I subdue demons and monsters, and cultivate immortality in hell to become a saint.

Upon reaching the Bridge of Helplessness, everyone was once again awestruck.

"That Meng Po is actually a reclusive powerhouse!"

Feng Xuanzi lowered his voice, his eyes solemn. Ordinary people could not see anything unusual, but these cultivators could clearly sense that Meng Po's body was like a magnet, continuously absorbing the yin energy between heaven and earth.

Zhihong gave a bitter laugh, filled with regret: "The underworld is indeed full of hidden talents; we were actually foolish enough to try and outmaneuver the City God's Palace..."

Previously, they had questioned the existence of the underworld, but now they have no doubts whatsoever.

"Let's go!"

The Black and White Impermanence gave a cold shout.

Everyone was secretly worried. If the Black and White Impermanence forced them to drink Meng Po soup, they would definitely refuse!

Forgetting the past is equivalent to forgetting spiritual practice. For them, being unable to practice is more painful than their soul being scattered.

The Black and White Impermanence showed no mercy, kicking them hard onto the Bridge of Helplessness.

They were walking on the most dangerous and least treacherous path of the Bridge of Helplessness.

The bottom of the Naihe Bridge is a treacherous place, as narrow as a single log, clinging tightly to the surging Wangchuan River.

Thousands of dead souls surged wildly in the river, their eyes gleaming with twisted ferocity, and their throats bursting with excited roars.

"Get down! Get down right now!"

The roar reverberated through the netherworld, its chilling and malevolent aura penetrating to the very marrow of one's bones, causing one's courage to tremble and one's soul to flee.

"How did we get banished to this lowest rung of society!"

"Oh no! If I fall into the River of Oblivion, I will never be able to be reborn!"

"Quick! Cross the river quickly!"

Everyone was terrified, their faces ashen, their eyes filled with utter fear.

The blood-yellow waters of the River of Oblivion instantly became the most terrifying nightmare of their lives.

Even though they had cultivated for many years, they were in a panic at this moment. One of them staggered and was immediately seized by the ghosts in the river, who pulled him into the water.

"Ah! Help me!"

He fell into the water without making a ripple, and thousands of souls swarmed up, letting out greedy and piercing howls.

Seeing this horrific scene, everyone felt their scalp tingle and their souls nearly leave their bodies.

"How could this be! How could this happen!"

Zhihong felt a chill run through his body; he never imagined that his trip to the underworld would be so dangerous.

The Black and White Impermanence had already crossed the bridge and stood on the opposite bank, coldly watching them. They didn't say much even though one of them was missing, but just gave a sinister smile and sternly urged them to hurry on their way.

Finally, the group arrived in Fengdu.

Gazing at this colossal city that resembled a ghostly realm, everyone couldn't help but feel a sense of awe.

This city is a masterpiece of nature; it could not have been built without the immense power of heaven and earth!

"Go in."

The Black and White Impermanence escorted them straight into the Judge's Hall...

Having endured considerable fright along the way, the group hurriedly knelt and kowtowed upon entering the hall.

When one bows down, one sees only the judge sitting high on the cloud platform, but not the legendary Ten Kings of Hell.

They secretly thought to themselves that it must be because of their lowly status that they were unworthy of being seen by the King of Hell.

"The person below is Feng Xuanzi..."

"The person below is Zhihong..."

"The person below is Zhi Chen..."

The official in charge of the procuratorial office sat high in the hall and loudly read aloud their numerous crimes.

The more they listened, the heavier their hearts sank, a chill ran through them, and they knew that things were going terribly wrong.

After reading out the charges, Judge Zhong Jiu swept his gaze across the crowd and coldly pronounced his verdict.

"Stripped of their celestial status, their entire cultivation destroyed, and cast into the Scissors Hell to suffer the unending torment of having their ten fingers severed!"

Upon hearing this, everyone was utterly shocked.

"Your Honor, we are members of the Daoist sect! How dare you treat me like this!"

As soon as he finished speaking, all the Yin spirits in the hall burst into laughter, their laughter filled with contempt and disdain.

Zhong Jiu chuckled lightly, then spoke sharply: "Well said! As a member of the Daoist sect, you should know the Heavenly Rules and Precepts. Now you knowingly break the law, your crime is compounded, and your sentence will be extended by another thousand years!"

"After serving your two-thousand-year sentence, you will be reborn as an animal!"

"Are you all satisfied with this verdict?"

Upon hearing the final result, Feng Xuanzi and the other members of the Daoist sect turned pale, and despair instantly welled up in their eyes.

"Your Honor, we are not satisfied! We are not satisfied!"

This ending was completely different from what they had imagined!

The legends of the underworld are true, but why do they completely contradict what they know?

The promised preferential treatment for Taoist practitioners has vanished without a trace!

They had already prepared for the worst, but they never expected the outcome to be so disastrous!

Two thousand years of torment in hell, every second was excruciating pain, two thousand years of endless torture!

There is absolutely no future to speak of.

Two thousand years later, in the cycle of reincarnation, he will be reborn as an animal!

From a high-ranking cultivator to a beast in a single day, the difference is so great that it can be described as heaven and earth!

"I refuse to accept this!"

Zhong Jiu suddenly flew into a rage, his overwhelming majesty sweeping across the entire Judge's Hall, making everyone breathless.

All the spirits in the hall sat upright and solemnly.

Those Taoist practitioners instantly fell silent, trembling as if they had incurred the wrath of the heavens.

"You are utterly lawless! As members of the orthodox Xuanmen sect, you do not benefit the common people, nor do you respect heaven and earth or the gods. You stood idly by when ghostly calamities raged, and now that spiritual energy has revived, you indiscriminately slaughter the innocent and poison living beings, even daring to invade the City God's Palace of Xingsha!"

