Chapter 128

After doing all of this, I snuck off to the mass grave on the back mountain to dig up my mother's corpse.

Thinking back on it now, I was truly stupid, wicked, and pathetic. Mother's body had been buried in the ground for seven or eight years; it had probably rotted down to a mere skeleton long ago. What would be the point of digging it up? Back then, my mind felt possessed. Driven by greed, I had turned into a beast completely devoid of reason.

Upon arriving at the desolate gravesite, something happened that filled me with both terror and anticipation. Large chunks of soil had been violently churned up, leaving a hollow the size of an adult woman in the ground. One glance was enough to tell that something had broken out of the earth from inside.

I realized with horror that the secret tome in the library pavilion really worked. The extra stars in the sky had heard my petition and answered me.

Of course, you modern people who study physics can calculate the terrifying amount of strength it would take for a human to climb out from two meters underground. Would that still be human? Although I didn't know the formulas back then, I still felt a faint sense of unease.

Looking down at the deep pit of churned earth, I saw a line of uneven footprints leading toward Longshu Temple. Feeling both excited and afraid, I followed them back. I was like a bratty kid who had snuck money from the adults' bookcase without permission to buy a super expensive Transformer.

"I will never forget that feeling of sin for the rest of my life."

Gao Tian thought, 'You're giving me too much credit.' As a genuine modern native, he had gone through twelve years of schooling and still had no idea how to calculate the strength required for a person to climb out of a two-meter-deep pit.

Of course, he didn't say it out loud. He simply remained quiet, listening as Yusheng continued.

Yusheng said, "Upon arriving at the gates of Longshu Temple, I knew something had happened. Looking over the outer wall, I saw the red maple trees inside shaking violently, as if a burly man stood beneath every single one, shaking it with all his might.

"Those dirt-stained footprints led straight to the temple entrance and across the threshold. My scalp went numb. I had no choice but to push the doors open and walk into the temple to face the wish I had so desperately longed for.

"What entered my sight was a middle-aged peasant woman whose body was still covered in dirt. One look was enough to tell she had just crawled out of a grave. It was exactly the Mother I had dreamed of night after night.

"At that moment, tears blurred my vision until I couldn't see anything clearly. Mother gave me a faint smile and opened her bloodstained arms. Just like when she used to return from working in the fields during my childhood, she motioned for me to come over. I threw myself forward, plunging into Mother's embrace, completely oblivious to the earth-shattering changes that had taken place throughout Longshu Temple."

Many years later, Yusheng had relived that terrifying scene upon returning to Longshu Temple within the Supernatural Zone.

Countless bloodstained corpses of gray-robed monks hung from rows of massive trees, swaying in the breeze. Those corpse-trees used humans as leaves, swinging them joyfully from side to side.

There were so many corpses, and the thick stench of blood was nauseating. Looking closely at the blood-red fallen leaves crunching underfoot, one could see they were actually severed limbs and broken arms. (See Volume 1, Chapter 69)

Yusheng continued, "Mother... My gentle Mother had slaughtered more than half the monks of Longshu Temple with effortless ease.

"Of the remaining monks, some went mad, some became delirious, and others were left crippled.

"Some knelt on the ground, slurring the Great Light Mantra to exorcise demons and suppress evil. They hoped the Buddha would bless them and bring the Great Light down to the mortal realm to banish the wicked spirits.

"Others, their courage completely shattered, violated Buddhist precepts by crawling into the dark hole behind the main hall's largest Buddha statue to hide inside its belly. They hoped to escape the calamity by acting like ostriches and burying their heads.

"And there were other senior brothers—"

Viscous liquid rolled down from the eye sockets of Yusheng's hideous face, making it impossible to tell for a moment whether it was tears or blood. "Even in death, they never knew that the monster who slaughtered half of Longshu Temple was brought there by me.

"Master spent years away from the temple suppressing Fierce Ghosts. Those senior brothers simply assumed this 'woman' was some unclean evil spirit he had failed to fully deal with outside, coming to Longshu Temple for revenge.

"My mother had died ten years prior and had only crossed paths with many of the senior brothers once. Naturally, they didn't recognize her face.

"When several senior brothers saw 'Mother' calling me over and even hugging me, they must have thought this Fierce Ghost had cast some mind-bewitching trick to control my body. They immediately let out furious roars and charged forward brandishing their Supernatural Items, yelling for me to run.

"Hearing the commotion behind her, 'Mother' merely turned her head slowly, her neck bending at a sheer 180-degree angle to glance back at them.

"Then, she opened her mouth. Her lower jaw tore open at an impossible angle, stretching wider than her entire face to reveal layers of jagged, interlocking teeth: human incisors, carnivore fangs, and herbivore cheek teeth."

That brief scene, which lasted less than five seconds, was etched into Yusheng's heart for a full thousand years. Later, after entering modern society and studying dentistry, he could even accurately identify the different classifications of teeth inside 'Mother's' mouth.

"Then, she let out a noise that sounded like a mixture of a wolf's howl, a lion's roar, a tiger's snarl, and the furious, terrified screams of a human.

