*Crack!*
Amidst the crisp sound of the shattering jade talisman, a wisp of dim black light expanded from Xiao Yuan's palm, draping the room's contents in an obsidian veil.
The scenery inside the room began to warp. The tables, chairs, benches, fine wine, and delicious dishes all vanished. Austere stone pavers replaced the carpet, a caisson ceiling painted with Buddhas and Bodhisattvas supplanted the ordinary roof, and bright candlelight burned in serene stillness.
They had arrived in a spacious, brightly lit, antique Buddhist hall.
Almost instinctively, everyone looked toward the giant Buddha statue that stretched all the way up to the caisson ceiling. With lowered brows and fingers in a mudra, clad in brilliant gold, it appeared benevolent and kind at first glance, but a hidden ferocity lurked within its half-closed eyes.
"No change..." The crowd murmured under their breaths before finally turning their gaze toward the figure in the green monk robe sitting cross-legged beneath the statue.
*It seems everyone is just like me, terrified that Master Wuhen might lose control. The moment anyone enters the hall, the first thing they do is check the Buddha statue.* Zhang Yuanqing noticed that many more prayer cushions had appeared inside the hall, matching the exact number of people present.
To the front left stood a full-length mirror framed in sculpted bronze.
The mirror's surface was completely blurred.
"Amitabha!" Master Wuhen's deep voice resonated, heavy with endured torment. "Please stand before the mirror, illuminate your mind, perceive your true nature, and behold your inner self."
"Yes, Master!"
Xiao Yuan pressed her palms together, bowed, and was the first to step toward the full-length mirror.
As she stood before it, the hazy glass abruptly cleared, reflecting her appearance.
Her features were exquisite, her bright eyes harbored gentle warmth, and the corners of her lips curved into a smile, as if she were filled with hope for the future.
Everyone exchanged glances, their eyes filled with envy, jealousy, and surprise, but also heartfelt relief.
"Sadhu! Well done!" Master Wuhen whispered in gratification.
Xiao Yuan stepped back calmly. She cast an imperceptible glance at Zhang Yuanqing, then pressed her palms together and bowed to the crowd.
The others returned the courtesy.
Farewell My Concubine, who identified as female, swayed a slightly thick waist forward and excitedly embraced Xiao Yuan.
"When I saw you in the mirror last year, you were still cold, unapproachable, and detached. This year, you've suddenly become so sweet! Sister, congratulations! What managed to wear away the resentment in your heart?"
*Congratulate her all you want, but don't hold my Xiao Yuan, even if you do consider yourself a woman...* Zhang Yuanqing protested silently in his heart.
To be honest, he didn't really want to interact much with this "older sister," who kept casting flirtatious winks his way. For all he knew, while this "sister" was hugging Xiao Yuan, the person on her mind might actually be him.
"Ugh, the stench of sour romance..." Kou Beiyue grumbled under his breath.
"What did you say?" Chief Instructor Lin Chong clapped him on the shoulder.
Kou Beiyue's posture collapsed instantly, and he shook his head repeatedly. "Nothing! I didn't say anything!"
While the two were talking, the middle school girl whose Spirit Realm ID was Zhao Xintong walked up to the full-length mirror.
She was a fair, pretty, and lovely young girl with faint dimples. Though she rarely smiled, she usually looked obedient and well-behaved. Yet the reflection in the mirror showed a girl with a sinister expression, a bizarre, chilling sneer hanging at the corner of her lips.
The smooth glass was tainted with a thin layer of grayish black, as if polluted.
"How come Little Tong looks even fiercer than last year?" Uncle Yang, his hair white, knitted his brows. "Your school is full of teachers and classmates. Could that really intensify your hostility?"
The middle school girl stepped away from the mirror in silence, her voice cool and detached. "Are all teachers good people? Are all classmates good people?"
"Teachers are role models; how could they not be good people? And your classmates are just children like you. You mustn't talk like that," Uncle Yang said displeasedly.
"Uncle Yang, you spent your whole life as a teacher. Don't you know that children can be the real devils?" Zhao Xintong retorted, then quietly sat down on a prayer cushion.
Next was Uncle Yang. His image in the mirror was that of a weeping old man, his eyes radiating loneliness and desolation, his hands dripping with fresh blood.
A bloody sheen washed over the mirror's surface.
Chief Instructor Lin Chong's reflection was hideous and ferocious—combative, brutal, like a lone wolf in the deep forest, glaring viciously at everyone.
