The great formation that shrouded the whole of Ananda cut off Shenshu’s path, barring him at the foot of the mountain and preventing him from advancing even an inch.
Shenshu raised a fist and smashed it into the golden barrier with simple, brutal force. Amid the humming shockwave, ripples spread across the surface of the golden screen, extending upwards and to both sides.
The headless Shenshu took a step back. He hadn’t broken through the barrier.
He fell silent for a few seconds, as if enraged. Then his navel split open, turning into a gaping bloody mouth that let out a deafening roar.
“Roar!”
The sound waves echoed across the wilderness of the Western Regions, echoed through the clear blue sky, and carried for dozens of miles.
The people of the Western Regions living near Ananda all turned to look towards the sacred mountain, their faces full of bewilderment and awe.
A few months ago, they had heard the same roar coming from the sacred mountain, and before that, there had even been a great sun rising there.
The Zen formation effectively blocked Shenshu’s assault, including the sound. The Warrior Monks in the mountain only felt their ears ringing and their heads spinning, but they didn’t suffer too much harm.
Under normal circumstances, at such a close distance, just that one roar from Shenshu would’ve been enough to shake more than half the Warrior Monks to death.
The Warrior Monks had only just recovered from their surging qi and blood when they saw a giant so enormous it defied imagination. His chest was as broad as a mountain wall, his body pitch-black, and his twenty-four arms were packed with bulging muscle, layered one upon another like a peacock’s tail feathers, like the spread tails of a nine-tailed celestial fox.
Every single arm brimmed with terrifying power, enough to make one suspect they could smash apart the void.
This giant had no head, but behind his neck blazed a searing ring of fire that scorched the air.
The temperature around Ananda rose rapidly, as if early summer had arrived.
Every Warrior Monk who beheld this Dharma Aspect found his legs trembling and his face turning pale. Let alone any will to fight, they could barely even hold on to the sabres and bronze staves in their hands.
The Vajra Dharma Aspect was the symbol of strength and majesty. Cultivators below beyond-mortal, when facing a Dharma Aspect directly, would almost all lose their will for combat.
The reason the Warrior Monks on the mountain could still grit their teeth and endure was because the Zen formation had blocked the “majesty” of Shenshu’s Dharma Aspect.
“Don’t be afraid!”
A middle-aged Warrior Monk with respectable cultivation looked around at his fellow disciples and said in a deep voice:
“The Zen formation is indestructible. No one can destroy it. Even this fiend can’t do it.”
The Warrior Monks, who had fallen into extreme fear and panic, were immediately heartened and regained some confidence.
There had always been a saying in Ananda, once a Zen Master entered meditation, all magics could not penetrate him, and he remained unmoving as a mountain.
At the highest level, that became the “Immovable Lord Dharma Aspect”.
Zen arts had always been born for defence. And now, with more than four thousand Zen Masters joined together in formation, presided over by three first rank Bodhisattvas, across all Jiuzhou, there probably wasn’t anyone capable of breaking it.
A first rank of the same level definitely didn’t have that kind of power, and in this age when Beyond-rank beings didn’t emerge, who could shatter such a world-shaking formation?
Without the slightest exaggeration, the Zen formation of Ananda was the greatest defence in all Jiuzhou in the present age.
Buzz!
Shenshu’s Dharma Aspect drove a fist straight into the golden barrier, sending golden ripples racing across it, yet it didn’t budge in the slightest.
Buzz buzz buzz…
His twenty-four arms were like the connecting rods of a steam engine, like pile drivers, pouring out violence with bang after bang, so fast that afterimages appeared.
The golden barrier was like an upturned bowl covering the whole of Ananda. At this moment, under Shenshu’s ceaseless bombardment, layer after layer of golden ripples coursed across its surface.
Then it began to shake, and even Ananda trembled slightly with it, truly as though the earth moved and the mountains swayed.
At this frequency, with this level of power being poured out continuously, if it were an ordinary beyond-mortal martial artist, at most they could keep it up for a quarter of an hour before exhausting themselves, and would need a short round of breathing and circulation to relieve the strain on their muscles.
But Shenshu was like a perpetual engine, striking without pause, as if he would never grow tired.
Buzz buzz buzz…
Specks of light shook loose and fell like rain. As the attack frequency continued, the golden barrier began to sway, and gradually, the frequency of its shaking began to synchronise to a certain extent with the frequency of the punches.
Resonance!
The golden barrier seemed unable to hold on any longer, trembling like foam in the wind, ready to collapse at any moment.
To their horror, the Warrior Monks of Ananda discovered that those Zen Masters seated cross-legged outside the halls had begun to shake violently, as if seized by convulsions, as though they would topple over the next instant. Some even had the flesh at the centre of their brows split open, blood streaming down.
Among all the Zen Masters in meditation, only Samantabhadra Bodhisattva, Vaidurya Bodhisattva, and Agaruka Bodhisattva remained utterly unmoving. Every other Zen Master showed abnormalities, some slight, some severe.
