At the far end of the ruins, an ancient temple came into view — silent, still, and small in scale, with nothing about it that could be called grand or imposing. Just a single ancient hall, with a stone Buddha standing inside, draped in a thick layer of dust, and beside it a bronze oil lamp swaying with a faint, flickering glow.
Beside the ancient temple stood a vigorous, aged Bodhi tree — so wide around that six or seven people with linked arms could not encompass it. The ancient trunk had hollowed out at its core. Were it not for the five or six gleaming green leaves still dotting its branches, the entire ancient tree would look as though it had long since died.
The ancient temple and the Bodhi tree stood side by side, steeped in an air of ancient timelessness, giving one a sensation of dim light and shifting ages, of time’s passage — filling the heart with boundless tranquility and a sense of deep antiquity.
Coming to stand here, everyone was unable to conceal the wonder on their faces. The magnificent and sprawling palace complex behind them had long since crumbled to ruin, yet this single small ancient temple still stood and endured — evoking a feeling of returning to simplicity, to the genuinely true.
“How can such a temple exist here?”
“The last few remaining leaves of that ancient Bodhi tree are actually shimmering with a translucent green radiance!”
The Bodhi tree is very nearly synonymous with the sacred tree of Buddhism, its ties to the faith running extraordinarily deep. According to legend, over two thousand five hundred years ago, Shakyamuni attained perfect enlightenment beneath an ancient Bodhi tree, achieving the status of Buddha.
The ancient Bodhi tree and the ancient temple standing side by side before them — both bearing unmistakable signs of the extraordinary — filled every observer with unavoidable wonder.
“Why does it feel to me as though a river of history is flowing past? Everything before my eyes seems impossibly ancient — as if it has passed through the very sediment of time.”
The fifty-meter distance was short, and the group was soon standing close. Each person felt a strange sensation rise within them — what they saw before them was like an aged, worn historical scroll, with the very breath of time drifting through it.
“Can this be a temple where a deity once dwelled?”
“Can there truly be a Buddha in this world? Though this ancient temple has fallen into ruin, it still radiates that sense of serenity and calm — the quiet realm of Zen.”
The ancient temple was absolutely silent. This place was utterly at peace.
“There’s a bronze plaque over there. There are characters on it.”
The weathered ancient temple had a rust-mottled bronze plaque, upon which four ancient characters were engraved, writhing like coiling dragons and serpents, suffused with boundless Zen essence. Again it was complex, difficult-to-read bronze inscription script — though the first character, “Great,” was easy enough to make out, recognizable even to many who had no knowledge of the old script.
“The last character is ‘Temple.'” Zhou Yi had a certain familiarity with bronze inscription script and identified the final character.
“These four characters read ‘Great Thunder Sound Temple.'” At that moment, Ye Fan read out all four characters aloud.
Everyone present was stunned without exception, every face showing an expression of utter disbelief.
“Great Thunder Sound Temple… I can’t have heard that wrong?!”
“How can this be possible…”
In legend, the Great Thunder Sound Temple was the dwelling place of the Buddha — the supreme sacred ground of Buddhism. Yet this decrepit ancient temple before them was so small and modest, with not a trace of grandeur or imposing presence — just a single ancient hall. How could something like this bear the name Great Thunder Sound Temple?
Having personally witnessed nine Dragon Corpses pulling a coffin, the group had long since mentally prepared themselves, and nearly believed in the existence of divine beings. Yet even now, there was no suppressing the shock — an ancient temple on Mars bearing the name Great Thunder Sound Temple. What could this mean? Perhaps many historical accounts and legends would need to be reinterpreted, and a corner of the veiled mystery of vanished ancient history might be about to be lifted.
“The sound of the Buddha’s voice, resonating like a thunderclap.” — That is the Great Thunder Sound Temple.
Could the ancient temple before their eyes truly be the legendary temple of the same name?
If the speculation were correct, the implications would be staggering beyond measure. On the surface of Mars, where reddish-brown soil and gravel blanketed the land, an ancient temple lay blanketed in dust — possessing origins that would shake the world.
The more everyone studied the ancient temple, the more they felt there was something extraordinary about it.
