Nightfall

Ning Que stood up and looked a little stunned. Then he spat out some blood. The wall was immediately covered with blood. The blood-stained meditation room originally had gray walls. The shadow was also covered with blood since it was on the wall.

The shadow put its hands together devoutly, as if it was joyful. Then it turned around and walked into the depths of the blood and gradually disappeared.

Seeing this, Ning Que suddenly felt very sad, for it seemed that he would never see the shadow again.

The shadow disappeared, and then the gray wall gradually disappeared. It turned out that the wall was fake. He looked back at the candle on the table, and the candle was fake too. He looked at the wooden door of the meditation room. It turned out that the door and the threshold were all fake.

Looking at the roof of the meditation room, his eyes passed through the beams to look at the gray sky.

The meditation room was fake and the temple was fake too. Then what about Chaoyang City? What about the sky?

Ning Que opened the wooden door of the meditation room and walked out. At this time, the clouds in the sky suddenly dispersed, revealing the sun. The world became very clear, and the White Tower and the clear lake were picturesque.

The sun shone on Ning Que’s face and he squinted his eyes slightly. The clouds appeared on the sky again, covering the sun. Then a cold autumn rain was wetting the picturesque tower and lake.

Sangsang was not outside the meditation room. She should be looking up the sky by the lake like she always did in the past years.

Ning Que walked towards the lake, and he looked calm as if he had been relieved.

Monk Qingban stood by the lake to shelter himself from the rain. Seeing the expression on Ning Que’s face, he was a little stunned at first and then became happy, “Elder brother, are you enlightened?”

Ning Que looked at the silly monk and said, “Yes.”

Monk Qingban opened his eyes open and asked eagerly, “What have you learned from the enlightenment?”

Ning Que answered, “All of these are fake.”

Monk Qingban didn’t understand, and he repeated subconsciously, “All these are fake?”

“Yes.” Standing by the lakeside, Ning Que looked at the White Tower that was being washed by the autumn rain and said, “This tower is fake, and the rain falling on the tower is also fake.”

“The lake is fake too.” He pointed to the lake in front of him and then continued, “The temple is fake, the city is fake, the country is fake, the people are fake, the snow covering the Languan was fake, and the seventy-two temples in the rain are fake too.”

Monk Qingban scratched his ears and cheeks in embarrassment, for he couldn’t understand what Ning Que meant but was anxious to understand. All of a sudden, he remembered one thing and took a steamed bun from his Kasaya.

“I am real.” While saying this, Monk Qingban took a bite of the steamed bun and chewed roughly and said, “I am eating the steamed bun, so it has to be real too.”

Ning Que looked at him, revealing compassion in his eyes. But he said nothing.

Monk Qingban pointed at the lake in front of him and the White Tower on the other side of the lake, and cried gloomily, “I can see all these. How can you be fake? You are just being unreasonable.”

Ning Que stared at him in silence for a long time and then said, “You are also fake.”

Monk Qingban looked at him with ignorance and didn’t understand what he was talking about.

Ning Que explained, “In fact, you have been dead for many years. The monks in the temple say that you have innate intelligence, which is of course not wrong, for you were a great monk of Buddhism in your past life. But unfortunately, you were killed not long after you began to cultivate Buddha Dharma. Otherwise you might have become a powerful monk with great virtue in the Xuankong Temple.”

Monk Qingban was a little confused, “I was killed? Who killed me?”

Ning Que looked at him calmly and answered, “I did.” “Your name is Daoshi. Your mother was the sister of the king of the Yuelun Kingdom, and was called Quni Madi. Tour father was Master Baoshu, the Chief Monk of the Commandment Hall in the Xuankong Temple. Because I had insulted your mother, you came to Chang’an to find me after you left the Xuankong Temple and made your name in seventy-two temples in Yuelun Kingdom. Then I killed you.”

He continued. “Later, in order to avenge your death and of course also to suppress the daughter of Invariant Yama, your father left the Xuankong Temple, taking the Ullam Bell with him to set up a trap with Qi Nian. But the Academy saw through and coped with the trap, so your father was killed by the Academy, which was practically the same as being killed by me.”

“Then Sangsang and I fled to Chaoyang City and were surrounded by countless followers and powerful masters from Buddhism and Taoism in the White Tower Temple. Your mother Quni Madi was practicing Buddhism here back then and was taken hostage by me. I was prepared to let her go after I got through the siege, but for some reason I killed her at last.” Ning Que looked at Monk Qingban and said calmly, “I killed you and your whole family.”

“But…but why did you kill me and my family?” Monk Qingban did not listen carefully to Ning Que, and he only felt very confused, “Besides, my name is Qingban, not Daoshi. Have you mistakened me for another person?”

Ning Que answered, “Qingban is Daoshi. They’re the same.”

“You are just telling jokes now.” Monk Qingban smiled and said, “My name is Qingban. When the abbot was playing mahjong one night many years ago, he was planning to play the strategy of Qingban but threw out the wrong tile for he was distracted by my crying. So, he gave the name Qingban to me to mark the mistake.”

