Chang Cheng, the Water God who governs the nine virtues of Si Zhangtian, stiffly walked out of the Kunlun Mountains, finally letting out a long sigh of relief.

Then, he reached out and grabbed the water ghost in his elegant butler's uniform in front of him, shaking him back and forth frantically.

"Is your mouth missing a lock?!"

"Why don't you have one on your mouth?! Huh?!"

Water God Chang Cheng was on the verge of tears, gnashing his teeth.

How dare he directly say that Lu Wu snores? How fat was his courage?

As long as it was related to that monkey, he always felt that his luck would never be good!

The water ghost was dizzy from being shaken and raised his hand: "How about I apologize to you?"

"Apologize? How will you compensate me?!"

The water ghost pondered.

Then, he solemnly suggested, "How about I fork myself out?"

Chang Cheng: "............"

The Water God, who had been a shut-in for thousands of years, fell into a self-doubting depression.

He should have just ignored this guy.

The Lord of Chongwu Mountain noticed this unfamiliar figure and asked with slight curiosity, "Chang Cheng, who is this..." Chang Cheng's thoughts paused. This was when the gods of Kunlun were gathering. If this elder knew that he had brought this outsider back, he would probably be punished.

Immediately, his thoughts turned slightly, and he said stiffly: "I met him. A new Water God."

"Oh? A new Water God..."

The old mountain lord was surprised, smiled, and said, "I didn't know that a new Water God had appeared under the Liusha River."

"Little one, what kind of Water God are you?"

Chang Cheng was speechless for a moment, not knowing how to explain.

The water ghost over there bowed elegantly and answered without changing his expression:

"In the entire museum, the entire old street, no one knows happy water better than me."

"Therefore, I am the God of Happy Water."

Chang Cheng's mouth twitched.

For a moment, he had the urge to raise his hand and smack himself in the face.

And the water ghost over there, who seemed to have maxed out his social skills, actually became acquainted with the mountain gods and water gods before Chang Cheng, the shut-in, even knew it. When the Lord of Chongwu Mountain asked and heard that the water ghost didn't have his own river yet, he confirmed that the latter did have some divinity and said:

"No wonder I see that the aura on your body is pure, but it is weak."

"Since you are a water god, without your own water area, you will naturally continue to weaken..."

He pondered for a moment and said generously, "In that case, this old man still has a branch water system that has never been occupied by a water god. If you don't mind, why don't you make your home there..."

Chang Cheng: "............"

On this day, the River God of the Liusha River truly sensed it.

What is it called that a lie needs more lies to cover it up.

………………

Wei Yuan's true spirit was still in his memories.

And in fact, this can also be regarded as something that truly happened during the Tang Dynasty.

It was true and unadulterated history.

After arriving at the first small city in the Western Regions, they began the truly crucial part of this journey. When Chen Yuan was recording what he saw and heard, Xuanzang once asked him strangely why he paid so much attention to local customs, routes, and what he saw and heard.

Chen Yuan couldn't say why either.

He just felt that he should do so.

Xuanzang didn't care anymore. The bandit Shi Pantuo also followed behind. He learned how to use writing. After Chen Yuan recorded this long journey, he also recorded many experiences and his own thoughts—

Number Three:

That Tang Dynasty monk is a very strange person.

I have seen many, many monks from various places.

On this road, there is never a shortage of merchants transporting silk and porcelain, nor is there a shortage of those monks. Besides monks, there are also all kinds of so-called wise men.

Some of them have withered faces, frowning tightly, as if they have used all their experiences to think about the great Dharma; others are fat-headed and big-eared, like fat pigs placed on offering tables, loudly chanting dogmatic and incomprehensible principles.

Some are serious and solemn, even children will be scared to cry, while others are too frivolous.

But I have never seen someone like Xuanzang. He is handsome, with a childlike innocence in his eyes, but he is also full of wisdom and strength. Even when facing death, he has a smile on his lips, and this smile contains a kind of sorrow.

What kind of place is the Tang Dynasty that can nurture such a person?

Although I don't like him, I still have to say.

He is like a true monk.

Number Seventeen:

We have arrived in the Gaochang Kingdom, which is a hegemon in the Western Regions, but before I came here, I didn't expect that the king here is actually a Central Plains Han Chinese. To what extent are these Han Chinese full of martial virtue? According to that damned stinky Yuan (this place was smeared, it seems that it stopped suddenly when recording, or was heavily smashed by a punch)'

According to that Yuan, the capital here is very similar to Chang'an City in the Tang Dynasty. Later, I learned that the king here had been to Chang'an City. Hmph, the king here hopes to keep that monk here. At first, he persuaded him well, but later he directly threatened him, planning to forcibly keep Xuanzang here as a national teacher.

But in the end, we still left here. I don't know what Dharma Master Xuanzang said to him.

