Chapter 335: Legendary Evolution Path: Three Faces As One, Becoming Hannya! Onmyo Grand Master Nanjo Emi, The Great Purge
【Evolution Path One（Super Epic）: Mask of Wrathful Hannya】
【Super Epic Task·Mask of Wrathful Hannya】
【Completion Condition: Make “Demon Incarnation·Red Hannya” complete the Heavenly Path Trial, with rank reaching Four-Star.】
【—The world’s anger belongs to you.】
Shangshan Che stared at this remarkably brief “completion condition.”
The task completion condition for this evolution path seemed unexpectedly simple?
As long as he normally completed the ascension to Ghost God, he could turn the Red Hannya, which was everywhere on the streets and had been cut down countless times by the Onmyo-ryo Special Affairs Office…
Into the “hidden incarnation” Mask of Wrathful Hannya that he had never heard of before!
Even if his Mask of Wrathful Hannya was not as good as the one blessed by Mount Oe that was slain by Shuten Doji, its upper limit among Wild Gods should not be low.
For the Half-Star incarnation he drew at the very beginning to have a chance to reach this level, Shangshan Che was already very satisfied.
After all, he had more than just this one “Hannya” incarnation.
But the evolution path did not stop there.
Shangshan Che shifted his gaze downward and saw the prompt with an even deeper color below—
【Evolution Path Two（Legendary）: Red, White, Laughing!】
【Legendary Task·Red, White, Laughing】
【Completion Condition One: Make “Demon Incarnation·Red Hannya” complete the Heavenly Path Trial, with rank reaching Four-Star.】
【Completion Condition Two: Obtain the key evolution items “Resentful Hannya Mask” and “Envious Hannya Mask,” and use them on “Demon Incarnation·Red Hannya” before its rank reaches Four-Star.】
【—Wrathful Red, Envious White, Resentful Laughing! Three faces as one, that is Hannya!】
This was the second Legendary Task Shangshan Che had received since “Betsuri Kiri.”
However, the completion difficulty of the two was somewhat different.
The Betsuri Kiri task seemed to require slaying a Ghost God and also a Wild God, which he could not do now, whereas the Legendary evolution task for the Red Hannya right in front of him…
Shangshan Che blinked and looked at the additional “Completion Condition Two.”
Compared to “normally” ascending to Mask of Wrathful Hannya, he also needed to obtain “Resentful Hannya Mask” and “Envious Hannya Mask”?
Thinking normally, if Mask of Wrathful Hannya was the evolution direction of Red Hannya, then these two should respectively be the evolution directions of Laughing Hannya and White Hannya.
And in this “Red, White, Laughing” Legendary Task, he needed to get all three masks and do so before the Hannya incarnation ascended to Ghost God!
That would be truly completing the task.
It also perfectly matched the situation of his Hannya incarnation starting from the weak Laughing Hannya and coming all the way here.
If he could do it, by the time the Hannya incarnation ascended to Ghost God, let alone ordinary Ghost Gods, even the famed Mask of Wrathful Hannya might not be his match in one clash.
But the key problem was—
He still needed to gather the Resentful and Envious masks, which were on the same level as the Wrathful… And the Wrathful Hannya Mask itself was something he luckily obtained by chance from Shuten Doji.
It was worth noting that the Wrathful Hannya Mask had burst out from a Great Wild God slain by Shuten Doji in the Heian Period.
Great Wild God… probably even stronger than Factory Owner Z in full strength.
Even if a hundred Shangshan Ches were tied together, it probably wouldn’t be enough for a Great Wild God to blow away in one breath.
Moreover, the Eternal World was so vast, and rare varieties like Wrathful and Resentful Hannya were probably impossible to find even if he tried!
Against beings with high “status,” the Black Skin Person Book might not work; buying intel from Katsumi would require Soul Ash that wasn’t that abundant yet…
So, let’s look at the second method.
【Completion Condition Two（Optional）: Accumulate enough “Hate” and “Jealousy,” and find a Master Level or higher Blacksmith to forge an exclusive Hannya Mask for you.】
【Note: When beings with self-consciousness resent or doubtingly envy you, “Hate Value” and “Jealousy Value” will continuously increase until maxed out.】
Next to the optional prompt floated a black Hannya Mask and a white Hannya Mask.
But both were blurry, just as the prompt said, to be filled with Hate and Jealousy.
Although the required amount should be astonishingly large, it was still far more reliable than finding two Great Wild God-level Hannya in the Eternal World and then going to slay them.
This one it is!
【You have selected Evolution Path Two—Red, White, Laughing!】
The prompt appeared, and the two blurry black and white masks fell into Shangshan Che’s hands.
