[You told Chen Yue about some of the things that had happened to you over the past hundred-plus years.]
[From being a laborer by the Qing River, to destroying the Ancient Wasteland Secret Realm, to stepping onto the Path to Immortality and coming to the Real Realm to make your way.]
[Chen Yue looked at you, tears welling in her eyes, her gaze filled with pain.]
["Fourth Brother, you've suffered. When we were kids at home, everyone doted on you the most..."]
["Elder Brother doesn't count. I remember one time he and I went up the mountain to chop firewood. He said he wanted to bathe and told me to wait for him. But instead of him, a snake showed up..."]
[You made Chen Yue laugh with a single sentence.]
["Do you tell this story to everyone you meet? Elder Brother would be furious if he knew."]
[You didn't tell Chen Yue about the sights you'd seen when you went to the human world.]
[Father and Mother were already gone. If she found out Elder Brother and Third Sister were also gone, Chen Yue would be heartbroken.]
[Besides, she couldn't go to the human world anyway, so there was no need to burden her with unnecessary worries.]
[As you chatted with your second sister, Ji Baiming stepped forward and said.]
["May I ask if Miss Chen hails from the Nether Realm?"]
[Chen Yue nodded.]
["That's right, Head of the Ji family. I work in the Development Department of the Nether Realm, responsible for the construction and maintenance of various Nether Domains."]
["May I ask who your master is..."]
["The Red River Nether King!"]
[Ji Baiming gasped sharply.]
[Ji Wuqing was incredibly curious and kept pressing for answers.]
["Father, what does that mean? I know the Nether Realm, but what's a Nether Domain? And who's the Red River Nether King? Is he very powerful?"]
[Ji Baiming explained.]
[The Nether Realm wasn't another world, but rather the Nether Realm's local galaxy, adjacent to the Celestial River local galaxy.]
[When he said adjacent, he meant that without channel connections between local galaxies, the distances were extremely vast, making travel between them very troublesome.]
[The Nether Realm's local galaxy was very special. It wasn't originally called that.]
[Legend has it that in this region of the universe, a earth-shattering prehistoric war broke out in ancient times.]
[The war engulfed the entire local galaxy, destroying all life on every planet and rendering the area unsuitable for life's reproduction for a long time.]
[Thus, this local galaxy became a land of death.]
[No one knows how long passed, but in this dead land, some lingering souls of powerful beings opened up a unique cultivation path—Ghost Cultivation.]
[And they established a kingdom of the dead.]
[Over the long ages, the Ghost Cultivators grew into a powerful force composed of undead souls, occupying the entire local galaxy.]
[They called themselves Nether Realm people and renamed the entire local galaxy the Nether Realm.]
[Hearing this, you couldn't help but furrow your brow.]
["Uncle Ji, I also heard about the Nether Realm back in the human world. People there said that after death, souls are taken by the Nether Realm. Are these two..."]
[Ji Baiming nodded.]
["They are the same."]
["Sss..."]
[This time, it was your turn to gasp.]
[Before the Nether Realm appeared, when living beings died, their physical bodies returned to the earth, and their souls returned to heaven.]
[This was a natural phenomenon.]
[After the Nether Realm appeared, in order to expand their clan and also to cultivate and obtain resources for the Ghost Cultivation path (that is, souls), powerful Ghost Cultivators of the ancient era created the Soul Sea.]
[The Soul Sea absorbed free-floating souls from the heavens and earth, gathering them in one place for easy use by Ghost Cultivators.]
[The souls of living beings from just one local galaxy gradually couldn't satisfy the ever-growing Ghost Cultivator population.]
[So, they created the Nether Domain.]
[Beyond the normal world, they opened up an additional Nether Domain that ordinary people couldn't enter—only souls could enter it.]
[When a living being died, the power of the Nether Domain would automatically draw in their soul, then guide it into the Soul Sea.]
[Over endless ages, the Nether Domain had already covered many galaxies. As a neighbor, the Celestial River had naturally been included long ago.]
[The Nether Domain had no effect on the real world. Its only function was to absorb souls after death.]
[So, most galaxies didn't care about the Nether Realm's methods.]
[Even without the Nether Domain, souls of the deceased would dissipate anyway.]
[Of course, there were those who did care, like the Dragon-Man tribe.]
[Originally, after their physical bodies died, their souls could defy the laws of heaven and earth, automatically becoming beings similar to Ghost Cultivators.]
[Now, they needed to reach a certain cultivation level, enough to resist the Nether Domain's attraction, to stay behind.]
[But the Nether Realm wasn't someone to be trifled with either.]
[If you agree to let me lay down a Nether Domain, we'll mind our own business. If you don't agree, then thank you for contributing to the Soul Sea in advance.]
["The methods of the Nether Realm's experts are transcendent. For cultivators of our Celestial River local galaxy, even an Immortal King would find it difficult to touch the Void Realm. But the Nether Domain has already encompassed it long ago."]
[This was why the various planes of the Void Realm also had legends of the Nether Realm.]
[You scratched your head.]
["That's so mysterious..."]
["It's normal that you don't understand the methods of Ghost Cultivators."]
["Then what about the Red River Nether King?"]
["The Nether Realm, like our Celestial River, has only one Immortal Emperor. Their Immortal Emperor there is called the Nether Emperor. The Red River Nether King's strength is equivalent to our Immortal Kings here. In the Nether Realm, whether in power or authority, he is the number one figure beneath the Nether Emperor!"]
[Your eyes sparkled as you looked at Chen Yue.]
["Second Sister, is that true?"]
[Chen Yue nodded.]
["Head of the Ji family, your knowledge is profound. Chen Yue is impressed. Although my master is famous across the entire galaxy in the Nether Realm, not many people know of him here. My master's abilities are heaven-defying. Back when I was just a lowly martial artist in the human world, he could pull my soul up from the Real Realm. I used to see many Ghost Cultivators and never found their soul-manipulating methods particularly remarkable. Only after learning how deeply isolated the Void and Real Realms are did I realize how powerful my master really is."]
[Ji Wuqing immediately seized the key point.]
["Why did the Red River Nether King pull you up from the Void Realm? Even if he's very powerful, doing that must have cost him a lot, right?"]
["Yes, that time my master used ten percent of the souls in the Soul Sea. As for why he valued me, he only said it was because I had a special soul, very suitable for the Ghost Cultivation path. He hoped to train me to inherit his legacy in the future."]
["Inherit his legacy? Aren't you Ghost Cultivators already dead?"]
["Although Ghost Cultivators don't have the concept of lifespan, not dispersing after death goes against the heavenly dao. We experience ghost tribulations at regular intervals. If we fail the tribulation, our souls scatter and vanish. Even if we succeed, we consume our original essence. Over time, when the original essence is exhausted, our soul bodies will scatter as well."]
[You found this quite novel.]
[You had been wondering why this immortal cultivation world didn't have heavenly tribulations.]
[So it turned out the Ghost Cultivators were bearing all of them.]
["Wait, Second Sister, are you also a Ghost Cultivator?"]
["Of course. I cultivate under my master, so naturally I am a Ghost Cultivator."]
["Then you... are already dead?"]
["You could understand it that way."]
["But you clearly have a body?"]
["Our physical bodies are just for convenience when moving through the world. Otherwise, many people wouldn't be able to see us at all, making it very inconvenient to interact with the living."]
[A Ghost Cultivator's physical body wasn't strong, and they had no interest in refining powerful bodies because it was meaningless. If the body shattered, they would just forge a new one from the Soul Sea, which was far more cost-effective.]

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