Chapter 157: The Trial

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The sky was azure, without a cloud in sight. The transparent seawater brushed past the sand, like a scene in a summer glass bottle.

The group was either on a boat on the sea or flying in the air, leaving the beach to the muscular practitioner from Group One named Soma.

Between the sky and the sea, only the sound of the waves hitting the shore, which had remained unchanged for millions of years, was left.

Soma was three meters away from the Great Stone of Yomotsu when he suddenly stopped.

The characters on the Great Stone of Yomotsu scattered like fireworks, turning back into a smooth surface.

The afternoon sun shone on it, like a huge piece of gold.

In the silence, a faint sound of footsteps could be heard.

“They’re here,” Amatsumara said in a deep voice.

“The dead Soma?” Spider turned her head and asked him.

Amatsumara nodded, his eyes fixed on the Great Stone of Yomotsu. He had only read about the Yellow Springs Kingdom in documents.

“To come to the human world from the Yellow Springs Kingdom, one must pass through Hirasaka. The dead Soma should be coming from there,” he said.

The sound of footsteps became clearer and clearer. When it stopped, everyone knew that he was already behind the giant stone.

The sun was right above their heads, and the clear seawater was under their feet. There were hundreds of people around, but many still felt fear and couldn’t control their trembling.

My dead self…
Soma, who was standing alone on the beach, was panting heavily, his eyes fixed on the Great Stone of Yomotsu.

The surface of the stone rippled, and a figure, as if emerging from the water, broke free from the Great Stone of Yomotsu.

He was 1.9 meters tall, with a bare upper body, and muscles as solid as granite. He was a person who looked exactly like Soma.

“Gulp.” On the sea, the sound of swallowing could be heard one after another.

No one cared about these things. They didn’t even remember if they had heard it or not.

“Exactly the same?” A hint of doubt flashed in Sanae Sara’s eyes. “Lord Amatsumara, does this mean Soma will die here?”

“That’s right,” Amatsumara replied.

“Killed by himself?” Itomi Sayaka asked.

Amatsumara nodded, not telling the truth.

The Great Stone of Yomotsu transcended fate. Even if the dead Soma killed the living Soma today, the one who came out would still be the Soma who was supposed to live until a certain time.

The Soma who appeared before them was exactly the same as the living one, which proved that he would die today.

‘The Divine Medium is here.’ Amatsumara was slightly relieved.

“I was killed by you?” the living Soma asked loudly.

The dead Soma stared into his eyes, his pale lips suddenly curling into a strange smile.

“Bang!” The qi wave exploded, and the dazzling light flickered.

The living Soma was suddenly pushed back. If he hadn’t been on guard from the beginning, he would have been seriously injured by his own full-force strike.

The dead Soma was shrouded in a dim yellow divine power, and he was actually using the Yellow Springs divine energy.

“Bastard!” the living Soma roared, and two arms tore out from his back.

Almost at the same time, the dead Soma also transformed into four arms.

The two of them crashed together, and in the blink of an eye, they had exchanged hundreds of punches.

The qi waves rolled, and the sea waves rolled back. The practitioners on the boat quickly stabilized their boats.

Swept by the strong wind, Itomi Yuki couldn’t even breathe smoothly.

Minamoto Kiyomoto propped up his blue divine power to protect her. This person named Soma had at least the strength of twenty-five subjugations.

“Bang!” Another dull explosion.

The two Somas were both pushed back, their throats gurgling, as if they were gargling with blood.

Before one of them could recover, the other, with an even more sinister face, pounced on him as if to devour his flesh and blood.

Amidst the exclamations of the crowd, the living Soma hastily met the attack and was instantly at a disadvantage.

The two of them fought fiercely by the cliff. One tried his best to block, while the other wanted to kill the other.

The dim yellow Yellow Springs divine power and the earth-like brown divine power, every time they collided, they would create layers of light waves.

“What’s going on with this cliff?” someone shouted in surprise.

“Who cares about the cliff now!”

A part of the people discovered that the fierce battle between the two Somas would occasionally hit the cliff together.

The force that could easily pierce through a building didn’t leave any marks on the cliff.

The knife and axe marks on the cliff were left by at least thirty practitioners holding divine artifacts.

As for the claw marks, it was obvious that a Kasen had challenged it, and had even been in a desperate struggle.

The battle gradually came to an end.

