597 Buddhism vs Taoism (2)
Zhang Yucheng frowned as he immediately noticed something. He had fought many times before Monk Wuzhi again, and their last confrontation was only a couple of decades ago. Back then, his Altruistic Golden Buddha Body was only 5 meters.
He knew the Altruistic Golden Buddha Body was a great body refining technique with 12 layers; with each layer, a monk would grow one meter. Despite how powerful the technique was, only a few people could cultivate it because it required a deep understanding of Buddhism, a lot of incense, and merit.
Wuzhi was the most talented younger generation of Buddhism, and he only cultivated it to the fifth level after millions of years. But now, after just a few decades, he went two levels.
‘This could only mean two things: there was a catastrophe, and he saved billions of lives. Or, he was enlightened and created something that would greatly benefit Buddhism.’
Zhang Yucheng knew it was most likely the second option since he would know if Monk Wuzhi saved so many people. Regardless, he knew this battle would not be as simple as he thought.
Due to a lack of knowledge or information, Zhang Yucheng knew that something out of his expectations might occur with each passing minute. Furthermore, his master warned him of the possibility of the Dao Opening Sect’s heir in the lower dimension intervening in his battle. After analyzing the situation, he decided to end this battle as quickly as possible.
[Wuji Has No Limits: Infinite Swords]
A black-and-white diagram covered the entire sky. And from that diagram, swords began to fall, with no indication of stopping. Each sword had the power to eradicate thousands of tiny universes, and there was an infinite amount of them.
Monk Wuzhi immediately knew his opponent was going for the kill after seeing this attack.
[Out of the Five Elements and Three Realms]
Buddha is a supreme being that has transcended the five elements of all matters. It is also detached from the mundane realms, the realm of the dead, and the realm of the spirit.
After using this technique, all the swords passed through Monk Wuzhi’s body as if he was nonexistent. With this technique, he entered a state of intangibility similar to Wang Wei’s Nothingness Dao.
Monk Wuzhi could see the shock on his opponent’s face, and he knew the reason. In their last confrontation, he could not achieve this level of intangibility. Wuji involved the concept of everything being born from nothing, so his technique should be useless to a high-level spell like the one Zhang Yucheng used.
However, the current him was not him of yesterday. Without giving the latter a chance to brief, Monk Wuzhi went on the offensive.
[Buddha’s Light: Call of Samsara]
Monk Wuzhi first took a prayer stance with his palms touching before putting one hand forward. A bright and pure golden light emanated from his hand, illuminating the dark night; the light was so bright that, for a moment, it appeared as if the sun had resurfaced, signaling the end of the darkness knowns as the night.
The golden light did not affect the diagram above them, nor did it affect the falling swords. The light directly attacked Zhang Yucheng.
‘Do it. You know you want to.’
‘That’s right. Life is hard, so why struggle?’
‘End this misery and relieve your burden by entering Samsara.’
‘That’s right. This is the best place; you can forget your problems, pain, and suffering.’
‘You can be free.’
Zhang Yucheng groaned as he felt a massive headache. He could not concentrate with millions of whispers tempting him to give up on his life and enter Samsara. He could feel his Will to live rapidly diminish, and each voice’s reasons to do so became more convincing.
Zhang Yucheng could feel his spirit falling into an eternal abyss full of despair and negative emotions.
‘Nooo,’ he screamed, waking up from the terror. The voices continued, but he took advantage of this brief clarity to act. He manifested a two-fold shield inside his Sea of Consciousness to defend his soul.
The first shield contained Yin-Yang power, with a heavy focus on the Yin side since it was related to the soul. Wuji came before Yin and Yang and can evolve into Yin-Yang. So, his Wuji Tao Body was a Yin-Yang Body with even more abilities.
For the second layer of the shield, Zhang Yucheng condensed all the Defensive and Soul-related Sword Wills he knew. With these two levels of protection, he reduced the voices to the point where he could ignore them.
But Monk Wuzhi would not let things proceed smoothly.
