Chapter 465: Ling Mountain: Myriad Buddhas Pay Homage!

A stone shatters the Golden Body!

The name on Zhunti's jade talisman has not yet fully appeared.

Tathagata moved first.

He could wait no longer.

The image of Bodhi fanning Zhunti out to 108,000 li had completely shattered everyone's courage present.

Any further delay and the troops' morale would scatter.

"All Buddhas pay homage!"

Tathagata bellowed, and his golden Dharma Aspect shot up into the sky.

Behind him, eight hundred Arhats and three thousand Buddhas simultaneously formed seals.

Heavenly golden light exploded, each Buddha statue turning into a golden pillar of light shooting toward the sky.

The light pillars intertwined.

They wove.

Forming a formation.

A massive formation composed of myriad Buddha silhouettes condensed from the void.

At the formation's center stood Tathagata's Golden Body Dharma Aspect, surrounded on all sides by the illusory images of Arhats and Bodhisattvas.

The entire formation began to rotate, emitting a deep, resonant Brahman sound.

That Brahman sound was not meant for human ears.

It was meant for the 'soul' to hear.

Hummm.

The sound waves layered, carrying the supreme brainwashing power of Fómén.

"Let go of obsession."

"All phenomena are empty."

"Turning back is shore."

The Brahman sound bored into the ears, into the Divine Soul, into the deepest reaches of consciousness.

Even Sun Wukong felt his mind grow dazed, as if someone were pouring porridge into his head.

He shook his head hard, throwing off the fog.

Then he spat toward Tathagata's direction.

"You think this broken thing can wash my Master's brain? You must be farting."

Yet the Brahman sound kept intensifying.

The entire battlefield was shrouded in that golden light and Buddha sound.

The gaze of the 100,000 Heavenly Soldiers began to waver.

Three thousand Arhats chanted in unison, their lip movements perfectly synchronized, like a group of soulless marionettes.

At the formation's center, Tathagata's eyes were tightly shut.

He was gambling.

He was gambling that Bodhi was weakened to the extreme, unable to withstand the mental erosion of the myriad Buddhas.

He was gambling that he could still buy a bit more time.

But he guessed wrong.

Bodhi stood still, unmoving.

The all-encompassing Brahman sound falling on him was no different from a mosquito's buzz.

The old man merely furrowed his brows.

Like being annoyed by a fly buzzing in his ear all day.

"Noisy."

Just one word.

Then he lowered his head.

Among the void debris at his feet, he picked up a stone.

Ashen, fist-sized.

It wasn't any kind of treasure.

Nor any innate spiritual object.

Just a broken stone.

Seeing his Master's move, Sun Wukong's eyes lit up and he grinned.

He knew what was coming next.

Bodhi took the stone in hand, weighed it.

Then he tossed it casually.

Light as a feather.

As casual as an old man skipping stones after a meal.

The stone flew out.

It carried a barely perceptible gray-gold halo.

Dao Rhythm.

The purest, most ancient, most unreasonable Dao Rhythm.

The stone dragged a white trail along its flight path, growing faster and brighter.

Turned into a meteor.

A meteor flying toward the eye of the Myriad Buddhas Paying Homage Formation.

The Tathagata's eyes snapped open.

He felt it.

The power carried on that stone outweighed his lifetime of cultivation combined.

"No!"

He wanted to dodge.

Too late.

The meteor pierced the first layer of light formed by the Eight Hundred Arhats.

Silently.

Like a finger poking through paper.

It pierced the second layer formed by the Three Thousand Buddhas.

Just as silently.

Then.

Bang!

The stone struck the Tathagata's Golden Body Dharma Aspect squarely.

Entering through the front chest.

Exiting the back.

A fist-sized hole pierced through the Buddha Patriarch's Golden Body, said to be indestructible.

The Tathagata lowered his head to look at the hole in his chest.

Golden blood welled from the wound.

He opened his mouth and spat out a mouthful of golden blood.

The Myriad Buddhas Paying Homage Formation collapsed completely at that moment.

The formation's core was pierced, and all the golden light pillars snapped simultaneously.

The Buddha silhouettes shattered.

The light curtains broke.

The Arhats and Bodhisattvas maintaining the formation lay limp like puppets with their strings cut.

Plop.

They fell from heaven.

One after another.

