Stealing The Heavens

“Six Paths Mandala?” Wu Qi roared with laughter, “Do you think you can hurt me with that?”

Wu Qi was provoking Bodhisattva Kṣitigarbha when his long hair, like Xiang Yu’s, burst into flames and burned to ashes in just a flash. The flames then burned his scalp and made it crackled, washing him with a pain so intense that he could not help but cried out.

Looking in horror at the Bodhisattvas who held all the key points of the mandala-shaped formation, Wu Qi knocked Xiang Yu out of consciousness with the edge of his palm and threw him into the Dark Yin Celestial Tower, which was hovering over him. Inside the tower, the chaotic energy rolled Xiang Yu up and threw him into Wu Qi’s interstitial world.

Then, Wu Qi threw his head back and roared. Dragon aura surged around him as his body grew to about ten thousand feet high, and his arms, bulged with muscles and covered with dragon scales, struck down at the void. In front of his fists, there appeared numerous transparent ripples, which was a sign that the void could not bear his terrible force and was about to crack. But the Bodhisattvas in the formation began to chant the Buddha’s epithet. Shafts of Buddha’s light poured down from the sky and the void that was about to shatter suddenly calmed down. Wu Qi’s two powerful punches were like stones thrown into the sea, with no effect but ripples.

“This is…” Wu Qi began to laugh coldly. Staring at Bodhisattva Kṣitigarbha, he said, “It’s indeed an excellent trick to combine your own Buddhist Kingdom with the formation and take control of time and space with your Buddha power. Unfortunately, how many punches of mine do you think a Buddhist Kingdom can withstand?”

The holy fire surrounded Wu Qi, Ao Buzun and Catfish, burning the auspicious light rippling on the surface of their bodies and causing it to produce dull explosive noises. This kind of holy fire of the Buddhism League had a strange power which was constantly weakening their magic power and spirit. Even the divine souls in their spiritual oceans could sense the terrible temperature of this fire. Wu Qi was better, but Ao Buzun and Catfish were already frowning because of the burning pain in their divine souls.

Bodhisattva Kṣitigarbha looked at Wu Qi with easy grace, smiled disapprovingly and said, “A mere Buddhist Kingdom of mine naturally cannot withstand a few punches from you. But here you are facing 800 Bodhisattvas, each of who have created 3,000 Buddhist Kingdoms, and all their kingdoms have linked as one through the Six Paths Mandala Formation. Now tell me, Your Excellency, can you destroyed over two millions Buddhist Kingdoms with just one punch?”

Wu Qi was struck dumb. Of all the 800 Bodhisattvas here, each had created 3,000 Buddhist Kingdoms? What a bunch of freaks! No wonder they did not give face to even today’s Lord Buddha. Some of the Buddhas in today’s Buddhism League had only created three to five Buddhist Kingdoms, and yet these Bodhisattvas had created 3,000 each. They truly proved themselves to be the almighty experts who served Vairocana, the Lord Buddha of a hundred generations before today. Their reserves were much stronger than today’s Buddhas.

There were altogether 2.4 million Buddhist Kingdoms. When Wu Qi calculated the number, he felt his head was buzzing. A quantitative change could lead to a qualitative change. He might have easily destroyed 2.4 million individual Buddhist Kingdoms with one punch, but when so many of them were linked as one through the formation, he was not confident of doing so.

And this formation was more than just linking these Bodhisattvas’ Buddhist Kingdoms together!

In the Yellow Spring, the enormous light wheel that was the Six Paths of Reincarnation emitted a spirit light of black and white, illuminating the sky; the Six Paths Mandala Formation was filled with the same light, together with countless Vajra Wheels that flickered with black-and-white light while spinning rapidly around Wu Qi and his companions. Each time the wheels spun, they felt the magic power in them trembled violently; each wheel was like a tiny black hole, unleashing a mighty suction to draw their magic power over and slowly dissolving them.

“The formation also combines some of the power of the Six Paths of Reincarnation?” Wu Qi frowned at Bodhisattva Kṣitigarbha.