【Hate·0%】
【Jealousy·0%】
The black mask was Hate, the white mask was Jealousy.
Just as Shangshan Che wanted to use Hundred-Eyed Demon’s Eye more to study the two masks, he saw the number on the white mask twitch.
【Jealousy·0.11%】
?
Shangshan Che was stunned.
In just a few seconds, the progress bar had increased by a little over 0.1%?
Was this really like playing a game?
At this growth rate, it probably wouldn’t take two or three days for the Jealousy Mask’s progress bar to reach 100%.
Shangshan Che stared at the continuously growing progress bar on the Jealousy Mask, then looked at the motionless Hate Mask beside it, and fell into thought.
It shouldn’t be a BUG, but rather someone—or rather, many people—were envying him right now.
After a good while, a look of realization flashed in Shangshan Che’s eyes.
If he guessed correctly, this was probably due to the Seed Battle earlier.
In the Seed Battle, he took the Champion position, went undefeated from start to finish, and plus Lili Zi publicly declaring sovereignty on the arena in front of so many audience members and cameras…
The epitome of a “life winner.”
In this era with terrifying information dissemination efficiency, Shangshan Che estimated that at least several million, or even tens of millions, knew of him and had seen him.
Even if only one-tenth or fewer “envied” him, under this massive base, the number of people envying him and wanting to become him was countless.
Naturally, the Jealousy Mask’s progress bar rose so quickly.
This was truly an unexpected delight.
Shangshan Che couldn’t help but smile relaxedly—unexpectedly, before he even started thinking of a way, half the problem was already solved.
Wasn’t this much faster than going to slay some Great Wild God?
However, the Hate Mask’s progress bar was practically crawling like a turtle, hundreds of times slower than Jealousy.
Shangshan Che thought that it was probably because during his Seed Battle, he didn’t do anything bad and only acted like a good person…
Tsk, if only he had trash-talked more and acted like a villain.
Once away from the big stage of the Seed Battle live stream, it would be hard to incite emotions from millions afterward.
Moreover, Shangshan Che speculated that this “Hate” level had to be as intense as “wanting to kill Shangshan Che.”
In the Mortal Realm, ordinary people generally couldn’t develop such emotions toward a complete stranger.
It was impossible for him to go around crazily saying “I don’t eat beef” and then have someone film and expose him… How would he mix in the Mortal Realm after that.
In the Eternal World, aside from the Demon Guide Association lurking in the undercurrents and the Factory Owner who could crush him instantly and might hold some grudge, ordinary demons wouldn’t even have this concept.
But the Sengoku Period was different.
If he went to the Sengoku Period, Shangshan Che could completely make other Daimyo want to dismember him, and with some small tricks, make the civilians and soldiers under them want to stab him to death.
This wasn’t hard to do, and the consequences were easy to clean up—have Imagawa Yoshimoto wipe out the other Daimyo and leaders, then after a few decades, everything would be as if nothing happened.
Not bad, not bad.
Shangshan Che added one more goal to his next Sengoku trip.
The prompts didn’t stop there.
【Because you have already used the key evolution item “Mask of Wrathful Hannya” on “Demon Incarnation·Red Hannya,” your demon talent—Ghost God, Bloodthirsty Crimson has been strengthened!】
【At the same time, your body has become even tougher due to the influence of the Mask of Wrathful Hannya, your Physique +5!】
A surge of power that was abundant even for Three-and-a-half Star surged within Shangshan Che’s body, then was expertly brought under his control.
Shangshan Che glanced at his Physique attribute.
【Physique: 105+5=110】
He then looked at the talents in Red Hannya’s panel and found that “Ghost God” and “Bloodthirsty Crimson” only had a “+” added at the end, with no change in the talent descriptions.
They were probably just enhanced in effect, without major qualitative changes.
But this was enough; after Physique reached 105 points, these 5 Physique points, plus the strengthening of two commonly used talents.
This bit of power left in the crevice of a Great Wild God’s finger was not insignificant.
If he really gathered the Resentful, Envious, and Wrathful three masks, and then let this Red Hannya ascend to Ghost God, who knew what kind of spectacle would appear!
In the vast Eternal World today, a Hannya that could spontaneously gather these three masks—forget big talk, there definitely weren’t many, if any at all.
Putting away the black and white masks, Shangshan Che returned to the Mortal Realm.
Minamoto Family guest residence.
Nishaku and her group outside felt nothing, but Qing, who had been marveling at modern high-tech and how everyone could eat their fill, shifted his attention.
He looked toward the inner room.
