Chapter 222
Chapter 222
Before Deaf Granny could answer, Hua Jiunan spoke first.
“Unless someone risks never returning and uses Guoyin to investigate!”
Chen Daji clearly did not understand. He asked timidly,
“Big Brother, isn’t Guoyin just like in novels, when your soul leaves your body and takes a stroll through the Underworld?
“Is it really dangerous?
“In *Journey to the West*, didn’t the Monkey King wreak havoc in the Underworld Court? Those little ghosts down there didn’t seem very powerful…”
Chen Daji’s thinking was the same as that of most ordinary people.
Perhaps this was what people meant when they said the ignorant knew no fear.
Deaf Granny smiled helplessly and patted Chen Daji on the head.
“Silly boy, Guoyin is both difficult and dangerous!
“Otherwise, people wouldn’t say that every time Immortal Spirits explore the Yin-Yang Realm, they gamble with their lives!”
As the story quietly explains:
Guoyin was not some carefree three-day tour of the Underworld Court that any person with a little cultivation could take simply by chanting an incantation and sending their soul out of their body.
According to traditional Daoist scriptures, only two kinds of “people” could achieve Guoyin without outside assistance.
The first were those who had reached the realm of Ghost Immortal or higher.
Even then, they could not be corpse-liberated immortals, such as the Ghost Buddha, who had cultivated after death.
The second were those who held a special office bestowed by Heaven and Earth.
These included Mountain Gods, Earth Gods, and City Gods enfeoffed by the Underworld Court, as well as the Twelve Treasury Officials under Emperor Dongyue.
Apart from such beings, any creature that dared intrude upon the Underworld Court without permission would be suppressed by yin deities as soon as it was discovered-whether god, immortal, demon, devil, ghost, or monster, and no matter what reason it gave.
For a lesser offense, the intruder would be punished for hundreds or thousands of years and lose a vast amount of hidden virtue.
For a serious offense, the intruder would be cast into the Eighteen Levels of Hell.
For an offense graver still, its soul might be destroyed outright, never to reincarnate!
Some honored readers may ask:
Are the yin deities of the Underworld Court truly so powerful?
This author will not answer the question directly. Instead, let us reason it out together in the simplest possible way.
Every living being in the Three Realms returns to the Underworld Court after death.
No matter how terrifyingly powerful it was in life, there has never been an exception.
If the Underworld Court lacked the power to suppress such mighty beings, would the world we inhabit not have fallen into chaos long ago?
Imagine this:
Two great gods are fighting. One kills the other, only for the slain god to turn into a ghost on the spot and continue the battle.
Or perhaps the dead god storms into the Underworld Court, causes havoc until he has vented his anger, then returns to life “fully healed”…
Has such a scene ever occurred?
The Underworld Court of Fengdu was guarded by far more than the Ten Kings of Hell. Even more terrifying gods stood above them.
Highest of all was the Emperor of Fengdu, supreme ruler of the Underworld Court.
He governed the entire bureaucracy of the Netherworld and all matters concerning every ghost beneath Heaven.
Below the Emperor of Fengdu stood Emperor Dongyue. Enfeoffed by the Heavenly Court and stationed in the Underworld Court, he presided over the vital functions of life and death in the mortal world.
Next came the Five Directional Ghost Emperors, who governed the five ghost domains:
The Eastern Ghost Emperors, Cai Yulei and Shentu, governed Mount Taozhi and the Ghost Gate.
The Western Ghost Emperors, Zhao Wenhe and Wang Zhenren, governed Mount Bozhong.
The Northern Ghost Emperors, Zhang Heng and Yang Yun, governed Mount Luofeng.
The Southern Ghost Emperor, Du Ziren, governed Mount Luofu.
The Central Ghost Emperors, Zhou Qi and Ji Kang, governed Mount Baodu.
Only after the Five Directional Ghost Emperors came the familiar Ten Kings of Hell.
They administered the lifespans and deaths of mortals, governed fortune and calamity in the Netherworld, and each oversaw a portion of the Eighteen Levels of Hell.
The one who had subdued the Ghost Mother Evil Goddess was King Biancheng, the sixth of the Ten Kings of Hell, whose mortal name was Bi Yuanbin.
His name was written on the Talisman that suppressed the black stone coffin.
Below the Ten Kings of Hell were the Six Merit Registrars, the Reincarnation Department, the Four Great Judges, the Ten Great Underworld Marshals, and others.
There were also Ghost Kings from various regions;
And the many generals who had died in battle from ancient times to the present, along with the Hundred-Battle Warrior Spirits who followed them.
There was no need to list them all here.
(Interested readers may consult the relevant Daoist scriptures themselves. As always, do not believe the foul-mouthed know-it-alls on that certain search engine.)
Of course, some books also recorded a singular existence within the Underworld Court:
The greatly compassionate Ksitigarbha Bodhisattva, who vowed, “If I do not enter Hell, who will?”
It was precisely because these great gods of the Underworld Court maintained order that the Six Paths of Reincarnation could function normally and the karma of good and evil could ultimately receive its due!
Despite how terrifying the Underworld Court was, it could not shake Hua Jiunan’s determination to save his mother.
“Grandma, no matter what, I must use Guoyin and bring my mother back!
“Please help me!”
Chen Daji immediately added,
“I’ll go with you, Big Brother! Good brothers stand by each other. If we die, we die together!”
At that, Chen Daji became somewhat listless.
“It’s just… it’s just a shame about all my wives…
“Grandma, if Big Brother and I don’t return, I’ll have to trouble you to tell Grandmother.
“Tell the female ghost sisters to hurry and remarry while they’re still young. I’ll miss them…”
Deaf Granny looked at Hua Jiunan and Chen Daji with immense approval.
“Good, good, good! Xiao Jiu, filial devotion comes before all other virtues. Grandma supports you!”
The old woman turned and lovingly stroked Chen Daji’s head.
“Daji, Grandma truly never realized that someone so young could be so loyal and hot-blooded!
“A true man isn’t someone who charges ahead because ignorance has made him fearless. He’s someone like you, who knows he may die and still goes bravely to uphold righteousness despite everything and everyone he cannot bear to leave behind!
“How does that saying go…?”
Moved, Hua Jiunan gently embraced Chen Daji and answered,
“Where righteousness calls, though ten million stand against me, I will go!”
Deaf Granny clapped and laughed, her voice filled with a courage no less heroic than any man’s.
“Hahaha! Yes, yes, that’s the one!”