Tales of Herding Gods

The expression of the elderly god twisted, and he wanted to escape. However, he immediately stopped when he saw Qin Mu shaking the Life and Death Book in his hand. He didn’t dare to make any sudden movements.

Qin Mu was even more sure that the Life and Death Book was the bane of the starved corpses.

“You say we’re starved corpses, and you’re not wrong.”

The elderly god finally spoke, and he chuckled. “The origin of the Heavenly Yin World is incomparably ancient, and it’s so far back to the beginning of heaven and earth. When Youdu and Xuandu were born, Heavenly Yin World was born as well. Before there were so-called humans, ancient gods ruled the universe, and they formed the celestial heavens of the ancient gods. Goddess of Heavenly Yin is one of the ancient gods.”

Qin Mu’s heart trembled violently, but he said with a calm face, “In that case, Goddess of Heavenly Yin is like Earth Count and Heaven Duke, they are all gods born from heaven and earth.”

The elderly god shook his head and said, “Goddess of Heavenly Yin is greatly inferior to those two. Heavenly Yin World is just a piece of darkness under Heaven Duke’s feet; it’s incomparable. However, there is also a benefit for Heavenly Yin World, and that is that it isn’t under Heaven Duke’s jurisdiction. Heaven Duke and Earth Count, neither can come here, and that means…”

Qin Mu said, “Which also means, the lifeforms living in Heavenly Yin World will never have their souls fall into Youdu; therefore, they can be undying. Is my reasoning correct?”

The elderly god laughed loudly, but there was no laughter coming from his heart. He seemed to be laughing for the sake of laughing. He shook his head and said, “Undying? Hehe, you wish. However, the kind of immortality in Heavenly Yin World isn’t what you imagine it to be. Our souls are indeed immortal, but this also results in more and more souls accumulating once their corporeal bodies died. If it were a god it would be fine, as they could preserve their corporeal body, but the other lifeforms? So many of them have died.”

Qin Mu asked curiously, “If more and more lifeforms die, wouldn’t this place become another Youdu?”

“As I said, Heavenly Yin World isn’t under Earth Count’s jurisdiction. Earth Count can’t control this place, so how will it become Youdu?”

The elderly god shook his head and said, “This place will never be Youdu, and it will never be Xuandu. No matter whether its the Earth Count or Heavenly Duke, this is their blind spot—a place they can’t step into. However, when too many souls accumulate in the Heavenly Yin World, the souls will start to create chaos. How can the dead stand watching other people living in happiness? Thus, the war between souls and the living erupted.”

Qin Mu was puzzled. “How can souls fight humans? People who have a corporeal body and a soul are much stronger than purely a soul. A soul that’s dead can never defeat a living human.”

The elderly god said with a smile, “However, the corporeal body will always have the day where they wither while the souls in Heavenly Yin World are immortal. Even gods cannot completely vanquish the souls in Heavenly Yin World. Even if their souls are completely wiped out, they don’t disappear at all. In the battle between humans and ghosts, too many souls dispersed, and those souls finally become the black sand.”

His eyes suddenly become incomparably dark, and they were like incomparably fine black sand.

It was obvious he wasn’t a living person. He was a strange monster formed when the black sand invaded the human skin.

“The black sand is our shattered souls.”

The elder god revealed a strange smile. “Because we are too shattered, no one can see us clearly, and no one can touch us. You’re one of the rare few who can see us. After we attained our corporeal body, we would feel hungry, and this is unbearable hunger that makes us frantic for food. Thus, we started eating.”

He didn’t talk about this history, and he only said, “Soon, all of the living people in Heavenly Yin World were eaten by us.”

Qin Mu felt his hair standing on ends, and even though the elderly god didn’t describe this period of history, he could well imagine how horrifying the chaos was!

“In that case, where’s Goddess of Heavenly Yin?”

Qin Mu said solemnly, “Why didn’t Goddess of Heavenly Yin stop you guys?”

The elderly god didn’t reply and continued to say, “As we ate and ate, we realized there were no more living people in Heavenly Yin World; therefore, we started to eat ourselves. We ate the flesh and blood of our body, we ate our bones, our divine arts, and our primordial spirit—in the end, everyone was only left with skin. When we had nothing to eat, we were too hungry, so we set our gazes on Goddess of Heavenly Yin…”

Qin Mu shuddered. When the elderly god said that, he said it like it was natural, and the devilish nature of his voice made Qin Mu feel fear.

The elderly god said, “We aren’t Goddess of Heavenly Yin’s opponents, but luckily, we have many people. However, even with so many people, no one could bite the Goddess of Heavenly Yin. She beat us up badly, but we cannot die! We are souls so shattered that we can’t shatter anymore. She couldn’t kill us, and we couldn’t eat her. This lasted until a guest came from outside—a guest like you who can see us, hear us, and touch us. He could even hurt us.”

He chuckled and said, “We allied ourselves with the guest from outside, and thus, we ate Goddess of Heavenly Yin. After we ate her, there was nothing else to eat in Heavenly Yin World. However, we are still ravenous—”

He smacked his lips as though he was reminiscing something delicious.

“Ate Goddess of Heavenly Yin?”

Qin Mu shuddered and narrowed his eyes while saying solemnly, “Is this guest perhaps Black Deity of Mingdu?”

“You guys call him Black Deity of Mingdu?”

The elderly god shook his head and said, “We don’t call him that here, we refer to him as Son of Heaven Yin.”

