Confucian and Taoist scholar

Chapter 641 Buddhist Scriptures Appear in the World
This is just a high-ranking monk probing; who knows, a true combat master might arrive later.

There are many powerful figures in the Great Dynasty. Hu Qing was worried that some extraordinary figure might come and wouldn't listen to Lu Zheng's ramblings about grand principles. He would just take action to suppress them.

At that point, they probably won't even have a chance to escape.

Lu Zheng remained calm. The matter had not yet occurred, so there was no need to worry so much.

there is always a solution to a problem.

He had already planned various options, and the situation hadn't reached a life-or-death crisis yet.

However, the fact that Wei sent people so quickly shows that they value him quite a bit.

Lu Zheng knew that this was partly due to the instigation of certain local forces.

In the future, there will definitely be other people coming from Wei.

Neither the major nor minor powers in the Northern Regions, nor the State of Wei, would stand idly by and allow him to expand his influence here.

Lu Zheng looked towards the south and said slowly, "Since that's the case, it's time to take the next step. We need to give them a little shock."

The two people next to him turned their heads in surprise upon hearing this.

Hu Qing's beautiful eyes flashed with a strange light, "What do you want to do?"

"Find them something to do, they won't have time for me."

After saying that, Lu Zheng took a step and disappeared from the spot.

Hu Qing stared wide-eyed and looked around, but couldn't find where Lu Zheng had gone.

"Wow, he went to do something big all by himself?"

Hu Qing felt a little dissatisfied, and she couldn't help but look at Ku Xin, "He's definitely worried that you'll leak the news!"

His face darkened slightly, and he said unhappily, "What does this have to do with me?"

Hu Qing said quietly, "I've entrusted my life and so many people to him. You're just a monk from Wei, of course I have to be wary of you!"

He said earnestly, "You witch are being unreasonable. How could I do such a thing?"

Hu Qing clicked her tongue and said, "If Young Master Lu and your sect were to fight, whose side would you take?"

Ku Xin couldn't help but say, "That's impossible."

Hu Qing chuckled and said, "It's hard to say. Although I don't know which temple you come from, there must be some experts in your sect. What if you run into Young Master Lu?"

He pretended not to hear the question and refused to answer it.

He felt that if things really came to that, he could only watch from the sidelines; he had no ability to help anyone.

Thinking of Lu Zheng's resounding words, Ku Xin knew that Lu Zheng's future path would be difficult, and he would likely face great obstacles, whether on the righteous path or the evil path.

And how should he face this?

A sense of bewilderment arose in his heart, feeling that despite all his years of cultivation, he was not as good as a young man.

He touched his chest earnestly; his Buddhist heart was clouded...

Mahayana Buddhism, Mahayana Buddhism...

His painstaking eyes flickered with emotion. What exactly is Mahayana Buddhism, and how does one practice it?

Seeing Ku Xin's unusual behavior, Hu Qing couldn't help but say, "Are you lost in a trance? Should we go find Young Master Lu to enlighten you?"

He chanted a Buddhist prayer with great effort, then asked softly, "What do you think a true Buddha looks like?"

"what?"

Hu Qing paused, her delicate brows furrowing as she pondered.

Seeing that Hu Qing couldn't give a coherent explanation, Ku Xin shook his head slightly. Why was he asking this wicked woman who had gone astray?

Suddenly, Hu Qing said softly, "I have never seen the real Buddha, I have only heard some legends about the Buddha. I think, perhaps before the real Buddha became Buddha, he was just like Young Master Lu!"

Hu Qing's eyes sparkled with a strange light. "I may not have as much experience as you, but that's how I feel. Many of the people rescued by Young Master Lu think that he is a living bodhisattva. However, Young Master Lu doesn't seem to like that title and forbids the propagation of Buddhism. He always says that he is just an ordinary person with a little bit of ability, and he usually plays with children as an ordinary person... Even though he is more capable than us."

With a sudden thought, I felt as if I had touched upon something, a very subtle feeling.

"The Buddha's teachings should be the path for all sentient beings..."

With a painstaking glint in his eyes, he took a step forward and vanished in a flash, preparing to emulate Lu Zheng's usual ways.

Seeing that everyone had left, Hu Qing shook her head slightly and went to supervise the construction of the new city.

……

A border town in the State of Wei.

There is a temple in the city, and incense is always burning there.

The entire temple was shrouded in a hazy, incense-filled atmosphere, with the subtle fragrance of sandalwood.

A young novice monk, having finished his work, was resting under a tree, closing his eyes to relax.

Just then, a blue bird flew to the treetop and perched there.

The bluebird's eyes sparkled with intelligence as it looked at the little monk below and spoke in human language.

"Avalokitesvara Bodhisattva practices profound Prajna..."

The young novice monk suddenly opened his eyes and looked up to see the birds chirping incessantly on the branches, his face showing a look of shock.

He had been in the temple for several years, and upon hearing the bird's chanting, he knew it was no ordinary Buddhist scripture.

The bluebird recited about a hundred words, then seemed startled by the appearance of the little novice below, shut its mouth, and flew away.

"Hey, don't go!"

The young novice monk was still engrossed in his Buddhist scriptures when he saw the bird fly away, and he quickly chased after it.

