At those words the young monk Chenghuai flew into a towering rage and rebuked him: "Blasphemy! How dare you insult the Buddha!" Shen Mu smiled, and his heart settled into perfect calm; an incomparable confidence flowed from his eyes. However strong this young monk might be, however refined his arts, he had already lost in the realm of the heart! The white-browed monk opposite Huo Ye wavered in indecision. Shen Mu's words had seemed utterly lawless—insulting not the Buddha alone but gods and demons alike—yet as they fell upon his ears they were no blasphemy at all, but the very words of truth! Only when there is no Buddha in the heart can one become a Buddha; once a Buddha dwells in the heart, one can never become a Buddha. Only when there is no demon in the heart can one become a demon; once a demon dwells in the heart, one can never become a demon. Chenghuai's cultivation had not yet reached that stage, and he could not grasp the words; the white-browed monk had grasped them to the bone. Only after stepping into the Heaven-Man realm had he come to understand their truth, yet even now, having cultivated all the way to the Life-and-Death realm, the Buddha in his heart remained unbroken. The deeper one's cultivation, the more one knows how terrible gods and demons are, and how vast the Tathagata. Easy to know, hard to do. That the same words should come from the mouth of a little child like Shen Mu seemed exceedingly strange; stranger still, this little child claimed to have shattered the gods and Buddhas in his heart! Shen Mu was far too young ever to have touched the truth of those words—and if he could not touch the truth, how could he possibly have shattered the gods and Buddhas within? To shatter them demands bitter cultivation and sudden enlightenment; otherwise the Buddha in the heart remains a Buddha, and the demon a demon. "Be that as it may, he never obtained the true supreme arts of our Great Tingming Temple. However lofty his state of heart, he will be no match for Chenghuai." The white-browed monk let his eyes rest on his nose and his nose on his heart, as though sunk in meditation, caring nothing for victory or defeat upon the platform. On the dueling platform a faint golden light rose about Chenghuai's tall, thin frame, and the young monk gave the uncanny impression of a living Buddha—holy, majestic, boundless—pressing upon the soul with incomparable weight! Below the platform, men and women, old and young, had gathered from every village, drawn to the spectacle; the din of voices had seethed like a boiling cauldron, but the moment golden light shone from Chenghuai's body every voice died away at once, till the hush was such that not a crow or sparrow stirred. Almost in the same instant they shut their mouths, as though each had received a head-on blow of the staff and a cry of awakening! This was the heart-method of the Buddhist school, the Tingming Mahayana Sutra. Its path differed from the heart-methods of other schools: it proceeded from the outer to the inner—the outer being the body, and the body a Tathagata; the inner being the heart, and the heart a Tathagata. The Buddhist school called these body-suchness and heart-suchness. Though Chenghuai had cultivated only the outermost layer of body-suchness, once the Buddha-aspect appeared he could strike others like a blow of the staff and a shout of awakening! Granny Zhu and the others grew anxious again. Chenghuai had not yet struck, but this aura alone could serve as an opening rebuke to Shen Mu, crushing his will to fight before the fight began. Ask yourself: who would dare raise a hand against a Buddha? But Shen Mu dared! Shen Mu joined body to heart, heart to intent, intent to fist, fist to breath, breath to body; and at the same moment his Spirit Fetus moved together with his flesh, body joined to spirit, as he unleashed the Nine Dragons Commanding Wind and Thunder! His footwork was the Lame Old Man's Sky-Sweeping Divine Legs, swift beyond measure: before Chenghuai could blink, Shen Mu stood before him; before Chenghuai could raise a hand, that fist, vast as a mountain range, crashed into his chest. In this single technique nine layers of force lay hidden within one blow. The first layer struck like a dragon of fire bursting from the eye of Shen Mu's fist against Chenghuai's heart, with a great bell-like DONG! The golden light over Chenghuai's body blazed suddenly bright, and faintly there surfaced the image of a great golden bell. The second layer came hard on its heels: Twin Dragons Entwining, two dragon-forces coiling about each other as they bored toward the pit of Chenghuai's heart! DONG— another toll of the bell; the two forces came so fast that the two tolls sounded almost as one, deafening! Then came the third layer of the Nine Dragons Commanding Wind and Thunder, Three Dragons Shattering Stone; after it the fourth, Four Dragons Pouncing to Kill; the fifth, Five Dragons Subduing Demons; the sixth, Six Dragons Turning the Wheel of Samsara; and the seventh, Seven Dragons Overturning the Sea! Seven layers erupted in succession, seven bell-tolls merging into one roar, and at last the golden bell-shroud of light over Chenghuai's body dimmed, forcing the tall, thin young monk back a single step. The eighth layer, the Force of the Eight Divisions of Heavenly Dragons, burst forth, and Chenghuai retreated again, the golden bell over his body flaring back to brilliance—then Shen Mu's ninth layer, Nine Dragons of Wind and Thunder, erupted, and the golden bell-shroud shattered with a crash. Shen Mu was astonished. Even the Dark-Fanged Demon Ape could not withstand all nine full layers of the Nine Dragons Commanding Wind and Thunder; every time he fought it he stopped at six or seven layers, lest he kill or maim the beast—yet this Chenghuai, neither dodging nor evading, had endured the full nine with his body alone! He had heard Granny Zhu's words; this time he had held nothing back, exerting his full strength, even drawing on the divine treasury of his Primal Fetus—yet all he had done was force Chenghuai back a few steps. "You never received the true transmission of the Eight Tingming Techniques." Chenghuai's feet moved; vital energy burst from his soles, and his speed was blinding. His palm rose, thunder pealed forth, and his fist came booming with the cry of a dragon. BOOM— before the blow even landed, his vital energy took the shape of an azure dragon—faint, yet ferocious and savage, domineering beyond measure! The first layer of the Nine Dragons Commanding Wind and Thunder had actually been given visible form by his vital energy, a sign of how deep that energy ran; more crucial still, he possessed a heart-method in perfect accord with the Eight Tingming Techniques, and that was precisely what Shen Mu lacked! Shen Mu took the strike head-on and found the first layer of force astonishingly powerful; and before he had fully absorbed it, the second layer, Twin Dragons Entwining, came hard behind—two dragon-shaped streams of energy churning about each other, wrenching both his arms askew—and then the third layer, Three Dragons Shattering Stone, crashed directly upon his arms! Blood ran from both of Shen Mu's arms; his feet shifted and he fell back again and again, the stones of the platform bursting and flying beneath his tread. Four dragon-forces pounced in for the kill. Shen Mu gave a muffled grunt; vital energy surged into his eyes and the Heaven-Soaring Divine Eye opened at once. The energy in his hand became a long spear, and thrusting it out he passed between the four pouncing dragons and, with a sharp ting, pierced Chenghuai's palm—before the Five Dragons Subduing Demons could even erupt, the thrust had scattered his energy to nothing. The two forces collided, and the spear of energy in Shen Mu's hand likewise burst apart and dispersed. Shen Mu's brows lifted as he looked at Chenghuai's palm: a single drop of blood was running down from the fingertips. The thrust had pierced i