Chapter 3: The Legacy of Past Life

  At this moment, Zhang Cheng sat on the bed in a daze, his hands involuntarily making several gestures, but as soon as they took shape, he forcibly relaxed them, a hint of hesitation flashing across his face, thinking to himself: "Should I continue practicing or not?"

  He is now hesitating about whether or not to use the handprint that he unintentionally obtained on Earth when he was a child, which is a mysterious group of handprints.

  That set of handprints was picked up unintentionally by him in front of the orphanage door in his previous life, with no text on it, only recording nine handprints, and a golden paper strip of unknown material in between.

  On this golden piece of paper, there was only a strange Buddha image carved on it, and nothing else.

  The Buddha image on the screen was quite strange, although its appearance was the same as other Buddha images, all of which were full of kindness.

  But unlike ordinary Buddha statues, this statue has eighteen arms on both sides, nine right arms and nine left arms, one by one opposite each other, located in front of the chest, neatly arranged from top to bottom.

  But what's even stranger is that these eighteen arms don't have hands, as if they were chopped off by someone, leaving a hollow space in the middle.

  At first, when Zhang Cheng got this book, he looked at it for half a day and couldn't figure out what was going on. He just thought the handprints were fun, so he practiced drawing the nine handprints on it.

  Later, as he grew older and started going to school, he came into contact with new things, so he put this book aside and didn't look at it for several years, until finally, he even forgot that the book existed.

  It wasn't until later, because of one thing, that he realized how bad this book was.

  When he was eight years old, a sudden fire broke out in the orphanage, and the entire orphanage was reduced to ashes. When he returned to his room, the whole room had been burned to charcoal.

  But just as he was about to leave the room, he inadvertently found the golden paper that was originally sandwiched in that book among a piece of black charcoal.

  He found that there were only some gray paper scraps on this piece of paper, and it seemed that nothing had been burned.

  He picked it up and patted it casually, but what shocked him was that there was not a single burn mark on the paper, just like new.

  After this, the paper and the set of handprints successfully caught Zhang Cheng's attention.

  Later, he also did a special experiment and found that this piece of paper not only resisted fire but was quite resistant to it. He put the paper in the furnace for several days and nights, and it didn't burn at all.

  After a few days, Zhang Cheng put it in water again and soaked it for several days and nights. However, after taking it out and shaking it a few times, the surface was dry, just like before it was put in.

  Not only that, but also knife chopping, axe chopping, car crushing, needle piercing and so on, Zhang Cheng personally experimented with all of them, but for this piece of paper, it was completely useless.

  This completely overturned all his cognition, after all, things that were invulnerable to swords and guns, and impervious to water and fire, in his consciousness, only appeared in myths.

  At that time, he guessed that this piece of paper might be a treasure.

  But this piece of paper, apart from being tough and impervious to water and fire, had no other abilities, which made Zhang Cheng deny this guess.

  Later on, no matter how he studied, there was no clue at all. Under the helplessness, he could only give up again. It was also a thing that happened later that made him think of some ways.

  It was a spring outing organized by the school, and we happened to arrive at a temple.

  At that time, Zhang Cheng discovered that some Buddha statues in the temple had their hands clasped together in front of their chest, forming strange handprints.

  Although these strange handprints were different from the ones he had practiced before, they gave Zhang Cheng an inspiration to connect the Buddha image drawn on that piece of paper with those nine handprints.

  Nine pairs of arms, nine pairs of palms, aren't they just right?

  The more he thought about it, the more reasonable it seemed. So after school that day, he returned home and couldn't wait to try it out. With both hands forming the handprint shape, he outlined the Buddha image in his mind, then filled in the pair of wrists at the bottom with the first print.

  However, as soon as he started, he felt dizzy and fainted, and then he didn't know anything.

  When he woke up, it was already the second day. However, after waking up, he clearly felt that his spirit was exceptionally good, as if he had slept for a whole month. Moreover, his body also felt very comfortable and much lighter.

  Having seen the real benefits, he began to continue his research. After a period of time, Zhang Cheng really gained something.

  He found that when he meditated on a Buddha image alone or formed a hand seal, he didn't feel any effect at all.

  However, when he visualized the Buddha image and formed hand seals together, he felt extremely fatigued all over his body and couldn't persist for long before having to stop, otherwise he would faint like before.

  However, after each practice session, Zhang Cheng could feel his body and mind getting better and better, his attention was highly concentrated, and he could even achieve the level of "one glance, ten lines" and "read once, never forget".

  It was also for this reason that he practiced for ten years at a stretch.

  Later, as he grew older and knew more things, he gave this handprint a better-sounding name, called "Mahamudra of Secret Buddhism".

  He also searched online and found that the real "Mahamudra" has nine handprints, but those nine handprints are quite different from his nine handprints.

  However, the names of those nine handprints were moved onto his own handprint instead.

  From the first seal to the ninth seal are called: Akasha Vairochana Mudra, Mahavairochana Chakra Mudra, Outer Simhamukha Mudra, Inner Simhamukha Mudra, Outer Bandha Mudra, Inner Bandha Mudra, Jnana Mushti Mudra, Surya Chakra Mudra, Kumbhaka Mudra.

  However, the difficulties stirred up by cultivating these nine hand imprints took a whole decade to overcome, and he still hadn't truly mastered the first imprint, let alone progressed to the second one.

  However, this also enabled him to be admitted to Tsinghua University with excellent grades before the age of 20, and he was a specially recruited student who was exempt from tuition and accommodation fees.

  But it was during his junior year that an unexpected event brought him here.

  He thought at first that this set of handprints would make him feel a little more comfortable, just like before.

  But after he really practiced it, he found that his spirit was better, but his body was getting worse and worse, to the point where it was now appalling.

  It was also recently that he discovered that his deteriorating physical condition might be inseparable from his daily practice of this handprint.

  He had already stopped practicing several months ago, and the rapid deterioration of his physical condition was slightly alleviated, but his situation did not improve as a result.

  Of course, he also saw many famous doctors in between, but their own bodies were also helpless, and some people even said that they would not live beyond ten years.

  Now calculating, I'm about to die again.

  So now he is very difficult to decide whether to continue or completely give up.

  But to say give up, he really couldn't bear to part with it, after all, this was the skill he had practiced for a whole ten years, and these nine hand seals had changed his life.

  There is also one more thing, after obtaining this Dharma method, he has not yet practiced to the ninth hand seal, so in his heart there are some regrets.

  But if he continues to practice like this, his body probably won't be able to hold on for much longer. At that time, he will have to cross over again.

  Of course, for him, crossing over is nothing to be afraid of, what's scary is if he crosses over into a sickly body again, that would be completely unbearable.

  "Alas, heavens! You've really played an international joke on me. Since you brought me to this world and gave me extra life, shouldn't you also give me some benefits? At the very least, a decent body would be nice, so I can finish practicing my hand seals. Now it's all good, I come here and haven't even lived for a few days, yet I'm about to kick the bucket again. Aren't you just teasing me? What am I supposed to say is good about this?" Zhang Cheng sighed, lay down on the bed, gazing out the window at the sky, his face revealing a hint of bitterness and helplessness.

  After a while, Zhang Cheng sat up again, looking at the sky and said: "Heavenly Father, do you know? I really want to tell you something now..."

  But Zhang Cheng didn't say it out loud, instead he raised his middle finger, and the implication was clear.