand tightened: “Dharma Master…”

“I am here!” Xuanzang pressed his ear to Boluoye’s lips. Boluoye, his eyes open but vacant, murmured haltingly: “What Fa Ya has done… is evil, yes… and yet in this mortal world… it has great merit… Dharma Master, you may judge… for yourself…”

Xuanzang was startled, and then suddenly felt a weight upon his arm — Boluoye closed his eyes, and passed away.

Xuanzang sat stunned for a long moment. In the midst of his grief, he turned Boluoye’s words over carefully in his mind: In this mortal world, it has great merit? He thought, Does this mean that the common masses, the ordinary people, can only be kept to goodness through intimidation and threat? He slowly raised his head, saw Li Shimin standing in the distance, and his heart gave a jolt. The common people, yes, they may be controlled and intimidated by those in power. But what of the Emperor himself? Who is to intimidate him?

Xuanzang sank into deep thought. He placed Boluoye on the ground, removed his own monk’s robe and draped it over the body, then slowly rose to his feet.

“Halt!” An arrow embedded itself at his feet.

Xuanzang turned and looked. He saw the fear on Fa Ya’s face, and the trembling curved bow in Lu Luo’s hands. He smiled with quiet sorrow and walked, one step at a time, toward Li Shimin.

“Halt!” Another arrow shot into the ground at his feet. Xuanzang took no notice, and continued his heavy-footed advance.

No more arrows came. On the hillside, Lu Luo stood with bow in hand, an arrow nocked to the string, as if turned to stone.

The four ghost soldiers had by now reached Xuanzang’s back, and raised their blades viciously, ready to hack down. Lu Luo gave a cold laugh, and with a single motion loosened her fingers — with a sharp twang the arrow shot forward like lightning, and one ghost soldier screamed and fell, struck down dead. Before the other three ghost soldiers could react, Lu Luo calmly fitted another arrow. Twang twang twang — three arrows in quick succession, and all three were shot dead.

“What is the meaning of this?” Fa Ya demanded in a fury.

Lu Luo said coldly, “Xuanzang-ge can only die at my hands — no one else is worthy of killing him!”

“Then why didn’t you kill him?” Fa Ya asked with a darkened face.

“I changed my mind,” Lu Luo said with quiet sorrow. “Isn’t a woman always changing her mind? I love this man — one moment I want nothing more than to kill him, and the next moment I find him dear and precious.”

Fa Ya was left speechless.