The living Soma, seeing that the other party was dressed exactly the same as him today, was already flustered.

And the dead Soma had everything the living Soma had, and was calmer, crazier, and more fearless of death than him. After the two fought for two hundred rounds, the living Soma’s head was smashed by a punch.

Scalp, blood plasma, splattered on the cliff, disgusting.

The dead Soma was also injured. A piece of his left shoulder was missing, like a crescent moon.

“What is that? So disgusting,” a female practitioner covered her mouth.

Itomi Yuki was already disgusted by Soma’s corpse and had already averted her eyes. Itomi Sayaka suddenly fixed her head from behind and forced her to look.

“Becoming a practitioner is like a pawn that has crossed the river in chess. You can only move forward and face the cruelest side of this world,” the older sister said in the younger sister’s ear.

On the dead Soma’s missing shoulder, maggots wriggled, and the rotten flesh stank, extremely disgusting.

Itomi Yuki’s stomach turned, and her face was pale.

The headless living Soma, a brown stream of qi shot out from his corpse and was absorbed by the dead Soma.

Without this qi, the living Soma’s corpse and bloodstains instantly turned into ashes.

The wind blew, and it floated in the air like a layer of gray gauze, scattering without a trace.

After getting this qi, the dead Soma trembled all over, and a halo of light appeared on his skin.

“Lady Sanae,” he knelt on one knee on the sand. “Soma is back. Whether in life or death, I will always serve you.”

“Are you really Soma?” Sanae Sara’s charming eyes sized him up carefully.

“Yes!” the dead Soma said loudly. “I—”

“Don’t listen to him!” Amatsumara cut him off. “The living dead who have returned from the Yellow Springs have no human feelings. You can tell by looking at his wounds!”

Everyone looked at the dead Soma’s shoulder again. Rotten flesh, maggots.

Sanae Sara, who only liked handsome men, immediately frowned her graceful and slender eyebrows.

“Lady Sanae!” the dead Soma quickly said. “Even if I’m already dead, my loyalty and love for you have absolutely not changed!”

“Even the Mother God has lost herself. You are also worthy of retaining your humanity!” Amatsumara said with contempt. “Your Excellency, Sanae, if you keep him, the others in your group will sooner or later become his food.”

The people of Group One’s faces changed, and they all looked at Sanae Sara.

“Soma,” Sanae Sara spoke.

“Your subordinate is here!” the dead Soma responded loudly.

“To make me believe you, it’s very simple. This is the Demon Dragon Nail. You take it and return to the Yellow Springs Kingdom and let the divine artifact absorb enough Yellow Springs divine energy.”

“As expected of Sister Sanae!” Spider couldn’t help but say.

Everyone looked at the dead Soma on the beach.

“It’s a pity Soma died today. Otherwise, we could have asked about the future,” Drunkard said with regret.

As soon as his voice fell, Sanae Sara, Spider, and Drunkard suddenly turned their eyes to the other followers.

“Group leader!” Everyone quickly retreated.

Minamoto Kiyomoto, however, felt that things couldn’t be that simple.

Sure enough, the next moment, Amatsumara sneered, “The Great Stone of Yomotsu is so easy to break through. Do you think Her Majesty would let this place be entered and exited at will?”

Sanae Sara and the others’ faces changed, and they asked him, “What’s going on?”

“Old man, make it clear at once. Don’t drag it out like you’re constipated,” the Shinto sect followers all shouted.

Amatsumara ignored these extremely low-quality rats and turned to look at the Great Stone of Yomotsu.

“Mother God,” he said respectfully, “please forgive your descendant for not being able to let you return to the human world.”

That majestic female voice, which was like a god’s whisper, let out a soft sigh.

The people with low cultivation levels present felt an impulse to ‘even if I have to sacrifice myself, I must relieve her of her troubles.’

The dead Soma, who was kneeling on the beach, trembled all over. A very pure Yellow Springs divine energy suddenly drilled out from the top of his head and disappeared into the Great Stone of Yomotsu.

The dead Soma, who had been so vivid just now and was almost exactly the same as a real person except for his body, suddenly had no expression.

He knelt there coldly, his eyes looking at the crowd, and suddenly rushed over.

He grabbed a practitioner on a boat and bit down on his face.

“Ah!” that practitioner let out a miserable cry and struggled desperately.

