Longevity, starting from raising chickens

"The plundering of spiritual energy here seems to be much stronger than in Daoshengzhou and Tupizhou."

In the quiet night sky, in the northwest direction, one can still see that half of the sky is covered by a layer of faint glazed golden light.

The strange and magnificent colors that cannot be described in words add a unique flavor to the night view of Xituozhou in the distance.

However, Wang Ba and Zhao Jie, who were standing in mid-air, both had gloomy expressions.

As they flew along, they could clearly sense an invisible force trying to penetrate their realm and draw out the massive amount of magic power hidden in their souls.

Although this invisible force was not a threat to them, the problem was that this pulling force became more and more obvious as they got closer to Xitaozhou.

"But Xitaozhou has never had such a situation before..."

Zhaojie felt the pulling force outside the Dao Realm and his face was full of confusion.

Wang Ba was silent for a moment, thinking back to the abnormalities of Daoshengzhou and Tupizhou, but he already had some guesses in his mind:
"It should be related to the great flood... I remember that the source of the great flood was near Xituozhou?"

Zhaojie nodded upon hearing this:
"That's right. It's just to the north of Xituozhou... Let's go to the Great Wheel Buddha Kingdom first, get the Ten Thousand Buddhas Relics Pagoda, and then continue north. With our speed, we can arrive in about half a day. We might as well go and take a look then."

Wang Ba did not refuse. He was really curious about the source of the flood that indirectly caused turmoil in the entire Xiaocang world. However, he knew in his heart that now that the flood had receded, he was afraid that the eye of the real membrane had already been healed.

"But where does this force that pulls on spiritual energy and magic power come from?"

With such doubts in mind, the two soon arrived above Xitaozhou.

"Fortunately, it's not like Daoshengzhou."

Zhaojie glanced at the endless mountains, plains and deserts before him and couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief.

What he was most worried about was the sinking of Xituozhou, and the second was that there were still many continents like Daoshengzhou that were still submerged in water.

But at the moment, it seems that at least the two things he was most worried about did not happen.

In his joy, he did not forget the etiquette of being the host and quickly invited Wang Ba:
"Tanyue, let's go down and take a look."

"The old monk's Buddhist kingdom is not far from here."

Wang Ba was also a little curious when he heard this:
"Master, do you also have a Buddhist kingdom?"

"Haha, you don't know that all the Buddha countries in Xituozhou are actually derived from the Great Wheel Buddha Country. Because of the different karma and thoughts of each person, many schools have been born. Some of these schools are feasible, while others are not. For those who are feasible, as long as they achieve the "Nascent Soul" fruition mentioned by you, they can receive a city from the Buddha of the Great Wheel Buddha Country, practice their own ideas, and achieve a Buddha country."

Zhaojie explained carefully:
"However, the Buddha Kingdom will not always exist. When the debate fails or the younger generation can no longer achieve the 'Nascent Soul' stage, the Buddha Kingdom will be taken back by the Buddha and given back to those who have attained enlightenment."

"It is said that at the peak, our Xituo Continent had 100,000 Buddhist kingdoms at the same time, and the number of monk kings at the level of incarnation was countless. It's a pity that now..."

Thinking of his past glory, the old monk couldn't help but sigh.

Wang Ba subconsciously thought of a sentence:

Whose ancestors haven’t been rich?

The same is obviously true for Xitazhou.

Thinking of this, he couldn't help but look forward to it even more.

The two of them walked and talked at a very fast pace. Not long after, after crossing a snowy mountain, Zhao Jie paused slightly and pointed downward with a look of surprise:

“This is Master Ci Jue’s Brahmayan Buddha Kingdom. I didn’t expect it to still be there!”

Wang Ba looked in the direction of the ring and saw a khaki city standing in the snow-capped mountains below.

This city is obviously quite old. The walls have been eroded by the sea water and have peeled off a lot, with the loess inside the walls exposed in many places.

The Buddha statues standing on the walls have lost their spiritual energy and have been completely changed by the baptism of sea water and time, and their appearance is almost unrecognizable. Fallen Buddha statues and heads can be seen everywhere in the city, but some details have been erased by the wind and sand.

What surprised Wang Ba was that, although there were no monks in the city, there were still mortals living here.

