Chapter 906: The Accumulating Daoist

At the westernmost tip of the West Sand River Basin, atop Chiyan City, veteran guard Wang Quezi squinted at the horizon. His rough palm, worn by wind and sand for years, suddenly trembled, and on the distant horizon a strange black line was slowly rising.

"Black Sand Storm! It's a Black Sand Storm!" He hadn't let the bronze hammer that rings the alarm bell fall, when the whole city was suddenly shrouded in shadow.

That is not an ordinary sandstorm.

The wind wall, black as ink and a thousand zhang tall, churned inside with blood‑red lightning.

Sand grains, whipped by the gale, coalesced into blade‑like crystals; wherever they passed, the thirty‑zhang‑high Xuan Iron city wall melted like wax under a hot knife.

Even more terrifying were the alternating beast roars in the storm, the ancient monsters called "sand demons" in old texts, riding the Black Sand Storm back to the mortal world.

"Close the city gates! Activate the city‑guard formation!" City Lord Yuwen Tuo's roar was drowned in the howling wind.

He saw with his own eyes the Vajra Temple thirty li beyond the city, its pagoda cast from Xuan Iron being torn to pieces like paper in the Black Sand Storm.

When the first grain of black sand pierced the protective light shield, a figure in a blue‑green robe suddenly appeared on the eaves of the city tower.

"Poor Daoist has a formation that can hold the sandstorm for three days," the newcomer said, his voice warm as jade, the talisman he pinched between his fingers glowing emerald.

The guards noticed that the black sand capable of piercing Xuan Iron turned into fine powder the moment it came within three chi of him.

Yuwen Tuo's pupils contracted: "You are......"

"I am a wandering lay cultivator, Ji Daoren," the blue‑green robe Daoist said with a smile and a bow, three hundred and sixty formation flags fluttering from his sleeves: "If the City Lord trusts me, perhaps I may place formation eyes at the Qian, Kun and Zhen positions."

While he spoke, a ten‑zhang‑high sand demon suddenly burst from the Black Sand Storm outside the city.

The beast resembled a giant scorpion, its tail hook bearing a human face—it was the "Resentful‑Faced Scorpion" recorded in the *Record of Strange Creatures of the West Sand*.

"Careful!" Yuwen Tuo's words hadn't finished when Ji Shan Daoren casually tossed a copper coin.

The coin transformed in midair into a Bagua mirror the size of a millstone; where its light fell, the Resentful‑Faced Scorpion let out a wailing cry like a newborn, blue smoke rose around it, and in an instant it turned into a pool of foul, bloody water.

"What a domineering Golden Light Spell!" the city‑guard mage gasped, "Even the head monk of Great Brightness Temple uses it......"

"Just a petty insect‑carving trick," Ji Shan said with a smile, interrupting, the formation flags already covering the city: "Kindly channel your spiritual energy into the formation eyes."

When the city‑guard formation flared again, a marvel unfolded!

The black sandstorm slammed into the pale‑blue light shield, scattering like waves crashing on reefs. Even more wondrous, golden Dao patterns surfaced on the shield, converting the storm's violent qi into pure spiritual energy that fed the formation.

Yuwen Tuo stared at the Daoist's back, feeling that the "Ji" Daoist title sounded familiar.

He suddenly recalled a secret report received a month ago: among the thirty‑six cities of the West Sand, a mysterious cultivator had recently emerged, called "Ji Daoren," who appears in disaster‑stricken places, heals and saves without charge, and is revered by cultivators everywhere as "Ji Shan Real Person."

Seven days later, the Black Sand Storm approached Great Brightness Temple.

This thousand‑year‑old monastery's eight‑treasure glazed‑tile roof was already coated with a thick layer of black sand, black blood seeped from the eye sockets of the eighteen golden‑bodied Arhat statues. Abbot Hui Ming gazed at the churning sandstorm beyond the temple, and the prayer beads in his hand suddenly snapped.

Within the storm, a hundred‑zhang‑high phantom of a demon‑Buddha emerged, exactly the "Mofa Xiang" foretold in the sutras!

"Amitabha, it seems our temple is facing this calamity......"

"Abbot, why belittle yourself?" Qing Lang's laughing voice pierced the Sanskrit bell as the blue‑green robe Daoist strode through the sandstorm.

The black sand that can erode bone and soul astonishingly solidified beneath his feet into a crystalline lotus.

Hui Ming's pupils narrowed: "Daoist Golden Light Spell? You are......"

"Poor Daoist Ji Daoren, I have come specifically to aid the Master in crossing the tribulation," the Daoist said, twelve violet talismans fluttering from his sleeve and forming a Bagua formation in the air: "But before that, I wish to discuss with the Master the true meaning of the Fourth Chapter of the *Lotus Sutra*."

The moment those words were spoken, the whole assembly erupted in astonishment.

Great Brightness Temple is the leading Buddhist stronghold on the West Sand border; though it cannot match the Buddha's sacred mountain Great Thunder Sound Temple, it should not allow a Daoist to presumptuously discuss Buddhist sutras.

Hui Ming, however, raised his hand to halt the monks, a fierce light flaring in his eyes: "Brother Daoist, please speak."

"The sutra says: 'All dharmas originate from the beginning and always bear the aspect of silence and extinction.'" Ji Daoren's fingertips ignited Dao fire, writing Sanskrit in the air: "Then, with the demon‑Buddha manifest now, are the dharmas not silent and extinct? Or is silence itself the demon‑Buddha?"

