Yang Guo said with a smile,
"Sure."
"First wipe your nose."
Outside the crumbling walls of the ruined temple.
A tall figure stood at an unknown moment.
Holding a wine jar, the old monk silently watched the firelight flickering inside the temple.
He saw the twelve-year-old boy grimacing as he blew on the hot medicinal broth to cool it for his companion.
He saw the thin, small child clumsily wiping cold sweat from the sick patient.
He also heard that weak yet resolute promise: "I'll help you beat them back."
The old monk swirled the wine jar in his hand, nostalgia welling up in his eyes.
Many years ago.
He, too, had possessed two sworn brothers with whom he shared life and death.
When critical, life-threatening moments arrived,
no one stopped to think whether it was worth it.
No one tallied up who suffered a loss.
As long as their brothers were by their side, they always felt the sky would never fall.
Unfortunately, time aged everyone, and most old friends had passed away.
A gentle smile appeared at the corners of the old monk's mouth as he raised his foot and stepped over the threshold of the ruined temple.
"Amitabha."
Yang Guo was just preparing to pull a cover over Aniu when he jolted violently at the sound, hurriedly grabbing a fire poker from the ground to shield himself.
Illuminated by the firelight, the old monk strolled inside at an unhurried pace.
An old monastic robe, straw sandals, and that jar of Daughter Red.
The creditor had come to the door.
Little Shitou collapsed onto his rear in fright, his voice trembling as he tugged at Yang Guo's hem.
"Yang Guo... the wine-and-meat monk who lost his money found us!"
Though Yang Guo felt uneasy inside, he didn't show the slightest bit of fear on his face.
Quietly, he used his toe to nudge the paper wrapper that had held the medicine into the straw pile.
"Old monk, we don't have food here. If you came here to beg for alms, you've knocked on the wrong door."
The old monk sat down on a green stone opposite Yang Guo, his expression calm and unruffled.
"Did you spend all the silver?"
Yang Guo went silent for a moment, then stiffened his neck:
"There are a few copper coins left. If you want them, take them."
The old monk said, "Do you think this poor monk is here to collect a debt?"
Yang Guo snorted. "Nonsense. Are you here to deliver a late-night snack?"
Amused, the old monk threw his head back and took a heavy swig of wine.
"You stole a monk's money. If this poor monk strikes you dead with a single palm, would you be wronged?"
Yang Guo sneered and tossed aside the fire poker in his hand.
"Then go ahead and do it right now."
The old monk smiled. "Why are you so sure this poor monk won't do it?"
Yang Guo sized him up carefully:
"Just judging by how silently you move, you must be a skilled martial artist."
"If you were truly a villain out to attack, you would've kicked me as soon as you stepped inside. Why bother wasting your breath with me?"
"Besides, you carry silver and drink fine wine worth three hundred wen a jar."
"Would you kill a starving kid over a bit of money? You couldn't afford to lose face like that."
The old monk looked deeply at him, no longer concealing the approval in his eyes.
"Outside earlier, those three were older than you and stronger than you."
"If you had used that footwork technique on your own, they wouldn't have even touched the hem of your clothes."
"Why didn't you run?"
Yang Guo rubbed his aching ribs:
"Aniu is lying sick inside, and Little Shitou is too young to run fast."
"If I ran, the two of them would starve or die of illness in this ruined temple tonight."
"My mother taught me the Carefree Stroll to protect myself, not to abandon my brothers and hide like a timid turtle."
The old monk's body shuddered slightly.
He asked no further, simply reaching an emaciated hand into his robe.
When he withdrew his hand, a yellowed, aged scripture rested in his palm.
The scripture had been flipped through countless times, its corners frayed and the ink on its cover faded to near invisibility.
"This poor monk has carried this scripture around for nearly half a jiazi."
"I originally intended to hide it in a temple, but feared it would be coveted by evil men."
"I also thought about tossing it into an incense burner to burn it away, but in the end, I could not let go of my attachment, unwilling to let my hard work go to waste."
Yang Guo narrowed his eyes, thinking, "A worn-out scripture, is it really that serious?"
The old monk looked up, meeting Yang Guo's eyes directly.
"On the street today, did you truly think that with your amateur skills, you could swipe the pouch from this poor monk's waist?"
