ལས་བརྒྱ་ཐམ་པ་པ 15.9

15.9

yet without harming others I cannot get freshly drawn blood. If they can use my blood for food, then I will give them my own flesh and blood.’ So he asked the yakṣas, ‘My friends, could you perhaps use my blood for food?’

“ ‘Yes, Deva, we could!’ they replied.

“When he heard this, without delay King Maitrībala arrayed the yakṣas before him and then summoned his healers and made his request, saying, ‘Find five points on my body from which to drain me, and I shall feed these beings with my blood.’

“ ‘But Deva,’ the healers pleaded, ‘we could never pierce your body with a weapon!’

“ ‘They do not wish to be parted from me,’ he thought. ‘Very well, I will extract my own blood.’ Bodhisattvas have mastery of all manner of arts and professions, so he took up a mirror himself, pierced five points on his body, and offered one to each of the yakṣas, thinking, ‘I shall not stop letting my own blood until they are satisfied.’

“At this Śakra, King of the Gods, thought, ‘Bodhisattvas keep their promises, and this bodhisattva has undertaken a magnificent austerity. It wouldn’t be right for the bodhisattva to suffer too much hardship.’ He decided, ‘I will fortify the life in his body!’

“So Śakra, King of the Gods, fortified the bodhisattva’s body with divine life force, and even miraculously accomplished much of the bloodletting. After the bodhisattva had sated all five of the life-draining yakṣas with no difficulty at all, he prayed for unexcelled, total, and complete enlightenment, saying, ‘By this root of virtue, may I become a buddha to serve as a protector for the world’s blind without a guide,