[{"content_id":4923,"novel_id":74,"chapter_no":1,"chapter_title":"Prologue","content":"

\n Prologue\n

\n\n

\n The last emperor died more than a hundred years ago.\n

\n\n

\n Later generations said it was Heaven's will to end a dynasty that had lost the Way. Beyond the Pass, the barbarian tribes who worshipped the Sa Cult drove straight for the Great Wall; within it, Henan lay buried under snow in the tenth month, locusts stripped Hubei bare, and crushing taxes and forced labor met famine on every road. The people traded their children to eat and split the bones for fuel; husbands sold their wives, fathers cast off their sons—a sight no man could bear to look upon.\n

\n\n

\n Out of such times a hero was forged—\n

\n\n

\n The Wrathful King rose in fury, and all the land was shaken!\n

\n\n

\n As it is said:\n

\n\n

\n Hatred for a tyrant's foul and reeking reign,\n The fires of revolt against cruel Qin lit once again.\n Blade and spear raised up to right the earth and sky,\n That in the world made new no soul should starve and die.\n

\n\n

\n The Insurgent Army, raised from the heroes of the martial world, broke through the Capital. Next they faced the fierce barbarian tribes of the Sa Cult, and the last iron cavalry of the Great Wall, led by Grand General You Changbo.\n

\n\n

\n In one great battle at Hongxia Pass, the Wrathful King, the Barbarian King, and You Changbo—three figures who tipped the balance of the age—all fell together. The Sa Cult worshippers withdrew beyond the Pass; the Loyalist Army, left without a head, scattered as warlords carved out their own domains, while the sects and gates of the martial world attached themselves to one master or another, forging alliances and counter-alliances. From that day strongholds rose on every hill, and across Shenzhou no dynasty ruled again.\n

\n\n

\n Ten years on, the last of the warlords, Zuo Liangbi, was beset by the Four Great Houses on Mount Diancang and slain.\n

\n\n

\n Twenty years after that, Gu Langya, master of the Qingcheng Sect, summoned the Nine Great Houses to the Kunlun Council and laid down the laws of the jianghu: whoever broke them, all the heroes together would destroy.\n

\n\n

\n From then on, the martial world lived not within the martial world alone, but beneath the whole of heaven.\n

","published_time":"2026-06-15T00:00:00.000Z","paid":false,"show_flag":true,"show_scheduled_time":"2026-06-15T00:00:00.000Z","unpaid_scheduled_time":"2026-06-15T00:00:00.000Z"},{"content_id":4950,"novel_id":74,"chapter_no":2,"chapter_title":"Vague and Unspoken Part 1","content":"

\n The sixty-seventh year of Kunlun, autumn, the eighth month.\n

\n\n

\n The night Ming Buxiang was born, his father, heating water, knocked over the oil pot by accident.\n

\n\n

\n Ill timing did the rest. A spark fell into the oil. It was a thatched hut, and rain had fallen the day before, so the place was packed with freshly gathered rice straw; in an instant a tongue of flame sealed the doorway. The midwife panicked. She never cut the cord—she hauled the infant out of the womb still joined to the afterbirth, clutched the lot to her chest, and clambered for the window. But she was a heavy, fleshy woman, and she managed only to wedge her upper half through before her lower half jammed fast and would not budge. That blockage doomed them: Ming Buxiang's parents could no longer escape, and the one opening that might have let in air was stopped up. They were overcome by the smoke and collapsed senseless.\n

\n\n

\n The fire spread with terrible speed, light and black smoke spurting through the gaps in the door. The midwife screamed for help, her hand slipped, and she dropped Ming Buxiang hard onto the muddy ground outside. Villagers came running at the noise. Some scrambled for water to fight the blaze; three or four strong men seized the midwife and hauled at her, but she was wedged so tightly she would not move a hair's breadth. She wailed and shrieked, a sound piteous beyond bearing, and then a fit took her—her eyes rolled back, froth ran from the corners of her mouth. Two of the men put their strength together and at last dragged her free of the window. But the little hut had been smoldering airless, and the moment that one vent was cleared and air rushed in, the whole thatched house roared up in flame. The crowd recoiled. When they turned back to the midwife, they saw that her upper body was whole, while everything below the waist had been roasted through, and the smell of cooked meat drifted off her.\n

\n\n

\n The villagers fighting the fire took one look at the sight and were sick. For three months afterward, half the village turned queasy at the smell of lard.\n

\n\n

\n In the confusion a sturdy young woman scooped the infant up from the mud and carried it clear of the disaster.\n

\n\n

\n The little hamlet lay within Dengfeng, in Zhengzhou, under the direct jurisdiction of Shaolin. Two days later Liaoxin, a Shaolin proctor monk, arrived to examine the scene, and his brow furrowed despite himself. A fire so strange—and above all the dreadful manner of the midwife's death—was a rare thing indeed.\n

\n\n

\n The villagers said the child had killed his own parents and the midwife the moment he was born; he was a star of calamity, and no one dared take him in. The Chan master Liaoxin took the infant into his arms. The boy's gaze was dull, lacking the bright quickness of ordinary babies. Unwrapping the swaddling, Liaoxin found a great bruise across the back of his head; asking after it, he learned the midwife had dropped him, and so he asked a few questions more. He was told the child was remarkably easy to keep—seldom cried, seldom fussed, ate when fed, soiled himself like any other—only that his parents had died young. His surname was Ming, and he had not yet been given a name.\n

\n\n

\n Fearing the infant carried some hidden affliction, Liaoxin dared not place him with strangers, and instead carried him back to the temple and reported the matter to Juejian, the Chan master who presided over Right Action Hall. Juejian said only, "Since there is a karmic bond, then take him in. Has he a name?"\n

\n\n

\n "He was born trailing calamity," Liaoxin said. "Perhaps that is his karma. Since we do not know his name, let him be called Buxiang—the Unspoken."\n

\n\n

\n At first Liaoxin found a household in Buddha City to nurse him. Even when hungry, Ming Buxiang did not cry. The wet nurse, marveling at it, pinched him a few times; he would struggle a little, then go still. She tickled the corners of his eyes with a straw, and tears ran, but no wail came, and only then did she give him the breast. When Liaoxin came to see the boy, she told him the child must be simple, and would be of no use grown; Liaoxin only gave her silver and bade her care for him well.\n

\n\n

\n After the Kunlun Council, the old dynasty had been supplanted by nine great sects, known together as the Nine Great Houses. The Nine Great Houses divided the realm among themselves, and one of their resolutions ran: "Whoever dares proclaim himself emperor, all under heaven shall strike him down." From then on there was no emperor in the world, and no government office. The Nine Great Houses each laid down their own statutes and ordinances, and each governed many lesser sects beneath them. These sects administered their own districts, taking the place of the old dynasty's magistrates and yamen, yet wielding the local gentry's knowledge of custom and their hold upon it. It was as though the world had returned to the Spring and Autumn and Warring States era of a thousand years past, the Nine Great Houses standing like nine feudal lords, each leading still lesser lords beneath them, together keeping order within the pass.\n

\n\n

\n Liaoxin was a Shaolin proctor monk. By Shaolin's regulations, every sect and temple within its territory had resident administrative monks; a proctor's duty was to police all breaches of the law in his territory and arrest offenders. As a proctor, Liaoxin often had to travel far on his rounds. Ming Buxiang had only just been weaned, so when Liaoxin went out he left the boy in the care of a neighboring monk, Liaoxu.\n

\n\n

\n For the first two years, no matter how Liaoxin tried to teach him, Ming Buxiang never spoke a word. There were times Liaoxin suspected he was mute, and times he believed the wet nurse had been right—that the boy was truly a simpleton.\n

\n\n

\n In the fourth year, one day, Liaoxin was reciting his morning office. He had come to "Section Seven: No Attainment, No Teaching" of the Diamond Sutra, and paused for breath. As he was about to go on, Ming Buxiang, who had been listening at his side, suddenly opened his mouth and took up the recitation: "Subhuti! What do you think? Has the Tathagata attained Supreme Perfect Enlightenment? Has the Tathagata any Dharma he has taught..."\n

\n\n

\n And so Ming Buxiang recited the whole passage from memory, then stared up at Liaoxin with wide eyes, as if waiting to see how he would react.\n

\n\n

\n After that, Ming Buxiang could be said to have learned to speak.\n

\n\n

\n Liaoxin was astonished and overjoyed. He was a proper monk—unlike the lay monks, he was a practitioner who kept the precepts in earnest. Convinced now that Ming Buxiang had a karmic bond to the Buddha, he reported the strange event to Juejian.\n

\n\n

\n Juejian knit his brow. "Did this truly happen?"\n

\n\n

\n "How would your disciple dare deceive you?" Liaoxin answered.\n

\n\n

\n "This foster son of yours has a bond to the Buddha and ought to draw near the Dharma," Juejian said. "He should enter the temple and take up practice—is that your meaning?"\n

\n\n

\n Liaoxin caught the implication and flushed red. "If the abbot does not believe me, I will bring Buxiang here."\n

\n\n

\n Juejian waved a hand. "No need. You are diligent and hardworking; I have long meant to bring you into the halls. There is no call to push your foster son. Let the boy follow his own nature."\n

\n\n

\n Liaoxin had been a proctor stationed outside the temple proper, dealing with breaches of the law in the districts. To enter the halls meant to pass into the four courts and eight halls, attached to the center, and to handle the affairs of Shaolin itself. He would still be a proctor, but his authority would be vastly greater; he would even take up residence inside Shaolin Temple, and after death his ashes might be enshrined and venerated by Shaolin. Many monks dreamed of nothing so much as a place within the halls, the proper monks most ardent of all, every one of them holding entry to the halls a high honor.\n

\n\n

\n Liaoxin understood the abbot had misread him. He sighed, but offered no defense, and moved Ming Buxiang into a vacant two-room dwelling within Shaolin Temple. The lodging had a single front room that served both as the shrine for morning and evening recitation and as a sitting room; small as it was, it held two chairs, a tea table, and a few bookcases.\n

\n\n

\n From then on Liaoxin handled his official duties at Right Action Hall.\n

\n\n

\n By this time Ming Buxiang could speak, yet he rarely did. Liaoxin noticed that most of the time the boy simply watched—watched him, watched him chatting idly with other monks, watched other monks chatting among themselves. And besides watching, he listened: the evening drum and the morning bell, the morning and evening sutras, he listened to all of it. Worried the boy was bored, Liaoxin bought him some children's toys when he went out, but whether kite or diabolo, the nine-linked rings or the rattle-drum, Ming Buxiang did more turning-over-in-his-hands than playing. Liaoxin could not tell whether the child was clever or dull.\n

\n\n

\n When he was seven, one day, Ming Buxiang listened quietly as ever while Liaoxin finished his morning office, then suddenly asked, "All that has form is illusion—what does that mean?"\n

\n\n

\n Liaoxin felt a rush of excitement. Ever since Buxiang's fourth year he had been certain the child had a bond to the Buddha, and he had waited three years for the boy to ask his first question—and that it should be a line from the Diamond Sutra. He was glad, and at the same time anxious, afraid he would miss the heart of it and lead Buxiang's practice astray, so he thought it over carefully before he spoke.\n

\n\n

\n "To understand this line, you must first grasp what 'form' means," Liaoxin said. "Form is what our eyes see, our noses smell, our ears hear, our tongues taste, our bodies touch, our minds conceive. Every surface of the world is form."\n

\n\n

\n "Every surface of the world?" When Ming Buxiang asked a question, no puzzlement would show on his face; only after a moment would he 'squeeze out' a puzzled look. Liaoxin had grown used to it. The boy's feelings always lagged a little, and his expressions were stiff, like a clumsy imitation.\n

\n\n

\n "Just so," Liaoxin went on. "Everything you perceive is not real; it is illusion, false. And form includes more than that—your fixed attachments, your notions, are also form. For instance..." He picked up the wooden mallet he used in chanting and asked, "Is this mallet hard or soft?"\n

\n\n

\n "Hard."\n

\n\n

\n Liaoxin closed both palms around the mallet and quietly summoned the force of the Great Prajna Palm. Crushed under the enormous pressure, the mallet caved in until it bent like a rice spoon.\n

\n\n

\n "I'd say it's soft," Liaoxin said.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang nodded. "Hard and soft are relative. I think it's hard; you, Master, think it's soft."\n

\n\n

\n "You think it hard, I think it soft—these are both notions. A notion is also a kind of form. A preconceived idea is mistaken."\n

\n\n

\n "If all of these are false," Ming Buxiang asked, "what is real?"\n

\n\n

\n "The moment you cling to real and false, you too have fallen into form. You have made a discriminating mind that divides the true from the false."\n

\n\n

\n After a while Ming Buxiang squeezed out his puzzled look again.\n

\n\n

\n "You needn't sort out true from false, real from empty. You are false, the rice is false—yet when you are hungry, you must still eat. Understand that all that has form is illusion, and a man will not grow proud in good fortune, nor rail against heaven and others in bad. To truly see through the real and the empty—that is another realm altogether, and your master still has a long way to go." With that, Liaoxin laughed aloud. After a moment Ming Buxiang smiled too, and asked, "Then who has reached that realm? Abbot Juejian?"\n

\n\n

\n Liaoxin shook his head. "Abbot Juejian hasn't reached it either."\n

\n\n

\n "What about Abbot Juekong, the Head Monk?"\n

\n\n

\n "You remember Head Monk Juekong's name—when have you ever seen him?"\n

\n\n

\n "I heard you mention it to others, Master."\n

\n\n

\n Juekong was the Head Monk of the Samantabhadra Court, the senior court above Right Action Hall, lofty and revered in rank—yet Juekong was a lay monk, and Liaoxin held that, set beside a proper monk like himself, the man fell far short where the Dharma was concerned.\n

\n\n

\n "He's beneath even Abbot Juejian."\n

\n\n

\n "Then Abbot Juesheng?"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang named several in a row, and Liaoxin could vouch for none of them, saying only, "There are many high monks of great virtue who have seen through life and death and illusion—that is a marvelous realm. But you cannot tell it from a man's outside; you must look to the heart. The world is full of false monks and counterfeit Buddhas, and you must learn to tell them apart. If you have a taste for the Dharma, I will begin teaching you the sutras tomorrow."\n

\n\n

\n From the next day, Liaoxin began with the story of the World-Honored One, then taught Ming Buxiang the Treatise on the Middle Way; that done, the Heart Sutra and the Diamond Sutra. In the scriptures Ming Buxiang's grasp was superb—he drew three conclusions from one, his thought ranging without obstruction. At every examination his answers came smooth and ready. The blankness slowly left his eyes, replaced by a kindling light, and his face was no longer so dull as before; whenever Liaoxin spoke of something that delighted and moved him, Ming Buxiang too would let slip a knowing smile.\n

\n\n

\n From the age of eight, Ming Buxiang began to train in the martial arts under Liaoxin, starting from the basic Horse Stance Bridge Hand and working step by step to the Arhat Fist and the inner-energy methods.\n

\n\n

\n His aptitude for the martial arts seemed to surpass even his gift for the sutras: any technique, once demonstrated, he grasped at a glance. Inner cultivation prized a still mind and few cares, and once he entered meditative stillness, not a single thought strayed. Liaoxin understood now that what he had carried home was no simpleton at all, but a prodigy such as the world saw only once in a century.\n

\n\n

\n On his twelfth birthday, Liaoxin called Ming Buxiang before him. "You are twelve this year. Though you've grown up in the temple, you've never gone out to play; you do nothing but train, and few visitors come to my lodging. I've told you some of the temple's rules—do you remember them?"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang nodded. From earliest childhood the one constant in him had been his dislike of talking.\n

\n\n

\n From his robe Liaoxin drew a little booklet, no larger than a palm and half a knuckle thick, with four characters brushed in small script on its cover: Buddhist Disciple Precepts. This was the code of discipline that every soul within Shaolin Temple, monk or layman, was bound to uphold. Within it were set down three hundred and sixteen precepts, all written in small regular script. Every disciple was to carry it on his person and never lose it, and to know its precepts cold; whenever an elder put a question to him about the temple, he could produce this booklet to answer.\n

\n\n

\n "Keep it on you. Don't lose it." Liaoxin handed the Buddhist Disciple Precepts to Ming Buxiang. "A Shaolin disciple who turns twelve must serve as a laborer if he wishes to remain in the temple. They say that in the old days Shaolin Temple meant only the main hall where the abbot dwelt, with no dividing into proper monks and lay monks; though it touched the martial world, most of what it did was righteous and chivalrous work. The Shaolin Temple of today has grown to the size you see, proper monks and lay monks mingled together, and it is no longer the pure place it once was. There are no women here, and you..."\n

\n\n

\n Liaoxin looked at Ming Buxiang's handsome, lovely face, the skin fair as a maiden's. He had heard of certain foul doings within the temple. "You must be careful in all things. If anyone forces you to do what you do not wish, you must resist, and your master will see justice done for you. You understand my meaning?"\n

\n\n

\n "That sort of thing—is it very pleasant?"\n

\n\n

\n Liaoxin had not expected such a question and was taken aback a moment before answering. "The great desire of human life—food and sex are part of our nature. But to give oneself over to lust does harm to one's practice."\n

\n\n

\n "Have you done it, Master?"\n

\n\n

\n Liaoxin laughed aloud. "Is that you teasing your master? Your master left home for the monastery as a child. I've never given it a thought."\n

\n\n

\n "Then how do you know it harms one's practice, and how do you know what it is to sink into it?" Ming Buxiang concluded, "Master speaks of many principles, but has done few things."\n

\n\n

\n Liaoxin had truly never considered the question. He had kept the precepts since boyhood, taking pride in being a proper monk; the things he had never done in this life were many indeed, and what a pity that was...\n

\n\n

\n The moment that thought—what a pity—rose up, Liaoxin came sharply alert. To stir a thought is to make karma. His discipline ran deep, and he rose at once to his feet. "I must chant the sutras. From tomorrow you'll join the others in cleaning Right Action Hall."\n

\n\n

\n From that day on, the words "Master speaks of many principles, but has done few things" lodged in Liaoxin's heart, surfacing now and then. It was a seed, fallen on barren ground, stirring to life.\n

\n\n

\n ......\n

\n\n

\n Right Action Hall stood within the Samantabhadra Court, to the right of Shaolin Temple's main hall. After the fall of the old dynasty, Shaolin—like the other sects—had raised a great many pagodas and halls. Facing it head-on, a straight processional avenue ran clear to the main hall; to the left, in order, lay the Samantabhadra Court and the Manjushri Court, and to the right, the Avalokitesvara Court and the Ksitigarbha Court. Each court held two halls—one hall, four courts, eight minor halls. Such was the order of Shaolin Temple as it now stood.\n

\n\n

\n Shaolin Temple was unlike the other sects. The Buddhist gate prized purity, and so it sat in no bustling, clamorous place; there were no shops or dwellings around it. The myriad monks and disciples, more than ten thousand, all lived within the temple, each court furnished with a thousand monks' quarters. Not until five li beyond the temple walls, at Buddha City, did one find any liveliness. There monks and townsfolk lived intermixed; it was the largest city in the Mount Song region, and within it lay several hundred more monks' dwellings for the monks who managed the Zhengzhou area from outside the halls. This place was called the Nameless Temple—for by rights every temple and sect that governed a district had a name, yet this one alone answered directly to Shaolin Temple while belonging to no hall, with no temple to call its own, and so was called the Nameless Temple. Ming Buxiang had lived there until he was four.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang was assigned to clean Right Action Hall, the lowest of the menial tasks. More than twenty disciples worked alongside him, most of them monks of the Ben generation, one rank below Liaoxin, and among them some lay disciples like Ming Buxiang himself. The disciple in charge was named Benyue, his face thick with dark blotches; behind his back the monks of his own generation called him "Spotted Dog." The nickname had a source: a few years earlier a spotted dog had wandered into Right Action Hall and bitten Benyue on the calf, and they had snickered to themselves that here was one spotted dog biting another.\n

\n\n

\n Out of compassion, Abbot Juejian had only driven the creature beyond the temple walls. Some said Benyue slipped out of his room by night, lured the dog with rat meat, and beat it to death, leaving the carcass in the woods outside the temple; others said he ate it. Benyue's teacher was Liaowu, and Liaowu was a lay monk, so naturally Benyue belonged to the lay monks' faction as well—and the lay monks' observance of the precepts was always in doubt. In any case, no one believed Benyue would let the matter rest.\n

\n\n

\n The first time he laid eyes on Ming Buxiang, Benyue knit his brow and asked, "You're the proctor Liaoxin's foster son?"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang nodded.\n

\n\n

\n Benyue spat and reached out to stroke Ming Buxiang's cheek, his manner thick with lechery. "No wonder—pretty as this, Liaoxin must dote on you no end. Doesn't he?"\n

\n\n

\n The moment the words were out, several of the monks beside him burst into laughter, and Ming Buxiang, of all people, laughed along with them. Benyue snarled, "What are you laughing at?" and shoved him. He was nearing twenty, far taller and bigger than Ming Buxiang, and as a tonsured monk he was permitted to study the temple's deeper arts; the shove carried real force, and it knocked Ming Buxiang to the ground.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang showed no anger and got back to his feet. Benyue demanded again, "What are you laughing at?"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang said nothing. Benyue raised his voice and cursed again. "Can't you speak?"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang shook his head. "I can."\n

\n\n

\n "Then what were you laughing at? Speak!"\n

\n\n

\n Again Ming Buxiang gave no answer.\n

\n\n

\n In a fury, Benyue struck him a blow that sent him staggering. "What are you laughing at—speak!"\n

\n\n

\n The monks who had gathered to watch took fright and hurried forward to stop him, but Benyue would not let it go. "What are you laughing at? Do you look down on me?"\n

\n\n

\n A crisp crack, and another red palm-print bloomed on Ming Buxiang's face.\n

\n\n

\n The others rushed to pull Benyue off, pleading, "He's just a child, and a simple one at that. Don't hold it against him."\n

\n\n

\n "Simpleton—then it serves you right to haul the night soil! Fu Yingcong, from now on he works with you!"\n

\n\n

\n A youth of fifteen or sixteen stepped forward at once with an ingratiating smile. "Yes, yes! Newcomer, come with me, quick—no dawdling!" He snatched up a slop bucket and pulled Ming Buxiang away.\n

\n\n

\n Seeing the others still standing about, Benyue snapped, "What are you all gawking at? Back to work!"\n

\n\n

\n Fu Yingcong led Ming Buxiang off, glanced back to see the others dispersing, and said, "Why'd you go and offend that Spotted Dog your very first day?"\n

\n\n

\n "How did I offend him?" Ming Buxiang asked.\n

\n\n

\n "What were you laughing at just now?"\n

\n\n

\n "You all didn't find it funny—so why did you laugh?"\n

\n\n

\n Hearing the answer, Fu Yingcong shook his head, thinking, sure enough, an idiot. "Here." He shoved the slop bucket into Ming Buxiang's hands. "There are more than a thousand people in Right Action Hall, top to bottom, and if nobody clears it, the filth would pile up clear to Mahavira Hall. Don't turn up your nose at this work for being foul and heavy—it's important."\n

\n\n

\n Then he asked, "Your master is the monk Liaoxin. So do you mean to take vows yourself one day?"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang shook his head, and Fu Yingcong could not tell whether that meant 'I don't know' or 'no.'\n

\n\n

\n "With that dazed look of yours, if you don't take vows, you'll just get bullied staying on at Shaolin. Didn't the monk Liaoxin tell you?"\n

\n\n

\n Again Ming Buxiang shook his head. Though he could speak, he seemed to love only shaking and nodding his head.\n

\n\n

\n Seeing the boy didn't understand, Fu Yingcong began at once to show off. "What makes Spotted Dog so high and mighty? Just those few precept scars on his scalp. Let me teach you how things work. Shaolin doesn't strictly require its disciples to take vows—but of the one hall, four courts, and eight minor halls, which abbot or head monk isn't bald-headed? A Daoist temple might hold more than just Daoists, but a Buddhist temple is sure to be all monks. Don't take vows, and the most a lay disciple can ever rise to is a resident layman in the halls, assisting with the paperwork—like me, lorded over by monks day in and day out. Damn it, the day I leave Shaolin, I'll pour a bucket of night soil over Spotted Dog's head and teach him some manners!"\n

\n\n

\n When Ming Buxiang again said nothing, Fu Yingcong scolded, "Why've you gone quiet again?"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang shook his head, meaning he had nothing to say.\n

\n\n

\n "Stay quiet and people will bully you. Say something!"\n

\n\n

\n "Say what?" Ming Buxiang asked.\n

\n\n

\n "Whatever comes to mind!"\n

\n\n

\n "Are you going to take vows?"\n

\n\n

\n Wasn't that the very question Fu Yingcong had just put to him?\n

\n\n

\n "What's so good about taking vows? Can't eat meat, can't play with women. If it weren't to learn a craft and get a Hero's Warrant so I could go out and make my way in the world, who'd want to stay in this cursed place!" Still, Fu Yingcong answered. "Damn it, I just blame being born in the wrong spot. If I'd been born in Shandong, the Songshan Sect wouldn't have half these rules!"\n

\n\n

\n "The Songshan Sect?" Ming Buxiang asked. "And what's a Hero's Warrant?"\n

\n\n

\n "You don't know?" Fu Yingcong put on a show of great surprise, glad of the rare chance to flaunt the little knowledge he had. "The Songshan Sect actually answers to Shaolin Temple too—but they're like brothers about to split the household. No wonder, really; they're Daoists, not the same family as us. Still, mention Mount Song and everyone thinks first of Shaolin Temple—and over that one sore point, forty-odd years back they were clamoring to rename themselves the Songyang Sect. There was a great to-do, the so-called Shao-Song Dispute, but in the end Shaolin Temple thrashed them soundly and they crept meekly back under the name Songshan—they just moved their Daoist temple over into Shandong."\n

\n\n

\n He went on, "As for a Hero's Warrant, it's like an ordination certificate, but for a man of the wandering world. Master your craft and petition your own sect for a Hero's Warrant, and you're a hero. The sect pays you a monthly stipend; you can hire on as a bodyguard or house guard, or join the sect, take up a post, help one of the great houses govern a district, and do the work only a hero can do. Only, once you hold a Hero's Warrant you have to keep to the rules—your own sect's rules above all... ah, never mind that. Cursed luck, being born in Shanxi, ah..."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang listened closely. His master, Liaoxin, was a man of few words, devoted heart and soul to the Buddha; on an ordinary day, apart from chanting, teaching, and instructing in the martial arts, there were days he spoke barely two sentences to his disciple. Still less, having decided Ming Buxiang had the seed of wisdom and was destined to take vows at Shaolin as a proper monk, had he troubled to mention these tales of the wandering world or the rules of the martial fraternity.\n

\n\n

\n And so it was that only now did Ming Buxiang's words gradually begin to come more freely.\n

\n\n

\n ......\n

\n\n

\n A few nights later, asleep in his own room, Ming Buxiang suddenly heard a low growl, or perhaps a sigh. He rose and gently pushed the door open a crack. The window was unshuttered, and moonlight slanted in; by it he could faintly make out a figure pacing back and forth—his master, Liaoxin. Liaoxin's steps were quick and urgent, yet so light he seemed barely to touch the floor, as though something troubled him. A single oil lamp burned in the room, its feeble flame wavering before the Buddha-image, looking as if at any moment his stride might snuff it out.\n

\n\n

\n After he had paced like this for a time, Ming Buxiang again heard the heavy rasp of Liaoxin's breathing as he sighed, and saw him push open the door and go out—where, in the dead of night, there was no knowing. Ming Buxiang waited quietly. Most of an hour later, Liaoxin came back inside. He was soaked through, his monk's robe tied off at the waist, his upper body bare, baring muscle long honed firm and powerful, the water beads bright and clear in the moonlight. Ming Buxiang watched him enter, and once inside he did not come out again.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang did not ask Liaoxin what had happened. And whenever such a thing occurred again after that, Ming Buxiang never asked.\n

\n\n

\n Several more months passed. One evening, master and disciple had finished their night recitation and were about to retire when Ming Buxiang suddenly said, "Wait, Master." He stepped quickly into his room, and when he came out, he held a longevity peach bun in his hands.\n

\n\n

\n "Where did this come from?" Liaoxin asked, surprised.\n

\n\n

\n "I did Fu Yingcong's share of the work," Ming Buxiang answered, "and he bought it for me outside the temple." He raised it in both hands, motioning for Liaoxin to take it.\n

\n\n

\n "What's this for?"\n

\n\n

\n "Today is your fortieth birthday."\n

\n\n

\n Liaoxin was deeply moved. His eyes and nose stung; he drew a small breath to master it.\n

\n\n

\n "You're thoughtful. How did you know?"\n

\n\n

\n "When I was cleaning the room, I saw your ordination certificate, and that Hero's Warrant—both have your birthday written on them."\n

\n\n

\n "I mean the giving of a gift," Liaoxin said, putting on a stern face. "Where did you learn that?"\n

\n\n

\n "A few days ago I saw someone bring a gift to Abbot Juejian. I asked about it and learned it was the abbot's birthday."\n

\n\n

\n The powerful and exalted within the temple never lacked for flatterers bearing rich gifts on their birthdays and feast days, and Liaoxin held the custom a base one. Of course, Ming Buxiang's filial heart was not to be spoken of in the same breath as theirs. He took the peach bun—and saw a light seem to shine in Ming Buxiang's eyes, the boy looking rather excited.\n

\n\n

\n "Eat it, Master."\n

\n\n

\n "Your master takes no food after noon, as you know," Liaoxin replied.\n

\n\n

\n "Then how is it I may eat my evening meal?" Ming Buxiang asked. Every child has an endless supply of questions.\n

\n\n

\n "You're at the age for growing bone and flesh, and you've taken no vows or precepts, so you needn't be bound by this rule."\n

\n\n

\n "If a man were about to starve, and the hour had passed, could he still not eat?"\n

\n\n

\n "To break a precept for the sake of survival—the moment that thought stirs, you have opened a convenient gate for yourself. The flesh is suffering; if one truly starves to death, that too is release." Liaoxin thought, saying it this way, there was no telling whether the boy would understand.\n

\n\n

\n "Master, you often say to let go of attachment to self," Ming Buxiang said. "Isn't this an attachment too?"\n

\n\n

\n Liaoxin was startled.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang went on, "You taught me that a man is illusion and rice is illusion, but when a man is hungry he must eat. We eat in order to practice. If every infant saw through the real and the empty at birth, they'd all starve—how then would they practice?"\n

\n\n

\n "Without practice," Liaoxin said, "how does one see through the real and the empty?"\n

\n\n

\n "Without eating," Ming Buxiang said, "how does one practice?"\n

\n\n

\n "Unless one reaches the stage of Grain Abstention," Liaoxin said, "one must eat. Taking no food after noon is to honor the precepts."\n

\n\n

\n "But then you said one mustn't break a precept even to keep from starving."\n

\n\n

\n "To keep the precepts and practice is to put the precepts first."\n

\n\n

\n "And clinging to the precepts—isn't that an attachment?"\n

\n\n

\n Liaoxin wanted to answer 'no' but felt it wrong; wanted to answer 'yes' but felt that wrong too. After a moment he said, "It is a matter of the heart. Reach the realm of non-attachment, and naturally you will not cling even to the precepts."\n

\n\n

\n "How does one know he has reached that realm?"\n

\n\n

\n "Your master hasn't reached it yet. Reach it, and you'll know of yourself."\n

\n\n

\n "Does Master know who has reached it?"\n

\n\n

\n That, Liaoxin could not answer. Seeing him hesitate, Ming Buxiang said, "Master, have you never thought—that you must first try to let go of attachment before you can truly let it go?"\n

\n\n

\n Again Liaoxin was startled.\n

\n\n

\n "This peach bun will spoil by tomorrow," Ming Buxiang said. "Let me throw it away."\n

\n\n

\n "Eat it yourself," said Liaoxin. "The thought is enough. Don't trouble with such empty courtesies hereafter."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang shook his head. "This is Master's peach bun, not mine. Your disciple is clinging to it right now."\n

\n\n

\n Liaoxin laughed. Then, seeing Ming Buxiang's face fall as he took back the bun and turned to leave, he could not bear it and called out, "Wait."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang turned. Liaoxin hesitated, then shook his head and said, "It's nothing." Ming Buxiang turned to go, and Liaoxin called him back again; after a long moment's hesitation, he said, "Come here."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang walked back before him. Liaoxin looked at the peach bun, brooding a long while.\n

\n\n

\n At last he reached out, broke off a small piece, and put it in his mouth. He ate nothing after noon, and it was deep night now; the habit was old, yet this one small bite tasted sweet and fresh beyond all measure, wholly unlike anything he had eaten before.\n

\n\n

\n "This one bite—let it fulfill your filial heart," Liaoxin said. "That way your master isn't clinging, is he?"\n

","published_time":"2026-06-15T00:00:00.000Z","paid":false,"show_flag":true,"show_scheduled_time":"2026-06-15T00:00:00.000Z","unpaid_scheduled_time":"2026-06-15T00:00:00.000Z"},{"content_id":4951,"novel_id":74,"chapter_no":3,"chapter_title":"Vague and Unspoken Part 2","content":"

\n Ming Buxiang smiled faintly. "Master has broken a precept for his disciple, so eat the whole thing. Is there any difference between one bite and the whole bun?"\n

\n\n

\n Liaoxin shook his head. "You know your master's intent lies not in eating more or less. This is following the heart—understand?"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang smiled. "Following the heart means there's reason either to eat or not. First bite, second bite, third bite—where's the difference?"\n

\n\n

\n Liaoxin thought there was sense in this, and was about to reach out his hand when, with a sudden start in his heart, he drew it back. "It's rare to see you so glib... Off with you. Go to sleep."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang set the peach bun on the table, bowed, and went back to his room to rest.\n

\n\n

\n That night Liaoxin tossed and turned in bed, ravenously hungry—a feeling he had not known in more than ten years.\n

\n\n

\n ......\n

\n\n

\n After the Laba festival, a great snow fell on Shaolin Temple. Master and disciple swept the drifts from before their dwelling, and Liaoxin said to Ming Buxiang, "Practice is just like this. Each man sweeps the snow before his own door; to count on others to help you is to chase what isn't real."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang countered, "You mean—never mind the frost on another man's roof?"\n

\n\n

\n "Look at this courtyard," Liaoxin said. "The Samantabhadra Court alone has a thousand monks' dwellings. Could you ever sweep it all? If every man diligently swept before his own door, all would be pure of itself."\n

\n\n

\n "So Master means the World-Honored One was meddling in others' affairs?"\n

\n\n

\n Liaoxin laughed aloud. "In matters of practice, the World-Honored One can only point you the way—it's like handing you a broom and dustpan; you must sweep the floor yourself. Sweeping snow is only a figure. You can help a man sweep his snow, but you cannot practice for him."\n

\n\n

\n "So if a man's practice falls short, he can blame no one else?"\n

\n\n

\n Liaoxin nodded. "The world has always held many trials of the demon-kind, testing the human heart. Those trials are not curses—they are adversity bodhisattvas. Only by withstanding them can one's merit be made complete."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang gazed at the snow heaped on the eaves, and seemed to understand.\n

\n\n

\n The new year passed, and then came the Beginning of Spring, and after the Beginning of Spring the Rain Water term. The twenty-first of the second month was the birthday of the Bodhisattva Samantabhadra, the most important day of the year in the Samantabhadra Court: not only were the sutras chanted seven days and nights, but a scripture-monk from the Manjushri Court opened the hall to expound the Dharma, and all studied it together. In years past Liaoxin had always left Ming Buxiang at home and gone alone to chant at the assembly, but this year Ming Buxiang had turned twelve, so Liaoxin begged off his chanting duty and brought the boy to hear the Dharma.\n

\n\n

\n It was the first time Ming Buxiang heard anyone but Liaoxin expound the teaching.\n

\n\n

\n When the eighth of the third month came, Liaoxin summoned Ming Buxiang.\n

\n\n

\n "I must go to Mount Song to see to some business; I set out tomorrow. While I'm away, take good care of yourself."\n

\n\n

\n This "Mount Song" meant, of course, not the place but the Songshan Sect, which had moved to Shandong—settled in the city of Jinan, right beside the Taishan Sect.\n

\n\n

\n "Will you be gone long?" Ming Buxiang asked.\n

\n\n

\n "A month at the soonest, and I'll take you to Buddha City for the Buddha's birthday when I'm back. At worst, I'll still be in time to eat rice dumplings with you."\n

\n\n

\n Liaoxin then gave him a number of instructions, all to the effect that while he was away Ming Buxiang must not slacken.\n

\n\n

\n That night, just as Liaoxin was about to retire, Ming Buxiang suddenly pushed open the door and came in.\n

\n\n

\n "What is it?" Liaoxin asked.\n

\n\n

\n "I haven't slept beside Master in many years. I want to sleep with you tonight," Ming Buxiang said. "Master leaves on a long journey tomorrow."\n

\n\n

\n Since his promotion to hall monk, Liaoxin had mostly handled hall affairs; even when he went out, he was back within three days. Since Ming Buxiang had come to understanding, the two had never been parted so long.\n

\n\n

\n Liaoxin laughed. "As big as you are, still acting the child." He beckoned. "Come, then."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang climbed onto the bed, curled up in Liaoxin's arms, and was soon asleep. Liaoxin looked at the youth in his embrace, so handsome and refined, and remembering the old days, could not help a sigh.\n