Kṣitigarbha locked both hands into a lion seal and said slowly, “Your Excellency is incredibly smart. I’ve been guarding this place for countless eons. Although due to my vow, I can’t become a Buddha, I’ve mastered thirty percent of the mysteries of the Six Paths of Reincarnation, and I’ve combined them with the formation. Unless Your Excellency have the power to break the transmigration, you can’t escape from the formation!”

All the Bodhisattvas laughed, showing rows of white or golden teeth.

The power to break the transmigration? Only existences in the realm of Dao Reasoning had this kind of power. Below the realm of Dao Reasoning, even for someone with an overall strength like Kṣitigarbha, he could only use part of the power of the Six Paths of Reincarnation but dare not claim he could destroy the transmigration. The Six Paths of Reincarnation was, after all, evolved from the first thread of transmigration energy. The mysteries of the Heavenly Dao and the vast power contained in this kind of energy was incomparable by any other ordinary beings.

Wu Qi stared fixedly at Bodhisattva Kṣitigarbha. The holy fire burning on his body had started to make his flesh pain. This kind of fire was not recorded even in the Great Light Indestructible Amitabha Treasure Scripture. He reckoned that it should be some kind of Buddha’s fire Bodhisattva Kṣitigarbha had comprehended by himself. Extreme temperature, the magical power of attacking flesh and divine soul at the same time, and the ability to constantly dissolving one’s blood essence and magic power, all these attributes made this fire incomparably domineering, even more domineering than a few innate divine flames.

Innate divine flames were nothing but pure. Any kind of innate divine flames was extremely pure and clean, which gave them amazing divine abilities and magic power. But the Buddha’s fire in the formation was nothing but ‘domineering’, which gave it an incredible lethality.

Bodhisattva Kṣitigarbha looked at Wu Qi and laughed. He nodded and said, “Your Excellency have another way out. I happen to be short of a mendicant dhūta. If Your Excellency are willing to come down from your high horse, I’ll open the formation and let you out.”

A mendicant dhūta, to put it bluntly, was a menial servant of the Buddhism League whose status just a bit higher than the monks who swept the floor, the little monk who waited on the monk’s side with a bowl in his hand. By asking Wu Qi to be his mendicant dhūta, Bodhisattva Kṣitigarbha was not only bullying, but he was insulting Wu Qi.

Ignoring others, just Wu Qi’s title, Great Yu’s King of Dong Hai, was not something that the Buddhism League could afford to offend. Wu Qi had already announced his title, and yet Kṣitigarbha still treated him like this. It could only be said that this King Bodhisattva might have been dealing with ghosts in the Nether World for so long that he had been a little twisted in his dealings with others.

With a cold snort, Wu Qi shook his arms. The flames on his body, which was as sticky as molten glass, turned into countless thumb-sized droplets of fire and shot out in all directions. Then, he unleashed all his aura. As the terrible spiritual pressure of a Primordial expert towered into the sky, one after another, the rapid spinning wheels in the surroundings blown to pieces, while the spirit light of black and white dissolved into countless tiny specks of fire and were drawn back by the colossal light wheel that was the Six Paths of Reincarnation.

With just a shake of his arms, the Six Paths Mandala Formation produced a thunderous rumble — the void in which it was situated was forcibly plugged out of the Nether World by Wu Qi. It was like pulling a mandala flower out of a whole piece of glass. The space in which the formation was situated was surrounded by vast starlight, as well as countless stars condensed of the starlight the Dark Yin Celestial Tower had unleashed. Wu Qi had constructed a formation with the stars in the universe, trapping the whole Six Paths Mandala Formation from the outside.

Ao Buzun laughed viciously and swung the knife in his hand. A plume of dragon aura that was as sticky and black as ink gushed out of his body, towering hundreds of miles into the air like the eruption of a volcano. He, too, had released all his aura of a ninth-tier Primordial expert. He was lazy to use the divine abilities of the dragon such as summoning the wind or rain, but just swung his knife toward three Bodhisattvas over him with pure physical strength.

