The Twelfth Earthly Branches Return (Two)

  When it comes to the Blood Sea of Youming, it has a great origin. After Pangu's death, his body turned into the world: his breath became the wind and clouds, his voice became thunder, his sweat became rain and dew, his left eye became the sun, his right eye became the moon, his hair became the stars, his blood became rivers, his teeth became gold and stone, and his essence became pearls and jade. However, his belly transformed into a vast Blood Sea, with an area of unknown billions of miles. Inside, the bloody waves surged, fish and shrimp did not thrive, birds and insects did not arrive, and all the evil energy in the world gathered here. The people of Honghuang called this place the Blood Sea of Youming.

  The Blood Sea of the Netherworld was formed after Pangu opened up the heavens and earth, absorbing the most turbid and poisonous killing energy and netherworldly death energy between the heavens and earth. Regardless of whether it's a human, immortal, ghost, shaman, or demon that falls into it, they will all have their primordial spirit polluted and their physical body damaged, suffering an unparalleled torment. However, this creation is mysteriously extraordinary, as within this Blood Sea of the Netherworld, a great deity was born, named: Ancestor of the River of the Underworld.

  This person was born with two innate spiritual treasures, one of which is the 'Twelve Product Industry Fire Red Lotus', transformed from the 'Primordial Chaos Blue Lotus'. When activated, it has a blood lotus protecting its body, and even an innate spiritual treasure would find it difficult to break through its defense. The other is a pair of treasure swords named 'Yuantu' and 'Abi', which are a pair of innate spiritual treasures and instruments of slaughter, killing people without leaving any karma. Their quality is the same as that of the Exterminating Immortal Swords, but they do not have corresponding array diagrams, so they are much inferior to the Exterminating Immortal Swords.

  After Minghe Laozu was born from the Blood Sea, he once listened to Daozu Hongjun's lecture in the Purple Mansion. At that time, Minghe's cultivation was still low, and seeing the many powerful experts in the Purple Mansion, Minghe Laozu felt that his own cultivation was not as strong as the others, so he always acted very low-key. Every time he listened to the lecture, he would hurry back and forth between the Blood Sea and the Purple Mansion, without chatting or socializing with others, nor arguing with them, but only focusing on learning Daozu Hongjun's creation of the Great Way, in order to attain enlightenment and become a saint.

  Minghe Old Ancestor was also a great figure in the Primordial Era, with his cultivation having reached the quasi-saint realm. He was low-key and knew that the Primordial Era was a place of right and wrong, especially after Nüwa became a saint, the demonic tribe's power once again dominated the Primordial Era. Minghe Old Ancestor didn't even take one step out of the Blood Sea, spending his days comprehending the Great Dao within it. And the Underworld Blood Sea was a place where humans and beasts rarely visited, so Minghe Old Ancestor's life was actually quite comfortable.

  It's been a long time since the old ancestor of the Nether River discovered that there were many more living spirits in the bloody sea. In the vast wilderness, people are killing and fighting every day, and countless souls are dying. These spirits have no place to rest, either being taken away to refine magic treasures or wandering in the world. Some vengeful spirits and evil ghosts are attracted by the invisible heavenly aura emanating from the bloody sea, and they sink into the ground one after another, coming to this darkest and most polluted place in the world. However, these spirits are trapped in the Nether River Bloody Sea, unable to escape, and are enslaved by the heavenly aura in the bloody sea day and night, suffering unbearable pain.

  At first, Menghe didn't have any thoughts about these ghosts, letting them roam freely in the sea of blood. Since Nüwa created humans with mud and became a saint, he got inspiration from it and wanted to imitate Nüwa's creation by using the ghosts in the sea of blood to create living spirits, obtaining the supreme creative virtue.

  The River of the Underworld and the Ghosts coexisted day and night, and he was determined to understand them. After many attempts, although he did not succeed, he also gained insight. One day, out of boredom, he used the water from the bottom of the Blood Sea in the Underworld as a mold, poured it into the souls of living beings, and created a new species that had never appeared in the Primordial Chaos. The River of the Underworld called this species the Asura Clan. The male Asuras had ferocious faces, were tall and powerful, while the females were beautiful and alluring, but the Asura Clan could not reproduce like the other tribes in the Primordial Chaos. Fortunately, there were countless souls dying every day in the Primordial Chaos due to constant battles and killings, so the River of the Underworld did not mind. The River of the Underworld gained creation merit, his cultivation surged rapidly, and soon reached the Quasi-Saint realm.

  Kunpeng accompanied Hou Tu to the Youming Blood Sea, and along the way, Hou Tu saw that after the death of the Hongyuan spirits, their souls had nowhere to rely on, and felt very pitiful for them, making his determination to reincarnate in the Six Paths even more resolute.

  As they approached the Blood Sea of Youming, all the souls around them floated towards a place. Zu Wu followed closely behind, wanting to see what was going on, but she didn't expect that these souls had all come to this Blood Sea of Youming.

  Only to see the River Styx collecting souls in the sea of blood, which made Hou Tu feel disgusted. She looked at the ghosts struggling in the sea of blood with a sorrowful face. Looking around, all she saw was a scene of wailing and howling ghosts in the sea of blood, its appearance was terrifying and frightening beyond compare.

  Seeing such a tragic scene, Hou Tu was furious and said to the Naihe River: "Have you seen the Naihe River Daoist friend? Can you spare these souls for the sake of Hou Tu?"

  At this time, Minghe was annoyed that he had successfully created things but not let him become a saint. He also heard Hou Tu making noise above, which made him even more angry. Although the creation of Asura by Minghe did not make him a saint, it also made his cultivation progress greatly, so he was less restrained in his actions. Minghe came out to see Hou Tu, and the two had different words, so they started fighting.

