Chapter 165: The Three Immortalities
Qin Mu was stunned, looking at Si Yunxiang, then at Granny Si beside him, his mind a bit muddled. He had always thought Granny Si was Si Yunxiang, and now another Si Yunxiang had appeared, and she was the current Saintess of the Heavenly Demon Cult!
His head was spinning now. This current Saintess was also surnamed Si. He had a preconceived notion, so he kept testing her to see if she was Granny Si, even deliberately teasing the Saintess a few times to see if she would blush!
It wasn't until the last time Si Yunxiang tested him that he confirmed Si Yunxiang was Granny Si. And now...
"This generation's Saintess is much safer than the last one. The previous Saintess was a demon."
An elder with white hair sighed deeply, "Even though they're both from the Si family, this Saintess doesn't cause trouble for our Holy Cult."
Granny Si glared at him.
That elder turned his head away, pretending not to see.
Si Yunxiang stepped forward, arriving beside Qin Mu, still with a hint of shyness. She gracefully bowed, "Young Cult Leader, Saintess Si Yunxiang greets the Young Cult Leader."
Qin Mu quickly returned the bow, saying, "Junior Sister, you're too polite."
"This Saintess is poised and generous."
An old man said with deep emotion, "Not like the previous one, who as a wife actually killed the Holy Cult Leader."
Granny Si was furious and shouted, "I'm still standing right here, you old fool, what do you want?"
That old man quickly shut his mouth, not daring to argue with her.
"Saintess Si Yunxiang is no pushover."
Qin Mu's eyes flickered as he looked at the seemingly delicate and shy girl beside him, thinking to himself, "Her mind is very deep. It should have been her who defeated the Buddha Heart and Buddha Son, and then she came to show off to me, to test my depth. She already knew I was the Young Cult Leader, yet she still showed off and tested me in front of me. What was her purpose?"
Granny Si laughed, "Yunxiang is from my Si family. The Patriarch personally taught her for a few years. He found you before he found her. When he later encountered her, he sighed and said that if he had met her earlier, he wouldn't have chosen you."
Qin Mu looked at Si Yunxiang, and just then Si Yunxiang also looked at him. Their eyes met, and Qin Mu saw a hint of unwillingness in her seemingly gentle gaze.
Qin Mu smiled slightly.
Si Yunxiang was probably cultivated by the Young Patriarch according to the rules for a Cult Leader, and then he had her take the Imperial Academy's great exam in the same year as Qin Mu, likely with the intention of comparing the two.
Qin Mu had never known that there was actually a competition between him and this girl.
Unfortunately, Qin Mu was too brilliant in the great exam, fighting his way from Lingyun Daoist all the way to the Emperor. No matter what Si Yunxiang did, she would be overshadowed by him; she couldn't possibly do anything more outstanding.
And then, in the subsequent Patriarch's exam, which tested Qin Mu's ability as a Cult Leader, after the exam, the Young Patriarch had made up his mind. His chosen candidate was not Si Yunxiang. Compared to her, Qin Mu was more suitable to be the Holy Cult Leader.
But Si Yunxiang probably wasn't convinced, so after defeating the Buddha Heart and Buddha Son, she came to show off and test Qin Mu.
The Young Patriarch looked around and said, "Has Heavenly King Qian not arrived yet?"
"Not yet."
The Young Patriarch frowned. Heavenly King Han was always a quick-tempered person, always the first to rush forward no matter what happened. His absence now meant he couldn't make it.
What could be more important than the Cult Leader's enthronement?
There was only one possible reason why Heavenly King Han didn't attend the Cult Leader's enthronement ceremony.
"Young Cult Leader, you must treat Heavenly King Han's descendants well in the future." The Young Patriarch said quietly.
Qin Mu's heart trembled. He was about to ask, but the Young Patriarch said in a deep voice, "Three hundred and sixty halls, unfurl the banners, assemble at Holy Sage Mountain!"
Shua.
One by one, large banners unfurled, completely covering the entire City Lord's Mansion. With a single unfurling and retracting of the banners, the City Lord's Mansion of Yongzhou City vanished without a trace. Where the City Lord's Mansion once stood, there was now only a patch of bare ground.
