Chapter 812: Chapter 536: The Third Eye on the Forehead
"Three to five years is also fine. Although we’ve gained the advantage in the war, to completely eradicate the Demon Palace will take at least ten years. The sooner we take care of the Blood Vine, the sooner we can reduce our losses."
The Northern Guardian King’s eyes were filled with expectation.
Lu Chenzhou thought of something, then asked:
"President, among the Four Emperors, isn’t there one skilled in curse techniques? Does the Council know its current hiding place?"
The Northern Guardian King shook his head.
"Since the war began, the You Tong Demon Emperor has never appeared. The reason we know of its existence is that after it kills our Grandmasters with a curse, it uses blood to form the characters for ’You Tong’, deliberately provoking and angering us."
...
The next day.
Lu Chenzhou cultivated at home.
His clone was hiding somewhere in Su City. With his current telekinesis, he could almost cover the whole city if he exerted himself.
Every three days, he would perform the Dragon Roar and Tiger Roar Technique and, together with Old Man Hanshan, take turns acting as a radar.
In this way, they could maximize the reduction of demon infiltration into Su City, minimizing losses.
Of course, nothing is foolproof, and incidents of demons harming people within the city still occurred from time to time. Regarding this, they did their best; to completely eliminate such events was unrealistic.
On this day.
An old, black and skinny man in a hemp robe, stooped and barefoot, arrived at Su City. Old Man Hanshan and Lu Chenzhou greeted him.
"Greetings, Great Emperor."
The visitor was none other than Emperor Hanu, currently the strongest in Po Suo, stationed in the Human World on the orders of the Eternal Immortal.
With the Council’s Daoist Soldiers, Arrays, and many other trump cards, as long as a powerful Demon Venerable doesn’t appear, a single Spirit Emperor is enough to intimidate even Seventh Realm enemies.
The Spirit Emperor can manifest their sacred presence across distance.
This makes them the best candidate for saving the field.
Of course, the one before them was the Emperor’s projection.
Emperor Hanu said, "I heard that you want to learn a curse technique, so I made the trip to personally teach you."
...
"Eye of Calamity?"
Lu Chenzhou stared at the Jade Scroll’s projection, seeing countless mysterious spells and True Words forming a model of an eyeball.
Emperor Hanu said:
"This is the ultimate skill that Spiritual Eyes Tala spent her life developing. The Way of Curses in Po Suo is considered unorthodox, difficult to get started, and even more difficult to master. No one other than Tala has ever researched it."
Lu Chenzhou nodded slightly.
Emperor Hanu said, "To save time, I’ll directly impart my insights to you, helping you get started quickly, but after that, I won’t be able to help with your cultivation.
I hear your comprehension is astonishing. Let’s see who can master the ’Eye of Calamity’ first—me or you."
The old man smiled confidently.
As a Heavenly Realm powerhouse, his comprehension, talent, and fortune were all peerless, with a pride befitting his standing.
The Northern Guardian King having a junior compete with him roused a flicker of competitiveness as well. With his higher cultivation and broader vision, he could make up for any gap in comprehension.
Who could master it first was still uncertain.
Lu Chenzhou smiled slightly.
"Very well. Thank you, senior."
Emperor Hanu raised his hand, and wisps of Dao Essence wove together, constructing an illusion before Lu Chenzhou’s eyes.
There stood an old woman with a third eye on her brow.
It was Spiritual Eyes Tala.
"This third eye is the Heart Eye—it’s not a physical one. Many Sixth Realm cultivators in Po Suo practice this. Curse techniques, Nightmare Victory, or many illusion pupil arts are all inseparable from the Heart Eye. I’ll also pass on the method of refining the Heart Eye to you.
Among the Sixth Realm heart cultivators I know, the fastest to refine the Heart Eye was the Heart’s Mediator, who took a whole month. Opening the Heart Eye isn’t hard, but haste makes waste—go slowly..."
Before he finished speaking—
"Uh—"
Emperor Hanu fell silent.