Then came Farewell My Concubine. The mirror revealed an enchanting, beautiful woman whose facial features resembled the person before them, but were far more feminine.
Yet as this seductive woman glanced about with dazzling eyes, what radiated from her gaze was not charm, but ruthless malice and hatred.
The mirror's surface was similarly stained with a faint bloody hue.
*One after another, every single one of you has serious issues. Looking at it this way, Zhao Xintong is actually the mildest...* Zhang Yuanqing remarked internally.
The sixteen members approached the mirror one by one. Having already untangled the knots in his heart, Kou Beiyue carried no lingering burdens; his reflection was merely that of an irritable, rebellious young wolfdog going through puberty, but nothing more.
However, three people's reflections took Zhang Yuanqing by surprise.
The first was an honest-looking middle-aged man wearing black-rimmed glasses. He looked like an urbane math teacher or an ordinary office worker, yet the mirror reflected a frenzied villain clutching his forehead and roaring with laughter.
A dense, rich layer of bloody light washed over the glass, indicating that this man possessed an extraordinarily heavy murderous nature.
The second was Aunt Fang, who possessed a gloomy temperament. The reflection showed an emotionless, bone-deep grim old woman. Her gaunt, heavily wrinkled face reminded Zhang Yuanqing of the ghost-hags in old-school horror films.
A deep, heavy darkness condensed on the mirror, the hallmark of deep-seated malice.
The last one was A Good Subject Chooses His Master to Slay. To everyone's surprise, this exceptionally gifted Dream Master was revealed in the mirror as an obsequious, timid, and cowardly fat boy.
The way he nervously glanced left and right made him look like a frightened mouse.
*Timid and cowardly, with a hobby of looking for a boss...* Zhang Yuanqing watched the chubby youth hurry away from the mirror with a dejected, round face, lost in thought.
After finishing the mirror gazing, the members evaluated one another's "true selves," loudly congratulating those whose mental states had improved and gently counseling those whose "conditions" had worsened.
It was practically a support group meeting for fellow patients.
"How could you look so pathetic?" Kou Beiyue quietly voiced his dissatisfaction.
Flustered and awkward, the chubby youth forced a smile and changed the subject. "The Master is about to lecture on the sutras. Boss, let's take our seats."
Kou Beiyue nodded. Just as he was about to turn around, he suddenly remembered that Yuanshi Tianzun had not yet stepped before the mirror. "Yuanshi Tianzun, you're the only one left."
At his words, the crowd turned their eyes toward Zhang Yuanqing.
Yuanshi Tianzun was not strictly a member of the group, so in a procedure exclusive to their cohort, there was naturally no reason for him to go first. Only after the core members had finished was it his turn to experience it.
"A figure who can win the favor of Heavenly King Demonic Eye must surely be a glittering angel."
"Or maybe a magical girl from Balala the Fairies."
"Perhaps he even has a crescent moon mark on his forehead."
Lin Chong, Sweet Red Demon, and a few others joked lightly.
*I haven't had extreme thoughts in a long time. Ever since I got the Ghost Mirror, I've been peaceful every day, filled with wonderful hopes for life and the future...* Zhang Yuanqing took a deep breath and strode toward the bronze-framed, full-length mirror.
Everyone focused their attention on the glass.
Reflected within was... a shattered, fragmented human being.
A person split clean in two. The left half was rigid and wooden, while the right half wore a wicked, chilling smirk.
This wicked persona was ruthless, perverse, insolent, and perilous...
Between these two completely different "people" ran exaggerated fractures, like glass covered in spiderweb cracks.
The mirror was dyed in an intense, pitch-black darkness—even darker than Aunt Fang's reflection earlier.
Everyone froze, staring blankly at the prodigy heavily lauded by the authorities, at the moral exemplar whom Demon Eye considered a kindred spirit.
He was actually... an evil even more wicked than they were?
How could someone so perverse and twisted still belong to an orthodox class? Just what had Yuanshi Tianzun been through?
And someone bearing such deep-seated hatred and suffering disguised himself behind smiles and sunshine, bringing warmth to others...
Surprise flickered in Aunt Fang's eyes. Red Demon and Sister Ji wore expressions of shock and pity. Uncle Yang narrowed his eyes. Zhao Xintong showed fear. The middle-aged man pushed up his glasses, the corners of his mouth curling up.
Kou Beiyue and the chubby youth were dumbfounded, the latter murmuring under his breath, "Just which one of us belongs to an evil class?"