"The sound was so chaotic that it was impossible to distinguish which animal's cry she was imitating. But if heard from a distance, the deep rumble mixed with unintelligible, piercing shrieks sounded a bit like... a bear's roar."

A bear's roar.

Gao Tian's blood felt as if it had half-frozen.

None of the anomalies that occurred in Longshu Temple had happened without reason.

All the inexplicable puzzle pieces were slowly coming together to form a massive, eerie, and indescribable picture.

Yusheng said, "After those terrifying waves of sound, every living person in Longshu Temple died, except for me.

"I don't know why that thing—that entity possessing the exact likeness of my mother when she was alive—spared only me. Perhaps, being created in the image of my real mother, she still retained a trace of love for me. Or perhaps the stars in the sky simply kept their word and fulfilled my wish to the best of their ability.

"Death arrived so suddenly. Many of the surviving monks didn't even realize they were already dead.

"Those monks sitting on the ground chanting scriptures continued to meaninglessly open and close their mouths even after becoming corpses. Many years later, with maggots wriggling in and out of their rotting flesh, they were still murmuring Buddhist texts.

"Even after Master carried their bodies out of Longshu Temple and buried them, their vague, slurred murmurs could still be heard upon returning to the temple. Their lingering spirits refused to disperse.

"The monks who had hidden inside the giant Buddha in their panic stubbornly refused to come out, even after dying within it. They truly believed the great Buddha possessed the divine power to protect them.

"Though there was really nothing left to protect anymore. They were all ghosts."

After listening to Yusheng's account, Gao Tian understood a small detail.

The starving ghost monks inside the Buddha statue had been dead from the very beginning. They hadn't died after entering the time loop.

However, it didn't matter. This minor misconception hadn't stopped the four-person temple exploration team from finding a way out and surviving past ten o'clock.

Yusheng continued, "After killing the others, the monster who looked just like Mother kept holding me gently, motioning for me to leave with her.

"I regretted it. I knew the thing that had returned was not my mother at all. I was scared witless. My legs numb, I simply followed her, stepping away from Longshu Temple and its corpse-littered grounds.

"Not long after, Master returned from exorcising demons in a nearby town. I don't know whether it was fortunate or unfortunate, but he didn't run directly into 'Mother' upon her return.

"I didn't witness what happened next with my own eyes. I only roughly deduced it through speculation and corroborating conversations with Master.

"Upon entering the temple, Dharma Master Jingming was thrown into a state of immense panic, realizing the centuries-old ancient temple had suffered a great catastrophe. At that time, he still didn't realize the severity of the situation. He thought it was a supernatural incident he had suppressed in the past that hadn't been fully dealt with, allowing some filthy creature to escape and seek revenge. He was still blaming himself.

"Seeing the corpses of the monks still chanting scriptures, he dragged them to the graveyard, burned them, and buried them. Although this couldn't completely release my senior brothers from the agony of becoming Fierce Ghosts, it could at least offer them a little relief.

"As for the monks trapped inside the great Buddha, Master knew that releasing them would just trigger another supernatural incident.

"He could only comfort them, telling them he was leaving the temple for a while and that they absolutely must not come out while he was gone. He used this method to keep them pacified.

"Of course, it was only meant to be a stopgap measure at the time. He never expected that after leaving on that day, he wouldn't return for an entire thousand years. And the senior brothers waiting inside the Buddha's belly ended up waiting on that exact same day for a thousand years as well.

"Master still had an even more important matter to attend to.

"It wasn't just to track down the Fierce Ghost that had slaughtered Longshu Temple and stop it from going down the mountain to harm people. Even more so, it was because while counting the corpses of all the senior and junior brothers in the temple, he discovered that only my body was missing.

"Perhaps, at that moment, Master had already faintly guessed the truth and begun to realize the gravity of the problem. He didn't blame me. He simply rushed to prepare all the Supernatural Items he had accumulated over his lifetime. Following the footprints outside Longshu Temple, he gave chase.

"At the Stargazing Platform in the wilderness, I, 'Mother,' and Master finally met.

"At that time, 'Mother' held onto me and brought me to the Stargazing Platform. Raising her hand to point at the sky, she told me that above this starry expanse, there were many, many good friends just like her. I was the one who had awakened her and brought her to this place. She was very grateful, and now, she wanted me to continue making wishes to bring more stars down. 'This way, the entire village that was massacred by horse bandits back then—my father, older sister, uncle, the wealthy Wang who sold pork at the village entrance, Chunhua from next door, Zhuzi, Er Gou—all these people could come back to life. We could all live together happily ever after, forever and ever.'

"Wasn't this exactly what I had always wanted?

"If that scene at Longshu Temple hadn't happened, this proposal really would have tempted me. But after seeing 'Mother's' true face, I already knew she wasn't my biological mother at all. She was a monster—a monster wearing a human skin drenched in blood.

"Yet, I didn't dare defy this monster's gentle request. Just as I was trying to think of a way to stall for time, a furious roar like a clap of thunder came from behind me. Master had hurriedly arrived."