The King of Gaochang became sworn brothers with him in front of the Buddha.

This is too outrageous.

But it's good that we are no longer on the road alone. We have twenty years of travel expenses, thirty horses, and twenty-five followers, but the Dharma Master was stuffed with four disciples, and a Gaochang official by the way…

I don't know how a king would be willing to become sworn brothers with a wanted monk? How much charm does such a person have? But I am more inclined to think that Xuanzang did all this with his fists that are bigger than a monk's bowl, but gave up the position of national teacher. I am a little amazed.

He doesn't seem like a monk anymore.

According to what that… 'ape' said, this is more like a Confucian scholar.

Damn it, are the Confucian officials in the Central Plains so outrageous?

Number Twenty-Six:

We have arrived in Qiuci. Qiuci has a strange custom. After a child is born, they wrap their heads with wooden boards. The royal family is no exception. Their heads are all flat, so the women are not very good-looking, but I think it's almost the same if you cover your head with cloth.

I told that ape triumphantly.

Very good, that 'ape' beat me up. I remember it, you stinky monkey.

But this is really a great place, with continuous monasteries, towering pagodas, apsaras dancing in the air, and thousands of Buddhas jumping overhead. Monks and Buddhists flock here, and the sound of sutras being preached is endless. I thought Xuanzang would stay here for a long time, but he didn't.

A monk once told me that cultivating Buddhism must be a painful thing, but here, I saw that the box containing the relics of eminent monks was engraved with the songs and dances of the mortal world. I thought hard but couldn't understand it. Finally, I asked Xuanzang, and he told me after thinking for a long time:

What is Buddhism? Buddhism is for people to use.

If you can balance the secular songs and dances of the mortal world with the wisdom of eminent monks.

Then even if the Buddha is alive, he cannot say that this is not a clever kind of Buddhism.

I suddenly felt a little strange. Why would such a devout monk say such a thing? Is he really going to the Buddhist country to obtain scriptures? And if the Buddha doesn't agree with his views, what will he do?

After refusing the position of national teacher.

He once again rejected such a place where the mundane world and Buddhism reached a delicate peace, and continued to move forward. For any monk, leaving such a prosperous place of Buddhism is definitely more difficult than giving up wealth. He doesn't seem like a Confucian anymore.

He is an ascetic.

Number Twenty-Seven:

After leaving Qiuci, we must cross the snow-capped mountains, the Kunlun Mountains, and the Tianshan Mountains.

That Chen Yuan, that is, that 'ape', was inexplicably disturbed and wanted to climb Kunlun.

But for safety, we chose to go from the other side. No one has ever climbed up here. It is very dangerous. This snow mountain journey, the snow mountain is a thousand feet high, there is no road, and even warriors cannot breathe on it, and in the wind and snow, we saw Tyrannosaurus rex, 'The cold wind is biting, there are many Tyrannosaurus rex, flying sand and rocks, encountering them will lead to death'.

We walked for seven days and half of the people died.

I have never seen him so sad.

And during this journey, we encountered the Turkic iron cavalry bandits.

Those Turkic people's packages were filled with the belongings of the dead, and the bloody smell soared into the sky. They used ropes to pull women and men outside to run. Some had already died and had been ground out with a great stench. Even I, a bandit, couldn't bear it.

At this time, I saw Xuanzang's anger for the first time.

He single-handedly killed fifty-seven Turkic bandits clad in iron armor.

Then he buried those who had died.

The expression on his face was sad and weak.

I felt that when he was angry, he was like the Vajra in legends, and when he recited the scriptures at the end, he seemed to shed tears, grieving for strangers and secretly mourning for the departed, he was like a Bodhisattva again.

I never imagined that compassion and anger could appear on his body at the same time.

From this point of view, he is more like an ordinary person.

This time he didn't tell us how to record it, but both I and the ape silently made changes.

We told the outside world that those bandits had infighting and disagreed on how to divide the spoils, so they dispersed in a hubbub.

Everyone believed it.

Number Thirty-Seven:

We have arrived at the royal court of the Western Turks.

The Eastern Turks fought against the Tang Dynasty, while the Western Turks were actually allies of the Tang Dynasty.

This time, Xuanzang once again successfully obtained the friendship of the Turkic Khan. Although I know that this friendship is only because of Xuanzang's personal charm and confidence, although I was very flustered when his palm was pressed on the top of my head, when he put away his palm and his Zen staff, he was the most convincing person I had ever seen.

The Turkic Khan sent a general who had been to Chang'an and was proficient in various languages to escort us.

Although I believe that Xuanzang can bury this general in the ground with one hand.

In addition, that ape has been running around in this city, writing his so-called Records of the Western Regions, writing about geographical situation, climate, products, politics, economy, culture, customs, religion, everything. This guy is really boring. He said these things would be useful, but when asked what they would be useful for, he couldn't answer.

