Yama Rising

According to ancient legends, there were three divine mountains situated in the sea to the east of Cathay, namely Yingzhou, Fangzhang, and Penglai, which were also referred to as the three immortal mountains.

None of those mountains were in set locations. Qin Ye didn't know much about the other two mountains, but he had seen a passage written about Yingzhou in a book from the library for history professors. It was said that the vessel that carried Yingzhou on its back was none other than the divine beast, Gui Xu!

Qin Ye mused to himself, "Gui Xu is one of the four divine turtles, ranking alongside the likes of Xuan Wu, Shen Bie, and... what was the final one again? Forget it, that's not important."

He looked on at the island with an awestruck expression. This was the physical embodiment of an ancient legend!

"It was said that Xu Fu's intended destination for his final voyage was none other than one of the three divine mountains, Penglai, which is home to the elixir of immortality. However, it's Gui Xu and Yingzhou that have appeared here instead... Does that mean that what he discovered during his final voyage was actually Yingzhou rather than Penglai?"

Qin Ye was very perplexed, but this wasn't the time to be pondering something like this.

It was extremely quiet here, eerily so, and it was exactly because of this that Qin Ye was more focused and on-edge. As a result, he noticed that there was a building on the mountain summit. Unfortunately, it was surrounded by mountains and greenery, so he was unable to catch a clear glimpse of it.

He silently descended onto the mountain, and throughout this entire process, the feeling that he was being watched by something never abated. In fact, that feeling only became more pronounced as he set foot onto the island.

"It doesn't feel like there's something watching me..." he murmured to himself as he inspected his surroundings. "Instead, it feels like a group of some things watching me... Also, this island is too quiet, like the calm before the storm. It's so silent here that it's unnatural."

Indeed, there wasn't any sound to be heard, no birds chirping, no cries from insects, and not even the sound of rustling leaves could be heard.

The only sound was the crunch of dry leaves underfoot, and this unnaturally quiet setting only contributed to Qin Ye's unease.

He continued onward in a slow and careful manner. There had most likely been some people here a very long time ago, as evidenced by the fact that there was a stone staircase here. This was a winding staircase that led upward, and on either side of it were rows of stone lanterns. The lanterns had clearly not been cleaned or maintained in a very long time, and there was moss growing all over their surfaces.

10 minutes passed, then 20. Qin Ye tried speeding up, but that didn't lead to anything, and the feeling of being watched still remained.

It was as if something were waiting for him and patiently observing him in the meantime.

Qin Ye was maintaining a state of absolute calm and wariness. The absolute silence and gorgeous environment of the island presented a peculiar juxtaposition, and Qin Ye was traveling very quickly, having almost reached the summit after just half an hour.

At this point, he had arrived in front of a cliff.

White clouds were drifting through the air down below, while strange stone formations were standing all around him. A series of strange-looking trees were growing out of the gaps between the rocks, and up ahead, the stone staircase had already disappeared. In its place was a wooden bridge.

The wooden bridge led to another cliff, and the construction on the mountain summit was situated right there. From this position, Qin Ye could already see the building's true appearance.

It was a shrine, a Nipponese shinto shrine.

There were several hundred white-robed figures knelt in front of the shrine's entrance with their heads pressed against the ground. It was impossible to see their appearance or even their attire from behind, and Qin Ye only took a quick glance at them before withdrawing his gaze.

He then turned his attention toward the bridge.

His instincts told him that as soon as he set foot on the bridge, the things that had been watching him this entire time would immediately unleash a ferocious assault upon him.

Firstly, if he were in their shoes, he would also choose a precarious location like this bridge to initiate their attack.

Secondly, the shrine that was standing on the other side of the bridge was clearly the final secret to be uncovered here. It had already been over 2,000 years since Gui Xu perished, so the only person who could've placed a secret here would be none other than Xu Fu!

As such, this had to be a secret pertaining to Xu Fu. In fact, there was a very good chance that it had something to do with the true location of the Peach Blossom Spring!

At this point, it was already too late to turn back, so the only way was forward.

He took a deep breath, then carefully strode forward and stepped onto the bridge.

In the instant that he did so, the sound of a bell chime suddenly rang out from the shrine on the other side, immediately following which a streak of light flew out before instantly reaching him.

It was that white cicada!

The two of them were no more than 20 meters away, and all of a sudden, the white cicada swelled drastically until it was comparable in size to a human head, then began to screech at Qin Ye with all its might.

The wooden bridge was swaying and trembling violently, as if to warn him against proceeding any further, but Qin Ye was merely amused by this.

It was all an empty bluff. He couldn't sense even a single ounce of power within the white cicada's body. However, it was most likely some type of mystical creature, and it was extremely fast, while also possessing immunity to all arts, thereby allowing it to evade Qin Ye up to this point.

Thus, he paid no heed to the cicada and continued onward. Initially, he was walking quite slowly, but he sped up further and further, and after a minute, he had already broken into a full sprint.

The suspended wooden bridge was very long, spanning a length of roughly 500 meters, and he covered 200 meters of it in the blink of an eye. The white cicada's screeching became more and more frantic, and its entire body had even turned a bright red color. It was flapping its wings so rapidly that they sounded like the propellers of a bomber aircraft. Right as Qin Ye reached the halfway mark of the bridge, it suddenly let loose its loudest shriek to date.

This resounding screech echoed throughout the entire island, and in the next instant, the cloud and mist beneath the wooden bridge began to stir.

Is it finally coming? Qin Ye took a deep breath as he gripped his spear tightly in his right hand while charging toward the other side at full speed. However, whatever was below him was even faster! A string of dull thumps rang out as a series of objects shot up out of the clouds like sharp arrows before forming a barrier in front of him on the bridge.