\n\n

\n This child had never once given him cause for worry.\n

\n\n

\n Sunk deep in sleep, Ming Buxiang reached out and clasped Liaoxin just as he had as a small boy. Liaoxin closed his eyes, but his thoughts surged and would not let him sleep.\n

\n\n

\n The next day, as though he had foreseen something, Liaoxin said to Ming Buxiang, "If anyone bullies you these next days, endure it, bear with it; do not quarrel. Leave any trouble for your master to handle when he returns—understand?"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang nodded to show he understood.\n

\n\n

\n A month later, on the twenty-fifth of the fourth month, within the Songshan territory in Shandong, seven corpses were found—all monks who had been sent to Mount Song together. They had been killed on the road back. Among them, only Liaoxin's body was missing.\n

\n\n

\n Liaoxin had not died, yet no one in this world ever saw him again. He had vanished, strange and complete, and where he had gone was never known.\n

\n\n

\n ......\n

\n\n

\n The day Liaoxin left Shaolin Temple, Ming Buxiang went as usual to serve his labor at Right Action Hall. The moment Benyue saw him, his brows shot up and his eyes glared, and he kicked the slop bucket straight into Ming Buxiang's chest.\n

\n\n

\n "Your master thinks himself so grand," Benyue snarled, "he won't even give Head Monk Juekong his due?!"\n

\n\n

\n Remembering Liaoxin's words that morning, Ming Buxiang knew what was happening. He silently picked up the bucket and turned to go. Benyue darted a step ahead to block his path. "You see your senior brother and don't even pay your respects? A master with no sense of rank, a disciple with no breeding—both of you cheap trash, cut from the same cloth!" With that he struck Ming Buxiang across the face.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang neither answered back nor returned the blow, but walked straight on. Angrier still, Benyue kicked him from behind—a hard kick to the small of the back that pitched his body forward. Still he paid no heed. The monks at hand hurried to restrain Benyue.\n

\n\n

\n Seeing Ming Buxiang about to get clear, Fu Yingcong hastened after him. "The more you ignore him, the more he'll bully you."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang answered evenly, "With no hindrance in the heart, one is at ease."\n

\n\n

\n "You're really not angry?" Seeing Ming Buxiang only walk on without answering, Fu Yingcong went on, "They say that after the four courts held council yesterday, Head Monk Juekong handed down a decree, and your master openly opposed it and clashed with the Head Monk. Did you know about that?"\n

\n\n

\n "Master didn't mention it."\n

\n\n

\n "Spotted Dog is a lay monk, and his teacher Liaowu is of the same faction as Juekong. The way he's bullying you today, it's surely on his teacher's orders. Ming Buxiang—why not go to Abbot Juejian and lodge a complaint? Say Spotted Dog is throwing his weight around."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang halted, looked at Fu Yingcong, and asked, "He's bullied you no less—why don't you go?"\n

\n\n

\n Fu Yingcong reddened and lowered his head. "I... in three more months I turn eighteen. Once I pass the skills trial and get my Hero's Warrant, I'll be leaving Shaolin. Why bother quarreling with him?"\n

\n\n

\n "You won't pass the skills trial," Ming Buxiang said.\n

\n\n

\n Fu Yingcong's heart quailed, but he would not admit it. "Who says I won't? You haven't even seen what I can do!"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang shook his head and walked on.\n

\n\n

\n "Wait—your robe's covered in footprints. Take it off and beat it clean first." Fu Yingcong caught up quickly. "If one of the senior brothers asks, there'll be trouble again."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang set down the bucket and took off his outer robe, slapping it a few times. Fu Yingcong took it from him. "Let me." He turned and beat it a few times, and only when it was clean handed it back. Ming Buxiang put it on again, took up the bucket, and went off to work.\n

\n\n

\n The two of them emptied all the night soil and returned to Right Action Hall. Usually, once Benyue had made his inspection, the group would scatter to the dining hall for the noon meal; but that day Benyue mustered all twenty-odd monks. The others seemed to have known in advance—only Ming Buxiang was in the dark, standing in the line, waiting.\n

\n\n

\n Before long an old monk of about fifty arrived. Ming Buxiang recognized him as Juejian, the abbot of Right Action Hall. Benyue first made his greetings, and Juejian asked, "Today we examine the Buddhist Disciple Precepts. Was this duly passed along?"\n

\n\n

\n "The abbot gave the order; how would I dare be lax? I told all my brothers, as the abbot can verify."\n

\n\n

\n Several disciples in league with Benyue chimed in: "It's true, Brother Benyue told us." The rest held their tongues. Though Ming Buxiang knew nothing of it, he did not say so.\n

\n\n

\n "Then everyone, take out your Buddhist Disciple Precepts."\n

\n\n

\n Each man drew out the little booklet. Ming Buxiang felt about in his robe and could not find his Buddhist Disciple Precepts. He looked to Fu Yingcong, who wore a guilty expression and turned his face away, refusing to meet his eyes, and from his own robe drew out a little booklet—vaguely familiar. At once Ming Buxiang understood.\n

\n\n

\n Benyue bellowed, "Ming Buxiang, where is your Buddhist Disciple Precepts?"\n

\n\n

\n "Lost." Ming Buxiang turned back to look at him and said it lightly. "I threw it away."\n

\n\n

\n At these words the whole group buzzed in uproar, and Benyue, seizing his chance, cursed in a fury, "Threw it away? A Shaolin disciple—precepts before all! Didn't your master teach you that the Buddhist Disciple Precepts must be kept on you at all times, consulted always, to discipline the body and examine the nature? How dare you be so bold?!" He turned to Juejian. "Abbot, this Ming Buxiang is a shameless, incorrigible boy. You must punish him severely, or there's no telling what other tricks he'll pull!"\n

\n\n

\n Juejian walked over, looked at Ming Buxiang, and asked, "You are Liaoxin's disciple?"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang nodded.\n

\n\n

\n "Liaoxin has always kept the precepts with steadiness and care. Do you know why?"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang answered, "When the World-Honored One entered nirvana, Ananda asked him: While the Buddha is present, we take the Buddha as our teacher; when the Buddha is gone, whom shall we take as our teacher? The World-Honored One answered: Take the precepts as your teacher. And so my master keeps the precepts strictly, with especial care."\n

\n\n

\n Hearing him speak so out of the ordinary, Juejian asked further, "Shaolin requires its disciples to carry the Buddhist Disciple Precepts at all times, so that when there is an examination they may consult it—for this same reason. Since you understand the principle, why did you throw it away?"\n

\n\n

\n "Your disciple only said he threw it away," Ming Buxiang said. "He did not say it was not on his person."\n

\n\n

\n Juejian found this most curious. "What do you mean?"\n

\n\n

\n "All three hundred and sixteen precepts are engraved on my heart," Ming Buxiang said. "That is to carry it on my person."\n

\n\n

\n Benyue scoffed, "You claim you've memorized the whole thing? What empty boasting is this?"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang pressed his palms together. "Let the abbot examine me."\n

\n\n

\n Juejian knew Benyue had always bullied newcomers and guessed there was more to this than met the eye; but seeing Ming Buxiang so brimming with confidence, he asked, "What is the seventy-seventh precept?"\n

\n\n

\n "A Buddhist disciple shall curb desire and abstain from lust, forbidding all licentiousness. To debauch another's wife or daughter, to ruin another's good name—Hero's Warrant revoked, expelled from the temple gate, arrested for trial, tried for sentence."\n

\n\n

\n "The tenth?"\n

\n\n

\n "Without the permission of the master who taught him, one may not take disciples of his own. Without the leave of the eight halls' abbots, an outside disciple shall not be taught the Upper Hall Martial Arts recorded by Right View Hall."\n

\n\n

\n Juejian picked out several more precepts to ask. As they listened, the others followed along in their booklets, and indeed not a word was off—every one of them was struck with amazement. Juejian himself marveled inwardly, thinking, Liaoxin often said this boy had a bond to the Buddha; I never imagined him so brilliant.\n

\n\n

\n Benyue said angrily, "You say you've got it memorized cold—then I'll ask you: what's written on page thirty-seven, line five?"\n

\n\n

\n This was sheer malice, but to everyone's surprise Ming Buxiang answered without the least hesitation, "Buddhist Disciple Precepts, precept two hundred seventeen: A Buddhist disciple shall not covet wealth, nor contend with the common folk over property."\n

\n\n

\n Benyue flipped to the page and found it was exactly so, and his mouth fell open in astonishment. Ming Buxiang went on, "Page twelve, line five, character six is the word 'no'; page thirteen, line ten, character seven is the word 'fall'; page sixteen, line two, character nine is the word 'word'; page nineteen, line six, character eight..."\n

\n\n

\n There he fell silent. Juejian drew out his own Buddhist Disciple Precepts, turned to page nineteen, and saw that the character Ming Buxiang meant was 'script.' Strung together, the four characters read: "no reliance on the written word."\n

\n\n

\n Juejian understood: this was Ming Buxiang's way of declaring that he kept the precepts in his heart, with no reliance on the written word, and so had thrown the booklet away.\n

\n\n

\n "Remarkable—a rare memory you have. Yet memory or no, you should not have thrown the Buddhist Disciple Precepts away. Know that the scriptures are the source of the Dharma. To presume on your cleverness and cast them aside at will is a mind of arrogance," Juejian said. "If I let you memorize every word in the Sutra Repository, would you then set a torch to them all? What would those who come after rely upon?"\n

\n\n

\n Benyue said hastily, "Just so! This one's always been arrogant—the abbot should punish him, lest he presume on his cleverness and hold others as nothing!"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang bowed respectfully. "Your disciple will bear it in mind."\n

\n\n

\n "The rest of you should be like Ming Buxiang—commit the precepts to memory and keep them with your heart." With that, Juejian set about examining the other disciples' knowledge of the precepts. Seeing that Juejian had no intention of pursuing the matter, Benyue's resentment showed plain upon his face.\n

\n\n

\n From then on, Juejian kept Ming Buxiang in mind. He watched the boy and learned that his daily recitation never once lapsed; that after his labor he returned to his room and did not come out again until the evening meal, after which he doused his lamp and slept, keeping little company with others.\n

\n\n

\n A month or so later came grim news from Mount Song: seven bodies had been recovered, and among them Liaoxin alone was missing. The corpses were brought back to Shaolin Temple, and the proctor of Right Action Hall in the Samantabhadra Court examined them; before any finding was reached, rumors were already flying.\n

\n\n

\n Juejian sent someone to inform Ming Buxiang that Liaoxin had vanished. Ming Buxiang only nodded and shut his door.\n

\n\n

\n Before anyone marked its coming, the Dragon Boat Festival drew near. Each feast day a great flood of gifts arrived at Right Action Hall, and Juejian, unwilling to let his monk's quarters be tainted by such worldly things, had them set in the main hall. After the festival he would send half the gifts to Right Thought Hall in the Ksitigarbha Court for temple use, and pass the other half to the hall monks as recompense. Those hall monks, receiving their share, chanted the Buddha's name and protested they dared not accept, yet the corners of their eyes brimmed with delight; only a few could take not a single thing and turn all they received over to Right Thought Hall.\n

\n\n

\n How had Shaolin Temple come to this? Juejian wondered. Did it begin with the Kunlun Council more than eighty years ago, or with the Shao-Song Dispute some forty years back, when the lay monks were brought in?\n

\n\n

\n The change was like water wearing through stone—each erosion too fine to see, yet day by day, year by year, the old face was lost beyond recovering. Forty years ago lay monks could not enter the halls; now, of the four courts, two had head monks who were lay monks. In another twenty years, what then?\n

\n\n

\n Juejian dared not follow the thought. He felt that the contest between lay monks and proper monks at Shaolin was slowly gathering into a storm. Should he stand at the storm's heart, or withdraw while the current still allowed? He had never been able to decide.\n

\n\n

\n By now the storm was no longer merely gathering, but had taken dim shape. Of the eight hall monks sent to Mount Song, lay and proper were even; the bodies of the seven who died were brought back to Shaolin, and Right Action Hall's examination yielded an exceedingly ugly result. All seven had died by Shaolin martial arts, and by one another's signature techniques. If one had to render a verdict, it was this: proper monks and lay monks had fought, were gravely wounded unto death, and Liaoxin alone survived and, dreading the blame for his crime, had fled into hiding.\n

\n\n

\n The hall monk who examined the bodies dared not pronounce a verdict and reported to Juejian. Juejian ordered a second examination, but the examiner answered that the wounds were unmistakable, and a second look would yield the same. The Right Action Hall examination report now lay on Juejian's desk, wanting only his signature.\n

\n\n

\n Fortunately this year fell the once-in-a-decade Kunlun Council, with a change of alliance leader at hand; Head Monk Juekong would go to Kunlun Palace in the abbot's stead to walk through the formalities, and the matter could be put off a while longer.\n

\n\n

\n But how would Head Monk Juekong handle it on his return? The best course would be to enter a finding of "perpetrator unknown, cause of death pending inquiry," to wait until Liaoxin was found and the truth pressed from him before deliberating further; and if Liaoxin was already dead, to let the matter rest there.\n

\n\n

\n But would things go so smoothly?\n

\n\n

\n Juekong was the head of the lay monks. Would he proclaim the truth, or swallow it and keep silent? In the Shaolin Temple of today, lay monks made up well over six parts in ten, yet of the one hall, four courts, and eight minor halls there were only five head monks' seats; and though no written law governed the abbacy, it was an unspoken rule to pass it to a proper monk, never a lay one. Was Head Monk Juekong truly devoted heart and soul to Shaolin, or did he harbor some private design?\n

\n\n

\n Lay monks could not be trusted, Juejian thought. Those who took the tonsure not out of faith—who knew what they schemed? And this single sheet of paper was the very implement for stirring up trouble.\n

\n\n

\n If he were to bypass the Samantabhadra Court and submit it straight to the abbot, then wait for Juekong's return to convene the four-court council, Juejian could already guess the conclusion: that Liaoxin had murdered his brothers in the faith and fled the temple in betrayal.\n

\n\n

\n Liaoxin could never have turned traitor—of that he was certain. But that conclusion both avoided the strife between proper and lay, and meant the Samantabhadra Court and the other three courts had reached a common understanding, after which Juekong could hardly make further trouble of it. It was the cleanest way. Yet to submit it over his superior's head would surely bring Juejian into conflict with Head Monk Juekong—and Liaoxin would have to bear the outcome. Whatever the truth, the man Liaoxin could not, and would not, ever appear again; and Juejian himself would step from the storm's edge into its very heart.\n

\n\n

\n As to what the truth really was—he believed that in this martial world, no fewer than seven men died every day.\n

\n\n

\n Of a sudden Juejian felt very tired. Since taking up the abbacy of Right Action Hall, ten-odd years of heavy official duties, of human niceties and courteous exchange—less chanting, more endorsing of documents; less stilling of the mind, more vexing of it; and at every great juncture, deceiving those above and concealing from those below, acting as expedience demanded.\n

\n\n

\n For all his years of practice, he had only drifted further from the Buddha. At times he wished to let it all go—yet he thought, if I do not enter hell, who will? What proper monk does not wish to devote himself to quiet practice? Was he to hand the whole great expanse of Shaolin Temple over to the lay monks' keeping?\n

\n\n

\n But where, in the end, had Liaoxin gone?\n

\n\n

\n He had once thought highly of him—until, a few years back, Liaoxin had reported that the four-year-old Ming Buxiang could recite the Diamond Sutra. In that instant Juejian had grasped it: the steady gravity, the pure heart and few desires, were only a surface; at bottom Liaoxin still chased name and gain, a worldly man with his mind on entering the courts and halls. To force a four-year-old to memorize the Diamond Sutra—what bitter suffering that must have cost the child? Thinking of it, Juejian had grown cold toward him.\n

\n\n

\n Now, thinking it over, Liaoxin had spoken no falsehood, and it was Juejian, in the end, who had misjudged him.\n

\n\n

\n And thinking further: a brawl between proper and lay, and Liaoxin killing men and then fleeing the blame in hiding, was not impossible. Liaoxin would have broken the precept against killing and the precept against wrath—so Juejian had not been wholly mistaken either.\n

\n\n

\n Only—Liaoxin's disciple, that boy—how was he now to find his footing in Shaolin Temple?\n

\n\n

\n Juejian called a disciple and bade him bring Ming Buxiang.\n

\n\n

\n Liaoxin's affair must not be allowed to drag the child down, Juejian thought, looking at the examination report on his desk. Whatever came, he would keep this boy safe within the temple, and decide his disposition only after he came of age.\n

\n\n

\n Before long the disciple brought Ming Buxiang in. Ming Buxiang first made his bow. Juejian asked his age, praised his cleverness, then asked, "You serve your labor at Right Action Hall—are you settling in well enough?"\n

\n\n

\n "There is nothing I find hard to bear," Ming Buxiang said.\n

\n\n

\n "That Benyue is a small-souled boy; he won't be reasoned with, however often I try. I've seen that he often bullies you—is that so?"\n

\n\n

\n "My master used to say that every adversity bodhisattva is an aid to practice," Ming Buxiang said. "Besides, he hasn't truly bullied me."\n

\n\n

\n Juejian found the answer most surprising, and could not help asking, "How can you say he hasn't bullied you?"\n

\n\n

\n "At ease and following the heart, depending on nothing outside myself—how can he bully me?"\n

\n\n

\n "He strikes you. Doesn't it hurt?"\n

\n\n

\n "The pain is of a moment. It has injured neither sinew nor bone, nor put my life in danger."\n

\n\n

\n "And if it should injure your life, or sinew and bone?"\n

\n\n

\n "Then it would no longer be a question of bullying. If my life were threatened, I would have to strike back."\n

\n\n

\n Juejian sighed in admiration. "When Liaoxin spoke of you, I did not believe him. I came near to letting fine jade lie buried in rotted earth."\n

\n\n

\n "That saying of the abbot's only bears out that Brother Benyue is an adversity bodhisattva," Ming Buxiang said.\n

\n\n

\n "Even so, I cannot let him bully you," Juejian said. "Have you any thought of taking vows?"\n

\n\n

\n "Your disciple has not yet considered it."\n

\n\n

\n "You have the Buddha's wisdom; when the moment comes, you'll decide of yourself. I mean to move you elsewhere for your labor. Is there a place you'd like to go?"\n

\n\n

\n "Your disciple would like to go to the Manjushri Court."\n

\n\n

\n Juejian gave a small "Oh?" and asked, "Why the Manjushri Court?"\n

\n\n

\n "All the temple's texts are in the Sutra Repository of Right View Hall, and the scripture-monks are in the Manjushri Court as well," Ming Buxiang said. "Should I meet with a difficulty, it would be easy to ask."\n

\n\n

\n Juejian nodded, thinking, this boy is gifted by nature, and knows besides to seek ever finer mastery; rarest of all, he is neither self-satisfied nor proud. "Very good. From tomorrow, then, report to the Manjushri Court. I'll let them know to set you to cleaning the Sutra Repository."\n

\n\n

\n "Am I to move to the Manjushri Court to live?" Ming Buxiang asked.\n

\n\n

\n "There are vacant monks' quarters there. Move if you like."\n

\n\n

\n "Does the abbot believe my master won't be coming back?"\n

\n\n

\n Juejian started—truly this child was not to be underestimated; in a few short words he had drawn the words out of him. But mindful that the boy cared for his master, all of it filial feeling, Juejian could only say, "If your master returns, I will let you know."\n

\n\n

\n When he had said it, Juejian found that Ming Buxiang made no reply, but only watched him with a pair of clear eyes, and a discomfort crept over him. Yet Ming Buxiang asked nothing more, saying only, "If the abbot has no further instructions, your disciple will take his leave."\n

\n\n

\n "Wait a moment." Juejian rose and went to the main hall next door, picked from among the gifts a string of vegetarian rice dumplings, and came back to hand them to Ming Buxiang. "Take this string of dumplings back to eat."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang shook his head and did not put out his hand. Curious, Juejian asked, "You don't care for rice dumplings?"\n

\n\n

\n "These are gifts from outside, aren't they?" Ming Buxiang asked.\n

\n\n

\n "What of it?" Juejian returned.\n

\n\n

\n "My master said that what is sent to Right Action Hall is not a gift but a debt. Accept the debt, and however many hands it passes through, in time it must be repaid with interest. Whoever eats this string of dumplings will one day owe a debt to the one who sent them—only there's no knowing in what manner it will be repaid. This is called karma."\n

\n\n

\n Juejian chewed the words over carefully, and felt he had grasped it. His generosity was nothing but the shifting of these dirty trinkets of flattery onto the others of Right Action Hall. It was karma; the debt had to be paid. He was merely letting others bear the evil deed he himself had planted.\n

\n\n

\n To let others bear the evil deed—was that not the very thing he was preparing to do? In that instant Juejian felt that Ming Buxiang had seen clear through his design.\n

\n\n

\n But that was impossible. Ming Buxiang was only a child...\n

\n\n

\n "Go now. From tomorrow, report to the Manjushri Court," Juejian told him.\n

\n\n

\n After Ming Buxiang had gone, Juejian sat in thought a long while, then summoned a disciple and ordered, "Send all the gifts to the Ksitigarbha Court."\n

\n\n

\n "Keep none back?" the disciple asked, astonished.\n

\n\n

\n Juejian saw the disappointment in the disciple's eyes—yet he was more disappointed still in this whole band of disciples. "Keep none. And hereafter no gift sent here is to be accepted."\n

\n\n

\n On the examination report Juejian wrote his conclusion: "Likely death by brawling; doubts remain pending inquiry." Then he signed his name. He had resolved to submit the finding to the Samantabhadra Court and let Head Monk Juekong handle the matter. The strife between proper and lay at Shaolin was a shared karma; it could not be laid on Liaoxin alone, and even if today they papered over the peace, it would have to be settled in the end.\n

\n\n

\n If this was a storm, then he ought to throw himself into its heart.\n

\n\n

\n For years afterward, Ming Buxiang remained in the Manjushri Court, sweeping the Sutra Repository.\n

\n\n

\n Two years later, late one night, Fu Yingcong hanged himself in the woods beyond the temple.\n

\n\n

\n A year after that, Benyue suddenly went mad, gouged out his own eyes, and from then on was out of his wits, day and night beside himself with terror.\n

\n\n

\n Yet in the vast expanse of Shaolin Temple, these were but a few trifling things.\n

\n\n

\n No one would take any notice.\n

","published_time":"2026-06-15T00:00:00.000Z","paid":true,"show_flag":true,"show_scheduled_time":"2026-06-15T00:00:00.000Z","unpaid_scheduled_time":"2026-06-20T00:00:00.000Z"},{"content_id":4952,"novel_id":74,"chapter_no":4,"chapter_title":"The Buddha's Hand and the Spider's Thread Part 1","content":"

\n The eightieth year of Kunlun. Summer, the fifth month.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang did not move out of his quarters in the Right Action Hall. He simply rose earlier than before and made his way to the Right View Hall of Manjushri Court.\n

\n\n

\n Manjushri Court was divided into two halls, Right View and Right Concentration. Right View governed the keeping of texts and scriptures and the study of Buddhist doctrine and martial arts; Right Concentration handled instruction and teaching, its monks mostly lecturing scripture-monks or martial instructors. A disciple of the temple who wished to advance in martial arts generally had to study in the Right Concentration Hall, which from time to time held classes, expounding sutras, demonstrating forms, or going out to test the disciples.\n

\n\n

\n Buddhism prized scripture and commentary above all. The four courts were said to be equal, but that Manjushri stood first, Samantabhadra second, and Ksitigarbha last had long been an unspoken rule. Of the lay monks in Manjushri Court, only a scant few were permitted into its halls, and as for the head monk and the two abbots of the halls, not one had been a lay monk in decades.\n

\n\n

\n "This humble monk is Benyan, foreman of your labor detail." The monk at their head was tall and powerfully built, his two brows curving downward so that he wore a perpetual look of worry; the others had nicknamed him Brother Gloom. Brother Gloom asked Ming Buxiang, "What did they have you do in the Right Action Hall?"\n

\n\n

\n "Carried the night soil," said Ming Buxiang. "For a year."\n

\n\n

\n "That Spotted Dog, always lording it over people. Hmph." Brother Gloom pursed his lips, looking gloomier than ever. "Here the night soil goes by rotation. No one gets out of it." He went on, "Manjushri Court used to be called the Sutra Repository, where the scriptures were kept and martial arts pursued. Later it was reorganized into Manjushri Court, and the Right Concentration Hall was added to instruct the Buddha's disciples, to teach them and resolve their doubts. The reorganization changed the name, but the Sutra Repository is still here. The Right View Hall is not like the Right Action Hall. Fewer people, larger halls, mostly rooms for storing texts. The masters spend their years immersed in study, so we have all the more labor: not just sweeping and emptying the night soil, but hauling water and splitting wood. You're young. I'll parcel out your tasks accordingly."\n

\n\n

\n "Give me the same work as the other brothers," said Ming Buxiang.\n

\n\n

\n "I'll judge that myself," said Brother Gloom. "Go sweep the Sutra Repository."\n

\n\n

\n Manjushri Court was laid out much like Samantabhadra Court, most of its grounds given over to monks' quarters. The Right View Hall was a compound of five courtyards, its central yard a practice ground for drilling and lecturing. The Sutra Repository stood directly behind the Right View Hall, plain and unadorned yet vast and towering.\n

\n\n

\n The first time Ming Buxiang set foot in this sanctum of Shaolin, he felt only solemnity and grandeur. The faint sound of his steps echoed softly through the great hall, and to walk any quicker would have seemed a sacrilege.\n

\n\n

\n He entered the hall, turned to the left, and pushed open a great bronze door. A dense rank of bookcases met his eye. He looked them over: mostly works of literature and history and miscellaneous practical texts, arranged by category. This was the Natural Lore Vault.\n

\n\n

\n Deeper in, through a small wooden door, was another, smaller chamber. This was the Prajna Vault, where all manner of annotated and translated Buddhist scriptures were kept, alongside the original texts. Some of the books were so weathered and ancient they could scarcely be made out.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang took down a copy of the Samyukta Agama from the shelf and was about to open it when a voice spoke behind him. "If you want to read, you borrow it from the registrar-monk. It's cleaning hours now. No slacking."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang turned to find a handsome youth, just past twenty, his head unshaven—another lay disciple—smiling at him.\n

\n\n

\n The youth pointed to the far end of the hall. "There's one more room over there. Go sweep it."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang nodded and went. The entrance was a small iron door, narrow but fully three inches thick. Had it been solid steel, anyone of less than strong build would never have shifted it at all.\n

\n\n

\n The iron door stood half open. As Ming Buxiang approached, the others sweeping nearby suddenly stopped what they were doing and fixed their eyes on him. Seeming not to notice, he reached for the door—when a dark shape burst out with a shout and shoved him hard in the chest. The man was enormously strong; the blow sent Ming Buxiang flying. Yet in midair he steadied himself, came down on both feet, and stood firm—he did not fall.\n

\n\n

\n Behind him the others roared with laughter, and someone even cheered, "Not bad!" Ming Buxiang looked again at the man who had shoved him: crooked mouth, slanted nose, every feature wrenched out of place, perhaps six feet tall, stooped, with a hump on his back that drew the eye.\n

\n\n

\n The man flailed his hands, snarling, "No one's allowed in here! Get out! Get out!"—the words urgent and furious. Then he glanced at Ming Buxiang once more, his pupils contracting, the corner of his mouth twitching faintly, and ducked hurriedly inside, as though afraid of being looked at any longer.\n

\n\n

\n All of this Ming Buxiang noted.\n

\n\n

\n "Just a joke. Don't take it hard." The handsome youth came over, laughing. "Everyone here has been knocked down by Bugui. Consider it our initiation."\n

\n\n

\n A disciple said admiringly, "You're something, staying on your feet. Brother Lü took a tumble his first time too."\n

\n\n

\n The handsome youth cupped his hands in greeting. "I'm Lü Changfeng. A lay disciple, same as you."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang returned the bow. "I'm Ming Buxiang."\n

\n\n

\n "Your stance is rock-solid," said Lü Changfeng. "Who's your master?"\n

\n\n

\n "The monk Liaoxin," said Ming Buxiang.\n

\n\n

\n The disciples around them let out a soft murmur of surprise, putting their heads together, whispering. Lü Changfeng turned back to them. "Everyone, back to work." They scattered, each returning to his task.\n

\n\n

\n "Do you know where your master has gone?" Lü Changfeng asked.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang shook his head.\n

\n\n

\n "I thought as much. A pity." Lü Changfeng sighed. "Don't mind what happened just now. The brothers here are all good people."\n

\n\n

\n "Who was that man?" Ming Buxiang asked, looking at the iron door. "That room can't be entered?"\n

\n\n

\n "That's the Supernatural Power Vault, where the temple's martial treatises are kept. No one goes in without leave. That Bugui has a fierce temper. It's his patch to clean. Don't go provoking him for nothing."\n

\n\n

\n "Cleaning?" said Ming Buxiang. "He's the same as us?"\n

\n\n

\n "By rights he's the same, and yet a little different." Lü Changfeng thought it over. "The abbot lets him come and go freely from the Supernatural Power Vault, so he's the only one who tends it. Anyone who comes near, he drives off. It isn't that we shun him for being ugly. He's hot-tempered and won't speak to anyone, and no one wants to set him off."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang nodded to show he understood.\n

\n\n

\n The labor disciples of the Right View Hall got on well, roughhousing and trading insults in private, often going out together, close as brothers. Lü Changfeng was the standout among them—his master a hall-monk of the Right View Hall—and had become the unofficial head of the group. As for Brother Gloom, he divided the labor fairly enough, but of late he kept to himself, and the others said it was because the test of skill was coming up before long, the examination for a Hero's Warrant, and Brother Gloom was hard at his training.\n

\n\n

\n As for Bugui, he did not live in the monks' quarters but in a storeroom inside the Sutra Repository. Apart from the early-morning sweeping, he was rarely seen.\n

\n\n

\n The harmony of the Right View Hall did not seem to include Bugui. As Lü Changfeng had said, he was a little different.\n

\n\n

\n Bugui's real name was Bu Li—Stand Upright—a name his parents had likely chosen in the hope that he might one day stand straight and tall. The crooked mouth, the slanted nose, the hunched back were all things he had been born with; a physician was said to have given the reason once, but he could no longer recall it. His deepest memory of his parents was his father saying to him, "Li'er, stand straight! Stand straight!"—and the sound of his mother weeping.\n

\n\n

\n The memory was faint, so faint that Bugui himself did not know whether it was real.\n

\n\n

\n His parents had died early. He had been a beggar since childhood—indeed, his memory began on the streets, begging. Every child who saw him mocked him, cursed him; he had had stones thrown at him; other parents kept their children from playing with him, as though his hunchback might be catching.\n

\n\n

\n No one dared come near him, and after enough scorn and abuse he no longer dared come near anyone. He could only crouch in some corner, begging scraps and cold leavings, sometimes catching field mice, sometimes scooping fish from a pond, scraping by from one meager meal to the next.\n

\n\n

\n This lasted until the year he turned ten, when he met his master—Liaoyin, a hall-monk of the Right View Hall.\n

\n\n

\n Pitying him, the monk Liaoyin brought him back to Shaolin Temple and took him in, and only then did he have enough to eat. To show his gratitude he threw himself into every task. But Liaoyin did not have him in his care for long. In less than two years the monk fell ill for no apparent reason and, within a short while, was gone. Bugui wept bitterly, grieving for the kindness shown him and dreading, too, that his good days had ended.\n

\n\n

\n Mercifully, the monks of the Right View Hall did not turn him out; these proper monks were merciful and willing to keep him. But there was one thing—a thing Bugui himself did not know. Liaoyin had transferred in from Avalokitesvara Court, and though he had come up as a proper monk, in life he had kept close company with lay monks, and often said, "Shaolin owes the lay monks a great deal. We do not ask after a man's origins—so why divide proper from lay?"\n

\n\n

\n At this the monks of the Right View Hall only shook their heads and sighed, lamenting that so fine a monk as Liaoyin should have stumbled and fallen, sinking to mire himself with the lay monks.\n

\n\n

\n Since Liaoyin was reckoned among those who consorted with lay monks, Bugui's position became an awkward one. The proper monks, to avoid suspicion, dared not befriend him; the lay monks, taking him for a proper monk's heir, paid him no mind either. So it was that not one of the temple's monks was willing to look after him. Luckily he was simple and hardworking, and the abbot of the Right View Hall, the Chan master Jueming, assigned him to clean the Supernatural Power Vault—a place that normally took three men to keep in order, which he alone kept spotless. Because of his hideous looks and solitary nature, they housed him in a storeroom within the Sutra Repository, and there he had lived for ten years.\n

\n\n

\n Bugui treated the work of the Supernatural Power Vault as his one worth in all of Shaolin. He was born strong, and anyone who tried to come near, he drove away.\n

\n\n

\n He dreaded only that, the work gone, he would be back on the streets begging. He feared the streets, and he feared those people.\n

\n\n

\n It was not that Bugui had no longing. Every day, his sweeping done, he would return to his room, lean far back, brace his hands on the ground, and practice the Iron Plank Bridge. This was a skill he had begged from Liaoyin. Day after day he stretched his back, biting down against the searing pain, holding the posture for two hours at a stretch, hoping only that his hunched spine might straighten a little. He did not ask to be like other men—only to stand a little taller, a little straighter, even just a little.\n

\n\n

\n The posture made him look for all the world like a turtle flipped onto its back, and the irony was that he prayed this very posture might keep him from looking so much like a turtle. That was why he chose to live in the storeroom rather than share quarters with the other disciples—it was the secret he would never let anyone uncover.\n

\n\n

\n "Long ago there lived a great robber named Kandata, who in life did endless evil. When he died he fell into hell, there to suffer the torment of fire. One day the Buddha passed by a well and heard the screaming and wailing below. He looked—and found that the well ran straight down to hell, where Kandata burned in the flames. Seeing the Buddha, his sacred form so majestic, so pure and holy, Kandata cried out: Buddha, save me!"\n

\n\n

\n That day the abbot Jueming, moved by sudden inspiration, summoned the disciples to be examined on the Buddhist Disciple Precepts, and at the same time expounded the dharma. Bugui was among them, and Jueming told this story.\n

\n\n

\n "Hearing Kandata's cry, the Buddha opened his dharma-eye and surveyed the three thousand worlds, past and future. Now Kandata, for all the evil he had done in life, had once been walking and was about to crush a spider underfoot when a thought stirred in him: Why take a life needlessly? And so he stepped over it and spared the spider. The Buddha then reached out his hand, took up a spider, and set it at the well's mouth. The spider spun a thread and let it down into the well. Seeing his chance, Kandata seized it and began to climb. Partway up he tired and paused to catch his breath, and looking down, he saw the other damned souls climbing the same thread behind him. He thought: This thread is so thin—how can it bear all this weight? If it breaks, won't I be cast back into hell to suffer? So he kicked at the demons climbing below him and cursed: This spider's thread is mine—you may not follow! And with that kick the thread snapped at once. As Kandata fell back into hell, he heard only the Buddha's faint, soft sigh."\n

\n\n

\n Jueming said, "Do no evil; do all good. Neglect no good deed because it is small, and commit no evil because it is small. You are all young, your blood running hot—you must take special care. The Buddhist Disciple Precepts are your good teacher. See that you keep them well."\n

\n\n

\n Bugui sat in his corner, listening with rapt attention; the story seemed to have stirred something deep in him. Then Jueming had the disciples recite the rules aloud, and they read them out in chorus, books in hand. Bugui, coming to himself, hastily fixed his eyes on the text and chanted along—always half a beat behind.\n

\n\n

\n One afternoon the disciples, seeking relief from the heat, lounged about chatting in the Sutra Repository, Ming Buxiang among them. Their talk was in full swing when Ming Buxiang suddenly stood up. They all started. "What is it?"\n

\n\n

\n "I saw a rat," said Ming Buxiang.\n

\n\n

\n That was alarming. Rats were the great dread of the Sutra Repository; if one gnawed the books and did damage, the whole detail would answer for it.\n

\n\n

\n "Are you sure?" Lü Changfeng asked at once.\n

\n\n

\n "It might have been my eyes," said Ming Buxiang.\n

\n\n

\n "That's no joke to make. Everyone, search!"\n

\n\n

\n They split up to look, opening every storeroom in turn, working through them one by one. All of them, consciously or not, skirted Bugui's room, meaning to leave it for last—all but Ming Buxiang, who, wholly unaware, came to the door of Bugui's room, pushed it open, and saw Bugui belly to the sky, all four limbs braced against the floor, practicing the Iron Plank Bridge, the very image of an overturned turtle.\n

\n\n

\n In that instant, for the first time, Ming Buxiang saw such terror on Bugui's face.\n

\n\n

\n Bugui tried to right himself, but his back had locked stiff and for a moment he could not move. Hearing the other brothers drawing near, he was seized with dread—if they saw him like this, there was no telling how they would mock him.\n

\n\n

\n In his panic, he saw Ming Buxiang swiftly pull the door shut, and heard his voice say, "I've checked this one. No rat." And someone answered, "We've searched every room. Nothing." Ming Buxiang added, "Maybe it was just my eyes. Sorry to send everyone running for nothing." The voices drifted away, and only then did Bugui breathe easy, cutting his practice short. Thinking it over after, his heart was still pounding.\n

\n\n

\n Bugui remembered Ming Buxiang—he had marked the man at their first meeting. Ming Buxiang had a beautiful, refined face, like a figure carved of jade. Lü Changfeng was handsome too, but beside Ming Buxiang that handsomeness seemed coarse and dull, the face of a rough laborer.\n

