Chapter 175 — The Meditation Chamber
The Sword Questions the Heavens · Page 2 of 5
How long he slept this time, he did not know; in the course of it he woke several times, but each time after a brief clarity he would at once fall back into slumber, and all he remembered was that someone had been keeping watch at his side the whole while.
In that drifting haze he saw many people—his parents when he was young, his innocent and beautiful senior sister, Bi Li, graven on his heart, Lu Xueling, near yet ever distant, and many, many others, flickering one by one before him. Once he even thought he saw Fa Cheng and Fa Jing, those brothers of Fan Yin Temple from ten years past, sitting beside him chanting sutras and invoking the Buddha's name.
He smiled bitterly then—though even he did not know whether that bitter smile showed on his face, or whether, in the end, it was all no more than a dream.
Like this topsy-turvy life of his—a dream, an illusion!
Why chant sutras for me?
What good are sutras, in any case?
In one of his brief wakings, Ming Li thought such things quietly to himself—and then he fainted away again.
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"Dong... dong... dong... dong..."
Like a deep bell tolling at the far edge of heaven, it came drifting to him, waking him from the depths of nightmare; that heavy bell, from far to near, slowly, seemed to strike into the very bottom of his heart.
For the first time, he felt no urge to open his eyes. He simply lay there quietly, neither thinking nor caring where he was, or what world lay beyond him.
The vast universe—and yet at this moment all that remained was the low tolling of the bell.
"Dong... dong... dong... dong..."
The bell rang on, lingering, as though it would never stop, would go on striking forever. He listened, his breathing calm, his whole spirit merging into that placid tone, unwilling ever to leave it.
How long had it been since he last lay like this, with nothing at all weighing on his heart?
Who knows what agony it is, to live each day bearing countless burdens?
Only—this little heaven and earth of his could not last, after all; footsteps came from far to near, walking toward where he lay, scattering his thoughts.
The bell that had been striking at his heart suddenly seemed to draw away from him, all at once remote at the edge of the sky.
Silence, and a sigh...
Slowly, he opened his eyes.
Buddha!
That was the first thing he saw.
A single "Buddha" character, a full hand-span across, hung high upon the ceiling; around it coiled a ring of golden patterns, and beyond that, ring upon ring, five hundred arhats were carved in fine detail, forming a great circle. The arhats were all of a size, yet each differed in expression and posture, arranged in rows, perfectly upright. Beyond the great circle lay a coffered ceiling of blue ground and black border, two feet higher than the Buddha circle at the center, its painted scheme different again: square panels, each a foot across, edged in rolled gold, within which were painted qilin, phoenixes, golden dragons, goats, and other auspicious beasts of the Buddhist tradition—though each panel bore the same pattern. (Note 1)
Though he knew nothing of carving or architecture, one glance told Ming Li this was the work of a divine craftsman. From the ceiling, within that inner circle surrounding the Buddha character, two golden chains hung down, suspending a long-burning lamp; seen from below it was a bronze basin some three feet across, no doubt filled with lamp oil.