Chapter 766: Storming the Heavenly Court (A Four-Thousand-Word Chapter!)
This was an experience from Earth Lord’s reincarnation, a memory of the Life-Slaying Cauldron. Yet now, Qin Mu was viewing it through Earth Lord’s perspective, feeling it as if it were his own.
The Feathered Serpent had coiled around his wife and seized his two children, holding Earth Lord’s weakness in its grasp.
Many demigods were excited. The Earth Lord in the Netherworld was invincible—not just in strength, but in mindset as well. No one in the Netherworld could defeat him.
But the reincarnated Earth Lord was no longer invincible. In his reincarnated form, his strength was greatly diminished, and his mindset was riddled with weaknesses.
The greatest weakness was his family!
The reincarnated Earth Lord was no longer the true Earth Lord. He was merely Ugly, his mother’s son, his wife’s husband—a simple, honest, ugly man from the village, and the father of two children.
He was not Earth Lord. He was just Ugly.
“I reincarnated as a human without telling any ancient gods or informing the Heavenly Court. How did you find out about my reincarnation, and how did you know I reincarnated here?”
Ugly did not look at these demigods. His gaze passed over them, fixing on the empty sky, and he said in a deep voice, “Only the Heavenly Court could trace my reincarnation and pinpoint where I was reborn. So, who is it that covets my power?”
There was no movement in the air.
Ugly felt a pang of disappointment.
“Ugly, do you not care about the lives of your wife and children?”
The Feathered Serpent demigod shouted, “Kill yourself! Make sure your soul is utterly destroyed!”
Ugly did not reply. He picked up his iron plow and hoisted it onto his shoulder. The Feathered Serpent demigod grew furious and was about to kill his wife and children when suddenly a small paper boat appeared behind Ugly. Lamplight shone on the Feathered Serpent demigod’s face, and without even a grunt, his soul fell into the Netherworld.
On the boat was a youth, wearing a ghost-face mask on the back of his head. He raised a horse lantern and shone it around. One by one, the demigods collapsed like mountains of massive corpses.
The youth hung the lantern on the boat’s prow, glanced at Ugly, and said, “This time, it’s small fry. Next time, it won’t be so trivial. I can’t protect you forever. Come back soon.”
Ugly turned to look at his wife, children, and elderly mother, shaking his head. “I’ve developed feelings. I can’t go back.”
The youth tilted his head, thought for a moment, and said, “I’m not strong enough yet. There are many terrifying beings among the demigods whom I can’t defeat. And the ancient gods—if the one hiding behind the scenes appears, I won’t be able to fight them. How much of your power can you use in this reincarnated form?”
“This is the mortal world. I can’t use the power of the Netherworld.”
Ugly shook his head. “I feel there’s power hidden in my brow, but my third eye just won’t open.”
The youth looked at his brow. There was a vertical bloody scar on Ugly’s forehead, but no third eye was visible. He could only urge the small paper boat to sink into the darkness, saying, “You’re no longer Earth Lord. You’re just Ugly. Come back soon.”
Ugly watched him disappear, then after a moment, showed a simple smile. “I can’t go back…”
His wife came over, holding their children. He told her he was still Ugly, telling his family not to worry.
They could no longer stay here. Though he was burly, he was clever with his hands. He made a bamboo basket, lined it with soft cotton, and placed his elderly mother inside, carrying her on his back.
He set his two children on his shoulders, and his pregnant wife sat in the crook of his arm. Their family began to migrate.
Ugly raced against the wind and moon, leaving the place, but the road was not peaceful. They were attacked by many demigods. The world was swarming with more and more demigods. People called them primordial beasts. Demigods ate humans, slaughtering everywhere. There had never been so many demigods here before, but now they had suddenly appeared.
Ugly led his family, hiding and fleeing. But one day, his elderly mother’s time came.
“Ugly, I’m going to die.”
She said to him, “Take care of your woman and your children. You’re so ugly, but I never abandoned you, so don’t you abandon them. Ugly is not Earth Lord. Ugly is just an ugly child who looks like Earth Lord…” With that, she breathed her last.
Ugly sobbed, desperately trying to open the eye in his brow, desperately trying to use the power of the Netherworld. When he was Earth Lord, he could grant blessings and extend the lifespans of powerful post-natal beings like the Netherworld Lord, allowing them to live as long as the world. But now, he couldn’t save his own mother.
He cut open his brow with a knife, blood dripping, but he couldn’t find the eye. He couldn’t feel any power from the Netherworld.
He was not Earth Lord.
He still had his wife, his children, his attachments.
