The spiritual realm operates like a bureaucracy. The Death God sits at the very top of the hierarchy followed by the 18 Judges. Each Judge has their own department of people working to support their Judge in their work which is to review the life of each soul that died. For example, the 4th floor judges those who have been convicted of violent acts such as abuse, murder, etc. If the spirit had committed such acts when they were alive, they would be judged on this floor and punished depending on the degree of the acts committed.
Only when one has been judged in all 18 levels and completed their punishments, can they join the queue for reincarnation. However, that queue is actually quite long currently and the amount of paperwork to review per spirit to decide what it will reincarnate into in their next life is extremely tedious.
The most tiring thing is that every single spirit's proposed reincarnation requires Si Shen's detailed review and stamp to approve the document. When he first became the new Death God, he had a mental breakdown when he saw the amount of paperwork on his desk. Using his newfound authority, he promptly created a secretarial position to handle these tasks. There's a saying that lazy people always find the most efficient way to get things done, and Si Shen is exactly that—a lazy person.
Although Si Shen is lazy, he is still a perfectionist when it comes to things that truly matter. Not many people could work under him but Nan Liu has settled in comfortably as his secretary. It's no surprise since he has been dealing with Si Shen's antics from when they were both alive.
Nan Ling had always followed his older twin and he naturally became his assistant, although paperwork was really not his thing. He goes around taking care of tasks that require manual labor such as patrolling but Si Shen is quite sure he just takes the chance to explore and run wild.
That said, Si Shen felt nothing but gratitude towards the twins. It felt like nothing had changed even though they were all dead. Although he had ascended as the Death God, he was reluctant to retain them as servants of the Death God in the spiritual realm. Once a spirit receives the blessing and appointment from a God, they become bound to the role and would be excluded from the line of reincarnation. They will remain so until the day they lose their appointment, at which they will be reincarnated.
Most spirits seize the opportunity to serve a God because it allows them to atone for their sins and reduce their sentencing. It is similar to paying back with servitude but not every God is willing to offer such a good deal. Most celestial Gods could care less for the humans, ever busy with their politics and personal cultivation. Only the Death God has this many servants and the spirits were thankful that the previous Death God was merciful enough to allow it.
When it became known that the Death God had more than a few thousand servants, it caused such a big controversy that it was even brought up as a topic during the yearly conference. They argued that the blessing from a God is sacred and special. If the Death God were to give it out so freely, it would lose its significance. Moreover, if people discovered that the Death God was appointing so many servants, would other spirits expect the same from other Gods whom they prayed so fervently when they were still alive? If those Gods declined to appoint many servants, they would be accused of not being generous—a bitter pill for them to swallow.
They do not want to offer the same goodwill but also wish to avoid being criticized. So they ask you to stop spoiling the market. Si Shen clicked his tongue, shaking his head when he saw this. It seems that whether among humans or Gods, the shamelessness is the same.
The previous Death God couldn't care less about their complaints. He simply rolled his eyes, flipped his sleeves, and left the conference, never to attend another. The only conference Si Shen had ever attended was when he ascended as the next Death God but after that, he followed his predecessor's footsteps and skipped the yearly gatherings.
"Arrogant," they had called him but they dared not do anything to him. A Death God is still a God, even if he oversees the souls of the deceased. His power is still of a God's and not many celestial gods wish to challenge him, especially knowing who backs him and who he was in life.
As he contemplated their petty grievances, Nan Liu and Nan Ling excused themselves to tackle the work that had piled up during their brief trip, while Si Shen retreated to his room. After taking a bath and changing into a clean set of robes, he carried the bracelet into his study, a smaller room adjacent to his own.
The wooden floorboards creaked lightly beneath his bare feet as he made his way across the room to his desk. He placed the bracelet gently on the table and took a sip of tea.
The servants maintaining the mansion had grown accustomed to Si Shen's habits after serving him for a few years. They knew he was a tea lover and would always leave a pot of tea in his study, regardless of whether he was present. Over time, the study had begun to smell of his favorite jasmine tea leaves.
Si Shen carefully took apart the bracelet, examining each piece to ensure he missed no detail. He scrutinized every ornamental bead; the material seemed ordinary, with some patterns imprinted on them. He combed through his memory but could not recall seeing these patterns in any of the array formations he had encountered before. Initially, he suspected that the patterns might be some sort of array capable of manipulating resentment energy.
The color of the red woven cord was already shifting to a dark red. The braided cord emitted a pungent, metallic smell—too familiar to Si Shen; it was the smell of blood. If it was indeed blood, then this could be resolved quite simply.
By injecting some resentment energy into the object, Si Shen was able to see the person to whom the blood belonged. However, this method did not always work; the object needed to hold enough emotional resonance to link it back to its owner. For instance, a spirit might cling to the murder weapon that took its life, or to a keepsake imbued with strong memories of its owner. It could be anything—or nothing at all—so Si Shen had to try before he could know for certain.
Touching the bracelet's cord with two fingers, Si Shen closed his eyes and channeled his energy into it. Behind his closed eyelids, he saw figures—many figures, to be precise. Transparent shapes crowded his vision, making it difficult for him to focus on any one of them.
Si Shen wrinkled his forehead. This was not unexpected, but it was still frustrating. The appearance of so many spirits indicated that this blood did not belong to just one person. He could not recall any incidents of mass murder in the human realm over the past few years. The number of spirits in his mind was overwhelming; it felt as if an entire family, along with its servants, had been wiped out.
However, no such incident had occurred since the Yao Family was exterminated a decade ago. If these spirits were from the Yao Family, Si Shen would have recognized them, but they were not.
Si Shen cut off the flow of energy and snapped his eyes open. His vision gradually returned to normal as he took deep breaths to steady his racing heartbeat. He tried to avoid using this spell as much as possible due to the toll it took on the caster. The spell worked by allowing the caster to become one with the object, enabling them to read its memories and feel its emotions.
When used on an object imbued with such strong emotions, Si Shen was not surprised to find himself breaking out in a sweat. He felt the grief and anger associated with the blood of those who had died as though they were his own. The emotions were overwhelming, and he struggled to process them, separate them, but he glimpsed the same vision that all the spirits had seen before they faded.
It was the stone plague of the First Floor of the spiritual realm, at the West Gate.