His brows lifted; his mouth was slightly open.
In the moment he was imparting his insight, a vast spiritual power was gathering at Lu Chenzhou’s brow like a swirling vortex, sucking in even the surrounding light.
Buzz————
An invisible ripple spread out.
The vortex began to solidify.
In the end, a vertically oriented pupil about an inch wide took shape—vivid, lifelike, as dark and deep as a black hole.
"This Heart Eye is truly marvelous."
Lu Chenzhou opened his eyes, clicking his tongue in wonder.
From the perspective of the Heart Eye, the skinny old man before him was shrouded in gray mist—he couldn’t see through it—but when he looked to the other Myriad Phenomena Dao teachers and students, he could see all sorts of brilliant radiance.
"These are emotional waves from the soul itself. No wonder the Po Suo Emperor could instantly see the thoughts of all beings. These ripples themselves convey information."
Lu Chenzhou felt wonder surge in his heart.
"Combining this with my ’Listening to the World’s Sound’ makes it even more effective—everything in the city will be clear at a glance."
Suddenly, his gaze sharpened.
...
Fangshan High School.
Decades had passed, and Yu Zheng was still teaching, and with his Master Cultivation, had become principal of Fangshan.
Deep inside Yu Zheng’s heart, a jet-black, eerie seed was stealthily lurking—something even he himself couldn’t sense.
A wave swept by.
A light breeze passed.
Yu Zheng abruptly collapsed to the ground and fell into a deep sleep.
...
Myriad Phenomena Dao.
Lu Chenzhou made a capture in the void.
A jet-black seed struggled incessantly.
The shriveled old man’s expression shifted slightly.
"This is a Heart Demon Seed."
Su City was not his territory, so he had not activated his Heart Eye to probe the spirits of the populace, but he hadn’t expected Lu Chenzhou to not only master Heart Eye Skill in an instant, but also use the Heart Eye to enter others’ spiritual worlds.
This was on par with a veteran Spirit King. No wonder the Northern Guardian King wanted him to cultivate curses—his comprehension was indeed terrifying.
Lu Chenzhou’s face grew cold.
"These Evil Gods are truly disgusting."
He guessed that Yu Zheng must have been invaded by Evil God power when exploring a ruin or during a battle, without noticing.
The Heart Demon Seed doesn’t affect a Martial Artist instantly—it hides, absorbing spirit power to grow, then stirs up trouble when the Martial Artist attempts a breakthrough. If the Heart Realm and Martial Arts Will are insufficient, at best one merely loses control, but at worst, like Master Golden Light, becomes a clone of the Evil God.
Such sleeper agents are impossible to defend against.
Because they retain all of the host’s memories, do not practice sorcery, and have no demonic aura leaking out.
He used the Great Wilderness Prison Demon Hand to crush the Heart Demon Seed. Black smoke drifted out, faintly forming a stunningly beautiful woman’s face.
"Mother of Forgetting Woes."
Lu Chenzhou understood instantly.
It really was Her.
The Mother was skilled in illusions and the spirit; the world’s countless ghosts were all her creation. The most Heart Demon Seeds left behind were hers.
On the Martial Arts Tree, a new Martial Arts appeared.
[Eye of Calamity: First Layer (1%)]
Emperor Hanu’s voice rang out.
"The ’Eye of Calamity’ has six layers. To curse a peak Sixth Realm enemy, you need at least the sixth layer—and even then, the success rate wouldn’t be high.
Therefore, before achieving Perfection, don’t waste chances to curse. This secret technique, which can fell powerful foes, also has huge backlash. Each use—depending on your target’s level—can at best cost you Essence Blood or spiritual origin, and at worst cost years from your lifespan."
Lu Chenzhou nodded.
"Thank you for the warning, senior."
Emperor Hanu’s figure broke apart and vanished.
Lu Chenzhou then used the Heart Eye to scan the people of Su City again, discovering several more who were hosting Heart Demon Seeds—each having some connection with him.
