Becoming a Deity from Planting the Bodhi Tree

Chapter 1466 - 517: The Heavenly Court Strikes Back, The Great Trial of the Ancestors

When the team led by Qu Liushui returned to the various allied factions to report the news, the Transcendence Gates of each lineage dispatched several teams in succession to verify the account.The final result of their probing was that this Illusory Buddha Country capable of blocking the strongest Sword Light had actually been wrought by that World Venerable!

In a place none of them knew of, that World Venerable, with the cooperation of the Heavenly Court, took the sub-realms under the Heavenly Court as lands of proselytization, founded Buddhism, styled himself Buddha Master, and caused all beings to take refuge in him.

For a time, all kinds of rumors and malicious talk about that World Venerable spread abroad.

"So he really has betrayed our camp and defected to the Heavenly Court!"

"Wrong. When did he ever belong to our camp? It should be said: he is not of our kind, his heart must be different! These old undying things from a hundred eras ago—there is not one good sort among them!"

"The Ancestors misjudged this man. He is not someone worthy for the Ancestors to regard as a fellow traveler, and even less worth our respect!"

"Detestable! The breaking of the Heavenly Court was right before our eyes, and the one who blocked our Tao in the end turned out to be this World Venerable?!"

Just as every Gate was giving their opinions in confusion, discussing what to do next, the Heavenly Court actually took the initiative and launched the attack first!

Seventy-two high-seated Divines, led by that female Heavenly Emperor, launched a surprise assault on the northern defensive line of the Sea of Realms, in one stroke breaking through the joint blockade set by all factions, and consecutively breaching seven Realms.

After that they were like dragons entering a great sea, treating the northern Sea of Realms as a land with no one in it, wantonly invading numerous Realms and securing great victories one after another.

And after the collapse of the northern defensive line, although each Gate swiftly dispatched reinforcements, they still could not halt the Heavenly Court’s northern expedition, and could only change routes and continue to carry out their boundary-breaking plan.

...

The Qingxuan Realm was similar to the Netherworld, with little entanglement with the powers of the Sea of Realms, still mired in internal struggles within the Realm.

Not only was there no Transcendence Gate, but the internal strength of the Realm also did not count as strong within the Sea of Realms; an Ancient was already the pinnacle.

And on this day, the Qingxuan Realm, located in the northern Sea of Realms, had its passage to the outside forcefully pried open.

In that instant.

Within the Realm, the myriad Stars shone dazzlingly bright, suffused with a Misty Qi that faintly outlined the silhouette of a terrifying figure; its mere existence nearly crushed the starry sky of the main universe.

Countless living beings raised their heads in terror, only to see innumerable Divines, each as large as a Star, falling like rain.

No matter how the beings of the Qingxuan Realm struck out, smashing Divine Golden Bodies one after another, shattering them into pieces and bursting them into countless fragments of Golden Body, these Divines could restore themselves to their original state in an instant, reassembling into their Divine forms!

This lopsided incursion battle had its outcome decided from the very beginning.

The strength of the Heavenly Court was a crushing force against any Realm.

In the end, under the last desperate resistance of several Ancients of the Qingxuan Realm, the main universe was beaten into a stretch of Chaos.

As the final act, starlight blazed, tracing out a long, endless stairway to the heavens that descended from above.

A God walked down step by step, golden flowing in his eyes; with a mere wave of his hand, he heralded the reopening of Heaven and Earth from Chaos, reopened Earth, Fire, Wind, and Water, so that All Spirits might once more flourish and multiply.

From beginning to end it was but a few short months, and the Qingxuan Realm had already become the back garden of the Heavenly Court.

First, numerous Divines took station to oversee the various worlds, then they swiftly spread the doctrines of Buddhism, forcing All Spirits to believe; once Buddhism had taken root and borne fruit in this land, most of the stationed Divines entered the Heavenly Court one by one, leaving only a small number of Divines, together with the native powerhouses who had submitted to the Qingxuan Realm, to govern the Realm.

During this period, some Divines of the Heavenly Court even changed their fundamental allegiance, entered Buddhism, and became Bodhisattvas and Arhats in its teachings.

Thus was the process by which the Heavenly Court subdued a Realm.

Though the Heavenly Court was overwhelmingly mighty and used absolute power to subdue the Qingxuan Realm, to thoroughly conquer the "hearts" of a Realm within a short time was naturally a fantasy, until the allied armies belonging to the various Gates arrived...

On this day, the Divines guarding the Boundary Gate of the Qingxuan Realm were cut down into the Human World.

The All Spirits of the Qingxuan Realm, who had undergone Heaven and Earth Flipping changes over the past few months, all felt their spirits jolt; overjoyed, they looked toward the Outer Realm, each saying that the reinforcements had come.

A force assembled by the various Gates charged into the Qingxuan Realm: when they met a God, they killed the God; when they met a Buddha, they butchered the Buddha; when they met All Spirits... they slaughtered All Spirits!

Just as the All Spirits of the Qingxuan Realm were cheering the arrival of reinforcements, they blankly discovered that those powerhouses who came from the outer heaven were raising the Slaughter Knife impartially against all living beings within the Realm.

Paradoxically, it was the Heavenly Court’s Divines, gradually falling into disadvantage, who began organizing the All Spirits of Qingxuan to resist the Outer Realm powerhouses, calling upon all beings to believe in the Buddha Master and summon the Buddha Master’s protection.

This absurd scene caused many beings in the Qingxuan Realm to collapse on the spot, becoming utterly numb, and in the end, amid the Heavenly Court’s calls, they cast themselves into Buddhism, beseeching the Buddha Master’s protection.

The appearance of the Illusory Buddha Country caused more and more beings of the Qingxuan Realm to throw themselves into the embrace of Buddhism.

In the Buddhist scriptures and doctrines transmitted by the Heavenly Court they found their final harbor, and came to understand that the source of all these calamities lay in the sins committed in their past lives.

Only by redeeming their karmic sins in this life could they gain the qualification to enter Reincarnation, to be reborn anew, and thus enter that Buddhist Pure Land without the Eight Sufferings, where they might enjoy ultimate bliss...

...

...

As the Heavenly Court’s Buddhism spread, the boundary-breaking plans of the various Gates encountered more and more obstacles.

That Illusory Buddha Country which had originally blocked the full assault of Qu Liushui, as the Heavenly Court conquered one Realm after another, also became increasingly real, almost indestructible, faintly surpassing the level of a True Saint!

And under the extermination plans of the various Gates, the Realms originally taken by the Heavenly Court had no choice left, and could only change allegiance and submit under the banner of Buddhism.

Compared with the Heavenly Court that had conquered them, and the various Gates that left no way to survive at all, Buddhism seemed to have become their final choice.