Qin Mu was slightly stunned. “Son of Heaven Yin? The Son of Heaven of Heavenly Yin World?”

The elderly nodded his head and said, “Even though Goddess of Heavenly Yin is an ancient god born from Heavenly Yin World, she can’t subdue us because of the restraint of the great Dao. Meanwhile, Son of Heaven Yin has strange spells that could subdue us, and thus we followed him to fight wars on all sides, experiencing era after era. Afterward, he built Mingdu and the Life and Death Book in your hands is his treasure; therefore, you are capable of countering us. Since you are one of our own…”

“One of your own?”

Qin Mu gave a soft laugh and raised the Life and Death Book to shine at him.

The expression of the elderly god changed drastically, giving off piercing screeches and black smoke came spewing out from the five organs, causing him to shrivel quickly.

Qin Mu sat down on the throne and bent forward with one arm holding up his chin. He sank into deep thoughts.

‘Black Deity of Mingdu and Son of Heaven Yin. The invasion of the darkness is from the black sand that was once souls which have shattered. The monsters in the darkness are actually human skins and in the human skins are shattered souls of ghosts.’

‘Son of Heaven Yin connected Heavenly Yin World and the Great Ruins, allowing the black sand in Heavenly Yin World to invade the Great Ruins. The monsters in these sands, as well as the black sand, are terrified of the light from the gods, therefore when the gods enter the Great Ruins, the darkness dare not come forward.’

‘However, there’s one thing that’s wrong, that’s the faces in the darkness. I once saw the faces of devil gods invading with the darkness in Goddess’s Pass, and they got blocked by the god weapons of the goddesses that had revived. Such situations are everywhere in the Great Ruins, so where have the devil gods in the darkness come from?’

He looked at the town filled with skin. Even though the starved corpses could move around like lightning in the darkness, their abilities weren’t profound. It was clear they weren’t the devil gods in the darkness.

What was strange was that the devil gods in the darkness also came and left with the darkness. When the sky was bright, no traces of them could be found.

The elderly god didn’t answer the questions for him.

Qin Mu sat on the throne. The elderly god’s position in Heavenly Yin World shouldn’t be low, and since he was able to explain the history of Heavenly Yin World, it meant he had participated in the battle between Son of Heaven and Goddess of Heavenly Yin.

And from then onwards, he had never been broken apart before, so he could still preserve those memories.

After Qin Mu had used the Life and Death Book, he was formed by countless different soul atoms, yet his skin still had his name. The soul atoms didn’t belong to the skin, and they would naturally be discharged out after being shone on by the Life and Death Book.

It was equivalent to QIn Mu killing them once more.

Even though the black sand would return into their skins, they wouldn’t be who they were anymore.

‘The effect of Life and Death Book is truly astonishing, Black Deity of Mingdu. Yes, Son of Heaven Yin of Mingdu, he must be an incomparably talented person to have made this kind of treasure.’

Just as he thought until there, rustling sounds rang out, and Qin Mu’s heart stirred slightly. Qin Mu raised his head and saw the god of Founding Emperor that had led him over. He stood on a bridge and beckoned his hand at him.

Qin Mu’s heart stirred slightly, and he recalled in detail. The god wasn’t among those gods that were clamoring to eat him.

‘Could he still have his memories? That isn’t possible, right?’

Qin Mu hurriedly got up, and with a few steps, he reached the bridge. Below the long bridge was water rippling and stretching out from the town. The bridge stretched across the river, and the other end of the bridge had vanished in the vast grayness on the other side.

The god of Founding Emperor saw him following and continued forward. Qin Mu quickly followed him on the bridge.

When they left, the black sand gathered back in the town, and they rapidly tunneled into the organs of the skins on the ground. Soon, numerous gods stood up again, and they were vivid and lifelike. They walked around in the city and didn’t remember anything that had happened.

The length of this long bridge had still given Qin Mu a scare. The long bridge moved up and down, and even after entering the darkness, it didn’t break off and continued stretching above the lake.

The lake below couldn’t be called a lake; it would be more appropriate to call it a sea. It also had a dark and gloomy color.

Qin Mu followed him to sprint for a long time, and he still didn’t walk to the end. He suddenly stopped and said indifferently, “Senior, why are you leading me forward? Why can’t you say it bluntly? The elderly god could speak just now, so you should be able to, right?”

In the grayness, that god stopped and turned around to look at him with empty eyes. After a moment, he took off the clothes on his upper body.

Qin Mu was slightly stunned and walked forward to examine his chest. He saw some strange markings imprinted on the god’s body.

Incomparably thin and complicated runes formed the markings, and those markings formed words.

The word ‘shut’.

In front of his chest and on his back was covered with the word ‘shut’!

‘Heavenly Devil Creation Technique, it’s Saint Woodcutter’s work.’

Qin Mu was stunned and suddenly shed a tear. He revealed a smile and said, “Senior, that’s enough. Let us continue.”

The Founding Emperor God covered himself up and continued forward.

The word ‘shut’ was traces left behind by Heavenly Devil Creation Technique and Saint Woodcutter had used Heavenly Devil Creation Technique to seal his soul inside his skin. The starved corpses don’t eat the skin so he could preserve his own soul and memory.

However, his corporeal body was definitely unable to be protected. He would be eaten up by the starved corpses.

The reason why Qin Mu shed a tear was out of respect. It moved him, but he was mostly full of gratitude.

The Founding Emperor God knew he was definitely going to die by entering Heavenly Yin World, but he still ventured in without a second thought, to search for the truth of the darkness.