Calamity, Exploding!

In the 3,721st year of the Destined World.

The Daoist Era had fully formed a stable and mature ecological advancement system.

Over the years, the era had gradually grown more peaceful, yet legends had slowly begun circulating among the common people: the Nether Hometown, and Nether Emissaries who hooked away souls.

Nether Emissaries were mysterious Netherworld lifeforms. Ordinary people could not see them at all. They leaped through the hearts of living beings and walked on the level of the soul.

In secret, they hooked away the souls of Daoists burdened by Karmic Obstruction in their dreams, dragging them into the Nether Hometown.

The Netherworld. Cause and effect brought retribution. Those entangled in Karmic Debt could not die a good death.

The Nether Hometown erased Karmic Debt, slashing karma rather than people, preserving that person's true spirit so they could be reborn.

All sorts of stories gradually spread far and wide across the various regions.

Little by little, the forces of the Nether Hometown seemed to be growing stronger throughout the Nine Provinces, alarming some of the gods enough that they personally descended to the Lower Realm to investigate.

"What Nether Emissaries?"

"There are only two possibilities. Either those suffering commoners have placed their spiritual hopes in a fictitious savior, or those remnants and rebel traitors hiding in the shadows are waiting for their Night Emperor to return and secretly organizing resistance."

"Heh heh, since it's rare for us to descend to the Lower Realm, we might as well take a good stroll around."

The gods paid it no mind.

Only after tracing the matter all the way and hearing some bizarre and terrifying stories did they suddenly feel their hair stand on end.

They saw that some places had enshrined the Great Emperor Zhenwu of the Netherworld. Emperor of