"Your secret instigation, leading five armies to wreak havoc on the world, is an evil deed too numerous to recount!"

Now that you're in my hands, how dare you still complain?

Zhong Jiu pointed angrily at them and shouted sternly:

"Before being subjected to the Scissors Hell, first be thrown into the Tongue-Pulling Hell to suffer the agony of having your tongues pulled out, so that you may know the price of speaking nonsense!"

As soon as he finished speaking, the two underworld messengers attacked fiercely, wielding iron spikes that pierced their backs, instantly crippling their cultivation.

Then, like dragging a dead dog, they were forcibly pulled out of the hall.

"So, you all disagree?"

Zhong Jiu's cold gaze swept over the monks, his chill penetrating to the bone.

Having learned from past mistakes, the monks, including Zhihong, dared not say another word.

Zhihong was terrified, but he forced himself to remain calm and first bowed his head in submission:

"I dare not disobey the judge's order."

First, go along with their wishes, then seek a way to survive.

"Before I am punished, I have a request. As Buddhist disciples, we should first pay homage to Ksitigarbha Bodhisattva upon entering the underworld, as this is in accordance with Buddhist etiquette. I humbly request Your Honor to be lenient and allow us to pay homage to the Bodhisattva before we are punished."

He dared not ask for leniency; he only wanted to take the opportunity of worshipping the Bodhisattva to kneel down and plead, hoping that if he could see the Bodhisattva, things might turn around.

But Zhong Jiu saw right through his little scheme, and all he got in return was a cold sneer.

"You wish to see Ksitigarbha Bodhisattva? I have no objection, in principle."

Zhihong felt a sense of relief and was about to rejoice when he heard Zhong Jiu's next words, which made him feel as if he had fallen into an ice cave.

"However, there is no Ksitigarbha Bodhisattva in this underworld. Where will you go to see him?"

What?

Zhihong's pupils shrank suddenly, his face filled with disbelief.

"How is this possible?"

As everyone knows, Ksitigarbha Bodhisattva sits in the underworld and made the great vow, "I will not become a Buddha until the hells are emptied," making his status far superior to that of Yama, the King of Hell!

"Whether you believe it or not, there is no Ksitigarbha Bodhisattva in the underworld."

"It will not exist today, nor tomorrow, nor for all eternity to come!"

"A group of silver-tongued charlatans will also be cast into the Hell of Tongue-Pulling, to keep company with the treacherous Taoist sects!"

Zhong Jiu's tone was icy cold, showing no mercy whatsoever.

The underworld he created is supreme under his rule; how could he allow anyone else to ride roughshod over him!

As a judge, Chung Kau doesn't need to do everything himself except for major matters. If he did everything himself, wouldn't his subordinates, including his assistants, become mere decorations?

After arranging the operation of the underworld, he devoted his spare time to studying the "Yin Fu Li Jing" given to him by Bai Qi.

This "Yin Fu Li Jing" is divided into two parts. The first part is a military strategy and tactics used exclusively by immortals and gods, and is by no means a trivial skill for human warfare. The marching incantations and battle formation diagrams in it can make people's spines go cold just by reading the words.

The lower part contains actual cultivation techniques.

The killing formation was originally a closely guarded secret, but Zhong Jiu trusted Bai Qi and knew that he commanded the Yin Si army. Since he himself would not have many opportunities to personally go to the battlefield, he simply passed on the entire military strategy to Bai Qi.

As for cultivation techniques, although Zhong Jiu was already a top expert in the God King realm, he had never seriously practiced a systematic cultivation technique.

Only after trying it did I realize its profound mystery. My cultivation level soared from the first level, the second level, the third level... all the way up to the seventh level!

The Yin Fu Li Jing has thirteen levels. He was able to advance unstoppably all the way through it, simply because he already possessed a powerful divine king-level power within his body. He only needed to convert it into the power corresponding to the cultivation technique.

The essence of this technique lies in the seventh level: the ability to condense one's divine power into a talisman.

Talismans are divided into three grades: superior, middle, and inferior. The highest grade is extremely rare, but Zhong Jiu is an exception.

The talisman he condensed was black and white, shaped like a yin-yang symbol. Divine power was in the black, and immortal power was in the white. The cultivation of the divine path and the human path were strangely merged into one.

Zhong Jiu's heart skipped a beat; the power of this talisman was probably enough to destroy the heavens and the earth!

What's even better is that once you reach the seventh level, there's no need for meditation and arduous cultivation anymore. The Yin Talisman will operate on its own, continuously absorbing the free energy between heaven and earth, making it even more heaven-defying than the so-called Mysterious Yin Body.

His cultivation level also broke through, reaching the mid-stage of the God King Realm and the mid-stage of the Profound Immortal Realm!

Having experienced the thrill of a sudden surge in cultivation, Zhong Jiu returned to the Judge's Hall and immediately established three rules, categorizing the wandering spirits into three tiers based on their crimes.

The third category consists of those whose merits and demerits offset each other and whose crimes are not serious. These are handled by ordinary officials, referring to the regulations of the underworld and Zhong Jiu's previous judgments, without much effort.

The second category consists of wicked and evil people, who will undoubtedly be sentenced, but the sentencing must be carefully considered. They should not be lenient or harsh, unless they are like Feng Xuanzi, who dare to use clever words to argue, roar in court, and disrespect the gods. In that case, don't blame him for increasing the punishment!

Such spirits require at least one high-ranking official to conduct a joint trial and determine the outcome based on the majority opinion;

As for the first tier, they are all heinous criminals, whose crimes are too numerous to count, or cultivators like Feng Xuanzi, all of whom will be judged by Zhong Jiu personally!