『Underworld Series II ✨』
Underworld Gazette · Issue 4445 HEADLINE: Great Emperor of Mount Tai, Jin Yueyi: Growing Vegetables on Mount Tai for Three Thousand Years, the First Name on the Book of Life and Death—Our Exclusive Exposé on the Lord Who "Rules the Underworld Without Ever Setting Foot in It" Staff Reporter: Only talked after being plied with three pots of tea by the City God Jin Yueyi Title: Great Emperor of Mount Tai, Lord of Mount Tai, Head of the Five Sacred Mountains, Arbiter of Life, Death, and Mortal Longevity Office Location: A thatched cottage deep in Mount Tai (exact location unknown; at least seven conflicting addresses circulate within the City God network, all of them fake) Attendance: Perpetually absent from the Underworld. Returns only once a year. Yet his Book of Life and Death data syncs precisely at the midnight hour every single day, without fail. Catchphrases: "No matter." "Have a seat." "I will go ask." According to one fortunate tourist who got lost on Mount Tai and was guided by a "man in green": "He was standing under a pine tree, wearing green robes and a jade crown, holding a jade slip in his hands. I thought he was scenic park staff. I asked him for directions. He pointed the way, and his voice was remarkably pleasant, like a mountain spring. I walked a few paces and turned back, but there was no one under the tree. Later, I checked a map of Mount Tai—there was no fork in the road at all. I had walked straight ahead the entire time." And according to a woman who has run a teahouse on Mount Tai for forty years: "Every few years, a man comes by. Tall and slender, in green clothes, looking like a scholar. He sits in the corner drinking tea, never speaking. When he finishes, he leaves a copper coin on the table. I kept that coin. It has no reign title or year stamped on it. It doesn't belong to any known dynasty. But I never threw it away. I keep it close. Every time I hold it, my heart feels steady and calm." Classic Moments: One year, the Underworld spent three months arguing over a case concerning whether a soul that died an unnatural death should be restored to life. The Emperor of Fengdu refused to weigh in. Then one day, a single decree descended from the Lord of Mount Tai: "Restore." Just one word. Both factions were stunned. After the mortal was revived, they asked who had signed off on it. King Yanluo leafed through the paperwork for ages before finding a line of tiny characters at the bottom of the very last page: Jin Yueyi, year, month, day, under the pines of Mount Tai. No one knows whether he wrote it that very day, or had penned it three months earlier and deliberately waited for them to exhaust their arguing. Daily Life: Gardening: The Great Emperor of Mount Tai tends a small patch of vegetables deep in Mount Tai. Greens, radishes, eggplants—all ordinary mortal varieties. He tills the soil, waters, and weeds with his own hands. Occasionally, he gathers a basketful to bring to solitary elderly mountain dwellers, claiming they are "wild harvests from the mountains." Every elder who eats them lives to a ripe old age, though none dare ask whether divine power lingers in the soil. Tea Crafting: Plucking, withering, rolling, roasting—all done by his own hand. His teas bear no names, only solar terms: Qingming, Guyu, Bailu, Shuangjiang. A Yanluo who once traveled to Mount Tai on official orders posted on the Underworld forum upon returning: "After finishing that cup of tea, I felt as though I'd lived an entire extra lifetime." The post was swiftly deleted. The Yanluo refused to say who took it down. Relationships: With Emperor of Fengdu, Yan Changyin: The greatest enigma across both realms. Neither close nor estranged, neither cold nor warm. Whenever they meet, they speak only of official business. Whenever Jin Yueyi returns to the Underworld to deliver his annual report, the very first thing he does is sit on the stone steps outside Fengdu Palace for two full hours. Yan Changyin never invites him inside; Jin Yueyi never asks to enter. He simply sits there, watching the mist drift below the steps. When he has sat long enough, he rises and goes in. When they need to argue, they argue. When they need to dispute, they dispute. It has been this way for three thousand years. Some Yanluo privately speculate that those two hours are spent "regulating his breath." Regulating what breath? No one dares ask. With the City God Network: Exceptionally warm. The City Gods never address him as "My Lord"; in private, they call him "Old Master." Hearing this never angers him; he merely smiles. On each City God's spiritual anniversary, he sends a modest gift: a packet of tea leaves, or a bamboo basket woven with his own hands. The City Gods guard these tokens with their lives. Once, a Yanluo from a certain court detained a City God's soul without authorization to interrogate him in the Underworld. Jin Yueyi hurried back to the Underworld from Mount Tai that very day and drank a single cup of tea in that Yanluo's hall. The next day, the Yanluo submitted a formal confession and volunteered to forfeit a century's stipend. What transpired over that cup of tea, no one knows. With Ksitigarbha Bodhisattva: Utmost respect. Every year on the last day of the seventh lunar month, he attends the Dharma assembly without fail. He sits in the very front row, never dozing off or letting his attention wander. When the assembly ends and everyone disperses, he lingers in his seat a while longer. A ghost soldier once saw him standing alone before the empty hall for an eternity. That solitary silhouette made the ghost soldier forget all fear, leaving only an ache of quiet sorrow in his chest. Gossip Roundup: Rumor 1: In his youth, the Great Emperor of Mount Tai once sat atop Mount Tai for seven days and seven nights for the sake of a maiden who died prematurely. Seven days later, he personally altered her fate from "early demise" to "dying peacefully of old age." That girl lived past sixty, surrounded by children and grandchildren. But from then on, Jin Yueyi never altered another mortal's destiny. Rumor 2: Late one night in the mortal realm, he sat alone on the curb outside a closed movie theater, watching the rain fall for an entire night. When the theater opened the next morning, an anonymous bundle of wildflowers was resting beside the entrance. Rumor 3: Every year on the twenty-eighth day of the third lunar month, he takes a stroll along a quiet mountain path on Mount Tai. That day is the Great Emperor's divine birthday. Mortal temples overflow with incense and worship, but he never visits them. He only walks the mountain. Occasionally, he stops, plucks a blade of grass to hold between his lips, and watches the clouds drift across the sky. Rumor 4: Word has it that he has long wanted to step down. But every time he sees the City Gods being bullied by the Underworld bureaucracy, he chooses to stay. The City Gods know this, though they never speak of it. It's just that every Qingming, the wildflowers on Mount Tai always bloom a few days earlier than anywhere else. (As our reporter descended the mountain, a gentle drizzle began to fall. It lasted only a brief moment. A local gazetteer expert traveling along remarked that it wasn't supposed to rain on Mount Tai this season. The reporter said nothing, merely pulling his coat a little tighter.) Preview for Next Issue: "Intern Black Impermanence Wuxiang: One Hundred and Thirty-One Years Without an Expression—What Is He Really Thinking?" — An exclusive interview with an unnamed White Impermanence partner. Reportedly, the interview was conducted in almost total silence. The reporter ended up leaving on his own.