The Divine Prison's Eighth Level, 50 Years of Executions
Chen Du has now joined the Divine Prison Bureau, his token has been changed to dark gold, and his daily patrol route has been extended from the first floor to the eighth floor.
But he still made it a habit to walk around the first three floors first, to see if the young prison guards were slacking off, and to see if the prisoners in the cells were behaving strangely.
On this day, as usual, he walked through the first corridor, and the newly arrived prisoners in the cells rushed to the bars.
"Injustice! We are innocent!" An elderly man with gray hair gripped the iron bars, his voice hoarse. "I have followed the Prime Minister for thirty years and have never done anything wrong! The Prime Minister is a loyal minister! He has devoted his entire life to the court, yet he was ultimately killed by that traitor Jing Prince! Our loyalty to the Prime Minister is our loyalty to the Heavenly Dragon Divine Dynasty! What crime have we committed?"
A middle-aged man in the next cell chimed in, "That's right! The Prime Minister was framed! Jing Prince is the real traitor! He usurped the throne, persecuted loyal officials, and we refuse to accept this! Your Divine Prison doesn't distinguish right from wrong, locking us all up—you're accomplices too!"
Chen Du did not stop, but slowly walked past their prison.
These people are right.
Although Wei Changgeng was power-hungry, greedy for wealth, and purged his political opponents when he was in control of the court, he was truly loyal to the Heavenly Dragon Divine Dynasty.
He killed the old emperor because the old emperor wanted to kill him.
He supported the young emperor because he wanted to continue being a powerful minister, not because he wanted to sit on the throne himself.
He was loyal to the Heavenly Dragon Divine Dynasty, ruled by the Zhao Clan Imperial Family.
But what Jing Prince wanted was not loyal ministers; he wanted absolute obedience.
Wei Changgeng's former subordinates were all potential threats to him. Therefore, they were all brought in on the charge of "colluding with the rebels."
Whether a loyal minister or a treacherous minister, it's just a matter of changing the master, and thus the terminology changes.
Chen Du continued walking forward; he had been in this Divine Prison for decades.
Some of the young prison guards who entered with him back then have already died.
Some died in prisoner riots, some died in accidents on patrol routes, and others, like Old Zhou, were worn down by the yin energy and evil aura of the Divine Prison and died silently in the stone house.
The Divine Prison is a cold, damp, and malevolent place. One can endure it for ten or twenty years, but for several decades, even cultivators at the Fourth Realm or fifth realm cannot withstand it.
Of those young prison guards, only a few are still alive today.
He walked to the end of the first floor and glanced back at the long corridor.
The oil lamp still flickers, and water droplets still seep from the stone wall, but most of the familiar faces from back then have changed.
He didn't linger; today was the first time he had officially entered the eighth floor.
The stone door slowly opened before us, and a deep, almost stagnant aura rushed out.
The stone walls of the eighth level are older than all the levels above, the array patterns are denser, and the phosphorescent light is dimmer.
There weren't many cells here, and each one was far apart, separated by thick stone walls.
The prisoners held on the eighth floor are all at the Tenth Realm Middle Stage, and some have even reached the threshold of the Peak Stage of the Tenth Realm.
Chen Du walked down the corridor on the eighth floor, he could feel the heavy atmosphere emanating from the cells, like sleeping giants, quiet yet making one dare not be careless.
He walked to a secluded cave, sat cross-legged, placed his palms against the stone wall, and activated [Become a Saint on the Spot].
The Dao Resonance emanated from the depths of the stone wall, several times more concentrated than that of the fifth level.
Then, by further activating the [The World as a Book], the Dao Resonance surge, intertwine, and coalesce.
A moment later, the five volumes of cultivation techniques simultaneously took shape in his sea of consciousness... five Lower First-Level Laws.
Moreover, these five laws are actually matched with the Netherworld Prison Soul Devouring Spirit Suppression and Calamity Light that he had previously obtained.
[Volume 1, * The Nine Abysses Soul-Drowning Scripture *, Tenth Tier. Contains the Lower First-Level Law "Nine Abysses Soul-Drowning". It uses the power of the Nine Abyss to drag the enemy's soul into an endless abyss, condemning them to eternal damnation, never to escape.]
