Chapter 27 Incense Ash

When Shipantuo stumbled and pushed open his master's meditation room, he saw the monk had already closed his eyes completely and departed from this world. Zhang, the former bandit who had toughened up in the chaotic borderlands, opened his mouth, as if he had lost his spirit in that instant.

He cried like a helpless child.

In the palace, Li Zhi, the third emperor of the Great Tang, learned of the passing of the venerable Xuanzang.

The emperor was stunned.

Under his rule, the Tang Empire had reached its greatest extent. When the emperor went to perform the Feng and Shan sacrifices, the leaders of countries from Goryeo in the east to Persia and Uchang in the west had to attend respectfully as his subjects.

At that time, Li Zhi, who had not yet fallen seriously ill, suspended court for several days and left behind a sixteen-character lament.

*The sea of suffering is vast, the boat suddenly sinks; the dark room is still dim, the lamp is extinguished.*

"Your Majesty, how should the Master's remains be handled?"

Empress Wu Meiniang asked gently.

Li Zhi rubbed his brow and said, "That Chen surname swordsman submitted a memorial on behalf of Xuanzang, hoping to wrap his body in the simplest way and place it in a secluded place. Let us grant his wish."

"The Chen surname swordsman..."

Wu Meiniang murmured a few times and reached out to massage Li Zhi's shoulders.

"Death is a great matter. How can the Master, with such great merit and virtue, be treated so crudely?"

"The empire conquered the Western Regions, and the Master also made great contributions. Wouldn't this lead the ministers to mistakenly believe that Your Majesty's rewards and punishments are unfair? His remains should be brought to Chang'an to inform the world of Your Majesty's sorrow, so that the people of the world may know that Your Majesty has his own rewards for meritorious ministers, in order to win their hearts."

Li Zhi pondered slightly and said, "Let it be as the Empress says."

Therefore, when the swordsman was about to bury Xuanzang, the Imperial Guard Xuanjia Army from Chang'an appeared at Yuhua Temple. No one knew who had ordered the deployment of a thousand Xuanjia soldiers in formation. This almost represented the most elite thousand armored warriors in the entire world.

Everyone thought that this was to highlight the imperial family's respect for the great Master Xuanzang.

Shipantuo desperately held onto the swordsman, preventing him from drawing his sword. The swordsman, with bloodshot eyes, watched Xuanzang being taken to Ci'en Temple in Chang'an. He held no sword in his hand, but in the void, it seemed as if ten thousand swords were screaming.

And the swordsman, who had not entered Chang'an for several years after that incident, finally stepped into this city.

During this time, more than three thousand people came to Chang'an every day to mourn this legend of the Great Tang, a true Buddhist practitioner whose body did not decay, becoming a *sharira*. On one day during curfew, even the Emperor and Empress of the Great Tang came to Ci'en Temple.

The Empress temporarily left the Emperor and took a stroll in Ci'en Temple.

Finally, she stood in front of the Xuanzang *sharira* pagoda. In front of this newly built pagoda, the swordsman, dressed in white linen, sat quietly. In his youth, the swordsman was unrestrained and unruly, with long hair as free as a ponytail. But now, the swordsman's first sword was buried with a foreign king, and the second sword accompanied his friend out of this world. Dressed in white, his hair was tied up with a hairpin.

It was just past the first month, and the spring chill was still biting.

The Empress dismissed those around her and said softly, "...Brother Chen, are you well?"

"The dead cannot be brought back to life. Please, take care."

The swordsman sat quietly.

Wu Zetian said softly, "Brother Chen, do you really not want to talk to me anymore?"

"Brother Chen, please turn around and look at me."

"Brother Chen..."

On this day, it snowed. Finally, the shoulders of the Empress of the Great Tang were covered with white snow. She said:

"Chen Yuan, this Empress orders you!"

"Turn around!"

The swordsman raised his eyes and turned around, but his eyes were no longer focused. His voice was hoarse:

"...Your Majesty respects Xuanzang very much. Was it you who had Xuanzang's remains brought back?"

The Empress said softly, "This Empress just wanted to see you again."

The imperial family's affection was too heavy, too domineering.

The swordsman said calmly, "Chen Yuan greets the Empress."

"In Chen's eyes..."

"There is only Buddha."

The Empress took a deep look at the swordsman who did not look at her at all, and left with a flick of her sleeves.