[Soul Sundering Bell]
A bronze bell appeared above Monk Wuzhi, ringing so loud that it echoed in the soul. Zhang Yucheng’s noise bled as the vibration from the soul directly injured his soul.
However, the Taoist Priest gritted his teeth before also going on the offensive. He swung his sword, using a superb technique.
[Wuji Sword: The Unmanifest Sword]
Golden blood spewed from Monk Wuzhi’s body as a diagonal scar appeared on his chest. He could not sense, see, or detect the slash in any shape or form.
In Taoism, Wuji symbolizes the unmanifest, the unknown, the undetectable, and the nonexistent. Meanwhile, Taji–the successor of Wuji–symbolizes the manifest or the physical.
Monk Wuzhi has often suffered against that sword since he could not detect it with his eyes, his reaction, his danger sense, his Divine Sense, or even eye secret techniques. At least before, that was the case.
[Buddha’s Benevolence]
Buddha once cut off a piece of his body to feed a starving animal. His benevolence grants him power.
Monk Wuzhi’s aura suddenly increased, and when a second slash appeared on his body, forming the X shape, his aura further strengthened. With his technique, he can boost his power with every injury.
Then, the monk’s golden body rushed toward Zhang Yucheng to fight him head-on. Wuzhi wanted to limit his opponent’s use of the sword while he took the time to execute the ability he developed after opening his Crown Chakra.
Inside the mansion, Wang Wei witnessed the battle through a formation.
‘I should not underestimate these Heaven Chosens from the upper dimension. Their use of Duyi Realm is phenomenal.’
He could sense that every attack Monk Wuzhi and Zhang Yucheng used was boosted by their Duyi Realm. It magnified their Qi/energy, spiritual strength, physical force, and even Laws.
The subtle and ingenious way they use this power is something Wang Wei just recently learned from the Battle Maniac Paragon.
One of the main reasons that Eternal Emperors are so powerful is their Dao Will’s boost. It is not just a method to eliminate other Emperor’s Imprints, but a method that augmented their overall power.
The Dao Will is why it is hard for Insurgents to reach the Pseudo and Eternal Emperor level of power. And the reasons that it is statistically impossible to become an Insurgent on par with Everlasting Empyreans.
‘Monk Wuzhi is not bad. I thought his main law was Nirvana, but it appeared his main Dao is Soul. As for Zhang Yucheng’s Wuji…’
Wang Wei observed carefully, fully immersed in the Taoist priests’ use of Wuji Law.
‘Wuji, meaning without limits, without boundaries: boundless. A state of non-distinction, nothingness before the Tao–or the manifestation of everything came into being.
‘The Laws of Wuji contained properties of nothingness. Its very definition of beings without limits, distinction, or boundaries can also apply to nothingness.’
Wang Wei opened his eyes, full of wisdom and containing the universe’s fundamental truth. After this enlightenment, his body had subtle and unnoticeable changes.
He raised his hand to manifest a mysterious power. He removed an Immortal ore from his space ring to test that new power. The ore vanished as if it had changed from a state of existence to nonexistence in a matter of nanoseconds.
“Is this the power of the Void?”
For many years, he pondered how to enter the next stage of his Tabbo Dao of Nothingness. After many failures, he decided to wait until he proved the Dao to try again.
But now, after comprehension of the correlation between Wuji and Nothingness, he accessed the power of Void beforehand. Of course, Wang Wei knew the transformation was not complete.
He was still in the Intangibility stage but now contained some powers of the Void Stage. Wang Wei took a moment to calculate something.
“I can reach the Void Stage in the Great Emperor Realm, the Emptiness Stage, after becoming a Paragon. But what about the True Nothingness Stage?”
His eyes lit up after figuring out some things. Although he knew his prediction might not be correct since he had yet to reach these realms and only knew some vague knowledge about them.
Yet, he believed he had a high chance of being correct, so he looked forward to the future.
“Maybe there is a connection between Perfection and Nothingness,” he muttered after suddenly having an idea. “Is nothingness one of the few things that are considered perfect?”
Wang Wei shook his head as he felt he might be reaching. Then, he concentrated on the battle.