Have you heard of Journey to the West?
Long ago, the Merit-Bearing Buddha of Sandalwood and his three companions traveled west to seek the scriptures, facing eighty-one trials along the way. After they obtained the scriptures, the Buddha realized that one trial was missing, so he ordered the Bodhisattva Guanyin to add another. And so came the tale of the old turtle soaking the scriptures.
Yet even then, the journey was not entirely complete. The Mahayana scriptures still made their way to the Central Plains. In exchange, the trials left unfinished attached themselves to humanity.
Of all these trials, the greatest were those involving demons. Great monsters and powerful fiends arose one after another, so later generations came to call these events the Demonic Calamity!
For five hundred years after Journey to the West, Demonic Calamities erupted repeatedly, and the Tang court struggled to hold them back.
Until one day...
A book and a sword, a carefree wanderer; three stars point to the moon and shine upon the world!