But, what is Buddha?

When Shipantuo hurriedly came to find the swordsman with clothes, Chen Yuan was covered in white snow. The more than sixty-year-old former bandit quickly wiped the snow off the swordsman's body with his sleeves, worried that the latter, who was not young, would also fall ill. He tried hard to wipe it away, cleaning the snow on his clothes, but the snow on his head could never be wiped clean.

It was as if it was branded on it. The swordsman, whose cultivation was the best of his time, had turned white-haired in the blink of an eye.

Young and frivolous, unrestrained and arrogant, with a sword in hand, daring to overturn the world.

But now, past middle age, sad and painful, with broken swords and lost friends, he finally knew the vicissitudes of the Great Dao.

The swordsman staggered to his feet and said, "Let's go."

When Xuanzang was buried,

This monk, who only sought simplicity, received a golden coffin and a silver outer coffin bestowed by the imperial family.

In addition to this, upon learning of Xuanzang's death, history recorded that more than a million people from Chang'an and various states within five hundred *li* came to see him off. That night, as many as thirty thousand people kept vigil before the tomb. Chang'an, which had once forced Xuanzang to choose to stow away when he was young, offered its farewell in an unprecedented spontaneous manner after his death.

"Shipantuo, do you want to stay in Chang'an?"

After Xuanzang passed away, the swordsman asked the former bandit,

"Here, you can at least spend your remaining years in peace."

Shipantuo, who also had a full head of white hair, shook his head and said softly:

"No."

He replied:

"When I was young, I was a bandit. When there was work, I would be a merchant, and occasionally I would rob. Although I didn't like to kill people, I actually did a lot of absurd things. At that time, I had to sleep with a weapon under my pillow, and I felt unsafe everywhere. The world was not my home."

"Later, Master found me. After that, I felt that although the world was big."

"But wherever Master was, was home."

"And now, Master is also gone."

Shipantuo said softly, "But on the contrary, I feel that the world is so big that everywhere can be home."

"If that's the case, then I'll go to the place where we met back then."

The bandit, whose life was full of ups and downs, said the most Buddhist thing in his life:

"Only then do I know that my life has a beginning and an end."

It happened that Geng Chen came to find the swordsman, saying that killing himself on Kunlun Mountain was the best choice. The swordsman also received instructions from Yuan Tiangang and his apprentice. In this year, he stepped forward and walked towards Guazhou again. When he walked out of the city, he looked far away at the Wild Goose Pagoda in Chang'an City.

At the highest point of the pagoda, composed of countless *sharira*,

Was Xuanzang's parietal *sharira*.

It seemed that he would never leave.

Chen Yuan took a deep look, as if he saw the smiling monk sitting cross-legged at the highest point of the pagoda, quietly watching him. The swordsman laughed, flicked his sleeves, and mingled into the crowd, stepping out of the Chang'an city gate.

This swordsman left Chang'an for nineteen years, and after returning to Chang'an for nineteen years, he embarked on his journey again. It was as if he would never stop, as if this was his destiny in this life.

And in this year, the Emperor and Empress jointly ruled the court.

Emperor Li Zhi at least followed Xuanzang's last wish and buried him in Bailuyuan.

Feeling the impermanence of the world, he wanted to build Buddhist statues and stone carvings for the Tang imperial family to pray for blessings. When discussing the location with the Empress, the Empress said softly, "I heard... that the Northern Wei Dynasty also built stone carvings."

"Northern Wei Buddhist stone carvings?"

The Emperor was thoughtful, and then agreed. This was not an important matter in the first place.

"Northern Wei stone carvings, I remember they are in Longmen, Luoyang."

Luoyang.

The Chang'an swordsman Chen Yuan was from Luoyang.

At that time, the Empress, who was the mother of the world, summoned monks and skilled craftsmen from all over the world. As the master of the harem, she spent a full twenty thousand strings of cash for this carving of Buddhist statues. When the Emperor asked, she just jokingly said 'rouge money'. And she once saw the monk in charge of carving, and there was an unspeakable majesty in her eyes.

"Raise your head and look at this Empress."

The monks trembled and raised their heads, seeing the gentle and majestic Empress.

The Empress said softly, "This Empress wants you to incorporate this Empress's features into the Buddhist statues."

