Chapter 197
The staircase, blank just moments ago, was now densely packed with layer upon layer of ghost envoys, completely blocking Jian Yunlan’s path forward. The ghostly aura they emitted turned into something tangible, covering the sky and earth. In an instant, Jian Yunlan was surrounded by eerie winds and flickering green ghost fire. He could no longer even see the stairs beneath him.
Then, the black crack widened further—And an even larger figure emerged.
This figure towered high enough to blot out the sun. Seated upon a throne, wearing an imperial robe adorned with black and gold dragons, he had thick eyebrows and a broad, imposing face.
It was none other than King Yan (Yama) himself!
With his arrival, all ghost envoys and judges fell to their knees and bowed in unison, opening a path.
Even Ma Mian—who had just been acting cocky before Jian Yunlan—now respectfully put away his scythe, bowed low to King Yan, and said:
“Welcome, esteemed superior, to our humble inspection. Please feel free to offer guidance and suggestions to help us improve and develop better!”
King Yan: “…”
He remained silent for a long moment, completely ignoring Ma Mian, and floated forward to face Jian Yunlan.
“Jian Yunlan,” he boomed like thunder. With just two sentences, he pronounced judgment:
“Your death is today. The Book of Life and Death holds two hundred pages filled entirely with your name.”
“Heaven’s decree cannot be defied. Surrender now.”
Although Jian Yunlan had seen Ma Mian before—and even hired Niu Tou as an employee—he had never witnessed a full-scale underworld operation like this.
He stared at the scene, stunned, then quickly caught a flaw in King Yan’s words:
“Two hundred pages? Two hundred full pages?! How’s that possible? Why would the Book of Life and Death have that many entries under my name—do I have two hundred lives or something?”
He raised a perfectly reasonable objection: “That’s gotta be fake!”
King Yan clearly hadn’t expected someone to talk back. He choked mid-sentence, face flushing with anger, and snapped:
“I am upright and just, my word is law, and once spoken cannot be taken back! How dare you, with your petty mortal mind, question the dignity of a king?!”
“Ghost, show him the evidence!”
As soon as the words left his mouth, a gray-white figure emerged from the crowd.
“Ahem.”
A judge with an abnormally long tongue flew up to Jian Yunlan, holding a laptop in his arms. He flipped the screen to face Jian Yunlan, revealing a spreadsheet titled ‘LifeAndDeathRegister.xls’.
“Lord Yama speaks only truth. This is today’s Life and Death Register. Please take a look, dear client…”
The judge moved the touchpad, scrolling downward.
Sure enough, the spreadsheet had a full two hundred pages, and every single row contained just one name: Jian Yunlan.
The Heavenly Dao was clearly in a rush to claim his life.
“Hehehe… You’re really too stubborn,” Ma Mian sneered again, grinning wide in his tailcoat, scythe in hand. He slowly approached Jian Yunlan, eyes sunken and filled with black ghost fire. He murmured:
“If you had obediently forgotten that Taotie, you could’ve lived a long, peaceful life. But you insisted on coming to the Silent Extinction Platform. Every step you take closer adds another entry of your name in the Life and Death Register.”
…So the Heavenly Dao never intended to let Jian Yunlan reach the platform from the very beginning.
“And we…” Ma Mian’s eyes gleamed with hunger as killing intent erupted from his body,
“…now have the right to take your life two hundred times.”
“Last time, we failed because that punk Niu Tou got in the way. But this time, that stupid ox is dead. I, Old Ma, can finally fulfill my wish—to personally send you off to the afterlife!”
As he spoke, the howling winds and wails around them grew darker and more piercing, like the mournful dirge of the underworld itself.
The shadow of the scythe was already reflected in Jian Yunlan’s eyes.
Lord Yama, still seated upon his throne, said nothing—his expression blank—but his gaze was fixed squarely on Jian Yunlan. That stare, from the depths of the underworld, made Jian Yunlan feel as if his entire body had been cemented in place—completely unable to move.
The cold blade pressed against the side of his neck, inching forward…
Suddenly, it was stopped.
Some great force had intercepted the blade—it could no longer move even a hair’s breadth!
Jian Yunlan couldn’t turn his head, but he heard a deep, familiar voice:
“If you want to hurt Mr. Jian, you’ll have to step over my dead body first!”
With those words, a burst of golden light enveloped Jian Yunlan, and the paralyzing force that had held him still began to melt away. He could move again.
He flexed his fingers, then turned to look—
It was Niu Tou, still dressed in simple work clothes. In one hand, he carried a sack of freshly harvested crops; in the other, a hoe. He looked just like a farmer who’d just finished work in the fields. With a sheepish smile, he scratched his head and said:
“Mr. Jian, Old Niu’s here to help! Sorry for being late—I was busy harvesting. Just finished, so I rushed right over!”
A warm surge flowed through Jian Yunlan’s chest. If it weren’t for Niu Tou, he’d probably be dead already.
“Niu Tou… I don’t even know how to thank you…”
Niu Tou grinned: “What’s there to thank? You’re my boss—I can’t just watch you die, can I?”
Seeing Niu Tou suddenly appear, Ma Mian’s eyes widened in disbelief:
“You… YOU?! How are you still alive?!”
He stared at Niu Tou, increasingly shocked and horrified. They had all assumed Niu Tou had been erased from the underworld registry—completely annihilated.
Yet here he was—not only alive, but glowing with a stronger spiritual energy than ever before?
