Shen Mu quickly mastered the craft of steering the paper boat. The little vessel was, you might say, the fastest thing that flew in all of Youdu; with it, he could go in search of his mother, held prisoner somewhere in Youdu.

"By the time the Lord of Earth and Heavenly Venerable Yu find out, it will already be too late!"

He stood at the bow, gazing into the endless dark. The little boat drifted through that darkness, looking utterly forlorn.

Yet Youdu was not wholly dark. There was molten rock as well, blood-red, streaming down the surface of the Lord of Earth's body. The Lord of Earth was so vast that his skin was like armor forged of incomparably hard stone; the seams between the rocks were like the grain of that skin, and lava, crimson as blood, flowed through them.

Shen Mu urged the boat nearer. Seen from afar, that rocky hide revealed nothing, but up close it bristled with peaks like blades and spears and halberds, all coarse and jagged; and there were enormous demon-beasts and demon-gods bearing palaces upon their backs, threading their way among the mountain ranges.

And countless green-skinned imps swarmed around the palaces borne on those backs, jabbering and shouting as they went to war with another horde of imps, slaughtering one another until the blood ran in rivers.

The green-skinned imp was a kind of creature found only in Youdu, though Fengdu had imps of this sort as well: blue-faced and fanged, their faces indigo. Some imps stood three or five times the height of a man, while others did not reach past a man's calf, and they ran very fast.

Among these imps there were Ghost Kings too, beings of tremendous power, the match of gods and demons.

War of this kind was to be seen everywhere in Youdu; even the demon-beasts and demon-gods joined in. The demon-beasts and demon-gods who bore palaces on their backs possessed immense strength, but their weapons were crude in the extreme: they snapped the peaks off the Lord of Earth's skin, and these, like cudgels of monstrous girth bristling with spikes, they swung and smashed about in every direction.

Sometimes Shen Mu would see several primordial spirits of gods and demons emerge from the palaces on the backs of those demon-beasts and demon-gods, to work their arts before the halls, or to unleash divine powers and command divine weapons as they battled the foe across the way.

"Youdu is a clamorous place indeed."

Shen Mu watched, exhilarated. Passing over a battlefield, he halted the little boat and called out in a ringing voice: "Fellow Daoists!"

Both sides in the battle were startled by the sound of his voice. Countless green-skinned imps hastily ceased their killing, and the demon-beasts on either side hurriedly stayed their hands, leaning on their clubs hewn from mountain peaks as they lifted their heads to gaze up at the little boat.

From the palaces on both sides, primordial spirits of gods and demons flew out and stood in the air, and crying out a great salute, they bowed to the little boat and said: "Lord, we are unworthy of the words 'Fellow Daoist'!"

"Is the Lord here to kill us? Is the Lord of Earth going to eat us?"

The two gods and demons who had been locked in battle suddenly fell into each other's arms, clutching their heads and weeping bitterly, choking out: "Everyone else fights and fights, scrambling for territory. Why is it that when our turn comes, we are to be eaten..."

Shen Mu said hastily: "Don't cry, either of you. The Lord of Earth does not mean to eat you. I have only come to ask the way; once I have asked, I will go, and you may go on slaughtering each other."

The two primordial spirits of gods and demons hastily let go of one another.

Shen Mu said: "Where is the place where the gravest prisoners are held?"

The two primordial spirits of gods and demons breathed a sigh of relief and said: "In the Jade Lock Pass of Youdu, beneath the feet of the Lord of Earth."

Shen Mu thanked them and said: "Everywhere along my road I have seen war. Why is Youdu in such chaos?"

The two primordial spirits exchanged a glance, and each saw astonishment in the other's eyes. One of them, the primordial spirit of a demon god, said cautiously: "Has the Lord forgotten what happened twenty-two years ago? Twenty-two years ago, that existence whose name cannot be spoken fought its way down from the Nine-Bend Corner, through one layer of the Yellow Springs after another, who knows how many; it slew who knows how many titans, devoured who knows how many titans. We too are but seizing on the fact that there are so many masterless lands, to contend for a scrap of territory and settle a few old scores."

The other primordial spirit nodded hastily.

"An existence whose name cannot be spoken? There is a being as terrible as that in Youdu?" Doubtful, Shen Mu urged the boat onward and departed.

Only when the two gods and demons saw the little boat recede into the distance did they set their hearts at ease and say: "How strange. Why did the Lord ask us the way? He is the Heavenly Benevolent Sage King; how could he not know the Jade Lock Pass of Youdu? Not know the Little Tyrant of Youdu either?"

"Never mind him. Kill! Cut down those bastards across the way, and thirty ghost beauties are your reward!"

"To think that in life I took you for a brother, and you made advances on my wife! Help me kill this bastard!"

And the two sides fell to fighting again.

Shen Mu flew on downward along the body of the Lord of Earth. The farther down he flew, the heavier the demonic aura of Youdu grew, and the stronger its demonic nature became.

What he saw along the way made his heart pound and his flesh crawl. Youdu was at war everywhere, slaughter so fierce it darkened heaven and earth; and many powerful ghosts that made the heart quail were stirring up trouble, burning, killing, and plundering wherever they went.

"That nameless existence in Youdu twenty-two years ago must have done no end of evil, slain who knows how many titans, to have stirred up such turmoil in Youdu, and even now it has not subsided."

A chill ran through Shen Mu's heart. "It seems Youdu is unfathomable too, with hidden dragons and crouching tigers everywhere."

Upon the body of the Lord of Earth there were many ancient cities, where the lights blazed bright and splendid, and where gods and demons were garrisoned.

And there were cities of darkness floating in the air, joined to the cities on the ground by cableways; arrayed one and all in battle formations, they looked grim and murderous.

Shen Mu gave them one distant look and did not draw near. He thought: "Those must be the garrison grounds of the military commissioners whom Lu Li and the other outland Heaven Courts have stationed in Youdu. Best not to approach."

He flew a long way farther, and saw divine cities in the sky battered and tattered, and dark, sunken cities on the ground beaten into ruins. And in these cities, strewn everywhere, were mutilated limbs and bodies, judging by the wounds as though some incomparably savage behemoth had gnawed half of each body away.

A mighty fortress wall barred the way ahead like a rampart of black iron. The wall was exceedingly high. Shen Mu was about to go around it when he suddenly froze: upon that fortress wall were palm prints, one after another, shocking to behold.

The palm prints were immense beyond measure, the fingers like mountain peaks smashed against the wall. Truly, five fingers like five mountains.

There were fist prints upon the fortress as well, and a great many marks left by gods and demons smashed against the wall. On the ground lay demon-gods' bleached bones scattered everywhere, and broken divine weapons and demon-god weapons heaped like mountains.