But the dead Soma’s cultivation was far superior to his. He held him down firmly and continued to gnaw on the flesh and blood on his face.

The people around them were so scared they desperately fled. Some even forgot their divine power in their haste and fell into the sea.

“Group leader!” the people of Group Seven quickly looked at Spider.

Spider flicked her finger, and a purple flame pounced on the dead Soma, instantly corroding him into ashes.

And the practitioner under the dead Soma, who was so close to the flames, was not harmed at all.

But that face, the protruding nose, and the flesh on the right half of his face had already been eaten away.

“Ah, ah!” that person curled up on the boat and let out a painful wail.

Itomi Yuki was about to avert her gaze when she took a deep breath and forced herself to look.

“You don’t have to force yourself,” Minamoto Kiyomoto said softly.

Itomi Yuki wanted to speak, but as soon as she opened her mouth, a wave of nausea came up. She could only shake her head gently to indicate that she was fine.

“Amatsumara, what happened just now?” Sanae Sara asked Amatsumara.

“I was once granted permission by Her Majesty to enter the library,” Amatsumara said. “In a document called ‘The Original Map of the Yellow Springs,’ I saw the research of past practitioners on the Yellow Springs Kingdom—the Mother God is already dead. Without her present self, she cannot obtain the life qi to pass through the Great Stone of Yomotsu. But with more of her descendants’ life qi, it can also be of use.”

“You mean, Izanami’s purpose in manipulating Soma was to find her descendants and bring them here?” Minamoto Kiyomoto asked.

Amatsumara glanced at him, “That’s right.”

“There are quite a few people who have died here. Most of them should be her descendants. After so many years, isn’t it enough?” Itomi Sayaka was puzzled.

“If it were a direct descendant like Her Majesty… like the Ogosho or the Divine Medium, it would have been enough long ago. But they won’t come here.”

Everyone thought for a moment and understood what he meant.

Ordinary people had no reason to go to the Yellow Springs Kingdom. And people like the “Ogosho” and the Divine Medium, how could they be a match for their dead selves?
In front of the Great Stone of Yomotsu, the more powerful one was, the more vulnerable one was.

“Since you knew, why the fuck didn’t you say so earlier?” someone from Group One cursed.

“And you even hurt Oigami!” a person from Group Seven followed, supporting the person whose nose had been bitten off just now.

Amatsumara originally didn’t want to bother with these people, but Sanae Sara and the other group leaders were also looking at him, so he had to explain.

“The information from the library, how can I easily tell you? Once Her Majesty finds out, do you know what the consequences will be?”

“Now you’re scared?” Drunkard laughed sarcastically. “When you were trading with us, why weren’t you worried about the Lord of Kyoto?”

“In order to forge a divine artifact that can break through the barrier of divine energy, what is death? But for a piece of information, it’s not worth losing a single hair.”

Mentioning breaking through the barrier of divine energy, Amatsumara’s face was full of fanaticism.

The practitioners of the Shinto sect cursed, thinking that he had deliberately concealed it and wanted to kill them.

Some experts could understand him. People with high cultivation levels were more or less paranoid in some places.

“What now?” Drunkard asked Sanae Sara.

Sanae Sara pondered.

To defeat one’s future self, the best way was to die in the near future, just like Soma just now. But how would one know who would die in the near future?

“I have an idea,” Spider suddenly spoke.

“Speak,” Sanae Sara raised her chin slightly, signaling her to continue.

Spider reached out her hand, grabbed a practitioner from the surface of the lake, and threw him on the beach.

“I’ve injected a toxin into his body, and it will gradually stiffen. By this time tomorrow, he will be stiff and dead.”

“My lord, my lord, I don’t want to die, I don’t want to die! Ah!” that person’s face was full of terror. He struggled to get up, then suddenly fell down.

Spider continued, “The toxin has already crippled his divine power and his legs. Give him another weapon. I don’t believe he can’t win.”

“Good idea!” Drunkard laughed heartily, patted the wine gourd at his waist, and wine splashed out, condensing into a dagger in the air.

“A bigger weapon, you can’t use it now. A dagger is just right. Take it.”

The dagger was stuck in the sand.

“If you win, I’ll let you live,” Spider said with a smile.

Anyone who could still think normally knew that this was a lie.

If this person survived tomorrow, then the one who came out would not be his tomorrow’s self.

