Chapter 3035 - The Threelives Buddha
Sandy winds rustled Su Yi’s clothes as he scanned the area countless times, but in the end, he found no worthwhile clues.
Had a battle been fought here, there’d have been ruins, fragmented treasures, pooled blood, chunks of corpses, and other such vestiges, but he saw nothing of the sort. It was as if the Aberrants’ territory had simply vanished overnight. All that remained was bleak, ruined earth.
Su Yi stood there for a while, his expression shifting and uncertain. Don’t tell me that a Heavenly Sovereign used some sort of unsurpassed divine ability to collect the entire Heavenly Aberrant Hidden Realm?
“My condolences, Fellow Daoist Su.” A benevolent voice drifted over on the wind.
Su Yi whipped around and saw a figure headed toward him, a young monk in snow-white robes. His whole body emanated an ethereal air as clear as glass.
The Dipankara Buddha! Or rather, the Threelives Buddha, as he’d fused with the Buddhas of the Present and Future. In doing so, he’d achieved a breakthrough in his pursuit of the Grand Dao.
He was a disciple of the Buddha of Non-Existence, and River Empress Peacock had once rescued him on her master’s account.
But the Threelives Buddha was obviously starkly different from before. With every step he took, a clear, glassy lotus bloomed in midair. When he passed, the lotuses vanished behind him, winking out of existence with ever-shifting, impermeable charm.
Su Yi felt intense pressure bearing down on him. This was the unique majesty of a Heavenly Sovereign!
“Did you do this?” asked Su Yi.
The Threelives Buddha came to a halt a thousand feet away, then shook his head. “I arrived one step too late for that. By the time I got here, it was already as you see it.”
He grinned. “Fortunately, I was able to cross paths with you here. To me, that’s already a stroke of good fortune.”
He stood beneath the light of the heavens in pristine white robes, calm, steady, and extraordinary. It wasn’t just his appearance; even his bearing and disposition were completely different from before.
Su Yi struggled to mentally connect him with the withered, stick-thin Dipankara Buddha he’d once known.
He was in no mood to respond to the Dipankara Buddha’s wistful sighs. “So you’re saying someone, a Heavenly Sovereign at the bare minimum, carried the entire hidden realm off?”
The Threelives Buddha nodded. “That’s most likely the case.”
Su Yi sighed. “I’m in a bad mood. If you want to fight, cut the crap and let’s get to it already.”
The Threelives Buddha’s eyes were calm and crystal clear. He stared at Su Yi for a while before whispering, “It’s been so long since we last saw each other. Aren’t you curious to know what I’ve been up to over the years, or how I became a Heavenly Sovereign?”
“We can talk after we fight, can’t we?” said Su Yi. The wooden sword, Nine in Third, floated into the air. Faint blue sword shadows flowed over the blade, and its sword force was as heavy as the divine mountains of the nine heavens.
When he took the sword in hand, Su Yi’s presence transformed.
The Threelives Buddha couldn’t help but look exasperated. “Fellow Daoist Su, I think of you as the type who wouldn’t so much as furrow his brow even when the heavens came crashing down around him, a man with rare, contemptuous pride even in the face of death. So why is it that now that we’ve been reunited, you...”
Boom!
Su Yi’s sleeves billowed around him as he swung his sword. Sword intent rumbled and boomed throughout the desolate landscape.
Naturally, the rest of the Threelives Buddha’s question went unsaid, but he didn’t lose his temper. He just stretched out his hand and pressed down.
A lotus bloomed between heaven and earth, and as it swayed, three thousand illusory worlds floated between its petals.
As terrifyingly strong as Su Yi’s slash was, the petals neutralized it. Even that shocking sword force was ground away.
“It’s just as the Heavenly Sovereigns said. When you fought in the Struggle for Heavenly Fate, you were already strong enough to shake Heavenly Sovereigns’ avatars of will,” the Threelives Buddha said with a sigh. “Such foundations are unparalleled. I could search the world and all of history without finding another like you.”
Back in the God Domain, when he was still the Dipankara Buddha, he and Su Yi clashed repeatedly. The two of them had long since gotten familiar with each other. Now, he was the Threelives Buddha of Spirit Mountain Buddhist Court, while Su Yi was famed throughout the Eternal Heavens Domain. They might have been irreconcilable enemies, but it was only natural that they’d feel rueful at being reunited.
But Su Yi was in no mood to chat. When his first strike missed, he simply launched a second one.
Sword qi flew through the air, shaking heaven and earth. Startling chasms opened in the sky.
The entire Great Aberrant Ruins were plunged into an atmosphere of collapse and upheaval.
The Threelives Buddha remained perfectly calm. His white robes billowed around him, and with every casual gesture, a lotus bloomed. Each seemed boundlessly vast, and they blocked one streak of sword qi after another.
“I’ve been lonely since my return to the Eternal Heavens Domain. It’s not exactly that I couldn’t find any opponents, but that none of them truly understood me.” The Threelives Buddha sighed as he clashed with Su Yi. “And each faction of the Far Shore is more conceited than the one before it. They’re truly loathsome. It’s only when I’m with you that I can pour my heart out freely. This, perhaps, was what is meant to truly understand another. We might be enemies, but that does nothing to diminish our mutual appreciation.”