—In just a few minutes, Lord Shangshan’s body had grown stronger again?
Shangshan Che sensed it and looked toward Qing through the half-open wooden door, smiling.
—Fine, this was good news.
Qing saluted him, then returned to his Wikipedia deep dive.
Shangshan Che took out his mobile phone and was surprised to find he could still connect to the internet at the Minamoto Family.
This was good too, so he didn’t have to leave early.
He was going to Fushimi Inari Shrine next, so he could first ask the netizen who recommended it to him【Work to Die】, and Sister Nanjo—they were both from the Nanjō Family after all.
He could also ask Sister Nanjo about the current situation in Hokkaido.
Opening LINE, Shangshan Che saw that【Work to Die】’s profile picture was gray, offline.
Sister Nanjo’s profile picture was lit up, but she hadn’t updated her status in a long time.
Just as Shangshan Che was about to open the chat interface, his finger paused slightly.
【Onmyo Grand Master·Nanjo Emi】
Sister Nanjo had directly gone from Onmyo Major Official to Onmyo Grand Master?
Shangshan Che hadn’t paid attention to the Special Affairs Office’s power structure, but if based on the Onmyo-ryo… shouldn’t there be【Onmyo Junior Officer】 in between?
In other words, Sister Nanjo had skipped two levels at once?
In plainer terms, she went from “district head” to “high official” in one leap?
The Special Affairs Office didn’t have many “provinces” under it, and hers was a remote frontier “big province.”
Probably now, Nanjo Emi’s position in the Special Affairs Office was only slightly below Tokyo’s central Five Person Council.
“No wonder she rushed off without even saying goodbye after I passed out.”
Shangshan Che typed, smiling: “Turns out she had to hurry off to become a big official.”
【Moon Sand Sauce: Sister Nanjo, how does it feel to be Onmyo Grand Master? What’s the situation like in Hokkaido?】
He waited a bit, and just as he was about to put down the phone, a voice message popped up.
Voice message?
Shangshan Che was a bit puzzled.
Nanjo Emi usually rarely used voice messages when talking with him.
He opened the voice message.
Nanjo Emi’s characteristic cold, official tone during work hours came through: “Nothing much, just that the Special Affairs Office branch here is a bit far from Tokyo…
Because of lack of oversight, they teamed up with the local government, those officials who haven’t recognized the situation, and did some stupid things.
Small matters, no need to worry.”
But beyond the coldness, Shangshan Che could hear the exhaustion and fatigue in it—probably hadn’t rested properly for days again.
“As for Onmyo Grand Master? I didn’t really notice… It’s just little workhorse turning into big workhorse. There are pitifully few people here, everything has to be done personally.
Remember to tell Lan and Manatsu, they can hurry over in a couple days, wages and benefits have been greatly improved, plus expense-paid trips, expense-paid snacks.
Junior Officer, Major Official level positions open for them to take on, if work isn’t finished they can squeeze others too.”
Nanjo Emi sent two more voice messages, but there were some strange noises in them, making her words a bit unclear.
Shangshan Che listened and laughed.
Whatever benefits improvement, position selection, he couldn’t hear clearly… These two sentences from Sister Nanjo reeked of two chilling big words!
—Overtime!
—Overtime! Overtime! Overtime!
He couldn’t burst this bubble, because Nanjo Emi was a true, round-the-clock Special Affairs Office corporate slave who wanted to slack off but had to serve the people.
If two more familiar little workhorses were sent over, the people of Hokkaido would truly be blessed.
【Moon Sand Sauce: Got it.】
Just as he was about to put down the phone to not disturb Nanjo Emi and instead ask the netizen about Fushimi Inari Shrine, another voice message popped up.
“No wonder demons are rampant here, supernatural phenomena are turning into disasters in the fringe areas…”
Besides that, the “squelch squelch” background noise in the voice was clearer.
【Moon Sand Sauce: Isn’t the second tide still far off? Demons and supernatural phenomena overflowing? Sister Nanjo, what’s really going on in Hokkaido?】
“Hm? Oh, I forgot to hang up the phone…”
“Whatever, it’s fine for Shangshan Jun to know about this a day or two early.”
Squelch!
This time, the sound of some liquid spraying was exceptionally clear, exceptionally close!
Nanjo Emi’s voice came faintly: “No big deal, I’m just swinging the blade from top to bottom.”
“Swinging the blade, sword swings, exercising, got it.”
Squelch!
Squelch! Squelch!
Squelch! Squelch! Squelch!
The BUG in yesterday’s chapter where Nanjo Emi revealed her identity has been fixed, thanks to readers’ reminders