Ning Que stopped talking. Since he does not believe me, why should I bother to explain further?

Monk Qingban was not willing to give up. He followed Ning Que and kept asking, “How can you prove it?”

Sangsang sat by the lakeside to look up the sky this whole time, hearing clearly what the two had been talking about. She turned back and looked at Ning Que with a confused look, for she didn’t understand what Ning Que meant either.

Ning Que didn’t need to prove anything to Monk Qingban, but he must make Sangsang believe that the whole place was fake. It was the way for her to really wake up and leave this place.

“In which direction is Chang’an located?” Ning Que asked.

Sitting by the lake, Sangsang pointed to the east.

He untied the arrow casket and assembled the iron bow in a short period of time. Then he drew the bow, fitted the arrow to the bow and aimed at the direction to which Sangsang pointed. When the bow string was like a full moon, he released the arrow.

A round white turbulence appeared at the end of the arrow, and the dark iron arrow disappeared in the lake. There was no response at all for a long time.

“See? Like I said, these are all fake.” Ning Que said.

Sangsang asked, “Why?”

Ning Que answered, “The Academy would know that I have shot the iron arrow if Chang’an was really there.”

Sangsang thought for a while and said, “Then?”

Ning explained, “My Eldest Brother still has not come after such a long time, which indicates that Eldest Brother is not in this world. Thus, the world must be fake.”

Sangsang was confused and then asked, “Are you sure that Li Manman would come?”

Ning Que replied, “Of course. He came back then and he will come now.”

Sangsang did not respond.

Ning Que pointed to the lake and the White Tower and said, “The lake and the White Tower came to the Xuankong Temple before we entered the chessboard. Why are they here now?”

Sangsang said, “We left Xuankong Temple. The lake and White Tower can come back with us.”

Ning Que’s arrow and words couldn’t convince her, for she had not waken up yet, or she was just not willing to wake up. She quietly looked at the sky that was reflected on the surface of the lake.

“Actually…I don’t want to wake up either. I was very upset and even very scared when I woke up. I felt cold and even vomited a lot of blood.” Walking to her, Ning Que sat down beside her and held her hands gently. He looked at the sky and said, “Although the world is fake, we have been really happy these years, especially the first few years. I can’t bear to part with all these wonderful days.”

Sangsang leaned against his shoulder and looked very sad.

Ning Que touched the little white flower in her hair gently and asked, “Do you think the sky is beautiful?”

Sangsang nodded slightly.

Ning Que said, “You think the sky is very familiar, so you like to look at it?”

Looking at the gray and high sky, Sangsang clearly knew the answer but dared not to speak out.

Ning Que hesitated but continued to say, “You were born in the sky and grew up there. The sky is your home, so you feel that it is familiar to you. And it’s also the reason why you always want to go back.”

Hearing this, the sadness in Sangsang’s eyes gradually disappeared. She was now calm. And the lake which was disturbed by the autumn rain before gradually became calm too, revealing the clear sky.

As she blinked, the surface of the lake rippled.

The sky reflected in the lake had been cut into countless pieces of light and shadow, and the original appearance of the sky could no longer be found, turning into countless stars.

The lake evaporated and the White Tower disappeared. Since they were actually in Xuankong Temple, they couldn’t be in front of her.

As Sangsang looked at the sky, the rain clouds suddenly spread out, revealing the clear sky. But it was still not the sky Sangsang wanted to see. Several cracks suddenly appeared on the porcelain-like blue sky.

Just like a delicate porcelain was thrown to the ground, the sky was broken.

She had quietly watched the sky in the small courtyard and by the lakeside for hundreds of years. Now, with the help of Ning Que, she finally saw through the sky and caught a glimpse of the darkness and nothingness behind it.

Yes, the world is fake, or maybe it is real. But in any case, it is not my world. It is inside the chessboard and the world of Buddha.

She stood up slowly and held her hands behind her back.

Looking at the blue sky which suddenly turned into a dark sky, Monk Qingban was terrified. He clutched Ning Que’s sleeves and asked in a trembling voice, “Elder Brother, what’s wrong?”

Ning Que said, “We are leaving now. You go find a place to hide.”

Monk Qingban asked, “Where are you going?”

Ning Que said, “Outside.”

“Outside? Where is outside?” Monk Qingban looked at him and suddenly cried bitterly, “Does it mean that I am already dead?”

Ning Que said nothing.

Monk Qingban was crying nonstop. He tried to wipe the tears with his sleeves, but the tear just kept running.

Ning Que suddenly became solemn.

Monk Qingban wiped the tears with his sleeves, but the tear just kept running.

He wiped his face with the sleeves. As he kept wiping, his one eyebrow was gone, then his nose was gone, and then his eyes gone too.

He seemed to feel a little embarrassed, covering his face with the sleeve and requesting, “I don’t want you to go.”

Monk Qingban turned himself to a Phra Pidta.

He said he didn’t want Ning Que and Sangsang to go.

He won’t let Ning Que and Sangsang go.