Eternal Night.

Chapter 947 Wake up
Wu Pifu was in a daze, unable to distinguish east from west, north from south, or center. He was in a state between waking and dreaming. In layman's terms, he was in a vegetative state, almost on par with someone with dementia or intellectual disability.

Inside the vehicle, two crystals rolled around, one named Taiyi and the other named World. At the same time, a human youth named Qing was acting strangely, disappearing and reappearing from time to time, sometimes laughing like an idiot, sometimes deep and thoughtful like a fool, and sometimes transforming into one, two, three... countless people.

Whether male or female, old or young, each person has a different expression, appearance, and state, as if a scroll of portraits of all people has appeared on them.

Apart from Wu Pifu, who has become a vegetable and shows no signs of recovery, and Qing, who has multiplied into millions and continues to multiply, the other five logistics personnel have completely disappeared without a trace. Apart from a faint imprint in the deepest part of Wu Pifu and Qing's memories, not even a trace of their existence has been left behind. They have all vanished without a trace throughout history.

Only Wu Pifu and Qing remained in the vehicle, adrift in this nightmare, oblivious to time, space, and even logic...

Compared to Qing's infinite derivatives, Wu Pifu's vegetative state remained unchanged. The essence that had been restored countless times in the past seemed to have reached a critical point or exceeded its upper limit of restoration this time. He remained in a vegetative state of essential collapse. Although it did not completely dissipate due to its overwhelming "scale", there was no sign of recovery under foreseeable circumstances.

All this continued until the fish, now only half a complete body, could no longer contain a certain conceptual existence, and a ray of light shone through its lower body, which had become a fishbone.

"If I hear..."

"If I hear..."

"If I hear..."

……

"...One day, the Buddha sat in the vast world, observing the past and present, and all directions, and realized the difference between reality and illusion. Feeling that all living beings were trapped in the sea of ​​suffering and unable to be liberated, he preached the scriptures to ordinary people..."

A strange chanting sound appeared, gradually becoming indistinct. What appeared before Wu Pifu's eyes was a bizarre and grotesque world, just like the pure pollution he had seen before. It was something he could see but could not understand or describe, truly indescribable.

Fortunately, this bizarre world wasn't as malicious and aggressive as pure pollution. In Wu Pifu's eyes, this bizarre world began to evolve, transforming into the sky, the earth, forests, lakes, grasslands, towns, caves...

There are also humans, fairies, animals, plants, monsters, and demons...

Wu Pifu was transformed into a first-level trainee warrior wielding a longsword and shield and wearing leather armor.

He swung his longsword, slaying a slime. Oh, it still showed 10 HP. He dealt three damage with each hit, and the slime retaliated, losing one HP each time. In the end, he killed the slime at the cost of three HP...

Wu Pifu wanders through this world, fighting monsters to level up, selling loot, accepting quests, gaining levels, and changing jobs at the temple. Gradually, he becomes stronger and makes many friends in this world...

The image gradually zooms out, from the ground to the sky, from the sky to outer space, from outer space to galaxies, starry rivers, and the myriad stars of the universe…

Ultimately, one by one, 0s and 1s formed the foundation of this world. Wu Pifu sat in front of a screen, lost in thought, clicking on the characters on the screen with his mouse. As the characters moved, the world he had just seen appeared on the screen: sky, earth, forests, lakes, grasslands, towns, caves... humans, fairies, animals, plants, monsters, demons...

Wu Pifu controlled his game character to walk and play in the game world. After playing for several hours, he got hungry. His hunger value had dropped below the red line, and his toilet value had also dropped below the red line. However, his entertainment value had been fully increased, so he left the game table, went to the toilet first, and then took out ingredients from the refrigerator to prepare a meal.

Then the image stretches...

Behind those more complex characters, Wu Pifu was playing virtual reality, and then the image stretched...

what is this.

A question arises.

reality.

Buddha said.

But aren't those games?

You asked again.

How do you know that the you in those games isn't real? How do you know that the you right now isn't just words, games, and comics seen by beings of higher dimensions and higher levels?

You are lost and confused.

So... am I fake?
No, it's true.

Buddha said.

But how can I know if I am real? Just as I don't know what the fish think, the fish doesn't know what I think, or perhaps I am a butterfly's dream, just as I dreamt of being a butterfly...

The Buddha said...

...Wu Pifu woke up.

Everything that had just happened was like a dream, there was no Buddha preaching, and there was no endless, bizarre, ever-expanding world. There was only the interior of the vehicle in front of him and the sleeping Qing.

But none of that was an illusion or a dream. At that moment, Wu Pifu understood what the Buddhist secrets were all about!

The rumors are true!
The Buddhist treasury holds the greatest secret of the entire dream world... the secret of the source of pollution!!
The first to know this secret was the Buddha Master, but he did not attain true enlightenment, so he could not understand what the secret he knew was. The one who truly expounded this secret was the First Buddha, the first Buddha, and also the strongest Buddha.

