Wandering Gods of Day and Night-Chapter 1109 - 428: Sea of Bitter Tears_3

Master Wu Ya gestured towards a cypress wood, and the wood flew into his hand.

Once in his hand, the cypress wood became thin and short, eventually transforming into a fishing rod.

Zhou Xuan glanced at the rod and immediately understood, saying, "Zen Master, are you going to fish that Jiangyu Monk out?"

"You are perceptive, sir. However, even with the rod in hand, I still need a fishing line."

After Master Wu Ya spoke, he muttered under his breath,

and with his chanting, a faint black mist emerged from the heads of the thousands of monks in the Mahayana Temple, swirling towards Master Wu Ya.

"These young monks usually work for the ’Six Desires Zen,’ whether they do good or ill, it’s all under my junior brother’s orders,

My junior brother gives the orders, which leads to karmic consequences. Entangled by karma, even if they swim to the deepest depths of the Sea of Bitter Tears, they cannot escape."

Master Wu Ya turned the ’black mist into a line and hook,’ and with a flick of his wrist, cast the rod.

The black ’karmic line and hook,’ swiftly traversing the Sea of Bitter Tears, within moments, hooked onto Jiangyu Monk’s gills.

The Fish Monk cried out in pain, shaking his head vigorously to shake off the line and hook. After several attempts, he suddenly saw an illusion.

In the illusion, there stood a monk with a decayed body, speaking mournfully to the Fish Monk,

"Master, we always followed your orders, committing every foul deed, and now that the scandal has surfaced, why do you escape alone, abandoning us?"

"Why! Why! Why!"

The decayed monk’s voice grew increasingly shrill, and the Fish Monk’s beautiful fish body began to rot; scales fell off, the fish tail lost its luster,

Within moments, he transformed from being bright and beautiful to a beggar covered in sores and pustules.

"Junior brother, stop struggling and come ashore."

The Fish Monk, rotten and powerless, was finally fished out from the Sea of Bitter Tears by the tensed fishing line held by Master Wu Ya.

The large decayed fish gazed upon the distant ’Sea of Bitter Tears,’ aware that he would perish, and instantly tears began to fall.

He stammered with his lips, saying, "Regret, truly regret... Brother, I regret all the wrongs I’ve done over these thousand years, if you would just consider..."

The Fish Monk’s ’will to live’ surged, chanting words of repentance,

Master Wu Ya looked toward Zhou Xuan, asking, "What does the wise sir think of my junior brother’s words?"

Zhou Xuan replied with a smile, "His tears are not from regret; he realizes death is near and he’s scared."

"Wise sir indeed."

Master Wu Ya said, "Junior brother, let your elder brother see all you’ve done over these thousand years."

Then he said to Zhou Xuan, "Sir, why not accompany me to look, I’m rather lonely to see it alone."

"Alright, I will also see how the current Fish Monk, once Master Lu Xue, resurrected his family."

Zhou Xuan said thus.

With Zhou Xuan’s response, Master Wu Ya immediately grasped Zhou Xuan’s left arm and walked towards the enormous fish’s body that stretched several dozens of meters.

...

The life experiences of the Fish Monk were revealed like a carousel to Zhou Xuan and Wu Ya Zen as they stepped in.

Nine hundred years ago, the Fish Monk was still known as Master Lu Xue,

He dreamt of a deer adorned with snowflakes, believing it was a Buddhist destiny, he entered the temple and became a monk.

Initially, Master Lu Xue was still studying Buddhism, and the abbot saw his intelligence and diligence, especially since Master Lu Xue had a golden "relic" appearance, precious beyond words,

Thus the abbot cultivated him earnestly, considering him a successor of the teachings.

But the abbot did not know, Master Lu Xue was a man of intense desires.

He drank wine, ate meat, stole incense money from the temple, and went down the mountain to court women,

For each rule in the temple, Master Lu Xue broke a corresponding one.

One day, the abbot descended the mountain to perform ritual offerings for a household and inadvertently saw Master Lu Xue walking out of a brothel in the county.

He immediately dragged Master Lu Xue into a deserted alley, questioning what had happened,

At that time, Master Lu Xue was in tears, confessing his indulgence in pleasure and repenting immediately,

The abbot considered it his first offense and a material worthy of cultivation, forgiving him this time,

However, within another two years, the abbot caught Master Lu Xue ’courting prostitutes’ again, this time determined to expel this ’wine and meat monk’ from the Mahayana Temple, despite Master Lu Xue’s pleas.

Master Yunlu saw the old abbot as stubborn and unyielding, his anger flared, his wickedness surged, and with brute force, he strangled the old abbot to death, then fled back to the temple under the cover of night.

After the abbot’s death, Master Yunlu, as the abbot’s favored disciple, became the new abbot in a high-profile fashion.

He acted with greater impudence, drinking wine, eating meat, courting women, not only those forsaken in brothels but even using temple incense money to keep well-bred women as mistresses.

In days to come, Master Yunlu basked in daily revelry, but this revelry bore marks of decay,

The reason being—Mahayana Temple was not famous, the followers were few, and the incense money collected daily was meager.

Just that incense money couldn’t withstand Yunlu’s wastefulness. 𝘧𝓇ℯ𝑒𝓌𝑒𝑏𝓃𝘰𝘷𝘦𝘭.𝒸ℴ𝓂

"Without money, good days can’t continue."

"How can the temple’s incense money increase?"

Master Yunlu pondered tirelessly each day, finally arriving at a conclusion—A mountain without a famous monk cannot attain Buddhist fame; how can a temple acquire incense money if it is not renowned?

"The temple needs a famous monk."

"I will be that famous monk."

Master Yunlu immediately plotted to use deceitful and corrupt methods to earn himself a formidable Buddhist reputation—