\n\n

\n He envied that face a little. That face was, in itself, the cruelest mockery of his own. The same eyes, ears, nose, and mouth—how could one man be made so exquisite, and he so coarse?\n

\n\n

\n If there was anyone Bugui least wanted catching him in his ugliness, it was Ming Buxiang—and of all people, it was Ming Buxiang who today had seen him aping a turtle.\n

\n\n

\n Would he tell the others what he had seen?\n

\n\n

\n That night Bugui lay awake, sick with worry.\n

\n\n

\n At the next morning's sweeping, Bugui peered out from the Supernatural Power Vault and met Ming Buxiang's eyes, then hurriedly drew back. He listened closely to the talk outside; nothing seemed amiss, and he was a little reassured.\n

\n\n

\n In the days that followed nothing happened, yet the matter hung over Bugui's heart the whole time.\n

\n\n

\n One afternoon, after the others had gone back, Bugui stood blankly in his room. He had no heart for practice and only paced back and forth. Then he heard a voice outside: "Didn't you just borrow the Surangama Sutra? Why ask for the Vimalakirti Sutra now?" Another voice answered, "This disciple wishes to cross-reference more of the scriptures." Bugui's heart jumped—he knew it was Ming Buxiang. The first voice went on, "How old are you? You can fathom these scriptures already?" "What I can't fathom, I write down," said Ming Buxiang. "The Right Concentration Hall has plenty of masters." The other laughed aloud. "The abbot Juejian said you were clever, and so you are. Don't lose it."\n

\n\n

\n Bugui pushed the door open a crack. He saw Ming Buxiang standing in the long corridor, and a little way off a young monk strolling away with a lazy stretch. He vaguely recognized the back of him—the registrar-monk of the Sutra Repository—though he had scarcely ever spoken to the man.\n

\n\n

\n Bugui hesitated a long while, and seeing Ming Buxiang about to leave, could not help but clear his throat. Ming Buxiang turned, as Bugui had hoped. He saw Bugui half hidden behind the door, seeming to waver, saying nothing.\n

\n\n

\n Bugui watched him a moment, then at last put out his hand and beckoned.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang came over. Bugui asked, "That day... when you saw me... practicing... did you tell the other brothers?"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang shook his head. "No."\n

\n\n

\n "Don't tell anyone, all right?"\n

\n\n

\n "No," said Ming Buxiang.\n

\n\n

\n Bugui's alarm flared, and he was about to ask why not, when Ming Buxiang went on, "Practicing like that won't do. It won't cure you."\n

\n\n

\n So that was what he meant. Relieved, Bugui said quickly, "Never mind about me. Just don't tell anyone."\n

\n\n

\n "A hunched back is hard to mend," said Ming Buxiang. "There are plenty of medical texts in the Natural Lore Vault, and the temple has its medicine-monks. Why not ask them?"\n

\n\n

\n "My master took me to ask, long ago." Bugui shook his head. "They said it was hopeless."\n

\n\n

\n "I thought nothing of what I saw that day," said Ming Buxiang. "But since it matters to you, and you want me to keep it quiet, then you'll do me a favor in return—otherwise I'll tell."\n

\n\n

\n "Do you what?" Bugui asked.\n

\n\n

\n "I come here to borrow scriptures, but I can only take two at a time. You borrow two more for me. How about it?"\n

\n\n

\n "No," Bugui said hurriedly. "I—I can't."\n

\n\n

\n "Why not?"\n

\n\n

\n Bugui stammered and could not get it out, only saying, "Not that. Ask me something else."\n

\n\n

\n "You can't read, can you?" said Ming Buxiang.\n

\n\n

\n Struck on his sore spot, Bugui flushed crimson and bowed his head. "How did you know?"\n

\n\n

\n "That day, reciting the Buddhist Disciple Precepts, you couldn't keep up. You were only mouthing along. I noticed." Ming Buxiang said, "That's easily solved. I'll just teach you to read."\n

\n\n

\n Bugui looked up, startled. "You'll teach me to read?"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang nodded. "If you can't read, you can't borrow books for me." And with that he walked straight into the room.\n

\n\n

\n Before Bugui could stop him—the room was for storage, with no windows, and even in daytime it was too dark to see—Ming Buxiang said, "It's too dark in here, you won't be able to see. Let's go outside."\n

\n\n

\n Bugui shook his head. "I won't go outside."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang nodded. "Then I'll fetch paper and a brush. Wait for me."\n

\n\n

\n He left, and Bugui fretted, not knowing what to do. After a while Ming Buxiang returned, as promised, with an oil lamp and the tools of the writing desk.\n

\n\n

\n "I'll start you on the simple ones. One, two, three, four—have you learned those?" Ming Buxiang lit the candle, spread the paper, and ground the ink, and as he asked he wrote five characters: Sutra of Forty-Two Chapters.\n

\n\n

\n "I know one through ten," said Bugui.\n

\n\n

\n "Then I'll teach you 'chapter' and 'sutra' first, and tomorrow you'll borrow this sutra for me." Then he reconsidered. "No—if your uncle Liaojing learns you can't read, he's sure to ask what you want the book for. You'll need to learn a bit more, so you have an answer if you're questioned."\n

\n\n

\n Bugui's heart stirred. He had never wanted to face outsiders; each day he went to the dining hall only at mealtimes, head down, in and out quickly, neither speaking to anyone nor meeting anyone's eyes. He had long wanted to learn to read but was too ashamed to ask, and Ming Buxiang offering to teach him was more than he had dared hope for. Turning it over, and still afraid Ming Buxiang might give away his secret, he could only say, "All right. I'll help you."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang looked at him and suddenly smiled, a smile warm and radiant as sunlight on an autumn afternoon. Watching that smile, Bugui thought, How can he smile so beautifully?—and seemed quite struck dumb.\n

\n\n

\n From that day on, every afternoon Ming Buxiang came to Bugui's room to teach him to read. When Bugui asked about Ming Buxiang's past and learned that he too was an orphan, his master vanished, he could not help feeling a kinship of shared misfortune, and the two of them gradually grew close.\n

\n\n

\n After that Bugui gave up his practice and devoted himself to reading. His memory and quickness were nothing remarkable, but he was diligent to a fault: every day, his labor done, he set to studying, and after Ming Buxiang left he reviewed it again, not sleeping until deep in the night. In under a month he had learned over a hundred common characters.\n

\n\n

\n The hardest part of learning to read is the foundation; once the foundation is laid, progress comes by leaps. So Ming Buxiang had him go borrow the Sutra of Forty-Two Chapters. Bugui begged off several times, and each time Ming Buxiang shook his head, until at last he had no choice but to steel himself, go into the Prajna Vault, take down a copy, and tell the monk on duty he wished to borrow it.\n

\n\n

\n The registrar-monk was a young man with the dharma name Liaojing. Seeing Bugui, he was taken aback. "It's rare to see you borrowing scriptures."\n

\n\n

\n Bugui reddened, his heart hammering, ashamed of himself; he bowed his head and dared not answer. Liaojing did not press him, only said, "If you run into anything you can't follow as you read, come ask me. If I don't know, I can ask it of the scripture-monks for you."\n

\n\n

\n Bugui had not expected such kindness, and thanking him over and over, took the book and hurried away.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang was already waiting in the room. The moment Bugui got inside, he felt like a man reprieved, gasping for breath.\n

\n\n

\n "It wasn't so hard, was it?" Ming Buxiang said mildly.\n

\n\n

\n Bugui nodded and handed over the sutra, but Ming Buxiang did not take it. "I can finish this book in a couple of days. If you return it that fast, they'll grow suspicious. Better to use it to learn your characters first."\n

\n\n

\n So Ming Buxiang went on teaching Bugui to read, and explaining the scriptures besides. Bugui half understood the texts, and bit by bit came to grasp their gist from the words themselves.\n

\n\n

\n A few days later Ming Buxiang again had Bugui borrow a book—this time a miscellaneous one, the primer Thousand Character Classic.\n

\n\n

\n "My master said the Thousand Character Classic is the fastest way to learn characters," said Ming Buxiang. "Many of the characters in it you've already learned. It shouldn't be hard."\n

\n\n

\n Bugui studied for a few days, then it struck him: He has me borrowing scriptures—why a Thousand Character Classic? And then another thought: His talk of borrowing scriptures is a pretext. What he really wants is for me to learn to read and write, to face other people. Working this out, Bugui's heart swelled with feeling, and he looked at Ming Buxiang, choked, unable to speak. Seeing his odd expression, Ming Buxiang asked, "What is it?"\n

\n\n

\n "You... you borrowed the books for my sake?"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang neither confirmed nor denied it, only saying, "The borrowing can wait. You can help me with it later." Then he added, "If there's a book you'd like to read, you can borrow it yourself."\n

\n\n

\n Bugui said, moved, "Besides my master, you're the first person to treat me this well. Why?"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang thought for a moment. "You're like me—no parents, no master. Maybe I've come to think of you as a friend."\n

\n\n

\n "A friend!" Something turned over in Bugui's heart. The only kin he remembered in all his life was the master he had known for those two brief years; he had never had a single friend. Ming Buxiang was the first person to call him one, and he could not help being moved.\n

\n\n

\n "I... I've never had a friend... Do you have many?" Bugui asked.\n

\n\n

\n "Back in the Right Action Hall there was one who carried the night soil with me. Maybe he counted as a friend. But later he helped Benyue bully me, and stole my copy of the Buddhist Disciple Precepts." Ming Buxiang paused, brooding a moment. "There are friends who do you harm, too."\n

\n\n

\n Bugui said hastily, "I'd never be that kind! Besides you, I have no other friends!"\n

\n\n

\n "You could make a few more," said Ming Buxiang.\n

\n\n

\n Bugui hung his head. "Me... looking like this, no one would want to be my friend."\n

\n\n

\n "The brothers in the Right View Hall are all good people," said Ming Buxiang. "You've tried once already. Why not try a few more times?"\n

\n\n

\n "How?" Bugui asked.\n

\n\n

\n "Tomorrow, when you sweep, step out of the Supernatural Power Vault and say hello to them."\n

\n\n

\n "What do you mean?"\n

\n\n

\n "Just a greeting. One a day is enough," said Ming Buxiang. "After that you'll understand."\n

\n\n

\n The next day, his sweeping done and the time nearly up, Bugui remembered Ming Buxiang's words and hesitated.\n

\n\n

\n He thought of his childhood, of how, when he got close to the other children, he either frightened them to tears or brought down their parents' curses and blows.\n

\n\n

\n He was afraid—of those scornful looks, that contemptuous bearing, as though he were a monster who should never have been born.\n

\n\n

\n He had hidden in Shaolin for ten years, building his whole world in that solitary little room; that was all he had. And now he was to step out of that world, into another that had once been full of hostility toward him.\n

\n\n

\n It's only a greeting, he thought. What more could I lose?\n

\n\n

\n He drew a breath, his legs gone a little weak, and walked slowly, step by step, to that small iron door.\n

\n\n

\n The door was heavy—hard to open once shut, hard to shut once open. He stood in the doorway where everyone could see him. Soon someone noticed, and before long every sweeping disciple had turned to look.\n

\n\n

\n "Everyone..." His mind went blank; he did not know what to say, and at last managed, "Good morning."\n

\n\n

\n By now it was nearly noon. Seeing his awkwardness, they all burst out laughing. Bugui felt the shame of it and was about to shrink back—when he heard them call out in answer, "Good morning!" "Good morning!"\n

\n\n

\n He could tell there was no hostility in their voices. At most, only surprise.\n

\n\n

\n After that, from one greeting a day, he went to greeting them on meeting and on parting, then bit by bit to two or three lines of simple talk; in under three months he had worked his way into the circle of disciples. He could feel it—they had been a little afraid of him at first, but later treated him no differently than anyone else, sometimes even cracking jokes at him. Slow and tongue-tied as he was, when he didn't get the joke he could only grin foolishly along.\n

\n\n

\n He couldn't follow the jokes, but the grinning was genuine.\n

\n\n

\n In under half a year he could read, and he had made friends—and not just one.\n

\n\n

\n All of it was because of Ming Buxiang.\n

\n\n

\n He was as grateful to Ming Buxiang as he had been to his master Liaoyin.\n

\n\n

\n One afternoon Lü Changfeng abruptly proposed an outing to the hills behind the temple. Some of the disciples said they would have to ask their masters' leave; others agreed on the spot. Lü Changfeng asked Ming Buxiang, "We're all going up the back hills to ramble. Are you coming?" Then he turned. "Bugui, are you coming?"\n

\n\n

\n Caught off guard by the question, Bugui glanced quickly at Ming Buxiang. Ming Buxiang nodded, and Bugui nodded along, saying yes.\n

\n\n

\n Lü Changfeng did not notice the understanding that passed between them.\n

\n\n

\n So several dozen monks and laymen gathered outside the Right View Hall and set off in a great, cheerful procession for the back hills.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang had been up the back hills a few times before, taken there, of course, by Liaoxin. The way was bright and lovely, alive with the chirr of insects and the calls of birds, the whole party laughing and chattering. Reaching an open clearing, Lü Changfeng directed the gathering of firewood; one disciple brought out tea leaves, another cakes and fruit, and they shared everything around, sitting on the ground, talking and laughing, in perfect good humor.\n

\n\n

\n Bugui had not left the temple in ten years, and though this was only the back hills, it felt to him like seeing the sun again. His heart eased and his body loosened; he wandered everywhere, beside himself with excitement.\n

\n\n

\n The talk turned to lore of the martial world, and someone brought up how, more than half a year before, the Head Monk Juekong had led a great body of monks out, gone for over two months. Lü Changfeng said with a grin, "Head Monk Juekong went to the Kunlun Council, to choose the new alliance leader."\n

\n\n

\n Someone asked, "Isn't the leadership rotated among the six great sects? Qingcheng, Huashan, and the Tang Clan can only stand by and drool—what's there to choose?"\n

\n\n

\n Lü Changfeng laughed. "That's where you're wrong. The rule is that he's chosen, and even if in practice the post just goes round by turns, you still have to go through the motions for appearances' sake. Once every ten years, that's the one time the masters of the Nine Great Houses are all gathered under one roof."\n

\n\n

\n "They say the sect masters attend in person," a disciple put in, "but Head Monk Juekong isn't the abbot."\n

\n\n

\n "Are you addled? When is the Kunlun Council held? The fourth month!" Lü Changfeng asked with a smile. "And what great day falls in the fourth month?"\n

\n\n

\n This was a question even Bugui could answer, and the disciples cried out in one voice, "The Buddha's Birthday!"\n

\n\n

\n "The Buddha's Birthday is a grand affair for Shaolin," said Lü Changfeng. "For that very reason, it was agreed decades ago that unless the date is changed, Shaolin can only send a representative. All these decades, except when it's our turn to lead the alliance and we have no choice but to go, we always send someone of weight in the abbot's place."\n

\n\n

\n "It's only because Head Monk Juekong is away that the abbot Juejian has been able to drag out the case of our uncle Liaoxin so long," Lü Changfeng went on.\n

\n\n

\n And so the talk came round again to the case of Liaoxin's disappearance. Months earlier, Juejian had submitted the autopsy findings to Samantabhadra Court, and Head Monk Juekong had handed down a verdict: "Death apparently from a mutual brawl; doubts remain, pending inquiry." This had set off a great upheaval within Shaolin, with rumor and gossip running unchecked—and the one key figure in all of it was the missing Liaoxin. In that time, more than a few hall-monks had called on Ming Buxiang, but found no thread to follow.\n

\n\n

\n Reaching this point, they all fell to guessing, but with Ming Buxiang sitting right there it was awkward to debate it, so they steered the talk elsewhere—which abbot was strict, which lenient, along with all manner of petty rumor.\n

\n\n

\n A disciple said, "Did you hear? Head Monk Juekong had a wife and family down the mountain!"\n

\n\n

\n Several burst out laughing. "Who doesn't know that? Juekong didn't take the tonsure until he was forty. It'd be strange if he had no family."\n

\n\n

\n "Looking at how dignified and upright he is, I'd taken him for a proper monk," the disciple said. "Only later did I learn..."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang suddenly asked, "Proper monk, lay monk—how do you tell them apart?"\n

\n\n

\n They all looked at him, surprised at the question, but seeing how young he was, said, "You don't know how to tell them apart?"\n

\n\n

\n "Master Liaoxin mentioned it," said Ming Buxiang. "A proper monk enters the temple for the sake of cultivation; a lay monk does not. A lay monk's disciple, even after taking the tonsure, is still a lay monk. Only a proper monk's disciple can be a proper monk."\n

\n\n

\n "That's about the size of it," a disciple said. "Let me tell you—some lay monks only keep the precepts inside the temple. Outside it, never mind the ones with wives and families; there's drinking, whoring, and gambling too."\n

\n\n

\n At this, several disciples wore looks of disdain.\n

\n\n

\n "When I went down to Buddha City to buy things a while back, I got to know a few disciples from Ksitigarbha Court. My master particularly charged me to keep my distance from lay-monk disciples," said one already tonsured, sipping his tea. "When I ran into them lately, I didn't even greet them."\n

\n\n

\n "My master said the same," said another youth. "Said those people don't keep to the right path."\n

\n\n

\n "The Right Action Hall is the real spectacle. I heard from a brother there that the moment you walk into the dining hall, the proper monks sit on one side, the lay monks on the other, with a whole row of empty seats between—like fire and water."\n

\n\n

\n The rift between proper and lay monks was widening, a hidden current running deep, and even the disciples were beginning to sense that something was wrong.\n

\n\n

\n "Don't talk nonsense," said Lü Changfeng. "Brother Ming still lives in the Right Action Hall. Ask him and you'll know." He looked to Ming Buxiang. "Is it really like that?"\n

\n\n

\n "There aren't enough seats in the dining hall to leave a whole row empty," said Ming Buxiang.\n

\n\n

\n They all laughed.\n

\n\n

\n A familiar voice cut in, cursing. "Living high, aren't you, you little wretch!" They looked over to see a monk whose face was covered in dark blotches—none other than Benyue, who had somehow come up to the back hills today as well.\n

\n\n

\n Benyue strode forward, snarling, "Your master kills a man and flees, and here you are, living it up!" With that he drove a kick into Ming Buxiang's back, sending him sprawling.\n

\n\n

\n A roar went up, and Bugui charged forward, throwing his arms around Benyue's waist. By now Bugui regarded Ming Buxiang as kin—how could he stand by while he was abused? Seeing him struck, he had rushed in. Benyue, startled by Bugui's fearsome shape, gave a jump; Bugui was strong and was about to heave him to the ground. Benyue, not about to suffer such insolence, propped his hands under Bugui's arms, locking onto his meridians, then drove a knee up into Bugui's belly. Bugui took the pain but still flung Benyue off with all his force. Benyue staggered back a few steps, then threw two punches in quick succession, left and right, into Bugui's face. Bugui's hide was thick and his flesh tough; he gave ground a step or two and meant to fight on, but several disciples rushed in and held him back.\n

\n\n

\n Lü Changfeng rose, furious. "What right have you to hit people?!"\n

\n\n

\n "The wretch is a disciple of the Right Action Hall," said Benyue. "What business is it of the Right View Hall's?"\n

\n\n

\n "A floor-sweeper has the right to discipline disciples? Is that the rule of the Right Action Hall?"\n

\n\n

\n "What of sweeping floors?" Benyue spat. "Aren't you a floor-sweeper too? Where's your right to discipline me?"\n

\n\n

\n "You hurt my friend, so it's my business!" said Lü Changfeng.\n

","published_time":"2026-06-15T00:00:00.000Z","paid":true,"show_flag":true,"show_scheduled_time":"2026-06-15T00:00:00.000Z","unpaid_scheduled_time":"2026-06-27T00:00:00.000Z"},{"content_id":4953,"novel_id":74,"chapter_no":5,"chapter_title":"The Buddha's Hand and the Spider's Thread Part 2","content":"

\n Ming Buxiang tugged at Lü Changfeng's sleeve and said mildly, "It doesn't matter."\n

\n\n

\n Benyue swung another slap at Ming Buxiang, cursing, "Who said you could speak?"\n

\n\n

\n He knew Ming Buxiang no longer had Liaoxin to back him, and reckoned that, given his peculiar standing, no master would step up for him either—so he meant to grind him down all the harder.\n

\n\n

\n Lü Changfeng wasted no more words and spun a kick at Benyue.\n

\n\n

\n "Come on, then!" Benyue roared.\n

\n\n

\n The two went at it. Several Right View Hall disciples shielded Ming Buxiang and Bugui; others wanted to break it up but were checked by Lü Changfeng's shout.\n

\n\n

\n At the start the two traded fists and feet, only simple grappling, and Lü Changfeng was plainly the stronger. Seeing he could not win, Benyue turned fists into palms, striking out in unbroken waves as though he had sprouted extra arms, palm-shadows layered thick.\n

\n\n

\n This was the Thousand-Eye Thousand-Hand Avalokitesvara Palm, a high-order skill of the temple, not the stuff of common brawls. Benyue's inner power ran shallow, but his forms were practiced; trusting in his bulkier frame over Lü Changfeng, he assumed his inner strength must run deeper, and meant to win by it.\n

\n\n

\n He had reckoned wrong. Lü Changfeng suddenly struck out a palm, its force gusting into the face—the Great Vajra Palm.\n

\n\n

\n In martial terms, the Vajra Palm lay in the sheer weight of its force, the Avalokitesvara Palm in deftness; each had its strengths. But skill knows no high or low—inner power does. Though Lü Changfeng was barely past twenty, his inner strength was honed deeper than Benyue's; for every three or five palms Benyue threw, Lü Changfeng need only answer with one to drive him back step by step.\n

\n\n

\n A few exchanges more, and Lü Changfeng landed a palm on Benyue's shoulder, knocking him back several paces. Having taken the worst of it and judging himself outmatched, Benyue cursed, "You're trading on your numbers today, so I'll swallow this loss. We'll see how long you can shelter that wretch!" And with that he turned and left.\n

\n\n

\n A disciple jeered after him, "Don't run off! We'll pick a weaker one to fight you, one on one—no ganging up!"\n

\n\n

\n The crowd roared with laughter and cheered, "Brother Lü's the best!" "What a hand Brother Lü has!"—thronging around Lü Changfeng as though around a great hero.\n

\n\n

\n Lü Changfeng asked Bugui, "You all right?" Bugui shook his head. "I'm fine." But there was a bitter, unsatisfied look on his face.\n

\n\n

\n "Cross Benyue," said Ming Buxiang, "and sooner or later he'll find a chance to get even."\n

\n\n

\n Someone else said, "If he goes and reports it, Brother Lü might be punished by his master."\n

\n\n

\n "The Spotted Dog's a lay monk," said Lü Changfeng. "Hitting him, my master will praise me."\n

\n\n

\n The crowd laughed again.\n

\n\n

\n Lü Changfeng said to Ming Buxiang, "You live in the Right Action Hall. Sooner or later he'll come make trouble for you, and you'll have nowhere to hide. There's still an empty room in the Right View Hall. You really won't move in?"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang shook his head again. "That's my master's room."\n

\n\n

\n Seeing how he held to the thought of his master, they were all rather moved. Lü Changfeng said, "If he bullies you again, tell me, and I'll stand up for you."\n

\n\n

\n "Brawling is forbidden in the temple," said Ming Buxiang, "and he has helpers." Then he added, "With Brother Lü beside me now, if he comes to provoke me, Brother Lü will help me too."\n

\n\n

\n Lü Changfeng laughed aloud. "That's nothing. Don't worry—if he dares make a noise about it, I'll tell my master how he bullied you, and someone above will see justice done. The brothers of the Right View Hall are all your backing."\n

\n\n

\n The words were scarcely out before the brothers cried in one voice, "That's right—we're all your backing!"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang looked around at them and suddenly smiled, warm as the morning sun. Since entering the Right View Hall, he had never been seen to smile by anyone but Bugui; the others had supposed it was grief over Liaoxin's disappearance, and seeing him smile now, they felt they had done a good thing, and were all delighted.\n

\n\n

\n All but Bugui.\n

\n\n

\n He stood at the back of the crowd, his face desolate.\n

\n\n

\n That night Bugui tossed and turned, unable to rest. Early the next morning, sweeping the Supernatural Power Vault, he could not stop himself from secretly slipping out a treatise on the Dragon Claw Hand and tucking it into his robe.\n

\n\n

\n He chose that one because, of all the characters, so many he could not make out—only the word "dragon" struck him as mighty and commanding.\n

\n\n

\n That afternoon, while Ming Buxiang taught him to read, Bugui asked about the bad blood between Benyue and him. "He used to be foreman of the Right Action Hall's labor monks, like Brother Gloom," said Ming Buxiang. "Only he lorded it over those under him, giving orders and doing none of the work himself. People feared him but did not respect him."\n

\n\n

\n "But Brother Lü is so beloved by everyone," said Bugui.\n

\n\n

\n "He's warm-hearted, always helping the brothers, so of course he's loved," said Ming Buxiang. "If you helped the brothers often too, you'd be loved as well."\n

\n\n

\n Bugui nodded and asked no more.\n

\n\n

\n After that Bugui took to helping the brothers of his own accord. He learned that whenever the brothers needed supplies they had to buy them in Buddha City, a full five li away, and that some, forbidden to leave the temple without their masters' leave, inevitably needed someone to buy for them, and when they couldn't find anyone convenient, had to go begging help all around. Bugui had no master and could come and go freely, so he volunteered, buying supplies for all the brothers. At first they were a little embarrassed and tried to decline, but seeing Bugui insist, they accepted his kindness.\n

\n\n

\n Short and hunched as he was, Bugui was strong, and no quantity of goods was too much for him to haul. Whenever he came back from a buying trip, everyone thanked him and praised him, and though Bugui was drenched in sweat and worn out, he always smiled with delight.\n

\n\n

\n As time went on they grew used to it, and whenever they wanted something but didn't care to make the long trip, they entrusted Bugui with the buying—sometimes sending him on the ten-li round trip for nothing more than a missing toothbrush.\n

\n\n

\n In the last month of the year, snow fell heavy over Mount Shaoshi, and then came the New Year. Shaolin observed the Buddha's Birthday rather than the New Year, but there was still merrymaking to be done. After that came the birthdays of the bodhisattvas Avalokitesvara and Samantabhadra, and over those months the Right View Hall disciples were run quite off their feet.\n

\n\n

\n In the blink of an eye it was the warm third month of spring. One day someone came knocking at Ming Buxiang's door to say the abbot Juejian was asking for him in the Right Action Hall.\n

\n\n

\n "I'd meant to come see you sooner," Juejian said. "But there's no end of business in the Right Action Hall, and I could never spare the time, and after a while I forgot, until lately it came back to me."\n

\n\n

\n "This disciple knows how to look after himself," said Ming Buxiang. "I only hope my master may be found soon." He paused, then went on, "It would also spare the temple its strife."\n

\n\n

\n Juejian raised an eyebrow. "I hear you've borrowed a great many books in the Right View Hall. Which have you read?" Ming Buxiang reported them one by one, and Juejian put questions here and there, to which Ming Buxiang answered without a stumble, leaving Juejian full of admiration.\n

\n\n

\n His examination done, Juejian said, "You've studied hard in the Right View Hall, and that gladdens me—your master, I should think, would be glad of it too. What gift would you like? I'll give it to you."\n

\n\n

\n "This disciple needs no gift," said Ming Buxiang.\n

\n\n

\n "This is a reward, not a debt," said Juejian. "It's to encourage your diligence. If you remember it, you'll strive all the harder."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang thought a moment. "I'd like a pair of shoes."\n

\n\n

\n Juejian asked, puzzled, "Shoes?"\n

\n\n

\n "Yes. A pair of shoes."\n

\n\n

\n Juejian laughed. "Where's the difficulty in that? I'll have someone bring them to you in a day or two."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang bowed. "Thank you, Abbot."\n

\n\n

\n Juejian commended him a little more and had someone see him back.\n

\n\n

\n In that same third month, two things happened in the Right View Hall.\n

\n\n

\n The first was that Brother Gloom passed his test of skill and was appointed an overseer-monk, to leave Shaolin and go to Shanxi.\n

\n\n

\n The others were glad for him, and saddened at the parting, and at the same time the post of labor foreman fell vacant. The foremanship was nothing much to covet; by custom the departing foreman nominated his successor and the abbot approved, and the choice could only be Lü Changfeng.\n

\n\n

\n At the farewell feast, the others pooled their money to buy Brother Gloom a set of monk's robes and shoes—bought down the mountain by Bugui, of course. Each in turn spoke his words of parting.\n

\n\n

\n When it came to Ming Buxiang, Brother Gloom said, "Since you joined the Right View Hall I've had little to do with the management and seen little of you, and taught you nothing. Looking back now, I feel I've wronged you."\n

\n\n

\n "The brothers of the Right View Hall are all good people," said Ming Buxiang. "Brother Lü is good, and Brother Bu is good. I'm only a little sad—and next year, I expect, I'll be sad again."\n

\n\n

\n "How do you mean?" Brother Gloom asked.\n

\n\n

\n "Within two years it should be Brother Lü's turn to take a Hero's Warrant and leave the temple," said Ming Buxiang.\n

\n\n

\n Brother Gloom raised an eyebrow, thinking, Brother Lü has learned his skills well; he may not even need two years to go down the mountain. These past six months I've been busy preparing for the test, and let a good deal of the labor work slide—run ragged at both ends, with no peace—and I leaned on him for all of it. After I'm gone, who will Brother Lü turn to for help?\n

\n\n

\n Thinking this, he could not help glancing at Bugui.\n

\n\n

\n Just then Lü Changfeng raised his teacup and called out, "To Brother Gloom—a smooth road, an early posting, and a swift return to Shaolin!"\n

\n\n

\n They all raised their cups and clinked them, laughing together.\n

\n\n

\n Two days after Brother Gloom left, the abbot Jueming handed down his order: Bu Li would replace Benyan as foreman of the labor detail.\n

\n\n

\n At this appointment, not only Lü Changfeng but everyone was dumbfounded—Bugui no less than the rest.\n

\n\n

\n Lü Changfeng had indeed considered that serving as labor foreman would interfere with his test of skill, but he thought highly of himself and judged it not impossible to manage both; Brother Gloom's good intentions had been, it seemed, a one-sided notion. Bugui had grown well liked among the brothers of late, was of a fitting age, and the labor needed no great talent; since he had no ambition for a Hero's Warrant and would not be leaving the temple, the post suited him well enough. Yet for some reason Lü Changfeng always felt a knot of resentment lodged in his chest.\n

\n\n

\n Taking up the post, Bugui stammered, "I... well... I'll do my best." Watching him stutter and fumble, the others wavered a little more.\n

\n\n

\n That afternoon Ming Buxiang came to teach Bugui to read. Over this past half year and more, Bugui had learned a great many common characters and now and then would bring out some obscure one to ask about, which Ming Buxiang would teach him on the spot. Young as he was, Ming Buxiang had become a half-teacher in Bugui's eyes; whenever he was at a loss, he had only to ask.\n

\n\n

\n "Brother Ming, I... I've become foreman, and... well... what should I do?"\n

\n\n

\n "I've never been a foreman, so I don't know how to teach you," said Ming Buxiang. "But leading by example is surely never wrong."\n

\n\n

\n Bugui asked what that meant, and learned it was to set himself up as a model—to do more himself, and those under him would fall in willingly.\n

\n\n

\n Bugui understood. But he did too much.\n

\n\n

\n For hauling water each man carried ten buckets; trusting in his strength, Bugui carried dozens more, so that everyone else carried two fewer.\n

\n\n

\n For splitting wood, Bugui alone did the work of five, and everyone split a few bundles less.\n

\n\n

\n For cleaning, Bugui was foremost of all, shifting the heavy things, scrubbing the old grime by his own hand.\n

\n\n

\n He only did the work, and assigned none of it, but every brother was delighted, all praising Bugui: since he took the post, their work had grown much lighter. Bugui laughed with pleasure too, and his gratitude to Ming Buxiang deepened a little more.\n

\n\n

\n The second great event of the third month also concerned Bugui.\n

\n\n

\n He lost the money the other disciples had given him to buy snacks.\n

\n\n

\n "I had it with me, I'm sure of it!" Bugui was wretched with vexation. "When I got to Buddha City and reached into my pocket, it was all gone..."\n

\n\n

\n "You weren't picked, were you?" a disciple said. "Buddha City's full of cutpurses. I told you to be careful."\n

\n\n

\n "I was careful," Bugui said dejectedly. "I'm sorry, everyone."\n

\n\n

\n Lü Changfeng comforted him. "It's only a few dozen coppers. Don't take it to heart."\n

\n\n

\n The monks of the Right View Hall were all proper monks, with no income beyond their stipend, and the pocket money given to disciples was scant—some relied on help from family. The snack-buying had drawn many in this time, a few hundred coppers at most, a few dozen at least; the sum was not large, but it stung.\n

\n\n

\n Stinging or not, there was nothing to be done, and Bugui could not make it good. Besides, these past months he had relied on Bugui to run his errands; a good pair of shoes had been worn to rags in the doing of it—how could anyone have the face to lose the money and then lay it on him?\n

\n\n

\n Bugui went back to his room, low in spirits. Then came a knock, and he saw it was Ming Buxiang, a bundle in his hand.\n

\n\n

\n Bugui said miserably, "Brother Ming, are they still angry with me?"\n

\n\n

\n "Brother Bu, have you heard the story of the broken oil jug?" said Ming Buxiang.\n

\n\n

\n "What story?"\n

\n\n

\n "A man went to the market and bought a jug of oil. Carrying it home in his arms, he slipped on the way and dropped it, and it shattered. The man didn't even turn his head; he just walked on. A passerby called out, 'Hey, your oil jug's broken!' Brother Bu, can you guess how the man answered?"\n

\n\n

\n Bugui, who was not quick, scratched his head. "I don't know."\n

\n\n

\n "The jug's broken—it's broken," said Ming Buxiang. "What good would looking back do?"\n

\n\n

\n Bugui blinked, half catching the sense.\n

\n\n

\n "The money's lost," said Ming Buxiang. "What use is regret? From now on, just help the brothers a bit more."\n

\n\n

\n Then it dawned on Bugui, and he nodded again and again.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang crouched, opened the bundle, and drew out a pair of brand-new monk's shoes. "Try them. Do they fit?"\n

\n\n

\n "What's this?" Bugui asked hurriedly.\n

\n\n

\n "It's the gift the abbot Juejian gave me. I thought they'd suit you. Only don't tell anyone—if Abbot Juejian were to hear of it, it wouldn't look well for him."\n

\n\n

\n "And if someone asks?" said Bugui. "What do I say?"\n

\n\n

\n "Just say you bought them yourself. You earn a little stipend for your labor in the hall."\n

\n\n

\n "These shoes are so fine, I can't take them."\n

\n\n

\n "Your old pair, up and down the mountain, are worn through and past wearing," said Ming Buxiang. "Put on these new ones, and you'll be able to move faster when you buy things for the brothers."\n

\n\n

\n Bugui was overcome. He threw his arms around Ming Buxiang and wept. "Brother Ming, you're a truly good man!" Ming Buxiang waited for him to finish crying, then had him try the shoes on; they were a touch narrow, but they fit well enough.\n

\n\n

\n The day after he put on the new shoes, Bugui noticed that the way everyone looked at him had changed. He took it for the lost money, that they still hadn't gotten over it, and only thought how petty they were—nowhere near as generous as Brother Ming.\n

\n\n

\n But from that day on, no one ever again sent him down the mountain to buy things. Little by little he felt himself being shut out, and behind his back came whispers he could not understand.\n

\n\n

\n Bugui grew anxious. These "friends" had cost him such effort to win, and he did not understand what had gone wrong. He could only work all the harder, taking on more and more, to win this group of friends back.\n

\n\n

\n And bit by bit the brothers of the Right View Hall grew slack, no longer putting their hearts into the sweeping and the chores. The less heart they put in, the more Bugui had to do, and the more Bugui did, the less heart they put in.\n

\n\n

\n By the fourth month, when Juejian came to the Right View Hall to see the abbot Jueming, he found Ming Buxiang, Bu Li, and the others splitting wood, and noticed that Ming Buxiang still wore his old shoes. Puzzled, he saw Ming Buxiang shake his head at him, and following his glance, found that the new shoes were on Bugui's feet.\n

\n\n

\n He knew Bu Li's story, and knew that after Ming Buxiang came to the Right View Hall, Bu Li—who had not been seen by anyone for ten years—had been willing to step out of his room and even grow close to the other disciples; this, he thought, must be Ming Buxiang's doing. He gave Ming Buxiang a faint smile, nodded, and turned to go.\n

\n\n

\n This child has not disappointed me after all, Juejian thought. But he had not gone two steps when he turned back, frowning, and after a moment closed his eyes, then turned and left.\n

\n\n

\n A while later a hall-monk came and called Bugui over.\n

\n\n

\n "How much wood was to be split today?" the monk asked.\n

\n\n

\n "A hundred bundles," said Bugui.\n

\n\n

\n "How much did you split, and how much did that child?"\n

\n\n

\n "I split twenty bundles, and Brother Ming split ten."\n

\n\n

\n "The two of you split thirty bundles, and the remaining seventy are left for twenty-odd disciples to share?"\n

\n\n

\n "Brother Lü split five too," Bugui said quickly, but his defense found no favor.\n

\n\n

\n "You're the foreman. With the labor so unevenly shared, what kind of work is this?"\n

\n\n

\n Bugui stammered, "But the wood gets split in the end, every day. The work's never held up past the deadline."\n

