318: Chapter 309 This is My Bitter Sea…
318: Chapter 309 This is My Bitter Sea…
…
Mo Wangchen reached the entrance of the inn, feeling that everything was too strange, but no matter how he looked at it, it seed to be just an illusion.
He turned his head to glance inside the inn and noticed the middle-aged couple standing together, looking at him with puzzled and confused faces.
Mo Wangchen frowned, he stepped out of the inn and walked a few steps forward.
Buzz!
Suddenly, he felt a slight ripple in the space, and the next mont, when he turned his head, the middle-aged couple was gone, and not just them—the inn was gone too.
Behind him was a vast emptiness, an endless desert!
On him, the feeling of hunger that he had earlier was already gone, as well as the feeling of being full and the sleepiness.
At this mont, Mo Wangchen felt just like he did two months ago, without the onslaught of hunger or sleepiness.
“Could it really be an illusion…?”
He frowned, shocked in his heart, with himself now back in that harsh desert, lost.
With no choice, Mo Wangchen took another step forward and continued straight on.
The Bitter Sea Restricted Area was too strange, the things here, although not as perilous as the Emperor Fallen Mountain Range, seed to harbor many unknown things.
…
After leaving the inn, Mo Wangchen continued walking straight.
He didn’t know how long he had walked, but the change between day and night gave him an approximate sense of ti—it had been at least half a month since he left the inn.
The feeling of loneliness struck again, as though the whole world had only him left.
Mo Wangchen once again beca sowhat listless, the sky above blazing with a fierce sun and the ground below warming up trendously, but under such conditions, Mo Wangchen seed to have adapted already, unaffected by it in the slightest.
Suddenly, he heard a sound from ahead and instinctively looked up.
The scene before him made Mo Wangchen pause, then his brows tightened slightly.
He saw the inn again, the sa inn, with a few figures lingering and moving about.
Mo Wangchen walked toward the inn, that sense of hunger attacking him once more.
Coming toward him was a middle-aged couple, shockingly the very Zhao Kang couple he had encountered a month ago.
“Young brother, are you here to eat or to stay overnight?”
“Brother Zhao?” Mo Wangchen was stunned for a long ti before he ca back to his senses, finding it unbelievable.
He had been walking straight in the desert, but he encountered the sa inn, the sa people, in different places.
Hearing Mo Wangchen’s words, Zhao Kang couple paused for a mont, looked at each other, and then looked at Mo Wangchen incomprehensibly, “Young brother, how did you co to know my surna is Zhao?”
“Don’t you recognize ?” Mo Wangchen frowned.
The faces of the Zhao Kang couple showed even more confusion, “Although our inn receives quite a few guests daily, my eyes are sharp, Brother Zhao, and I usually rember any guest who cos within a year, but I haven’t seen you, young brother…”
Hearing this, Mo Wangchen felt even more that things were strange.
Gurgle gurgle!
But at that mont, the feeling of hunger left him feeling weak.
He rembered the Gold Coins he had, which might not be usable here.
The middle-aged woman smiled and noticed Mo Wangchen’s predicant, “You sit and wait for a mont, I’ll go make so signature dishes…”
She left, leaving Zhao Kang to keep Mo Wangchen company.
When the middle-aged woman brought the als, Mo Wangchen discovered they were exactly the sa as what he had eaten a month ago.
This ti, after finishing his al, Mo Wangchen didn’t leave the inn; he chose to stay overnight.
During that ti, Mo Wangchen asked Zhao Kang about many things and learned that what he saw was completely different from what Zhao Kang and others saw.
The inn was located in a town, and the people walking back and forth at the entrance of the inn were all town residents.
What Mo Wangchen could see was only everything within the scope of this inn.
…
At that mont, he had finally confird that both Zhao Kang and his wife and the guesthouse itself were re illusions, and he was not in so city but within the Bitter Sea Restricted Area, one of the seven restricted zones in West Earth.
Everything that happened here, while called an illusion, was in so ways an actual place that once existed— a projection within the Bitter Sea Restricted Area.
Within the Bitter Sea Restricted Area, there was so mysterious power unknown to others, capable of projecting everything in the world and re-creating it, like a mirage.
Yet, what was strange was that these projections, now appearing in the Bitter Sea Restricted Area, were incredibly realistic.
The people and objects here could even make contact with Mo Wangchen, which was truly astonishing.
…
Inside the guesthouse, Mo Wangchen felt not only hunger but also tiredness.
That night, he went to bed early and slept soundly.
“Hmm?”
He did not know how long it had been, but when Mo Wangchen woke up again, he felt a striking light shining before his eyes.
He suddenly opened his eyes wide and looked around to see nothing but the sky with the Bright Sun blazing fiercely upon the earth.
After sitting up from where he was, Mo Wangchen discovered that he was no longer inside the guesthouse; instead, he was surrounded by an endless desert!
…
He continued to march forward, not knowing where he was headed.
Since he had entered the Bitter Sea Restricted Area, three months had passed; the Bitter Sea was boundless, the other shore, limitless.
There was no end because the end was the other shore, but where was the other shore?
Then, half a month later, in front of Mo Wangchen, he saw the guesthouse again, still operated by the sa middle-aged couple.
…
Watching the middle-aged woman bring two dishes to the table and seeing the enthusiastic smile on her face, Mo Wangchen did not know why, but he suddenly realized sothing.
The Buddhist Sect says, at the foot of Lingshan, the Bitter Sea is boundless, and the Buddha’s ladder stretches ten thousand feet before achieving enlightennt.
“People have Seven Sins: greed, wrath, ignorance, hatred, love, evil, desire.
The seven realms of West Earth are nad after the sins, and Lingshan represents the other shore.”
“The Seven Sins are the sea of suffering for humans.
If one can fully comprehend all, one could reach the other shore…”
“I have walked alone in the desert for months, utterly alone, desperately desiring ‘love,’ which is one of the seven sins, signifying excessive favoritism or indulgence.”
“This is my sea of suffering…”
“Brother Zhao and his wife showed favoritism and indulgence…”
In a few monts, nurous thoughts flashed through Mo Wangchen’s mind.
When the middle-aged woman, holding two dishes, eventually reached him, Mo Wangchen stood up and turned toward the door to leave.
“What’s the matter?” Zhao Kang and his wife looked on puzzled.
Mo Wangchen turned around, looked at them, and after a mont of silence, smiled and said, “I have fallen into ‘favoritism’ and cannot reach the other shore…”
Hum!
After saying this, suddenly, Mo Wangchen felt a slight fluctuation in the space around him.
Zhao Kang and his wife looked at him with an ambiguous smile, then gradually faded, disappeared along with the guesthouse.
“Phew!”
Mo Wangchen let out a long breath, enlightened at that mont.
Entering the Bitter Sea, crossing the Bitter Sea, he had just crossed the sea of ‘love.’ If he could also cross greed, wrath, ignorance, hatred, evil, desire, he should be able to leave the Restricted Zone.
He breathed a sigh of relief, understanding the true essence of the Bitter Sea Restricted Area—if he could not achieve enlightennt here, he feared he might never be able to step out.
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