Legend of the Great Sage

The scarlet-red flames licked a large, black pot. The surrounding walls had all become charred black as a few ghosts fed wood to the flames.

The pot was a dozen metres wide, basically resembling a small pond. It was filled with thick, yellow oil, bubbling away endlessly.

At this moment, a large, blue ghost appeared from the pitch-black walls. He lifted a person high into the air and tossed him into the pot viciously.

With a pop, oil sprayed everywhere. The oil hissed away and surged violently.

The ghosts around the pot fled in a scramble. One of them accidentally got a droplet of oil on him, and he rolled around on the ground, wailing out like he was in great pain. Even his hunched-over figure became twisted.

The blue ghost laughed aloud, finding great delight in these howls of pain.

This was no regular pot of oil, but the first layer of hell’s Minor Hell of Oil Pot. If regular people even got a droplet of oil on them, they could die from the pain.

But strangely enough, he did not hear any howls from within the oil pot. He looked down, and his smile froze.

The criminal who raised a fuss in the Office of Reckoning Mirror and publicly insulted the adjudicator was actually… actually doing laps in the pot!?

When Li Qingshan fell into the oil pot, he was filled with a sense of righteousness. He possessed a dauntless spirit, ready to sacrifice himself for the great cause of revolution. However, as the oil bubbled around him, he did not feel any pain at all.

Hmm? Have I grown numb to the pain?

As a result, he just spread his arms and swam a lap in the pot, but sure enough, it still did not hurt. The oily sensation was slightly bothersome, but the warmth and smoothness did bring him some comfort.

As such, he simply swam away, changing through various different forms like the breaststroke, free style, butterfly, and even the doggy paddle.

He left the blue ghost stunned, while the little ghosts around the pot were dumbfounded.

“What’re you standing here for? Get out of the way! Stop blocking my way!”

At this moment, another scarlet ghost arrived from the wall, shoving the blue ghost aside rudely and tossing another person into the oil pot.

Li Qingshan smiled as soon as he saw him. “You’ve come too!”

He happened to be the old man who had come with him. The old man’s expression changed drastically the moment he hit the oil, trembling all over. Seeing Li Qingshan again, he ground his teeth, which twisted his expression. He really was filled with pain and resentment, utterly hating him.

Killing intent roused within him, and the pain immediately worsened. He circulated his powers in a hurry to steady his mind, squeezing out a single sentence from between his teeth. “Y- you’ve screwed me over!”

As it turned out, after judging Li Qingshan, the old man was next. He had prepared a bountiful gift beforehand, such that he did not even have to stand before the Mirror of Retribution.

However, granny Meng was still around. She said after taking a single glance at him, “This one’s broke too!”

He was speechless. How could he tell a furious Ghost Immortal that he had been lying to her earlier?

As a result, he was dragged off before the Mirror of Retribution and shone upon. He was better off not being shone on. The mirror was clouded with black mist, basically without a speck of light at all. Clearly, he was ridden with sins.

He had always been an infamous demonic cultivator in his original world. He loved forging arcane treasures from live souls, and he would not even bat an eye when it came to massacring cities and ending countries. He was called the Soul-taking Old Freak. After ascending to the Human realm, he did dial it back slightly, but he definitely was not a good person.

Adjudicator Lu was in a fit of anger as well, so with a great swing of his brush, he banished him to the tenth layer of hell, even one layer deeper than Li Qingshan. He was troubled, but there was nothing he could say. He had prepared gifts, but he had to keep them to himself now. How could he not hate Li Qingshan given the circumstances he had ended up in?

“Old man, you sure are unreasonable. How have I screwed you over?”

With some further thought, Li Qingshan guessed the approximate reason and laughed. “You sure have been asking for it!” He spread his arms extravagantly and leaned against the side of the oil pot, yelling at the two large ghosts on the walls, “Oi, green and red dumb cunts, what’re you looking at? The oil is too cold!”

The old man turned green. His face twitched.

The two ghosts were taken aback as well, probably because they had never received a request like that before. They yelled furiously at the ghosts near the fire, “Stoke the flames! I want it on full!”

The small ghosts stoked the flames in a hurry, making the oil pot bubble even more vigorously

Li Qingshan still did not feel any pain whatsoever. He looked at the old man who trembled all over with a contorted expression. “Tsk, you’re like a fried donut. Does it really hurt? Surely it’s not all an act!”

