Chapter 119: Second-Class Merit

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Qin Ye closed his eyes and took a deep breath.

Patience in the face of haste… patience in the face of haste… It was only a rejected call, wasn’t it? Weren’t there plenty of such lousy friends in real life? Plenty… plenty… What difference did one more make…

“I just went to the design institute to ask about the blueprints.” He opened his eyes and said, “They told me…”

“Point to the moon with your left hand, take the red thread with your right, grant you and me the love we desire, beneath the moonlight, ahhh~~~ you and me, ahhh!!!”

After suffering blow after blow from this bizarre silicone doll, Qin Ye had already gone numb. Amazingly, he was not disturbed in the slightest. Wearing an expressionless face, he said, “The expansion of the Underworld has officially been put on the agenda. All we lack is an overall map of the Underworld before construction can begin in full. As chairman of the New Underworld Group, I’m willing to work like an ox or a horse. As its CEO, shouldn’t you at least be willing to work without complaint?”

The voice on the other side of the light screen stopped at once.

Althas’s uncertain voice came through. “In all my years, I never thought I’d live to see you work diligently… Excuse me while I take a moment to recover. The change in tone came too quickly, and I haven’t adapted yet… Could it be that the readers’ complaints about your cowardice finally convinced you to turn over a new leaf?”

“…I’m warning you. Familiarity is one thing, but if you keep talking nonsense, I can still sue you for defamation! Haven’t I been unleashing my Armament Haki for the past dozen chapters?” Qin Ye retorted with plenty of attitude but very little confidence.

“Oh, ho, ho, ho… Young man, it seems you’ve developed a rather inflated misunderstanding of yourself… Have you already erased the fear of being dominated by Lin Han from your mind?”

There were some people with whom, once you started sparring, the matter could not be settled in one or two minutes.

Two venomous snakes spent a full half hour biting each other before finally emptying their venom. Both were left gasping for breath. Qin Ye glared at the light screen like a bull and thrust out his hand.

“I have no desire to waste words with you. Hand over the overall map!”

“What makes you think I have one?”

Qin Ye could already imagine Althas picking her nose smugly on the other side of the screen, showing none of the dignity expected of a Judge: So what if you’re impressive? In the end, you still have to kneel before my high heels.

Grinding his teeth, he said, “Without the overall map, how am I supposed to know what special structures the Underworld contains? The Soul-Reception Terrace and the Hall of Yin Spirits you told me about before—were those all just hot air?”

Althas paused. Her voice turned serious.

“You don’t have it?”

“How could I possibly have it?” Qin Ye’s smile faded as he stared at the light screen in astonishment. “You… really don’t have it?”

Althas fell silent for several seconds. The image on the light screen wavered, then suddenly switched to a view of Bao’an City. She spoke with certainty.

“Impossible. You must have it! I once saw one when I paid respects to a Yama King. There was one hanging behind every Yama King’s office, but my rank wasn’t high enough to have one displayed. I’ve heard that the First Yama King personally measured the land inch by inch and surveyed the terrain to draw it. Every expansion of the Underworld has one. It’s extremely important.”

Qin Ye racked his brains, but he could not recall ever receiving anything resembling a map. Just as he was about to speak, Althas suddenly vanished for several seconds. When she reappeared, she said, “I can’t explain it clearly to you. Wait until I come over.”

The next second…

Qin Ye suddenly saw the talisman burst into red light. As the radiance gradually spread, it transformed into a roughly two-foot-square light screen. Then, a silicone doll with a head full of black hair slowly crawled out of the red screen…

She crawled out…

Out…

Why did this scene seem so familiar?

He really wanted to switch off the television halfway through… He really wanted to kick this idiot cosplaying Sadako back where she came from… What was he supposed to do if he could no longer control his hands? Urgent answers requested…

Althas crawled out in a contorted pose. Having made it more than halfway, she suddenly stopped and raised one silicone hand.

“Give me a hand.”

“Turn off the television?” Qin Ye asked, his tone thoroughly malicious.

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“No… I ate too much. My stomach feels bloated, and I’m stuck… Pull me out… Do you think my figure has gone out of shape because I’ve been eating too well?”

You’re a silicone doll! Who gave you the right to tell me your figure has gone out of shape?!

Qin Ye forcibly suppressed the urge to shove this Chinese Sadako back inside. He pulled her out, then glanced at the light screen as it shrank on its own.

“This thing…”

“You can’t use it.” Althas straightened her clothes. “Your Underworld is fundamentally incapable of supporting a subordinate Ghost Guard opening a Shared-Yin Talisman. At the very least, you need to build a Hall of Yin Talismans and possess one hundred thousand square kilometers of land before we can discuss such matters.”

“…”

Are you a parasite in my stomach or something?!

Althas ignored Qin Ye’s inward complaints and elegantly sat down on his bed. The corner of her eye swept across the room.

“Let’s get to the point. You said earlier that you didn’t have an overall map of the Underworld. Do you know why I said that was impossible?”

Qin Ye shook his head.

Althas said blandly, “Because if Granny Meng did not entrust this to you, she would not deserve to be Granny Meng.”

“You think Granny Meng is weak? Just a cook handing out bowls of severed-head soup at the Underworld’s entrance? You’re wrong… She has sat beside the Bridge of Helplessness for three thousand years. How many spirits has she seen cross it? There were alchemists from the Pre-Qin era, grand magi from the Tang and Song dynasties, imperial preceptors from the Yuan dynasty, and celestial masters from the Ming dynasty. What would happen if they refused to drink the soup?”

Qin Ye blinked.

“If the ox won’t drink, force its head down?”

“…You should be grateful they can’t leap out of their coffins and beat you to death. That’s more or less how it works. Think about it. With her abilities, after lingering in the mortal world for so long and deliberately leaving you the final hope of rebuilding the Underworld, how could she possibly fail to anticipate the greatest difficulty you would face?”

