Chapter 240: Attaining Buddhahood
The colossal Bodhisattva visage froze.
Its four massive arms slowly lowered. The radiant glow of the vajra, the lotus, the sword, and the prayer beads—all four ritual applies dimmed in unison. The holy monk's gaze locked onto Kobe Hikaru. He stared for a long, heavy moment.
In the ruined corridor, only the Sanskrit chants continued to echo. Yet, their rhythm had fundamentally changed. The oppressive, mind-crushing weight had dissolved into something gentle, resembling the quiet exhale of a man finally unclenching a fist he had held tight for a lifetime.
Having flaws allows one to progress... to become complete...
The voice rumbled from the Bodhisattva visage, stripped of its previous crushing pressure. Only the weary rasp of an impossibly old man remained. And beneath that weariness lay a deep, aching confusion.
But even so, you could leave right now. You are no longer bound by my barrier. Why do you stay?
Hikaru did not answer immediately.
He calmly slid Yomikiri back into its sheath. The sharp click of metal meeting wood echoed through the cavernous space. He returned all three of his blades to their resting positions—Onikiri secured on his left hip, Yomikiri on his right, and the massive Banryu slung securely across his back.
Standing amidst the rubble, his Crimson Demon Eyes leveled with the towering Bodhisattva visage. Only then did he speak.
"Because I want to hear your question once more."
He had completely ceased his attack.
Master Hakushin's golden eyes trembled at the sight. The demon before him had sheathed his swords. Despite possessing the strength to continue the slaughter, he had voluntarily disarmed himself.
The simple gesture violently pulled Master Hakushin's mind back into the distant past.
Many, many centuries ago.
A young monk traveled through the unforgiving mountains on a freezing, rain-swept night. Seeking shelter, he stumbled upon a dilapidated temple on the verge of collapse. Inside sat an elder monk. The old man's face was withered, his robes reduced to filthy rags, yet he sat perfectly still, chanting sutras into the dark.
The young monk had asked him: Venerable one, after so many years of bitter practice, have you attained enlightenment?
The elder practitioner merely smiled, his voice raspy from the cold. No. I have merely witnessed much life and death.
Then what use is your chanting now?
By chanting and chanting, one can face death with composure while holding reverence, and not become a demon.
At the time, the young monk thought those words were the ramblings of a fool. How could someone so accustomed to the cycle of life and death still fear the end?
The old man's reply had been infuriatingly simple.
I may not fear death, but of course, one should hold reverence for it.
Capable of not fearing death, yet deliberately choosing to fear it.
It was exactly like the undead Oni standing before him now. A creature entirely capable of mending his own flaws, yet deliberately choosing to leave them open.
The young monk had not understood back then.
Later in life, that same young monk went on to save tens of thousands. Hundreds of thousands. The masses wept at his feet, calling him a living Buddha. Moved by their suffering, he willingly sacrificed his own life, burying himself alive to transform into a Sokushinbutsu—a holy mummy that would protect the lands forever.
When he descended into that pitch-black pit, he truly believed he held no fear of death.
But at the final moment, on the forty-ninth day in the suffocating dark, he found his hands shaking.
He was afraid. He was utterly terrified.
And from that terror, resentment was born. A hatred that festered and boiled for hundreds of years.
In that suffocating darkness, he finally comprehended the state of mind of the elder monk he had met in his youth. The realization crashed over him—life and death were the true, impossible terrors of this world.
He failed to transcend. He failed to attain Buddhahood.
He successfully transformed into a Sokushinbutsu, yet simultaneously warped into a 'demon Buddha'—a resentful spirit tethered to the mortal realm. His immense Power of Will refused to extinguish, and his resentment proved equally impossible to dispel.
He became the very mountain spirit dwelling within Mount Hakurei, a ghost wandering the edges of the mortal world.
Over the centuries, countless people entered the mountain. Many came, many died, and a rare few 'met' him... including the legendary Onmyoji from centuries past, Abe no Seimei.
Every single one of them believed the holy monk resented his fate. They believed he hated the world.
Only, the truth was far different.
This old monk indeed hates—
The Bodhisattva visage's stone lips parted. The light pooling in those massive golden eyes was no longer the divine glow of a Buddha.
It was the shimmering reflection of tears.
He finally continued the question he had asked earlier.
But what this old monk hates... has never been those who wished for this old monk's death.
His voice was a fragile whisper, nearly drowned out by the fading echoes of the Sanskrit chants.
Hikaru stood perfectly still, offering no interruption.
Those people... their lives were far more bitter than this old monk's.
