My name was Chen Liu.

It was a name as common as the dirt in the mountain hollow where I was born. My village was a barren, isolated place where you could see the end of your life from the moment you took your first breath.

My parents were mortals. I had three older sisters and two older brothers. I was the sixth mouth to feed, so they simply called me Six.

When I was eight, a Buddhist assembly passed through our town to test for spiritual affinity. My parents shoved me forward. I suspect they were mostly hoping to save a copper on my midday meal.

Bewildered, I accepted a cold, smooth orb from a monk. The moment my fingers closed around it, a blinding violet light erupted, forcing the crowd to shield their eyes. My parents fell to their knees in the dust, weeping and muttering about the Bodhisattva’s grace.

In that instant, I became the golden phoenix of the village. An old monk took me by the hand, and I left that tiny, suffocating hollow forever.

The temple on the mountain was quiet, filled with the eternal scent of sandalwood. The Abbot himself took me as his disciple. He said my affinity was profound—that I was a “Buddha Seed.”

He taught me to chant sutras, to meditate, and to use minor arts to coax green shoots from withered branches or ease the aches of the elderly. I learned quickly. My master praised my innate wisdom constantly.

What I loved most was descending the mountain to treat the mortals. Watching their expressions shift from agony to tearful gratitude, hearing them call me “Little Holy Monk,” warmed my blood sweeter than honey.

I thought this was the Dao. I thought this was my life.

Eventually, my reputation outgrew the temple, and my cultivation surpassed my master’s. Then, a young monk named Zen Master Ming Huai arrived from the great Mountain Zen Monastery.

He told me I was cultivating the “Lesser Vehicle.” If I went with him, I could cultivate the “Greater Vehicle”—the salvation of all sentient beings. Moved by the grand ambition of universal deliverance, I bid farewell to my master.

Ming Huai gave me a Dharma name: Jian Chen. It meant “Seeing Dust.” The intent was for me to see through the vast, red dust of the mortal world to find my true self.

But the Mountain Zen Monastery was too big. It was suffocating.

Geniuses walked the halls like commoners. The talent I had prided myself on in the countryside was a single drop of water lost in a violent ocean. The “Buddha Seed” became just another face in the crowd of the Six Paths Zen Courtyard.

What confused me more was the reality of the place. They preached equality, yet the strong bullied the weak at every turn. Faced with mortal suffering, the high “Buddhas” turned a blind eye.

Then there were the monks of the Joyous Zen Courtyard. They wallowed in carnal desires, treating women as tools. Yet, because their fists were hard and their combat power high, they held esteemed positions. Even my master could only shake his head and sigh.

I asked him, “If all beings are not equal, why cultivate the Six Paths?”

My master replied, “We do not cultivate the Six Paths because there is equality. We cultivate so that one day, we might enforce equality. That is the Great Vow.”

It sounded hollow. It sounded like a lie he told himself to sleep at night. The Dharma could not reconcile with the reality I saw, and my cultivation stagnated.

During the Southern Region Grand Competition, I lost.

I was defeated by a little girl with braids whose cultivation realm was lower than mine. It was a needle through my pride. Later, she was effortlessly crushed by a woman in snow-white robes.

In that moment, my ego shattered. What Buddha Seed? I was a frog at the bottom of a well. True geniuses were as numerous as carp in the river. I, Chen Liu, was merely mediocrity incarnate.

I needed power. Only power could enforce equality.

I began frantically exploring dangerous secret realms, seeking a breakthrough. On my third expedition, disaster struck. I was trapped in a collapsed ruin with a few temporary allies.

Days turned to weeks. Resources ran dry.

One of our companions, a rogue cultivator, set his sights on a female disciple from the Yunmiao Sect. He claimed she practiced a Cauldron Method and wanted to force a dual cultivation session to replenish his energy. I firmly opposed it.

Buddhist precepts cannot be violated, I thought.

Conflict erupted. The Yunmiao disciple and I killed the scum together. It was the first time I had taken a human life. My hands shook, and my heart hammered against my ribs, but I told myself I was righteous.

But the infighting delayed our escape. Half a month later, the last pill was gone. Despair rose like a cold tide, threatening to drown me. I didn’t want to die.

The Yunmiao girl was heavily injured, drifting in and out of consciousness. A terrible thought, like a venomous viper, slithered into my mind.

If I used the Joyous Zen Method combined with her constitution… could I break through? Could I live?

I had secretly studied the forbidden texts in the library. I had despised them then, but now… now it was life or death.

Once the spark was lit, it became a wildfire. I didn’t notice the strand of sinister black energy that had already coiled around my soul.

As I wrestled with my conscience, writhing in internal agony, the woman sensed my instability. She saw the hunger in my eyes. She struck first.

The pain of her attack jolted me awake. Instinct took over. I countered, knocking her to the stone floor.

I saw the terror and despair in her eyes. A mad voice roared in my skull: She showed no mercy! Don’t blame me for being unrighteous! If you don’t kill her, she will kill you!

Reason snapped.

I pounced. I plundered her essence. I ended her life. It was all done in one breath.

I survived. I even broke through to the next realm.

But I dared not return to the Mountain Zen Monastery. I was stained with filth that no holy water could wash away.

With the first time came the second. Like a man possessed, I used various excuses to lure female cultivators into the depths of secret realms. They never returned.

My cultivation soared. But after each success, a tearing agony surged from the depths of my soul—Karmic Fire. It burned my very spirit, a reminder of my retribution. But the thrill of power… I couldn’t stop.

Until the day the man in black robes found me.

He called himself the “Black Venerable.” His voice carried a dark magnetism that soothed the frantic roaring in my soul.

He offered me a stream of white energy—vast, brimming with the aura of life. I took only one breath, and the Karmic Fire that had tormented me for so long receded. The relief was so profound it made my knees weak.

I never wanted to feel the fire again. So, I became his dog.

Later, he told me the white energy was Life Essence, distilled from the stolen lifespans of countless mortals. I struggled with the truth. I felt remorse. But the fire was too hot. I chose numbness.

I went from a passive consumer to an active harvester. Black energy fueled my strength; white energy numbed my pain. A perfect, damnable cycle. Whenever my conscience pricked me, I just inhaled another lungful of darkness.

Then came the “White Venerable.”

He knew I had once walked the Buddhist path. Occasionally, he would seek me out, looking for philosophical loopholes to justify his actions.

What a joke. I was neck-deep in the mire; how could I save anyone?

From his fragmented confessions, I guessed his identity. A pitiful father trying to save a daughter with a shattered soul. He had discovered the Life Essence and conceived a wicked plan. But he knew the essence was tainted with the resentment of the victims. It couldn’t save her.

He tried to filter the resentment. He failed, again and again.

He thought becoming stronger would yield a solution. Hah. Just like me, he was deceiving himself. He was even more pitiful—he couldn’t even face his wife and child. If he couldn’t save himself, how could he save his daughter?

We were just two wretched worms writhing in the mud.

The Black Venerable always said we hid in the shadows because the world’s fists were bigger than ours. He said that when our fists were the hardest, we could stand in the sunlight and call it justice.

I believed him. I drowned in that lie until the very end.