Yama Rising

Chapter 1096: Supercritical Tide (2)

Qin Ye's pupils abruptly contracted slightly upon seeing this.

He had envisioned the space of the underworld to be quite similar to the space of the mortal realm. Even though the second King Yanluo had already told him about things like supercritical tides, planar scales, and the Yin Space River, he had thought that these terms were simply different ways to describe the things present in the space of the mortal realm.

However, what he was seeing was completely different from his expectations.

Qin Ye inspected the bands of Yin runes carefully, and discovered that he recognized every single one of them. They were all mid to high-grade Yin runes within or above the fifth circle!

These asteroid belts formed by Yin runes were known as planar scales, and there was one around every plane. Their radiance lit up the inky darkness of space, much like street lights turning on in a city at night, and as a result, Qin Ye was able to clearly see all of the planes laid out before him.

He gently exhaled as he stood on the palm of the fifth sun god, looking into the space that he had never seen before. All of a sudden, he was overcome by a sense of awe and wonder.

So this is the space of the underworld...

Some of the planes were extremely even and symmetrical, while others had very irregular topography, and there were even some planes that were formed by countless pieces of charred, black bones and asteroids...

There were planes of all sizes and descriptions!

The Yin Space River was like a vast piece of black velvet, while the planes and their planar scales were like designs embroidered onto the black velvet. In contrast, a human couldn't be any tinier and more insignificant, and the sight of the vast cosmos struck the beholder with a sense of awe and perspective, as well as an urge to explore.

Mictlantecutli and Mictetikasiwa didn't say anything, nor were they looking down on Qin Ye for his loss of composure. Back when they had seen space for the first time, their reaction had been much the same.

The higher one stood, the more one would be able to see, and the more they would come to realize just how insignificant they were.

After staring into space for a long while, a faint smile appeared on Qin Ye's face.

In contrast with what he was witnessing, all of his worries and concerns seemed so insignificant.

Right at this moment, all of the planes in the entire Yin Space River suddenly began to tremble slightly.

All of the Yin runes began to fluctuate in brightness, and several seconds later, the entire Yin Space River began to flash unsteadily like a lightbulb with a bad connection.

"What's going on?" Qin Ye was instantly snapped out of his reverie as his brows furrowed slightly. There was no way that Yin runes would react like this for no reason, and there was only one type of situation that could cause such a strong reaction in Yin runes: there was an external influx of Yin energy triggering this reaction.

All arts consisted of Yin runes that resonated with one another, and Yin energy had to be injected into the system to trigger the chain reaction. Without the injection of Yin energy, arts would only be chains of Yin runes that couldn't do anything.

Inside the Yin Space River, there were countless Yin runes and boundless Yin energy. However, having existed for countless years, these Yin runes and the Yin energy had already fused as one long ago. In this state, there was no way that any fundamental change could take place in space. An analogy could be drawn here to the space of the mortal realm. The Big Bang was the event that had created the universe, but having been in existence for tens of billions of years, space had already reached a natural equilibrium, which explained why there hadn't been any subsequent Big Bangs.

The only thing that could trigger such a violent reaction was an influx of Yin energy that didn't belong to the space here!

Could it be coming from extraterrestrial life forms?

Qin Ye was staring intently at the center of the image with an unblinking gaze. All of the planes in the entirety of the Yin Space River were flashing and flickering unsteadily, yet the Scar of the Sun remained completely unmoved. However, the red mist around it was becoming dense and denser.

It was as if some type of terrifying monster were about to tear its way out of the rift!

What could it be?

Inside the image, the planar scale was trembling more and more violently, and at this point, even Mictlantecutli and Mictetikasiwa had risen to their feet. "The reaction is even more violent than last time!"

Qin Ye didn't say anything, but his mind was already racing rapidly.

The reaction is more violent than last time? Could this mean... that something's coming closer and closer to the underworld?

In the next instant, the image fell into complete darkness.

All color seemed to have been drained away, and the entirety of the Yin Space River seemed to have returned to a state of primitive chaos.

Qin Ye drew a sharp breath upon seeing this. In this instant, he had been struck by an inexplicable feeling, and goosebumps had been raised all over his arms.

As a Yama-King, he was extremely sensitive to impending danger. In fact, this premonition was developed as an Abyssal Prefect. Past instances of this included Qin Ye's premonitions of danger in the Huang Clan's earthen building, during the Xu Fu crisis, and prior to the arrival of the three pillars. However, never had he been struck by such a strong premonition of peril before! Furthermore, the scene that he was witnessing was actually taking place countless kilometers away, and it was already striking him with an inexplicable sense of terror!

"You must be wondering what could've driven us to create Omeyocan, right?" Mictlantecutli's voice rang out behind him. "That is the reason we created Omeyocan! We saw that thing last time, and it's like a demon that resides in space, constantly sizing up all of the Yin Star Systems. On the previous occasion, we saw one of its eyes. In the next few seconds, the darkness will begin to vibrate, after which an eyeball the size of a plane will appear. Their eye will be of a crimson color, and it'll appear right at the Scar of the Sun. It's like the center of the entire Yin Space River, able to see us from countless kilometers away!"

Could it be that they had been discovered by an almighty extraterrestrial being?

