Yama Rising

According to what Tezcatlipoca had said earlier, this place was once under the Plumed Serpent God's jurisdiction, but it had been taken over by another death god.

Perhaps this unknown death god was related to the three Caribbean death gods and the grand script of death from 10 years ago.

Furthermore, the grand script of death had something to do with the black box.

In that case, why had the Plumed Serpent God led them to this place?

This wasn't the time to be thinking about that. Prior to making sufficient preparations, Qin Ye wasn't even going to think about opening the black box.

He was already galloping along as fast as he could, and if it weren't for the flight restriction here, he would've already taken to the sky. However, the enormous suction force coming from behind them prevented him from reaching top speed.

All of a sudden, Woody's feeble voice rang out from behind him. "We... We can't hold on for much longer..."

Qin Ye didn't even have to look back as he could assess the situation with his consciousness alone.

He was frantically charging ahead, while the black hole behind them was pulling in the opposite direction with all its might. Tezcatlipoca was fine, but the three humans were clearly struggling. Their blood had already seeped through the pores of their skin in the form of crimson beads before being sucked away by the immense suction force, and their souls were also flickering unsteadily.

His eyes narrowed slightly, and in the next instant, he suddenly released the Soul Shackle around their waists, upon which the three of them were instantly sucked into the distance amid anguished wails.

Having shed those dead weights, they were finally able to accelerate, and Tezcatlipoca drew closer to Qin Ye as he said, "I thought you would've protected them at all costs."

Qin Ye took an indifferent glance at him. "I never disregard human lives."

Before Tezcatlipoca had a chance to say anything, he explained, "The Plumed Serpent God said that five people are required to open the treasure vault, so I'm very curious to see whether those three will be able to survive even if I abandon them."

The Plumed Serpent God had woven this elaborate plot to lure them onto this island, there was no way that he would accept a failure to open the treasure vault.

Without those three dead weights slowing them down, the two of them instantly accelerated drastically, flying over the ground as a pair of dark shadows, and in less than two minutes, they had already arrived by the shore.

As soon as they arrived, Tezcatlipoca's pupils contracted slightly as he asked, "Is there someone on the ship?"

Their ship was over a kilometer away!

"No, the island is sinking," Qin Ye said as he looked down with a grim expression.

"Damn it..." Tezcatlipoca gritted his teeth as he transformed into a gust of Yin wind to fly toward the ship, yet right as he was about to step onto the surface of the sea, Qin Ye stopped him cold in his tracks.

Before he had a chance to say anything, Qin Ye shook his head before pointing down at the sea. Tezcatlipoca was rather perplexed, but he also looked down at the sea below, upon which his pupils instantly contracted drastically.

Even though the seawater had been extremely dark, it was still able to reflect the sky like a mirror.

However, there weren't any reflections on the surface of the surrounding sea at this moment, and it was also rippling in an extremely irregular fashion.

Normally, waves on the sea rose up one after another, but that wasn't the case here. Instead, every single square meter of the sea was writhing and churning violently.

Those weren't waves. Instead, it was as if a layer of skin had settled over the entire sea, and countless worms were writhing beneath the skin in an attempt to break out.

The sea was no longer the sea...

Beneath the surface, millions of unknown creatures had gathered!

Their physical appearance was virtually no different from seawater, and when tightly bunched together like this, it was impossible to see what they were. However, all of them had bright, crimson eyes, and it was as if there were countless piranhas lurking beneath the surface.

"My Yin energy is unable to penetrate through them," Qin Ye said with tightly gritted teeth. "They're capable of devouring Yin energy!"

"Shit!" Tezcatlipoca cursed under his breath. If there were only one or two of them, then they would be entirely consequential, but there were far too many of them gathered here!

In addition to the flight restriction, these accursed things really could wear them down until they died here!

What could they do?

The two of them exchanged a glance before immediately turning around to rush back toward the center of the island without any hesitation.

In the instant that they did so, both of them were stunned by what they saw.

It had only taken them two minutes to reach the shore, yet during this time, the island had undergone a complete transformation.

Its gentle exterior had been removed, revealing its true, sinister appearance. The entire island was covered in bones, piling up a total of three layers.

Every single layer consisted completely of bones, and it resembled a bone lotus flower that was over 30 meters tall blooming on the sea. It was several hundred kilometers in size, and Yin energy was permeating over its entire surface. This was a scene that one would only see in movies.

It was a silent invitation, one that said: "Welcome to my hell!"

"Fine, we'll just have to accept the invitation then!" Qin Ye said with a cold smile as he rushed directly toward the center of the island as a gust of Yin wind, followed closely by Tezcatlipoca.

They were a pair of Yama-Kings, what did they have to be afraid of?

They were traveling extremely quickly, and even though they couldn't fly, they were still able to levitate slightly. The terrifying suction force coming from the center of the island didn't affect them in the slightest, and they sliced through the fierce wind like a pair of sharp swords. As they traveled toward the center of the island, the rate at which the island was sinking became noticeably faster!

10 minutes later, they had already arrived at the center of the island, and at this moment, the seawater had already submerged the second layer of the skeletal lotus flower.

All of a sudden, they seemed to have passed through some type of barrier, and the sound of the howling wind around them instantly subsided. At the same time, a skeletal plaza that was around a kilometer in size had appeared before them.

