Judge of Souls - Chapter 116

The conversation ended with that person’s sarcastic complaints, causing the mental framework in Yama’s mind to become completely distorted, making it impossible to establish an image of the opponent as fierce and menacing.

From the sound of it, he was just an innocent fool.

Yama’s entire body now emanated a disgusting aura of malevolence. Several young people and nearby hotel guests, though they couldn’t see his transformation, subconsciously kept their distance from him. Now whenever they saw him, they felt inexplicably irritated, even though he had previously been such a likeable young man. The group muttered among themselves, figuring this was probably what they called “aura.”

After Yama spoke, corresponding changes indeed occurred, proving that the opponent truly intended to make a move. Therefore, tonight’s developments should be the key.

Shortly after they turned off the computer, the sky began to darken. Yama and Jiang Feng began to keep their distance from the others.

For the convenience of allowing the opponent to strike, Jiang Feng deliberately stayed alone in Chu Xuanliang’s room. Under everyone’s intense curiosity, he placed a computer in the corner of the room, turned on the camera, then covered the screen.

At 7:15 PM, Yama was washing his hands in the bathroom.

Water rushed from the faucet as he shook off the water droplets, then pressed the switch.

That rhythmic, soothing sound began to occupy his mind.

Yama looked up at himself in the mirror. The handsome, delicate young man inside revealed a sinister expression.

A thought suddenly emerged in his mind, as if someone were advising him.

Yama cooperatively looked at himself in the mirror.

The person in the mirror said: “Go, personally kill Jiang Feng with your own hands. I will teach you how to do it.”

Yama: “Why?”

“You just need to listen to me.”

“Turn off the water first,” Yama said. “It’s written on the wall: ‘Turn off water promptly, be a decent person.'”

The other was stunned, his gaze becoming sharp.

Countless thoughts flooded Yama’s mind again, his brain feeling as if it had been overworked, revealing exhaustion as if he had worked intensively for three days and nights without sleep.

Yama put on a confused expression. “Who am I?”

The person inside said with satisfaction. “You are the master of life and death.”

“Am I King Yama?”

“No, you are more noble than King Yama,” he said. “He can only manage the dead, while you are the supreme human in the mortal world.”

Saying he was inferior to himself – he didn’t know whether to be happy or depressed about this.

“But I want to be King Yama,” Yama said. “They say you’re just a moderator.”

The person in the mirror flew into a rage. “Who!”

Yama: “Conan.”

“Conan?” the person in the mirror said. “I can make him die tomorrow.”

Yama said coldly, “Then you’re indeed more powerful than the Kings of the various halls.”

The person in the mirror seemed somewhat confused, because Yama’s behavior didn’t seem like someone who had been bewitched. Yet he felt that Yama was indeed an ordinary person.

Yama lowered his head and fiddled with the faucet switch. After several seconds, whether the opponent gave up or for some other reason, the water flow successfully stopped.

The person in the mirror also put away that strange expression and returned to normal.

Yama walked out and went to the room of Wu Teng’s friend.

A group of people were eating takeout while occasionally glancing at the computer to make sure nothing unusual was happening inside.

Inside, Jiang Feng sat on the bed watching TV while absent-mindedly texting someone.

Yama pulled over a chair, chose the best viewing position, and said, “It should start soon.”

The group immediately dropped what they were holding and gathered behind him to observe nervously.

They watched for five minutes, during which Jiang Feng showed no changes whatsoever.

The hotel had two layers of curtains – one was white gauze, currently drawn, and the other was brown thick curtains, pulled back to the sides.

The window was closed, and the fabric hung straight down.

After five minutes, the group had reached their limit of attention and began to scatter their focus, returning to checking their phones while occasionally scanning the computer.

At this moment, the curtain trembled almost imperceptibly.

Jiang Feng turned to his side to reach for something on the nightstand, turning his back to the computer camera. He felt something strange about his face and reached up to touch it in this position.

The texture was wrong – it didn’t feel like human skin, but rather like soft paper. The corners of his mouth were twisted upward in a bizarre way, and his eyes had taken on a drooping shape.

Jiang Feng very seriously stroked his face, mapping out the current situation on his face while remaining completely calm inside.

The people watching the surveillance on the other side saw him motionless for a long time and said nervously:

“Why isn’t he moving?”

“What is he touching?”

“Is something happening?”

“Let’s count to three, if it really doesn’t work…”

While they were struggling with indecision, Jiang Feng finally sat up straight and looked at the computer, his entire face fully exposed to everyone.

“Holy shit!”

The group was genuinely startled.

“What the hell is that thing!”

“What’s wrong with his face?”

His face still seemed to be his face, except that his original features had been forcibly arranged into an exaggerated expression.

“An emoji…” a girl said. “Like those black and white emojis! The ones that are popular online – someone laughing maniacally!”

When everyone looked carefully, it really did seem to be the case.

Over there, Jiang Feng stood up, walked to the table, picked up his backpack, and took out a folded talisman from a compartment.

The moment his fingers touched the yellow talisman, he felt as if his entire body was being blown apart, as if his body was being thrown in different directions.

His eyeballs seemed to fly toward the ceiling under the internal airwaves, then stick to the lampshade. He saw minced meat all over the floor, bloodstains, and fragments of clothing. The only thing that remained intact was probably his legs, which were perfectly inserted into his open backpack.

Although they were only separated by one room, they heard no sound whatsoever.

However, this spectacular and nauseating scene was truly unbearable. The people behind the screen immediately vomited. A timid girl watching this was about to faint directly.

Yama steadied them, saying, “It’s just fake.”

The next second, Jiang Feng was standing by the table again, except the talisman in his hand had already burned to ashes.

He opened his fingers, letting the paper ash flow through his fingertips, then returned to the bed.