Qin Ye's brows furrowed tightly upon hearing this. None of the planes actually possessed light of their own, and the light that they were giving off was light that was being reflected from other stars. The fact that all of them had gone dark at once could only mean one thing: the stars had disappeared.

Of course, the stars couldn't possibly just cease to exist all of a sudden, so there was only one terrifying explanation: they had been covered up.

Some unfathomably gargantuan object had completely covered up all of the stars!

Their light had been intercepted, meaning that it was unable to reach this Yin Star System, thereby plunging it entirely into darkness.

Something had covered up all of the stars and was watching them at this very moment. In fact, perhaps it was even approaching them!

"Are we able to see further than this?" Qin Ye asked.

"Yes, but we'll have to wait until the supercritical tide begins," Mictlantecutli replied with a rare surprised look on his face. "Last time, the eye had already appeared at this point..."

On the previous occasion, it had only taken the eye five seconds to appear, yet over 10 seconds had already passed by on this occasion.

There were no vibrations, nor any gargantuan eyes. The only thing that they could see was an all-encompassing, suffocating darkness.

No one said anything after that.

Everyone was waiting for the arrival of the supercritical tide in silence. After a full minute had passed by, something finally seemed to have begun to move within the darkness.

It was very difficult to describe this spectacle. Theoretically speaking, there would be no way to detect any movement in pure darkness, but this vast expanse of darkness seemed to have a life of its own, and one could clearly sense that it was moving.

The vibrations were becoming more and more powerful, and 10 seconds later, a pillar of dazzling white light suddenly erupted into the heavens.

Light returned to the entire Yin Space River, yet in this instant, Qin Ye, Mictlantecutli, and Mictetikasiwa let loose a cry of alarm in unison as they took an involuntary step backward.

A terrifying giant had appeared in the image!

It was very difficult to describe just how massive this creature was. It was wearing a tattered black cloak, and the parts of its body that were revealed were all white, skeletal appendages. It had a total of four arms and was wearing a mask that resembled a goat's skull. Above the mask was the antler of a deer that resembled the complex canopy of a locust tree, while down below was a vast expanse of black Yin energy.

Two of its palms were resting on two planes, and the massive planes were around the same size as its hands. Scarlet flames were erupting out of its eyes, and around it were countless humanoid figures wearing white clothes and black conical hats. There were hundreds of thousands of these humanoid figures hovering in the air around the giant, like stars around a moon!

The giant was so enormous that it took up the entirety of heaven and earth! With just a single press of its palm, an entire plane would be utterly destroyed. None of the shooting stars and asteroids could inflict even the slightest harm upon it. In fact, they were like peashooter projectiles that went completely unnoticed by the giant, even as they exploded upon striking its body.

"Is that a spatial Yin beast?" Mictlantecutli was staring at the gigantic monster with a stunned expression. "How is this possible? This is an image of our Yin Star System! How could there be such an enormous monster in our Yin Star System?!"

With a monster like this present, not even 10 Omeyocans would be able to protect Mictlantecutli and Mictetikasiwa!

Qin Ye didn't say anything. He didn't know what this thing was, but something simply wasn't adding up in his mind.

If such a monster truly existed, then why was it that the underworld had never been attacked by it before?

A monster like this was definitely above the Yama-King level! The terrifying power that it was giving off was something that Qin Ye had only ever felt from the second King Yanluo, and with its astonishing mass, it wouldn't take very long at all for it to traverse through their entire Yin Star System, so why had it left the underworld untouched?

Could it be that it had only recently made an arrival in this Yin Star System?

Could it be that it discovered this rift during the last supercritical tide 50 years ago, then took advantage of this supercritical tide to pass through it?

No, this isn't the time to be thinking about these things...

Qin Ye cast his gaze toward the white light. In the instant that the monster emerged, he had clearly caught sight of that pillar of white light striking the giant's chest, upon which the image of a dazzling white sword appeared on the giant's body.

This was an antiquated Cathayan longsword. Cathayan swords were very different from western swords, so it was clearly identifiable.

The sword was bound by chains from all directions, keeping it hovering in mid-air. It was only an image, but in the instant that Qin Ye caught sight of it, he felt a violent wave abruptly surge through his consciousness.

"What is that thing?" Qin Ye immediately lowered his head and frantically massaged his own temples to fight off the splitting headache that he had suddenly been struck by. "Since when was there such a fearsome sword in Cathay? It's not the Xuanyuan Sword... Half of the Xuanyuan Sword is still in the possession of Sword Master Xuanyuan, yet this sword is whole, but what Cathayan sword other than the Xuayuan Sword could evoke fear even within me?"

Right at this moment, he abruptly raised his head and cast his gaze toward the heavens.

Mictlantecutli and Mictetikasiwa also raised their heads in unison, and they faltered momentarily at the sight that they were greeted by, following which furious looks appeared on their faces. "How dare you!"

Qin Ye also faltered slightly before immediately casting his gaze toward the eye of the sun god.

Inside the image depicted within the pupil, that spatial giant was reaching out toward the lens with a gargantuan hand!

It was grabbing out toward the underworld!

It was also at this moment that all of the Yama-King level death gods in the entire underworld raised their heads in unison!