When the banners covering their heads disappeared, Qin Mu looked around and was greatly shocked. They had already left the bustling Yongzhou City and arrived at a place that didn't seem like the mortal world.
Here, the sky was a round dome above, the ground was square below. It was a mountain peak standing in a place of nothingness, not touching the sky above, nor the earth below.
The green mountains were lush, but looking up, there was no sun; looking down, there was no earth. This mountain seemed as if it wasn't in the human world at all.
"Is this Holy Sage Mountain?"
Qin Mu looked around. He saw overlapping peaks and ridges, with palaces hidden deep in the mountain forest, probably halls built by the Holy Cult. However, the Young Patriarch didn't lead them to that hall but came to a pine and cypress tree.
The pine and cypress were lush and green, having existed in the world for who knows how many years. Under the tree was a thatched cottage, very clean, showing no signs of decay over the passage of time.
There was also a large stone under the pine and cypress. The Young Patriarch came beneath the tree. The three hundred and sixty hall masters, twelve Cult-Protecting Elders, eight Supervisory Envoys, three Town-Cult Heavenly Kings, and the Left and Right Dharma-Protecting Envoys each sat in their lower seats.
The Young Patriarch signaled Qin Mu to come forward and said, "This mountain was originally in the human world. Back then, the founding patriarch of our Heavenly Sage Cult came here and saw a woodcutter chopping wood. He was chopping this very pine and cypress. The woodcutter swung his axe to chop the pine and cypress, his movements orderly, seeming to contain infinite profound principles within them. And the pine and cypress, after being struck by the axe, would grow back a piece, returning to its original state. The founding patriarch knew he had encountered a sage, so he asked the woodcutter for guidance. That woodcutter taught him right here under this pine and cypress tree. The teaching lasted for decades. The founding patriarch gained endless insights, but was still unsatisfied. So he asked the woodcutter, 'How does one become a sage?'"
Qin Mu listened carefully. The Young Patriarch paused and continued, "The woodcutter said, 'To become a sage, one must establish virtue, establish merit, and establish words—the three establishments, the three immortalities.' The founding patriarch asked again, 'How does one achieve the three immortalities?' The woodcutter said, 'Understand principle, understand knowledge, understand teaching—the three understandings, the teacher of ten thousand people.' Then the founding patriarch achieved great enlightenment."
The Young Patriarch looked up at this pine and cypress that had weathered the vicissitudes of time: "The founding patriarch knew that to become a sage, he must first become a teacher of ten thousand people through the three understandings. So he compiled the sage's teachings, organized them into chapters, and compiled them into a record, which is what the outside world calls the Great Cultivation Heavenly Demon Sutra."
"The founding patriarch wrote the Great Cultivation Heavenly Demon Sutra, achieving the understanding of principle."
"Then he traveled the world for several hundred years, passing on the principles taught by the sage to others. The principles taught by the sage, after he passed them on to others, became his own principles. 'One mouth speaks to your ear, your mouth speaks to another's ear'—this is knowledge. The founding patriarch achieved the understanding of knowledge."
"As for the understanding of teaching, the founding patriarch established a sect, grateful to the woodcutter for pointing the way, so he called it the Heavenly Sage Cult and established its doctrines. 'The way of the sage is no different from the daily needs of the common people; anything different is heresy! Acting according to one's nature, purely following the natural, is called the Way.' This is the fundamental doctrine of our sect."
Below, the various hall masters, Dharma protectors, and elders, although they were all high-ranking members of the Heavenly Demon Cult, most of them were experiencing a Cult Leader's enthronement for the first time. Even the Cult-Protecting Elders and Town-Cult Heavenly Kings weren't too familiar with this history.
They had originally thought the Cult Leader's enthronement required some earth-shattering ceremony, but they didn't expect the Young Patriarch to tell the story of the sect's founding.
They had occasionally seen some records of the legendary stories about this founding patriarch in the sect's texts, but only glimpses, not as detailed and moving as the Young Patriarch's account.