Kaboom!
Su Yi attacked with increased intensity, with the force of an avalanche or tidal wave. Nine in Third’s sword force was utterly shocking. Yet it was useless against the Threelives Buddha. The white-robed monk’s power was simply transcendent, every movement seamless and perfect. Every casual strike ground away all of Su Yi’s power.
Anyone else would have given in to helplessness by now, but Su Yi didn’t even seem to notice. He was still fighting!
The Threelives Buddha said, “I know you’re trying to trick me. You want me to believe that in your current state, you’re unworthy of caution. Then, you hope to unleash your killer weapon and catch me off guard.”
He shook his head. “You might pull it off, but there’s no way you can defeat me.”
Su Yi had been silent all this time, but he finally couldn’t take it anymore. “Since when were you such a chatterbox?”
The Threelives Buddha couldn’t help but laugh. “It’s just as you think: I’m stalling for time. My true body will be here soon. I’m just trying to keep you here until then.”
A thoughtful look appeared on his face. “It won’t be much longer, ten minutes at most.”
He spoke openly and forthrightly, not hiding a thing.
Su Yi’s eyes narrowed. “I knew it. You shouldn’t have come out into the open. You should have just waited until your true body got here, then let him attack me.”
The Threelives Buddha looked exasperated. “But if I hadn’t shown myself, you might have just left. What would I have done then?”
As the two of them conversed, the aftershock of their clash overturned heaven and earth. The sun and moon lost their luster.
Terrifying sword qi swept outward, triggering strange and unbelievable phenomena beneath the dome of heaven.
But the sword qi and strange phenomena quickly faded away, as the swaying lotuses ground them into nothingness.
The Threelives Buddha sighed. “We can’t cause too much of a disturbance. If we draw Heavenly Sovereign Wen over, it’ll ruin our one-on-one duel.”
He suddenly seemed to realize something. “Fellow Daoist, are you perhaps attacking with such ferocity because you hope to draw Heavenly Sovereign Wen’s attention?”
Su Yi shook his head. “You’re jumping to conclusions. Given my strength, there’s no need for me to play such petty tricks.”
“Truly?” said the Threelives Buddha.
“If you don’t believe me, I’ll just have to broaden your horizons!” said Su Yi, suddenly charging forward.
His aura suddenly transformed as he used Seizing Destiny to borrow the power of River Ancestor Ji Dian’s true name.
The Threelives Buddha’s expression shifted, and his brow furrowed. His hands formed seals, and he drew on the full extent of his strength.
Boom!
A Buddhist mountain appeared in midair, glowing with far-reaching, holy light. Chanting rumbled like thunder, echoing throughout heaven and earth. The mountain suddenly expanded until it was endlessly, immeasurably grand, then descended ruthlessly onto the world below.
Time and space seemed to shatter beneath it. The boundaries between the past, present, and future were overturned completely. It was terrifying to the extreme.
When Su Yi swung his sword, that endlessly grand, towering mountain actually managed to block his strike head-on.
“I get it now. You’re borrowing a River Ancestor’s power. It’s no wonder your presence suddenly expanded like that,” the Threelives Buddha said with a laugh. “Unfortunately for you, this is the Eternal Heavens Domain. Here, River Ancestors are suppressed by the ambient power of the Laws. They’re no match for Heavenly Sovereigns under these circumstances.”
But before his voice had even finished echoing through the air, his smile froze in place.
A massive, indistinct abyss appeared, blanketing heaven and earth as if intent on burying all of creation.
The Buddhist mountain was enormous and grand, yet seemed as minuscule as a speck of dust by comparison.
The mountain was instantly swallowed up, while invisible pressure bore down on the Threelives Buddha. It was as if a giant hand had seized him, intent on dragging him into that ethereal abyss.
His heart was instantly solemn, and his voice boomed like spring thunder as he unleashed a divine ability he typically kept in reserve.
His whole body erupted with dazzling light, illuminating the nine heavens. His imposing majesty instantly expanded.
But it was then that an explosion went off in his mind, leaving him seeing stars. It was as if a blazing sun had slammed into his heart.
For all his usual calm, and as strong as his heart was, this blow dealt massive damage. His vital energy circulation stagnated, and the ability he was about to use collapsed as he was flung uncontrollably toward the abyss.
At a critical juncture, he bit through the tip of his tongue, and his whole body caught ablaze. He broke through his fetters, then shot forth like an arrow loosed from a bow, hurtling through the air and retreating several hundred thousand feet.
But he’d only just steadied himself on his feet when he took another heavy blow to the heart. It was as if sword qi had cleaved into it. The agony was such that his whole body convulsed, and he staggered on his feet, almost toppling from the sky.
Meanwhile, Su Yi shot explosively towards him.
Boom!
Su Yi swung Nine in Third with all his might, not hesitating in the slightest. Its wooden blade billowed with terrifying sword force.