Although there were not many people, most of them were dressed simply and had calm expressions. They walked and talked slowly in the city.

Even when buying and selling, they were neither hurried nor slow, chatting and laughing.

Compared with the bustling scene of people in Daoshengzhou rushing about, the people in the city here are more relaxed and peaceful.

"It's a small country with few people, living and working in peace and contentment. If there is no foreign invasion, it is not a bad thing for the people here."

Wang Ba said sincerely.

As for Dao Shengzhou's future, he had personally experienced it in his previous life. The improvement of many skills not only failed to allow mortals to escape from the complicated mundane affairs, but made mortals more exhausted and difficult to get rid of.

He did not comment on the many reasons; it was simply human nature.

But now he thought that if he were still a mortal, he would prefer to live in this city, with a pure heart and few desires, but also be able to be free.

Of course, there is no permanent paradise in the world. If there is, there must be someone to shelter it from the wind and rain.

Therefore, this thought can only remain as an idea in the end.

Zhao Jie sighed:

"A hundred miles from here, there is a temple with a reclining statue of the Buddha entering Nirvana, which is over a thousand feet tall. In the past, when Master Ci Jue was alive, he would often hold unrestricted conferences here, donating all the treasures from the national treasury. Lay people and monks would debate the sutras here without any hindrance, without distinction between superiors and inferiors, and everyone would express their own opinions. It was a very lively time, and it was the happiest time for us."

"It's a pity that the great flood reached this place, and Master Ci Jue happened to have passed away, so everyone was too busy to take care of themselves..."

Speaking of painful things, he seemed to recall the tragic scene of the great flood in the past, and his expression became gloomy for a moment.

Upon hearing this, Wang Ba couldn't help but yearn for it.

The Unrestricted Assembly does not mean that people do not wear clothes, but that they do not have any worries and fully debate their own ideas. No one here cares about whether what is said is good or evil, right or wrong, but only seeks the pleasure of expressing one's true feelings, without being punished for what they say, nor being punished for what they say.

The great monk king sat and discussed Buddhism with ordinary lay people and monks, which shows how open and peaceful the atmosphere here was in the past.

Of course, everything has its pros and cons. Perhaps it is precisely because there is a lack of fighting that the monks here have become lazy in their practice and are not good at fighting.

Once a major change occurs, it is very easy to be overwhelmed by past laxity and it is difficult to regroup.

The two of them sighed and fell into the ancient city below one after the other.

When the people in the ancient city saw Wangba and Zhaojie coming from the sky, they were so shocked that they knelt on the ground and saluted.

But there was not much fear on their faces, some even showed curiosity.

Zhaojie asked, and to his surprise, although the language used by the people here was slightly different from his, they could still communicate normally.

After some inquiries, the two of them also had a general understanding of the situation in Xitaozhou in recent years.

It turned out that during the great flood, the monks on Xituozhou either stayed or left due to their different ideas. Those who left joined forces with the monks from Tupizhou and Daoshengzhou and crossed the sea to Fenglinzhou in the east.

This triggered a protracted dispute among the monks of the Three Continents and Fenglin Continent.

However, some monks felt guilty for not being able to take their people away, and some of them transformed themselves into Buddhas to stop the flood and buy time.

Some of them built ships, collected food, and led mortals to survive.

It was under such circumstances that Xituzhou was eventually submerged by a flood and sank into the sea, but a small number of ordinary people from Xituzhou were eventually preserved.

After drifting in the sea for a long time, these monks seemed to be eroded by invisible forces and died of old age.

It was not until all the monks died out that the ordinary people of Xitazhou, who had been wandering, surviving and multiplying in the sea for nearly two hundred years, finally waited for the day when the truth came out.

They left the ship and returned to the land, to the Buddhist city where their ancestors once lived.

Like Daoshengzhou, with the depletion of spiritual energy, the many methods passed down by monks are no longer useful. With the passage of time, the former Buddhas and monk kings have gradually become just legends.

Fortunately, there were many monks on the ship who taught them writing and scriptures, so the civilization of Xitaozhou was not cut off. Although there were no magical powers, the scriptures passed down still educated the people. They also continued to live according to the living habits of their ancestors, staying in the Buddhist kingdoms that had long lost the Buddha's light.

