Chapter 230 - 204: Executing the Traitor by Crushing His Spirit
The enormous statue of Maitreya Buddha stood in the Mahavira Hall.
Here, everyone believed in the coming of Maitreya, and that when He descended, they would achieve enlightenment and liberation.
Under the sunlight, the emaciated hungry ghosts faced piles of gold scattered across the ground without a shred of greed, for gold could not become food.
It wasn’t that no one tried stripping bark or eating grass roots; it was just that those things, in this Hungry Ghost Realm, turned into nothingness the moment they entered the stomach.
Not only that, but consuming them seemed to fuel insatiable greed, adding karma needlessly.
The people were so thin that they looked like skin wrapped around bones, their stomachs rumbling like drums. So they recited the Buddha’s name and chanted Buddhist scriptures, awaiting the day their death might grant them liberation. But was that true liberation? In this Hungry Ghost Realm, nobody knew. They just believed it to be so, as did the elderly abbot.
Yin Tingxue watched the wandering hungry ghosts inside the temple, her heart sinking.
Standing beside her was the female crown, who pitied the suffering souls as well, though her empathy was not as deep as Yin Tingxue’s.
Rows of Buddha statues stood silently, their serene and benevolent faces exuding kindness, yet remaining mute. The scriptures spoke of the Buddha’s great compassion and immense power, but those who had truly read them understood: the Buddha could not comprehend human suffering.
The Buddha is uncreated and undying; He knows no pain.
Yet all beings suffer.
Today, the elderly abbot planned to lead the people in chanting sutras and praying for blessings. The faith of everyone here was genuine. Nearly the entire Thousand Buddha Village gathered, filling the temple and its surroundings with the bustling noise of fervent devotion. Yin Tingxue could, however, see the shadows of suffering cast upon every forehead—pain that couldn’t be hidden. Their rumbling stomachs echoed like the knock of wooden fish, and one haggard face after another revealed an endless hunger, a numbness stretched on for untold years.