Chapter 103

Extending his right hand, which housed divine power, he actually began—stripping off the shrine maiden's clothes!!

"Ah? Ah?!"

In an instant, the shrine maiden screamed, gasped, and struggled in terror, but how could she possibly break free?

Because what Qi Xing was peeling away layer by layer with his hand was not just the white wedding kimono on her body, but the [clothing] enveloping her soul!

—The belief of Yazidism holds that the soul is the essence, while the physical body is merely a temporary outer garment. Reincarnation is simply taking it off after death and changing into another.

Buddhism also considers the physical shell to be an illusion, not the true reality.

"Then wouldn't it solve everything if I just stripped you all bare?"

"I don't care how many shells you can escape into; it doesn't matter how many faces you hide behind."

The master of the Sea of Chaos can make everything return to the primal state, return to the essence.

Although Sasa didn't like teaching Qi Xing how to use the [silver coin] and preferred watching him figure it out himself, the situation was special this time! She had no choice!

"You are not this body."

"You are not this face."

"You are not [Amaterasu]."

"You, are merely a will hiding under a physical shell—so, take off your clothes!"

Take them off! Let me see!

The silver coin spun gently. The rules of the world began to waver. Qi Xing's hands and words themselves transformed into razors, beginning to slice through the white-haired shrine maiden's [clothing], exposing the disguise of this [reincarnator].

One layer of clothing was stripped away, then two; the white wedding kimono shattered in the wind, and her skin faded like oil paint—these were not physical changes, but rather her [appearance] being taken off.

She tried to scream, but she had no mouth.

She wanted to flee, but she could find no footsteps.

Because all of that was just [clothing] she had put on.

—However, what happened next was still somewhat beyond Qi Xing's expectations.

Because as he stripped away the shrine maiden's clothes layer by layer, he discovered that the deep red sea beside them also began to crack open.

This was only natural. Since this was an [Inner Realm] established and managed by the white-haired shrine maiden for nearly a thousand years, when Qi Xing ripped away the clothing of her soul, it would naturally force her [Inner Realm] to reveal its essence as well.

But this essence truly made Qi Xing shudder.

Click.

It sounded like a mirror shattering, or perhaps the low groan of flesh being torn apart.

The blood sea, which had been churning like a nightmare, actually began to slowly split open along an invisible axis, like a massive blood-red wound opening in the center of the world.

The thick fog and blood waves receded, revealing a bottomless trench.

And inside that trench—it was full of people.

Figure after figure with white hair and golden eyes lay quietly in the seawater, like countless sleeping dolls.

Some were young, like innocent girls; some were already aged, with graying temples, yet their expressions remained serene; there were even infants in swaddling clothes, curled up in crystal-clear amniotic sacs, their nails delicate and soft, their eyes unopened.

There were even people with twisted bodies, people with extra or missing limbs and organs, people abnormally large or abnormally small—many strange and naturally deformed individuals.

But without exception, they all possessed faces strikingly similar to the white-haired shrine maiden—the thing that called itself [Amaterasu].

It was as if they had been carved repeatedly from the same template, with slight variations in detail, subtle differences in expression, and even occasional failed products from the manufacturing process. Yet all of them bore those golden eyes, snow-white hair, and that calm, half-smiling composure.

Even Qi Xing, the dignified [Master Leipu], couldn't help but stiffen for a moment upon seeing this scene.

This wasn't one or two clones, nor was it a few simple [reincarnations].

This was [her], one after another; they were [clothing] used for reincarnation, spare [selves], like dolls displayed in a wardrobe, slumbering in the depths of the blood sea.

"You are fucking insane."

Behind the white-haired shrine maiden's clear sense of self and rationality, there was ultimately a bone-chilling madness.

He finally understood.

This really wasn't a [metaphor] for changing clothes for the soul.

She had hidden away every version of herself from every lifetime.

Past, present, future.

Failed bodies, prepared bodies, bodies that had yet to awaken.

Like changing outfits, she arranged them in this blood-colored deep sea of the [Inner Realm], one after another, layer upon layer, a stacked [wardrobe] like a valley of hidden corpses.

But where did so many [clothing] come from? Perhaps with modern technology, [Amaterasu] being rich, she could secretly clone—but where would there be cloning in ancient times?

What Qi Xing had stripped away at this moment was merely the top layer, the newest piece of [clothing].

Where was the real her—the true body—actually hidden?

Just as Qi Xing was thinking this…

From the depths of the seabed, a soft, sigh-like echo suddenly came: "You are really very rough, [Master Leipu]."

The voice swirled in his ears like water flowing from all directions.

Those countless golden eyes opened at the same moment, all looking toward him in unison.

[Amaterasu] (Image)

I forgot to post the image when the last chapter was updated.

Considering she is the BOSS and not one of the heroines, I shouldn't put it in the work-related section.

As the BOSS of the third volume, I'll give her some face and place it here alone for everyone to see.

Hm? Why not put it in the next chapter?

Because starting from the next chapter, she won't look like this anymore… that's why I said I should have posted it in the last chapter.

Well then, the next chapter will be updated tomorrow morning, meow—

101: Mad Mother

At this point, it's time to explain a little.

The mythological archetype that Qi Xing drew from the [silver coin of Illusion] was not actually any mainstream deity from the East or West, but an ancient god of the Canaanite civilization long buried in the dust of history—

The primal sea god, the Dragon King [Yam].

