"Huff..."
Looking at the dazed and defeated Hui Xing still kneeling on the shattered ground, Su Min took a deep, steadying breath and descended from the now dissolved barrier. Having reached the Nascent Soul stage, and not consuming two of those potent pills simultaneously this time, the backlash was not as agonizing as before. There was no repeat of rolling on the ground in blinding pain like last time. Still, the physical and spiritual toll was significant. She needed to find a quiet place to fully dissolve and refine the turbulent medicinal energy still raging within her body.
"Amitabha." Elder Kong Chen's voice broke the silence. "Hui Ming, escort Benefactor Su back to her room to rest. As for Hui Xing," he turned his gaze to his disciple, "come with me. May this failure serve as a profound lesson. Your scheduled meditation under the Bodhi Tree will wait until your injuries have fully healed. This battle, though a loss, was a valuable experience for you. Reflect on it deeply, and perhaps it may even help you advance further in the future."
"Understood."
After hearing Kong Chen's dismissal, Su Min simply turned and left, following the young reincarnated monk. The other monks here were remarkably restrained in their reactions, after all, this was a disciplined Buddhist sect. Their entire cultivation path emphasized inner peace and discipline, so they remained composed in all matters, victory or defeat.
If this had been an ordinary, more secular sect, there would have been either raucous cheers or furious curses, and some impressionable junior disciples might have even clamored to become her followers on the spot. But the Buddhist sect was different. And considering she had just very publicly shattered their senior brother's pride and body, it was best to keep a low profile and depart swiftly. Besides, after any major battle, quiet reflection was always the best opportunity for a cultivator to digest their experiences and improve.
Thus, upon returning to her guest quarters, Su Min quickly entered a temporary state of seclusion to refine the lingering, volatile medicinal energy in her meridians. If left unchecked, it could crystallize and create blockages, negatively affecting her future progress. And if she was fortunate, she might even use this process to advance her cultivation a small step.
Seven days later, Su Min opened her eyes again. She had successfully purged all residual medicinal effects, and her cultivation had solidified, improving slightly towards the next threshold.
"Progress in the Nascent Soul stage is truly difficult," she murmured to the empty room. "It requires slow, meticulous accumulation over time. Unfortunately, time is not a luxury I have." She shook her head slightly. "Well, no matter. I should go find them now."
Muttering to herself, she stepped out of the simple meditation chamber. She was not picky about living conditions, as long as they were not outright filthy or disgusting, she could adapt.
Click.
As the wooden door opened, she saw the young novice, Hui Ming, waiting patiently outside as if he had never left.
"Benefactor, I will now escort you to the Great Thunder Temple's sacred ground. Please follow me closely and do not stray from the path."
"Thank you."
Su Min was slightly surprised. She had not sensed this young monk's presence at all through the door. But given the Buddhist sect's ancient heritage and mastery of esoteric reincarnation techniques, this unassuming youth might very well be a powerful figure from a past era. Who could say for sure?
She decided to remain cautious and respectful. After all, even the terrifying Fallen Ones had never dared to launch a direct attack on core Buddhist territories, and in the game's lore, the moment the Fallen Immortals descended, their first coordinated act was to attempt to eradicate the Buddhist sects. Clearly, there was something within the Buddhist teachings or their hidden power that even the Fallen Immortals feared, though she did not know the specifics. Her knowledge only extended to the game's 1.0 version.
As Su Min's thoughts wandered, the young novice raised his hand in a gentle gesture. A pristine, glowing white lotus platform rose from the ground beneath her feet. Without waiting for her response, it carried her smoothly high into the sky, passing effortlessly through layers of shimmering mystical barriers until they arrived in a realm shrouded in ethereal mist, a place that felt completely separate from the world below.
"Benefactor, this is the true core of the Great Thunder Temple, Mount Sumeru." The young monk's voice was calm. "Do you see that ancient tree ahead? That is the Sacred Bodhi Tree."
Following his gaze, Su Min saw a towering, magnificent tree whose crown seemed to hold up the very sky. She compared it mentally to the Fusang Divine Tree she had encountered before, both were equally majestic on a grand, divine scale. The Fusang Tree contained the bloodline essence of the Golden Crow, but what profound mysteries did this Bodhi Tree hold? She was deeply curious.