The fields yielded no grain. The rivers held no water. Starving children gnawed on tree bark until their gums bled. The elderly leaned against the village walls, their breathing so shallow you could not distinguish between sleep and death...
They wished for this old monk's death because they had absolutely no other recourse.
The Bodhisattva visage's four massive arms slowly drew inward, folding protectively across its chest. The imposing, divine posture evaporated. What remained was merely the projection of a terrified old man, curling into himself.
This old monk knew.
This old monk... always knew.
The giant golden eyes slid shut. When they opened again, the divine gold had vanished, reverting to a cloudy, milky murkiness.
Withered eyes.
Human eyes. The eyes of a frail old man.
They were the eyes of a mortal facing the abyss of death, overflowing with confusion and dread.
What this old monk hates... is himself.
The moment the confession left his lips, the towering Bodhisattva visage began to crumble.
Massive stone arms fractured and shattered. Golden light drifted from the falling debris like a swarm of fireflies, scattering into the cold mountain air. The petrified, divine skin flaked away, revealing the stark truth hidden beneath.
White bones.
The true, physical remains buried deep underground centuries ago.
This was Master Hakushin's true form: a withered, hunched, skeletal mummy.
Something wet traced a path down the bone of his face. It was not the glow of Buddha-light, nor the manifestation of his Power of Will.
It was tears.
Murky, warm tears carrying the heavy scent of graveyard earth dripped down, one by one, from empty sockets so dry they should have been incapable of weeping.
...Why?
Why did this old monk feel fear in the end? Why, at the very last moment, did this old monk feel such unwillingness and dread?
Yes, why?
He who had preached fearlessness his entire life. He who had been worshiped as a holy saint, a living Buddha—why did he break down and weep in terror at the end?
"Because you are human."
Hikaru's voice cut through the silence. His tone was flat, pragmatic, yet entirely devoid of mockery. He delivered the exact same answer he had given earlier, but the weight behind it had shifted.
This time, he was not just speaking; he was standing as living proof.
The impact of those simple words struck Master Hakushin's soul with the force of a tidal wave.
"Even a sage is human," Hikaru continued, his Crimson Demon Eyes watching the weeping skeleton. "You are not perfect and flawless. Therefore, you are capable of fear."
"And precisely because you are not perfect, you can progress. Is it not the exact same for me?"
As the undead Oni's words settled into the dust, the entire world seemed to hold its breath.
After a long, stretching silence—or perhaps just a fleeting instant—Master Hakushin let out a long, shuddering exhale.
His mind drifted back to the ruined temple. To the elder monk in the rain. To his younger self, full of arrogant certainty, and his older self, trapped in the dark.
All the centuries of agonizing philosophical debate melted away, leaving only a single, fragile truth.
So that's how it is... So, it was permissible for me to be afraid.
His skeletal jaw trembled. His entire decaying frame shook as he spoke the words aloud. I could fear death.
I can feel fear.
I can... be like an ordinary person.
For hundreds of years, he had demanded absolute perfection from himself. He had chained his soul to the impossible standards of a flawless saint, punishing himself for a single moment of mortal weakness.
As those final words echoed through the cavern, Mount Hakurei fell entirely silent.
The Sanskrit chants ceased.
The howling wind died down.
The grinding noise of shattering stone statues faded into nothingness.
Only the quiet, relieved weeping of an old monk remained.
His centuries of resentment were never directed at the starving villagers who needed him to die. It was pure, unadulterated self-hatred. Hatred for fearing the dark. Hatred for failing to be a perfect god. Hatred for being called a living Buddha, only to realize in his final forty-nine days that he was nothing more than a terrified mortal man.
But now, a demon stood before him and offered him absolution. He did not need to be flawless.
A saint is still a human.
He is allowed to be afraid. He is allowed to feel terror. He is allowed to tremble in the suffocating darkness and feel desperate remorse in the mud.
None of it was shameful.
Because that very imperfection was the ultimate proof that he was alive. It was proof that his life had meant something.
And so, the old monk's skeletal body began to glow.
It was not the oppressive, blinding gold of his forced Bodhisattva manifestation. This light was soft. Warm. It carried the gentle promise of the first ray of dawn breaking over the horizon.
True Buddha light. Entirely devoid of resentment.
It bloomed from the center of his ribcage, spreading down his withered limbs, illuminating his skeleton, and seeping into the very air of the cavern.
The scattered gravel, the ruined walls, and the broken fragments of the statues were bathed in the gentle warmth. Their jagged edges blurred, as if the physical world was quietly merging with the heavens.
The last lingering traces of the mountain's dark miasma dissolved into nothing.
Master Hakushin's skeletal form began to turn translucent. His bones shifted into pure light. His leathery skin dissolved into light. Even the heavy wooden prayer beads around his neck became rings of floating luminescence.