"So, not long after the flood, the spiritual energy here began to disappear..."

Wang Ba was keenly aware of this detail.

Zhao Jie's face was slightly condensed:

"If you count it this way, it should have been more than 700 years ago, when I had not yet broken through to the fifth level."

The two looked at each other and saw the seriousness in each other's eyes.

Neither of them had expected that the loss of spiritual energy had actually begun more than seven hundred years ago and had continued until today.

Zhao Jiegeng suddenly remembered something and his expression changed slightly:

"Also, I remember that among those who decided to stay, there were also several uncles and uncles with the surname Ci, and they were all fifth-level..."

Wang Ba's expression suddenly became serious, feeling the pervasive but not strong pulling force around him. He didn't care much about it before, but now he was on guard and said in a deep voice:

"These seniors may have exhausted their mana in the process of saving mortals, and they could not get any spiritual energy to replenish it, so they fell to a lower level and died of old age. Of course, it is also possible that they were indeed drained of all their mana by this external force..."

Zhaojie shook his head and said:
"Although the cultivation resources in Xituozhou were not abundant at that time, they could not be exhausted in a short period of time. I am afraid the latter is more likely."

After these words came out, both Zhaojie and Wangba looked more solemn. They were all fifth-rank monks. If this invisible pulling force could drain the Xituozhou Ci-generation monks, it might also drain them.

Thinking of this, Zhaojie originally wanted to stay here for a while, but now he no longer had interest. After using a little magic power to improve the health of the people in this Buddhist country, he did not even go to visit his former Buddhist country. Instead, he led Wang Ba and quickly flew straight to the location of the former Dalun Buddhist country.

The further north you go, the more obvious the glazed golden light at the end of the sky becomes.

What made the two of them feel a little depressed was that the power that absorbed magic power was becoming stronger and stronger.

"It seems that the spiritual energy in the Three Continents is cut off, and the source is in that direction."

Zhaojie made this judgment as he quickly used his spiritual sense to scan the city below, observing the changes over the years.

Wang Ba didn't say much. It was not difficult to come to this conclusion. The key was to know why this situation occurred.

"The real membrane eye at the source of the flood is also there. Could it be that..."

"That's the Great Wheel Buddha Kingdom!"

At this moment, Zhaojie suddenly stopped, pointed to the distance, and spoke with a complicated tone.

Wang Ba also stopped suddenly and looked around.

But under the glazed golden light in the distant sky, there was a huge three-faced Buddha statue with one hand in the fearlessness seal and the other hand in the granting seal.

Although his face was mutilated, he could still see peace, compassion, and wrath.

There is a dim golden wheel on his back.

Standing in the vast mountains and valleys.

Majestic and silent.

There are mountains on both sides of the Buddha statue in a crescent shape, and a pit in front of it.

"There should be a lotus pond in front of the Buddha's statue, where five-level precious lotuses are planted. Whenever the precious lotuses bloom, the Bodhisattva Xinyuan will order a 'Lotus Dharma Assembly' to be held. Thousands of Buddhist kings and monks from thousands of miles away come to participate in the event... I was fortunate enough to go there once, and I still can't forget it."

A trace of memory flashed across Zhaojie's eyes, as if he had returned to the grand scene before the great disaster when thousands of Buddhas paid homage to him.

Who would have thought at that time that the entire Xitaozhou would fall into the sea for two or three hundred years in the near future?

Who would have thought that after more than seven hundred years, he would return here again and recall the past?
The changes of fortune and misfortune in the world are always difficult to describe in words.

Although Wang Ba had some yearning, he was much more realistic at the moment and said in a deep voice:
"Master, may I ask where the Ten Thousand Buddhas Relics Pagoda is?"

Zhaojie came back to his senses when he heard this. He glanced at the dim Buddha statue in the distance, and his eyes also dimmed a little. He said in a slightly low voice:

"This pagoda is behind the Buddha statue. I will take you there now."

After saying that, he flew over first.

He flew to the huge Buddha statue and bowed deeply and respectfully. He stayed there for a few breaths before going around it from the side.

Wang Ba followed the local customs and did the same thing.

