Tang Monk Doesn't Chant Sutras, He Only Wants to Meet You

Everyone says that once Tang Sanzang brings back the true scriptures, all living beings under heaven can be saved.

But Tang Seng alone knows that incense offerings cannot hold back a flood, and scriptures cannot fill an empty stomach. True compassion has never belonged to the temples and courts. It lies among the ordinary people, in the bustle of everyday life.

So the holy monk lets go of his attachments, sets aside the scriptures, and enters the world. With his three disciples, he travels across the Tang Empire, building dikes, opening roads, cleaning up officialdom, and settling displaced people. He replaces empty Zen chants with practical deeds.

A reunion brings old friends together again after a long separation.

Princess Changning joins them in plain clothes, treating the sick, saving lives, and cleverly investigating corruption. She stands shoulder to shoulder with him through every storm.

He keeps his heart clear and his desires in check, observing the Buddhist precepts. He dares not let himself fall for her, yet time and again he pauses for her, breaks his vows for her, and sends the prayer beads that have always rested calmly in his hands into disarray.

She knows that monks and laypeople walk different paths, and never dares reveal even a trace of her feelings. She simply stays by his side in silence, understanding all that he suppresses and all that he holds fast to.

Dark currents churn in the halls of power, the Buddhist order faces mounting pressure, and hardship never ceases in the world.

He saves the people. She saves him.

Can this journey into the world, begun for the sake of all living beings and ensnared by love, break through the barriers of fate?

A thought for all living beings, a thought stirred by love: all his unspoken feelings lie along the long road west.