But that person had already been driven mad by death and had lost the ability to think. He picked up the dagger and staggered towards the Great Stone of Yomotsu.

Itomi Yuki looked at him with pity, even though she knew that this person’s hands were definitely stained with the blood of many innocent people, just like those geishas in the reed marsh.

Under the fox mask, Minamoto Kiyomoto’s face was expressionless as he watched that person crawl on the beach.

He glanced at Amatsumara. This old man’s expression was calm, but there was a hint of sarcasm in his eyes.

It seemed his guess was right. People couldn’t deceive fate. Only fate played with people.

A faint sound came, not a crawling sound, but footsteps.

In that person’s terrified eyes, a person who looked exactly like his today’s self walked out of the Great Stone of Yomotsu.

“What’s going on?” Everyone frowned and looked at Spider.

Spider looked at Amatsumara.

“Old age, sickness, and death are curses that only the living have. The dead can do whatever they want.”

“Then how can we possibly win!” someone couldn’t help but say.

“If we could win, this place wouldn’t…”

“Ah!”

Before Amatsumara could finish, the living person was lifted up by his dead self.

The dead person bit down on the living person’s neck and swallowed his blood in big mouthfuls.

“Ah! Ah!” the living person desperately stabbed the dead person’s head with the dagger.

The dead person clearly had divine power, but he didn’t care at all. He let the maggots and rotten flesh fly and continued to drink his own blood.

It was too tragic. It was simply a beast enjoying the delicacy of a living person.

Let alone Itomi Yuki, many of the Shinto sect practitioners who had killed people like flies were horrified.

When that person was no longer breathing, Spider made a move and burned the dead person to ashes.

The death qi returned to the Yellow Springs, and the life qi dissipated into the heavens and the earth. Two thick piles of ashes were blown away layer by layer by the wind.

“Has no one ever succeeded?” Sanae Sara lost her patience and asked Amatsumara directly.

“The Father God, Izanagi, perhaps succeeded,” Amatsumara said.

“Are you playing with us!” Drunkard’s heart was filled with anger.

The Shinto sect followers also cursed, all urging their group leaders. They just wanted to leave this damn place as soon as possible.

“You want to know how to enhance the power of the Demon Dragon Nail. I’m just telling you the method I know,” Amatsumara said faintly.

“Your Excellency, Amatsumara,” Minamoto Kiyomoto said curiously, “if you give the challenger a divine artifact midway, is that okay?”

“An unowned divine artifact can’t be used. An owned divine artifact, the other party can also control. The divine artifact doesn’t care if it’s death qi or life qi, it only recognizes capacity,” Amatsumara replied.

The group leaders quieted down, thinking of a way.

But if the method was so easy to think of, the government wouldn’t have left this place alone.

“The wind rises, the clouds fly. Everyone, what a coincidence,” a clear and pleasant voice, with a hint of a smile, came.

Everyone suddenly turned back and looked at the strange cave they had come from.

Itomi Yuki looked at Minamoto Kiyomoto with disbelief.

And Minamoto Kiyomoto stared at the cave on the sea surface with disbelief.

The sun was bright, and the sea breeze was gentle. Three figures flew out of the cave side by side.

A red and white shrine maiden’s uniform, with blooming magnolias embroidered on the snow-white sleeves. Her black hair fluttered, and a sacred golden light shone. Her clothes fluttered, and against the blue sky and clear sea, she was like a goddess descending to the mortal world.

“…The Divine Medium,” Sanae Sara’s usually charming smile disappeared. Her whole body tensed up, on full alert.

Beside the goddess, the figure in the middle of the three was shrouded in a rolling black mist, and could not be seen clearly.

But the black divine power was unique in the world. That person’s tone was arrogant, and his aura was pressing, as if he were about to rule the world. Who else could it be but Minamoto Kiyomoto?

The remaining person had hair as white as snow, a face as smooth as ice, and eyes as beautiful as autumn water. She was a doll-like delicate girl.

“The Hokkaido Miko?!” Spider’s eyes widened. She didn’t understand why this shrine maiden, who was even more detached from the world than the Divine Medium, would appear on Yomijima Island, thousands of miles away from Hokkaido.

Drunkard gulped. This Kasen-level group leader was also so nervous he started to swallow his saliva.

The three of them flew out of the cave and hovered in the air, their backs to the setting sun, like heavenly gods, surrounding everyone.