High-ranking officials and nobles used their own features in Buddhist statues to seek protection. This was not something that had never happened before. In many local Buddhist temples, there were so-called Thousand Buddha Halls, and the Buddhist statues inside were all different, all donated with incense money from high-ranking officials and nobles.

The monk felt at ease and asked with his hands clasped together, "I wonder how big the statue the Empress wants?"

The woman with dignified features said calmly, "The biggest one in the world."

The monk's pupils shrank.

The monks eventually left trembling.

Twenty thousand strings of cash, the twenty thousand strings of cash in Wu Zetian's hands, were definitely not so easy to take. They spent three years and nine months incorporating the Empress's features into the Buddhist statue, which became the Vairocana Buddha. It was the most beautiful Buddha in the entire Divine Continent, in the entire world. The dignified Empress walked in Chang'an, looking into the distance with a calm gaze.

She would never be the kind of plain and gentle woman.

You will always go back.

She thought.

You want to see the Buddha.

Then, when you travel eight hundred *li* across the desert and three thousand *li* across the snowfield, when you return to Luoyang, when you return to your hometown, when you raise your head and see the biggest and most majestic Buddha.

It will be me!

………………

And Chen Yuan and Geng Chen, with Shipantuo, followed the path that Xuanzang took to the Western Regions back to Guazhou.

This journey was actually not as difficult as it had been in the beginning.

It could even be said that the journey was very smooth. The Eastern Turks had already submitted, and Guazhou was no longer the frontier of the Tang Dynasty in this era. Compared to the military stronghold of the past, it had naturally changed into another appearance. Chen Yuan turned his head and looked at this city, and said, "Are you really just staying here?"

Shipantuo had a smile on his face and said, "Yes."

"After so many years, you finally came back. Don't leave, okay?"

Chen Yuan took a deep look at him, nodded lightly, and turned around.

After walking no more than a dozen steps, there was a thud behind him.

He did not turn his head.

Shipantuo, with a full head of white hair, bowed down and shouted loudly with a smile:

"Brother Yuan, have a good journey!"

"Shipantuo."

"I can't send you off anymore!"

His smile turned into a sob, and when he raised his head, his face was full of wrinkles and tears.

Shipantuo staggered to his feet and walked back to Guazhou City in the astonished eyes of others.

He was already an old man.

He eventually lived in seclusion not far from Guazhou, reminiscing about his teacher and the past, ending his life. Later, when the Western Xia people came here, they discovered stone caves in this place. The murals inside brought the mysteries of Buddhism to the barbarian nation on horseback, and eventually they expanded and completed more magnificent murals here.

That was the Eastern Thousand Buddha Caves, as famous as the Mogao Grottoes in Dunhuang.

Here, there is the earliest Xuanzang's Journey to the West.

The bright moon hung high, and Xuanzang, dressed in travel clothes, closed his eyes. Behind him, his yellow-haired disciple, a *hu* person, reached out and covered his forehead, his eyes anxious, not knowing who he was waiting for. This was an unprecedented painting, and there would be no future one, with Xuanzang as the center of the Buddhist mural.

Inside, there was a skeleton.

No one knew how the painter, with tears streaming down his face, missed his past.

Then, either peacefully or with a sigh, he left this world, chasing after his master.

And in that year, the swordsman of Chang'an finally embarked on the road to West Kunlun. The first time he came to the snow mountain, half of the team died. But this time, the vast snowfield of West Kunlun had not yet approached him, and it had already been shattered by the invisible, fierce aura.

The swordsman was dressed in a light blue linen robe, with his hands behind his back, his white hair fluttering.

He had once gained everything, and he had once lost everything.

Now, Wang Xuance was dead, and Tang Xuanzang had passed away.

Shipantuo returned to Guazhou with a laugh.

The little girl had become a ruthless noblewoman within the layers of palace walls, and even the Five Ind heroes, whom he had once fought and befriended, had passed away. The former Nalanda had become ruins, all things returned to nothingness, and all the people were gone, only I remained.

He turned his head, as if he could still see the smoke rising from Ci'en Temple in Chang'an when Xuanzang's body was burned and turned into *sharira*. And now, that *sharira* was in the Wild Goose Pagoda, the great plan for thousands of years.

Chen Yuan stepped over Geng Chen step by step, muttering:

"Burning the remaining body to thank the common people."

"We are all heartless people."

"Let's go, to Kunlun!"

ps: Today's first update...