\n\n

\n "A foreman isn't about who does the most work," said the monk. "It's about dividing the labor fairly, overseeing and managing it, each man to his task. If it were about doing the most, you'd just pick the strongest as foreman—why would you need an older man at all?"\n

\n\n

\n Bugui had no answer.\n

\n\n

\n "From now on the labor must be shared fairly. Next time I'll come to oversee it, and if I see anyone slacking again, you'll be the one punished."\n

\n\n

\n Bugui mumbled his assent.\n

\n\n

\n But he could no longer command the brothers of the Right View Hall.\n

\n\n

\n The labor he assigned, much or little, was never finished. The numbers had not dropped, yet the great hall of the Sutra Repository was never as bright as before; the wood-splitting and water-hauling fell behind day after day, and he took no end of scolding for it.\n

\n\n

\n When he grew anxious Bugui would chide them; in time chiding did no good, so he cursed.\n

\n\n

\n But cursing did no good either—and what was more, over this stretch of days, no one had asked him in a long while to go rambling or drinking or chatting.\n

\n\n

\n At last he saw it: he had been frozen out.\n

\n\n

\n But he did not know why.\n

\n\n

\n Only when Lü Changfeng now and then urged them on did the disciples set to work in earnest.\n

\n\n

\n No one took him seriously at all.\n

\n\n

\n Frantic, he turned to Ming Buxiang for help, and Ming Buxiang only urged him to let it go and suggested he have a talk with Lü Changfeng.\n

\n\n

\n But Lü Changfeng always pointedly avoided him.\n

\n\n

\n One day, in a fit of rage, he actually struck one of the younger brothers. Everyone seemed shocked, and only then began to work in earnest. He remembered the Benyue that Ming Buxiang had told him of, and felt remorse; he apologized to the young brother, who put him off with a few words and then kept his distance.\n

\n\n

\n After that day the other brothers began working in earnest, and the work was finished on time at last, and Bugui won the hall-monks' praise once more.\n

\n\n

\n The method was crude, but it worked: whenever the brothers slacked, he had only to roar a few times, or even strike someone, and the rest would set to. And no one, it seemed, complained of him to the hall-monks.\n

\n\n

\n But Lü Changfeng stopped working.\n

\n\n

\n He looked at Bugui always with scorn, and however Bugui bellowed and raged, he would not be moved—as though he were goading Bugui into striking him.\n

\n\n

\n And the work Lü Changfeng left undone was all taken up by Ming Buxiang, which made Bugui feel all the more in his debt.\n

\n\n

\n One day Bugui finally could not hold back and swung a fist at Lü Changfeng. But Lü Changfeng seemed to have waited a long while for it; he slipped aside lightly, caught Bugui's arm and wrenched it, until Bugui howled with pain.\n

\n\n

\n He heard all the brothers clapping and cheering.\n

\n\n

\n He felt utterly humiliated—humiliated as he had been in childhood when other parents drove their children away from him, humiliated as when the other children threw stones.\n

\n\n

\n Only Ming Buxiang anxiously urged Lü Changfeng to let go.\n

\n\n

\n Only Ming Buxiang was his friend—the first friend, and the last.\n

\n\n

\n "It's my fault you've come to this," Ming Buxiang said in Bugui's room, handing him a jar of bruise salve.\n

\n\n

\n "It's nothing to do with you," said Bugui. "They hate me."\n

\n\n

\n "They think you stole their money." Ming Buxiang pointed at the new shoes on his feet. "They think you bought these shoes with the stolen money. I heard them say it."\n

\n\n

\n Only then did it all come clear to Bugui—so this was why they had drifted away from him.\n

\n\n

\n "I explained it to them, but they wouldn't believe me," said Ming Buxiang.\n

\n\n

\n "What do I do?" Bugui asked.\n

\n\n

\n "Tomorrow I'll go and bring Abbot Juejian to bear witness and clear your name—then they'll believe you," said Ming Buxiang.\n

\n\n

\n "Will it work?" Bugui asked.\n

\n\n

\n "Hand the foremanship back to Brother Lü," said Ming Buxiang. "Brother Lü will forgive you. If Brother Lü forgives you, the other brothers will forgive you."\n

\n\n

\n Forgive? After Ming Buxiang left, Bugui lay on his bed, turning it over and over.\n

\n\n

\n This once, and only this once, he did not believe Ming Buxiang—because he had cursed them, had struck them.\n

\n\n

\n So long as Lü Changfeng was there, he could never win back everyone's trust, because everyone loved Lü Changfeng. Handsome, tall, skilled in martial arts, well-bred, and ready to act for justice's sake.\n

\n\n

\n Beside him, Bugui was only a hunchback.\n

\n\n

\n In these days Bugui had finally come out of his room. The world outside was vast, but too heavy—so heavy he could not straighten his back under it. It was as though he had shrunk back into that little dark room, alone in its cramped walls, practicing the Iron Plank Bridge, struggling with all his might to straighten his hunched spine by even a fraction.\n

\n\n

\n At last he understood: all along, he had been jealous of Lü Changfeng.\n

\n\n

\n He took the Dragon Claw Hand treatise from the drawer, tucked it into his robe, and slipped out under cover of night.\n

\n\n

\n He knew where Lü Changfeng's room was. He was no thief—but he could make a thief of Lü Changfeng. To steal a treatise from the Sutra Repository was a grave crime; he had only to report tomorrow morning that a scripture had been stolen, and every monk's quarters in the Right View Hall would be searched, and Lü Changfeng would be caught with the goods on him.\n

\n\n

\n He could say, too, that Lü Changfeng was the one who had stolen the money—and with Ming Buxiang's testimony proving these shoes had not been bought with stolen coin, Lü Changfeng would be the likeliest thief.\n

\n\n

\n Then he and his "friends" could put the "misunderstanding" behind them—this was how he would win their trust back.\n

\n\n

\n He crept along, dodging the patrolling watch-monks, and came outside Lü Changfeng's room. It was a two-room lodging; he eased the main door open. Lü Changfeng slept in the room on the right. He gave the door a push—curse it, it was locked.\n

\n\n

\n He circled around to the back, saw a window standing open, and climbed in through it.\n

\n\n

\n He had no practice at climbing through windows, and just when he thought he was through, the hump on his back struck the window frame with a great crash. Horror-struck, before he could pull back, Lü Changfeng had already woken; seeing the figure at the window, he shouted, "Thief! Thief!"\n

\n\n

\n Lü Changfeng rushed over. Bugui tried to back out the window, but his hump was wedged fast and for a moment he could not move, and Lü Changfeng seized him by the collar. Recognizing Bugui, he said in astonishment, "It's you? What are you doing breaking into my room in the dead of night?!"\n

\n\n

\n There was a roaring in Bugui's head, everything a blur; he could think only of struggling free and escaping. If he were caught here, he would never make a friend again in all his life. But Lü Changfeng's skill far outstripped his own—how could he break loose? With no time in the crisis to think it through, Bugui hooked his right hand into a claw and thrust it forward, loosing the one move of the Dragon Claw Hand he had drilled for over half a year—Adamant-Crushing Force—clamping it at Lü Changfeng's throat.\n

\n\n

\n Lü Changfeng knew the shallowness of Bugui's skill and paid the strike no mind; his hands still gripping Bugui's collar, he merely turned his neck aside to dodge.\n

\n\n

\n But he was wrong. Bugui's claw closed on his throat all the same, and with one wrench it tore his windpipe apart. Lü Changfeng clutched his throat with both hands, unable to breathe, gasping for air, and in moments toppled to the floor, dead.\n

\n\n

\n Bugui did not escape either. The watch-monks and disciples who came at the noise seized him and pinned him to the ground.\n

\n\n

\n The thing shook all of Shaolin. A monk of the Right View Hall had framed an innocent man, killed a brother of his own order, stolen a treatise and murdered, and studied a martial text in secret—any one of these crimes was punishable by death.\n

\n\n

\n The temple was already in turmoil over the case of the fatal brawl between proper and lay monks, and at this very juncture Bugui, in his standing as both proper and lay, had killed a disciple of the temple—touching the temple's most sensitive nerve, so that the matter seemed once more to rise to the pitch of the proper-and-lay struggle.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang visited Bugui once in his cell. He asked nothing, and Bugui had nothing to say. The two sat facing each other without a word, Bugui only staring at Ming Buxiang's face.\n

\n\n

\n Brother Ming's face is as fine as ever—far finer than Lü Changfeng's. From their first meeting he had carried that face in his mind. If in my next life I were born with that face, Bugui thought, I too would have many friends.\n

\n\n

\n As Ming Buxiang rose to go, Bugui said, "Thank you, friend. What I owe you, I'll repay in my next life."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang nodded and did not look back.\n

\n\n

\n The Right Action Hall's ruling came down swiftly.\n

\n\n

\n Execution, carried out at once.\n

\n\n

\n A Shaolin execution was not by beheading; in keeping with the Buddhist spirit of mercy, they chose a death as painless as could be. The condemned was bound and made to kneel forward, while the executioner stood behind him—a monk who must have trained in a hard, fierce finger-skill of the Dragon Claw Hand's order or above. Such monks were mostly lay monks, who with their finger-force shattered the lung-shu and heart-shu points on the condemned's back; at a single blow the heart and lungs burst, and death came without a sound, without pain.\n

\n\n

\n The executioner that day used the very art Bugui alone had known, the one with which he had killed Lü Changfeng—the Dragon Claw Hand.\n

\n\n

\n Kneeling in the execution yard, Bugui looked around him, but he did not see Ming Buxiang.\n

\n\n

\n This is karmic retribution, Bugui thought, and closed his eyes. Suddenly he remembered the story the abbot Jueming had told, the one he had loved so well—Kandata and the spider.\n

\n\n

\n Perhaps that spider's thread was never meant to save Kandata, Bugui thought. Perhaps it was only there to let him fall deeper, and harder...\n

\n\n

\n He felt a pain in his back, the pain reaching through to his chest, and before it could spread to the rest of him, his awareness was already dissolving, a heavy drowsiness sweeping over him.\n

\n\n

\n ...\n

\n\n

\n After Bugui's death, Ming Buxiang asked that the Supernatural Power Vault be given to him alone to clean. The others took it for a way of honoring Bugui's memory, and agreed.\n

\n\n

\n An older brother became the new foreman, and the sweeping of the Right View Hall went on as before—windows bright, tables clean, everything neat and trim, every disciple earnest and diligent, not one of them slacking now.\n

\n\n

\n Only they would never go out together again, and there was far less that passed between them than before.\n

\n\n

\n Each of them carried a heavy weight of sin.\n

\n\n

\n Like the hump on Bugui's back.\n

","published_time":"2026-06-15T00:00:00.000Z","paid":true,"show_flag":true,"show_scheduled_time":"2026-06-15T00:00:00.000Z","unpaid_scheduled_time":"2026-07-04T00:00:00.000Z"},{"content_id":4954,"novel_id":74,"chapter_no":6,"chapter_title":"Old Enemies in the Snow Part 1","content":"

\n The eighty-second winter of the Kunlun era, twelfth month.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang had been at the Right View Hall for a little over a year.\n

\n\n

\n After the Dragon Boat Festival, another mishap struck Shaolin Temple: a disciple of the Right Action Hall hanged himself.\n

\n\n

\n The affair raised an uproar, much as the Bugui matter had, and just as quickly the Right Action Hall closed the case as "suspected suicide over an affair of the heart."\n

\n\n

\n Juejian, the abbot of the Right Action Hall, seemed to find this contemptible. With a cold laugh he said, "That it was suicide, no one doubts. But where was there any affair of the heart?"\n

\n\n

\n Those who knew the truth behind it sighed quietly to themselves.\n

\n\n

\n There was another small matter: the Right Action Hall's head labor disciple had been replaced. Spotted Dog left Shaolin that month and took lodging at a temple in Buddha City, where he would wait out the year before returning to test his skills and claim his Hero's Warrant.\n

\n\n

\n A labor disciple did nothing but the lowest work in the temple, and such a change was hardly worth remarking on.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang swept and cleaned the Supernatural Power Vault, one month no different from the last. His life was the simplest thing. He chanted the sutras at sunrise, swept at dawn, returned to his room in the afternoon, borrowed one book every two days, and after the evening meal shut his door and rarely came or went. By rights, his was a room meant for two, but Liaoxin's disappearance was an unusual case, and besides, Abbot Juejian looked on the boy with favor and feared he might be dragged into the feud between Proper and Lay Monks — so Liaoxin's place had been left deliberately empty. Yet Juejian, it seemed, had worried for nothing. To all appearances, no one ever troubled Ming Buxiang.\n

\n\n

\n Even Spotted Dog, who hated him most, never came to make trouble.\n

\n\n

\n Beyond the daily three meals, Shaolin issued each disciple one set of clothes and one pair of cloth shoes a year, and four ounces of lamp oil a month. A labor disciple's monthly wage was only a hundred coppers, with a little extra for additional duties — though never much — and once his clothes wore out, or his oil ran low, or he needed anything else for daily life, he had to go down to Buddha City to buy it.\n

\n\n

\n So nearly every month, Ming Buxiang made a trip to Buddha City.\n

\n\n

\n Buddha City lay about five li from Shaolin Temple, reachable along the broad, newly rebuilt high road — a thoroughfare wide enough for eight carriages to ride abreast. Shaolin was not only the foremost of the Nine Great Houses but a holy ground of the faith, and on every great festival, especially the Buddha's birthday, pilgrims came in their thousands to bow before it, shoulder pressed to shoulder. To spare the temple's quiet, Shaolin arranged its various rites and observances to take place in Buddha City instead.\n

\n\n

\n Even so, no small number of the faithful — some come to fulfill vows, some to pray for blessings — would prostrate themselves three times and kowtow nine on the high road itself, facing the distant Mahavira Hall. Wide as the road was, it still choked with bodies every Buddha's birthday.\n

\n\n

\n The bustle of Buddha City stood in sharp contrast to the stillness of the temple. Here teahouses, taverns, inns, and shops crowded one against the next, and several thousand Shaolin disciples had made their homes in the city: lay disciples who had earned their Hero's Warrants but never taken the tonsure, householder residents who assisted with official business, and married Lay Monks. The Shaolin men who governed the affairs of the Zhengzhou region — Proper or Lay, householder or disciple — mostly lived in the southeastern corner of the city, a quarter known as the Nameless Temple. It was the very place where Ming Buxiang had lived as a boy with Liaoxin. For all his many trips to Buddha City, he had never once gone back to look.\n

\n\n

\n That twelfth month, Mount Shaoshi was buried under several heavy snows. The sky hung gray and low, the north wind howled, and the heavens seemed to be brewing some fiercer storm still.\n

\n\n

\n Before setting out, Ming Buxiang took a snow-coat from Liaoxin's wardrobe. He was at the age when bone lengthens and flesh fills in, shooting up fast, and the snow-coat Liaoxin had once bought him no longer fit; so he had pulled out its cotton wadding, stuffed it into his quilt, and taken to wearing Liaoxin's clothes instead. Liaoxin had not been tall, but he was thickset, and the padded coat hung loose on Ming Buxiang's frame.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang lowered his head and breathed in the smell of the cloth, then pushed open the door. Fine snow still drifted outside. He took up a bamboo hat and set off into it.\n

\n\n

\n The north wind struck his face. The mountain road lay deserted, as if he alone were braving the storm down the mountain — a storm that might at any moment turn savage.\n

\n\n

\n The ever-burning lamp before the Buddha was about to go out. He meant to buy a wick.\n

\n\n

\n Before long he reached Buddha City. Snow or no snow, the main street still saw plenty of people going to and fro. Ming Buxiang found a shop he knew and spent two coppers on a packet of wicks, tucking it inside his coat so the snow would not soak it.\n

\n\n

\n On any ordinary day he would have turned for home then. But today Ming Buxiang took a turn instead and went to the Ganjiang Smithy.\n

\n\n

\n The name of the Ganjiang Smithy was grander than its workmanship. It was nothing but a common smithy — a clumsy one, even — which of course also meant it was cheap.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang made a circuit of the shop, which took only a few steps. The place was so small that, once you subtracted the racks of assorted weapons and the counter for settling accounts, there was barely room for two men to turn sideways past each other.\n

\n\n

\n The smith's name was Yao, Yao Yunda, an outsider. He did not live in Buddha City — the rents were dear, and renting even this storefront strained him, never mind that business was slow. Seeing a customer enter, and a handsome youth at that, dressed in clothes that did not quite fit, he hurried over to greet him. "Looking for a weapon, young sir? A Precept Knife, a sword, a dagger, a Monk's Spade, a spear?"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang ran his fingers lightly over the flat of a Precept Knife, his expression solemn, and asked, "I read in a book that a saber is poor for thrusting and a sword poor for hacking. Is that so?"\n

\n\n

\n "It is," said Yao Yunda. The youth was so fine and gentle-mannered that no weapon in the shop seemed to suit his hand, and seeing how young he was, the smith picked out a short dagger that could be hidden in a sleeve. "Why not try this one, young hero? Good for self-defense — and out on the road, handy enough for splitting kindling or other odd jobs."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang took it, weighed it in his hand, and said, "Too short, and too light. It can only cut and stab, and it chips easily."\n

\n\n

\n "If you want something long, heavy, and good for striking, that would be the Monk's Spade. It can hack and thrust both — fell a tree thick as a bowl-rim in two or three strokes."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang glanced at the Monk's Spade on its rack and shook his head. "Thank you, master. Let me think it over." With that he made a bow, courteous and respectful, and left the Ganjiang Smithy for the Chan Wind Teahouse across the way.\n

\n\n

\n The Chan Wind Teahouse was neither the priciest nor the finest teahouse in Buddha City, but it was the largest. Shaolin held to the orthodox Chan school, and the monks under its sway far outnumbered those of any other house. The Hengshan Sect honored the Buddha too, but it mixed monks, Daoists, and laymen freely and did not require its disciples to take vows, so among the Nine Great Houses Shaolin's monks were still the most numerous.\n

\n\n

\n Monks kept the precepts and abstained from wine, meat, and pungent foods, so teahouses serving vegetarian fare and tea had multiplied across Shaolin's territory. The Chan Wind Teahouse charged fair prices and was clean and plain, with no private rooms; its two floors held a full hundred and fifty-odd tables, and inside, naturally, it was loud with the din of voices.\n

\n\n

\n When Ming Buxiang stepped in, the two rows of tables facing the door stood empty.\n

\n\n

\n There were two reasons for this. One was that the seats facing the door caught a draft. The other was that the hall's left side mostly held lay disciples, and its right side mostly monks.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang recognized several disciples of the Right Action and Right View Halls. The left was largely the Lay Monks' faction, the right the Proper Monks' line. As it happened, a good many in the room knew him, and his entrance drew their notice.\n

\n\n

\n As if to draw it on purpose, Ming Buxiang stood in the doorway a good while, seeming to hesitate, and that only turned more eyes his way.\n

\n\n

\n Left or right? Proper Monk or Lay?\n

\n\n

\n In the end, Ming Buxiang chose a seat in the middle.\n

\n\n

\n A few resentful glances came his way; so did a few approving nods, and a few looks of relief. At any rate, everyone went back to their own business, and no one paid him further mind.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang ordered a pot of coarse tea and a dish of melon seeds.\n

\n\n

\n He had been to the Chan Wind Teahouse before, back when the Right View Hall disciples were still on good terms. He and Bugui had both come. Since Bugui's death, this was his first time here — and the only one of that whole company to revisit the old haunt.\n

\n\n

\n He passed over the seeds that were misshapen and might crack a tooth, choosing only the ones with clean, even shells, and set each empty husk flat on the table. Lost in thought, he carefully arranged the husks into a pattern.\n

\n\n

\n It was a crooked, winding shape, something like a little ladle, something like a short dagger.\n

\n\n

\n After a while Ming Buxiang noticed this had drawn other people's eyes, so he swept the arranged husks back into the small dish.\n

\n\n

\n Then he noticed a man.\n

\n\n

\n This man was about forty, with a sharp, narrow chin and a head of wild hair. Like Ming Buxiang, he sat alone at a table, seven or eight saucers stacked before him, stealing glances at the Ganjiang Smithy across the street — his gaze fixed there and never wandering far.\n

\n\n

\n ......\n

\n\n

\n The man's name was Yin Sen. He had come to Mount Shaoshi not to worship the Buddha, nor to seek skill in arms, but to take revenge.\n

\n\n

\n It had taken him twelve years to track down his enemy through one place after another. And the enemy was there, in the smithy across the street, plying his shoddy trade.\n

\n\n

\n Of course it was shoddy — that half-baked craft of his, how could it turn out a decent weapon?\n

\n\n

\n He turned his head, and his eyes met Ming Buxiang's.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang gave a small smile — the polite kind meant to smooth over an awkward moment — and it was warm as sun melting drifted snow.\n

\n\n

\n Yin Sen started, looked away, then peered sidelong at the youth again. Seeing Ming Buxiang absorbed in his tea, he decided it had only been chance and turned his gaze back to the smithy.\n

\n\n

\n Winter days are short. Before long the smithy's owner gathered his things, set up the shutters, locked the door, and started up the mountain. Yin Sen hastily settled his bill, took up his sword, snatched his bamboo hat, and stole after him.\n

\n\n

\n Yao Yunda walked up the mountain along the high road, seeming to head for Shaolin Temple; but soon he turned aside, cut through a stretch of woods, and climbed on by a narrow path.\n

\n\n

\n The path was rugged — cliff face on the left, a sheer drop on the right, wide enough only for two abreast. A sudden gust nearly tore the hat from Yin Sen's head; he looked up, and a burst of driving snow lashed his face.\n

\n\n

\n "Damn it — why now!" Yin Sen peered ahead. His enemy was walking faster now, plainly anxious to get home and out of the storm.\n

\n\n

\n The snow had been expected, but it came down far harder than anyone could have guessed. Wind and snow swiftly buried the road and blotted out his sight, and Yin Sen had to close the gap to keep from losing his quarry. He hurried after — then his foot found nothing, and he nearly fell, throwing back his hips and twisting to barely catch himself. Lifting his eyes to the top of the cliff face, he saw snow heaped to the peak; should it slide, it would seal this path off entirely.\n

\n\n

\n Walking through the snow was hard, the ground narrow and slick. Had he fallen just now, he might well have been dashed to pieces. Watching his enemy draw away, Yin Sen gritted his teeth, threw caution to the wind, and hugged the cliff face as he hurried on.\n

\n\n

\n After another two li or so he made out a small cabin. Yao Yunda quickened his steps, pushed the door open, and went in. Light bloomed within. Yin Sen crouched outside and lifted a corner of the window to peer through.\n

\n\n

\n The cabin was small, perhaps two rooms and a main hall, with firewood stacked by the door. Yao Yunda lit a brazier, took a little wine jug from a cupboard, and poured himself a small cup to warm up.\n

\n\n

\n 'Where's that little bitch?' Yin Sen wondered. 'Two rooms in this place — has he got a child now?'\n

\n\n

\n He waited a while, but the one he wanted to see never appeared. The storm outside worsened, and he found himself shivering, afraid he would freeze solid before long.\n

\n\n

\n No more putting it off. He began turning over how to strike. After some thought, he went to the door and knocked.\n

\n\n

\n "Who's there?" the man inside asked.\n

\n\n

\n "I'm a hall-monk of Shaolin Temple, out on an errand and caught in the storm." Yin Sen lowered his voice. "I beg shelter."\n

\n\n

\n "Coming." Yao Yunda started for the door. Yin Sen gripped his sword fast, ready to strike the moment it opened.\n

\n\n

\n "May I ask the master's dharma name?" Yao Yunda did not open at once, but asked the question warily. Yin Sen thought a moment and made up a name on the spot. "This humble monk is called Liaoming."\n

\n\n

\n "Slide your Hero's Warrant under the door and let me see it," Yao Yunda said.\n

\n\n

\n Yin Sen was caught off guard — he had not expected such care — and for a moment did not know how to answer. Yao Yunda asked again, and Yin Sen said quickly, "I'm only doing business nearby. I didn't bring my Warrant."\n

\n\n

\n "Step up to the window and let me see you," Yao Yunda said.\n

\n\n

\n Left no choice, Yin Sen faced the window and said, "All right. It's dark out — you'll need to come close to make me out."\n

\n\n

\n Yao Yunda agreed. Seeing him reach the window, Yin Sen darted forward; the instant they came face to face, he thrust his sword through the window at Yao Yunda behind it.\n

\n\n

\n The stroke split the window but was slowed by it, and Yao Yunda twisted aside to escape, losing his balance in the process. Fearing pursuit, he rolled twice along the floor to get clear of the window. Yin Sen kicked the window in, leaped into the cabin, raised his sword, and hacked down at Yao Yunda, roaring, "Die, you son of a whore!"\n

\n\n

\n Yao Yunda had no weapon in hand and snatched up a stool to block. With a crack the sword lodged in the stool; Yao Yunda wrenched it hard, dragging Yin Sen off balance, and used the moment to scramble up and grab for a weapon.\n

\n\n

\n Yin Sen pulled his sword free, and when he turned back Yao Yunda had already taken a saber down from the wall. Yin Sen rushed forward, driving a thrust at his enemy's back; Yao Yunda hastily raised the saber to parry, and Yin Sen at once drove a heart-piercing kick square into his chest.\n

\n\n

\n Yao Yunda bore the pain and slashed down, the blade biting into Yin Sen's leg, and blood gushed at once. Heedless of the pain, Yin Sen brought out Wudang's Soft Cloud Swordplay. This was a high art of the Wudang Sect, prizing one thrust hard upon another, blow chasing blow in an unbroken stream. But Yin Sen's training was poor, each move walled off sharp from the last — clouds, perhaps, but scattered ones, broken into separate clumps.\n

\n\n

\n Yao Yunda met each move as it came, parried a few, then brought down a Wudang stroke, Splitting Mountains and Rivers. This move prized raw ferocity, breaking the empty with the solid; land it cleanly and it could cleave a foe in two.\n

\n\n

\n But Yao Yunda's own power fell short, and though the move was rightly made, Yin Sen slipped it. "Take it!" Yin Sen shouted, and his sword struck Yao Yunda full on the radius of the forearm, drawing a howl of pain. Yin Sen was about to press the attack when a sudden agony tore through him — the wound on his thigh, flaring. Yao Yunda seized the chance to kick out; Yin Sen flung up his arm to block, but in his haste failed to summon his inner force and was kicked into a roll across the floor before he could rise.\n

\n\n

\n Yao Yunda dared not pursue either, and slumped against the wall, gasping. Yin Sen fell back to the doorway. The two glared at each other, teeth bared, every shred of their hatred laid plain in their eyes.\n

\n\n

\n The wind drove in through the broken window, and the coals in the brazier burned all the fiercer.\n

\n\n

\n Each weighed his own hurts. Two of Yao Yunda's ribs were broken, and his left hand had taken a sword-cut deep enough to show bone; from here on he would be at a disadvantage in any exchange. Yin Sen was no better off — the wound on his thigh poured blood and was sure to slow him.\n

\n\n

\n Afraid Yao Yunda would flee, Yin Sen held the door close. The two glared, eyes all but spitting fire. After a long while came a sharp pop — the sound of a coal cracking in the heat — and both glanced reflexively at the brazier. And both went wide-eyed.\n

\n\n

\n A handsome youth in an ill-fitting snow-coat had, at some unknown moment, come into the cabin, and now sat warming himself before the fire.\n

\n\n

\n "Who are you?" Yao Yunda studied the youth and found him familiar; he remembered seeing him in the smithy that day, and wondered if the boy had come scouting. "You're his man?" he barked.\n

\n\n

\n "I'm a Shaolin disciple. My name is Ming Buxiang." Ming Buxiang returned a mild smile, then added, "Out on an errand, and caught in the storm."\n

\n\n

\n The reason he gave was word for word the same as Yin Sen's.\n

\n\n

\n "This is no business of yours. Get out!" Yao Yunda snarled.\n

\n\n

\n "The mountain path I came by is blocked with snow. I can't turn back, and there's no household nearby, so I've no choice but to stay a while. I beg your shelter." As he spoke, Ming Buxiang seemed not to notice the drawn weapons and bristling tension at all, warming his hands toasty over the fire, then leaning his face close and stroking it gently with his palms to warm that too.\n

\n\n

\n By now the golden crow had sunk in the west, and the cabin was dark save for the brazier's glow. In the firelight Ming Buxiang looked finer and more comely still.\n

\n\n

\n Yin Sen started at his words and said, half believing, "Don't lie! I just walked it — that path was fine!"\n

\n\n

\n "It's true," Ming Buxiang said. "I came right behind you. The path really is buried in snow. Go and look, if you don't believe me."\n

\n\n

\n Yin Sen's face fell at once. It had been a narrow path to begin with; with days of snow on it, and tonight's storm besides, it would be no surprise if it had truly been cut off. But if the only road out really was blocked, then how he would leave after his revenge became a thorny question.\n

\n\n

\n "Why were you following me?" Yin Sen asked — for he placed the boy now too. "I saw you in the Chan Wind Teahouse!"\n

\n\n

\n "You did," Ming Buxiang said, looking at him. "There were seven snack saucers on your table, all empty, so you'd clearly been there a long while. A man drinking tea alone, staring at the smith across the street — too suspicious." He looked back at the brazier. "I was curious, so I followed. I never expected that halfway up I'd hear a cracking sound, and when I turned, the path was buried in snow. No turning back, so I came on along."\n

\n\n

\n "You're a Shaolin disciple — you've studied martial arts, then?" said Yao Yunda. "I know a fair number of the brothers. Which hall are you from?"\n

\n\n

\n "The Right Action Hall." Ming Buxiang thought a moment, then added, "Or perhaps it should be the Right View Hall."\n

\n\n

\n "I know Abbot Jueming! Help me kill this fellow, and I'll report it to Abbot Jueming and have you credited with a great merit!" Yao Yunda said eagerly.\n

\n\n

\n "Horseshit! What grand personage would a worthless smith like you know?" said Yin Sen. "I've got five taels of silver on me. Help me kill him, and it's all yours!"\n

\n\n

\n "I've got more silver than he does! Help me kill him and I'll give you ten taels!"\n

\n\n

\n "Where would a poor wretch like you get ten taels? Ten taels of dog shit, more like!"\n

\n\n

\n Back and forth they went, falling to cursing each other again.\n

\n\n

\n "I came to wait out the storm," Ming Buxiang said. "I never thought of killing anyone." He looked at the fire and asked, "Aren't you two cold?"\n

\n\n

\n The storm outside was raging now, the window broken, and cold wind and snow poured ceaselessly into the cabin. Both Yin Sen and Yao Yunda were feeling the chill, and the night was deepening — it would only grow colder.\n

\n\n

\n Yin Sen, tucked behind the door, fared well enough, but Yao Yunda faced the window straight on, snow blowing into his face, and it was hard to bear. So, watchful as he moved, he edged over to a cupboard and nudged it a little to block some of the cold wind.\n

\n\n

\n 'Freeze to death for all I care,' Yin Sen thought.\n

\n\n

\n 'This can't go on,' Yao Yunda thought. 'He holds the door and won't let me out — am I to be trapped here and die?' His eyes drifted to the window despite himself.\n

\n\n

\n Yin Sen caught his intent and felt a stab of alarm. If Yao Yunda slipped out the window, then with his wounded leg he would surely never catch him. Twelve years he had spent finding the man — how could he let him escape? He was casting about, finding no answer, when Ming Buxiang spoke again.\n

\n\n

\n "Lucky your window's broken, or I'd never have known how to get in. Spend the night outside and I really would freeze to death."\n

\n\n

\n Yao Yunda's heart jumped. 'This boy says the road's cut off — true or not, who knows. But if it's true, and I flee out this window, he need only hold the window, lock the door, and I can't get back in. In this killing cold, wouldn't I freeze to death out there?'\n

\n\n

\n But he truly could not bear the cold, and could not help saying, "Little brother, can you think of some way to block up the window?"\n

\n\n

\n A moment ago he had been counting on the window for escape; now, instead, he wanted it shut.\n

\n\n

\n "Don't listen to him!" Yin Sen said quickly.\n

\n\n

\n "You each have your own opinion. I don't know whose to follow," Ming Buxiang said. "Settle it between you, then tell me."\n

\n\n

\n "It's my house — of course it's mine to say!" Yao Yunda said. "Shut the window, quick!"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang looked at Yin Sen, who laughed aloud. "Don't mind him! Give it a bit longer and he'll freeze to death!"\n

\n\n

\n The storm grew heavier, snow drifting into the cabin and wetting the floor, and before long the room turned colder still. Yao Yunda shivered all over, and Yin Sen too was suffering more and more, while only Ming Buxiang, warm by the fire, did not care in the least.\n

\n\n

\n Yao Yunda reckoned that at this rate he would be the first to freeze. Suddenly he gave a great shout and slashed his saber at Yin Sen. Yin Sen swung his sword in counter. Knowing Yin Sen was hampered in his movements, Yao Yunda kept circling and skirmishing, until Yin Sen simply shrank into a corner and guarded it tight; unable to find an opening, Yao Yunda had to fall back again.\n

\n\n

\n The exchange only set both their wounds to throbbing worse. Both understood now that if they truly fought it out to the death, the likeliest end was that both would die. A thought struck Yao Yunda; smiling, he walked over to Ming Buxiang and actually squatted down to warm himself, and Ming Buxiang did not stop him.\n

\n\n

\n Yin Sen had not foreseen Yao Yunda going to warm himself at the fire, and was just raising his sword to go over when Yao Yunda at once lifted his saber on guard — and any move now meant another fight to mutual ruin. Yin Sen reckoned that if he retreated to his corner, he himself might well be the first to freeze tonight. He was wavering over whether to risk all on a desperate fight when Ming Buxiang suddenly said, "That firewood won't last long."\n

\n\n

\n The words reminded Yin Sen, and he withdrew to his corner again — for the firewood lay there in the corner, and now it was his to guard.\n

\n\n

\n With that the balance tipped once more: if Yao Yunda wanted the firewood, he would have to cross blades with Yin Sen. Yin Sen heaped the wood up, took his fire-starting kit from his coat — but the storm was too fierce, he had stowed it carelessly, and the tinder and flint had taken damp; try as he might, he could not strike a flame. Yao Yunda laughed aloud. "This is the will of Heaven! If you and I must freeze, then so be it! Better that than this — let's die together now!" And he raised his saber to advance again.\n

\n\n

\n 'Better to fight him to the death than freeze,' Yin Sen thought. He was about to meet him when Ming Buxiang suddenly said, "Not necessarily. Even freezing, there's always a first and a second."\n

\n\n

\n The words reminded them both at once. 'I've got my back to the window,' Yin Sen thought, 'I'm not in the brunt of it the way they are. He's taken so much cold already — once my tinder dries I can make fire, and then I'll freeze him to death.'\n

\n\n

\n But Yao Yunda thought: 'I'm warming myself here, recovering my strength, while he takes the cold. In damp like this, his tinder and flint may not dry even by dawn — he'll surely freeze first.'\n

\n\n

\n Then another thought struck Yao Yunda, and he turned to Ming Buxiang. "Little brother, when the fire goes out, you'll freeze too. Why not join forces with me, kill this fellow, and once the storm passes I'll see you back to Shaolin."\n

\n\n

\n "Your grudge is nothing to do with me," Ming Buxiang said. "I only came to borrow a place to wait out the storm. Help one of you kill the other — that I can never do."\n

\n\n

\n "I'm master of this house," Yao Yunda said. "If you want shelter from the storm, you'll help me kill him. Otherwise, I'll throw you out."\n

\n\n

\n "If you throw me out," Ming Buxiang said mildly, "I'll die the moment I leave this cabin, so I'll surely fight back. And the moment I fight back, that man will come to help me."\n

\n\n

\n Yao Yunda saw the sense of it. The boy clearly knew some martial arts; he himself was wounded, and if pushed too hard the boy would join with Yin Sen instead, and then he stood no chance. "Without firewood," he said, "you'll freeze too."\n

\n\n

\n "Perhaps," said Ming Buxiang. "But you two are wounded, and you've stood in the cold wind half the day — you'll bear it worse than I will. Once one of you is dead, things will be easier for me."\n

\n\n

\n "Call yourself a Shaolin disciple," Yao Yunda raged, "with not a shred of mercy in you? You'd watch us die and not lift a hand!"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang shook his head. "That's your own grudge. I'm only passing through. To help either of you would be wrong."\n

\n\n

\n The fire dwindled and the cabin grew colder. Yao Yunda and Yin Sen shivered without cease, knowing they might well freeze to death — and with firewood right there before them, to freeze like this would be sheer folly.\n

\n\n

\n "I'm getting cold," Ming Buxiang said. "Tell me — shall we shut the window or not?"\n

\n\n

\n "I said shut it just now, and you wouldn't!" Yao Yunda raged.\n

\n\n

\n "He didn't agree just now." Ming Buxiang looked at Yin Sen. "There are three people in this cabin. Without all of you agreeing, I can't shut the window."\n

\n\n

\n Yin Sen dared not hold out now, and quickly said yes. Ming Buxiang pushed the cupboard up to the window and covered it over.\n

\n\n

\n With the window shut, the storm stopped dead inside, only a faint cold draft slipping through the cracks, and the two men felt much warmer at once. The cabin was pitch black now but for the brazier's last glow; Ming Buxiang found two candles and lit them, and though the light was weak, it was at least a little brighter again.\n

