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  A monk said to Dasui, "When the thousands of universes are utterly destroyed in the kalpa fire at the end of this aeon*—I wonder whether this perishes or not."
   "This perishes," said Dasui.
   "If so," persisted the monk, "does it follow the other?”
   "It follows the other," said Dasui.

   The same monk later asked Longji, “When the thousands of universes are utterly destroyed in the kalpa fire at the end of this aeon—I wonder whether this perishes or not."
   Longji said, “This does not perish.”
   The monk asked, “Why does it not perish?"
   Longji said, “Because it is the same as the universes.

Book of Serenity, Case 30

*A kalpa is an inconceivably long age. In Chan cosmology, the universe undergoes endless cycles of emptiness, formation, existence, and destruction, called great kalpas, each of which ends in an all-consuming fire.

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