Amid the howling gale, the voices debating Buddhist and Daoist doctrine were clear. When Ji Daoren said, "The demon‑Buddha is one body; subduing the demon is the Buddha," the phantom demon‑Buddha outside the temple suddenly emitted a painful, guttural roar.

Seizing the moment, Hui Ming tossed his Bodhi prayer beads; the one hundred and eight beads transformed into a demon‑subduing vajra staff, which, together with the innate Bagua formation, drove the demon‑Buddha into the earth's ley lines.

When the Black Sand Storm receded, the monks discovered that the sand grains tainted by demonic qi had turned within the Bagua formation into white lotuses covering the ground.

"Poor monk.... I have been taught."

For a moment, the surrounding monks' gazes toward Ji Daoren became reverent and humble.

On the thirty‑nineth day of the Black Sand Storm, the Western Sand Imperial Capital.

The nine moats had long since dried up, and the famed "Nine Dragons Burning Heaven Formation," said never to fall, now held only scattered flames.

City Lord Wu Zhao stood on the Star‑Plucking Terrace, watching the faint ten‑thousand‑zhang serpentine shadows in the Black Sand Storm—those were the "Nine Infant" recorded in the annals, nine heads spewing poisonous flames of various elements.

"Your Majesty, Ji Daoren has arrived."

Wu Zhao turned and saw the blue‑green robe Daoist scrutinizing the bronze cauldron at the formation eye.

That cauldron was a royal secret treasure, now riddled with cracks.

"I've heard the true Daoist can alter feng shui?" the City Lord asked, his tone probing.

Three days earlier, this Daoist had reversed the dire situation of Tianxiang City using only nine copper coins.

"It's not alteration, but alignment." Ji Shan gently stroked the cauldron, and the cracks began to heal slowly: "The Black Sand Storm is not a natural disaster, but the manifestation of aggrieved earth‑line qi. Your Majesty, have you ever wondered why each sandstorm arises without cause?"

City Lord's complexion changed abruptly.

The Daoist suddenly bit his fingertip, drawing a blood‑red dragon pattern on the cauldron: "I have long heard that twenty years ago, the City Lord used the blood of thirty thousand death‑row prisoners to sacrifice to a demon dragon—is that true?"

The commander of the imperial guard's sword had not yet left its sheath when it froze in mid‑air. Ji Daoren's voice turned cold: "Today's calamity is indeed the revenge of those wronged souls. To break this impasse, Your Majesty must go personally..."

"Roar!"

The Nine Infant's roar cut off the speech, and one of its heads spewed ghostly nether fire, instantly melting through the three layers of city walls.

Ji Daoren sighed, unfastened the wine gourd at his waist and tossed it into the air. The gourd swelled with the storm, and it sucked in all the poisonous flames the Nine Infant expelled.

"Qian Kun Wu Ji, Capture!"

As the technique unfolded, the gourd's mouth burst with multicolored radiance. The Nine Infant's massive body was ripped toward the gourd, each head letting out a grudging roar.

When the last snake scale fell into the gourd, Ji Daoren's complexion turned deathly pale; the creature then self‑detonated a demonic elixir inside the vessel!

The City Lord watched with his own eyes as the Daoist's teal robe was instantly soaked through with blood.

"Daoist Master, you...?!"

"No problem, we can't just stand by while the whole city's living beings are scorched," Ji Daoren said, his face full of sorrow.

The City Lord and the surrounding guards, upon hearing, instantly showed moved expressions, clasped their hands and said, "Daoist, you are truly benevolent!"

On the sixtieth day of the Black Sand Storm, White Dew City at the northernmost tip of the West Sand River Basin.

This frontier town had reached a desperate state: the protective city array shattered, cultivators were almost all dead or wounded, and some mortals curled up in the cellars awaiting death.

When the sand demon's claws tore through the final barrier, a clear, ringing sword sound suddenly rang out amid the children's cries.

Ji Daoren, his blue robe stained with blood, descended from the sky, his peachwood sword emitting a brilliance brighter than the sun.

Those sand demons impervious to swords and spears melted in the sword light like spring snow.

"It's Daoist Ji!" the survivors wept with joy.

They saw the True Person using blood as ink, drawing a mysterious sigil array on the ruined city wall;

They saw him take a spirit pill, dissolve it into the well water, and the wounded healed upon drinking; the eldest Li even swore that she had personally witnessed the True Person cut his wrist to let blood flow, using the pure blood to spur the growth of protective green vines around the city.

When the final wave of sand demons receded, Ji Daoren was already at the end of his strength. Yet a pure white rooster suddenly flew out from his sleeve, excitedly attacking those sand demons!

"What is that…"

"What a strangely unique spiritual beast, it can actually suppress sand demons?"

"Ji Daoren, Chicken Daoist? This Daoist wouldn't have named himself so casually, would he?"

Yet another great city was saved from peril with Ji Daoren's help.

The sandstorm ceased.

Three months later, the West Sand River Basin once again saw blue skies.

Red Rock City erected a shrine for True Person Ji Shan, yet the incense never caught fire; the merit monument at Great Brightness Temple could not record his deeds; the City Lord's search parties traversed the West Sand River Basin, finding only an empty wine gourd on an unnamed sand dune.

Thus, the name "Ji Daoren" spread throughout the entire West Sand River Basin.