\n\n

\n Yin Sen and Yao Yunda stripped off their sodden outer robes. They had fought a spell, lost no little blood, and taken cold besides, and now found themselves hungry. Yao Yunda rose, opened the cupboard — it was full of steamed buns and flatbread and other dry provisions — took a piece of flatbread, and ate, paying the others no mind.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang stood up too, walked over to him, and said, "I want half."\n

\n\n

\n "Why should I give you any?" said Yao Yunda. He looked at Yin Sen. "If you're willing to help me, half of it is yours, no trouble at all."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang shook his head. "I help no one. I ask only for a place out of the wind and snow. Anything not agreed by everyone in this cabin, I won't do." He turned to Yin Sen and asked, "Do you think he ought to give me half?"\n

\n\n

\n Yin Sen laughed aloud. "Best you take it all!"\n

\n\n

\n "Half is all I want," Ming Buxiang said. He looked back at Yao Yunda. "Now you're the only one against it."\n

\n\n

\n Yao Yunda caught his meaning: if he did not give the boy half, the boy might side with Yin Sen against him. He had no choice but to hand over half the provisions.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang took his half of the provisions and walked over to Yin Sen, who at once went on guard. "I want half this firewood too," Ming Buxiang said.\n

\n\n

\n Seeing Yao Yunda's cold sneer, Yin Sen ground his teeth. "You'll share your fire-light with me, or you'll not have it though I die."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang lit a candle, handed it to Yin Sen, and took away half the firewood.\n

\n\n

\n He carried the brazier to a corner, heaped wood on the embers, and before long the fire blazed up again; then he sat before it to warm himself. When Yao Yunda made to come near for warmth, Ming Buxiang said, "This is my firewood — he gave it to me. If you want it, go to him."\n

\n\n

\n Rage rose in Yao Yunda and he was about to move, but recalling Yin Sen watching like a tiger at his back, he only said, "What will it take for you to share a little?"\n

\n\n

\n "Trade food for it," Ming Buxiang said. "Bring half your food and I'll give you half the firewood."\n

\n\n

\n The storm still had not eased, and Yao Yunda was wet and cold; to hold out further might mean death by morning, so he traded half his food for firewood. Seeing that Yao Yunda now had both food and firewood, Yin Sen hurried to deal with Ming Buxiang too, trading half his firewood back for food.\n

\n\n

\n Yao Yunda took the firewood and glared at Yin Sen; Yin Sen glared back; and so each kindled his own fire. Almost at the same instant, two fires rose in the cabin, and the two men, who had borne the cold half the day, felt as if reborn now in the warmth, and both let out a long breath.\n

","published_time":"2026-06-15T00:00:00.000Z","paid":true,"show_flag":true,"show_scheduled_time":"2026-06-15T00:00:00.000Z","unpaid_scheduled_time":"2026-07-11T00:00:00.000Z"},{"content_id":4955,"novel_id":74,"chapter_no":7,"chapter_title":"Old Enemies in the Snow Part 2","content":"

\n But the food and firewood were now barely two parts in ten of what they had started with.\n

\n\n

\n With three fires in the cabin, it naturally warmed up. Ming Buxiang dried his snow-coat over the flames and draped it on, toasted his flatbread warm and ate it, then sat cross-legged on the floor, palms pressed together, head bowed and eyes shut, murmuring his recitations without pause as he did his evening devotions. Yao Yunda and Yin Sen were both wounded and bleeding, frozen half the day, and now hungry, cold, and spent, pale and listless; still they forced themselves up and copied Ming Buxiang, toasting flatbread to eat. The wind howled outside without cease, squeezing through the cracks with a sound like the weeping of ghosts. The two enemies faced each other across the firelight, teeth grinding, each longing to tear the other like a mouthful of flatbread, and each helpless to do it.\n

\n\n

\n Another two hours passed. Both were heavy with weariness and wanted only to rest, but each feared the other would strike while he slept, and so they forced themselves to stay awake.\n

\n\n

\n A thought came suddenly to Yin Sen, and he asked, "Where's Huigu?"\n

\n\n

\n "Shut your mouth!" Yao Yunda cursed. "What right have you to say her name?"\n

\n\n

\n Yin Sen sneered. "She's my wife. Why shouldn't I say it?"\n

\n\n

\n "If she'd felt even an ounce of a wife's bond with you," Yao Yunda said, "would she have run off with me?"\n

\n\n

\n Yin Sen understood all at once and asked, "She's dead?"\n

\n\n

\n "You abused her," Yao Yunda said. "Her health was never good."\n

\n\n

\n "I see neither of you wants to sleep," Ming Buxiang said abruptly. "What deep blood-feud is this, that you'll have each other dead at any cost?"\n

\n\n

\n "What's it to you?" Yin Sen cursed. Ming Buxiang had stolen near half their food and firewood and would not help — small wonder his heart was sour.\n

\n\n

\n "You both want my help, but I don't know whom to help." The handsome youth's voice was wavering and hard to pin down, like the flicker of the brazier. "Tell it plainly, so I can judge who's the good man and who's the bad."\n

\n\n

\n At his words both men scrambled to speak at once, then fell to cursing each other, shouting and clamoring, neither giving way. Ming Buxiang shook his head. "Nothing's clear this way." He held out a slender white forefinger, pointed it at Yin Sen, and said, "You first."\n

\n\n

\n "Why should he go first?" Yao Yunda raged. A figure flickered — a stinging slap landed on Yao Yunda's face — and by the time he could look, Ming Buxiang was seated on the floor again.\n

\n\n

\n The two were stunned. They had taken the boy for an ordinary Shaolin disciple who had studied a little, and never dreamed he was so formidable. "Say one more word," they heard Ming Buxiang say, "and I'll help him, not you."\n

\n\n

\n Yin Sen said quickly, "The great hero's skill is fearsome — better finish him off soon, and there's more firewood and food for it." No sooner were the words out than a slap landed on his face too.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang tugged at his snow-robe and said mildly, "Speak now, or I'll let him go first."\n

\n\n

\n Each seething, yet wary of the boy's fearsome skill and afraid he might side with the enemy, neither dared erupt. Hoping for Ming Buxiang's help, Yin Sen began on the old days. "I'm a Hubei man, a disciple of the Qingyun Temple, a Wudang offshoot. My wife and I knew each other from childhood — we got on well, at first..."\n

\n\n

\n Yao Yunda made to cut in, but recalling Ming Buxiang's earlier rebuke, swallowed it.\n

\n\n

\n Yin Sen went on. "This Yao Yunda was an outsider — no telling whether he'd done some wrong at Huashan and run a few hundred li to take a master. He was my junior brother, and when he first entered, our master told me to look after him well, and I did, with all my heart, helping him along everywhere. He learned his skills poorly, and I taught him patiently. After we earned our Hero's Warrants, we were both guards in the Xiangyang Gang. I treated him as a brother through and through — and who'd have known this dog-bred wretch would seduce my wife while I was off on the boats, carry her away, and then send her to her death! How could I not avenge a stolen wife? Twelve years I hunted him! And at last Heaven opened its eyes — some of the old boatmen came to worship at Shaolin, spotted this ingrate beast in Buddha City, and told me, so I finally tracked him down!"\n

\n\n

\n "Twelve years?" Ming Buxiang repeated, then asked, "You never remarried?"\n

\n\n

\n "I have only one wife. We were deeply bound — of course I'd take her back!" Yin Sen raged. "Even dead, her spirit-tablet belongs in the Yin family! Young hero, I treated him as a brother, and he made a cuckold of me — tell me, doesn't a man like that deserve to die?"\n

\n\n

\n "Are you done blathering your damned nonsense?" Yao Yunda cursed. "Done? Then it's my turn! Letting you spew all that rot!"\n

\n\n

\n He was plainly enraged, foul words pouring out one after another. Ming Buxiang turned to look at him. "Your turn."\n

\n\n

\n "I'm a Taiyuan man by birth," Yao Yunda said. "Taiyuan's near the Lone Grave Land, where the ground's never quiet, and a living's hard to come by. I'd learned some fist-work as a boy from the monks at a temple nearby, but never took a master; at fifteen I went to Wudang to learn, under Daoist Fulu, so I had a trade in hand. I finished my training at twenty-five, earned my Hero's Warrant, and threw in with the Xiangyang Gang—"\n

\n\n

\n "I've no interest in your origins," Ming Buxiang said. "Just the heart of it."\n

\n\n

\n Pulled up short, Yao Yunda flushed, then went on. "This beast earned his Warrant two years later. He had no ability; I begged and pleaded to get him onto the boats. Who'd have known he was a coward who beat his wife every few days — I couldn't bear to watch. Huigu... she came weeping to me, and I'd long cared for her in secret. How could I bear to see her suffer? So while this coward was away on a far journey, I took her and we hid here at Shaolin. The poor woman — she'd scarcely had a few good years before she..."\n

\n\n

\n Hearing Yao Yunda speak his wife's name, Yin Sen cursed again, and the two fell to quarreling, dredging up every ugly thing about the other. Ming Buxiang shook his head. "Listening to you both, neither is a good man, and I can't see which is worse." With that he ignored the pair, lay down in his clothes, and slept.\n

\n\n

\n By daybreak Ming Buxiang rose. Yao Yunda and Yin Sen each huddled in a corner, glaring. Too wary of each other to sleep, they had held this stalemate the whole night through.\n

\n\n

\n This was the first night Ming Buxiang had spent outside Shaolin, and he had his morning devotions to do as usual. Seeing no Buddha-image in Yao Yunda's house, he bowed once to the west, chanted the sutras and kept his devotions, then pushed open the cupboard. The storm had eased outside; he scooped up some snow, took a pot, melted the snow to water, and washed himself a little.\n

\n\n

\n That done, he put on his snow-coat and said to the two, "I'll go see how the road is." He pointed at the food and firewood. "This is mine. Touch any of it and I'll take it back." Then he rose and leaped out the window.\n

\n\n

\n Yin Sen and Yao Yunda dared not sleep, still glaring at each other. Yin Sen recalled last night's talk and asked, "How did she die?"\n

\n\n

\n "A hard birth," Yao Yunda said. "We lost mother and child both."\n

\n\n

\n "You killed her!" Yin Sen said bitterly.\n

\n\n

\n Yao Yunda spat. "Say it again and I'll fight you to the death!"\n

\n\n

\n "You're courting death!" Yin Sen said.\n

\n\n

\n The two snatched up their weapons and fell to fighting again — but worn out after a full day, neither having shut his eyes, where was the strength to be had? A few rounds in, they were only spending themselves to no purpose, and each withdrew to his own ground, panting.\n

\n\n

\n After a long wait, Ming Buxiang finally leaped back in. "Do people come by here often?" he asked.\n

\n\n

\n Yao Yunda shook his head. "Sometimes ten days or half a month pass with no one at all."\n

\n\n

\n "Why live somewhere so out of the way?" Ming Buxiang asked.\n

\n\n

\n Yao Yunda glanced at Yin Sen and said coldly, "To hide from an enemy."\n

\n\n

\n "The road's blocked solid," Ming Buxiang said. "If no one passes, it may be days before anyone can leave. Did you never think you might be trapped here?"\n

\n\n

\n "These provisions and firewood are enough for half a month," Yao Yunda said.\n

\n\n

\n "That's for one man," Ming Buxiang said. "There are three of us."\n

\n\n

\n He sat on the floor as if pondering some hard problem, looked at the two of them, and asked, "Will you two still not settle who lives and who dies?"\n

\n\n

\n His meaning was plain enough: if one were dead, the firewood and provisions left over could be shared. Yao Yunda and Yin Sen looked at each other, both feeling that a deciding fight now was anything but certain.\n

\n\n

\n "You've worn yourselves out all night — you must badly want sleep," Ming Buxiang said. "Here's how it'll be. Three flatbreads, two pieces of firewood, and I'll guard your sleep."\n

\n\n

\n "Why not just kill us?" Yao Yunda raged. "Then it's all yours!"\n

\n\n

\n "My master says one must not lightly break the precept against killing. You've taken no harm to my life — why should I kill you?" Ming Buxiang said. "Guarding your sleep is a good deed; it's nothing like killing."\n

\n\n

\n "I'll give it! I'll give it!" Yin Sen said hastily, sharing out his food and firewood to Ming Buxiang.\n

\n\n

\n 'Once he's slept his fill, his strength will be full,' Yao Yunda thought. 'How could I ever beat him then?' He had no choice but to share out his food and firewood as well.\n

\n\n

\n The two lay down in their clothes. Uneasy at first, after a while they could not fight off the heavy pull of sleep and dropped into deep slumber.\n

\n\n

\n They slept clear into the afternoon. Yin Sen woke first, rolled up, and sat. Seeing Yao Yunda still deep asleep, an evil thought rose in him, and he reached for his sword.\n

\n\n

\n "You can't harm him." Ming Buxiang, who had read his intent, spoke up. "I promised you'd both have a sleep in peace."\n

\n\n

\n "You heard our story last night," Yin Sen said. "Surely you can tell right from wrong. I treated him as a brother, and he stole my wife — isn't he the one in the wrong?"\n

\n\n

\n "Why did you beat your wife?" Ming Buxiang asked. "Twelve years and you never remarried; you go on and on about your stolen wife, yet you've no blame for her. If you truly loved her, why did you beat her?"\n

\n\n

\n "She was clumsy, she'd anger me, and my temper was foul..."\n

\n\n

\n "Yao Yunda entered the school after you, yet earned his Hero's Warrant two years before you, and was the more valued in the Xiangyang Gang," Ming Buxiang said. "You envied him."\n

\n\n

\n Yin Sen started, and was about to argue when Ming Buxiang shook his head. "You saw a junior brother who entered after you learn faster, earn his Warrant sooner, while you yourself couldn't master the skills — so you took it out on your wife. After, you regretted it, and turned your anger on others rather than look at yourself, wanting only to lay the blame on him..."\n

\n\n

\n "Damn your mother!" Yao Yunda suddenly opened his eyes and sat up. He had woken at some unknown moment and feigned sleep, so that if Yin Sen tried to harm him he could turn the ambush back. Now, hearing Ming Buxiang lay out the old story, he could not hold back his fury and rose. "If I hadn't taken Huigu away, you'd have bullied her to death sooner or later!" He turned to Ming Buxiang. "Tell me — doesn't he deserve to die?"\n

\n\n

\n His secret laid bare by Ming Buxiang, Yin Sen was furious and mortified both, and at Yao Yunda's words found, for the moment, no way to answer.\n

\n\n

\n "Did you ever counsel him?" Ming Buxiang asked Yao Yunda.\n

\n\n

\n The question left Yao Yunda at a loss, and even Yin Sen looked puzzled.\n

\n\n

\n "You said you'd cared for his wife a long time," Ming Buxiang said. "His wife ran off with you, so plainly you two saw each other often, and you surely knew he often beat her. Did you ever offer one word of counsel?\n

\n\n

\n "Or did you hope he'd beat her all the harder, so you could slip in through the gap?"\n

\n\n

\n The words were like a battering ram, toppling a corner of the wall without warning. Caught unguarded, Yao Yunda gaped, dumbstruck, and could only stammer, "I... I didn't..."\n

\n\n

\n "Yao Yunda!" Yin Sen barked.\n

\n\n

\n Yao Yunda took his sword in hand and said loudly, "What if I did have such a thought? In the end it was you who were in the wrong first!" The memory of his wife's wretched death kindled his hatred again.\n

\n\n

\n "Which of you do you think Huigu would have wanted dead?" Ming Buxiang asked suddenly.\n

\n\n

\n Both men pointed at the other at once and said loudly, "Him, of course!"\n

\n\n

\n Roused now, glaring, each certain the other had killed his wife, they snatched up their weapons and rushed at each other. In his fury Yin Sen forgot his leg wound; the pain flared and he could not help a cry, sinking to one knee. Seeing his chance, Yao Yunda raised his sword to thrust. Faltering at the brink, Yin Sen thought himself surely dead; his heart wrung, he thrust his saber out with all his might, bent on taking the other with him.\n

\n\n

\n Somehow Yao Yunda did not seize this fine chance — the sword rose but never thrust, and Yin Sen's saber too struck empty air. Seeing how fierce the saber-stroke was, Yao Yunda broke into a cold sweat: had he pressed in just now, they would surely have died together. He hastily knocked the blade aside and fell back.\n

\n\n

\n All three in the cabin went still. Only the storm peered in through the cracks of door and window, stealing a look. The fire still burned, popping and crackling now and then.\n

\n\n

\n Yao Yunda withdrew to his place and sat, as if all the fight had gone out of him, and Yin Sen shrank back to his corner. Seeing they had no wish to fight on, Ming Buxiang asked, "Done fighting?"\n

\n\n

\n Neither spoke, each sunk in his own thoughts, and so it went until dusk darkened the sky. His evening devotions finished, Ming Buxiang lay down in his clothes and said, "Tell me when you want to sleep."\n

\n\n

\n There was another layer to his words. With each man now too wary of the other for either to dare sleep alone, they would surely have to trade food and firewood for his protection. At this rate, the provisions and firewood meant for half a month would not stretch to five days, and each sleep would cost more — in two or three days both would be stripped of food and fuel alike.\n

\n\n

\n 'This little bandit!' Yin Sen cursed inwardly. He looked at Yao Yunda, who had plainly grasped the problem too, and for the moment could do nothing but surrender his firewood and food, lie down, and pass a sleepless night.\n

\n\n

\n Another day, and Ming Buxiang went out to scout the road as usual, leaving the two behind. Watching Yin Sen knead his arm without cease, Yao Yunda sneered, "Your arm's broken, the wound on your thigh's gone bad — that hurts, doesn't it?"\n

\n\n

\n Yin Sen jeered back, "If that sword-cut on your wrist isn't seen to, even healed you'll be a cripple."\n

\n\n

\n "You're lame in one leg — the rest of your life's ruined too," Yao Yunda taunted. "You were always slow anyway, and there you were, fool that you are, trying to learn Wudang's Soft Cloud Swordplay."\n

\n\n

\n "I'll learn it yet!" Yin Sen raged. "I won't believe I can't master it!"\n

\n\n

\n Yao Yunda laughed aloud. "'Diligence makes up for dullness' — that line ruined your whole life. Fool, you've no gift for it; you simply can't learn it!"\n

\n\n

\n The curse struck a nerve. Yin Sen meant to flare up, but the words died and his anger drained away. He sighed. "That's the truth — my whole life ruined by these words, 'diligence makes up for dullness.' If I'd seen my own nature sooner, would I have ever taken the temper of my failing out on her, and driven her to run off with you?"\n

\n\n

\n Seeing him sigh so suddenly, Yao Yunda was reminded of the past too, and after a silence he sighed. "I always loved her. If you'd treated her well, I'd have had nothing to say — better one person suffer than three."\n

\n\n

\n Yin Sen sneered. "When you ran off with her, did you ever once think of me? And then a child! When you lay with her, was your conscience easy?"\n

\n\n

\n Yao Yunda sighed. "I carry that guilt. She was frail, and died in a hard birth — and when even the child couldn't be saved, I actually thought... I thought... this was my retribution..."\n

\n\n

\n Once close friends and now enemies, the two could not help a flood of feeling.\n

\n\n

\n "Yesterday, when I fell," Yin Sen said, "why didn't you finish me?"\n

\n\n

\n Yao Yunda shook his head. "That boy asked who Huigu would most want dead. I thought — if she knows anything down below, perhaps she hates me more than you..."\n

\n\n

\n Yin Sen sighed. "Enough. After all this, what's left to say? We've under two days' food left now. Without food we could last a few more days — but without firewood, we won't make it through a single night."\n

\n\n

\n "Why not decide it now," Yao Yunda said, "and settle this grudge for good."\n

\n\n

\n Yin Sen nodded. "All right!"\n

\n\n

\n The two set to at once — but all killing intent was gone now. A few moves in, it was mostly self-defense, and what killing strokes there were landed soft and harmless.\n

\n\n

\n Yao Yunda pulled back his blade and withdrew. "Enough, enough — wasted effort. Where's your killing edge gone?"\n

\n\n

\n "All I want now is to live," Yin Sen answered, "and to hope I never see you again in this life." After a moment he added, "I only fear we'll both die."\n

\n\n

\n "If we share the firewood, we can hold out a few more days," Yao Yunda said. "Let's talk to that boy — see if he'll give us back some food."\n

\n\n

\n Yin Sen hesitated. "That boy's strange. I'm afraid he means to keep all the food and firewood for himself."\n

\n\n

\n Yao Yunda had no faith in Ming Buxiang either and was about to speak when the door swung open, and a gust of wind and snow drove into their faces, forcing their eyes shut. Ming Buxiang was back.\n

\n\n

\n Seeing no enmity in their faces now, Ming Buxiang asked, "Done fighting?"\n

\n\n

\n "For now," Yao Yunda said. "Master Ming, let's strike a bargain. Three fires is too wasteful. Why not share one, save firewood, and give ourselves a chance to live?"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang poured out lamp oil and went on lighting his own fire. "This is my firewood. If you two want to share, share your own."\n

\n\n

\n "It's the same fire — costs you not a whit more," Yao Yunda raged. "Why be so petty? This is my house!"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang lifted his eyes to Yao Yunda, and under that look Yao Yunda felt thoroughly ill at ease. Mustering his nerve, he said, "Am I wrong?"\n

\n\n

\n "It can't be done," Ming Buxiang said, shaking his head. "The road's blocked, this place sees few souls, and even if the firewood holds, the food won't be enough. I eat no meat, and I kill no one. At most, only one of you can live."\n

\n\n

\n "What do you mean?" Yin Sen caught something strange in his words; a thought rose dimly, and all at once he went cold to the bone. "You... you mean... you mean..."\n

\n\n

\n "From the start there was never any way for all three to live," Ming Buxiang said. "I don't kill, and I don't eat meat. You can."\n

\n\n

\n Yin Sen and Yao Yunda both cried out together. "You want us to kill each other," Yao Yunda said, "and then eat the flesh?!"\n

\n\n

\n "To eat his flesh and sleep on his hide," Ming Buxiang said. "Isn't that what you each meant to do to the other to begin with?"\n

\n\n

\n The two drew a cold breath. They knew now that Ming Buxiang meant every word.\n

\n\n

\n The cabin fell silent again, and a new round of contest began. Wresting food from Ming Buxiang's hands was impossible; but to kill the other man and eat his flesh to outlast the winter — that...\n

\n\n

\n 'If I don't harm him, will he harm me?' Yin Sen thought. The two had laid everything bare that day, yet now they wavered again. More than ten years of piled-up hatred — was it really to be wiped away just so?\n

\n\n

\n As night fell, Ming Buxiang said it once more. "Three flatbreads, two pieces of firewood, and I'll guard your sleep." Yin Sen and Yao Yunda exchanged a look, hesitated a long while, and in the end handed them over.\n

\n\n

\n Yin Sen slept very poorly. Why had Yao Yunda surrendered his flatbread and firewood, if not because he didn't trust him? And seeing that he too had handed his over, hadn't he shown the same distrust? With not even trust between them, what talk could there be of mending the feud?\n

\n\n

\n After midnight he heard a faint sound. Squinting, he saw Ming Buxiang already asleep against the wall.\n

\n\n

\n 'That boy truly can't be trusted,' Yin Sen thought, then was struck by an idea. 'Isn't this the perfect moment to strike?'\n

\n\n

\n His heart pounded. The man he had been bent on killing only that morning — for some reason, now that the moment came, he wavered and could not steady himself. How had twelve years of hatred dissolved away in a single afternoon?\n

\n\n

\n He hesitated a long while and in the end could not bring himself to it. After a moment a shadow flickered past the firelight: Yao Yunda had risen, saber in hand, and was creeping closer, step by careful step.\n

\n\n

\n 'That dog of a thief — surely he doesn't mean to kill me?' Fury rose in Yin Sen, and he felt his earlier softness had been the height of folly. This was the man who had stolen his wife — he had laid his whole sincere heart bare to a wolf-hearted, dog-lunged beast!\n

\n\n

\n But it was not as he thought. Yao Yunda, treading with care, was moving toward Ming Buxiang. Yin Sen's heart lurched. Could it be that Yao Yunda meant to kill Ming Buxiang? Young as the boy was, his skill was terribly high — how could he... how could he have lost his mind so?\n

\n\n

\n Sure enough, Yao Yunda reached the spot before Ming Buxiang, hesitated, then gritted his teeth and raised the steel saber. Ming Buxiang's eyes snapped open; he rolled, slipping the killing stroke by a hair's breadth, then sprang up with a carp's leap and kicked out with both feet, sending Yao Yunda flying.\n

\n\n

\n At the commotion Yin Sen could feign sleep no longer and scrambled up. Yao Yunda swung his saber at Ming Buxiang, fierce as a mad tiger, blow upon blow, while Ming Buxiang dodged left and right, light as a drifting ghost. No — in that faint midnight light, he was a ghost: seen but untouchable, weightless as nothing, exactly like the phantom shapes Yin Sen had thought his own eyes had conjured. Yin Sen was aghast. The boy's skill was many times higher than he had imagined.\n

\n\n

\n Now, if he rushed in to work with Ming Buxiang, a few casual strokes would finish Yao Yunda — or he need not even lift a hand, but let Ming Buxiang do it. But the boy was vicious of heart, bent on forcing them to eat human flesh; his talk of not killing was surely only toying with them. And besides, even if he went to help, he could never finish the boy off. How could Yao Yunda be such a fool as to court his own death?\n

\n\n

\n Across the room Yao Yunda hacked and slashed wildly until he was spent, never once touching even the hem of his opponent's robe. Suddenly Ming Buxiang kicked, driving hard into Yao Yunda's chest, then shot out his left hand to clamp the man's pulse-gate and drove his right fist into his belly. With ribs already broken, Yao Yunda nearly fainted from the pain; a fist to the lower belly on top of it sent a spasm through him, and he doubled over despite himself.\n

\n\n

\n A wave of dizziness took Yin Sen. Watching his enemy about to die, he gave a sudden cry and lunged from behind, thrusting his sword at Ming Buxiang. Ming Buxiang turned aside, chopped his hand-edge down on Yin Sen's wrist, and the sword fell. Hot blood surged in Yin Sen; he flung his arms around Ming Buxiang and roared, "Kill him, quick!" He spent every ounce of his strength, and for the moment even Ming Buxiang could not break free.\n

\n\n

\n Yao Yunda struggled to his feet, but seeing the two so tangled he had no opening, and called out, "Get clear!" Yin Sen shouted, "Never mind me! Better one die than two!" He understood that Yao Yunda had risked killing Ming Buxiang precisely because he did not want to kill him. Seeing Yin Sen throw away his life to help, Yao Yunda's heart could not bear it, and somehow the saber would not fall. These two enemies, at each other's throats only the day before, now stirred with the warmth of old friendship.\n

\n\n

\n In the midst of his hesitation, Ming Buxiang abruptly stopped struggling. As Yin Sen marveled at it, he felt Ming Buxiang's body twist, slipping from his arms like a loach — and only then did he understand that Ming Buxiang could have broken free without the least effort, and that had Yao Yunda truly brought the saber down, he would only have killed Yin Sen.\n

\n\n

\n Yao Yunda too gaped, astonished.\n

\n\n

\n "Do you two truly no longer wish to kill each other?" Ming Buxiang asked.\n

\n\n

\n Neither knew how to answer, and both froze.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang looked at Yin Sen, and Yin Sen said, "No more killing."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang nodded. "The road down the mountain isn't damaged. Once the storm passes, you can leave."\n

\n\n

\n "What do you mean?" Yao Yunda asked.\n

\n\n

\n "Nothing," Ming Buxiang said. "It's good, the way you are now." With that he pushed the cabin door open. Wind and snow whirled in, forcing Yao Yunda and Yin Sen to shut their eyes.\n

\n\n

\n "I'm going back to the temple." In the rush of wind they faintly caught these words from Ming Buxiang; then the door swung shut, and that strangely beautiful youth vanished into the storm.\n

\n\n

\n Yao Yunda and Yin Sen let out a long breath together. They had thought they would surely die that day; now, snatched back into life, and thinking on all the unspeakable folly of the past, shame and remorse and more came flooding over them at once. As if waking from another lifetime, they could not help exchanging a smile.\n

\n\n

\n Both were of one mind now: where on earth had that mysterious youth come from? Could he truly be a bodhisattva come down to earth to set them right?\n

\n\n

\n ......\n

\n\n

\n When Ming Buxiang had been missing for several days, the brothers of the Right View Hall all knew, but the storm was too fierce for anyone to go out searching. Only Juejian was deeply anxious, ordering every hall-monk of the Right Action Hall to look for him.\n

\n\n

\n When Ming Buxiang returned, he only said he had lost his way in the snowy night, taken shelter for a few days, and come back once the storm eased.\n

\n\n

\n A few days later Yao Yunda came to visit Shaolin, asked to see a hall-monk of the Right View Hall, and reported Ming Buxiang's "righteous deed."\n

\n\n

\n "Had he not risked himself for our sake," Yao Yunda said tearfully, "my brother and I would have killed each other long ago. He's truly a living bodhisattva reborn. In that cabin he pressed us, my brother and me, and only then did we have the chance to wash away the old grudge and return to the right path."\n

\n\n

\n The hall-monk reported it upward, and Abbot Jueming found it remarkable indeed.\n

\n\n

\n This Abbot Jueming had a nickname, "Not a Leaf Clings," taken from the line, 'Pass through a thousand flowers, and not a leaf clings to you.' This did not mean he rose unstained from the mud, a man of some rare and transcendent character; rather, it was that nothing ever concerned him, that he held himself above it all, that he could take any matter lightly and dismiss it with a few lines of scripture. However busy or tangled an affair, he could always pass through a thousand flowers with not a leaf clinging to him.\n

\n\n

\n But this matter was so strange that even his curiosity was pricked, and he summoned Ming Buxiang to question him closely. "Your disciple only thought that true feeling shows in hardship," Ming Buxiang said. "Press them hard enough, and they'd think of things they'd never reach in the heat of anger."\n

\n\n

\n Jueming nodded again and again and sighed. "To have a disciple like you, Liaoxin's life was not lived in vain."\n

\n\n

\n "Abbot," Ming Buxiang replied, "my master is not yet dead."\n

\n\n

\n Jueming laughed aloud, then asked, "Your martial skill is so fine — you could handle the two of them?"\n

\n\n

\n "My master taught me a little," Ming Buxiang said. "They were wounded at the time, no match for your disciple."\n

\n\n

\n Jueming nodded. "Fifteen, and brought into the school by Liaoxin alone, yet already with such ability — your future is beyond measure. Here is what we'll do: from now on I'll have someone instruct you in martial arts. Since you haven't taken the tonsure, I'll make you a householder resident, and you can help me with documents and records hereafter. How does that sound?"\n

\n\n

\n A householder resident was the post for placing untonsured disciples in the temple. It carried no rank and was not bound by the temple's rules; such men were mostly advisers, or able assistants to the chief abbot. For Ming Buxiang to win such an honor at fifteen, he was the first ever. Of course, Jueming's deeper purpose was that, since Ming Buxiang would not take another master, only by keeping him close could he be cultivated; and besides, a boy this clever and this capable might see a matter differently from the other residents, and to hear all sides made for clear judgment — a help to Jueming in handling the affairs of the hall.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang cupped his hands. "Sweeping in the mornings is your disciple's duty, and a practice besides. I dare not let it fall to waste — I'll come to the inner hall to work in the afternoons."\n

\n\n

\n Jueming nodded. "Brother Juejian praised you, and I always thought he overpraised. I never imagined you'd truly be so clever and so modest. You want to keep sweeping — then as you like."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang thanked Jueming and left the Right View Hall.\n

\n\n

\n Back in his quarters, he finished the weapon design he had pondered so hard over those days at the Chan Wind Teahouse.\n

\n\n

\n It was a weapon of his own devising, a strange-shaped thing with no second like it under heaven.\n

","published_time":"2026-06-15T00:00:00.000Z","paid":true,"show_flag":true,"show_scheduled_time":"2026-06-15T00:00:00.000Z","unpaid_scheduled_time":"2026-07-18T00:00:00.000Z"},{"content_id":4956,"novel_id":74,"chapter_no":8,"chapter_title":"True Sutra, False Sutra","content":"

\n Kunlun Year 83, the second month.\n

\n\n

\n Thirteen prayer mats had been laid out in the center of the council hall of the Abbot's Court, and on each sat a monk.\n

\n\n

\n The one in the middle wore a red kasaya. His frame was lean as old pine, his bearing graceful as a crane; white brows drooped low over half-closed, compassionate eyes. This was Juesheng, abbot of Shaolin Temple.\n

\n\n

\n To his left and right sat six monks each, robed in yellow. On the left, in order, were Jueyun, head of the Manjushri Court; Jueguan, head of the Avalokitesvara Court; Jueming, abbot of the Right View Hall; Jueguang, abbot of the Right Concentration Hall; Jueru, abbot of the Right Speech Hall; and Juewen, abbot of the Right Mindfulness Hall.\n

\n\n

\n The first man on the right was tall and broad, chest out and spine straight, his face all hard angles, his gaze sharp and commanding—like a drawn sword resting at the brow that left a man uneasy whether sitting or lying down, even when it made no threat, forever on guard, knowing that the slightest offense would leave him bloodied. This was the foremost Lay Monk of the age: Juekong, head of the Samantabhadra Court.\n

\n\n

\n The second man on the right had a round face and a broad, heavy build, his fat features glistening; he was also the eldest present. This was Zide, head of the Ksitigarbha Court, and one of the few monks of the "Zi" generation still left at Shaolin Temple. The next three were Juejian, abbot of the Right Action Hall; Jueji, abbot of the Right Livelihood Hall; and Jueci, abbot of the Right Effort Hall. The last, somewhere past forty and the youngest of them all, bore the dharma name Liaozheng. He was abbot of the Right Thought Hall, and the only monk of the "Liao" generation in the room.\n

\n\n

\n For a time the thirteen sat in silence, each lost in his own thoughts. At length Abbot Juesheng spoke. "What are everyone's thoughts?"\n

\n\n

\n "In my view, renaming the Lay Monks must not be done." Even as he spoke, Juekong sat with his spine straight as a rule, hands resting on his knees, his dignity perfectly measured. From his bearing alone, one might have taken him for the master of the whole sect.\n

\n\n

\n He went on. "It breeds the mind of discrimination."\n

\n\n

\n "Head Juekong overstates the matter." The speaker was Jueguan, head of the Avalokitesvara Court. The Avalokitesvara Court governed the temple's internal and external affairs, divided between the Right Speech Hall, which handled matters within, and the Right Mindfulness Hall, which handled those without. Of all the men in the four courts and eight halls, Jueguan was perhaps the one who loathed the Lay Monks most, forever finding pretexts to thwart them. His methods were cunning and ruthless, a single stroke that drew blood, and yet his victims could do nothing against him. The Lay Monks both hated and feared him, and had given him the nickname "Knife in the Nest." This whole council of the four courts had been jointly raised by Jueguan and Jueru, abbot of the Right Speech Hall, with one aim: to force the Lay Monks to change their names.\n

\n\n

\n Now this Knife in the Nest continued. "Separating Proper from lay by name is only for ease of governance. Shaolin Temple was founded as a place of quiet cultivation, but in these years its affairs have grown tangled and burdensome, a great distraction from practice, and it has fallen wholly to the Lay Monks to manage them. Their merit cannot be erased. Take the Samantabhadra Court—everything in it runs in perfect order, thanks entirely to the labor and care of Head Juekong."\n

\n\n

\n Juekong said flatly, "Head Jueguan may spare us these empty words."\n

\n\n

\n "Three months ago," Jueguan said, "Liaozhen went to Zhejiang on temple business, spent the night in a brothel, gambled away his every last coin, and was seized by the Beggars' Sect, who sent men to escort him home to fetch the money. Two months ago, Bengang brawled and made trouble in Shaanxi, and the Huashan Sect cut off his nose and sent him back. In both cases the Samantabhadra Court handed down light judgments—and dig to the root of it, both men were Lay Monks. Bengang is young and hot-blooded, given to brute displays of temper; Liaozhen is fond of women and gambling. None of this is so grave in itself. They give heart and strength to the temple's affairs, and have no mind for the Buddha—so why hold them to such harsh standards? Let those who break the rules be punished by the code, and that is enough. But out beyond the temple gates, will anyone ask whether you, Liaozhen, are a Proper Monk or a Lay Monk—or you, Bengang?"\n

\n\n

\n "It is not only the Lay Monks who flout the precepts," Juekong said. "Liaoxin has yet to return. Has anyone asked whether he is Proper or lay?"\n

\n\n

\n "The precepts are kept by the Proper Monks," Jueguan said. "The disciplines are kept by the Proper Monks. The Lay Monks need only avoid breaking the rules. The morning and evening recitations—who has ever held the Lay Monks to them? Outside Shaolin, what temple of true faith makes a distinction between Proper and lay? And yet among Shaolin's own monks, those who break the precepts are many."\n

\n\n

\n "The strife within the temple springs from this very division of Proper and lay," Juekong said. "Rather than think how to dissolve it, Head Jueguan would carve the difference still deeper into our names. Would that not only inflame the quarrel further?"\n

\n\n

\n "Twenty years ago," Jueguan said, "when Old Beggar Peng sheathed his saber and retired, I went to Jiangxi to offer my congratulations. While we reminisced, do you know what he said to me?" He looked at Juekong. "He said that these days, when the Qunfang House opens its doors and finds a monk standing there, the girls can't tell whether he's come to whore or to beg alms. Shaolin Temple stands among the Nine Great Houses of the martial world—but before the Buddha, we are merely disciples. In these past ten years, of every ten monks within the temple who have broken the precepts, nine were Lay Monks. Shaolin Temple is a stronghold of the Buddhist faith. How can we let our disciples defile the Three Jewels?"\n