"The Benefactor has seen such wonders before?" the young monk noted, smiling faintly as he observed her analytical expression. "Could it be due to the Eastern Azure Wood you carry?"
"No," Su Min replied honestly. "It was the Fusang Divine Tree."
"The Golden Crow's tree..." The monk was not surprised. During the great battle against the Blood Puppet Sect, the young Golden Crow's emergence had revealed Su Min's true trump card to the world. It was now common knowledge among the higher echelons that the two divine artifacts of the Golden Crow lineage were now housed in her sect.
As they spoke, the distance between Su Min and the colossal tree closed in an almost unnatural, frame skipping manner. In the blink of an eye, she stood directly beneath its vast, sheltering canopy, making her eyebrows twitch slightly in surprise.
"The Spatial Shrinking Technique..." she murmured, impressed.
"This is our Great Thunder Temple's most sacred inheritance, the Sacred Bodhi Tree." The young monk's tone became reverent. "It is also the final place where our highest ranking monks pass into Nirvana. Every generation of such monks, upon nearing the end of their natural lifespan, comes here. After their physical bodies enter Nirvana, a trace of their essence and wisdom remains within the tree before their consciousness departs to reincarnate. As for how much you can comprehend here, Benefactor, that depends entirely on your own fortune and affinity."
"That is…?"
However, Su Min was not looking at the tree itself anymore, her attention was completely captured by the crystal clear, placid spring bubbling up at its massive roots. The water seemed ordinary at a glance, but the Eastern Azure Wood within her dantian pulsed in strong response, and her body began emitting a faint, eager emerald glow.
"It seems the Benefactor has already sensed it." The young monk smiled. "That water is one of the legendary Heaven Earth Divine Waters, the Nectar of Enlightenment. It is the sacred water that nurtures all living things and cleanses spiritual impurities."
Su Min's eyebrows rose in genuine astonishment. If she remembered correctly, in Journey to the West, Guanyin Bodhisattva had used this very water, also known as the Sweet Dew Water, to revive the Ginseng Fruit Tree after Sun Wukong uprooted it. Clearly, this was an extraordinary treasure of the highest order.
The idea of using this water to nurture her own divine wood was incredibly tempting. She glanced sideways at the young monk beside her, this was their most sacred territory, after all, and using the sacred water without explicit permission would not be appropriate.
"There is no issue," the monk said, as if reading her thoughts. "The Eastern Azure Wood within you has been severed from its original body too many times, leaving only its core origin without the long accumulation of time. Its current capacity is limited. If you wish, you may place the divine wood in the spring while you meditate beneath the tree. Just remember to retrieve it once your enlightenment is complete."
"Then I thank you for this generosity."
With a wave of her hand, a small, shimmering green tree flew out from her chest and landed gently in the center of the spring. Almost immediately, it began to grow at a visible pace, its leaves unfurling with renewed vitality, filling her with a sense of awe and envy. To nurture the Eastern Azure Wood like this for an extended period, she would likely need to obtain the Northern Water's Profound Origin first.
Once the Eastern Azure Wood was settled, Su Min wasted no time. She stepped forward and sat beneath the overwhelming presence of the Bodhi Tree. A faintly glowing blue lotus platform made of light awaited her, this was the designated seat of enlightenment.
The moment she settled upon it, a flood of strange, abstract, and profoundly insightful knowledge surged into her mind like a gentle but relentless tide. At the same time, the Great Sun Tathāgata Sutra within her body began circulating on its own, its golden characters glowing warmly. Clearly, without having cultivated this core sutra, gaining any enlightenment here would have been impossible.
"Amitabha." The young monk sighed softly behind her. "It seems the Benefactor shares a deep karmic connection with the Buddha. She has an innate understanding of the scriptures. It is only a pity…" his voice held a note of something unreadable, "her future is one even I cannot clearly discern. Such individuals are destined for great missions that shake the world. Even I dare not interfere with their preordained path."
He sighed once more before his figure gradually faded into specks of light, vanishing from beneath the ancient tree.
When he reappeared, it was before Kong Chen, Kong Hui, and the other elders, who immediately bowed with deep respect. This figure was no ordinary monk, he was the legendary junior brother of the Great Thunder Temple's founder, the original Awakened One. After the Awakened One, like the ancient emperors of lore, crossed to the distant shore and never returned, nor reincarnated, this elder had become the oldest existing being in the entire Buddhist sect. It was said he had reincarnated at least ninety times.
