122: Choose a Faith

Li Shimin was indeed a wise ruler; under his leadership, the Grand Tang had made significant progress far beyond historical records, but when things went beyond his comprehension, he would still curse!

Where did that come from? Even the great Divine Abilities of the Buddhas and Immortals were destroyed, let alone his Human Realm nation!

"Holy Monk, you and I are like brothers; just tell me what happened directly. I, Li Er, can handle it!" Tang King Li Shimin asked in shock.

Tang Ku looked at the several people around him, and everyone was looking at him too, seemingly waiting for him to make a decision.

He smiled helplessly: "Anyway, I'll have to tell you eventually, so I won't be coy. In short, we are about to face an enemy, a powerful enemy who seeks to utterly destroy the entire world. He can even erase a Saint from this world..."

With that, Tang Ku recounted everything he had experienced to Li Shimin. Of course, he didn't mention many of the more dangerous events or some perilous conjectures, fearing that Li Shimin might truly collapse.

However, even with his efforts to be concise, it still left our Emperor of Great Tang dumbfounded, to the point where his hands and feet couldn't help but tremble.

Li Shimin had strong psychological fortitude. After all, he was an emperor who fought on horseback; half of the Grand Tang's territory was personally conquered by him, and he had faced life and death countless times during that period. Yet, never before had he been afraid.

But today, he was truly afraid!

In this game of chess, even Saints were pawns. What ability did he, a mere Mortal, even as a Human Emperor, possess to contend with such an enemy?!

All of this was both absurdly unbelievable and seemed to be happening right before his eyes, forcing him to believe it.

His mind in a mess, Li Shimin finally recovered after a long while, looking at Tang Ku and saying, "So, their ultimate goal is still to destroy my Grand Tang..."

"Not for now!" Tang Ku said. "As things stand, I'm not afraid to tell you, in fact, according to the original historical trajectory, the Grand Tang's Zhenguan era only lasted 23 years. But now... hmm, it should be the 28th year of Zhenguan, right? This means that, for some reason, the Zhenguan era has indeed extended by four or five years, and Your Majesty's Dragon body is still healthy. This indicates one thing: the Grand Tang's Luck is far from exhausted, and not only is it not exhausted... the Dragon Qi gathers throughout Chang'an, and this Luck is rising steadily. It's not that easy to destroy. And we will do our best to preserve the Grand Tang until all these extraterrestrial devils are exterminated!"

It must be said that Tang Ku made sense. Li Shimin glanced at him, pondering many things in his heart. After a quarter of an hour, he finally sighed helplessly: "According to the Holy Monk, I should have passed away five years ago, right?"

Tang Ku said, "That was originally the case, but now it seems that Your Majesty's body can live for another ten or twenty years without issue. Furthermore, from now on, Poor Monk will impart to you the Dao of cultivation for prolonging life. Although it cannot grant immortality, it can certainly extend your lifespan further."

"I certainly hope to live a long life, but with such immense pressure..." Li Shimin said helplessly, "Why don't I just abdicate now and give the throne to the Crown Prince? How good it would be to be a carefree Taishang Huang! My son, Li Chengqian, is not young anymore; if I drag this out, he might even raise an army and revolt!"

"That is your concern, Poor Monk dares not comment. However, as for prolonging life, that is still necessary... And, next, Poor Monk also needs to train soldiers!" Tang Ku said in a deep voice, "I always feel that besides those fellows from outside the heavens, there are still many unsettling things. If we don't strengthen the combat power of the Tang soldiers, I'm afraid it will be very difficult to cope in the future..."

"Is the Holy Monk referring to the strangeness of Chechi Kingdom!"

Nezha remembered something and couldn't help but frown, "Those guys, we really should be wary of them... You know, the Immortals in heaven aren't a monolithic block. If they have any dangerous ideas, we must prepare early!"

"Alright, alright, weren't we talking about the monk's matter? How did we get so off-topic? Master, what do you think we should do about this now?"

Bianji still called Tang Ku 'Master,' as it was a habit of many years, difficult to change.

"I actually have no solution either!"

Tang Ku said helplessly, "In this situation, we can only follow the law. For any monk who has committed a capital crime, kill them if they should be killed. As for the rest, punish them as they should be punished..."

"But, this is only for now!"

The Bull Demon King, however, suddenly pinched his chin and pondered, "Holy Monk, you must know that these monks are only a tiny fraction of all the monks in the Grand Tang. Just as Master Wu Zhen said, the Buddhist Realm no longer exists, and the faith of all monks has collapsed. This kind of thing will sooner or later spread throughout the country, and even the entire Four Continents might become like this. All Buddhists... will fall into depravity because of this. This matter is truly difficult to resolve!"

Everyone fell silent, and Wu Zhen, who was feeding Ao Lie hawthorn cake, suddenly turned around. Seeing everyone's troubled expressions, she couldn't help but ask in confusion, "Isn't this matter very easy to solve? Why are you all looking like this?"

Whoosh!

Everyone's gaze focused on Wu Zhen. Wu Zhen's face reddened: "Why are you all staring at Poor Monk? Poor Monk has entered Buddhism and no longer thinks about those things!"

"Think about what things?"

Tang Ku suddenly shook his head and said, "You mean you have a way to solve the current situation?"

"This is very easy to solve!" Wu Zhen said strangely, "Before, on Olympus, after a deity was defeated, new deities would fill their positions, and then the believers would convert to the new gods, wouldn't they regain their faith?"

"Good idea!"

Shi Jingmo clapped his hands and laughed, "We can just apply that directly! Junior Sister is truly intelligent; I couldn't think of such a method!"

"Actually, it wasn't my idea either; it's just a conventional rule in our world. I just happened to know it!" Wu Zhen said with a smile, "You were Athena's subordinate, you should know this principle too!"

Shi Jingmo nodded and looked at Tang Ku, saying, "Master, this method is feasible!"

Tang Ku was slow to catch on, scratching his bald head and saying, "But, where do we find this temporary faith?"

"Heh heh, what's there to find!"

Li Shimin also understood the implied meaning in their words and couldn't help but clap his hands and laugh loudly, "Isn't there a ready-made faith right now?"

"Ready-made?"

As the saying goes, those involved are often blind to the obvious. Tang Ku still didn't understand where they were saying the faith was.

"Holy Monk! You shouldn't be too modest; that will invite criticism!" The Bull Demon King also laughed, "Isn't this ready-made faith yourself?"

The Bull Demon King's words awakened Tang Ku from his daze. Tang Ku couldn't help but point to himself, asking in shock, "Me?!"