\n\n

\n "There are countless monks under heaven," Juekong said. "Who can say they all come from Shaolin?" Even with the Knife in the Nest's sneering jabs, the leader of the Lay Monks kept his commanding air, his tone steady and composed. "Hengshan, the Tang Clan—do the houses under the Nine Great Houses not have monastic orders of their own?"\n

\n\n

\n "The monks elsewhere are far more dignified than ours at Shaolin," Jueguan said. "And the proposal I bring is no complicated thing. I ask only that the present Lay Monks and their disciples set the character 'sui'—'following'—before their dharma names, to mark that they follow the lay order. Take the abbot of my own court's Right Mindfulness Hall, whose dharma name is Juewen: he would become Sui Juewen. From now on the Lay Monks' disciples would no longer follow the generational sequence of 'Liao, Ben, Yuan, Ke, Wu,' but a new sequence of eight characters—'Sensation, Perception, Formation, Consciousness; a single thought, like a dream.' An outsider would hear it and know at once they were Lay Monks, and not call them to account for the precepts."\n

\n\n

\n "Why is it the Lay Monks who must change their names?" The speaker was a broad-shouldered, heavyset monk of middle years. Though shorter than Juekong, he was still a large man, and the solid muscle beneath his robes was plain to see. By contrast his head, small though properly set, looked almost comical perched atop such a body. This was Jueji, abbot of the Right Livelihood Hall, himself a Lay Monk and Juekong's right hand, bold and fierce by nature. That nature, paired with the small head that ill-suited his powerful frame, had earned him the nickname "Brocade-Maned Lion."\n

\n\n

\n "For fifty years Proper and lay have been mingled together, sharing the same generational sequence with never a problem—and now a single decree from the Avalokitesvara Court is to make every monk change his name? That is high-handed, to say the least." The Brocade-Maned Lion Jueji's voice rang out, loud and full of displeasure.\n

\n\n

\n The one who wore an unbroken smile was Jueru, abbot of the Right Speech Hall. He governed the temple's many rules and regulations, and was forever grinning and chuckling; within the temple they called him "Laughing Amitabha." He was mild with everyone, a deft hand at smoothing things over; when a subordinate erred, he corrected them with a smile and seldom raised his voice in anger.\n

\n\n

\n Now Laughing Amitabha Jueru spoke. "There is no harm in having the Proper Monks change their names as well—we need only set the character 'Shi' before each Proper Monk's dharma name. As for the names, they serve only to tell one from another. Proper and lay alike are disciples of the temple, and there will be no difference in their treatment or standing hereafter."\n

\n\n

\n "No difference—and yet a distinction." The speaker was Juewen, abbot of the Right Mindfulness Hall, under the Avalokitesvara Court, the Lay Monk most devoted of all to the dharma. "Even a single red thread embroidered onto a robe is a distinction. And is the mind of discrimination not itself an obstacle to practice?" Unlike the sharp clash of the two court heads, and unlike Jueguan's relentless pressing, he spoke these words with great calm—even, it seemed, with a touch of worry.\n

\n\n

\n Juewen had given his heart to the Buddha in his youth, but by an unlucky turn had taken a Lay Monk for his master, and so had been counted ever after among the lay order. Most men caught in so awkward a place would have been torn between both sides; but his nature was gentle, his work tireless and uncomplaining, careful and exact, and he had talent besides—he could read a man's face and unravel the affairs of the day. So he had risen step by step until he became Juekong's right hand, and at last abbot of the Right Mindfulness Hall, charged with the temple's dealings with the Nine Great Houses.\n

\n\n

\n Both the Right Speech Hall and the Right Mindfulness Hall fell under the Avalokitesvara Court, and that Juewen and Jueru had never gotten along was common knowledge.\n

\n\n

\n All at once a faint snore rose, strangely distinct in the great hall. Juesheng's gaze went to Zide, head of the Ksitigarbha Court. Zide was a heavy man, well over two hundred catties. The Ksitigarbha Court handled provisions of every kind—purchasing, building, budgets, expenditures—the equivalent of another house's accounting, treasury, and general affairs all in one. Over forty years Zide had saved the temple no small sum through diligence and shrewd reckoning, and so had earned his place in the Ksitigarbha Court. Only past the age of sixty had he become its head, and that owed entirely to Juekong's strenuous recommendation.\n

\n\n

\n Before taking the tonsure he had been the richest man in Henan; it was said he had taken five concubines and sired a swarm of children, the newest concubine wed only a few years back—and this too was common knowledge. If anyone could stand as the very emblem of just how worldly a Lay Monk could be, it was Zide; go a step beyond him and one would be treading the edge of breaking the precepts outright.\n

\n\n

\n Seeing Zide asleep, the others frowned. Then Head Jueguan, seated directly across from him, suddenly called out at the top of his voice, "Run, Uncle Zide! Head Juekong is coming!"\n

\n\n

\n Zide jolted awake and sprang to his feet, crying, "Where? Where is Head Juekong?"\n

\n\n

\n "Right here," Juekong said coldly. Only then did Zide realize he had been played by Jueguan, and he sat back down, his round old face flushed with vexation. Though a generation senior to Jueguan, he carried no authority and dared not scold him; and even as he seethed at this Knife in the Nest, he heard Abbot Juesheng ask, "And what do you make of this matter of renaming the Lay Monks?"\n

\n\n

\n Zide, with no idea what was being discussed, hastily said, "Nephew Juekong has the right of it, Nephew Juekong has the right of it. I see it much as he does."\n

\n\n

\n Juejian asked, "Is Head Juekong for it or against it? Does Uncle Zide even know?"\n

\n\n

\n Zide blinked, then said quickly, "I know, I know."\n

\n\n

\n He claimed to know—but by the look of him, he had likely fallen asleep not long after the council began.\n

\n\n

\n Jueci, abbot of the Right Effort Hall, which fell under the Ksitigarbha Court—nicknamed the "Iron Rooster" for his stinginess—hurried to cover for Zide. "I am of one mind with Uncle Zide. We both hold that renaming would be unwise."\n

\n\n

\n So now the head of the Lay Monks, Juekong; the Brocade-Maned Lion Jueji; Zide with his swarm of children; the devout Juewen; and the Iron Rooster Jueci—five Lay Monks in all—had voiced their opposition. As for the seven Proper Monks, none had spoken save the head of the Avalokitesvara Court, Jueguan, and his able lieutenant, Laughing Amitabha Jueru.\n

\n\n

\n Abbot Juesheng turned his head. "And what does Head Jueyun think?"\n

\n\n

\n Jueyun was head of the Manjushri Court, second in standing only to the abbot himself, and so the abbot had asked him first. Shaolin was a sect built upon the dharma, and within its lands the great majority held to the Buddhist faith. The Manjushri Court kept the temple's collected scriptures, taught its martial arts and dharma, and arranged all the important rites throughout Shaolin's domain; the monks who entered its halls were all Proper Monks, chosen first for their depth of study in martial arts and dharma. Jueyun had no gift for worldly affairs, but his cultivation of the dharma was profound. His feeling toward the Lay Monks was not as fiercely hostile as Jueguan's, yet he too found it strange and unnatural for a monk not to revere the Three Jewels.\n

\n\n

\n Jueyun said, "Proper and lay are different. The disciplines of those who cultivate the Way need not, in my humble view, be applied to the Lay Monks. Let each honor his own dharma and cultivate in his own way."\n

\n\n

\n Juekong said coldly, "If that is so, then let the whole line of Lay Monks return to lay life. Lay disciples can serve Shaolin just as well."\n

\n\n

\n Jueguang, abbot of the Right Concentration Hall under the Manjushri Court, said, "And if a lay disciple takes the tonsure—what then?"\n

\n\n

\n "Better to ask," Juekong said, "if a monk is a monk, why divide Proper from lay at all? Cultivation is a thing of one's own heart, nature, and karmic conditions—and yet you would have it that only Proper Monks may cultivate."\n

\n\n

\n This Abbot Jueguang was nicknamed the "Tongue-Plucking Bodhisattva"—a cultivator he might be, but his words were the most acid and cutting of any. Now he said, "If a man's heart is truly set on the Buddha, Shaolin Temple gladly takes in all who have the karmic bond. But how many among the Lay Monks came for the Buddha's sake? Surely Head Juekong knows the answer in his own heart."\n

\n\n

\n "Then why not drive out the Lay Monks altogether?" Juekong said. "The lesson of the Shaolin–Songshan conflict is not so distant. Would Abbot Jueguang have us repeat that disaster?"\n

\n\n

\n This vexed question of Proper and lay had its roots in Shaolin's own rules. After the Kunlun Council, Shaolin Temple had rested and recovered, and as it grew in scale, its internal affairs grew steadily more tangled. By temple law, only ordained monks could hold posts in the halls; yet monks, having renounced the world and given their hearts to the Buddha, had neither the strength nor the skill for the struggles of the martial world or the care of the common people. In those days the various houses under Shaolin's authority were riven by strife that Shaolin could not check, and along its borders it quarreled ceaselessly with Huashan over the "Lone Grave Land." Yet Shaolin, foremost of all the great houses, swallowed its anger before Huashan again and again—until the Shaolin–Songshan conflict.\n

\n\n

\n Songshan had once been a great sect in its own right, and after decades of deepening its foundations, its power stood no lower than Huashan's, one of the Nine Great Houses. Naturally it chafed at bowing to Shaolin. At first, Songshan's renaming of itself the Songyang Sect was merely the fuse; from it grew the Shaolin–Songshan conflict.\n

\n\n

\n No one had foreseen that this single conflict would very nearly drive Shaolin to ruin. The monks' poor head for scheming and their meek, conflict-shunning ways brought the war again and again to the brink of disaster. When Songshan at last laid siege to Shaolin Temple, that thousand-year-old monastery stood on the verge of perishing in the battle.\n

\n\n

\n At that hour of peril, the rescue of Shaolin came from five lay disciples led by Zhang Qiuchi. But hobbled by the rule that none but ordained monks could hold a post in the halls, these five had to take the tonsure to enter. Zhang Qiuchi, nicknamed "Iron Brush Painting the Tide," was master of both pen and sword; he laid Shaolin's plans and strategies, and since Shaolin's foundations ran deeper than Songshan's to begin with, before long the tide of the war had turned. Songshan removed its entire sect to Shandong, spoke no more of changing its name, and its dealings with Shaolin grew steadily more delicate thereafter.\n

\n\n

\n These five monks were the beginning of the Lay Monks. From then on, what Shaolin asked of its monks was no longer founded solely on religious faith, as in the past, but added to it the demands of practical need—and that was the Lay Monk. Zide was skilled in commerce, and so became head of the Ksitigarbha Court; Juewen was deft with people and could read the shifting currents of the martial world, a smooth and able hand—just the man to govern the Right Mindfulness Hall.\n

\n\n

\n Since the Lay Monks had come to handle worldly affairs, they were not necessarily loyal to the faith. At first they still held strictly to the precepts, but over fifty years of change, the divide between Proper and lay had gradually emerged. Now the disciples a Proper Monk took were Proper Monks, and the disciples a Lay Monk took were Lay Monks.\n

\n\n

\n The reason Juekong's proposal to return the Lay Monks to lay life could never work came down, in the end, to that same rule: none but ordained monks could hold a post in the halls. To rise at Shaolin Temple—never mind the heights of court head or hall abbot—even an ordinary hall monk had to take the tonsure. So even if every Lay Monk were returned to lay life, would they not still have to be tonsured to enter the halls? And if they did not enter the halls, how were the affairs of the temple to be handled? If lay disciples were to govern the four courts and eight halls, then the whole vast Shaolin Temple would rest in lay hands—and could it still be called a "temple" at all?\n

\n\n

\n This quarrel between Proper and lay had until now run as an undercurrent; with Liaoxin's disappearance, it had risen openly to the surface.\n

\n\n

\n Of the seven Proper Monks present, the eminent Head Jueyun and the Tongue-Plucking Bodhisattva Jueguang seemed to lean toward renaming the Lay Monks as well. Only three had yet to speak: Jueming of the Right View Hall, Juejian of the Right Action Hall, and Liaozheng of the Right Thought Hall.\n

\n\n

\n Abbot Juesheng looked to Jueming. Jueming said, "Let us first hear Brother Juejian's view."\n

\n\n

\n Jueming was nicknamed "Not a Leaf Clings"—even when he had an opinion, he liked first to see which way the wind blew. He had pointedly asked after Juejian first. Everyone knew of the friction between Juejian and Juekong; for all that they stood as superior and subordinate, their quarrels had been many—the older one being Liaoxin's disappearance, the more recent ones the death of Fu Yingcong and this month's madness.\n

\n\n

\n Juejian pondered a long while, then said slowly, "I believe the renaming of the Lay Monks calls for deeper thought."\n

\n\n

\n At this the others were taken aback. The Right Action Hall governed punishment; of every ten monks who broke the precepts, nine were Lay Monks. If anyone in the four courts and eight halls loathed the Lay Monks more than Jueguan, it was Juejian, keeper of the disciplines—and now, of all people, he had taken the Lay Monks' side?\n

\n\n

\n In truth Juejian's hesitation sprang from practical considerations. Unlike the three monks of the Manjushri Court who shunned all conflict, he was a pragmatist. To press for renaming now would only be pouring oil on the fire of the Proper–lay quarrel.\n

\n\n

\n Juejian went on. "We are all disciples of Shaolin, all giving our strength wholeheartedly to the temple. Draw a distinction in our very names, and the Lay Monks will feel their standing diminished—which does nothing to quell the quarrel between Proper and lay."\n

\n\n

\n The Knife in the Nest, Jueguan, said, "If there is to be no distinction, then let the Lay Monks keep the precepts just as the Proper Monks do. Monks within the temple, laymen the moment they step outside it—it is neither one thing nor the other!"\n

\n\n

\n As he said this his gaze went to Zide, who only nodded along ceaselessly—having dozed off again.\n

\n\n

\n Then Not a Leaf Clings, Jueming, spoke as well. "We are all disciples of the Buddha—why divide Proper from lay? If cultivation follows one's karmic conditions and joys, then whether a Lay Monk is lay or monk, what does it matter? Dissolving the prejudice between them is what comes first. As for names, they are mere designations—why study them so closely?" Seeing Juejian break with the others to become the first Proper Monk in opposition, he had set aside his reservations. He opposed the renaming, but not out of pragmatism—he truly held that to rename the Lay Monks ran against the Buddhist principle of equality.\n

\n\n

\n Still Jueguan would not give up. He pressed on. "If it is karmic conditions and joys you want, there are dharma-gates aplenty for cultivation. The Sangha is one of the Three Jewels, and the Jewel of the Sangha must honor the precepts and cultivate in truth—how can it be allowed to mingle with and defile such men?"\n

\n\n

\n Juekong said coldly, "Is Head Jueguan saying the Lay Monks defile Shaolin Temple?"\n

\n\n

\n "If a man cultivates with a true heart, he is not among their number," Jueguan said. "Then again—a name is an empty appearance. Why should one who cultivates care for a paltry dharma name?"\n

\n\n

\n "You say with your mouth that the dharma name does not matter," Juekong said, "and yet you propose to rename the Lay Monks. Does Head Jueguan not feel he contradicts himself?"\n

\n\n

\n "The renaming is to mark Proper from lay for those outside; cultivation is each man walking his own road. The two do not conflict," Jueguan said. "Or will the Lay Monks somehow forget how to cultivate once their dharma names are gone?"\n

\n\n

\n The two clashed point against point, and seeing the matter grind to a deadlock, Abbot Juesheng said, "This is a weighty thing, and I would have each of you reflect on it with care. In another month it will be the Buddha's birthday, and the work is endless—pilgrims beyond counting will come to Shaolin Temple then, and we must all bend ourselves to it with diligence."\n

\n\n

\n The assembly pressed their palms together. "We humbly obey the abbot's command."\n

\n\n

\n Abbot Juesheng was about to rise when his eye fell on Liaozheng at the very end of the row, and only then did he recall that the man had not yet spoken. "Does Abbot Liaozheng have any thoughts?"\n

\n\n

\n Liaozheng had become abbot of the Right Thought Hall only recently, the lowest in seniority and shallowest in standing of them all. The Ksitigarbha Court was the last of the four courts, the Right Thought Hall the last of the eight halls; before every other court head and hall abbot he had to bow and scrape, and so the temple had lately given him a new nickname, "Steamed Bun"—a mockery that he could be kneaded into any shape. In this council of the four courts they had nearly forgotten to let him speak at all.\n

\n\n

\n He was about to open his mouth when the Knife in the Nest, Jueguan, said coldly, "Seven here are against it. Does it matter what he says?"\n

\n\n

\n The Steamed Bun could only swallow, press his palms together, and say respectfully, "I have no thoughts for the present."\n

\n\n

\n …\n

\n\n

\n The eighth day of the fourth month was the birthday of Shakyamuni, also called the "Festival of the Buddha-Jewel," the greatest celebration of Shaolin Temple's year. It was also one of the few days the temple opened to the common folk—though "open" meant no more than the carriage road before the gates, where the people were permitted to bow toward the temple doors from afar.\n

\n\n

\n On the Buddha's birthday, the liveliest place of all was Buddha City.\n

\n\n

\n Beginning on the third of the fourth month, for seven days running, Buddha City would raise its altars to receive the Golden Buddha, the Buddha's Relic Bone, the Seven-Colored Sarira, and other treasures Shaolin Temple held in keeping, set out for veneration. The faithful would bathe the Buddha, offer flowers and fruit, and feed the monks, and pilgrims came from all four directions in an unbroken stream. Seven dharma assemblies opened at the same time, where scripture-monks of the Manjushri Court expounded the sutras—and among the listeners were no small number of leading figures from the martial world's various sects.\n

\n\n

\n In this season the Manjushri Court took charge of expounding the scriptures and answering the faithful; the Samantabhadra Court kept the peace and guarded the temple treasures; the Avalokitesvara Court received honored guests from within and without; and the Ksitigarbha Court raised the various altars and apportioned the expenses. The whole third month was, for everyone at Shaolin Temple, the busiest and most grueling of the year.\n

\n\n

\n Only one man had the easiest time of it—Liaojing, the registrar-monk of the Sutra Repository.\n

\n\n

\n The registrar-monk's task was to record which monks borrowed books from the Sutra Repository, and to report and press for the return of any not given back. So Liaojing's work amounted to little more than jotting down a few notes in the Sutra Repository—and if one spoke of tedium, this was likely among the most tedious posts in all of Shaolin Temple. On the Buddha's birthday, when monks within and without the temple were rushed off their feet, no one came to borrow books at all, and Liaojing had even less to do than usual. As a hall monk he was excused from sweeping; each day after his morning meal he read, then practiced his arts, and beyond that—nothing.\n

\n\n

\n But this year Liaojing was not at his leisure. He had something weighing on his mind.\n

\n\n

\n Something to do with Ming Buxiang.\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing had first taken notice of Ming Buxiang because of the startling speed at which the boy borrowed books. By the rules of the Sutra Repository, no one could check out more than two volumes at a time. Ming Buxiang always borrowed and returned at the swiftest possible pace; Liaojing could not tell whether he was truly reading them or merely skimming. In any case, every two or three days Ming Buxiang came to borrow, the subjects varying—mostly sutras, but all manner of miscellaneous books as well. Liaojing had once teased him with a few questions, and Ming Buxiang only said, "I've finished them. The ones I don't understand, I'll understand once I've read enough." It happened so often that Liaojing stopped giving it any thought.\n

\n\n

\n The next time Ming Buxiang caught his notice was when Bugui borrowed his first sutra. Liaojing was surprised, and so he greeted Bugui, telling him, "If you run into trouble with the scriptures, you can come ask me."\n

\n\n

\n He knew Bugui was illiterate. From that time on he began to watch the boy, and from Bugui's dealings with Ming Buxiang he saw that it was Ming Buxiang who had taught Bugui to read.\n

\n\n

\n Then he saw the change in the disciples of the Right View Hall. He had sighed over Bugui's having stepped onto the wrong path, thinking it an unlucky tragedy.\n

\n\n

\n What had truly caught his attention was a small matter the year before. A hall monk of the Right Action Hall had borrowed a copy of the Flower-Plucking Finger Art. This was an Upper Hall martial art, drawn from the parable of the Buddha plucking a flower and the faint smile it brought—an art prizing a finger-strike that left no trace, so that at times a struck opponent never even sensed it, never knowing he had been wounded. It was one of the twenty-seven arts that could be studied only with the approval of a hall abbot or higher. Liaojing, seeing Abbot Jueji's written authorization, took the secret manual from the Supernatural Power Vault, and while leafing through it to check it over, found a loose page. It was pages thirty-seven and thirty-eight—which naturally should have fallen between pages thirty-six and thirty-nine.\n

\n\n

\n This ordinary, self-evident thing was exactly what struck Liaojing as wrong.\n

\n\n

\n Many of the books in the Sutra Repository were old, and loose or damaged pages were common enough. Apart from the two great true classics, the Sinew-Changing Classic and the Marrow-Cleansing Classic, the Right View Hall would generally send someone to copy out fresh duplicates for safekeeping, and when even a duplicate grew old, another would be transcribed.\n

\n\n

\n This copy of the Flower-Plucking Finger Art was such a duplicate.\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing was by nature a lazy man. When a sutra was returned, he was supposed to check it for missing or damaged pages, but he had always done no more than ask a few offhand questions and flip through a page or two before calling it done. After all, if anything were missing, the next borrower would report it; and since this was only a duplicate, damage was no great matter—at worst he would take a scolding. And were he truly to be scolded, the previous borrower would bear the brunt of it first.\n

\n\n

\n He remembered clearly that the last time this book had been returned, the borrowing monk had told him a page had come loose. He had shaken the volume, and sure enough a page had fallen out; he had tucked it back in and canceled the loan, then returned the book to the Supernatural Power Vault.\n

\n\n

\n But now that page sat tucked in its correct place.\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing was lazy, but he was meticulous. His master had once told him that if he weren't so slothful he would surely have been a first-rate man at the temple—as it was, he was only a first-rate idler.\n

\n\n

\n To this he offered no opinion. He had become a monk because it was the easiest living he knew. He had entered the halls at twenty-five and become a registrar-monk, and his one wish was to go on being a registrar-monk for another forty years just so.\n

\n\n

\n Someone else has gone through this book, Liaojing thought. The first person who came to mind was Bugui.\n

\n\n

\n But this copy of the Flower-Plucking Finger Art was an Upper Hall martial art, kept on the topmost shelf of the Supernatural Power Vault, and Bugui was hunchbacked and short—even stretching, he could not have reached it. Of course, with a single jump, or by fetching a stool, he could have gotten the book down. But the question was: did Bugui have any reason to take this book?\n

\n\n

\n With Bugui's grasp of the martial arts, he had no idea which book held a profound technique—why would he set his heart on this one in particular? The Dragon Claw Hand that had gone missing sat only on the vault's second shelf; he hadn't even mastered the Dragon Claw Hand, so how could he take up the Flower-Plucking Finger—and go to such trouble to reach it besides?\n

\n\n

\n The second question was: even if he truly had taken the book, how could he have put it back? Jump up and stuff it in? With his scant reading, how would he remember where it belonged? Looking at the rows upon rows of densely packed books, Liaojing set the possibility aside.\n

\n\n

\n Then who had gone through this book—right under his nose? After handing the book over to the borrowing monk, he began to turn the matter over in his mind.\n

\n\n

\n The next day, at the usual hour for sweeping, he came to the Sutra Repository early and took his place, watching Ming Buxiang walk into the Supernatural Power Vault.\n

\n\n

\n Just as it had been in Bugui's day, the Supernatural Power Vault was now Ming Buxiang's own private sweeping ground.\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing watched Ming Buxiang's back. From outside the door, only a small portion of the Supernatural Power Vault was visible, and the spot where the Flower-Plucking Finger Art had originally sat fell just outside his line of sight.\n

\n\n

\n He walked over and passed through the little iron gate. Ming Buxiang was sweeping; seeing him, the boy only nodded in greeting—his bow, such as it was—then went on with his work.\n

\n\n

\n "The books in here are not to be read. You know that, don't you?" Liaojing asked.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang nodded. "No one below the rank of hall monk may read the martial texts kept in the Supernatural Power Vault. I understand, Uncle."\n

\n\n

\n "You're young and don't know better, and you love to read," Liaojing said. "I'd hate for you to break a precept by accident."\n

\n\n

\n "Thank you for your concern, Uncle," Ming Buxiang said.\n

\n\n

\n After Liaojing left, Ming Buxiang swept a quick glance around, and at last his gaze came to rest on a spot on the upper shelf.\n

\n\n

\n It was where the Flower-Plucking Finger Art had originally sat.\n

\n\n

\n That afternoon, when the labor-monks had all departed from their sweeping, the doubt still gnawed at Liaojing's heart. He hoped it was only his imagination, but he could not work out how that loose page of the Flower-Plucking Finger Art had returned to its place. Could a careless tuck of his own truly have slid it back into exactly the right spot?\n

\n\n

\n He lifted his head; Ming Buxiang was walking toward him.\n

\n\n

\n "Come to borrow a book again?" Liaojing asked.\n

\n\n

\n But Ming Buxiang hung back, hesitating, starting to speak and stopping—nothing like his usual composure. Seeing something amiss, Liaojing asked, "What is it?"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang said, "If someone secretly read a text from the Supernatural Power Vault, what would the punishment be?"\n

\n\n

\n "That depends," Liaojing said. "At worst, expulsion from the temple—or like Bugui… well, you know. If it was only an accidental glance, not much read, then a tongue-lashing, or the rod, or labor service, depending."\n

\n\n

\n "I secretly read one of the texts," Ming Buxiang confessed. "The Flower-Plucking Finger Art."\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing was greatly startled by the confession, and said, "Do you understand that this is a grave offense?"\n

\n\n

\n "Please, Uncle, take me to the Right Action Hall to receive my punishment." Ming Buxiang lowered his head, seemingly in repentance.\n

\n\n

\n "You've always kept the rules," Liaojing pressed. "How did you come to open that book?"\n

\n\n

\n "Three months ago," Ming Buxiang said, "I borrowed the Sutra of Mahabrahma's Inquiry to the Buddha, which tells the story of the Buddha plucking a flower and smiling. I turned its meaning over and over and still couldn't grasp it. While sweeping, I saw the Flower-Plucking Finger Art, and without thinking I took the book down. I'd barely opened it when I saw a page come loose; I hurriedly tucked the loose page back in and put it away in a rush."\n

\n\n

\n "You didn't read what was inside?" Liaojing asked.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang hesitated a long moment, then said, "Actually—I read a few pages."\n

\n\n

\n "They say you never forget a thing you've seen," Liaojing said. "So you've learned it already, haven't you?"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang shook his head. "I remember it, but I don't understand it. If you wish to hear which pages, Uncle, I can recite them for you."\n

\n\n

\n The Flower-Plucking Finger was an Upper Hall martial art, and Liaojing could not help feeling a flicker of curiosity. He was about to agree when a thought turned him: This is a superior art. If I should chance to commit it to memory, my own curiosity might get the better of me, and I'd be the one tempted to study it. He said quickly, "No need." Then he asked, "What made you come to confess to me today?"\n

\n\n

\n "You asked about it this morning, Uncle," Ming Buxiang said. "I guessed I couldn't keep it hidden. It's weighed on me these past days, so I've owned up to it."\n

\n\n

\n And with that the matter of the loose page seemed answered. Liaojing said, "We'll let it go this time. But I'll keep a close eye on you from now on—don't let it happen again."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang bowed. "Ming Buxiang will never do it again."\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing nodded. "It's settled, then. Off you go."\n

\n\n

\n Could it truly be such a coincidence? No sooner had his suspicion stirred than Ming Buxiang came to confess? Liaojing felt the doubt, yet he reasoned that Ming Buxiang was a boy of barely fourteen or fifteen, with no master to guide him—and even if he had read the Flower-Plucking Finger Art, there was no way he could have learned it.\n

\n\n

\n He sat idle the whole afternoon, and when the Sutra Repository closed and the guard-monks came up, he skipped his evening meal, went to the Buddha Incense House in Buddha City to buy a few vegetarian rice dumplings, and went to visit his master and reminisce.\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing's lineage was no ordinary one. His master was none other than Jueru, abbot of the Right Speech Hall, who governed all the temple's administrative affairs—one of the leading figures among the Proper Monks, nicknamed Laughing Amitabha. But Liaojing knew his master's true character: if not for the dagger behind that smile, how could he have joined hands with the Knife in the Nest to deliver a swift two-bladed stroke and stir up this whole storm over renaming the Lay Monks?\n

\n\n

\n "So kind, coming to reminisce with me? You're not after some martial art, are you?" In the abbot's quarters of the Right Speech Hall, Jueru ate a rice dumpling and grinned.\n

\n\n

\n "You misjudge me again, Master—this is pure filial piety," Liaojing said. "Last month was your birthday."\n

\n\n

\n "Oh—that was last month? I'd have forgotten if you hadn't mentioned it," Jueru said dryly.\n

\n\n

\n "You'd never forget. The gifts started piling up the month before that, into a small mountain. Plenty of people line up to flatter you—I didn't care to join the crowd, so I waited a whole month before coming."\n

\n\n

\n "I'd have guessed as much. Even if I tried to teach you a martial art, you'd be too lazy to learn it," Jueru said. "I sent you off to the Right View Hall to be a registrar-monk—as cushy an idle post as there is. Have you been diligent at your sutras, serious at your arts? Has your kung fu gone to seed? Come, try a few moves with your master."\n

\n\n

\n "That's enough, Master—spare yourself the effort and spare your disciple the bruises," Liaojing said.\n

\n\n

\n "You're just lazy," Jueru said. "If you'd apply yourself, I'd have one more helping hand."\n

\n\n

\n "You've no shortage of senior brothers—they can all lend a hand," Liaojing said. "Besides, it's only by wanting nothing and seeking nothing that one comes to see one's true nature."\n

\n\n

\n "Do you know why I took no more disciples after you?" Jueru said. "I'd pinned all my hopes on you."\n

\n\n

\n "Seventh Brother says you told him the very same thing," Liaojing said. "And you told Eldest Brother he was fit to be molded—that taking him as a disciple was enough for you."\n

\n\n

\n Jueru roared with laughter. "Enough of your glib tongue—you'll never cultivate the Buddha that way."\n

\n\n

\n "If I can't, I'll return to lay life," Liaojing said, then asked, "Anything interesting lately?"\n

\n\n

\n "What could there be but the Lay Monks stirring up trouble?" At the mention of the Lay Monks, Jueru set down the rice dumpling he had just unwrapped. "Dragging all their filth in with them."\n

\n\n

\n "What happened?" Liaojing unwrapped a dumpling and put it in his mouth; finding it a bit dry, he poured tea and washed it down—only to scald himself.\n

\n\n

\n "Drink slower, you'll burn yourself to death!" Jueru went on. "That fellow in the Right Action Hall who hanged himself—you know the one?"\n

\n\n

\n "I heard of it," Liaojing said. "What of him?"\n

\n\n

\n "What of him? Do you know what they wrote down as the cause of death? Suspected suicide over a love affair!"\n

\n\n

\n "Inside the temple?" Liaojing said. "Hm… that is a bit strange. Still—well, it's not as if such things are unheard of."\n

\n\n

\n "How does an autopsy turn up suicide over love?" Jueru said.\n

\n\n

\n "Was there a note left behind?" Liaojing asked. "Or did they go by his associations?"\n

\n\n

\n "No note, no associations," Jueru said. "The 'love' was right there in his back gate."\n

\n\n

\n The back gate meant the anus, and at these words Liaojing understood at once. There were no women in the temple, and a taste for cut sleeves was no rare thing; he asked, "Do they know who the other party was?"\n

\n\n

\n "Nine times out of ten," Jueru said, "it was Benyue."\n

\n\n

\n "Spotted Dog?" Liaojing thought it over. "Quite the appetite."\n

\n\n

\n "Juejian flew into a great rage over it," Jueru said, "and said it was a good thing they'd sent Ming Buxiang away, so he wouldn't be tainted by such filth."\n

\n\n

\n At the name Ming Buxiang, Liaojing's ears pricked up at once, and he asked, "How does this have anything to do with Ming Buxiang?"\n

\n\n

\n "This Ming Buxiang was doing labor service in the Right Action Hall," Jueru said, "alongside Benyue and that dead Fu Yingcong. Juejian treats the boy like a treasure—praises him to everyone he meets, till we're all sick of hearing it. He even brought up how he once gave Ming Buxiang a pair of shoes, and the boy turned around and gave them to Bugui. A pity that Bugui never came to any good—Juejian made a special trip to counsel him over the matter."\n

\n\n

\n "Bugui's shoes came from him?" Liaojing let out a small exclamation. As a registrar-monk he had always known the Right View Hall's disciples well, and after the Bugui affair he had asked the other disciples what had truly happened. He knew the gist of how it had all begun and ended—it was those very shoes, the ones Bugui would never say where he'd gotten, that had made the sweeping disciples suspect him of stealing money.\n

\n\n

\n First Bugui, then Fu Yingcong—a curious coincidence indeed. Liaojing said, "Spotted Dog doesn't seem the cut-sleeve sort. My guess is Fu Yingcong was deceived by him, and afterward hanged himself in a fit of rage."\n

\n\n

\n "If that were all, well and good," Jueru said. "But if Benyue forced him, then the matter isn't so simple. Settling on suicide over love—at bottom, I'd say it's because digging deeper would turn up something too ugly to bear, and they wanted to cover the shame."\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing ate another rice dumpling and said, "If that's truly how it is, Abbot Juejian won't let it rest."\n

\n\n

\n "One after another," Jueru scolded, "did you buy these for your master to eat, or for yourself?"\n

\n\n

\n "Ah—I got so caught up listening, my mouth couldn't keep still," Liaojing said.\n

\n\n

\n Jueru rose, fetched some melon, fruit, and pastries from the cupboard, and set them on the table. "Gnaw away at your leisure. Whatever you can't finish, wrap up and take home."\n

\n\n

\n "How could I?" Liaojing said. "Oh—what's this, it smells so good?" He picked up a piece of pastry and asked.\n

\n\n

\n "Osmanthus chestnut cake," Jueru said. "Sent last month."\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing knew it was one of the gifts—all of the finest quality—and indeed it proved soft and fragrant and sweet in the mouth. He praised it a few times, then asked, "And what came of it all?"\n

\n\n

\n "Benyue's master, Liaowu, pleaded with Abbot Juejian to have the matter wrapped up quickly. Benyue's been moved outside the temple, to wait for next year's trial of skill."\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing thought a moment, then said, "So that's how it is." And he picked up another piece of pastry.\n

\n\n

\n "Same generation, both of you 'Liao,'" Jueru complained, "and Liaozheng's already abbot of the Right Thought Hall, while you just sit there eating."\n

\n\n

\n Master and disciple chatted on for a while longer, until weariness set in and Liaojing returned to his room at last.\n

\n\n

\n That was in the sixth month of last year.\n

\n\n

\n The months that followed brought nothing further. After winter came, a blizzard struck, and Ming Buxiang vanished for several days—so much so that Juejian, in a panic, sent out all the Right Action Hall's disciples to search for him. Later it was heard that Ming Buxiang had reconciled an old feud between Yao Yunda, who ran the smithy down the mountain, and an enemy of his. Abbot Jueming was greatly impressed, and brought the boy in as a resident lay practitioner of the hall. Not yet sixteen, and already a resident practitioner—Jueming personally assigned men to teach him martial arts, and it was said his progress was swift beyond measure.\n

\n\n

\n A boy of barely a dozen-odd years, talking two grown men into beating their swords into plowshares? Liaojing thought, This Nephew Ming is a clever one indeed.\n

\n\n

\n But a vague unease lingered in his heart, and that fallen page of the Flower-Plucking Finger Art would not stop circling in his mind.\n

\n\n

\n By every measure, Ming Buxiang was beyond reproach—clever, diligent, kind, modest. And yet, beginning with Liaoxin—Bugui, Lü Changfeng, the Right View Hall disciples, Fu Yingcong—everyone whose path crossed his met with one accident after another.\n

\n\n

\n After the New Year, Liaojing heard yet another piece of news.\n

\n\n

\n Benyue had gone mad in Buddha City and gouged out his own eyes.\n

\n\n

\n So now it's Benyue's turn? Liaojing thought. When he spoke of it with his master Jueru, everyone said Benyue had gone mad because he could not bear the reproach of his own conscience. But Liaojing said, "If Spotted Dog had a conscience, he wouldn't be Spotted Dog."\n

\n\n

\n In the third month, as the piled snow began to thaw, Liaojing threw on an outer robe and went to Buddha City.\n

\n\n

\n He arrived at Benyue's lodging in Buddha City, a small hut with two monks standing guard outside. Liaojing greeted them and said he wished to see Benyue.\n

\n\n

\n "You want to see Spotted Dog?" one monk asked. "What for?"\n

\n\n

\n "We've met a few times," Liaojing said. "Call it a bit of concern for him."\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing was only twenty-seven, yet he was a monk of the "Liao" generation. Shaolin Temple had disciples beyond counting, and ranked by generation the gaps could be vast; a man high in generation but young in years was a common sight. The guard-monks were only of the "Ben" generation, and did not bar him much, saying merely, "Mind he doesn't fly at you."\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing nodded, pushed open the door, and at once heard Benyue's panicked, raging roar—a sound like a wild beast.\n