He buried his mother and continued on with his wife and children, fleeing the pursuit.
Finally, his wife went into labor. He had to stop and find a midwife, but in this world, demigods roamed everywhere, devouring humans, and it was hard to find any living people.
The human race in this world was nearly extinct. He searched for thousands of miles without finding a single living soul. He had to find a cave, hide inside, and deliver the baby himself.
After a grueling ordeal, the child was born—a girl, like him, with two small horns on her head and a pair of tiger-like teeth from birth. She was very healthy.
Ugly was overjoyed. He went out hunting to nourish his wife.
But when he returned, he saw demigods covering the mountains and fields like a forest, blocking the entrance to the cave where his wife and children were.
Several immensely powerful demigods sat on the mountaintop, looking down at him. His wife and children were beside them.
He charged forward madly, smashing the heads of the demigods blocking his way with his iron plow, crushing their chests with his fists, piercing them with his ox horns, and tearing at them with his teeth.
He went berserk, using every ounce of his strength to fight his way toward the opposite cliff.
Those demigods were immensely powerful. They beat him black and blue, battered him until he was a bloody mess, broke his bones and tendons, and snapped his curved horns. Yet Ugly still charged forward madly, more like a primordial beast than any of them.
He fought for an unknown amount of time, utterly exhausted, leaning against a tree, gasping for breath, glaring fiercely at the opposite peak.
The few demigods still sat there, coldly watching, saying nothing, not moving.
Ugly rested a moment, then charged forward again. All around were severed limbs and broken bodies, the shattered forms of demigods. His strength seemed inexhaustible, but the power of the Netherworld remained beyond his reach.
“Kneel.”
A voice came from the mountaintop. Ugly looked up and saw a demigod gripping his wife’s neck, holding her at the edge of the cliff. If he let go, she would fall and be crushed to pulp.
Ugly stopped, looking up at the mountaintop with a pleading gaze.
The demigod’s hand released. His wife fell from the cliff. Ugly screamed, lunging forward with all his might, but other demigods blocked his path, beating him until his skin split open.
Thud.
The sound of a heavy object hitting the ground reached him.
“Kneel.” The demigod on the mountaintop lifted his eldest son, speaking coldly.
Ugly’s body trembled. His legs gave way, and he finally knelt, lowering his head.
A demigod stepped forward with a gleaming great axe, measuring it against his neck, about to chop. Suddenly, a voice shook its head and said, “You can’t kill him like that.”
The demigod quickly stopped.
Radiant light filled the sky. The ancient god hidden in the shadows descended. It was a face appearing in the sky, its features obscured, hiding its true identity. It said coldly, “If you kill him like this, his three souls will still fly to the Netherworld and return to Earth Lord’s true body. We need to make his soul utterly vanish. Only then can we replace Earth Lord.”
At that moment, another face appeared in the sky, also hidden, and a similarly cold voice said, “I borrowed the Heavenly Court’s Soul-Slaying Mystic Blade. It can sever souls. This is the Heavenly Court’s most fearsome weapon—it cuts through anything!”
A beam of light fell from the sky, stabbing into the ground. The blade itself was invisible, only a flowing light could be seen.
“Cut him down.” Several more faces appeared in the sky, their features unclear, but their eyes gleamed with excitement.
A demigod grabbed the Heavenly Court’s Soul-Slaying Mystic Blade and swung it down at the kneeling Ugly.
Hum.
The blade emitted a violent tremor, shattering the demigod holding it into a mist of blood. But there was no wound on Ugly’s neck.
Earth Lord’s three souls were too powerful. Even his reincarnated body could not be slain by a demigod.
Another demigod stepped forward, grabbed the Soul-Slaying Mystic Blade, and swung. He too was shattered into dust, while Ugly remained unharmed.
A third demigod stepped forward, also shattered by the blade. The demigods covering the mountains and fields were horrified. No one dared to pick up the Soul-Slaying Mystic Blade again.
“Useless trash!”
A furious shout came from the sky. An ancient god couldn’t restrain himself and descended, grabbing the Soul-Slaying Mystic Blade. He sneered, “If you don’t slay Earth Lord, how can you achieve great deeds? How can you sit on the throne of the gods?”
“Brother, submit to the blade!”
His blade fell. A bloody gash appeared on Ugly’s neck, while the ancient god’s arms went numb from the backlash.
The ancient god was both shocked and enraged, laughing loudly, “Earth Lord, your will to live is too strong! Even with the Mystic Blade in hand, I can’t cut you down. It seems I’ll have to make you give up that will yourself. Throw his child down!”