However, he then noticed that at the foot of the Buddha statue, there was a vast city that was hundreds of times larger than the Brahma Buddhist Kingdom.

There were also civilians in the city, and a few monks who had no magical powers at all.

Work and live in peace and comfort under the gaze of the giant Buddha.

Feeling a little emotional, he followed Zhaojie to the back of the giant Buddha.

What comes into view is an old stone pagoda that is much smaller than the giant Buddha, standing alone in the middle of the mountains on both sides.

However, if you look closely, you can still see that in addition to this stone pagoda, there are also many smaller stupas standing below. However, with the disappearance of the spiritual energy, these stupas have become like ordinary stone pagodas, eroded beyond recognition by sea water, wind, sand and time.

The surrounding mountains blocked the way and there was no place for people to climb. It was obvious that apart from the monks like them, it was impossible for ordinary people to come here.

At this moment, Zhaojie was staring blankly at the pagoda, his eyes slightly dazed.

"Is this the 'Ten Thousand Buddhas Relics Pagoda'?"

Wang Ba bowed first, then asked curiously.

Apart from its huge size, there doesn't seem to be anything special about this tower.

I couldn't help but feel a little worried.

Along the way, there was not a single spiritual energy in the entire Xitu Continent. Apparently, it had been completely sucked dry. The Ten Thousand Buddhas Relic Pagoda might be the same as well.

However, this stupa is of extraordinary significance to the monks, just as the ancestral temple is to the Vientiane Sect, so he did not say it out loud.

Zhaojie came back to his senses and nodded with a complicated expression.

Without saying much, he gently raised his palms and put them together in front of him.

Then he lowered his head and silently recited Buddhist scriptures.

There was no change at first, but then Wang Ba looked at the pagoda with a slightly strange expression.

But the stupa suddenly began to shake continuously.

The debris, dust, shells and other impurities on the tower fell down.

Then with a click, the surface of the stone cracked and fell off from top to bottom, revealing the purple-gold brilliance inside!

The tower base, thirteen steps, tower bottle, tower neck, treasure cover and stupa top...

The sun and the moon are the decorations, and the Buddha's light shines everywhere.

For a moment, the dim Great Wheel Buddha Kingdom was completely shrouded in this special Buddha light!

Unlike Zhaojie's respect, Wang Ba couldn't help but look surprised at this moment:
"Such pure mana!"

“So many Dao realms!”

"Isn't this stupa already above the fifth level?"

Judging from his dealings with several ancestors in the sect, the movement of this stupa at this moment has obviously surpassed that of the Nine-hole Patriarch and others.

I was shocked:

"With such a treasure, why didn't you just use this stupa to block the source of the flood?"

Just as he was wondering, Zhaojie suddenly stopped reciting the scriptures and his expression changed slightly.

But after hearing a loud noise, the purple-gold stupa in front of him suddenly rose from the ground, circled in the original place for a circle, as if expressing gratitude for something, and then flew straight to the north!

"What's happening here?!"

Wang Ba and Zhao Jie looked at each other, both shocked and caught off guard.

But then he reacted immediately:

"Come on!"

The two of them hurriedly chased after the stupa.

But when Wang Ba made a little more noise, a layer of dark clouds suddenly appeared in the sky.

"Not good, this is reaching the limit of what the will of heaven and earth can handle."

Wang Ba's expression changed slightly, and he quickly restrained his breath and slowed down.

The calamity clouds soon dissipated.

Zhaojie looked at Wang Ba with envy.

He was able to trigger the calamity cloud not long after entering the fifth level. What a profound foundation this must have. And he had been practicing for so long and still couldn't do it...

Fortunately, the stupa did not fly far away.

In less than half a day, the two of them chased all the way in the sky full of glazed golden light and finally saw the traces of the Ten Thousand Buddhas Relic Pagoda.

However, when they saw the Ten Thousand Buddhas Relic Pagoda, Zhaojie and Wangba's eyes were attracted by the figure at the head of the glazed golden light.

"Why is there a monk here?"

Wang Ba looked suspicious, as if he had guessed something.

However, Zhao Jie looked at the figure sitting cross-legged with eyes slightly closed, and after being surprised, his face turned pale in an instant:

"This is... Master Xinyuan?!" (End of this chapter)