The skeletons were quite chaotic, but there was a strange type of order to the chaos, and Tezcatlipoca immediately drew a sharp breath upon seeing this. "This is the Aztec genealogy!"

"What does that mean?"

Tezcatlipoca didn't seem to have heard Qin Ye as he cast a stunned gaze toward the left. "On the left is the hummingbird, while at the center..."

He and Qin Ye cast their eyes toward the center of the platform, where four pillars were standing on a pair of diagrams arranged out of skeletons.

They were diagrams of Mictlantecutli and Mictetikasiwa!

Tezcatlipoca's mouth gaped wide open as he shook his own head in disbelief. "When combined, they are known as the world's gate!"

The world's gate?!

Qin Ye turned to Tezcatlipoca with a stunned expression and asked, "Are you sure that's what it's called?"

"I'm certain of it!" Tezcatlipoca confirmed. "Our parent god told me about this once upon a time, before I slew Cipactli. That was also the only time that he told me about this. He said to never open the world's gate, and he even showed me the diagram of the world's gate. In the next few thousand years after that, I never saw this diagram, and I thought it was only a myth, but now..."

Qin Ye pursed his lips as his mind began to race rapidly.

This was the place where Tezcatlipoca had slain Cipactli, yet this was also the place where the world's gate was situated.

Could it be that there were two world's gates in this world? If that were the case, then why hadn't the second King Yanluo said anything about this? Was he of the opinion that Qin Ye would never come here?

In contrast with that theory, Qin Ye was leaning more toward the possibility that even the second King Yanluo didn't know about this. Qin Ye had some theories about what lied beyond the world's gate, and if this place really was another world's gate, then it would definitely be heavily guarded.

Furthermore, during the new continent's heyday, Mictlantecutli and Mictetikasiwa were at the height of their powers, ruling over around a dozen religions of the new continent and devouring several smaller religions, such as the Mayans and the Incas. Thus, they had the chance to become the fifth pillar, and Tezcatlipoca had said that the four pillars had just about agreed to this. Under those circumstances, their priority would've been to share the responsibility of guarding the world's gate. Thus, it was a surprise that there was a world's gate here, but it did make sense.

He cast his gaze toward the world's gate to find that Woody's trio was situated at the foot of three pillars, but they were already dead.

There were no injuries on their bodies, but their soulfire had lit three soul lamps at the top of the stone pillars.

The sound of the crashing waves was becoming louder and louder, and Qin Ye cast his gaze toward Tezcatlipoca, who was also looking at him.

Tezcatlipoca knew what Qin Ye's intentions were. He was the one who was going to light the final lamp.

Tezcatlipoca gritted his teeth and said, "Yanluo Qin, don't forget that the underworlds that have survived to this point are the cream of the crop. However, that doesn't mean that these were the only underworlds to ever exist in the very beginning."

He seemed to be unable to hear the approaching waves as he continued, "There were once hundreds of underworlds, all of which had their own religions. Many evil gods had emerged among them, such as the Aegyptian god of the desert, Seth, and the mother of the sea of the Carthage Underworld, which has already fallen. These are only two examples out of many, and..."

Before he had a chance to finish, Fate had already slipped out of Qin Ye's sleeve, and it had opened up like a lotus flower with its sharp tip aimed directly at his throat.

"I think you're a smart man, so I don't want to waste too much time with words," Qin Ye said. "I don't want to have to face those monsters in the sea. There are no records of those things that I'm aware of, and we know nothing about them. In contrast, regardless of what we'll have to face here, it'll only be a death god, which is something that I do know about."

Tezcatlipoca didn't say anything.

It was clear that this was a sacrifice, and he was very reluctant to offer himself as tribute.

Right at this moment, a massive wave crashed into the island, and only the top layer of the skeletal lotus flower was still above the surface of the sea. From where they were standing, they could even see the crashing waves about to creep over the edge of the third layer.

At this point, Fate had completely opened up, and Qin Ye said in a cold voice, "Either open the gate on your own, or I'll kill you and use your body to open it! I'm sure you know what the best option is for you!"

Tezcatlipoca's face was twisted with fury as he said through gritted teeth, "I am a death god..."

Whoosh!

A shackle wound itself around his neck and pushed him over to one of the stone pillars. At this point, the seawater was already beginning to submerge the third layer of the skeletal lotus flower, and Qin Ye's eyes were slightly bloodshot as he threatened, "I'm the ruler of the Cathayan Underworld! No one is going to say anything even if I kill a past death god like you!"

"Shit!" Tezcatlipoca cursed loudly before pressing his palms toward the clear handprint indentation on the stone pillar.

Boom!

His Yin energy erupted forth, instantly rising to the top along the ancient stone pillar, lighting up a white soul lamp there. At the same time, Qin Ye was already standing at the center of the four pillars.

In the instant that the soul lamp was lit, the four stone pillars suddenly shuddered slightly, following which four beams of sunlight erupted into the sky. The sunlight then formed a vast pillar of light that completely encompassed Qin Ye within it.

Four stone pillars to represent four suns, eh?

Everything in front of Qin Ye's eyes was rapidly changing, and he was struck by a familiar rush of dizziness, causing him to involuntarily close his eyes.

After an indeterminate period of time, he finally reopened his eyes, and he was greeted by the sight of a sea of golden radiance.