Everyone said in bewilderment. “What happened? Wasn’t that just now…”

Yama said calmly, “He’s a moderator, so controlling the computer’s video feed is easy for him. That was just a realistic illusion to scare people, don’t worry.”

A guy asked: “But what creates this illusion? Just with illusions… it could drive people crazy!”

“The internet,” Yama said. “In this era, there’s internet everywhere.”

The group suddenly became alert. “Then quickly tell your friend to turn off the computer over there! Would that be better?”

“Damn, having this experience, it would create lifelong trauma!”

Yama was quite indifferent – if a Judge could be frightened by a few petty tricks that couldn’t make it to the stage, he wouldn’t have been able to do this job for so many years.

“He wasn’t scared,” Yama said. “No need. Let’s keep watching. Perhaps the opponent will appear in person.”

Jiang Feng indeed acted as if nothing had happened, sitting back down to watch TV, just casually zipping up his bag.

“If it had the ability to kill people like this, it wouldn’t need to use the internet to gather netizens to help it. Although it has gained some divine consciousness and divine power, its magical abilities are clearly shallow, its time is short, and given its improper origins, it’s about the same as a malevolent ghost.” Yama spoke very casually, not knowing that what he called a “malevolent ghost” was enough to give Taoist priests and monks major headaches.

Yama said, “This is just a little intimidation before killing, like how perverts enjoy watching their victims struggle in fear before murder. Don’t take it seriously.”

There were many forces that could create evil gods.

There was the power of faith. This so-called “faith” didn’t only refer to devoutly believing in and respecting a certain deity, offering incense, and spreading its teachings. As long as it had a certain degree of fame and existed in human minds for a long time, with people believing in its existence, when the numbers grew large enough, similar power could emerge. Of course, this latter type of power was generally useless.

Then there was negative resentment and malevolent energy. This was why ghosts became malevolent ghosts. Obviously, this evil god had also taken this path.

Therefore, if someone seriously created a nonsensical divine title and infused this titled existence with large amounts of different negative emotions, then erected divine statues and tablets for it, conducting daily worship and offerings, it might produce an evil god similar to the “Moderator.”

Since it was such an evil god that embodied all forms of evil, it was undoubtedly a pervert. In front of most perverts, the more composed you were, the more it would displease them.

Jiang Feng hadn’t watched TV for even a quarter of an hour when someone knocked on his room door.

Hearing the doorbell, one of the brothers immediately tiptoed to the door and opened a crack to peek outside.

“Someone’s there!” the person turned back and mouthed silently, “This time it’s really someone!”

Another person went over to confirm.

It was a sexy woman in a fitted skirt, carrying a small red bag. She looked somewhat familiar – they seemed to have seen her eating in the lobby that morning, proving she was a guest at this hotel.

Over there, Jiang Feng normally opened the door, came out and asked, “Can I help you?”

“Could you chat with me?” the woman said, half-biting her lip. “I heard that they actually dug up a corpse in this hotel. My boyfriend isn’t here right now, and I’m a bit scared. Could I hide in your room for a while?”

Jiang Feng kept one hand on the door handle, blocking her from entering. His gaze carefully examined her, not responding for the moment.

After a moment, he made room and said, “Come in.”

The woman entered, closed the door behind her, took two steps forward, and familiarly hugged Jiang Feng’s arm.

Jiang Feng didn’t dodge, looking at her meaningfully.

“Wow—” the woman looked up and exclaimed, “Your room is so beautiful!”

Jiang Feng: “Aren’t all hotel rooms the same? Unless you booked a king bed room or family room?”

“Hm?” the woman grinned widely, “Your room is definitely different – it’s all minced meat, I love it so much.”

Jiang Feng: “You’re seeing things wrong.”

“You clearly saw it too,” the woman said. “People who lie will be killed.”

Jiang Feng asked, “Hmm, how do you want me to die?”

She opened the small bag she was carrying with her left hand, grabbed a round disk-shaped needle case from inside, and shook it in her hand. “Then swallow a thousand needles. Although there aren’t a thousand here, I think it’s enough.”

Jiang Feng took her needle case, spun it around with his finger, poured three thin needles from the small hole, looked at her and said: “I think your suggestion is good.”

The opponent felt his reaction was somewhat strange, unlike anyone it had ever encountered before. Things weren’t going according to her imagination at all, leaving her somewhat confused.

Then Jiang Feng moved, and thinking he was going to run, she immediately gripped his arm tightly. But Jiang Feng instead grabbed her with his other hand.

The woman’s mouth twitched, and her mocking expression suddenly changed flavor. Without much thought, she pulled out a knife from her waist and struck unexpectedly at his neck.

The knife attacked very quickly, but Jiang Feng didn’t dodge at all. After the blade made contact with his neck, it slid across rapidly. The brute force pierced through, leaving only a thin bloodline on his neck, which immediately healed, not even leaving a small scar, as if everything had been their illusion.

The woman’s voice carried a trace of masculine tone mixed in, and she screamed in terror. “Who are you!”

Without another word, Jiang Feng formed his five fingers into claws and pulled backward.

A white phantom was yanked from the woman’s body.

It screamed and tried to resist, pressing hard against Jiang Feng’s hand, but ultimately couldn’t fight back and was completely separated.

It was a man with an emoji-like face. At first glance, he had shifty eyes and was extremely vulgar, with exaggerated expressions and peculiar features that couldn’t reach normal human proportions. The feeling of looking at him was hard to describe.

A pair of eyes occupied half his face, the nose was just a small fleshy bump, and when he didn’t open his mouth, you couldn’t see it.

“Holy sh*t, holy sh*t, holy sh*t!” everyone exclaimed repeatedly, feeling like their eyes had been violated. “What kind of ugly freak is this?!”