However, the bird had long since disappeared.

The young novice monk looked lost and, recalling the Buddhist scriptures he had just read, began to recite them softly.

"...Shariputra, all dharmas are empty in nature, neither arising nor ceasing, neither defiled nor pure, neither increasing nor decreasing..."

Not far away, an old monk heard the young novice muttering incantations and suddenly stopped and turned around.

"Xuanjue, what scripture are you chanting!"

The old monk looked at the young novice with a surprised expression. "Ah, Elder!"

The young novice monk Xuanjue quickly bowed and replied, "I just saw a bird reciting Buddhist scriptures in human language, and I wrote it down."

The old monk, hearing this, said in surprise, "Let's read them all aloud!"

"oh oh……"

Xuanjue suddenly became a little nervous and began to chant the sutras haltingly.

The old monk was greatly surprised, feeling that the scripture contained the supreme Buddhist teachings.

Just as he was listening intently and absorbed, Xuanjue's chanting abruptly stopped.

The old monk seemed to have been struck on the head, and anxiously asked, "What else? What's next?"

The Buddhist scriptures that Xuanjue was reciting were clearly not finished, which made him feel itchy and unable to stop.

Xuanjue quickly replied, "No, no, I don't know... The bird flew away before it finished reciting the poem, I don't know where it flew off to..."

Upon hearing these words, the old monk wore an extremely distressed expression.

He felt extremely uncomfortable, both inside and out, after hearing only a small part of such profound Buddhist scriptures.

"How could it be gone? What did that bird look like? Which way did it fly off to?"

The old monk hurriedly inquired about the specific situation.

Xuanjue was frightened by the elder's appearance and explained the situation in detail.

The old monk then hurried off to search for the so-called bluebird.

……

In another temple, a group of monks gathered in the Buddha hall to meditate and chant sutras.

The sounds of wooden fish drums and chanting sutras echoed endlessly.

In a corner of the main hall, a young monk stood with his head bowed, his mouth slightly open, seemingly in a daze, half-asleep and half-awake state.

Those sitting nearby, watching from the sidelines, had long since become accustomed to it.

This young monk, who was slacking off, was originally a disciple of a wealthy family. He joined the temple only to learn some Buddhist teachings so that he could begin his spiritual practice. He usually just slacked off during these lessons.

The young monk sat there half asleep, but he could hear the sound of Buddhist scriptures being chanted in his mind.

Suddenly, the young monk stood up, without even opening his eyes.

"Avalokiteshvara Bodhisattva..."

The young monk closed his eyes and began chanting sutras, immediately disrupting the rhythm of the others.

Upon hearing the monks chanting other Buddhist scriptures, everyone in the hall fell silent.

The chanting and the sound of the wooden fish stopped.

Only the young monk's voice echoed in the main hall.

The other monks looked at the person chanting the sutra with their eyes closed with strange expressions.

"...Form is emptiness, emptiness is form..."

After reciting a sutra for a while, the young monk stopped talking, his body twitched, and he suddenly woke up.

When the monk opened his eyes, he found that everyone in the hall was staring at him, and their eyes looked rather strange.

He couldn't help but shudder, still confused, and said to an old monk, "Abbot, I didn't fall asleep on purpose. I was studying the scriptures too late last night, so I accidentally fell asleep just now."

Of course, he made this up; the main reason was that the chanting while everyone was doing their homework was too soporific...

The old monk, addressed as the abbot, looked on in astonishment and asked, "Do you know what you just did?"

"Huh? What...what did I do?"

The young monk looked bewildered and didn't know what to do.

Seeing the young monk's ignorant appearance, everyone was momentarily astonished.

If it weren't for the fact that this person was in a Buddhist temple, and in front of so many people, they would have suspected that he had been possessed by some kind of evil spirit.

……

In an ordinary courtyard, a man happily carried a large fish into the house.

His wife had just given birth to a son, and it was a joyous occasion.

In high spirits, the man spent some money to go to the market and pick out a big fish to nourish his wife.

Given his wife's physical limitations, the husband personally cooked the meal.

As he was preparing the large fish with a knife and cutting open its belly, his sharp eyes noticed something inside.

The man quickly took out the item, opened it, and found it was a piece of silk cloth with some clearly visible writing on it.

The man was not very literate and couldn't understand what was written on the silk cloth.

Of the few characters I recognized, the two characters "Bodhisattva" stood out the most.

Because he had a shrine to the Bodhisattva in his home, the two characters looked complicated, but he recognized them at a glance.

Upon seeing these two words, even the man dared not carelessly discard the piece of cloth.

He scratched his head, then remembered that the stonemason Wang next door knew many characters and often carved tombstones for people, so he took the silk cloth and went next door.

……

In various parts of northern Wei, strange phenomena began to appear one after another, and an incomplete scripture gradually spread.

Some temples with profound cultural heritage recognized the extraordinary nature of this Buddhist scripture and began sending people to search for its origins, hoping to find the missing part.

Some temples obtained the scriptures and tried to keep it a secret, but they soon discovered that it was impossible to conceal them...

Because nowadays, everyone is talking about this Buddhist scripture and all sorts of strange stories about it.

Such rumors are rapidly spreading to other parts of Wei.

(End of this chapter)