\n\n

\n Benyue's eyes were a pair of sunken hollows, gouged out by his own hand, so it was said. Hearing the door open, he bellowed wildly, "Don't come near me! Don't come near me!"\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing frowned and stepped forward.\n

\n\n

\n Hearing the footsteps, Benyue did not stop to speak but slashed out with a stroke of the Thousand-Hand Avalokitesvara Palm. Sunk in madness, his strength was boundless, and the palm came down with a howl of wind. Liaojing slipped aside, hooked out a foot, and tripped him; Benyue bounced straight back up and, heedless of all around him, struck and slashed in a wild storm.\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing thought, If he keeps flailing like this he'll surely do himself an injury. So he sent out both hands and worked the Left-Right Flower-Threading Hands.\n

\n\n

\n These Left-Right Flower-Threading Hands prized meeting force with emptiness, hinging on a four-word formula: divide, turn, shed, strike. "Divide" meant splitting the force—when an enemy's fist came, you struck its midstream and aimed at the elbow and forearm to scatter its power. "Turn" meant rotating the arm, changing the direction of the enemy's attack as though tracing a circle. Past these two gates, the force of the enemy's attack was already greatly reduced; then came "shed," using body and arm to slough off the opponent's strength, and at last the counterstrike. Its principle bore a likeness to Wudang's Cloud Hands—both used the tracing of circles to dissolve an opponent's force.\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing meant no harm now; he only divided and parried with both hands, sweeping aside Benyue's every palm-shadow until none was left, and before long Benyue collapsed to the ground, spent.\n

\n\n

\n So long without a fight, and my kung fu has actually improved, Liaojing thought. Master's always scolding me for not applying myself—turns out it serves well enough. Then another thought turned: Master would probably say, "You beat a 'Ben'-generation monk and have the nerve to brag about it?" And he supposed it was true—Benyue was only a labor-service disciple, and beating him was nothing to boast of. Still, not only had he won with ease, he had worn the man down to exhaustion, which was no such simple thing. Then again, he thought, Master would only say I'm getting proud. Ah—do what I might, the man's never satisfied.\n

\n\n

\n After this jumble of stray thoughts he looked again at Benyue and asked, lowering his head, "What did you see?"\n

\n\n

\n Benyue was gasping for breath; hearing Liaojing draw near, he shrank in terror into the corner of the hut and sobbed, "I didn't see… I didn't see anything, don't come near me…"\n

\n\n

\n Thinking of how vicious Spotted Dog had once been, reduced now to this—was it pity with a thread of satisfaction running through it, or satisfaction with a thread of pity? Liaojing bent down and said, "I won't hurt you. I only want to ask—what did you see?"\n

\n\n

\n No matter how Liaojing questioned him, Benyue only raved, panic-stricken, clutching his head and weeping. Unable to get anything sensible out of him, Liaojing fretted a while, then thought he might fight poison with poison and try a little probing.\n

\n\n

\n "I'm Ming Buxiang. Spotted Dog—you dared to bully me, and now I've come for my revenge!" Liaojing changed his voice and deliberately named Ming Buxiang.\n

\n\n

\n Benyue only twitched, then bellowed, "You worthless cur, one day I'll kill you, kill you! Come here, I'll kill you!"\n

\n\n

\n His hatred for Ming Buxiang was beyond doubt—but at the name itself he showed no special terror. Could it truly be that Liaojing was only imagining things?\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing lowered his voice again, and in a ghostly, eerie tone said, "I'm Fu Yingcong. Give me back my life!"\n

\n\n

\n At the name Fu Yingcong, Benyue jolted upright in fright and shrieked, "Fu Yingcong, don't come near me! Dead is dead! No—don't! Don't touch me!" And he shrank into the corner, arms wrapped about his shoulders, gripping so hard his fingertips nearly dug into the flesh.\n

\n\n

\n He sobbed and cried, "I did everything you asked—I gouged out my eyes to repay you. What more do you want, what more?"\n

\n\n

\n Pity stirred in Liaojing's heart, and he thought, So Fu Yingcong was indeed driven to his death by Benyue. His conscience won't let him rest; nightmares hound him day and night, and that is why he's gone mad. This man did endless evil—he deserves to die.\n

\n\n

\n He rose to his feet and was about to leave when his eye fell once more on Benyue huddled in the corner, arms locked about his shoulders. At first glance he had taken it for simple terror—shoulders clutched, body driven into the corner. But looking closer, it was different. A frightened man wrapping his arms about himself would have his hands fall a little below the shoulders—the natural posture for such an embrace. But Benyue's hands pressed at the upper part of his shoulders, his knees drawn up, his upper body leaning back, as though straining to push his torso into the corner rather than curl into a ball.\n

\n\n

\n A thought sparked in him. He walked over, pulled Benyue's hands away, and tore open his robe. On Benyue's shoulder were five bruised marks—where he had pressed his own hand so hard he'd bruised himself. On the other shoulder, in the very same spot, were the same finger-prints. The instant Liaojing's hand brushed the bruises, Benyue sprang up, screaming, "Don't grab my shoulders! Don't grab my shoulders!"\n

\n\n

\n Looking only at that placement, Liaojing thought, It's as if, in the act of coupling, the one beneath had clutched the shoulders of the one above. In a flash of comprehension he understood, and in that ghostly, bone-chilling tone he said, "I'm Fu Yingcong—I've come to grab your shoulders!"\n

\n\n

\n Benyue dropped to his knees begging for mercy, arms wrapped about his shoulders, kowtowing again and again until blood ran, wailing, "Don't grab me! Don't grab me! Go take your revenge on Ming Buxiang! It was him I meant to do, not you—who knew you'd turn up there? Who could have known!"\n

\n\n

\n At the name Ming Buxiang again, Liaojing pressed him at once, but Benyue was tangled and incoherent, raving in circles, every word looping back to Fu Yingcong.\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing left the hut and asked the two monks at the door what was to be done with Benyue.\n

\n\n

\n "His family's been notified," they answered. "If no one comes to claim him, he'll be imprisoned at Shaolin Temple."\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing nodded and left Benyue's lodging.\n

\n\n

\n Benyue had laid a trap, meaning to abuse Ming Buxiang; somehow it was Fu Yingcong who became the scapegoat instead. Unable to bear the abuse, Fu Yingcong had hanged himself—Abbot Juejian's reading had been correct. And to shield his disciple, Liaowu had brought in Head Juekong to stand for the boy and see him spared.\n

\n\n

\n A single question to Liaowu would settle the matter. But Liaowu was a Lay Monk, and a subordinate of the Brocade-Maned Lion Jueji; the Brocade-Maned Lion had never been on good terms with Master Jueru, and lately Master had joined hands with the Knife in the Nest to push this proposal to rename the Lay Monks. Were he to ask, would it not be suspected that he meant to reopen an old case? Better to make his own quiet inquiries.\n

\n\n

\n He went round the nearby shops, and at an apothecary learned that in the days before he went mad, Benyue had come to buy salve for treating bruises.\n

\n\n

\n "I asked him where he was hurt, and he wouldn't say—only that he wanted it, and the best there was," the apothecary said.\n

\n\n

\n "How did he seem at the time?" Liaojing asked.\n

\n\n

\n "A bit out of his wits," the apothecary said. "I'd never seen him like that before."\n

\n\n

\n "Before?" Liaojing said. "You knew Benyue?"\n

\n\n

\n "Before he went mad he beat a man at the Chan Wind Teahouse. The fellow said he'd report it to the Nameless Temple, so Benyue had to pay him off and brought him here for medicine. He was muttering then about how, once he had his Hero's Warrant, he'd go to Jiangxi and taste what a real woman was like—one look and I knew he was a Lay Monk. With that face of his and those vicious ways, how could I help but remember him? My shop sees plenty of custom; otherwise I'd never have."\n

\n\n

\n "How long ago was that?" Liaojing asked, deeply puzzled.\n

\n\n

\n "A little over three months, give or take."\n

\n\n

\n By then Benyue had not yet gone mad, and Fu Yingcong was already dead—yet he had shown no flicker of guilt. So why had his demons risen up so suddenly? Had it been thinking on it that bred his fear? Liaojing himself had never believed Benyue possessed much conscience; only when he saw the man raving had he supposed suspicion was conjuring phantoms—but by the apothecary's account, it did not seem to be that either.\n

\n\n

\n The bruises on Benyue's shoulders were indeed pressed there by his own hand—but he had done it to keep a ghost from seizing his shoulders. That was the very place where, as Benyue violated him, Fu Yingcong had clutched at his shoulders, trying to push him off.\n

\n\n

\n He questioned the nearby residents too: when Benyue went mad, had any strange person passed by? They all said no. Only one man said that one day he had seen a figure flash past outside Benyue's hut, like a ghost.\n

\n\n

\n What if someone had played the ghost to frighten Benyue, and driven him mad? But Benyue was a bold man—a mere ghost-act would not have shaken him. How had it been done? Benyue had bought salve for bruises before ever going mad; if the bruises on his shoulders had not been pressed there by himself, then by whom?\n

\n\n

\n That spot was near the front of the shoulder—to press it, one would surely have been seen. However swift a man's movements, the hut was cramped, with no room to dodge and circle—unless one struck across empty space. But what martial art could leave a bruise while the wounded man felt nothing at all?\n

\n\n

\n The Flower-Plucking Finger Art! It could strike an opponent with a formless finger-force, leaving the victim wholly unaware!\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing's heart gave a lurch, and he turned and started back toward Shaolin Temple.\n

\n\n

\n Someone had used the Flower-Plucking Finger, and while Benyue was off his guard, pressed bruises into his shoulders with finger-force across the empty air. Washing himself, Benyue had seen the marks on his body and taken them for the vengeful ghost of Fu Yingcong; tormented day and night, he had then been frightened all the more by that someone playing the ghost, until he gouged out his own eyes.\n

\n\n

\n So the maddened Benyue clutched his shoulders with all his might—and the bruises he pressed there himself covered over the wounds the Flower-Plucking Finger had left.\n

\n\n

\n The details were murky, but this was the likeliest of all explanations.\n

\n\n

\n And if such a person truly existed—could it be Ming Buxiang?\n

\n\n

\n A boy of barely a dozen-odd years, mastering the Upper Hall art of the Flower-Plucking Finger to such depth—and using it to toy with Benyue?\n

\n\n

\n More terrifying still was the calculation behind it…\n

\n\n

\n If it were truly so… if it were truly so…\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing's suspicions churned without resolution, and he had not a shred of proof.\n

\n\n

\n ......\n

\n\n

\n Head Jueguan came to the Manjushri Court; this Knife in the Nest had come to call on Abbot Jueming. At the same time, he had invited Abbot Juejian of the Right Action Hall.\n

\n\n

\n In the council of the four courts, only these two Proper Monks had opposed renaming the Lay Monks. He wished to win them over, though he was far from sure of it. Jueming knew his scriptures well and held that renaming the Lay Monks bred the mind of discrimination; but if Juejian could be won over, then given Jueming's "Not a Leaf Clings" nature, he would surely change his tune. The trouble was that Juejian was a pragmatist through and through, who held it unwise to pour oil on the fire of the Proper–lay quarrel just now—winning him would be no easy thing.\n

\n\n

\n Jueguan was still turning over how to persuade Jueming when a youth came barreling headlong into him. Jueguan was a court head, his martial skill beyond question; he stepped back a pace and, with an offhand motion, steadied the boy, saying, "Careful, now."\n

\n\n

\n The youth, having nearly knocked into someone, found his footing and bowed hastily. "Disciple Ming Buxiang, greeting Head Jueguan. I beg your forgiveness."\n

\n\n

\n Jueguan had often heard Juejian and Jueming speak of this disciple, and knew him for the newly raised resident lay practitioner who helped Jueming with documents and records. He had never paid him any mind, but seeing him now, the boy was indeed a handsome youth, and so he asked, "So you're Ming Buxiang? Have you seen Abbot Juejian?"\n

\n\n

\n "Abbot Juejian arrived just now," Ming Buxiang said. Then he yawned hugely, and catching himself in the rudeness, lowered his head at once. "Forgive my lapse, Disciple."\n

\n\n

\n Jueguan laughed. "Didn't sleep enough last night?"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang smiled faintly. "I was reading scripture yesterday, and one story was so dreadful it frightened me into a sleepless night, and left me ill at ease—which is how I came to bump into you, Head."\n

\n\n

\n His curiosity piqued, Jueguan asked, "What story could be so dreadful?"\n

\n\n

\n "Yesterday I was reading the Mahaparinirvana Sutra," Ming Buxiang said, "and I reached the seventh scroll—and it terrified me."\n

\n\n

\n The words fell on Jueguan like nectar poured upon the crown of his head, and all at once he understood.\n

\n\n

\n The Mahaparinirvana Sutra recorded the teachings the Buddha gave before his passing, and the seventh chapter ran thus:\n

\n\n

\n "The Buddha said to Kasyapa: Seven hundred years after my parinirvana, this Mara Papiyan shall gradually come to corrupt and disorder my true dharma. As a hunter clothes his body in the dharma-robe, so too shall the demon-king Papiyan—taking on the likeness of a bhikshu, a bhikshuni, an upasaka, an upasika; transforming even into the body of a srotapanna, and on up to the body of an arhat, and the very form of the Buddha. With this defiled form the demon-king fashions an undefiled body, and so corrupts my true dharma."\n

\n\n

\n The meaning was that the Buddha foretold that seven hundred years after his death, the demon-king would conjure himself into the likeness of a monk, and use a false dharma to destroy the true.\n

\n\n

\n Some had distilled the saying into a single line: "In the age of the dharma's end, to slay the Buddha with the Buddha."\n

\n\n

\n "I've often heard the two abbots praise you," Jueguan said, clapping Ming Buxiang on the shoulder with a smile, "and they had it right. Good boy!"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang asked, "Shall I show you the way?"\n

\n\n

\n Jueguan laughed. "No need. I know the way."\n

\n\n

\n Jueguan strode into the hall. He knew now how to persuade Juejian and Jueming both.\n

\n\n

\n These Lay Monks were exactly the demon-king's disciples of the scriptures—draped in the kasaya of the Jewel of the Sangha, working to destroy the dharma. Shaolin Temple was a stronghold of the Buddhist faith and a bellwether besides; should the day come when even the abbot's seat fell to a Lay Monk, what would be destroyed was not Shaolin Temple alone but, very possibly, the dharma itself, in catastrophe. The division of Proper and lay might be set aside; the rise and fall of Shaolin Temple might be set aside; but the dharma could not be set aside. To let such men seize Shaolin Temple was to let them seize the right to speak for the dharma.\n

\n\n

\n They must be set apart; the Lay Monks must never bear the same names as the Proper Monks. From this argument, he was certain, he could win over both Juejian and Jueming.\n

\n\n

\n Thanks to this boy, Jueguan thought.\n

\n\n

\n ......\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing raised his head and saw Ming Buxiang, who had come to return two sutras borrowed a few days before.\n

\n\n

\n They were the Mahaparinirvana Sutra and the Surangama Sutra.\n

\n\n

\n In the past Liaojing had seldom spoken with Ming Buxiang, but today he opened with, "Interesting sutras, aren't they?" He picked up the Mahaparinirvana Sutra. "This book has a story in it—about how, after the Buddha's passing, the heavenly demon disguises himself as a disciple of the Buddha, slips into the Buddhist fold, and destroys the true dharma."\n

\n\n

\n "It's recorded in the seventh scroll," Ming Buxiang said. "I remember."\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing then picked up the Surangama Sutra. "As for this Surangama Sutra, ever since it appeared in the world there have been no few who called it a forged sutra—simply because its contents are so marvelous as to strain belief. Many an eminent monk and lay scholar has argued over this book again and again."\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing looked at Ming Buxiang and asked, "Do you think the Surangama Sutra is true or false?"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang said, "Our forebears argued it many times, and never once produced proof that the book is false."\n

\n\n

\n "I happen to think it's false," Liaojing said. "I just haven't found the proof yet." He fixed his gaze on Ming Buxiang and turned the question back on him. "And what do you say?"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang gave no answer. He only smiled at Liaojing—a smile as radiant as a flower bursting open in the first warmth of spring.\n

","published_time":"2026-06-15T00:00:00.000Z","paid":true,"show_flag":true,"show_scheduled_time":"2026-06-15T00:00:00.000Z","unpaid_scheduled_time":"2026-07-25T00:00:00.000Z"},{"content_id":4957,"novel_id":74,"chapter_no":9,"chapter_title":"The Peach Tree in Bloom Part 1","content":"

\n The eighty-third spring of the Kunlun era.\n

\n\n

\n On the third of the fourth month, five days before the Buddha's birthday, the inns of Buddha City were already full, and pilgrims who could find no room lodged in the homes of ordinary folk. For the next seven days the city would blaze with lanterns, bright as noon, the din carrying through till dawn; stalls and shops kept no rest by day or night, and the stream of visitors never slackened.\n

\n\n

\n He Dasong had lived since boyhood in the countryside on the outskirts of Buddha City. His father worked a few acres of poor land, and his mother mended monks' robes for others at home, earning a little spare coin. From the age of seven He Dasong helped his father in the fields, and for that reason, thin as he was, his body had grown hard and tough. He had two younger brothers and a little sister below him. The year he turned seven, a great snow came, and the newborn baby brother could not pull through; he was simply gone. After that his mother bore no more children. Five mouths remained in the household, and feeding them all was hard enough; if anything was left over, by the time the land tax was paid, and the yearly oil offering as well, they generally still came up short. The oil offering was Shaolin's head tax, levied so that Shaolin might light a blessing lamp for each of its people, watching over the safety of every soul under its care. He Dasong always tried to eat less so his brother could eat his fill, but his mother said that he worked, and only a full belly would give him the strength.\n

\n\n

\n Prices in Buddha City were high, and life was lean. Sunrise to sunset, the work was always the same. Only at the Buddha's birthday each year did his parents take him into the city to pay homage, and there were so many fine things there: solemn statues of the Buddha, grand estates, street performers singing and reciting, the smell of cooking drifting out from teahouses and dining halls.\n

\n\n

\n But none of it belonged to him.\n

\n\n

\n What he wanted most was nothing more than a stick of candied haws, the one extra treat he might ever hope to receive.\n

\n\n

\n The year he turned eight, he finally gathered his courage and asked the price.\n

\n\n

\n Five coppers a stick.\n

\n\n

\n He told himself that when he came back to Buddha City the next year, he would have saved up those five coppers.\n

\n\n

\n But he could not put aside even a single copper. His days were carrying water, splitting wood, gathering deadwood, driving off pests, threshing grain, minding his brother and sister, and on top of it all snatching a little time to learn a few characters. Even when he had a spare moment, he had no idea where to earn money. At nine he came to Buddha City still empty-handed, and stared in secret longing at the candied-haw vendor's stall.\n

\n\n

\n At ten he carried firewood for a wealthy household in Buddha City. Each load earned a reward of ten coppers, and every copper went to his parents. One day the master of the house had a son. He Dasong delivered firewood as usual, and the gatekeeper guarding the manor asked him, "How many in your family?"\n

\n\n

\n "Five. Three big, two small." He Dasong had counted himself among the big ones.\n

\n\n

\n The gatekeeper nodded, brought out five pieces of pastry, and said, "The master's just had a son. Everyone who comes to the gate gets a gift. Here, take these five festival cakes."\n

\n\n

\n "Four is enough for me," He Dasong said. "Could you give me coin for the last one instead?"\n

\n\n

\n Puzzled, the gatekeeper asked, "How much do you want for it?"\n

\n\n

\n "Five coppers would do."\n

\n\n

\n The gatekeeper burst out laughing. "You don't know what you're holding, boy. That cake's worth twenty coppers at least, and you'll take five? All right. I'll go and ask for you."\n

\n\n

\n He went inside, and after a while came back with four boxes of cake and five coppers. "The master says you're to have five coppers."\n

\n\n

\n Back home, He Dasong claimed he had eaten his own piece on the road, and no one in the family thought to doubt him. That night the He family's supper was those four cakes, and He Dasong went hungry the whole night.\n

\n\n

\n He sewed the five coppers into his clothes and waited for the next Buddha's birthday.\n

\n\n

\n When the day came, he slipped away while his parents burned incense and prayed, and took his brother and sister running to the candied-haw stall.\n

\n\n

\n Seeing the way his brother and sister stared, mouths watering at the candied haws, he did not forget to warn them, "Don't tell Ma and Pa, or your big brother will get a beating."\n

\n\n

\n They nodded eagerly.\n

\n\n

\n "One stick of candied haws." He Dasong held out the money. The vendor frowned. "Not enough."\n

\n\n

\n He Dasong started. "What do you mean, not enough? Isn't it five coppers a stick?"\n

\n\n

\n "That was last year. It's six now," the vendor said. "You're one short."\n

\n\n

\n "I only have five coppers," He Dasong mumbled. He looked at the haws; each stick held three. "Sell me just two, then? My little brother and sister want some."\n

\n\n

\n The vendor shook his head. "Can't do that. These are skewered already. Who'd buy the leftover one?"\n

\n\n

\n He Dasong begged him again and again, until at last the vendor said, "Fine. Two, then." He pulled one haw off, skewered it onto another bamboo stick, and handed the rest to He Dasong.\n

\n\n

\n He Dasong said to his brother and sister, "One each. No fighting."\n

\n\n

\n His brother asked, "Aren't you having any, big brother?"\n

\n\n

\n He Dasong shook his head, looked at the candied haws, and could not help saying, "Your brother will just lick it a couple of times."\n

\n\n

\n He put the haw in his mouth, and it was cool and smooth and sweeter than anything in the world, the most exquisite taste ever known. His eyes narrowed and his whole face broke into a smile. Afraid he might swallow it without meaning to, he hurriedly handed it back to his little brother. "There. Go on, eat."\n

\n\n

\n Watching his brother and sister happily share it, he felt happy himself. At least he'd had a lick, He Dasong thought. Next year, he'd come again.\n

\n\n

\n With his brother by one hand and his sister by the other, he wandered the nearby lanes, circling a few times, until he judged it was about time to head back to the assembly grounds to find their parents. "Let's go," he said.\n

\n\n

\n He had just turned around when he collided with a girl. She gave a little cry, and a string of something fell from her hand.\n

\n\n

\n Beside her stood a youth, who cursed, "Damn you, are you blind?"\n

\n\n

\n He Dasong looked again at the girl. She wore her hair in two long braids, and her face was a pretty flushed round, lovely beyond words. He stared, dumbstruck.\n

\n\n

\n "It's all right, it's all right," she said quickly, and crouched to pick up what she'd dropped. It was a stick of candied haws.\n

\n\n

\n A stick with four haws on it, the very same that would have made up the one he'd come up short to buy.\n

\n\n

\n "They're filthy now," the youth said. "Throw them away."\n

\n\n

\n "Don't waste them," He Dasong said quickly. "Give them to me."\n

\n\n

\n The youth snapped, "Get lost!"\n

\n\n

\n "Lang, don't be cruel to him," the girl said. She hesitated a moment, then wiped the dust from the haws with her silk handkerchief and held them out. "Here, for you."\n

\n\n

\n He Dasong took them: a full stick, four haws. He was so happy he could have flown into the sky. "Thank you," he said to her hurriedly. "Thank you!"\n

\n\n

\n The girl flushed red and walked quickly away. He watched her receding figure as if entranced.\n

\n\n

\n After that year, he had one more longing. Every Buddha's birthday he would search for that girl, and every year, somehow, he would catch sight of her. She was a devout believer, and each year on the Buddha's birthday she came before the Buddha's relic bone to receive the monks' blessing. He had only to keep watch there, and he would always glimpse her once.\n

\n\n

\n But unlike the candied haws, the candied haws being a small happiness he could win with hard striving, that girl was like the deep courtyards of the rich man's manor, a world that did not belong to him.\n

\n\n

\n To see her this once was enough, he thought.\n

\n\n

\n Two years later, someone took an interest in their fields, wanting to buy the land to grow tea, and the family came into a little money and began to think of leaving Buddha City to seek a living elsewhere. But moving five people away from their home, the travel money might not stretch, and his parents thought of selling his little sister as a maidservant.\n

\n\n

\n He Dasong told his parents that he would enter the temple as a monk of his own will, to ease the family's burden. He took the Proper Monk Liaoxu as his master, kept his given name, and took the dharma name Bensong. Liaoxu was a supervising monk who had not entered a hall, and lived in the Nameless Temple within Buddha City.\n

\n\n

\n After that came the evening drum and morning bell, sutra lessons at dawn and dusk. He did not know whether it was for his sister's sake, or so that he might stay in Buddha City and see that girl once each year.\n

\n\n

\n Two more years passed, and he heard from his master that the monk Liaoxin had brought back a simple-minded child. Now and then, when Liaoxin was away on temple business, he would leave the boy in the care of Bensong's master. He remembered that the child was called Ming Buxiang, and was uncommonly well-behaved.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang grew up little by little, and so, of course, did the girl. He himself slowly grew from a boy of ten into a youth.\n

\n\n

\n The girl became a young woman, blossoming into grace and poise.\n

\n\n

\n Still he searched for her each Buddha's birthday, and each year he was not disappointed.\n

\n\n

\n No words, no nearness, only a stolen glance from far off.\n

\n\n

\n At eighteen, the great monk Liaoxin entered a hall, and Ming Buxiang left Buddha City.\n

\n\n

\n At nineteen, he saw the girl with her hair pinned up, and knew she had married.\n

\n\n

\n After the Buddha's birthday that year he fell gravely ill and nearly died. When he recovered, he did nothing but chant the sutras.\n

\n\n

\n At twenty, Liaoxu died of illness in the Nameless Temple, having never in his life entered a hall.\n

\n\n

\n At twenty-six, Bensong passed the trial of skill and earned his Hero's Warrant. Juejian assigned him to serve as a supervising monk in Hebei, but he insisted on staying in Buddha City to carry on the work of his master Liaoxu. Each Buddha's birthday, as an incense monk, he kept watch before the Buddha's relic bone, burning incense and offering prayers for the faithful. The faithful were many, and incense monks like him numbered more than twenty. Glancing left and right, he could always find that girl somewhere in the line before him.\n

\n\n

\n By now she was a young wife. She came down the long line to stand before him, pressed her palms together, and bowed her head.\n

\n\n

\n "Amitabha." He chanted the holy name, and traced a circle with his right hand above the young wife's head, almost touching her glossy black hair. But he did not presume; he prayed for her with a devotion he had never known before.\n

\n\n

\n Every Buddha's birthday the inns filled to bursting, and many came as whole families on pilgrimage. To accommodate the pilgrims, the Nameless Temple gave up its monks' quarters for them to lodge in, and the monks moved into the inns. Bensong's old room went to a pilgrim family of six, and he himself took a room at the Puguang Inn in Buddha City. It was an inn of ordinary size, with a row of peach trees planted in the back courtyard. At night, looking down from his second-floor room, he could see that row of peach trees just below.\n

\n\n

\n To his surprise he saw a familiar figure standing beneath the peach trees, gazing quietly at them in the pale moonlight. The moon's shadow and the peach blossoms set each other off, and she was lovelier in that light than ever.\n

\n\n

\n It struck him with wonder, and moved him too. This year he had seen her one more time than ever before.\n

\n\n

\n So he sat quietly at the window, the candle snuffed out, watching her figure, until her husband called her inside.\n

\n\n

\n He had never seen her husband. Curiosity stirred in him, but in the end he held himself back and did not spy. This was enough. The more one knows, the more one suffers. He took up the sutras and chanted them silently, but he could not still the swarm of stray thoughts.\n

\n\n

\n At twenty-seven, as in years past, by coincidence he prayed for her again, by coincidence he lodged at the same inn, and watched her figure beneath the same moonlight.\n

\n\n

\n At twenty-eight, it was the same once more.\n

\n\n

\n If year upon year, month upon month, I might know that you are well, this life would be enough.\n

\n\n

\n But if I should know that you are not well, then what?\n

\n\n

\n This year, this day, Bensong was twenty-nine. The fourth of the fourth month, four days before the Buddha's birthday.\n

\n\n

\n "Brother Ming?" Bensong looked at the youth before him in astonishment. "You've come to Buddha City too?"\n

\n\n

\n "Head Monk Jueming sent me to help," said Ming Buxiang.\n

\n\n

\n This was the first time Ming Buxiang had been sent to take part in the Buddha's birthday festival. While Liaoxin lived, he always had business to attend during the festival and so kept Ming Buxiang within the temple. After Liaoxin was gone, Ming Buxiang's standing was too low for much: he was given only the sweeping of the temple grounds, was never assigned to receive honored guests, and Buddha City had no need of his labor. Only this year did Jueming, wanting the boy to see something of the world, deliberately send him to help.\n

\n\n

\n Bensong smiled. "You surely won't remember me."\n

\n\n

\n "You are Brother Bensong, disciple of Elder Liaoxu," said Ming Buxiang.\n

\n\n

\n Bensong was taken aback. "That was ten years ago. You were only, what, four? Whenever Uncle Liaoxin went on a long journey, he left you in my care."\n

\n\n

\n "It was kind of you, brother," said Ming Buxiang.\n

\n\n

\n "It was no trouble at all. You were such a good child, never crying, never fussing. Well, I never thought you'd remember me. What have they sent you to do?"\n

\n\n

\n "I'm a lay receptionist," said Ming Buxiang. "I show the pilgrims their way."\n

\n\n

\n Bensong nodded. "I see. Hard work. Where do you sleep at night? Back at the temple?"\n

\n\n

\n "I'm lodging at the Puguang Inn for now."\n

\n\n

\n Bensong said happily, "Then it's the same inn as mine. We'll have a good talk when there's time."\n

\n\n

\n "Damn it, chattering away here, can't you see everyone's working?" A lean, middle-aged monk came up leading several young monks. Bensong recognized him as Liaowu, master of Benyue. They were charged with guarding the Buddha's relic bone, and besides them, presiding here from the rear hall was the abbot of the Right Livelihood Hall, Jueji, who went by the nickname "the Brocade-Maned Lion."\n

\n\n

\n Liaowu cursed, "Everyone else is working, and you two stand idle? So grand to be Proper Monks, are you? Leave all the labor to the Lay Monks while the Proper Monks see to eating and sleeping?"\n

\n\n

\n Bensong said quickly, "Calm yourself, Uncle Liaowu. It was I who kept Brother Ming talking. I'll get to it at once."\n

\n\n

\n He took Ming Buxiang by the arm to leave, but Liaowu barked, "Ming Buxiang, you come here!"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang stopped and turned to face him. Bensong hurried to smooth things over, but Liaowu cut him off. "I didn't call you!"\n

\n\n

\n Snubbed, and constrained by his station, Bensong dared say no more. Liaowu looked Ming Buxiang up and down. "Handsome as they say. A real little demon."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang only kept silent, and Liaowu asked again, "Why don't you speak?"\n

\n\n

\n "This disciple is a demon," said Ming Buxiang. "Should I open my mouth, I fear only demon's words would come out to lead the people astray."\n

\n\n

\n Liaowu sneered. "Don't think that because Abbots Juejian and Jueming dote on you, you can climb to heaven! Two abbots are worth less than one head monk. I've got my eye on you. Don't put a foot wrong, or you'll see what happens." With that he led his disciples away.\n

\n\n

\n Bensong said, "Brother Ming, don't take it to heart. His own disciple's gone mad, and he just wants someone to vent on."\n

\n\n

\n "It's all right," Ming Buxiang said mildly.\n

\n\n

\n The matter the four courts had debated, the renaming of the Lay Monks, was gradually spreading. In the four courts and eight halls, seven Proper and five Lay, the Proper Monks held the majority. It was said that even Abbots Juejian and Jueming, who had opposed the renaming, were wavering, and that the council would reconvene after the Buddha's birthday, by which time the renaming of the Lay Monks was all but settled. Shaolin Temple was in turbulent waters. The Lay Monks held that for years they had borne much of the temple's work only to be treated as a lesser order, and they were deeply aggrieved; the Proper Monks held that the Lay Monks had ruined the temple's good name and dragged them down with it, and now justice was finally being done.\n

\n\n

\n The two factions were now as fire and water. Whenever they met, it was nothing but cold mockery and barbed words, and clashes broke out without end. There had been no brawls yet, no lives lost, but the strife was sharpening, wanting only a spark.\n

\n\n

\n That night Ming Buxiang moved into the Puguang Inn. It was the first time he had ever stayed at an inn. The Puguang was no fine establishment, but it was far more comfortable than his quarters at Shaolin Temple. Ming Buxiang lit a candle, felt the quilt, and pushed open the window; in the moonlight the peach trees spread their leafy boughs.\n

\n\n

\n He left his room and strolled out to the back courtyard. Raising his head, he saw that the window of Bensong's room next door was unshut, and the figure behind it was looking this way, yet gave him no greeting, as though lost in some private thought.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang considered a moment, then gazed off toward Shaolin Temple in the distance.\n

\n\n

\n . . .\n

\n\n

\n At Shaolin Temple just then, most of the disciples had gone to Buddha City to help run the Buddha's birthday festival. Under cover of night, Liaojing went from the Manjushri Court to the Right Action Hall of the Samantabhadra Court. He climbed the courtyard wall, slipped past the watch monks, and came to the outside of Ming Buxiang's room.\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing knew Ming Buxiang lived alone, with no roommate. Seeing the door unlocked, he was about to push it open, then thought better of it and circled to the rear window instead, confirming there was no one inside before pushing the window open and climbing in.\n

\n\n

\n The reason he had gone around to the window was that he feared Ming Buxiang might have rigged the door so that an intruder would be detected. But when he afterward checked the door and window, he found no sign of any such device.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang's room was spotless, a world away from his own. "A regular model child," Liaojing thought. He searched carefully. Apart from sutras, the room held nothing. The wardrobe contained only two worn single robes and two sets of undergarments. He looked under the bed; even there it was clean, not a trace of dust. He pulled out the desk drawer, which held only a needle and thread, small scissors, a small brush, an inkstone, and an ink stick, odds and ends of that sort.\n

\n\n

\n Had he imagined it all, then? Come to think of it, what scheme could a fifteen-year-old be running, and to what end? Standing in the temple, or some other gain?\n

\n\n

\n He was about to push the drawer back when a thought struck him.\n

\n\n

\n "There's a brush, ink, and inkstone in his drawer. Why no paper?"\n

\n\n

\n The sutras borrowed from the Sutra Repository allowed no annotation by the monks. He looked around again, and having confirmed there was no paper in the room, he thought a moment, then drew the drawer all the way out and raised the candle to inspect its underside. There, to his astonishment, was a notebook. He snatched it out, and for fear the lamp oil would soil it, set the candle on the edge of the bed and read by its light.\n

\n\n

\n It was Ming Buxiang's notes. Unexpectedly, his hand was wild and careless, strokes often left half-formed. "So the fellow isn't flawless after all," Liaojing thought.\n

\n\n

\n He read on, and the more he read the more his heart turned cold, until a clammy sweat broke out over him. Set down here was how Ming Buxiang had laid his secret plans: how he had watched and lured every move of Bugui; how Fu Yingcong had come to make overtures and been seen through, and then by a ruse been made to swallow a drug Ming Buxiang had brought, and delivered to the place arranged with Benyue; how Benyue had slaked his lust there, abusing and crushing Fu Yingcong; how Ming Buxiang had then, in Fu Yingcong's broken and dazed despair, goaded him on and lured him to take his own life. And there too, atop the snow mountain, was how he had forced Yao Yunda and another to fight each other while he watched the changes in them, and last of all, how he had used the Flower-Plucking Finger to play a ghost and drive Benyue mad.\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing read with his scalp crawling. Had he not seen it with his own eyes, he could scarcely have believed such horrors existed in the world.\n

\n\n

\n Mara Papiyan, the demon king. That was the first thought to rise in his mind. If such a monster truly walked the earth, it could only be Mara Papiyan come into the world to destroy the Buddha's law.\n

\n\n

\n But however incredible, with this notebook in hand the wickedness in Ming Buxiang's heart could be exposed. Liaojing tucked the notebook into his robe and returned the drawer to its place.\n

\n\n

\n The night's work was a rich haul, and Liaojing ought to have been well satisfied; yet somehow he could not shake the feeling that something was off. He went next door to the adjoining room, which was Liaoxin's.\n

\n\n

\n Liaoxin's room was kept as spotless as Ming Buxiang's. Even with Liaoxin away, Ming Buxiang had let nothing slide. Searching carefully, Liaojing found beneath the bed a thick bundle of diaries tied with cord. He loosened the cord. Aside from records of Liaoxin's own practice, the diaries were a record of Ming Buxiang, the tenderness fairly spilling off the page. To read through them all, Liaojing thought, would take till daybreak. He worked back from the last volume, and saw that the final days held this: "These days my mind is dull and weary, stray thoughts swarming, evil demons troubling me from without, and I cannot master myself. My practice falls short, and so I am snared in desires I cannot pluck free of. I must hold to the precepts and chant the sutras, and press hard at my discipline."\n

\n\n

\n "How has even Liaoxin come to this?" Liaojing thought. He turned back further, and the pages were mostly words of inner demons, of self-warning and self-rebuke. He turned all the way back to the day Ming Buxiang had presented the longevity peach, where it read: "Xiang'er offered me a longevity peach for my birthday, and my heart is comforted. More than ten years have flown by, and I rejoice that Xiang'er is clever, deeply gifted in the Buddha's wisdom, his future without limit. Today, for Xiang'er's sake, I broke thirty years of pure precept; and though I do not repent it, I am ashamed in my heart. Practice is hard by nature. Once a single thought arises, there is no end to it."\n