*Is this me? Is this truly who I am...?* Zhang Yuanqing stood dazed before the mirror.
*So this is what I look like.*
*Perverse, extreme, riddled with gaping wounds, mentally fractured... this is me?*
*Someone harboring even more malice than evil classes?*
"Amitabha. Everyone, please be seated." Master Wuhen's voice broke the silence.
Shaking themselves free of the strange atmosphere, the members silently made their way to the prayer cushions.
Before the mirror, Zhang Yuanqing took a deep breath and walked toward the cushion at the very back.
"That's not your seat!" the crowd called out in unison.
With a face full of sorrow, Lin Chong led Zhang Yuanqing to the prayer cushion closest to Master Wuhen. "This is your seat, sir."
The others cast pitying looks at Yuanshi Tianzun.
Yuanshi Tianzun was family now.
No wonder he agreed so deeply with Master Wuhen's philosophy. No wonder Master Wuhen had permitted a member of an orthodox class to become an outer member of their group. It turned out Yuanshi Tianzun was just like them: a poor soul trudging along the path of redemption.
Zhang Yuanqing: "..."
While thoughts churned in everyone's minds, only Master Wuhen offered no comment. Like a statue of Buddha, he sat in silence, watching the joys and sorrows of the mortal world with detached eyes.
Once everyone was seated, the Master's deep voice, bearing an undercurrent of pain, began to chant:
"When Avalokiteshvara Bodhisattva coursed in the deep Prajnaparamita, he perceived that all five skandhas are empty, and transcended all suffering and distress..."
Zhang Yuanqing had flipped through several Buddhist scriptures the previous night, so he immediately recognized this as the famous *Heart Sutra*. Its core philosophy was that the self-nature is fundamentally empty, holding that prajna wisdom can deliver one across all suffering, attain ultimate Nirvana, and achieve the fruit of Bodhi.
Reciting this sutra to a group pursuing self-redemption was entirely reasonable, but Zhang Yuanqing knew nothing of the Dharma, so it sounded like impenetrable mist to him. He thought to himself that this disciple possessed dull aptitude, loved money and women, and couldn't comprehend the profound Dharma in the slightest.
Gradually, however, Zhang Yuanqing felt an inexplicable force sweep across his heart like a spring breeze, sweeping away his irritability and gloom. His mood suddenly turned bright and open, his thoughts utterly lucid.
Master Wuhen's deep voice seemed to take on a majestic, sacred resonance.
He understood at once: the sutra was not the key; the Master was.
A Voidwalker—an Inner Demon—could trigger the knots in people's hearts, but could also rely on their own abilities to soothe emotions and dissolve inner obsessions.
The layered chanting echoed, drilling into the ears of every member present and resonating with their souls. At this moment, Zhang Yuanqing also felt as if his spirit were being cleansed.
He seemed to forget the troubles of reality, no longer worrying about the myriad dilemmas around him.
The shadow of the Demon Lord, the shroud of Dark Night Rose, Elder Cai's vengeance, the headquarters' disfavor, the leverage held by the Soldier Master Sect... all were forgotten.
*Thus have I heard; all four elements are void.*
Before he realized it, the chanting ceased. Zhang Yuanqing opened his eyes, overcome by the fleeting illusion that life was but a dream and a hundred years had passed in a single blink.
Somewhat dazed and strangely serene, he looked around and found that most people had tear streaks on their faces, yet wore expressions of immense relief.
Master Wuhen, his back turned to the crowd, said slowly, "You may now confess on your own."
In that instant, an intense urge to confide surged within Zhang Yuanqing's heart. He wanted to pour out every secret crushed inside him; once spoken, he would feel weightless, like a fat man draining two hundred jin of grease from his frame.
Suddenly, with a loud wail, the chubby youth burst into floods of tears, weeping aloud:
"Master, I want to confess! I want to confess! I shouldn't have hung out with those hoodlums! I shouldn't have helped them bully my classmates! I should have studied hard and given back to society..."
Even with his current peaceful, untroubled state of mind, a string of question marks flashed across Zhang Yuanqing's head upon hearing this.
He thought to himself: *Among those seated here, who doesn't have blood on their hands? Who doesn't have an unbearable past they can never look back on?*
*Everyone here is a miserable soul with bitter grievances, yet you're sitting here confessing that you didn't study hard during your student days? Isn't that a bit disrespectful to the room?*
"I... I was terribly cowardly in middle school. Because I was fat, I had an inferiority complex, so the school bullies targeted me all the time. At first, they shook me down for pocket money. Seeing that I didn't dare tell the teachers, they escalated and started beating me. First they beat me in the dorms, then in the classroom.