“I- I curse you- to a horrible death!”

Li Qingshan laughed aloud. “Aren’t we already suffering from a horrible death?”

The old man was speechless. He loved extracting the souls of enemies for torture, but was there anywhere more torturous than hell?

Even if I butcher this kid right now, I’ll only be liberating him, and adjudicator Lu will definitely direct his anger towards me instead. I’ll be fortunate if he only increases my punishment by then. If he seals up my cultivation as well, I’ll be completely done for!

He gazed at Li Qingshan like he wanted to eat him, yet there happened to be absolutely nothing he could do.

The oil pot became hotter and hotter; the pain grew deeper and deeper.

When he saw how Li Qingshan began whistling away, relaxed like he was taking a bath, the old man immediately felt the pain intensify by several fold. He almost began crying out uncontrollably. He pointed at Li Qingshan and yelled out to the two large ghosts, “This isn’t fair! How come he’s fine!?”

Li Qingshan rested his head against the side of the pot, gazing at the distant, bizarre, deep-blue night sky. “Could you turn up the heat a bit more? Yeah, this is the perfect temperature.” He let out a comfortable moan and sank his head into the oil. He murmured to himself, “Probably because I’m a good person!”

He had once experienced the pain of hell from Gu Yanying, and if he had to be honest, that was extremely unbearable pain, well beyond the limits of what the body could endure.

Logically speaking, now that he had been sent to hell in person, the pain he experienced should have been much deeper, yet he was fine.

From the old man’s response, there was nothing wrong with the pot of oil, so there must have been something wrong with him or the sky above his head.

He recalled the knowledge regarding the six realms of saṃsāra.

As the most critical link in the six realms of saṃsāra, it was possible to say that there was no saṃsāra without hell. The laws of the world here seemed to possess some kind of extremely mysterious characteristic.

Whether it was the Road to the Yellow Springs that led off to countless worlds and countless destinations, the Bridge of Helplessness with a length that was impossible to gauge, or the Tower of Gazing Home that allowed him to see the home of his past life, all of it was unbelievable. Normal logic could not be applied to them.

He had a vague guess, but even he himself was not certain about it. Am I a good person? Yeah, I’m obviously not a bad person, but…

He shut his eyes as if he had fallen asleep.

On the battlefield in the Demon domain, he had led the army, slaughtering countless demonfolk and facing a Demon God alone in the very end.

In the World of the Five Continents, he had spread the knowledge of martial arts, such that there was martial arts for everyone, tearing apart the reign of those sects and clans.

In the World of the Nine Provinces, he had once destroyed the world and saved everyone’s lives.

... am I a good person?

The large, blue ghost rushed back to the Office of Reckoning Mirror. Adjudicator Lu was currently conversing with the three Ghost Immortals. He said with displeasure, “Why have you only returned now? How’s the kid?”

“Sir, the kid- he- he…”

“What’re you stuttering for? Spit it out!”

“Sir, he’s fallen asleep.”

“Fallen asleep!?” Adjudicator Lu doubted his ears. “He’s not pleading for mercy desperately?”

“He hasn’t. H- he doesn’t seem to be in any pain at all.”

“Don’t tell me?” Adjudicator Lu thought of something and gazed at the Mirror of Retribution, as well as the words above, “From the heart”!

Horse-face said sternly, “The kid has got more good than wickedness!”

The Mirror of Retribution was merely a manifestation of the laws of hell, which made it easier for the kings of hell and the adjudicators to make their judgement. However, even if they were not brought before the mirror, there was still a distinction between the good and the wicked.

Ox-headed A’pang suddenly recalled the principles which the Hell realm was founded on a long, long time ago. Appearances arose from the heart, and the mirror was forged from the heart. What went around came around, and good and evil would always be paid off.

His conscience was clear, Heh, how can wretched scoundrels and shameless rascals be chosen by the leader? He felt a little more hope too.

Granny Meng shrieked, “No, we can’t let him go like this!”

“Scoop him out of the oil pot and send him to a deeper hell!” Adjudicator Lu glanced over viciously. “I’ll have him understand what ‘there are no good people before the Mirror of Retribution’ means!”