He was, at long last, attaining Buddhahood.
Not as a fake deity trapped in a mountain. Not as a forced Bodhisattva piled high on devoured destiny.
This was true, enlightened attainment.
The ultimate realization of accepting his own fear, embracing his mortal imperfection, carrying the weight of the world, and then gently setting it down as if it weighed nothing at all.
He had harmonized his soul. Harmony is perfection; possessing flaws is the truest form of being flawless.
He was complete.
Within the radiant glow, Master Hakushin's hunched figure slowly stood upright. His spine straightened, shedding the weight of centuries.
As his form began to scatter into a rainbow of light, he saw the 'Buddha'.
In a peaceful trance, he looked back one last time and saw his younger self. He saw the young monk asking why the elder did not fear death. In that ruined temple. In that freezing night rain.
The elder monk had been chanting sutras.
The realization washed over him like a warm tide. The elder monk his younger self had met back then... was none other than his current self.
Past, present, and future converged into a single point of light.
Master Hakushin finally understood.
At the very last moment, just before his consciousness merged with the pure light, he turned to face Hikaru.
He bowed.
Pressing his skeletal hands together, he lowered his forehead to his fingertips, performing the deepest, most devout bow a disciple could offer to their master.
"Thank you, my Root Teacher."
The title drifted through the radiant light, slipping past the fading echoes of the chants, and landed clearly in Hikaru's ears.
The Oni had guided him through the fog of his own mind and led him to true Buddhahood. In the eyes of the monk, that made the demon his Root Teacher. The most fundamental guide of his soul.
Hikaru did not speak.
The swirling five-colored light within his Crimson Demon Eyes subsided, leaving only a razor-thin golden ring around his pupils.
He returned the gesture. A subtle, shallow nod of acknowledgment. The quiet respect of a junior seeing off an elder.
It was a final farewell.
Master Hakushin smiled.
On that withered, skeletal face, an expression of pure, unburdened joy bloomed. It was the exact same clean, sincere smile the young monk had worn centuries ago when serving hot porridge to starving children.
Then, he dissolved.
Nothing remained but pure, drifting light.
At the edge of the ruined corridor, Kikyo stepped quietly into the clearing.
Her pristine white robes and crimson hakama caught the soft warmth of the fading Buddha light. Her longbow was securely stowed across her back, and her dark hair drifted gently in the spiritual current.
She raised one pale hand to her chest and bowed her head in deep reverence.
She offered no superfluous words. She, too, knew the tragic legend of Master Hakushin. Long before she became the official guardian of Kaede Village, she had heard the tales of the high monk who saved the masses only to be swallowed by his own despair.
For this living Buddha, she offered the silent respect of a priestess honoring a great predecessor.
The Buddha light surged upward, piercing the cavern roof and soaring into the sky.
Outside, the dense, suffocating fog of Mount Hakurei finally began to break. The vast sea of white mist pulled back from the surrounding forests, gathering at the mountain's peak before exhaling upward into the heavens—as if the mountain itself was letting out one final, peaceful breath.
From within the dispersing mist, a song drifted down.
It was ethereal and faint, carrying the weight of centuries.
The voices of children.
It was a simple nursery rhyme, sung by a chorus of young, innocent voices, thick with a forgotten local dialect.
The crow is reverence, reverence is the crow—
Good is evil, evil is good—
The eerie yet peaceful melody rode the shifting mist, winding around the collapsed stone pillars, weaving through the shattered statues, and echoing across the entirety of Mount Hakurei.
It was not a magical spell. It was not a holy sutra. It was just a song.
A nursery rhyme passed down by the village children Master Hakushin had saved so long ago. Those children had grown old and returned to the earth centuries past.
But their song remained.
The singing grew fainter as the mist thinned out.
When the very last wisp of white fog vanished into the blue firmament, the ruins fell completely still.
At the end of the corridor, where Master Hakushin had stood for hundreds of years, the space was empty.
Only a single object rested on the stone floor before Hikaru. It felt like a parting gift, or perhaps something the monk was finally returning to the world.
It was the size of a palm, warm and impossibly smooth, resembling polished jade. A faint, pulsing golden light flowed beneath its surface.
It was the bone of a Bodhisattva. The seed of Bodhi.
It was also a remnant 'thought', carrying a familiar warmth that Hikaru recognized from his own past.
The fog was gone.
The children's song faded into the wind.
Mount Hakurei still stood tall against the sky, but the oppressive aura was gone. It was quieter than it had ever been.
It was as if the great mountain had finally, peacefully, fallen asleep.
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