"Later, it escalated to making fun of me. They forced me to confess my feelings to the pretty girls in school just to make a public laughingstock out of me. They forced me to ask out our English teacher. When I refused, they beat me.
"Every day, I had to fetch hot water for them, deliver their lunchboxes, and wash their clothes. I didn't want to get beaten, so I tried everything to please them, but they still beat me for no reason at all. They treated torturing me as entertainment. Once, they beat me so badly that the bruises hadn't faded when I went home for the weekend, and my parents saw them.
"My parents made a huge scene at school. The bullies threatened to kill me if I dared say a word. But under pressure from my parents, the teacher told me to speak freely and without fear, promising that the school would handle justice for me.
"I trusted the teacher and named everyone who had bullied me. The teacher was gratified and solemnly assured my parents that they would deal with the matter properly. But the school's handling was nothing more than calling in the bullies' parents for a verbal warning, followed by a school-wide disciplinary announcement against those students.
"And that was the end of me. Afterward, the bullies cornered me and told me that when taking a beating, I had to stand at attention. One by one, they came up to slap my face and burned my belly with cigarette butts.
"They gloated, telling me that running to parents and teachers was useless, that the school couldn't do a damn thing to them. They demanded five hundred yuan for their forgiveness, or else they'd burn me with cigarettes every single day.
"I had no options left. When adults are harmed, they can still protect themselves with the law. But even if I was beaten to death by them... truly, there was nothing I could do.
"Until one day, I ran into a bunch of loafers at an arcade. Because I played the arcade games well, Brother Dao took a liking to me. Brother Dao was the leader of those hoodlums—a street punk himself, but in my eyes back then, he was a big shot. Brother Dao said I could run with him from then on, but I had to pay him a hundred yuan a month in tribute.
"I told Brother Dao that my money had all been stolen by the school bullies. Brother Dao was very loyal; when school let out for the weekend, he took his crew and ambushed those bullies, dragging them to the school sports ground and beating them half to death, sending them straight to the hospital.
"From then on, the bullies took detours whenever they saw me. Ha! Turns out they were nothing but paper tigers who only knew how to throw their weight around in school.
"I began idling away my time with the street hoodlums outside school, hanging around arcades and internet cafes. I learned to smoke and drink, and when I ran out of money, I demanded it from my parents. I became a bad student in the eyes of my teachers and classmates, but nobody ever bullied me again."
From then on, he considered himself a hoodlum, took pleasure in tormenting others, made cruelty his creed, and committed many unforgivable deeds.
He had tried hard to forget the past, but the experiences of his youth were like an ugly, unhealing scar that still bled whenever he recalled it.
"I have to have a boss! The moment I don't have a boss, that cowardly, insecure self crawls out from the depths of my soul, like an unkillable, ineradicable phantom! As long as I have a boss, I don't panic. No matter how terrifying the enemy is, I dare to risk my life against them!"
The chubby youth prostrated on the floor, snot and tears streaming down his face. "Master Wuhen, I want to kill that cowardly self! I want to be a good student..."
Master Wuhen pressed his palms together and spoke slowly: "Amitabha! Recognizing your true self is the first step toward making peace with the past. Congratulations, Benefactor."
The others pressed their palms together one after another, saying in tones of envy and gratification, "Congratulations, Benefactor."
After a moment, seeing that no one else stepped forward to confess, Master Wuhen said in a deep voice:
"We shall conclude here. I hope next year, all of you—"
A voice interrupted him.
"Master, with your profound Dharma and clear perception of your true nature, don't you have anything to confess? If you wish to confess, I can give you an opportunity."
The hall fell dead silent.
Everyone looked at the speaker—Yuanshi Tianzun—with expressions that screamed, *Have you lost your mind?*
Had the Master's soothing failed to heal his inner wounds, and instead aggravated his "condition"?
Xiao Yuan stared at him blankly, unable to fathom what kind of fit had seized this fellow's brain.
Master Wuhen did not grow angry. His voice resonated through the hall:
"What does Benefactor mean by this?!"
Zhang Yuanqing fixed his gaze on the back clad in the green monk robe, delivering each word with deliberate weight:
"Blazing Sun and Dark Shadow!"
The moment the words fell, the towering golden Buddha suddenly snapped its eyes open, glaring with the wrath of a Vajra!
Chapter 525