The Celestial Palace behind them — how towering, vast, and magnificent it must once have been. Yet in the end it was destroyed, leaving nothing but a ground full of rubble. This ancient temple, worn and dilapidated as it appeared, still stood unyielding — forming a strange and striking contrast.
A Bodhi tree for company. A blue-flame lamp before an ancient Buddha. A single pinprick of light.
Plain and simple. Clean and still. It had withstood the grinding test of time, and what endured was what was “real” — what was extravagant and showy was nothing but a fleeting cloud before the eye.
One lamp. One Buddha. One temple. One tree. As though timeless, as though unchanging since the beginning — enduring in this world.
All of it together — peaceful and serene — made one feel as though bathed in a warm spring breeze, as though a faint, drifting Zen chant had begun to rise.
“If this truly is the legendary Great Thunder Sound Temple, could the ancient tree standing before the temple possibly be the very same Bodhi tree beneath which Shakyamuni attained enlightenment?”
“That’s impossible — it’s nothing but a religious legend. Do you truly believe that Shakyamuni, two thousand five hundred years ago, sat for seven days and seven nights beneath an ancient tree on Mars and attained Buddhahood?”
“Given everything we’ve experienced and been through, nothing is impossible!”
Everything the group had gone through that day made them feel as though they were dreaming — yet it was all an iron-hard reality.
At that moment, Ye Fan suddenly walked forward. Pang Bo walked alongside him. The two stepped directly into the ancient temple. At the same time, Zhou Yi quickened his pace and followed, with Wang Ziwen close behind — both entering the ancient temple as well.
Behind them, Liu Yinzhi seemed to realize something, his expression suddenly shifting as he rushed forward. The others snapped out of their daze as well. If this place truly was the Great Thunder Sound Temple of legend, then within it lay the former dwelling of a divine being. Though it had long since fallen to ruin and been coated in a thick layer of dust, it remained a place of extraordinary significance — there might be artifacts left behind by a divine being!
The ancient temple was small — nothing but a single Buddha hall, sparse and empty, with almost nothing in it. Ye Fan walked straight to the stone Buddha and reached out to grab the bronze oil lamp standing beside it.
The bronze lamp was plain and ordinary in appearance, its style simple and archaic. Yet the moment it was in hand, it felt warm to the touch — not with the cold hardness of metal at all, more like gripping a piece of warm jade. What was astonishing was that though the ancient temple was thick with dust, the bronze oil lamp was utterly free of it — as though it could repel dust entirely.
This temple had clearly gone without cleaning for many years, with dust having settled into a thick layer everywhere. Yet the ancient lamp could fend off dust and had remained perpetually lit — it filled Ye Fan with a sense of deep wonder. Could it truly have been burning without ceasing all the way from that distant ancient age until now?
“Truly spotless — nothing remains here but the stone Buddha and the bronze lamp.” Pang Bo swept his gaze around, disappointed to find no other objects.
At that moment, Zhou Yi — who had entered just behind the two of them — put his foot down on the thick layer of dust and with a loud clang, kicked out a small bowl.
At the same moment, Liu Yinzhi and the others also entered the ancient temple, all of them silent, searching quietly.
At first, the group had not been able to escape their habitual way of thinking, continuing to regard the ancient temple with wonder and uncertainty using the same mindset they had carried when still on Earth. It was only when Ye Fan was the first to take action that they suddenly realized — they were now on another planet entirely, standing before a temple that was very possibly the legendary dwelling place of the Buddha. Artifacts left behind by divine beings might actually exist here!
Inside the ancient temple, Ye Fan held the dust-free bronze lamp, its soft, gentle glow cascading down, filling the hall with flowing light.
Suddenly, Ye Fan heard a sound — faint as the edge of existence — like a Zen chant carrying in from beyond the sky. At first, he thought it was a hallucination, but the sound of the Buddhist scripture gradually grew in grandeur, reverberating throughout the entire ancient temple, resonating like the great bell and bronze chime — solemn, vast, profound, and mysterious.
Then, all at once, every trace of dust within the ancient temple retreated and vanished — pure and unsoiled, absolutely clean. And the six-syllable true mantra rang out: “Om, Ma, Ni, Pad, Me, Hum…”