"So they’re targeting me after all. If I hadn’t just mastered the Heart Eye, these hidden threats would have eventually erupted."
...
Next,
Lu Chenzhou added ’Eye of Calamity’ to his training regimen. With his foundation in the Lantuo Heart Sutra and his Immaculate State of Mind, he steadily and swiftly advanced through the first four layers.
In half a year, he mastered them.
The progress slowed from the fifth to the sixth layer, but he estimated another half-year would be enough. But even the sixth layer was just the beginning; to be effective, he would need to train it to the sixth layer’s limit.
Even then, the success rate would still be low.
The Blood Vine Demon Venerable’s cultivation was simply too high.
Curse killing was always strong bullying the weak.
To defeat the strong with the weak? Nearly impossible.
There might be a chance of success, but before that, one would consume endless spirit and lifespan, courting self-destruction.
On this day,
Lu Chenzhou gazed at his brow.
A crack split open, and a black pupil appeared.
The pupil spun unceasingly.
In his view, he seemed to see faint, wispy threads emerging from the tops of all people’s heads.
He began to comprehend something.
"The essence of curse techniques is to use a certain medium to connect one’s spiritual power to the target—an extremely specialized spiritual attack. Lower-class curse techniques use blood, hair, or other bodily materials as the medium; but such mediums are often limited and of little use against the strong.
High-class curse techniques use the entangled threads of causality between enemy and self as the medium. These threads of causality run through all living beings, like the lines of a great web.
Therefore, to practice curse techniques, the most important thing is to sort out the tangled threads of causality among billions, to find the path between the pair, and channel spiritual power along the thread of causality.
The difficulty of ’Eye of Calamity’ lies here—the Way of Cause and Effect is exceedingly complex; it is an upper-level Dao."
After understanding the principle.
Lu Chenzhou began studying the Way of Causality.
No Unity of Heaven and Man.
No Demon Emperor soul swallowing.
This time, it would depend entirely on his own comprehension.
Day after day passed.
The Wanbang Council steadily pressed forward with the plan to wipe out the Demon Palace, both sides locked in endless struggle.
Su City continued to suffer some harassment attacks from Demon Palace, all fended off by Lu Chenzhou’s clone and Old Man Hanshan.
The Blood Vine Demon Emperor’s clones continued to stir up trouble across the country, springing up like weeds, only to rise again as soon as they’re cut down.
Mo Yun Demon Emperor, on the other hand, had fallen into silence.
No one knew what scheme he was brewing.
Originally, Lu Chenzhou had wanted to test his speed.
...
In the blink of an eye,
it was already January 64th year.
A desolate planet.
The Blood Vine Demon Emperor looked radiant.
"All this time, Lu Chenzhou still hasn’t come for me. I really overestimated him. I’ve devoured so much blood food recently—the time when rivers of blood will flow is not far off."
Her aura was rising ever higher.
Once she overcame tribulation, she would become a Demon Venerable.
"I wonder how things are going with You Tong?"
...
A month later.
On another planet.
A strange being with a huge head and small body, toad-like in form, hovered at the peak of a ring-shaped mountain, eyes closed, robes fluttering in the wind.
Before him was a crystal ball, from whose surface endless threads wafted out, stretching into the void.
Buzz—
A force of absolute strength swept out, distorting the Void, the ring-shaped mountain constantly collapsing beneath the might of its spiritual power.
A projection appeared.
Its head was massive, mouth split to both cheeks, body coiling like a snake, each segment strung together like candied hawthorne, resembling a centipede; upon closer inspection, each segment was a half-transparent, multi-colored planet—dead, eerie.
Lord Toad—the 37th God revived from the Forbidden Zone.
The most recently awakened among them.
"My lord, I’ve advanced."
"The witches say Lu Chenzhou is hard to kill. Today, try out a curse on him—see how deep his foundation is." Lord Toad’s pupils flickered with strange light. "No one can escape the bonds of causality."