Chapter 113 The Common and Myself (1/2)

Speaking about seduction, the techniques used by Buddhism were far better than Daoism. In the previous generation, there was proof that the human form of Water and Moon Guanyin could beat everyone flat in all countries.

The Nine Lotus was closely related to Buddhism. It had a long history. Some many years ago, there was a saint with the surname Luo who was preaching at a bare mountain. He was explaining the fundamentals of Buddhism, with emptiness being the origin of the universe.

He gained more and more followers, and everyone started calling him Master Luo. After he ended his preaching, he left with an impact.

His students then formed Luo, having him as the Master. There were a few great people that were from Luoism and it was at one point extremely famous.

When Master Luo did his teaching, everything stemmed from the heart and there was no documentation. As a result, the great Luoist followers led their own paths, which were passed on to the future generations in different branches.

These branches subsequently started infighting, which broke down the huge Luoism into many secret cults, and Nine Lotus was one of them. The Book of Nine Lotus put a heavy emphasis on the principles of Buddhism. According to rumors, one would need the power of followings to reach the highest level of cultivation.

Due to that reason, they always made use of war times to spread the belief.

Given Nine Lotus had such requirement, Shen Lian could roughly guess the aim of Zhao. While the conversation sounded normal, they were both showing their edges through the Daoist mind. Shen Lian, however, did not allow out-of-body to happen so that it would not pierce through the peaceful surface.

If there was no hundred percent certainty, Daoist rarely combats each other in a death or alive situation, unless it involved cultivation.

Zhao Xiaoyu was the first person Shen Lian had ever met which could come head to head with him in the battle of the spirits at the same level. From the beginning, Shen Lian did not even try to pressure her for a battle. He left her with absolute control.

Shen Lian smiled at Zhao Xiaoyu’s words. The moonlight started to popple like water. He smiled as their Daoist minds continued the mental battle. It got more and more rigorous, while shapeless, it had affected the physical world. He spoke softly, ”When I was studying in Qing Xuan, I’ve never heard of anything that is considered out of the norm or anything that is inside the path of Dao. If there is anything that can be considered out of the norm, in my opinion, it will be anything other than my path.”

When Zhao Xiaoyu heard the phrase ”it will be anything other than my path”, there was a change in balance in terms of power. She was disturbed, and her calm disposition disappeared. Her look remained the same, it made her look more akin a girl from the neighborhood.

Shen Lian did not try to follow up the victory with hot pursuit. His Daoist mind remained calm. His eyes looked like the stars in the night sky. They were peaceful.

Zhao Xiaoyu started laughing, ”From what you said, you seem to approach the path of Dao.”

The previous statement did not originate from Shen Lian. He saw it from other places, and the reason why it had such a huge impact on Zhao Xiaoyu was because Nine Lotus walked the path of Shen. As it gathered the belief of the common, ”The common isn’t me and I am not the common”, it was hard to stay true to self if it relied on the belief of the common.

”It would be anything other than my path.

Anything different would not be a part of me.”

In Daoism, it was all about the self. In contradiction, for Buddhism, the revelation was the most important element. For Luoism, it was all about emptiness. The principles were clear, but knowing them was one thing, understanding them was another. The most difficult part was actually about understanding and implementing them in parallel.

What Shen Lian had said was able to affect Zhao Xiaoyu for a short while. It gave the opportunity for Shen Lian to get out of the battle of the Daoist minds. If she persisted, he would not have a chance to win at all. Even if he won, he would not be able to retreat fully. It also would not be beneficial to his cultivation.

”The classics of both Buddhism and Daoism is all about the speaking of the path, but it still could not help us reach mastery. We can only be close to it. The mastery is not something that can be achieved with the words of mouth,” Shen Lian laughed. It was indeed true that there were people who had achieved sudden revelation, but who would care for the time spent on it before revelation happened?

When Zhao Xioayu heard that, she lowered her head. There was a string of hair by the edge of her mouth. She looked out of this world.

The melody of the Guqin began again. It was akin to a soft sigh, or the dew on the lotus leaf. It was perhaps closer to the wind that blew through the branches of a willow.