\n\n

\n He turned a few pages further, and these too were mostly small matters. Liaojing was a slothful man by temperament, and tonight's labors were a diligence he had never shown before; having found his evidence, he did not linger.\n

\n\n

\n Just then he heard the front door open. Liaojing's heart jumped. He blew out the candle and listened intently, catching faint footsteps, and guessed Ming Buxiang had come back. He quickly retied the diaries, turning over and over in his mind whether he had left any trace in Ming Buxiang's room.\n

\n\n

\n He heard the sound of Ming Buxiang opening a window. To leap out the window and flee now would surely be noticed by Ming Buxiang next door. Liaojing pushed the diaries back into their place under the bed, gently swept up the dust that had scattered around, determined to leave not a speck. What he could not sweep clean he scattered with a long breath driven by his inner strength, all the while listening for movement outside.\n

\n\n

\n Then he heard Ming Buxiang's footsteps drawing near. In that hush, the slightest sound would draw notice. Softening his every motion, he rolled under the bed.\n

\n\n

\n The door creaked open. From beneath the bed he could see, by one feeble flame, only a pair of feet: Ming Buxiang coming in with the candle.\n

\n\n

\n "Has he found the notebook gone?" Liaojing held his breath. "If he discovers me now and it comes to blows, am I Bugui, who broke into the room and would twist his head off with one claw, or Lü Changfeng, riddled with dozens of holes by his Flower-Plucking Finger?"\n

\n\n

\n True, he was more than ten years Ming Buxiang's senior, and the foremost of the Liao generation, but Ming Buxiang was a genuine demon. Without full certainty, better not to risk it.\n

\n\n

\n The room was dark, lit only by the candle in Ming Buxiang's hand: the enemy in the light, himself in the dark. Catch him off guard and there was a chance to escape, and even a chance, with a single strike, to kill the demon. But with the evidence already in hand, why come to a hard clash?\n

\n\n

\n His thoughts whirling, unable to decide, he saw Ming Buxiang turn slowly, walk out the door, and close it. A moment later came the sound of the front door opening and shutting; Ming Buxiang seemed to have gone off into the distance.\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing let out a long breath, rolled out from under the bed, touched the notebook in his robe, and slipped away through the window.\n

\n\n

\n That night, Liaojing lay in bed turning over how to deal with the notebook. By rights it ought to go to Juejian, abbot of the Right Action Hall, or to Jueming, abbot of the Right View Hall, where Ming Buxiang had entered. But both elders favored Ming Buxiang, and the notebook might not be enough to condemn him; it would only stir up fresh trouble.\n

\n\n

\n Better to give it to his own master, Liaojing thought.\n

\n\n

\n Though the root of disaster might at last be torn out, Liaojing still felt a thread of unease. He was a perceptive man, and knew that what he called unease was in truth an instinct sensing some flaw or oversight, only he had not yet found where the fault lay.\n

\n\n

\n For that thread of unease, the next morning Liaojing did not go straight to Abbot Jueru. He knew Ming Buxiang was staying in Buddha City, and waited until after the evening meal before going to see Jueru.\n

\n\n

\n "It isn't my birthday. What brings you again?" Jueru asked. "If you've too much time on your hands, Buddha City's lively enough just now."\n

\n\n

\n "I simply missed you, Master, and wanted to spend a little time with you," Liaojing said. "We see so little of each other. It's a rare thing to meet, and your disciple wanted to show a little filial care."\n

\n\n

\n "Ah, Shaolin Temple's fine in every way, but the Manjushri and Avalokitesvara Courts are too far apart. You can't get from one to the other without a year and a half on the road," Jueru teased, then asked, "What would you like to eat?"\n

\n\n

\n "Is there any of that osmanthus-and-chestnut cake left from last time?" Liaojing asked.\n

\n\n

\n "Gone moldy long ago," said Jueru. "Someone sent loquats. Care for some?"\n

\n\n

\n "Sure. Whatever you've got, Master, suits me fine."\n

\n\n

\n Jueru took a sack of loquats from the cabinet and said, "If you're so fond of your master, why not come back and study under me? Good fruit every day, and you can learn a bit more skill on the side. I promise you'll make great strides."\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing pondered a while. "Learn skill, eh."\n

\n\n

\n "What is it? Got your eye on some Upper Hall Martial Arts?" Jueru asked.\n

\n\n

\n "If someone mastered the Flower-Plucking Finger Art at fifteen, what level would that be?" Liaojing asked.\n

\n\n

\n Jueru burst out laughing. "Are you joking? Fifteen? A man of poorer talent couldn't reach it at fifty!"\n

\n\n

\n "Just talking," Liaojing said. "If there were such a genius, how formidable would he be?"\n

\n\n

\n "That is Abbot Jueming's signature art. He began the Flower-Plucking Finger at twenty-eight. By the temple's records, the fastest anyone ever mastered it was twenty-three. Fifteen, that would have to be Bodhidharma reborn."\n

\n\n

\n "Or Papiyan reborn, who knows," said Liaojing.\n

\n\n

\n "Whether Papiyan's been reborn I couldn't say, but the temple has no shortage of Papiyan's disciples," said Jueru.\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing knew his master meant the Lay Monks. On this point he did not share his master's view. To his mind, let those who would cultivate cultivate; everyone labored for Shaolin's sake, and the Proper-Lay quarrel was truly needless.\n

\n\n

\n "What makes you ask about this?" Jueru said.\n

\n\n

\n "Nothing. Just curious," said Liaojing. "Is there any art made to break the Flower-Plucking Finger?"\n

\n\n

\n "Nothing made for it as such, but you can break it through its forms and nature. The Kasaya Demon-Subduing Art is rooted in softness and applied through hardness; it can ward off the formless finger-force of the Flower-Plucking Finger, and would be the best choice. Want to learn it? I could write you a letter of instruction."\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing waved his hands hurriedly. "No, no. Too lazy."\n

\n\n

\n "If you weren't so lazy, you might've made abbot before forty. Give your master some face, let me bask a little."\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing laughed. "Master, you're a Proper Monk. Letting yourself be burdened by empty fame, that won't do, won't do at all!"\n

\n\n

\n "Lecturing me now?" Jueru pulled a stern face. "Turn around and let me kick your backside twice!"\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing feigned alarm. "Master, you mustn't! When did you pick up this vile habit of going at people's backsides?"\n

\n\n

\n Jueru laughed heartily, then went on. "Even if a man did master the Flower-Plucking Finger at fifteen, with shallow inner strength his power would be limited. To wield the seventy-two unique skills of Shaolin to their depths, you must have deep inner cultivation for a foundation. Only the successive abbots of the four courts and eight halls may practice the Sinew-Changing Classic. Both the original and the copy are kept in the Mahavira Hall, in the abbot's own keeping. As for the Marrow-Cleansing Classic, you know how it is. When the Wrathful King rose in revolt, the temple was caught in the fires of war, and the copy of the Marrow-Cleansing Classic was lost. The original survives, but over the years moths and ants have gnawed at it, and so many characters are missing that anyone who forced the practice would surely go mad. It's stored away in the Supernatural Power Vault, only to be looked upon."\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing asked, puzzled, "They call them the two great divine arts, yet over these past decades quite a few have learned the Sinew-Changing Classic, while of those who learned the Marrow-Cleansing Classic, the records show scarcely any. Why is that?"\n

\n\n

\n "Truly scarcely any. They say that practiced to their depths the two are evenly matched. But the Sinew-Changing Classic is easy to begin and hard to perfect. Practice it twenty or thirty years, even forty or fifty, and to reach the level of Head Monk Juekong is still not the end of the road."\n

\n\n

\n Head Monk Juekong was not only the foremost of the Lay Monks; in martial prowess he was first in all Shaolin, and before Qi Zigai, Third Master Qi of Kongtong, rose to fame, most of the martial world reckoned him the first under heaven. But in these times the title of first under heaven counted for little; no one fought over it, no one cared, and it was taken for mere flattery.\n

\n\n

\n "The Marrow-Cleansing Classic is the opposite, easy to perfect but hard to learn. Once a man enters the gate, the early progress is by leaps and bounds. Yet plenty have spent thirty or fifty years and never even crossed the threshold, frittering their time away for nothing, worse off than with the early stages of the Sinew-Changing Classic. If it were you, would you practice the Sinew-Changing Classic or the Marrow-Cleansing Classic?"\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing asked, puzzled, "Over these hundreds of years the temple has had so many eminent monks of great virtue, no few of them brilliant and wise. Did not one of them ever master it?"\n

\n\n

\n "They say the Marrow-Cleansing Classic is missing its opening method of entry. Some say it was never completed. Others still say the copy now kept in the temple is false, that the true text was destroyed more than two hundred years ago when the emperor of the former dynasty moved to wipe out the Buddha's faith." Jueru went on, "But it's said someone mastered it more than a hundred years back, which puts the rumor to rest, so the Marrow-Cleansing Classic can indeed be mastered."\n

\n\n

\n "Who?" Liaojing asked.\n

\n\n

\n "No idea," Jueru answered.\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing's curiosity stirred again. "How is it you don't know?"\n

\n\n

\n "The temple records this man, only it never gives his name. Strange, isn't it?" Jueru said. "In any case, don't dream of reaching heaven in a single bound. Any martial art, carried to its heights, comes out much the same, not only in power but in the difficulty of the next step up. The Sinew-Changing Classic is easy to learn and hard to perfect, yet no few reach great accomplishment in under ten years. The Marrow-Cleansing Classic is hard to learn and easy to perfect, yet at your master's level, to climb one step higher still depends on talent and fortune. Otherwise everyone would practice the Marrow-Cleansing Classic, and what would be the point of the Sinew-Changing Classic?"\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing had been circling for a good while without ever coming to the point, his mind still on what felt wrong, and now at last he could not help himself. "Master, what do you make of this Ming Buxiang?"\n

\n\n

\n "Why bring him up again?" Jueru looked Liaojing up and down. "Asking your master what he makes of him? Don't tell me, what are you after? If you want me to bless a marriage, you'd best return to lay life and find a proper girl first."\n

\n\n

\n Caught between laughter and tears, Liaojing said, "Master, I'm asking in earnest."\n

\n\n

\n "And I'm in earnest too. Who'd have thought the Lay Monks would corrupt even you, this neither-fish-nor-fowl business. It truly grieves your master, grieves him," Jueru said.\n

\n\n

\n "I learned it from you, didn't I?" Liaojing spread his hands. "You just told me to turn around so you could have a go at my backside."\n

\n\n

\n Master and disciple both laughed.\n

\n\n

\n Jueru said, "In all seriousness, Ming Buxiang is a man of real talent. Never mind Abbots Jueming and Juejian, even Head Monk Jueguan now sings his praises. Handsome as a figure carved from jade, modest and clever, diligent and hardworking, never forgets a thing he's seen, and still mindful of his old bond with Master Liaoxin, living on in the Right Action Hall's old quarters. Strange, how is it I never got so fine a disciple?"\n

\n\n

\n When Jueru said "never forgets a thing he's seen," Liaojing felt a jolt. There was no paper in Ming Buxiang's room because he never forgot a thing he saw and had no need of notes. And if that was so, why keep brush and ink ready, solely to record his own crimes? Did he expect to forget them? And if he would never forget, why write them down at all?\n

\n\n

\n He turned around, his back to Jueru, and took out the notebook he had gotten the night before. In the bright daylight the writing was clear. Liaojing made it out carefully and found the hand familiar; looking closer, was this not his very own handwriting? Ming Buxiang had copied his hand to write this book. Had he foolishly handed it up, he would have sealed his own guilt as a man who frames the loyal and good, and in the clumsiest fashion at that.\n

","published_time":"2026-06-15T00:00:00.000Z","paid":true,"show_flag":true,"show_scheduled_time":"2026-06-15T00:00:00.000Z","unpaid_scheduled_time":"2026-08-01T00:00:00.000Z"},{"content_id":4958,"novel_id":74,"chapter_no":10,"chapter_title":"The Peach Tree in Bloom Part 2","content":"

\n Seeing him turn away, Jueru asked, "What are you doing? Really putting your backside to your master?"\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing quickly made a joke of it. "Just testing whether my master's virtue holds true," tucking the notebook away as he spoke.\n

\n\n

\n Jueru raised a foot as if to kick. "Talking nonsense, and so odd about it!" Then, "You ought to learn from him. Don't lean on your cleverness and let it make you lazy!"\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing said with a wry smile, "Yes, Master, your disciple will mend his ways at once."\n

\n\n

\n "How will you mend them?" Jueru asked.\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing pulled a long face. "You write me that letter of instruction now, and your disciple will go straight off to learn the Kasaya Demon-Subduing Art."\n

\n\n

\n Jueru laughed heartily.\n

\n\n

\n . . .\n

\n\n

\n The fifth of the fourth month, three days before the Buddha's birthday. At the assembly before the Buddha's relic bone, Bensong again caught sight of that one figure. Whether by fate or chance, she stood in his line as always, and it eased his heart greatly.\n

\n\n

\n A year of waiting, all for these few days of meeting; only these few days together, and they sufficed to soothe a year of longing.\n

\n\n

\n When only a dozen or so people remained ahead, Liaowu came over and murmured in Bensong's ear, "The tea's run out. Abbot Jueji wants tea. Go buy some at the Chan Wind Teahouse."\n

\n\n

\n Bensong said quickly, "But I'm in the middle of blessing the pilgrims."\n

\n\n

\n Liaowu hissed in his ear, "To hell with that, someone will cover for you. Go on, no arguments!"\n

\n\n

\n Bensong meant to refuse, but seeing Liaowu's fierce look he could only bow to the pilgrims and say, "This humble monk has business to see to. I'll be back shortly," and hurried off.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang was at the assembly grounds answering the laity's questions and pointing out the way. Seeing Bensong leave, he turned his head and saw another monk had already taken Bensong's place to bless the pilgrims.\n

\n\n

\n Bensong was anxious, but with Buddha City thronged with crowds, and being a monk, he could not run about heedlessly without losing dignity and drawing notice; he could only walk fast. He reached the Chan Wind Teahouse to find every seat taken, heads packed together, and hurried to join the line. He waited a full half-hour before his turn came to buy. He took the tea, and though he knew he would surely be too late, hurried back to the assembly all the same, handed the tea to Liaowu first, then returned to his place to bless the pilgrims.\n

\n\n

\n "I've missed her this year after all," he sighed inwardly. "No matter. She should still be lodging at the Puguang Inn tonight." He gathered himself and gave his full attention to blessing the pilgrims who came after.\n

\n\n

\n An hour later, he saw that familiar figure in the line again. She was still among them, moving forward in her turn.\n

\n\n

\n "How can that be?" Bensong marveled. "Could she have had business too, like me, and had to rejoin the line?" The thought came with a joy he could not hide, and a smile rose to his lips, his gaze meeting Ming Buxiang's just then.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang returned a courteous smile, opening like a peach blossom, warm and gentle.\n

\n\n

\n . . .\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang already knows I suspect him, Liaojing thought.\n

\n\n

\n When he came back to his room last night, perhaps he found me out and only hesitated over whether to act.\n

\n\n

\n The demon helped Abbot Juejian review documents at the Right View Hall and had seen his handwriting; who would have thought he could mimic it so perfectly, lifelike to the last stroke. There was nothing the boy could not do.\n

\n\n

\n At this point there was no more need for concealment. A man this vicious at the mere age of fifteen, if left in Shaolin Temple, would be an endless calamity.\n

\n\n

\n But how to root out the demon, that was the hard part.\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing looked at the manual of the Kasaya Demon-Subduing Art in his hands.\n

\n\n

\n How many days would this take to learn.\n

\n\n

\n If he struck now, the boy was only fifteen, and he himself was a full twelve years older; by rights his skill must be deeper.\n

\n\n

\n Yet this demon defied all reason.\n

\n\n

\n He thought of his seventh senior brother.\n

\n\n

\n His seventh brother had fine talent and had always been the best of them in skill; it was said their master had once meant to take him as his last and inmost disciple. Of course, their master had said as much to every disciple.\n

\n\n

\n In his first three years at the temple, his skill had lagged far behind his seventh brother's. After three years the gap began to narrow, and after three more they were evenly matched. From then on, his seventh brother could never catch up to him.\n

\n\n

\n I really should have studied martial arts in earnest, Liaojing thought with regret.\n

\n\n

\n The gulf in talent between himself and Ming Buxiang was likely greater still than the one between his seventh brother and himself. In a few more years, there might be no one left who could check the boy.\n

\n\n

\n To strike within the temple would not be easy; the moment fighting broke out, someone would come to stop it, and even if he succeeded, he could hardly escape death himself. He wanted as much as possible to avoid coming to that. The best outcome, of course, would be to kill Ming Buxiang and keep his post as annotating monk both, the whole thing passing off light as a breeze.\n

\n\n

\n That was, admittedly, a tall order.\n

\n\n

\n The best chance still lay on the Buddha's birthday, with Ming Buxiang out of the temple and Buddha City in its days of turmoil and confusion.\n

\n\n

\n Best of all, before the festival ended.\n

\n\n

\n He opened the manual of the Kasaya Demon-Subduing Art.\n

\n\n

\n Three moves. Learn three moves first. He would use these three moves against Ming Buxiang, catch him off guard and kill him.\n

\n\n

\n Whether the demon could be subdued was for heaven to decide.\n

\n\n

\n He rubbed his bald scalp and sighed. "I used to think you were good for something. Only now do I see how useless you are."\n

\n\n

\n . . .\n

\n\n

\n She came before Bensong once more at last, bowing her head and letting him bless her.\n

\n\n

\n Bensong chanted "Amitabha" and prayed for her, devout beyond measure as ever.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang came over, and the young wife raised her head, saw him, and froze for a moment.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang gave a faint smile and bowed with palms pressed together.\n

\n\n

\n The young wife returned the bow and turned away.\n

\n\n

\n "Poor woman," Ming Buxiang said softly. Bensong heard, and turned to ask, "What is it?"\n

\n\n

\n "Her husband beats her." Boundless pity was on Ming Buxiang's face.\n

\n\n

\n Bensong's heart lurched. "Don't talk nonsense. She looks perfectly fine."\n

\n\n

\n "The wounds are on her back. He's likely a son of some great house, hiding the shame, striking only at the back and chest where it leaves no mark, so her bearing seems unchanged."\n

\n\n

\n "How do you know?" Bensong asked.\n

\n\n

\n "When she bowed her head, looking in at the back of her collar, you could see the bruising."\n

\n\n

\n "Maybe she fell," Bensong said.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang shook his head. "I don't think so."\n

\n\n

\n Bensong stood rooted in place, forgetting his work for the moment.\n

\n\n

\n To know that you are well, this life would be enough.\n

\n\n

\n If you are not well, then what should I do?\n

\n\n

\n As the sun sank in the west, Bensong returned to the inn, pushed open the window, gazed at the peach trees below, and waited for her to appear.\n

\n\n

\n This year was not so calm as the years before.\n

\n\n

\n After the evening meal, the lovely woman did indeed appear again.\n

\n\n

\n Was she truly being abused?\n

\n\n

\n Before long another figure appeared. Looking closely, Bensong saw it was Ming Buxiang.\n

\n\n

\n His heart lurched. He saw Ming Buxiang raise a finger, pointing toward him, and the lovely woman lifted her head, meeting Bensong's eyes.\n

\n\n

\n Bensong gazed at the woman, and after a moment closed the window.\n

\n\n

\n The candle flame wavered; he could not master himself.\n

\n\n

\n A while later came a knock. Bensong opened the door to find Ming Buxiang.\n

\n\n

\n "I'm sleeping back at Shaolin Temple tonight," Ming Buxiang said. "Is there anything you'd like me to carry back to the temple for you, brother?"\n

\n\n

\n Bensong shook his head. "Nothing." Then he asked, "I saw you downstairs just now. What did you say to that lady?"\n

\n\n

\n "I asked her whether she knew you, brother."\n

\n\n

\n Bensong said, puzzled, "What made you ask that?"\n

\n\n

\n "This afternoon when you left your blessing halfway through, brother, didn't you see? When that lady saw you go, she gave her place to an old woman and waited until you came back to rejoin the line. I thought she must know you."\n

\n\n

\n Bensong started, recalling the afternoon, and asked, "What did she say?"\n

\n\n

\n "She said she knows you, but that you don't know her, that in all these years you've never sought her out to talk over old times."\n

\n\n

\n At these words a troubled doubt seized Bensong's heart.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang went on, "I came to Buddha City this time hoping to find old friends from my childhood, but to my surprise, after only eleven years, it's hard to find even one acquaintance. Unless it's in some well-known old place, there's really no way to meet again."\n

\n\n

\n With that Ming Buxiang took his leave. Downstairs, passing through the hall, where several monks of the Right Action Hall were eating, he said as if to himself, "Such a beautiful woman, what's she thinking, standing beneath the peach blossoms?"\n

\n\n

\n He was certain the Right Action Hall monks heard; they were Liaowu's men.\n

\n\n

\n Bensong stood blankly in his room a long while, then went downstairs to the peach trees in the back courtyard and stood beside the lovely woman.\n

\n\n

\n The one he had gazed upon in longing for nineteen years.\n

\n\n

\n After a long moment, the woman suddenly asked, "Were the candied haws good?"\n

\n\n

\n Bensong started and turned to look at her.\n

\n\n

\n "That year I asked Lang to take me to buy candied haws, and I was just behind you in line. I saw that because you were one copper short you went without yourself and split two haws between your brother and sister, so I bought that stick of four, and followed behind you. The truth is I wanted to give it to you. But I was timid then, afraid of wounding your pride, and didn't know how to speak to you. You spun around all at once and ran right into me."\n

\n\n

\n She told it gently, like a memory as distant as a past life, and to Bensong too that memory seemed a world away.\n

\n\n

\n "A year later I saw you at the assembly, and for years after that I always saw you. I thought, if I come to the assembly every year, I'll always glimpse you once. Then, not many years on, I saw you'd become a monk."\n

\n\n

\n Here the woman paused, then went on, "After that I married, and you became a blessing monk. I stood in your line, learned you lodged at this inn, and so I always spent my nights here. You love to look at the peach trees, so I stood beneath them. A few times I thought to speak with you, but in the end I thought, it was something from over ten years ago; I was afraid you'd long forgotten."\n

\n\n

\n "It isn't the peach trees I love to look at. What I wanted to see was the one beneath them," Bensong thought, but did not say it. He only said, "I never forgot that. I split that stick of haws, one for my brother, one for my sister, two for me. Just right."\n

\n\n

\n "A pity they fell in the dirt," the woman said wistfully.\n

\n\n

\n "They weren't dirty," Bensong said. "That was the most unforgettable taste of my life."\n

\n\n

\n The two were silent a long while. Then Bensong said, "The night is deep and the dew is heavy. Let's go up and talk."\n

\n\n

\n The woman nodded, and the two went up the stairs one behind the other, separately. They took care to avoid the other monks, and Bensong led her to Ming Buxiang's room, for no other reason than that he did not want to be disturbed.\n

\n\n

\n They did nothing improper, only sat and talked, a pot of tea, a few plates of fruit, telling over these ten-odd years. Her name was Yuan Zhixuan, born of a wealthy family devoted to the Buddha. Bensong said his parents had moved away, and only he remained in their old home. Yuan Zhixuan said Lang was a cousin of hers, a Wudang man who had earned a Hero's Warrant and had looked after her tenderly as a child, now married and gone back to Hunan. Bensong told how he had learned his skills at Shaolin Temple, how his master had cared for him, and of Ming Buxiang, who had spoken with her earlier, once taken for a simpleton as a child and now, against all expectation, grown into a prodigy.\n

\n\n

\n And so they talked until daybreak left them weary, and only then did Yuan Zhixuan return to her room to sleep.\n

\n\n

\n . . .\n

\n\n

\n The sixth of the fourth month, two days before the Buddha's birthday.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang returned to the assembly to receive the pilgrims. During the midday rest Bensong stole a brief nap, then asked Ming Buxiang where he would sleep that night. Ming Buxiang said he was going back to the temple, and Bensong asked no more.\n

\n\n

\n That evening Yuan Zhixuan came again, and the two fell to talking of all things under heaven, as if their words would never run out. They talked until the hour of midnight, when Bensong asked, "You came up Mount Shaoshi alone. Doesn't your husband's family worry?"\n

\n\n

\n Yuan Zhixuan was silent a while. "He brought me up the mountain and left. It's all Shaolin disciples here; nothing will happen. When the Buddha's birthday is over, he'll come to take me back."\n

\n\n

\n Bensong hesitated, recalling Ming Buxiang's words, then asked, "Is your husband good to you?"\n

\n\n

\n Yuan Zhixuan gently closed her eyes, then slowly opened them, rose, turned her back to Bensong, and undid her clothes.\n

\n\n

\n Bensong hurriedly looked away. Yuan Zhixuan bared half her back; on the snow-white skin, from neck to shoulder blade, was a sheet of bruising.\n

\n\n

\n "He's a son of a great house," Yuan Zhixuan said. "He loves his wine, and beats me when he's drunk. He beats me sober, too."\n

\n\n

\n Bensong glanced back, and at the sight of the bruises on her back his heart ached with pity and tenderness, yet he knew not what to say.\n

\n\n

\n Yuan Zhixuan was just putting her clothes back on when the window flew open with a crack and a masked man burst in. Bensong started violently and rose to step forward. The man's hand was lightning-fast; he seized Bensong by the throat. Yuan Zhixuan was about to scream, but remembering her secret tryst with a monk, she clapped a hand over her mouth.\n

\n\n

\n The masked man took in the two of them and cursed under his breath, "How is it you two?" Seeing Yuan Zhixuan in disarray, he lowered his voice. "So you're carrying on like this!"\n

\n\n

\n Yuan Zhixuan dropped to her knees. "Mercy, hero, we've done nothing! I seduced him. Let him go, it's nothing to do with him!"\n

\n\n

\n There was something odd in the way Yuan Zhixuan spoke, and the masked man saw she was fair of face, plainly a daughter of good family; then he looked at Bensong, who, though not ugly, was only an ordinary-looking man, nothing remarkable. It was more believable that Bensong had been the seducer.\n

\n\n

\n The masked man said, "Tell it plainly. Where's Ming Buxiang?"\n

\n\n

\n Bensong's face was flushed crimson, scarcely able to draw breath. "He, he went back to the temple."\n

\n\n

\n The masked man grunted, then said, "What's all this with you two? Tell me clearly."\n

\n\n

\n The two told their whole story. Frightened and at their wits' end, their lives in another man's hands, not daring to call for help, they hid nothing now, and their feelings for each other showed plain and whole.\n

\n\n

\n When they had finished, the two looked at each other with deep and tender affection.\n

\n\n

\n The masked man was none other than Liaojing. He had come meaning to kill Ming Buxiang, having asked after the room, and had not expected to blunder into this; he listened agape. The first thought to cross his mind was, in fact, "If even a man like Bensong has a beauty pining for him, then how is it that with my looks, the only ones facing me are my master and a pack of monks?" He stewed in private vexation a while. Knowing Ming Buxiang had not gone back to Shaolin and was likely keeping watch nearby, he wondered why the boy had arranged these two so. It was surely no kindly matchmaking; more likely these two were headed for ruin. So he said, "Your six roots aren't clean, so there's no use your staying a monk. Your affairs are beyond my care. Run if you'll run, or accept your lot. If someone catches you, you both die."\n

\n\n

\n With that he leapt out the window again, leaving the two of them at a loss.\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing sprang onto the rooftop, pulled off his mask, and looked all around. Buddha City blazed with lanterns, and there was no sign of Ming Buxiang.\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing thought, "Ming Buxiang moving on these two must have some scheme behind it. There's no telling how he means to harm them."\n

\n\n

\n He stretched lazily and decided he might as well sleep on the roof, thinking, "Maybe I should return to lay life. Might even land myself a wife." Then again, "Ah, but a living's hard to come by. As annotating monk in the Sutra Repository, reading books and honing my skill, the days are comfortable. To give it up for a wife, it isn't worth it, isn't worth it!"\n

\n\n

\n Early the next morning Liaojing woke, rolled down off the roof, and went out of his way to find a mirror. He looked at his sword-straight brows and bright eyes, and especially his fine high nose, and was quite pleased. Then, seeing a woman pilgrim pass by, he stopped her and asked, "Am I good-looking?" The woman started, took one glance, and nodded hurriedly. "Handsome! Handsome!" before fleeing in a fluster.\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing gave a "Ha." He was about to face a fight to the death; nervous, he teased her to ease his mind.\n

\n\n

\n The seventh of the fourth month, the day before the Buddha's birthday.\n

\n\n

\n Bensong had taken a fright the night before and slept poorly. When he pushed open his door, Yuan Zhixuan was already in the hall.\n

\n\n

\n He went down, and seeing him come, she came to meet him.\n

\n\n

\n "My husband comes for me tomorrow morning. Once the Buddha's birthday is over, we leave Shaolin," Yuan Zhixuan said quietly.\n

\n\n

\n Bensong understood her meaning.\n

\n\n

\n Nineteen years of longing, and now it would either turn full circle again, or take some other course.\n

\n\n

\n A few days ago he would never have agreed. She was a married woman, he a man who had left the world; once a year was already an extravagance.\n

\n\n

\n But after the night Liaojing had upended, he understood his own heart at last.\n

\n\n

\n "Pack your things," Bensong said. "When the assembly ends, we go."\n

\n\n

\n Yuan Zhixuan nodded, her face set with resolve.\n

\n\n

\n At the assembly Bensong found Ming Buxiang, meaning to tell him about the night before, but not knowing how to explain why he had been in the boy's room, he only said it seemed someone meant to harm him, and that Ming Buxiang should be careful, perhaps some monk in the temple who envied him.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang merely thanked him, seeming to think nothing of it.\n

\n\n

\n Bensong thanked Ming Buxiang as well. Ming Buxiang did not ask his reason, and Bensong himself could not have said it clearly.\n

\n\n

\n It was the longest assembly of his life. Mercifully, Yuan Zhixuan knew his heart, and found a moment to come glimpse him, just as in those years past, gazing at each other from the two ends of the grounds, all their love in a single look.\n

\n\n

\n That one look, and Bensong was at peace.\n

\n\n

\n When the assembly ended, Bensong arranged to meet Yuan Zhixuan on a small path outside Buddha City. As night fell, the two met and hurried down the mountain under cover of dark.\n

\n\n

\n They had not gone half a li when several men barred the road. Bensong's face changed; he recognized Liaowu, and behind him four supervising monks of the Right Action Hall.\n

\n\n

\n Liaowu sneered. "Heh. And here I thought the Proper Monks were all such men of great virtue, tireless in their cultivation. Turns out they seduce decent men's wives too. What does the Kunlun Council say? Defile a woman, and all the world joins to put you to death."\n

\n\n

\n What Bensong did not know was that from the moment he and Yuan Zhixuan had met beneath the trees, Liaowu's Lay Monks had been watching him. Everything of his secret meetings with her since they knew full well; they had simply waited deliberately until today to act.\n

\n\n

\n "Those Proper Monks say we ruin the good name of the Buddhist gate. Today we'll just take you and parade you through the streets on the Buddha's birthday, and see who's ruining the good name of the gate," Liaowu barked. "Seize him!"\n

\n\n

\n The four supervising monks rushed forward together. Bensong's skill was no great thing to begin with, and one against four, it was not long before he was pinned to the ground. Beside herself, Yuan Zhixuan could only throw herself on him, weeping; afraid she would be caught by the blows, Bensong turned and folded her in his arms, shielding her with his body. The four rained down fists and kicks, and in moments Bensong was wounded all over, blood spilling from his mouth, spattering across Yuan Zhixuan's fine robes. She could only hold him and scream wildly, powerless to do anything.\n

\n\n

\n Liaowu said, "Beat the man to death, no matter. Take the woman, we'll need her testimony."\n

\n\n

\n Bensong was about to be beaten to death where he lay when, with a sudden whistling cry, a masked figure came flying down. It was Liaojing. He had suspected Ming Buxiang meant to deal with these two and had been trailing them in secret; now he no longer doubted it, and at once moved to help.\n

\n\n

\n Though even he did not know whether what he did was right or wrong.\n

\n\n

\n His two palms wove back and forth, the Left-Right Flower-Threading Palm going left and then right again, and the four supervising monks felt their vision swim, as if lost in cloud and mist; before they could see clearly they had taken blow after blow.\n

\n\n

\n "Run, now!" Liaojing barked, and the sound jolted Yuan Zhixuan awake. She quickly helped Bensong up, and the two limped to make their escape.\n

\n\n

\n Liaowu gave a great shout and strode forward, striking out a palm to cut Bensong off, only to be intercepted by Liaojing. Far stronger than the four supervising monks, and Benyue's own master, Liaowu unleashed the Thousand-Hand Avalokitesvara Palm, its force all the more mighty and fierce; but it ran straight into the check of Liaojing's Left-Right Flower-Threading Palm, struck left and struck right, unable to pull free. Liaojing held off the four remaining monks besides, one against five with strength to spare.\n

\n\n

\n Liaowu, alarmed and furious, cursed, "Which court's hall-monk are you? Do you know that shielding criminals makes you one and the same in guilt?"\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing thought, "I'd be a fool to answer you." He knew that only by felling all five could Bensong get away. But he could not bring himself to strike with killing force, and could only do his utmost to hold them.\n

\n\n

\n In the midst of his hesitation he heard a faint whisper of wind, and the next instant a piece of his mask shattered for no reason, and where it struck he felt nothing at all.\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing went cold. The Flower-Plucking Finger.\n

\n\n

\n In that instant the truth dawned on him. Ming Buxiang's target had been him all along; Bensong was only the bait, brought in by chance. The moment Liaojing acted, he was caught in the snare. If he showed his true face before Liaowu and the rest, shielding Bensong, he would surely be cast out of the temple.\n

\n\n

\n He had no time to look about him; the night was dark, the cogon grass on both sides waist-high, and he had no idea where Ming Buxiang was hiding.\n

\n\n

\n Another faint thread of force came at him, and another piece of his mask shattered.\n

\n\n

\n If his true face were exposed, he could only kill these five to silence them.\n

\n\n

\n Kill to silence, or be cast out of the temple: this was the riddle Ming Buxiang had set him. Either road was one of no return.\n

\n\n

\n But Liaojing had a way of his own yet.\n

\n\n

\n Before the third whisper of wind, Liaojing dodged Liaowu's Thousand-Hand Avalokitesvara Palm, his right hand hooking into a claw to seize Liaowu's robe, and with a rip he tore away the better half of it.\n

\n\n

\n Just as the wind whispered, Liaojing turned the half-robe in his hand. Where his inner strength flowed, the cloth filled and swelled with air, and he swung it like a ball pumped full of wind, sweeping aside the formless finger-force even as he struck, the same motion dissolving the attack and landing a blow to Liaowu's chest. With his breath sealed off, Liaowu gave a stifled grunt and fainted on the spot.\n

\n\n

\n The Kasaya Demon-Subduing Art.\n

\n\n

\n This was the treasure he had meant to use against Ming Buxiang; knowing the boy was close at hand, he could no longer afford to hide the move.\n

\n\n

\n With Liaowu down, the remaining four monks were easier still. Liaojing turned the robe, and in moments the other four lay senseless on the ground as well.\n

\n\n

\n "Come out, Nephew Ming," Liaojing said. "We know each other well enough by now. No more hiding."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang stepped slowly out of the grass.\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing summoned his true strength, and the half-robe filled and swelled at once.\n

\n\n

\n This devil had to be rooted out today.\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang looked around and said mildly, "I never thought you knew the Kasaya Demon-Subduing Art." Then, "You fought them, and now you mean to fight me. Have you the strength left?"\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing said, "I'm a full twelve years your elder. I can spare you a little."\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang shook his head and said mildly, "Better that I spare you a little. Tomorrow at midnight, I'll wait for you here. You and I, the two of us alone."\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing asked, "What is it you're truly after?"\n

\n\n

\n Ming Buxiang did not answer. He leapt into the grass, and Liaojing did not give chase. Ming Buxiang was right; to fight him now, the loss would still fall more heavily on himself.\n

\n\n

\n Had I known, I'd not have hesitated at the outset, but felled them quickly and not wasted my strength on them, Liaojing thought ruefully. Yet he also knew that for Ming Buxiang to dare let him go, the boy must have his own confidence.\n

\n\n

\n As for himself, he had no such confidence at all.\n

\n\n

\n The eighth of the fourth month, the Buddha's birthday.\n

\n\n

\n When Liaowu came to, he raised an uproar, and the matter reached the Right Action Hall. They knew only that Bensong had vanished; the rest awaited inquiry.\n

\n\n

\n The Buddha's birthday passed without further incident, coming to a fitting close.\n

\n\n

\n Liaojing spent a day on breathing exercises and regulating his energy, bringing himself to his finest condition, then went to the Avalokitesvara Court, ate a few of his master's pastries, and bade him take great care of himself.\n

\n\n

\n At midnight, Liaojing came to the appointed place, and waited for Ming Buxiang to arrive.\n

","published_time":"2026-06-20T00:00:00.000Z","paid":true,"show_flag":false,"show_scheduled_time":"2026-06-20T00:00:00.000Z","unpaid_scheduled_time":"2026-08-08T00:00:00.000Z"}]

The Buddha's Hand and the Spider's Thread Part 1

Skye