There were too many of those things to count, and it was as if a massive white galaxy had appeared in front of Qin Ye.

These were all white cicadas as well, but in contrast with the giant cicada that had already swelled to the size of a human head and had also turned scarlet in color, these cicadas were far smaller, and each of them was only around the size of a human fist. There were far too many of them to count, and they encompassed the entire mountain as they flapped their wings and buzzed in unison, creating a sound akin to listening to an airplane take off from close range.

As soon as this sea of cicadas appeared, they immediately pounced toward Qin Ye in a torrential storm without any hesitation. Qin Ye reflexively made a grab for the golden spear that Fate had transformed into, but his hand gripped onto nothing but empty air.

Fate had transformed into a pen at some point without his realization, and it was rapidly writing something behind him. The problem was that without Fate, he had no weapon to defend himself with.

It was like a storm of shooting stars, presenting a marvelous spectacle that couldn't be described with words. The wave of white cicadas was extraordinarily fast, far faster than Abyssal Prefects, and in the blink of an eye, tens of thousands of them had already reached Qin Ye!

I can't allow them to land on me! 

Qin Ye didn't know what these white cicadas were trying to do, but it was naturally wise to try and stop them. However, he didn't have a weapon right now. In this perilous situation, Qin Ye's mind was racing, and all of a sudden, an idea occurred to him. He joined his palms before taking a deep breath, then suddenly brought his palms apart again.

Whoosh! Countless chains erupted out of his sleeves, forming a spherical defensive barrier all around him. The gaps in the barrier between the chains were extremely small, only around the size of human thumbs, so there was no way that those white cicadas would be able to sneak in through. Looking out from within the barrier, white cicadas were crawling all over the chains, and it was quite a harrowing sight to behold.

Before he even had a chance to heave a sigh of relief, his pupils abruptly contracted as those white cicadas had passed through his Heavenly Dragnet as if they were insubstantial wraiths and spirits!

Qin Ye immediately understood what had happened. The Heavenly Dragnet was also one of his arts, which meant that they were chains formed by Yin energy rather than actual chains. During his pursuit of the white cicada, none of his arts had taken effect on it, and this was the exact same situation, except he was the one being hunted now.

It was already too late for him to bring out any of his Yin artifacts.

The giant white cicada had dared to attack him even though it was aware of the fact that he was a Yama-King, so there had to be something that it was counting on. Currently, Qin Ye was like a traveler standing at the edge of a cliff. Taking one step forward could take him to his destination, but it could also spell the end of his life.

What should he do?

His mind was already racing at top speed, and in the split second, an inky-black protective barrier formed entirely by Yin energy appeared around his body.

This was his emissary aura!

Emissary aura was an innate ability that all underworld emissaries possessed, so it wasn't an art. Sure enough, as soon as the emissary aura barrier appeared, the white cicadas were no longer able to infiltrate any further. Immediately thereafter, Qin Ye deactivated his flight ability without any hesitation, and as a result, he rapidly plunged toward the valley down below in free fall.

This clearly came as quite a surprise to all of the white cicadas. Under the protection of his emissary aura, Qin Ye dropped rapidly toward the valley like a dead weight. However, the white cicadas were able to react extremely quickly, and after just half a second, they immediately set off in pursuit of Qin Ye in a frenzy.

However, half a second was still half a second, and this delay meant that only the initial layer of white cicadas was adhered to Qin Ye's emissary aura barrier, while the rest of the cicadas had been left behind. The white cicadas up above revolved in the sky, forming a giant white vortex that came plunging down at full speed.

Qin Ye looked on at the massive white cicada vortex overhead, and his brows furrowed tightly. All living beings had their own instincts, so the fact that they dared to attack an apex predator like him meant that these cicadas were definitely not to be messed with.

Thus, the tactic he should be employing against them was to avoid fighting fire with fire.

The valley was very deep, and the velocity at which he was plummeting was increasing rapidly. The white cicadas were hot in pursuit, but were unable to even chase him down, let alone surround him. All of a sudden, a line of flames appeared on each of the white cicadas' abdomens as they continued to pursue Qin Ye.

They had already been plummeting for what seemed like an eternity, and the surrounding area was lined with jagged rocks. There was no light at all aside from the faint radiance filtering through the opening of the valley up above, but in this instant, all of the white cicadas became new sources of light. Furthermore, the light was growing brighter and brighter while their bodies began to swell in size, making them resemble miniature suns.

Right as all of the white cicadas were swelled to the extreme, Qin Ye suddenly shuddered as an overwhelming sense of peril welled up in his heart.

He felt as if an electric current had run through his entire body from head to toe. This was a situation that was perilous enough to spell death even for a Yama-King!

Countless dazzling white cicadas were flying above his head, and he was almost compelled to doubt his own instincts.

Where was the danger coming from? Only in the final instant did he detect any killing intent, and at this point, it was already far too late. Even though he hadn't been surrounded by the cicadas, there was nothing but sharp and jagged rocks all around him, so the terrain certainly wasn't beneficial to him.

BOOM!!! 

Before he even had a chance to finish that thought, an earth-shattering boom rang out across the entire valley, and even the surrounding mountains trembled in its wake.

Ferocious winds swept up enormous volumes of dust and shrapnel, flinging them up by over a kilometer from the bottom of the valley!

Boundless scintillating light radiated in all directions as terrifying power tore through space. All of the white cicadas had self-detonated and been reduced to dust in this violent explosion. Fierce winds were sweeping across the mountains in all directions, causing countless rocks to clatter incessantly. A gigantic mushroom cloud that was rising up layer upon layer soon erupted from the bottom of the valley, presenting an awe-inspiring sight to behold.

It was truly a doomsday-like scene!