"Understanding teaching—'teaching' here means imparting and educating. The founding patriarch established the sect to pass on the sage's teachings to the people of the world. He achieved the three understandings—understanding principle, understanding knowledge, understanding teaching—and achieved establishing virtue and establishing words. But he failed to establish merit and did not become a sage." ①
The Young Patriarch said, "In his later years, he thought long and hard, but didn't know where merit lay. Although the founding patriarch never became a sage, he established words for the sage, founded a sect himself, and achieved perfect virtue and conduct. With the three understandings and two establishments and two immortalities, he had already surpassed countless mediocre people. Qin Mu, are you willing to inherit the virtue and words, the principle and knowledge of the founding patriarch?"
Qin Mu bowed, clasping his hands and extending them forward: "Your disciple is willing."
The Young Patriarch smiled and said, "Then the teaching is yours. You must bear it."
Qin Mu said in a deep voice, "Your disciple will bear it."
The Young Patriarch smiled slightly and said, "Sit on the stone."
Qin Mu stepped forward and sat on the stone under the pine and cypress.
The Young Patriarch looked down and said in a deep voice, "This stone is the Sage's Stone, the Sage's Seat. The woodcutter who guided the founding patriarch was a sage who descended from heaven. He had no blood relation or vested interest with the patriarch. The patriarch simply sought the Way, and he became his teacher, imparting his skills to the founding patriarch. The one who sits on this Sage's Stone is the Cult Leader, but also the Holy Teacher of our sect."
His gaze swept over each hall master, Cult-Protecting Elder, Supervisory Envoy, Heavenly King, and Dharma-Protecting Envoy, and he said in a deep voice, "All of you, observe the disciple's etiquette and pay respects to the Holy Teacher."
The three hundred and sixty hall masters, twelve Cult-Protecting Elders, eight Supervisory Envoys, three Town-Cult Heavenly Kings, and the Left and Right Dharma-Protecting Envoys all performed the disciple's etiquette. Saintess Si Yunxiang hesitated for a moment, then also had to perform the disciple's etiquette.
"Your disciples pay respects to the Holy Cult Leader!"
Their voices rang out in unison, echoing through Holy Sage Mountain.
The Young Patriarch looked at Granny Si and said in a deep voice, "Li Tianxing, the new Cult Leader has been enthroned. Why haven't you shown yourself? Why haven't you passed on our sect's techniques? Are you going to take our sect's sacred arts into the coffin and bury them forever?"
Granny Si's body trembled slightly, and an old, hoarse voice came from her mouth: "Your disciple... obeys the teacher's decree."
Although she was a woman, her voice now sounded like an old man's, very rough, and carried a kind of extremely domineering authority, though she didn't dare to be presumptuous in front of the Young Patriarch.
Granny Si came before Qin Mu. Qin Mu was about to stand up, but Granny Si's palm was already pressed against his forehead. Golden light flickered from between Granny Si's brows, and at the same time, various sounds emerged from the golden light, drilling into Qin Mu's brow and into his mind.
"Cult Leader Li..." someone below whispered.
At this moment, the one occupying Granny Si's body was the previous Cult Leader, Li Tianxing. Although he had been ambushed by Granny Si, he had also planted himself within Granny Si's Dao heart, becoming her inner demon, waiting for the right moment to take over and become the woman he loved most.
In Qin Mu's mind, various sounds were chaotic and complex, as if a god was preaching from beyond the nine heavens, a demon was whispering in his ear, and a Buddha was chanting sutras in his heart—indescribably strange.
"The voice of a sage?"
His heart trembled slightly, and a possibility suddenly occurred to him. This voice was the voice of the woodcutter. What Cult Leader Li was passing on to him was the scripture that the woodcutter had taught when he imparted the Dharma to the founding patriarch!
Note ①: The three understandings and three establishments originate from the couplet at the entrance of Wang Yangming's former residence: "Establishing virtue, establishing merit, and establishing words—truly the three immortalities; Understanding principle, understanding knowledge, and understanding teaching—the teacher of ten thousand people." This phrase was used by the ancients to describe a sage.