He was not a gentle and tranquil sea god, but a symbol of primal chaos and the untamable sea.

In the ancient times when the heavens and earth were not yet defined and gods fought, [Yam] symbolized the untamable sea and the primal storm. He transformed into storms and tsunamis, challenging the gods; his name was synonymous with [the ocean] itself.

He was the giant wave that swallowed city-states, the raging tide that dragged kingdoms into the abyss.

The thunderous war god [Baal] once fought him, using lightning to force back the sea god, establishing the order of kingship and making the sea retreat to its boundaries. But no one could truly kill [Yam]. Because as long as the sea exists, and as long as storms continue to come, he will live forever.

[Yam] is not just a god, but a force.

The power of primal chaos that battles with order.

Whether it be cities, kingdoms, or civilizations, they will all eventually vanish into chaos and return to the primal state.

Conversely, in mythological semiotics, the power of the sun god is generally regarded as a symbol of the power of order.

The divine power that the white-haired shrine maiden [Amaterasu] had somehow siphoned from somewhere has now been broken by Qi Xing's authority.

But after returning to the primal state, the essence that was revealed made even Qi Xing secretly shocked.

A deep-sea tomb stacked with [selves].

In this blood-colored sea, like amniotic fluid, floated countless amniotic sacs, within which slept [herself] from different periods and different states.

Those girls, old women, and infants sleeping on the seabed, every white-haired, golden-eyed corpse, were her past or future shells, the [clothing] she stored to continue her self, her reincarnation shells.

Now Qi Xing forced her true body to be revealed.

And so, from the very bottom of these [shells], the real her rose up.

An indescribable monster.

For a moment, Qi Xing almost thought his vision had been twisted.

The [white-haired shrine maiden] crawling out of the bottomless trench still had that familiar face on her upper body—white hair flowing, golden eyes gleaming, skin as fair as wax, expression elegant, even bearing her usual smile.

But from the waist down, it was a nightmare.

This was a terrifying [lower body] that could not be accurately described in physical language.

If one had to say, it was somewhat like a mermaid. Except the upper body was a beautiful white-haired shrine maiden, while the lower body was countless translucent tentacles stretching out from the sea.

Countless fin-like ribbons, like feathered garments hanging from the sky, dragged the placentas pulled from the seabed.

Within those fins were hidden thousands of unborn [thems]—some still wrapped in round amniotic sacs, others merely unformed spines and skulls, floating among them, silently waiting for the next [birth].

Elegant, yet bone-chilling.

Divine, yet maddening to behold.

She was neither human, nor fish, nor god, yet she combined the most terrifying aspects of all three.

It was as if she were a hybrid of a human and the creature known as a sea dragon that Qi Xing had once seen in a documentary.

He had previously wondered, where on earth did [Amaterasu] get so many identical [clothing] that she could [take turns wearing]?

Now the answer was clear at a glance.

She was merely—using her own true body hidden in the depths of the [Inner Realm] as a seedbed, constantly gestating new [selves].

Giving birth to herself, taking it off and putting it back on. Death after death, rebirth after rebirth.

By constantly giving birth to herself, she prolonged her own life.

Her true body had indeed merged with the very concept of [reincarnation].

"Ugh."

What kind of bizarre scenes hadn't Qi Xing seen?

Yet the grotesque anomaly before him, whose mere existence was nauseating, still made him feel an indescribable sense of disgust.

Even Sasa, sitting on his shoulder, showed an expression of disgust and wrinkled her nose.

"[Master Leipu], you are really very rough."

On the contrary, she herself—the shrine maiden whose upper body was still white-haired and golden-eyed, smiling brightly—seemed not to feel awkward at all.

She leaped gently, flying out of the trench, her translucent feathered fins spreading in the air, as elegant as if she were swimming in a windless sky.

"Although it's not like I haven't played rough before. In the past, there was someone who, while █-ing me, choked my neck and then chopped off my head."

Her tone was gentle, like banter between old friends.

Qi Xing had no interest in listening to her share her perverted sexual kinks.

He already knew who she was.

She was neither [Amaterasu] nor [Ise].

There is a very famous female figure in Japanese folklore. It is said that when she was young, she accidentally ate mermaid meat (some versions say dragon god meat), thereby gaining immortality, and thus lived to be eight hundred years old. Seeking redemption and peace, she shaved her head to become a nun and traveled throughout Japan to practice.

It sounds like a very ordinary folklore legend.

But Qi Xing knew another thing: in fact, after the Heian period in Japan, many nuns who traveled from place to place, as well as women like wandering shrine maidens, were actually working as █-workers while walking through the streets and alleys.

Looking back now, her image—a beautiful young girl on the upper body, like a deep-sea monster fish on the lower body, combining the structure of an embryo and a womb—has already hinted at everything.

It is said that over eight hundred years ago, she ate the meat of the [Duo Chenzi] that fell from the sky.

She has lived from at least 1181 to the present, meaning she has lived for at least eight hundred years, and still maintains her youthful beauty.

For at least several hundred years, until a few decades ago, her village still made a living by selling sexual services, and for generations, they were all women.

Her name has been passed down in various places since ancient times, like fog and mystery, like illusion and dream.

Then, may I ask who she is?

"Yaobikuni."

Qi Xing spoke, revealing her true [name].

The grotesque anomaly, upon hearing this, laughed instead.