“No…”
Ugly’s body trembled as he watched his eldest son fall from the sky. He frantically crawled forward. The ancient god stepped on his ox tail and raised the blade again!
The blade cut an inch deep into his neck, and blood gushed out.
The ancient god grew excited, shouting, “Are you still waiting for that little brat, the Netherworld Lord? To eliminate Earth Lord, you must first eliminate him. Right now, that little brat is too busy saving his own skin to help you. You have no hope left. Why hold on so stubbornly? Throw another one down!”
Ugly struggled to crawl forward but couldn’t move. His eldest daughter was lifted up and thrown from the cliff.
Ugly roared. Behind him, the ancient god swung the blade. With a flash of light, his neck was half severed.
“Throw another one down!”
The ancient god shouted in excitement, raising the Soul-Slaying Mystic Blade.
Ugly’s body trembled as he saw his newborn daughter held aloft. He felt as if he were dead, falling into a bottomless darkness, unable to see any light, only the sight of his youngest daughter plummeting from the sky.
A faint crack sounded in his heart, like the sound of it breaking. A faint crack also came from his brow. The bloody line he had cut with his knife had never healed, and now the wound split open again.
“Ugly is not Earth Lord. Ugly is just an ugly child who looks like Earth Lord.”
His mother’s words echoed in his ears again. In the years of suffering, those words had given him immense strength, supporting him as he led his wife and children to survive. But now, those words seemed to crumble as well.
He sank completely into darkness.
His brow split open, and his third eye emerged. It was a bloody eye, blazing with endless karmic fire, igniting the earth, setting the land ablaze!
Ugly vanished. Earth Lord had returned.
But this time, it was a furious Earth Lord, an avenging Earth Lord.
Countless chains suddenly appeared, clanging as they pierced through his body, impaling him, anchoring him to the earth.
These were chains formed from the laws of the Netherworld, binding the furious Earth Lord.
As Earth Lord, he could not violate the heavenly laws of the Netherworld, could not defy its great Dao.
Even Earth Lord could not break free from these chains.
He caught the descending Soul-Slaying Mystic Blade. The blade’s light cut into his hand, blood flowing. He stood up. The Soul-Slaying Mystic Blade melted in his hand. This fearsome weapon, infamous as the Heavenly Court’s most deadly, wailed in his palm, soon turning into molten iron.
The molten iron fell to the ground, forming a great cauldron. The awakened Earth Lord stood inside it.
The ancient god behind him trembled. Earth Lord grabbed his head, pressed it into the cauldron, and stomped heavily, crushing the skull. The ancient god’s face appeared inside the cauldron.
Within the cauldron was utter darkness. The face floated alone in the blackness, showing a look of terror.
But soon, more demigods came to keep him company. The demigods covering the mountains and fields died, dying swiftly. In an instant, they were all shattered by the cauldron’s might, refined into faces within it.
Earth Lord’s body grew taller and taller. He reached up and caught the infant girl falling from the cliff. Darkness surged from the cauldron, spreading in all directions, chasing the fleeing demigods. One by one, the powerful demigods twisted, their bodies turning into empty shells, falling to the ground as human skins.
The darkness surged wildly, spreading across every corner of this desolate world.
The ancient gods in the sky were shocked. They quickly concealed themselves and fled to the Heavenly Court.
This world had become another Netherworld.
They fled, not daring to stop. But when they looked back, they saw the increasingly towering ox-horned, tiger-faced demon god stepping out of that world atop endless darkness, a little girl with ox horns sitting on his shoulder.
He was covered in chains formed from the Netherworld’s heavenly Dao, binding him tightly. The other ends of the chains connected to the world that had become the Netherworld.
Yet Earth Lord dragged the chains, pulling that world along with him, chasing them as he charged toward the Heavenly Court!
“Earth Lord has gone mad!”
They shouted as they rushed through the Heavenly Court’s Southern Heavenly Gate. Many ancient gods surged out, standing in midair, blocking Earth Lord’s path, trying to persuade him, “Earth Lord, they were just joking with you. Why get so angry?”
“Why don’t you come and apologize?”
Someone tried to mediate, saying, “Luckily, no great disaster occurred. Earth Lord, calm down…”
Earth Lord carried the Life-Slaying Cauldron as he walked through the Southern Heavenly Gate. The chains on him grew more numerous. Outside the Southern Heavenly Gate was a dark Netherworld.
Suddenly, an ancient god who had come to persuade him fell, turning into a terrified face inside the cauldron.
That day, Earth Lord stormed through the Southern Heavenly Gate, and countless gods fell.
—Still a four-thousand-word chapter. The pig trotters are getting ripe…