Like dumplings being dropped.

The Eight Hundred Arhats smashed into the void debris, wailing horribly.

The Three Thousand Buddhas' Golden Bodies shattered inch by inch during the fall, scattering golden fragments everywhere.

Some landed headfirst.

Some with legs pointing up.

Two more collided head‑to‑head and passed out on the spot.

Wails of agony echoed across the battlefield.

Ling Shan's dignity, accumulated over millions of years, shattered more thoroughly than their Golden Bodies.

The Tathagata clutched his chest wound and plummeted from the heights, crashing hard onto a field of void wreckage.

His golden robes were soaked in blood.

Golden fluid streamed from his nose, mouth corners, and ears.

Like a broken kettle.

Seeing this, the Jade Emperor's legs went weak.

He had only come to make up the numbers.

Hongjun had summoned him, and he dared not refuse, but the situation was clearly wrong.

Run!

Got to run!

Staying here is suicide!

The Jade Emperor tiptoed away, ready to flee.

Then he froze completely.

From head to toe, even his breath stopped.

Bodhi glanced at him.

Just a glance.

That gaze held no anger, no killing intent.

Only a kind of indifferent 'try moving and see'.

But it was precisely that indifference.

It left the Jade Emperor's mind blank.

He could feel his bladder losing control.

His legs were shaking.

But he dared not move.

Not even a finger dared to move.

Bodhi withdrew his gaze and turned toward the Tathagata struggling to climb up from the ruins.

The old man walked over step by step.

Unhappy.

But each step made the Tathagata's face grow a shade paler.

Bodhi stood before the Tathagata.

He lowered his head to look at him.

The Tathagata lifted his blood‑stained face and forced a smile uglier than a cry.

"Ancestral Master... there is something good to say."

Bodhi raised his hand.

A finger touched the tip of the Tathagata's nose.

"Back then."

Bodhi spoke, his voice slow.

"True and False Monkey King."

The Tathagata's pupils dilated sharply as those four words fell.

"This scheme was yours."

Bodhi's voice was not loud, yet everyone on the battlefield heard it clearly.

"You hinted that the Six‑Eared Macaque should act."

"You stood by while my disciple was beaten to death."

"You concealed the heavenly secrets, making the Three Realms believe the impostor was genuine."

Each sentence was like a blade.

It pierced the Tathagata's heart.

It hurt more than that stone.

The Tathagata opened his mouth to argue: "Ancestral Master, see clearly! This matter was the Six‑Eared Macaque's own doing; I, the poor monk, am……"

He had only spoken halfway.

He stopped.

Because his mouth was shut.

It wasn't him who shut it.

It was the 'regulation' that shut it.

Bodhi lightly touched with his index finger.

An intangible law sealed the Tathagata's lips.

The Tathagata strained to open his mouth.

He couldn't open it.

His jaw seemed welded shut.

He strained until his face flushed red, his throat emitting muffled 'uh‑uh' sounds like a chicken choked in the neck.

"Shut up."

Bodhi said.

"It's not your turn to speak."

"Hahaha!"

Sun Wukong laughed hysterically behind them.

He laughed so hard he doubled over, his iron staff almost fell to the ground.

"Well hit! Well scolded!"

"Bald donkey! Make you hard‑mouthed! Make you pretend!"

"Master, give him two more slaps to the face!"

The pent‑up rancor in his heart, suppressed for who knows how long, finally found an outlet.

Satisfying.

Too satisfying.

He was laughing.

In his peripheral vision he caught sight of something.

The laughter ceased.

Eighty‑thousand miles around, a jet‑black light shot up into the sky.

Zhunti Saint, drenched in blood, held aloft that black jade talisman.

The ancient name on the talisman had fully manifested.

At the same time.

Hongjun wiped the golden blood from his lips, lifted his head, and the fear in his golden vertical pupils faded, replaced by reckless madness.

He bit his tongue, spraying a mouthful of essence blood into the void, drawing a rune ancient to the point of distorting light.

Jieyin, Zhunti, Tathagata, Jade Emperor.

Four auras began to resonate simultaneously.

Hongjun's hoarse voice echoed across the battlefield.

"Since you insist on overturning the table."

Then don't blame this old man... Please have that person come out!

The rune in his hand exploded.

In the deepest part of the void, something has awakened.