"If this poor monk did not wish to give it to you,"
"you wouldn't have even touched the dust on the bag."
Yang Guo froze. "So you did it on purpose?"
The old monk lightly pressed his forefinger and middle finger together.
A few crisp clinks echoed.
Without Yang Guo noticing, the few copper coins in his shirt had somehow ended up between the old monk's fingers.
Yang Guo's pupils instantly shrank to the size of needle points!
Extracting objects from a distance? Or a finger technique so fast it defied the naked eye?
A supreme master!
With a casual flick of his wrist, the copper coins fell precisely back into Yang Guo's broken earthen jar, without missing a single coin.
"This poor monk intentionally let you succeed because I wanted to see,"
"where a child so young, who steals money and even steals from a monk, would actually spend that money."
The old monk stood up and spoke unhurriedly:
"You returned money to the common people and bought medicine to save a friend, without wasting a single copper."
"Facing thugs, you chose not to flee when you could have, risking your life to protect your companions."
"Your theft technique was wretched, yet within your chest beats an unyielding, proud heart."
Yang Guo couldn't help but feel shocked, "So he had his eye on me all along."
The old monk let out a long sigh, extending the ancient scripture in his hands smoothly toward Yang Guo:
"I see that your nature is good and kind."
"Seeing the three of you supporting each other reminds me of my own past."
"Today, I present this scripture to you."
Little Shitou stared wide-eyed on the side, but Yang Guo didn't reach out to take it right away.
Frowning, he stared guardedly at the old monk.
"Old monk, spare me your smooth talk."
"It looks like just a worn-out scripture to me. Making it sound so mysterious... this thing can't be spent like silver!"
The old monk's lips twitched, clearly not expecting the kid to blurt out such a mercenary remark after pausing for so long.
"It cannot be spent like silver, but if you can comprehend eighty or ninety percent of it, all the gold and silver under heaven will be yours for the taking."
Yang Guo took it casually without even looking closely, rolling it up and stuffing it right into his tattered belt.
The old monk wasn't annoyed either. Lifting his wine jar, he strode toward the ruined temple's entrance:
"The mysteries within the scripture must not be spoken of lightly to outsiders."
"If you lack the karmic affinity, simply read it as an ordinary Buddhist scripture to cultivate your mind and body."
Before his words had faded, the old monk's figure drifted away, disappearing into the vast night.
It was as swift as a ghostly trail of grey smoke, vanishing in the blink of an eye.
Little Shitou scrambled over eagerly:
"Yang Guo, an immortal! That old monk just now was definitely an immortal!"
Yang Guo rubbed his sore neck and pulled out the crumpled scripture.
"Immortal my ass. He just has incredible qinggong."
He originally intended to toss it onto the straw pile as a pillow for Aniu.
However, by the flickering faint firelight, three small characters—a translation combining Sanskrit and Chinese—were worn down on the cover to near illegibility.
They unexpectedly caught his eye.
《Lankavatara Sutra》
Yang Guo snorted. "Tch, isn't it just a regular Buddhist scripture after all?"
Suddenly, Yang Guo's hand froze in midair.
A violent thunderclap seemed to detonate inside his mind!
The 《Lankavatara Sutra》?
Yang Guo's breath seemed to freeze at this instant, his heart pounding violently against his ribs as if it were about to leap out of his throat!
Little Shitou was startled by his pale face:
"Yang Guo, what's wrong with you? Have you lost your mind?"
Yang Guo couldn't hear a single sound.
With trembling fingers, he frantically flipped open the yellowed, damp pages of the scripture!
The Buddhist script was dense and flowing.
And in the margins between those profound and obscure Buddhist doctrines, neat rows of fine, tiny script surprisingly laid out an entirely different set of energy-circulating mnemonic formulas:
"Let him be fierce, for he is fierce; the clear wind blows across the mountain ridge..."
"Let him be harsh, for he is harsh; the bright moon shines upon the great river..."
"Let him be ruthless, for he is ruthless; I possess my own ample True Qi!"
Yang Guo's fingers gripped the scripture tightly, a brilliant light bursting from the depths of his eyes.
Hidden between the pages of the 《Lankavatara Sutra》!
The 《Nine Yang Manual》!
That seemingly scruffy hundred-year-old monk... was actually the Wine-Drinking Monk!
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