Aspiring to the Immortal Path

From within the coffin, Mei Huaping said, “My subordinate achieved merit in the battle several days ago, and I would like to apply for a Yellow Springs Baptism for him.”

The Yellow Springs Baptism was a special ceremony among the ghosts. While it didn’t improve a ghost’s cultivation, it made them stronger by refining their energy.

Only the most outstanding ghosts could obtain such a reward.

It didn’t matter if the silver-armored corpse Tang Jie was playing as had earned this reward. What was important was that Mei Huaping had found an excuse to enter the Nether God palace.

The ghost head looked at Tang Jie and said, “Request denied. Go back.”

Mei Huaping grunted, “King River Cross, your duty is to guard the Nether God palace, not to decide rewards and punishments. It’s not your place to say if my subordinate can or can’t be rewarded.”

King River Cross turned out to be the ghost head embedded in the gate.

King River Cross said, “The Nether God palace is closed, so all granting of rewards is temporarily postponed.”

Mei Huaping didn’t find this strange, so he replied with a sneer, “If there are no rewards being granted, does that mean there are no punishments either?”

Mei Huaping continued, “King River Cross, I know that you’re loyal to your duty, but I’m not asking to see His Majesty the Nether God, only to bring my subordinate into the Yellow Springs Hall to receive the baptism. This is in line with the laws of the underworld and the laws of Nirvana. You cannot stop me, or else you will be overstepping your bounds, transgressing the law!”

By the end, Mei Huaping’s tone had turned much harsher.

He had come prepared, having rehearsed all the excuses, words, and phrases, so all of his arguments were enough to render King River Cross speechless.

He was prepared to keep going when a voice rang out, “Let them in.”

King River Cross sighed in relief. “You can enter Yellow Springs Hall, but only there. You’re not allowed to go anywhere else.”

Mei Huaping delightedly said, “Of course. I would never dare to intrude upon His Majesty’s chambers.”

The bronze gates opened, and the coffin entered, dragging its chains behind it.

The ghost head watched the coffin enter, and after a while, it asked, “Why did you let them in? Anyone who comes at this moment generally means my lord harm.”

A ghost emerged in front of the gate: a skeleton wearing a golden robe and golden crown.

The Gold Extinction Nether Emperor.

He said, “I know, but this is His Majesty’s will.”

“‘His Majesty’s will’?” King River Cross said in shock.

“Yes. His Majesty said to open the Yellow Springs Hall so that more brave warriors can receive the baptism.”

“But this will only let more traitors into the palace, bringing more risk!”

“I know,” the Gold Extinction Nether Emperor sighed. “But what can we do about it? Not even mentioning His Majesty, that golden-armored corpse was correct. Rewards and punishments are based on the laws of the underworld. If one stops rewards, one must stop punishments as well. This is the way of the Nether Domain. And if we stop punishments, isn’t that essentially telling all the other ghosts that it’s time to rebel? You might be able to stop him today, but tomorrow, the ghosts of the four cities will all start causing trouble, giving us an even greater problem to deal with.”

“Then we just have to let them in?” King River Cross bellowed in fury. “Who knows what they’re plotting?”

“Hopefully, this will make them think twice, and hopefully, His Majesty has his own plans,” Gold Extinction sighed. “Each day they can’t confirm the state of His Majesty’s injuries is another day they don’t dare to act openly.”

This was true.

Even now, the three Nether Emperors were not 100% sure that the Nether God was injured. Most importantly, they didn’t know what injury the Nether God had sustained and how serious it was. Did it only seem serious and could actually heal very quickly? Or was the injury serious but he still had some trump card that would crush all the emperors without a doubt? Or could it be that he was unable to fight but still had the strength to run?

Any one of the three above was enough for Nether God Nirvana to close his palace, but it was also enough to shatter their dreams.

This was why, even after they had made up their minds, they were still hesitant and jittery. A random gust of wind blowing across some leaves might be enough to make them drop their plans.

Gold Extinction had even prepared an entire plan for this.

But none of this could fool Tang Jie.

…Because Tang Jie knew that Nirvana was injured, and that it was severe damage done to his Divine Soul.

This had been the blow of a Boundless Gold Immortal, unleashed by the Immortal Emperor. Even one tenth of its power was enough to cast him into a long slumber.

Of course, as time went on, he would slowly get better, and the better he was, the worse it was for Tang Jie. So Tang Jie quickly came over to take his life while he was ailing.

He followed Mei Huaping into the Nether God palace, taking in his surroundings.

An extremely powerful formation had been carved into the palace, which must be the Soul-Sealing Death Prison they had spoken of. Using the countless resentful souls of the Nether Domain as material and fuel, it harbored an immense lethal force.

Just standing within the formation, he could feel the pressure from its latent power. Once it was activated, it could even fend off a Nether God.

This was Nirvana’s final hope.

But Tang Jie knew that this formation was never going to be enough.