It was as if the final seal had been broken. His spiritual energy had ascended to an entirely new level, even able to break free from Lord Yama’s paralysis spell.
Even King Yan narrowed his eyes sharply:
“Niu Tou. You deserted your post—yet you still dare to return?!”
As he spoke, he flicked his fingers. A copper mirror descended from the sky, pressing down directly toward Jian Yunlan and Niu Tou, trying to trap them inside it.
All the other ghost envoys, the Black and White Impermanence, and the judges began scolding too:
“Exactly! A deserter! How dare he come back?”
“Can you even face your excellent boss and coworkers?”
“Lord Yama was so good to you—didn’t your career, pay, and benefits here beat working at some mortal food stall?”
At this, Niu Tou suddenly let out a cold laugh: “Career, benefits, pay? Really?”
He turned his head toward the Black and White Impermanence, eyes sharp with clarity:
“You two have worked as soul collectors for ten thousand years. Didn’t Lord Yama promise you promotions and permanent status within a thousand? Has that ever happened?”
“And look at you now—still running errands like temporary workers every day!”
White Impermanence’s face darkened. Black Impermanence’s face turned pale.
The two ghosts’ lips trembled, unable to come up with a rebuttal.
“……”
Niu Tou turned to Ma Mian, his voice calm but laced with clarity, as if he’d seen right through everything:
“And you, Ma Mian, my old colleague. No weekends, no holidays, always on call 24/7. You once applied for a single day off to celebrate your kid’s birthday—and Lord Yama made you make up for it by working a hundred thousand extra days! Not to mention that besides soul-hunting, all the dirty, exhausting, and thankless jobs are dumped on you!”
Ma Mian’s eyes widened. His eyes reddened.
“……”
But Niu Tou didn’t let up—his moral momentum now fully charged. He turned to the judges and ghost officers around him. Once the quiet and honest type, now he was a verbal machine gun, spitting truth with unwavering passion:
“And you all—ghost officers, judges of the Ten Courts—you work tirelessly day and night, yet your annual salary is just two strings of ghost currency! One mistake—like catching the wrong soul, arriving late, or letting a spirit escape—and they dock your pay to zero. In serious cases, you’re tossed into the boiling oil pit as punishment!
“Even if you work hard for thousands of years, you still can’t afford a house—you live in mass graves! Forget fresh offerings like fruits and vegetables. You’re stuck sniffing at the incense leftovers of others!”
The crowd of ghost officials heard this—and their eyes instantly turned vacant. Their souls seemed to wither.
“……”
As Niu Tou’s tirade echoed through the underworld, the morale of the entire underworld staff crumbled. Even Lord Yama couldn’t stay calm anymore. He snapped, his composed voice rising with sarcastic edge:
“Niu Tou! What’s the point of saying all this now? Every company in this industry is the same—these are the rules! What I offer is already considered good! If you think the pay isn’t enough, maybe you should reflect on whether you’re working hard enough! Not working overtime enough?!”
“And you dare brag about that mortal street-food stall job? You think that can compare to what I offer?!”
Now that hit a nerve.
Niu Tou puffed out his chest proudly and began counting on his fingers:
“Mr. Jian pays me thirty thousand a month, covers food and lodging, full benefits and insurance. Vacation? Just ask, always approved. No fixed hours—completely flexible. Whatever crops I grow, I get to keep almost all of it. Boss Jian just takes a small share.
“The business may be small, but it’s stable. No frequent staffing changes, no endless rules, no office politics…After just a few months, I already saved enough for a down payment on a house!”
With each word he spoke, the eyes of Black Impermanence, White Impermanence, Ma Mian, the judges, and the ghost officers grew wider.
By the time Niu Tou finished, the eyes of every ghost were bloodshot.
They stared at Niu Tou in disbelief, then at Jian Yunlan:
“No way. That can’t be real.”
“This sounds like a sci-fi movie. I don’t buy it.”
“W-wait… this sounds ghost-centered. I’m interested.”
“Wait… Is there really a job this good…?”
“Have we… have we been getting scammed by Lord Yama all these years?!”
Someone muttered that last line.
And like enlightenment from the heavens, the realization swept through the crowd.
Tens of thousands of eyes locked onto the throne where Lord Yama sat.
They said nothing, but their expressions spoke louder than words.
Yama felt a chill down his spine under their gaze. His back stiffened, cold sweat dripping down his forehead. In a flash of fury, he lashed his whip:
“You nobodies, stray ghosts—how dare you glare at me?! What do you think you are? Go capture that traitor Niu Tou and that mortal Jian Yunlan right now, or I’ll toss the lot of you into the oil cauldron!”
At first, the ghosts had only wanted an explanation.
But as soon as Yama said that—something inside them snapped.
All those years of pent-up resentment, bitterness, and frustration—burst like a dam.
So that’s it. He knows he’s been exploiting us—and he still doesn’t care!
At that moment, Niu Tou raised his hoe high above his head and shouted the words that echoed in every ghost’s heart:
“Ghosts of the underworld—unite! Overthrow the feudal capitalist Yama who exploits our souls, and build a new, fair, and free order in the afterlife!”
—“Abolish underworld bureaucracy!”
—“End the 996 ghost-hunting system!!”
—“Grant freedom of reincarnation!!!”
Ma Mian, Hei Wuchang, Bai Wuchang, the judges, and all the ghost officers—more and more spirits gathered together and shouted in unison.
Each grabbed whatever weapon they had, rising like a tidal wave—
—charging straight toward the highest throne where Lord Yama sat!