What—What kind of monster is this?!
Such a world-shaking formation, gathering the power of three first rank experts and more than four thousand Zen Masters, actually can’t withstand one monster’s crude, technique-less, brutally simple fists?
The lower and middle ranking Warrior Monks, who didn’t know Shenshu’s identity, only felt their hearts slowly sink into a pitch-black, freezing abyss.
“What terrifying brute force.”
High in the distant sky, Daoist Jinlian witnessed Shenshu’s power with his own eyes and sighed sincerely.
“This still isn’t the full strength of a half-step Martial God.” al-Asura added flatly.
“Having a crude martial artist smash open the formation and clear the way really does make things easy.”
Zhao Shou laughed.
The beyond-mortal experts each voiced their feelings. Since Sun Xuanji’s translation monkey wasn’t here, he’d lost his right to speak and remained silent.
The beyond-mortal experts present this time were Daoist Jinlian, Zhao Shou, Sun Xuanji, al-Asura, Li Miaozhen, and from the Yao clans, the Nine-tailed Celestial Fox and the Bear King.
“When will Xu Ningyan reach this level?”
Li Miaozhen instinctively compared Xu Qi’an with Shenshu.
Zhao Shou smiled.
“Today, Xu Ningyan and Shenshu will let the Buddhist Sect know what the violence of martial artists really means.”
As soon as he finished speaking, Zhao Shou suddenly yawned. His eyelids felt as heavy as a thousand catties, and he wanted nothing more than to sleep at once.
At that moment, he heard Li Miaozhen mutter:
“Why am I so sleepy…”
The beyond-mortal experts were all startled.
The silver-haired fox enchantress abruptly turned her head to look at the Bear King beside her, and sure enough, found its eyes half open and half closed, on the verge of sleep.
“Pa pa pa pa…”
All nine tails unfurled at the same time and lashed across the Bear King’s body like whips, giving him a considerate queen’s wake-up service.
The Bear King was in so much pain his beady little eyes nearly popped out. His drowsiness vanished at once.
The sleepiness of the beyond-mortal experts also disappeared with it.
Seeing Daoist Jinlian and the others looking over, the Nine-tailed Celestial Fox explained with a smiling expression:
“Sorry, the Bear King is fond of sleep. His innate divine ability is to drag the living beings around him into slumber along with him.
“Just be a bit careful, everyone. The moment you feel sleepy, wake the Bear King immediately. It won’t be a big problem.”
It’s a huge problem, alright? We almost fell for it just now… Li Miaozhen glanced at the Nine-tailed Celestial Fox, whose beauty even she had to admit defeat before, and silently grumbled inwardly.
Why is the style of the Yao clans always so strange and unreliable? That monkey and this bear are exactly the same… Daoist Jinlian kept a smile on his face and nodded, but inwardly he was lampooning the Yao clans.
Zhao Shou steadied the situation and declared loudly:
“No dozing off.”
The power of his words becoming law immediately enveloped the area. It was as though the Bear King had been doused with a bucket of cold water. His whole body shuddered, and he became completely alert.
Of course, he could still force himself to fall asleep, but the constant drowsiness that usually plagued him had already vanished.
“It can probably last a quarter of an hour.”
Zhao Shou endured the backlash from the spell. Once he confirmed it was only mild, he relaxed.
The Nine-tailed Celestial Fox continued the earlier topic:
“Don’t underestimate it. This formation gathers the power of the Buddhist Sect’s Zen Masters and three Bodhisattvas. It absolutely won’t be so easy to break.”
As though in response to her words, inside Ananda, Agaruka Bodhisattva, seated cross-legged in the main hall, opened his eyes and looked down.
Shenshu’s body was unimaginably huge. The grand and majestic Ananda looked like nothing more than a tall earthen mound before him.
The buildings in the mountain resembled models, and the monks in the mountain looked like ants.
Behind Agaruka Bodhisattva’s body appeared a Dharma Aspect with lowered brows, seated cross-legged, palms pressed together.
The moment this Dharma Aspect appeared, the violently shaking golden barrier on the verge of collapse immediately stabilised.
The clamorous winds died away, and the raging gales and surging qi mechanism were forcibly suppressed.
But that still wasn’t enough. Agaruka Bodhisattva’s burly body fused into the “Immovable Lord Dharma Aspect”.
Then the Dharma Aspect with lowered brows, seated cross-legged, began to expand, transforming into a giant Buddha hundreds, even thousands, of metres tall.
Its head touched the golden barrier.
It propped up the great formation.
Buzz buzz buzz… Shenshu’s fists struck the barrier like madness, knocking loose countless rays of light.
But the resonance could no longer continue. Each time the ripples spread and reached the Immovable Lord Dharma Aspect, they were mysteriously smoothed away.
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