Catfish’s movements were more straightforward, she did not even bother to release her aura. She just pulled out her hammer, clenched her teeth and struck it down with all her might toward a dozen Bodhisattva who was standing on a stamen of the mandala flower.

Bodhisattva Kṣitigarbha’s face changed color instantly. He looked like a weasel who was stealing chickens, but suddenly saw the delicious little hens transformed into phoenixes, and they were not just ordinary phoenixes but those evil ones who had been contaminated by fiend energy! Even after cultivating the cultivation technique of the Buddhism League for so many eons, his rock-like state of mind was shattered with fear by the trio. “Experts of Dao Reasoning! Three experts of Dao Reasoning!” he shrieked.

The wheel of Six Paths of Reincarnation in the distance trembled. Two beams of starlight shot hundreds of miles out of Wu Qi’s eyes, and immediately the stars that surrounded the Six Paths Mandala Formation crushed inwardly, shattering the translucent formation that shaped like a beautiful mandala flower and turning it int a rain of light. Meanwhile, the lotus platforms beneath the 800 Bodhisattvas all cracked with numerous lines, and their Buddhist Kingdoms suffered severe damages at the same time.

Ao Buzun’s knife struck three Bodhisattvas and hacked them in half, and Catfish smashed eighteen Bodhisattvas in the heads with her hammer, crushing their skulls and sending blood and brain matters flying in all directions.

Wu Qi gave a cold snort. The starlight that blotted the sky suddenly transformed into countless curved knives and flew toward those Bodhisattvas. “I’ve offered you a toast, and yet you chose to drink a forfeit!” he snapped. “If you don’t hand over the souls of the three girls, I’ll slaughter the whole branch of the Buddhism League in the Nether World!”

As the curved knives were about to slay all the Bodhisattvas, Kṣitigarbha suddenly sighed. He and other Bodhisattvas, including the ones hacked in half by Ao Buzun and those whose heads Catfish had smashed, all returned to the sky above the stretch of mountain ranges.

The thick yellow water in the Yellow Spring surged up into the sky, turned into huge waves and swept over the curved blades. Even with his cultivation base, Wu Qi felt his divine soul trembled as a vast evil aura rushed into his spiritual ocean. It frightened him, and hurriedly he protected his divine soul with the Divine Flame of Order so that it would not be invaded by the evil aura.

A torrent of yellow water washed up the mountain range. The Bodhisattvas who were wounded by Ao Buzun and Catfish were rapidly absorbing the water, and soon those who were cut in half had their bodies pieced back together perfectly, and the smashed heads had regrown as well.

Wu Qi was startled, while Ao Buzun cried out in disbelieve, “This is nonsense! The cultivators of the Buddhism League are healing their injuries with the water of the Yellow Spring? H-ho-how… how is this even possible?”

Wu Qi was stunned for a while, and then he glanced at these Bodhisattvas with his eyes wide open.

He exercised the Chaotic Divine Eyes with all his power. With his current cultivation base, unless the target’s overall strength was ten thousand times stronger than his, he could see through all the deception. As his gaze turned toward Bodhisattva Kṣitigarbha, the world in his eyes suddenly changed. Wu Qi could not help but suck in a cold breath—were these still the Bodhisattvas of the Buddhism League?

In the line of sight of his Chaotic Divine Eyes, the whole bodies of all 800 Bodhisattvas were dark gold, and they were surrounded by the water of the Yellow Spring, with dense black smoke oozing out from inside of their bodies from time to time. Beneath their feet were not lotus thrones as white as jade, but crimson lotus condensed of the fire of retribution.

What hung behind their heads were not the golden light of virtue, but the fiend light of evil karma that was despised by the Heavenly Dao!

Of all these 800 Bodhisattvas, even if Wu Qi just killed a random one, he would be bestowed with a virtue that was over a hundred times more than what he got when he killed the Sovereign of the Myriad Immortal Alliance!

How massive was the evil deed they had committed?