Chapter Nineteen: The Hex

The City God had already been hacked in two, yet he continued to struggle desperately. From nowhere, a sea of foul, filthy blood emerged, threatening to drag the City God down into its depths bit by bit.

"Ancestral Spirit!"

Wang Zhenling’s heart was filled with alarm. The Danling City God was the ancestral spirit of the Wang clan; how could this be happening? Even as anxiety gripped him, he saw countless ghostly claws latching onto his own body. In an instant, these claws tore chunks of flesh from his frame and stuffed them into their mouths to chew greedily.

Raw, visceral agony flooded his senses. The terror of feeling his own flesh being ripped away and devoured—a dual horror of mind and body—was enough to drive anyone to madness.

Meanwhile, the three assassins who had breached the county office had reached the courtyard where Wang Zhenling resided. Wang Hu and the others, living in constant dread, had bolted the inner and outer gates securely. However, the lead assassin walked up to the gate and struck with lightning speed, driving his blade into the seamless gap of the door. With a single thrust, he snapped the arm-thick deadbolt, and the massive gates swung open with a thunderous crash. The heavy, seemingly impenetrable doors had not held the assassins back for even a moment.

"Protect the Magistrate!" Wang Yong shouted. "I will handle him!"

He, too, was a member of the Danling Wang clan, specifically sent to provide protection for Wang Zhenling due to his strength and courage. Though he knew full well the assassin’s prowess far exceeded his own, there was no possibility of retreating. With a defiant roar, he charged. Yet, when he was still two yards away, he felt a chill in his chest. The assassin had struck from a distance, unleashing a blade aura that spanned nearly six meters, piercing straight through Wang Yong’s chest. Before his body even hit the ground, he was already dead.

The others were devastated, their eyes burning with the desire to fight to the death, but the ghost-like assassin ignored them, bypassing the small fry like Wang Hu and Zhu He to storm toward Wang Zhenling’s study. Seeing Wang Zhenling standing dazedly before the window, the assassin felt a surge of joy, knowing his target was trapped in the illusions of the Soul-Binding Curse. The curse alone was enough to kill; if the victim believed in the events unfolding within the hallucination, they would die just as they would in the vision.

The assassins were merely a double-insurance policy, ensuring that Wang Zhenling would not survive. Seeing him still lost in the illusion, the assassin lunged with his sword. But before he could strike, a flash of red light filled his vision, and he felt as if he had been struck by a charging elephant. He was sent flying backward, his bones shattering with a series of sickening cracks, and by the time he hit the ground, he was little more than a pile of pulp.

The two remaining assassins, who had arrived just a step behind, were stunned. Had Wang Zhenling not been affected by the curse? They could not have known that within Wang Zhenling’s spiritual chamber, the sprouted seed of the Heaven-Reaching Lotus was radiating a soft glow. The entire Lunar Palace was brilliant with light.

*Bamboo shadows brush the steps, yet the dust remains still; the moon wheel passes through, leaving no trace.*

The Lunar Palace had blocked all illusions from entering the spirit chamber. Wang Zhenling’s primordial spirit sat enthroned within, having watched the entire performance from start to finish.

"So, someone is using the Soul-Binding Curse against me..."

Through the connection of his arts, Wang Zhenling looked beyond his consciousness and saw a Taoist priest in black robes, wearing feathers in his hair, placing a straw effigy containing Wang Zhenling’s hair into a bowl filled with fresh blood. The man was murmuring ancient, incomprehensible incantations.

"A Taoist... practicing a curse. No wonder it was able to bypass the protection of the official aura."

Wang Zhenling sneered. With a thought, he channeled the immense, potent aura of the officialdom directly into the straw effigy.

*Boom!*

The blood-drenched effigy suddenly jerked, and the entire ceramic bowl exploded, spraying blood everywhere. At the same moment, the Taoist recoiled as if struck in the face, blood gushing from his nose. A small whirlwind formed above the altar, whipping up the shards of the bowl and the blood, forcing them into the priest's facial orifices. In the blink of an eye, the man’s face was a mangled, bloody mess, and he collapsed, lifeless.

"Hmph, to dare cast such a curse on someone protected by such vast official authority—you were truly seeking your own death."

The Soul-Binding Curse was powerful, but it relied on stealth to kill its victim in ignorance. Had Wang Zhenling been truly unprepared, he might well have died without ever knowing why. But with the Lunar Palace guarding his spirit, the spell had failed to take hold, and the backlash had been inevitable. Under the weight of the massive official aura, no individual caster could hope to survive.

After guiding the official aura to strike back, Wang Zhenling quickly recovered. Seeing the remaining assassins rushing forward, he did not hesitate to draw his primordial spirit out, cloaking it in the official aura. Before he had attained the Out-of-Body state, his spirit chamber had been incomplete and his access to the aura limited. Now, with his chamber expanded to five inches and his spirit doubled in strength, he had reached a level he hadn't even anticipated. He had endured so long in his cultivation, and few could boast the opportunity to continuously siphon aura from the government to refine themselves.

The power his spirit now carried was far more than double what it had been. He surged forward like a high-speed train, colliding with the assassins. How could they possibly withstand it? They were sent flying as if struck by a heavy vehicle.

Red light flickered as his spirit, burning with the intensity of the official aura, slammed into the next assassin. This one had been dueling with Zhu He; had he not been distracted by Wang Zhenling’s sudden display of power, Zhu He would surely have been dead by now. Now, with Wang Zhenling rushing toward him with overwhelming momentum, the assassin could no longer spare a glance for Zhu He. With a look of mad terror, he gripped his sword with both hands and slashed, his blade aura cutting through the air from over ten yards away with unstoppable force.