“No matter how brave you are or how much perseverance you possess, without an overall map of the Underworld and detailed plans of its special structures, you would probably need another three thousand years to rebuild it. And over those three thousand years… the spirits could well fill the mortal realm to bursting!”

A thought flashed through Qin Ye’s mind.

“You mean… Granny Meng’s notes?”

Before he had even finished speaking, an ancient book came fluttering through the air. Its pages turned by themselves despite the absence of wind. Althas gently raised one hand, and Qin Ye immediately felt the dormitory enter a unique state, as though it had been isolated from the entirety of Dai City.

“A world unto itself.” Althas glanced at Qin Ye’s expectant face, then struck him down with another dose of parasite-like insight. “Normally, once you reached the stage of Soul Capture, you would have been qualified to learn some Underworld techniques. But you’re a Ghost Guard from after the Underworld’s destruction, and you lack the imprint of the old Underworld’s laws. Your Underworld is currently only the size of a village; it hasn’t even reached the level of a town. After that come the county, city, province, and regional levels…”

“Once you reach the county level, and your buildings and manpower meet the requirements for that level, you can learn techniques on the Ghost Guard level. The same principle applies throughout. If you want to master a technique, your Underworld must first reach the corresponding rank.”

Qin Ye let out a mournful sigh.

It seemed the era of smashing everything with yin energy would last a very long time…

This wasn’t right. It didn’t fit the protagonist’s script. Shouldn’t he already have obtained something like the Eight Wastes, Sole Dominance Technique, or some Heaven-Shattering Earth-Splitting Battle Art by now?

The current situation was so crude that it was unbearable to look at…

Althas paid him no further attention. Instead, she stared intently at the pages. Her eyes gradually turned blood-red. Several seconds later, she smiled faintly.

“Just as I thought.”

Before she had finished speaking, her silicone hands moved so quickly they blurred. Yin energy within the entire room surged with a thunderous roar. The ancient notebook seemed to respond to the fluctuations, its pages turning faster and faster.

Swish, swish, swish…

Nine complicated hand seals gathered before Althas. Qin Ye took a deep breath and retreated several steps. The dense yin energy in the air had become almost tangible. The crushing pressure forced him to lean against the wall before he felt even slightly better.

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He suddenly remembered that she had vanished for two seconds. She must have gone to retrieve this thing.

“Sealing art…” Althas solemnly uttered three words. Then she abruptly flipped her hand outward.

“Ninjutsu: Reaper Death Seal!”

The moment her words fell, Qin Ye could no longer suppress his impulse. Whatever happened to be beside his hand, he hurled directly at Althas.

“…Huh? Little brat? Why are you so irritable?”

“…Damn it… I never should have trusted a flesh toilet trapped in a computer reincarnation cycle like you!!!”

Althas waved her hand. The pillows, fountain pens, notebooks, and other objects suspended in midair all came to a halt. She pointed at the notebook.

“Don’t you think it looked imposing? All right, all right, don’t look at me with those pitying little eyes… By the way, what do you call it? In any case, the seal has been removed, hasn’t it?”

Qin Ye nearly laughed.

You call that a look of pity? Come over here and take a good look. That is clearly the look one gives to a mentally deficient person!

Why did it feel as though his cheat ability’s intelligence had plummeted after becoming trapped in the online world?

Too lazy to argue with Althas, he turned his attention to the notebook floating in midair. It was radiating a vast surge of yin energy, and its power was not much weaker than the Record of the Underworld.

Swish, swish, swish, swish…

If Althas had not sealed the room, the ground nearby would probably have begun trembling. Countless streams of yin energy converged like dragons returning to the sea, forming a pitch-black vortex before him.

Several seconds later, the center of the vortex suddenly split apart, and a scarlet eye abruptly opened.

Boom!

At the same instant, Qin Ye’s legs went weak and he dropped to his knees. Althas froze as well. Her clothes billowed violently, and even the wig on her head was blown away.

Staring in astonishment at the eye shifting restlessly within the yin energy, she spoke in disbelief.

“The All-Seeing Mirror… She actually brought this thing out…”

“You still have time to look at it?” The muscles on Qin Ye’s face rippled like water. Gritting his teeth, he said, “If you keep staring at it… the last Ghost Guard in the world is going to report to the Underworld before you do!”

Althas suddenly came to her senses. Her hands moved like phantoms, forming more than a dozen seals in scarcely a second. Finally, she lightly tapped the eye.

Clang!

The sound was soft, like a finger striking glass. Countless ripples of pitch-black yin energy spread outward. The eye vanished at once. The yin energy spun wildly, transforming into a palm-sized mirror that dropped into Qin Ye’s hand with a dull thud.

“What in the hell is this?” Qin Ye asked between breaths, wiping the cold sweat from his forehead.

Althas stared at the ancient mirror in his hand with a complicated expression. Only after a long while did she speak.

“The All-Seeing Mirror… It is a deadly weapon for supervising Ghost Guards, and also an eye that sees through Heaven and Earth.”

“Nothing in the realms of mortals or spirits can escape its gaze… I thought it had already shattered beneath the might of Ksitigarbha’s attainment of Buddhahood… It is neither a supreme treasure of the Underworld nor an artifact like the Record of the Underworld, but… it may be called an immortal treasure.”

“Speak normally.” Qin Ye, somewhat drained, sat down on the bed. The sensation from moments ago remained vivid, leaving him shaken.

It had felt as though another eye had suddenly appeared within the Underworld, staring fixedly at him.

The moment he did anything wrong, he would be erased from the records of the Underworld!

“Forget the fantasy-novel nonsense… Come on, tell me what the hell this thing is, in plain human language.”