There are a total of twenty-two Buddhist secrets, namely the secrets of the One Buddha Master, the secrets of the Three First Buddhas, the secrets of the Six Great Buddhas, and the twelve secrets of those with affinity. Now Wu Pifu finally understands that the twelve secrets of those with affinity are actually qualification certifications. Only those with this knowledge and foundation can continue to obtain higher-level secrets. Otherwise, simply knowing the secret will render it non-existent in the narrative layer, or just a bubble.

The six great Buddhist secrets are the secrets that Wu Pifu just opened, obtained from the fish swallowing them. They contain information about the nature of the source of pollution, as explained by the Buddha. Each of the six secrets contains a portion of the information, but it is not necessary to collect them all, because understanding them is enough. Perhaps one or two secrets are sufficient. As long as one understands that they are the true marks of the source of pollution, one will be qualified to glimpse the secrets of the three great Buddhas.

Although he has not yet obtained the First Buddha's Secret Treasury, he can roughly imagine what it contains. Putting aside the small rewards left by the Buddha and the First Buddha, the First Buddha's Secret Treasury must contain the most direct description of the existence, nature, and terrifying extent of the source of pollution, which is everything that can be understood and felt from the perspective of the First Buddha's level of strength.

As for the secret treasure of the only Buddhist master...

Now Wu Pifu also knows what kind of secret it holds!

That is, the Buddhist master went directly to the source of pollution. This is the reason and justification for the Buddhist master's disappearance. He went to face the source of pollution directly, and what he left in the Buddhist secrets is the path he took to reach the source of pollution!
For a true being, anything below their level has no concept of past, present, or future, nor of space, cause and effect, logic, or anything like that. If explained using logic that mortals can understand, everything below the true being is like a game or a book to them. Everything about you can be flipped through at any time, or you can reload a save file whenever you want, or return to any moment you want.

Spacetime, causality, logic... everything that is not a true person is meaningless to it.

It's all fake!

This is the information Wu Pifu gleaned from the First Buddha's sermon within the Buddha's secret treasury. And without a doubt, the source of the pollution is precisely this true person, one without any flaws or weaknesses—possessing both a personhood and an existence sufficient to match its level!
To put it in an extreme way, the entire dream world, including him, the nascent immortals and Buddhas, and even everything else, may very well be nothing more than a single thought, a dream, the source of pollution...

Wu Pifu's emotions gradually filled with despair, and as he gained a clearer understanding of the nature of the source of pollution, this despair began to contaminate his very being.

Fantasy, unreal, despair...

It was all in vain...

Suicide, self-destruction...

Or perhaps I'll forever wallow in this false nightmare...

"...I see. These are the 'qualifications' selected from the twelve secret treasures of Buddhism."

Wu Pifu sensed the despair permeating his emotions and essence. He remained unmoved by it, savoring it carefully. As he remained unmoved, the despair gradually faded away and eventually disappeared.

This isn't actually pollution, but rather a symptom similar to megalophobia, acrophobia, thalassophobia, or similar phobias. However, the despair here stems from the inherent oppressive force of a higher being, and it's not limited to any particular race. Instead, all living and non-living things capable of understanding its true nature are affected. If they cannot resist, they will perceive everything as illusory and then vanish from their very essence...

Just like the other five support personnel in the vehicle!
Even if they don't know the true "real location" of the pollution source, but only some information about the fish or butterflies that have escaped, they still can't bear it.

On the contrary, it's Qing...

Wu Pifu looked at Qing with an incredibly complicated expression.

He is now absolutely certain that this Qing is the future Azure Emperor of Heaven.

He absorbed part of the butterfly's information and did not transform it into the false part of the true person.

However, this does not mean that he has obtained the butterfly's status or power. He has merely endured it and gained some special abilities, but he has also become a node, an anchor point, or the butterfly's "cocoon". As time goes by, the butterfly will be reborn in Qing's body unless he becomes a true person before the butterfly is reborn, or can kill the butterfly's information like Wu Pifu, or another true person suppresses the butterfly for him. If he does not have the above means, then he will become its bait at the moment of the butterfly's rebirth.

"...The Azure Emperor and the First Immortal?"

Wu Pifu stared at Qing for a long time before finally waking her up. Then, in Qing's dazed gaze, Wu Pifu said, "Wake up, Qing."

Qing's eyes were glazed over for a long time before she said blankly, "Ah, Wu Pifu, I just dreamed about so many people. I dreamed that I became so many people. I was them, and they were me..."

Wu Pifu shook his head slightly. He had a lot to say, but he couldn't utter a single word for a long time. Finally, when he turned around to pick up the two main control systems, he spoke the words he most wanted to say with the utmost sincerity.

"Qing, you must always be a good person."

(End of this chapter)