I Can See Your Combat Power-Chapter 1049 - 343 Emptiness is Form (Seeking Monthly
Chapter 1049: Chapter 343: Emptiness is Form (Seeking Monthly Votes~)
Chapter 1049: Chapter 343: Emptiness is Form (Seeking Monthly Votes~)
Outside Chaochang City lay the Fuyun Temple, which once was a temple of thriving incense offering but now had become a dilapidated and desolate courtyard. The root cause traced back to an obscene scandal ten years ago.
Adjacent to Fuyun Temple was a small village named Jialan, where the simple customs of the villagers flourished under the protection of Chaochang, leading a life of peace, far removed from worldly strife.
Eight years prior, an unwed village girl became pregnant, an occurrence considered a scandal of the highest order to the tradition-bound Jialan Village.
The village chief and the village elders decided together to drown the shameful girl and to extract from her the identity of the disgraceful man responsible.
Initially, the girl stammered and refused to answer, but after enduring a beating, she confessed the name of her seducer.
“It was a wandering monk from Fuyun Temple, Yanshan!”
Upon learning the whereabouts of the seducer, the villagers, armed with carrying poles and hoes, stormed Fuyun Temple and confronted the monk named Yanshan.
From the first glance at him, the village elders believed her story by eighty percent!
For the monk was exceedingly handsome.
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With skin as clear and sparkling as crystal glass, a pair of eyes as bright as the sun, moon, and stars, well-defined features, and a smile teeming with boundless compassion — a mere glance was enough to entrap any ordinary girl. With such looks, how could he be an upright monk!
“Take this lecherous monk and drown him alongside that shameless woman!”
Faced with the enraged villagers, the head of Fuyun Mountain hastily dispatched warrior monks to intervene, seeking to understand the cause of their fury.
Upon learning that Yanshan had tarnished the innocence of a Jialan Village girl, he slapped his chest in assurance and said, “The venerable monks of Fuyun Temple and I guarantee with our reputation that Master Yanshan would never commit such a vile act. Although Miss Xiaoya often visited Fuyun Temple, it was only to seek divinations and worship Buddha in the great hall; she has never even met Master Yanshan, let alone engaged in any disgraceful affair! Moreover, with Master Yanshan’s high moral character and profound understanding of Buddha’s teachings, how could he possibly consort with a country girl? This must be a misunderstanding!”
When the simple villagers heard the head pushing the blame away entirely, their anger became even more uncontrollable, “What you mean to say,” they exclaimed, “is that Xiaoya has falsely accused this handsome monk? Bring her forth!”
Xiaoya, bearing bruises and injuries, was brought by the villagers to Fuyun Temple and asked to identify the lecherous monk. Amidst the multitude of monks, she pointed directly at Yanshan.
At this, the villagers of Jialan exploded in outrage and collectively demanded the surrender of the lecherous monk from Fuyun Temple.
Seeing the agitated crowd, the head once again spoke to explain, “Miss Xiaoya regularly visits Fuyun Temple to offer prayers, and she is familiar with the monks here. As for Master Yanshan, he only recently arrived at Fuyun Temple and is still a new face; there should be no difficulty for Miss Xiaoya to recognize him. To decide solely on this basis that Master Yanshan is the culprit who defiled Miss Xiaoya is far too precipitous, wouldn’t you say!?”
“Monks are liars, one and all! Xiaoya has only been here a few times, and in front of this mountain gate, there are hundreds of monks; how could a young girl possibly recognize them all? If this doesn’t count as evidence, then what does!?”
As the enraged villagers were on the brink of a fierce clash with the warrior monks of Fuyun Temple, Yanshan, who had been quietly observing, suddenly spoke in a soft voice, “Please, everyone, hold back.”
With a calm demeanor, Yanshan walked into the tense standoff, gently helped Xiaoya to her feet, and consoled her, “It’s alright now; don’t be afraid!”
After speaking, he turned to face the villagers, admitted to all the sins, and on that very night, the reputation of Fuyun Temple was utterly destroyed. The old head was so overcome with anger that he spat out a mouthful of blood and then fell unconscious.
The villagers, inflamed with rage, grabbed their poles and hoes and thoughtlessly smashed at Yanshan. That night, the people of Jialan Village broke over three hundred wooden sticks.
Miss Xiaoya, who had once been known as a shameless wretch, became a pitiable person seduced by a lecherous monk and thus escaped the fate of drowning.
From that day on, Fuyun Temple changed from a monastery that thrived on the fragrance of incense to a forsaken hermitage scarce visited by people. The warrior monks and attached monks whose offerings had since dwindled, cutting short their means of livelihood, had no choice but to leave Chaochang. Some began austere practices, while others sought a new abode, as the reputation of Zen in Chaochang had been thoroughly sullied.
The old abbot, unable to reverse the temple’s decline, sought out Yanshan on his deathbed, asking why he had admitted to the affair. Yanshan merely smiled.
That smile embodied the great love that sees passion as empty, as well as a living interpretation of the Dharma Body.
As if enlightened, the old abbot passed the mantle of Fuyun Temple’s abbotship to Yanshan just before drawing his last breath.
“Please find a master who can convey the true Dharma and glorify Fuyun Temple,” he said. “If you cannot find one, then let Fuyun scatter to the winds.”
From then on, the lecherous monk Yanshan became the abbot of Fuyun Temple. Whenever the people of Chaochang spoke of the temple beyond the city, they would spit out a glob of thick phlegm, as if lambasting the lecherous monk was the mark of a righteous person.
And the best way to cozy up to a Chaochang local was to start with a phrase like, “Do you know about that lecherous monk from Fuyun Temple?”
If you happened to encounter a native of Chaochang, all you needed to do was listen in one ear and out the other, occasionally interjecting with “Oh?” “Ah?” “Is that so?” “What a scoundrel!” and similar fillers, and you could carry on a conversation for a good half hour.
As a child who had grown up in Chaochang, Fatso naturally harbored no goodwill towards this lecherous monk, but who could defy an order from Brother Tian?
He had heard rumors that this so-called lecherous monk named Yanshan possessed some medical skills, and had even saved a few farmers who had fallen into ravines while gathering herbs. But in Fatso’s view, this was nothing more than a strategy to buy favor and atone for his sins.
Perhaps those herb collectors who had fallen into ravines had been shoved by Yanshan himself. How else could his arrival at the scene always be so timely?
Fatso never hesitated to ascribe the worst intentions to monks who used their good looks to deceive naive young girls.
Why should someone as kind-hearted, hardworking, and skilled in cooking as himself remain unmarried just because he was poor, while the other, merely because of his good looks, still attracted countless women to Fuyun Temple to offer incense, even after being labeled a lecherous monk?
Those women weren’t going to pray to Buddha—they were clearly going to meet that wild monk!
Running along the mountain path to Fuyun Temple, Fatso was drenched in sweat, his contorted features betraying exhaustion or perhaps jealousy.
Yet, treating Brother Tian’s words as a command, he raced to the mountain gate of Fuyun Temple at the fastest pace in his life, shouting desperately, “Master Yanshan, save us!!!”
Although it was a monastery rarely sought by visitors, the mountain gate of Fuyun Temple was spotlessly clean, with not even a fallen leaf in sight.
As the tightly closed doors opened, Yanshan, whose skin was clear as glaze and whose face was as handsome as a celestial being, stepped forward with a cup of water and, with a squinting smile, said, “Here, have some water. Catch your breath and take it easy. Who is it that needs saving?”