  After obtaining the merits of creation, Minghe Laozu's cultivation soared to the middle period of Quasi-Sainthood. With the 'Twelve Product Industry Fire Red Lotus' defense and Yuan Tu's Anbi double swords as his main attack, his strength far surpassed that of Hou Tu. Moreover, the two were fighting on the Blood Sea, which gave him a geographical advantage, greatly increasing his power. Fortunately, Hou Tu was the ancestor of the earth, Wu, although not the most skilled in combat, but excelled in defense and recovery. Hou Tu revealed his true form as an ancestor, relying on his extremely powerful physical body, and for a time, he was evenly matched with Minghe Laozu.

  Minghe's outburst of anger has stirred up a big trouble. Kunpeng was worried that he wouldn't have the chance to deal with Minghe, but now Minghe has brought it upon himself.

  After Pangu's demise, his primordial spirit transformed into the Three Pure Ones. Most of his essence and blood transformed into the Twelve Ancestral Shamans, who were born with the ability to communicate with the heavenly and earthly primal energies. Their physical bodies were incredibly powerful. Among them was Hou Tu, the Ancestral Shaman of Central Earth, who inherited the earth's broad and benevolent nature. Unlike other ancestral shamans, she was not fond of violence and competition, but rather a compassionate person by nature. As time passed, she fell behind in the struggle.

  Kunpeng saw that Hou Tu and Minghe were fighting, and he was at a disadvantage. Under the pressure of Minghe, he retreated step by step. At this time, he appeared in person, waved his hand and struck Minghe, saying: "Minghe, don't be arrogant from now on, watch out!"

  The River Styx saw the Kunpeng and was surprised to see that it had also come to the Underworld Blood Sea with Hou Tu, and had intervened in his own struggle with Hou Tu. He couldn't help but feel a sense of vigilance. He hastily said: "You're quite bold, Kunpeng! Instead of staying in Heaven to receive blessings, you've actually colluded with the Witch Clan and come to my Underworld Blood Sea to stir up trouble. Aren't you afraid that Emperor Jun will find out and take your life?"

  Kun Peng sneered and said, "Minghe, it's better for you to think about yourself. My affairs don't need your concern. If you know what's good for you, listen obediently, otherwise today will be the day of your death."

  Minghe hastily retreated back to the ground, then said to Kunpeng: "Kunpeng, don't be too arrogant, aren't you afraid of provoking unnecessary great enemies for the demon clan?"

  Kunpeng sneered, "This is my own business and has nothing to do with the demon tribe. You don't need to use this matter to threaten me. If you had known today why bother in the past? You forgot who took advantage of someone's crisis and snatched away the spoils of war that originally belonged to me. Originally, I came here just to help my friend Hou Tu establish the six paths of reincarnation, and didn't want to settle that karma with you. But unexpectedly, you dared to commit a heinous crime, obstructing Hou Tu from doing his job. This is a case where heaven will not tolerate it, and man will not forgive."

  Minghe angrily said: "Kunpeng, you have a big tone, I'd like to see who dies today!"

  Minghe summoned countless blood god avatars from the dark and mysterious Blood Sea, these blood gods were refined by Minghe using the origin of the Blood Sea. Each blood god avatar was equivalent to one of Minghe's lives, as long as one blood god remained, Minghe could borrow a body to rebirth, meaning that as long as the Blood Sea existed, Minghe would not die.

  Kunpeng knew the pros and cons of Xue Shenzi, and said to Hou Tu: "Hou Tu Daoyou, it seems that if we don't solve the problem of Minghe River, we can't establish the Six Paths Reincarnation here. Minghe River was originally a strand of Pan Gu's polluted blood transformed, and Youming Blood Sea is his old haunt. Now he occupies the geographical advantage, and as soon as you hold back those Xue Shenzi, Minghe River himself will have me to deal with, and I can take this opportunity to settle the karma with him."

  Zǔ Wū Hòu Tǔ just experienced the harm of Ming River, so she nodded in agreement with Kun Peng's suggestion.

  Minghe understood that relying solely on his Blood God Avatar would be unable to withstand the joint attack of Kunpeng and Houtu, so he gritted his teeth and summoned the Xian corpse Blood Lotus that he had just cut off. Although Minghe had a cultivation base at the mid-True Saint stage, this Xian corpse was imperfectly severed using the 'Twelve Product Fire Red Lotus' by forcibly borrowing merit, which posed great danger to himself.

  Jiao saw the Minghe's corpse and couldn't help but mock him, saying: "Minghe, this corpse of yours is really special. On one face, there are both good and evil expressions. Such a corpse is unprecedented and unmatched. I'd like to ask you, is this a good corpse or an evil corpse?"

  Minghe's face turned bright red upon hearing Kunpeng's words. As Minghe was born from a strand of Pangu's polluted blood, he had an inherently evil nature and it was generally difficult for him to eradicate his benevolent corpse. However, Minghe managed to forcefully eliminate his benevolent corpse by relying on the merits he gained from creating the Ashura tribe. This act would be extremely detrimental to his future cultivation, making it unlikely for him to attain sainthood even if he lived a full life, and his cultivation would likely remain stagnant at the quasi-saint middle stage.

  Quasi-Saint Middle Period could have beheaded the two corpses, but although the power of Minghe's law was enough, it didn't have the realm of Quasi-Saint Middle Period. Moreover, he had just beheaded Shan Shi and hadn't had time to consolidate his own cultivation, so Kunpeng and Hou Tu arrived, and E Shi wasn't able to be beheaded yet.