There were two ways of breaking down this kind of formation. The first was that an expert in formations could break it from the inside. If this wasn’t possible, one could go with the simplest method, sending hordes of ghosts at the formation until it simply ran out of power. And the Nether Domain had no shortage of ghosts. Unless there was some endless wellspring of power in the formation, any formation would eventually be ground to dust.

If Nirvana’s subordinates were willing to fight with all they had, then this method might be effective. The problem was that his subordinates were all thinking about rebellion. With threats both inside and outside, Nirvana’s defeat was set in stone. The question was of who would pick the fruit of victory.

As they arrived at Yellow Springs Hall, Mei Huaping said, “Come; enter Yellow Springs Hall and receive the baptism. But remember: when you are receiving the baptism, throw this into the spring.”

Mei Huaping gave Tang Jie a small black seed.

When Tang Jie saw it, he understood the plan of the three emperors.

A Space Worm Gate.

It was an extremely rare treasure of the Nether Domain.

In the mortal plane, there was a fiend called the Space Worm that could go in and out of the Nether. Once it died, its spirit would live on and enter the Nether Domain, transforming into a Space Worm spirit that wandered about the Nether Domain. If one could capture it and refine it before it matured, it could be made into the treasure known as the Space Worm Gate. Its greatest use was that it could open a spatial gate that could ignore all seals and defensive formations.

Their plan was simply to sneak this treasure into the palace, and when the moment was right, they would activate the Space Worm Gate and enter the palace.

The Space Worm Gate was a one-time-use treasure and it was already extremely hard to come by, so it was often overlooked when it came to possible things to defend against. For the three Nether Emperors to have gotten their hands on one meant that they really were gambling everything on this plan.

Tang Jie inwardly chuckled as he held the Space Worm Gate, an unexpected gift that saved him a lot of trouble.

According to the rules, Mei Huaping couldn’t go in, only Tang Jie, so Mei Huaping waited outside while Tang Jie entered with the Space Worm Gate.

A carved dragon head protruded from the wall, water gushing out from its mouth. This was the spring of baptism.

A ghost that went through the Yellow Springs Baptism would grow much stronger, but each ghost could only experience it once.

Tang Jie had no interest in it, but Tang Chuan needed it.

He mentally called out, and Tang Chuan appeared in the Yellow Springs Hall.

The moment he appeared, he looked around and said, “There is a powerful binding force here that even I couldn’t pass through. Thankfully, it’s not active, and I have Father as my landmark. Otherwise, trying to get in here would be certain death.”

He had once thought about forcing his way in using his spatial abilities, but Tang Jie had stopped him.

Now that he was inside and could finally sense the force protecting this place, he couldn’t help but sigh in wonder.

Tang Jie said, “Alright, since you’re here, you might as well experience the effects of this spring of baptism.”

Tang Chuan turned to the spring, first looking at it, and then sniffing at the air a few times. “Strange.”

“What’s wrong?” Tang Jie knew that Tang Chuan must have noticed something.

Tang Chuan explained, “I feel some strange force suffused in the spring water.”

“‘Strange force’? Do you know what it is?” Tang Jie asked.

Tang Chuan’s eyes lost focus. “It’s a strange feeling that makes me both disgusted and happy, like two things are mixed together.”

“Hm? You mean…”

Tang Chuan sniffed the water a few more times before saying, “There’s a problem with the power of the spring. Something is hidden there!”

“‘Something is hidden’?”

“Yes!” Tang Chuan nodded in confirmation. “There’s something in there!”

While Tang Chuan was an emperor, he still spoke in a rather childish way.

Tang Jie narrowed his eyes. “Seems like there’s some secret to the spring water. Well, since we have time, we might as well see what’s going on.”

“Watch me.” With Tang Jie’s permission, Tang Chuan excitedly jumped into the spring, but in reality, he was jumping into the space that the spring was located in.

A moment later, he jumped out, holding a crystalline stone.

Tang Jie’s eyes lit up. “So it’s Primal Soul Stone! No wonder this Nether God set up this Yellow Springs Baptism to reward ghosts. The mindless ghosts don’t have anything like morale, so I was wondering why they needed things like rewards and punishments. Turns out this guy was finding a way to enrich himself.”

Primal Souls were extremely valuable to ghosts, able to strengthen their souls, power, and cultivation.

On the surface, this baptism rite arranged by the Nirvana God King seemed like a reward, but it was actually a way to furtively absorb the Primal Souls of ghosts. Of course, it was extremely subtle. While it drained the Primal Soul, it would also magnify their soul power such that a ghost would experience rapid growth in strength. As the price, the ghosts would lose all their potential, only being able to rise one or two tiers before reaching their limit. This was why it was restricted to those below Ghost King.

Nirvana could use this baptism to constantly absorb Primal Souls and grow stronger.

This was why the Yellow Springs Hall had been opened up so easily. Nirvana’s soul was gravely injured, and he needed large numbers of Primal Souls to heal. This piece of Primal Soul Stone was already rather large, meaning that the Nether God might soon wake up to consume it.

Tang Jie suddenly had an idea.

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