[Volume Two, * The Great Annihilation Scripture *. Tenth Tier. Contains the Lower First-Level Law "Great Annihilation." It erases all traces of existence with the power of extinction; those affected dissipate their souls, their bodies turn to ash, and they cannot even enter the cycle of reincarnation.]
[Volume 3, * The Yanfutu Record *. Tenth Tier. Contains the Lower First-Level Law "Yanfutu," using the power of Jambudvipa to annihilate the foundation of the enemy's laws; with a single annihilation, all laws wither and decay.]
[Volume 4, * The Thought-Cutting Spirit-Slaying Scripture *. Tenth Tier. Contains the Lower First-Level Law "Thought-Cutting Spirit-Slaying." It uses the power of severing thoughts to cut off the enemy's spiritual attachments, causing their soul to dissipate and their intelligence to be completely destroyed.]
[Volume 5, *The Eternal Night Sky-Burial Scripture *. Tenth Tier. Contains the Lower First-Level Law "Eternal Night Sky-Burial." It uses the power of Eternal Night to bury all light and life; wherever it passes, all things return to death and silence.]
Chen Du read it word by word, his heart surging with an indescribable tremor.
The five Lower First-Level Laws, along with the previous Netherworld Prison Soul Devouring Spirit Suppression and Calamity Light, form a complete system by connecting the seven laws.
The five newly acquired laws— Nine Abysses Soul-Drowning, Great Annihilation, Yanfutu, Thought-Cutting Spirit-Slaying, Eternal Night Sky-Burial —are complementary to the previous two, like seven branches growing from the same tree, connected by roots and originating from the same source.
He absorbed the five volumes of cultivation techniques one by one into the depths of his mind and slowly exhaled.
The eighth floor is indeed extraordinary.
With the Five Laws at his fingertips, his law system expanded once again.
The path to the Eleventh Realm is drawing ever closer.
Time flies, and years pass quickly.
Fifty years have passed in the blink of an eye.
Chen Du's temples were already completely white, his back was bent even more deeply, and even his walking had begun to be somewhat unsteady.
In the eyes of his colleagues in the Divine Prison Bureau, he was an old prison guard who had spent most of his life working hard, barely reaching the Sixth Realm cultivation, and was only exceptionally recruited into the Divine Prison Bureau in his old age.
No one gave him a second glance, and no one asked him a single question.
He was like an old brick in this Divine Prison, quiet and inconspicuous, yet omnipresent.
In those fifty years, he handled more executions than in the previous decades combined.
The Divine Prison Bureau Division has always been understaffed. The young prison guards are timid and dare not face high-ranking prisoners, so the execution work usually falls to them.
The Seventh Realms killed nearly 30,000.
The Eighth Realms killed over eight thousand.
The Ninth Realm killed over eight hundred, and the Tenth Realm killed over one hundred.
Before each execution, he would secretly sense whether the Heaven's Way of Righteousness or Heaven's Way of Evil.
The Seventh Realm lasts about a hundred years, the Eighth Realm about three hundred, the Ninth Realm about six or seven hundred years, and the Tenth Realm about two or three thousand.
Over the past fifty years, the newly accumulated White Qi has just exceeded ten million years, while the Black Qi has accumulated for a little over a million years.
He calculated the total, and adding the previous accumulation, the White Qi had been there for over ten million years, and the Black Qi for over a million years.
This is a fortune that would leave any cultivator speechless, a fortune accumulated over millions of years of White Qi and millions of years of Black Qi.
He sealed this fortune deep within his consciousness, leaving it untouched for the time being.
He's waiting for the right time to truly need him.
During this period, he patrolled during the day and cultivated at night.
He gradually extracted the Dao Resonance from the eighth level, and successively condensed several Tenth Tier cultivation techniques. Each technique contained a Lower First-Level Law, which corroborated the previous seven laws, allowing him to comprehend them one by one.
His current system of laws has become so substantial that even he himself finds it difficult to estimate its extent.
His cultivation level has also steadily remained at the Peak Stage of the Tenth Realm, just one step away from the Eleventh Realm.
The Eleventh Realm, the Martial Arts Master Realm, requires comprehending Medium Core Level Nine Law.
He had a vague feeling that the threshold was just ahead. It was just waiting for the right opportunity.
He slowly exhaled and walked towards the stone house.
The faint sounds of young prison guards chatting and laughing could be heard in the corridor.
The weather outside was still changing, but he just kept going his own way.