Legend stated that when he successfully completed his hundredth reincarnation, he would ascend to become the next Awakened One.
"Kong Hui, your judgment was correct." The ancient monk's voice was like the rustling of old leaves. "This benefactor's future is a tangled thread, impossible to divine. Perhaps in this life, she will become a guardian of all living beings, a pillar against the coming storm, like the ancient ones of prophecy."
"Yes, Elder."
Kong Hui nodded humbly. Among the three senior brothers, each had their own strengths, and divining fate and potential was his particular area of expertise.
Meanwhile, Su Min was completely unaware of their conversation. She had entered a vast, golden, otherworldly space within her mind. It was said that beneath the Bodhi Tree, there was no cycle of reincarnation to trap the mind. The Buddhist cycle of rebirth was deeply tied to this ancient tree's power. Now, Su Min felt as though she had been pulled back into her past life, everything was exactly as it had been in the moments before her transmigration.
"My past life… but my body is still the present one."
Looking at the familiar skyscrapers and traffic before her, Su Min sighed softly, a pang of complex emotion in her heart. But almost instantly, the vivid illusion shattered and vanished. Had this trial happened right after her transmigration, she might have been lost in a sea of nostalgia and desire. But now, she had lived fully in this world for over five hundred years, conscious and active, not in hibernation. To her, that past life was nothing more than a fleeting, distant dream.
If she could truly return, she might have been tempted. But a mere mental illusion conjured by a tree could not shake her solidified Dao Heart. Thus, she passed this critical trial of the mind almost instantly. At the same time, a peculiar, warm yet piercing energy began flowing into her, tempering her soul like a blacksmith's hammer on hot steel.
"No wonder they had such confidence in this place. The Bodhi Tree's effects are this powerful? But… ugh, it hurts!"
The energy came in relentless waves, forging her soul, compressing and refining it. Strengthening one's soul was never a gentle process, it required enduring significant torment. The extent of the improvement depended entirely on her willpower and capacity to endure.
Even as her vision blurred and swam from the sheer, mind bending pain, Su Min gritted her teeth and endured, focusing on her breathing and the circulating sutra.
Outside, the days began to pass.
One day, two days, three days…
In the blink of an eye, a full year had gone by.
This duration surprised even Kong Chen and the others observing from a distance. Normally, the enlightenment period beneath the Bodhi Tree lasted about half a year for even the most gifted disciples. Yet Su Min had persisted, unmoving, for an entire year.
The Bodhi Tree's primary function was to temper the spirit and soul, dramatically increasing the cultivator's chances of successfully advancing from the Nascent Soul stage to the Divine Transformation stage. To reach Divine Transformation, a cultivator had to refine their Nascent Soul into a more ethereal and powerful Divine Soul, a perilous process that required immense, unshakable willpower.
"If she can endure a full year, she has a ninety percent chance of reaching Divine Transformation in the future," Kong Hui observed. "If she lasts a year and a half, she will undoubtedly succeed when the time comes."
Another year passed…
"Master, should we wake her?" Kong Hui asked, a note of concern in his voice. "The Water Land Dharma Assembly is only half a year away, and she still needs time to prepare. Moreover, if she remains trapped in the illusion of the soul tempering, forcibly waking her might nullify her gains, but it is better than losing her soul entirely."
Just as he was about to step forward and act, however, Su Min's aura suddenly surged violently, causing the air around the Bodhi Tree to ripple.
Kong Hui paused, his hand halting mid air. He recognized this phenomenon all too well, it was the unmistakable sign of a cultivation breakthrough. Since she could still consciously control and guide her spiritual energy, she was clearly aware and fine. Sure enough, her aura soon stabilized, but it was noticeably stronger and denser than before.
She had reached the Mid Stage of the Nascent Soul realm.
At the same time, Su Min slowly opened her eyes.
When her dark, profound gaze, now filled with a newfound depth and sharpness, met Kong Hui's, even his seasoned, centuries old composure faltered for a brief, unguarded moment. It was like staring into a deep, still well that reflected an infinite sky.