Yama Rising

A split second later, the Yin spirits surrounding him roared at the top of their voice as they lunged straight for Qin Ye’s jugular.

It was like a chaotic dance of a thousand ghosts.

One second later, a boundless wave of Yin energy erupted from the mound of corpses like a terrifying explosion. The evil ghosts that were clinging desperately to Qin Ye suddenly shrieked in unison, before promptly being blown away in all directions like shrapnel from an exploding grenade.

Qin Ye wasn’t fully in his Hell’s Emissary state just yet. He was already dressed in the garments of an Infernal Judge, but his form was still that of a human body. He glanced around the surroundings, only to discover that the entire factory… was once again completely empty.

It was almost as though everything that had just happened was nothing more than an illusion.

He gently curled his fingers, and all of the loose sheets of papers flew towards him and stacked themselves up neatly.

“11 December, 1947.”

“When will days like these ever end… It’s already December, yet I don’t even have sufficient clothes to keep myself warm at night. How ironic is it that the only time I feel warm is the time spent working in the silk factory? I don’t even get sufficient food… how is the kid in my womb supposed to grow big and strong…? As things are right now, the future seems completely bleak and hopeless…”

Qin Ye continued reading on, “It’s meaningless to continue living like that. Every day is spent living in fear. If those demons realize that I’m pregnant with a child, I won’t be able to continue working here any longer… I even have to tighten my belt each day to keep things under wraps. Things might be difficult around here, but it’s the only place I can still make a living at. I’ve got to support my parents as well… I can’t afford to lose my job! Even if it means working for the Nipponese!”

Qin Ye maintained a calm expression on his face as he flipped the page. He had seen too many such incidents of death and departure, so he wasn’t the slightest bit moved by her journal records.

“12 December, 1947.”

This person’s handwriting was ostensibly a little bit more forceful than the one before. It revealed traces of her emotions at that time - her apprehension, fear and hesitance in her heart, “What do I do… What do I do?!”

“I’ve even got a six year old daughter to feed! As things stand right now… we’re stranded in the midst of a living hell. I can still scrape by with the food I earn from remaining around here. But if I leave this place right now… I might not even be able to survive this winter!”

Qin Ye was slightly astonished.

Human nature.

Someone had once said that all humans are selfish. Qin Ye subscribed to this notion. No matter how noble a person was, that person would invariably place the considerations of self before others.

The third page was of yet another person’s handwriting.

“Yu Lishan is pregnant… Her belly is already starting to show it… All of us in the team are on tenterhooks right now. Even the leader of our team has personally spoken to her, yet she… knelt down in front of all of us and begged us not to sell her out to the demons. She’s promised to resign as soon as the days of winter are over. I… don’t know what I should do.”

“The weather will soon get warmer in April wouldn’t it? That’s no more than a month away. Perhaps… everything will be fine after all?”

“Dear lord! The demon has noticed her! Although she’s tried her best to cover it up… the traitorous supervisor has already begun to ask our team leader about what’s going on over here!!”

“I just hope it’s not already too late! The demon is going to personally investigate matters this afternoon…”

“Yu Lishan is dead…”

After all, when teardrops fall onto paper made of poor quality, it would naturally leave a similar stain when it dried later on. All who had written such emotional letters in the past would have had a similar experience.

There were four exclamation marks in a row, each of which were ostensible written with greater force and emotion. Even the paper was torn at the end of it all.

“It shouldn’t be this way… It should never have come to that! We’d only asked her to leave! Nobody wanted her to die! Who was the one who snitched on her? Which one of us told that demon about this secret?!”

The pages at the back were all slightly torn and tattered. Qin Ye could practically imagine the grotesque, horrific sight playing out right in front of his very eyes, and not even he could help but frown subconsciously.

“It was a stillborn.” She appeared to have calmed down in this journal entry. Her handwriting was far softer than before, “Yu Lishan had tightened her belt too much in order to keep things under wraps, and… the baby ended up dying of suffocation in the womb. It was a baby girl. I’ll never forget that image for the rest of my life - that purple-looking baby that was… held up in the air by that demon, before being tossed into the pool of boiling water used for cocoons…”

The journal entry ended there abruptly.

Qin Ye had his suspicions. These were the memoirs of the dead. All Yin spirits that harboured grievances would naturally leave behind a set of memoirs or similar memorabilia that documented the source of their grievances. Incidentally, it also formed the evidentiary basis of all investigations by Emissaries thereafter. But these journal entries clearly meant that… he was only at the prologue of the matter.

“There are ghosts!!!”

Then, the next entry was scribbled as though with frantic writing, “There are ghosts… there are ghosts! There really are ghosts!!! Ahhhhhhh!!! I can’t stay here any longer! I’m going crazy!!”

Rustle… rustle… He flipped through the pages quickly. Then, after fifteen or so pages, he finally arrived at the next entry that was filled with writing once more.

The top half was filled with text, while the bottom half was covered in blood.

It was obvious that the author of this journal entry was trembling profusely, almost as though he were desperately trying to suppress the fear in his heart, “I’m next… I know that I’m next…”

“And I know it’s true because every morning, when I get up, I can still see signs of a baby having laid on my bed before!!!!”

“Was that just a reflection? I don’t know… I don’t know anymore… There’s something here… there’s definitely something unclean here! She’s coming for me! Yu Lishan and her child are coming for me!! I shouldn’t have told that demon that she was pregnant with a child! I didn’t expect them to kill her! I only wanted them to chase her away!!!”