He just said that it seems that someone told him that routes, culture, and customs are the most important.

Oh, right, this royal court.

It's called Suyab.

Shi Pantuo stretched his lazy waist, left his writing, routinely mocked the ranger ape, and was beaten up. After lying flat for an hour, he went to the ground to eat. Then, the ranger who went out to fight with others was dragged back by the monk by the neck and ordered to read Buddhist scriptures.

Taking a glance, the Buddhist scripture in the ranger's hand was the *Vimalakirti Sutra*.

During their stay here, Xuanzang was given a rare lotus seed, but because of the hard journey, he had to put the lotus seed in the water tank of this courtyard. They soon left. When they left, the ranger slashed heavily at the door with the Chang'an sword in his hand, the sword energy was fierce.

To show that this was the place where the Chang'an ranger lived in those years.

At this time, no one knew that half a century later, the Tang Dynasty's iron cavalry relied on the routes recorded in the Records of the Western Regions to kill into the city of the Western Turks, and established a Tang Dynasty office in the former royal court. Outside the city, Empress Wu Zetian ordered the construction of a Buddhist temple.

And at this time, a family named Li from Tianshui came to Suyab.

One day.

Their child found the *Vimalakirti Sutra* in the cracks in the wall.

This Buddhist scripture is also known as the Azure Lotus Buddhist Scripture, and because a lotus flower in the courtyard is quiet and secluded.

Therefore, he called himself Qinglian.

Seventy-two years after Xuanzang and Chen Yuan passed through Suyab, the Qinglian Layman was born here.

And twenty years later, wearing a long sword on his waist, like a ranger, he walked towards Chang'an.

History is always like this, intersecting in places where no one has ever imagined, romantic and magnificent.

And that bandit certainly didn't care about these things. He just accompanied Xuanzang and the ranger who he called the ape, walking hard on the road in the Western Regions, recording what he saw and heard:

'Samarkand, the people here all believe in Zoroastrianism.'

'We were beaten when we entered the city.'

And such things also existed in Xuanzang's memories and were recorded.

"My two disciples were chased by Zoroastrians with torches and almost lost their lives."

The results after that were still impossible to put on paper, but whether it was Xuanzang's memories or the bandit's records, they all wrote down the result - Xuanzang introduced Buddhism to the King of Samarkand, and 'reversed' the king's beliefs in one night.

The king gave up Zoroastrianism and began to live according to the rituals of Central Plains Buddhism.

He even began to capture and expel Zoroastrians.

It is difficult to say that there was no reason for the monk to vent his anger for his own people in this kind of behavior. Anyway, the bandit was very happy, and later arrived in Huoguo. The queen of this place was the sister of the King of Gaochang, so he felt that he should have a good rest, and even the ranger thought so.

Then they encountered something very dumbfounded.

The King of Gaochang's sister died.

The King of Huo married a new wife.

Then a very bloody thing happened. The king's son took a fancy to his stepmother, killed his father, and the recorded text was 'The child was young, the adult son inherited the throne, and still married his stepmother as his wife.'

So in the turmoil, Xuanzang opened up a path with a pair of iron fists and an eight-hundred-pound Zen staff.

He actually broke through.

'In the country of Kapishi, divination with the Buddha's relics obtained the omen of the Bodhi tree.'

'Seen broken in Gandhara, encountered bandits.'

When Xuanzang and Chen Yuan finally arrived at their destination, a very outrageous thing happened. Xuanzang was actually robbed of his beauty. A goddess of ancient Indian religion, Durga, claimed to be the source of the Ganges, and wanted to make Xuanzang her sacrifice.

More than fifty warriors of the Age of Gods kidnapped Xuanzang.

Xuanzang was in a good mood.

So he just overturned the god's boat. The *Biography of the Tang Monk* concealed that Xuanzang did this, recording that 'Black winds rose, trees were broken and sand flew, rivers surged, and the barge capsized. The warriors of the Age of Gods thought that the gods were angry, so they honestly knelt down and worshiped.'

And finally, when the Tang Dynasty successfully conquered the Eastern Turks and let the Turkic Khans dance in the back garden, Xuanzang and Chen Yuan also came to the destination of this trip, raised their heads, and saw Nalanda Temple.

ps: Today's second update... In history, Shi Pantuo actually left Xuanzang outside Yumenguan. Of course, there will be an explanation for the reason later. Cat head likes it, because in order to shape Xuanzang's characteristics, I had to use this method of recording similar to a bystander's narration.

Li Bai's birthplace chose one of the most popular sayings, Suyab.

To be honest, the official history is even more outrageous.

Xuanzang's experience is excerpted from: *Biography of the Tang Monk*, that's right, the reason for writing it is really that the bandits had an infighting, and then after the infighting, they left directly, doing nothing. I believed it.