Chapter 62 — Damaging Your Hidden Merit
The Herdsman of the Wasteland · Page 1 of 3
"Ruin your cultivation?
Ruin your merit? " Shen Mu sneered, slashing at the other chains. "You are merely a bronze-cast Buddha image—what merit could you have?
Your merit lies in suppressing Sang'e here, yet when Sang'e devours people before your very eyes, you do nothing. If you ever had any merit, it would have been squandered long ago! " The great Buddha's body shook; the blood-red patterns on its bronze body burst forth in beams of light, reflected by the outer gold leaf, turning it into a glittering golden Buddha.
In a hollow, muffled voice it said, "Do you know how many people it will devour, how many living beings it will destroy, once you release it?
" "All I know is that behind you it has hidden countless bones and used you to commit evil. I have not seen you do anything. " Shen Mu severed the second chain and sneered, "Outside is the ice flood, erupting several times every year—what have you done? That would be merit.
It is not merit to sit in a temple and suppress a demon, still less to allow it to devour people. If you were to smash the ice flood and save the common folk downstream, then you would have great merit!
" The Buddha statue shone with golden light, and its hands moved, as if about to come alive.
Sang'e was terrified and cried out hastily, "This old bald donkey is an evil Buddha!
He wants to refine me to death—hurry!
" Shen Mu's feet flew as he darted out of the temple, urging the Chubao sword to slash at the chains outside. "The evil of all sentient beings must be washed away by a great flood before they can shed their wickedness.
This is the fruit caused by their own causes.
" Boom.
A violent tremor came; the bronze Buddha stood up, its head smashing through the ancient temple, its voice shaking heaven and earth: "You heretical demon, daring to destroy the Dharma! Obstinate sinful creature, beyond all deliverance! " At once the chains binding the Buddha's bronze body and Sang'e seemed to come alive, whistling through the air and whipping toward Shen Mu. "Your Buddhist doctrine saves people only to save yourselves, not for the sake of saving people—hypocrisy! " Shen Mu leapt aside to dodge a chain's coil, urged his Chubao sword to strike at the final chain, and said, "When you suppressed Sang'e back then, if you had killed it, that might count as your merit.
But instead you suppressed it and let it harm people.
Its devouring people is its own sin; the deeper its sin, the greater your merit in refining it?
Bah! The people devoured by Sang'e should all be accounted to you! " Clang! The Chubao sword clashed against the chain; a tremendous force came through the chain and sent the precious sword flying. Shen Mu gave a muffled grunt, stepped back to dodge two chains that lashed like black pythons behind him, and sneered, "You sit in the temple while floods reach the sky outside. Not only do you refuse to save people, you stop me from saving them—and still you dream of merit?
Let me tell you, the elders in my village go out every year to fight the ice flood, saving the common folk downstream and the birds and beasts, saving countless lives!
If merit were enough to become a Buddha, every one of them would already be a golden-body Great Buddha, not bronze-and-clay idols! " "Absurd!
" The bronze Buddha was towering and immense; it lifted its foot and set it down with a boom, stepped out of the ruined temple, pressed its palms together, and a sound of metal clashing rang out.
Instantly the Buddha-light blazed and sent Shen Mu flying. Every limb and bone of Shen Mu's body shook violently.
While he was still in midair, the chains came locking toward him. Shen Mu's feet repeatedly tapped on the chains as he raced along them, using his primal qi to drive the Chubao sword like a flash toward the last chain that bound Sang'e.
The chains, like enormous pythons, wove and crossed in midair, striking at Shen Mu in succession, dazzling the eye.