Rescue Successful

Kenjaku jumped down from the tree, turned, and quietly left the scene.

After observing everything tonight, he was extremely satisfied with the results.

Cursed Spirit Manipulation, this special ability capable of endlessly devouring and enslaving monsters, was practically the perfect experimental tool tailor-made for his millennium-long plan.

Taking over Suguru Geto's body had officially become his highest-priority next step.

As for Lu Ping and Kamo Chitsubaki, who had unexpectedly entered the game,

one possessed the Ten Shadows Technique, while the other possessed Blood Manipulation.

Though these two variables had somewhat disrupted the rhythm, they were still within an acceptable margin of error.

Over his long years, Kenjaku had not failed to deal with Ten Shadows Sorcerers.

He knew their nature all too well.

Those who inherited the Zenin Clan's supreme legacy were all like gas tanks ready to explode at the slightest spark.

They did not respond to tactical pressure at all.

Whenever they encountered an enemy they could not defeat, or the situation turned even slightly unfavorable, those madmen's first instinct was never a strategic retreat.

Instead, they were very likely to flip the table outright.

The previous Ten Shadows Sorcerer seemed to have flipped the Gojo Clan head's table during a sparring match, and the two had perished together.

Once the pressure rose, Mahoraga inherent to their technique was like an unstable nuclear bomb. Whoever got near it was unlucky.

For that reason, unless he possessed an absolute trump card for victory or some special means to instantly erase Mahoraga, Kenjaku would never provoke a Ten Shadows Sorcerer on the brink of collapse.

The weaker the opponent became, the farther away he stayed.

He had countless opportunities to make mistakes, while his opponents only had one life.

As long as he had enough time, with his thousand years of experience and foundation, no one in this world could survive to the end of his game.

If I can't guarantee victory, can't I just outlive you?

As for that little girl from the Kamo Clan who used Blood Manipulation, she interested him even less.

The identity he had abandoned before this one had been an ancestor of the Kamo Clan who conducted a series of inhumane human experiments.

Those "Cursed Womb: Death Paintings," later known as Special Grade Curses, were merely one product of his idle experiments.

No one understood the limits of Blood Manipulation better than he did.

Everything was within his expectations. There was nothing new about it.

Only that boy named Lu Ping.

His strength had clearly not yet crossed the threshold of Grade 1 Sorcerer, yet under the extreme danger and crushing pressure just now, he had displayed astonishing resilience and calmness.

He had not chosen to self-destruct the instant he fell under the illusion technique's control. That emotional control alone surpassed ninety percent of Ten Shadows Sorcerers throughout history.

Even more rare was how terrifyingly solid the boy's cursed technique fundamentals were. The seasoned experience he showed while weaving through tactics even surpassed that of many veteran Grade 2 Sorcerers who had spent half their lives struggling on the edge of death.

Given time, he would surely become someone formidable.

Kenjaku narrowed his eyes slightly, and a cold glint flashed through the pupils beneath his stitches.

He had a powerful premonition that this boy, who never played by the rules, would very likely become the greatest obstacle to his future takeover of Suguru Geto.

If he found an opportunity to act in the future, he had to make thorough preparations in advance and send this potentially troublesome fellow far away.

The schemer atop the mountain was still calculating the killing game of the future.

Meanwhile, at the foot of the mountain,

Lu Ping and the others had already crossed stretches of ruins and reached the edge of an extremely secluded patch of wasteland behind the village.

The area was overgrown with weeds and littered with shattered rubble.

The boy suddenly stopped.

He closed his eyes and guided the Three Corpses dormant within him to spread their senses outward.

His keen perception of cursed energy fluctuations allowed him to precisely lock onto an extremely faint yet unusually steady energy source within this chaotic field.

Lu Ping opened his eyes and walked straight toward a dry well in the middle of the wasteland.

Several heavy stone slabs had been haphazardly placed over the well's mouth, and moss covered its surroundings.

He reached out, effortlessly pushed aside the slabs, and leaned over to peer into the dark depths below.

By the faint light, the sight at the bottom of the dry well was fully visible.

Suguru Geto, the Grade 1 Sorcerer hailed by the outside world as a once-in-a-millennium talent and burdened with the title of the strongest,

had his eyes tightly shut, his breathing even and deep, his chest rising and falling in a steady rhythm.

A few soft, defenseless snores could even be faintly heard.

Without hesitation, Lu Ping leaped into the depths of the dry well.

The light at the bottom was extremely dim.

That top genius in whom the outside world had placed such high hopes was currently sprawled in the mud.

His sleeping posture was remarkably peaceful.

Lu Ping reached out with his right hand and patted the black-haired sorcerer, who was covered in mud.

Suguru Geto groggily opened his eyes.

He instinctively wiped the mud from his face.

After seeing who stood before him, the favored genius visibly froze for half a second.

"Good evening. Slept well? Want to keep the music going and keep dancing?"

Lu Ping delivered the teasing remark in an even tone.

The poorly timed greeting left the other man feeling awkward.

Suguru Geto gave a wry smile.

He did not refuse the hand the boy offered. Using it for support, he rose to his feet and dusted himself off.

"Thank you. I owe you a tremendous favor this time."

The two then left the bottom of the well and exchanged information briefly.

The overall sequence was more or less the same as Lu Ping's earlier deductions.

As the wielder of a cursed technique with Special Grade potential, this promising sorcerer had enjoyed smooth sailing during the early stages of the extermination.

He had steamrolled his way through with his powerful Cursed Spirit Manipulation.

It was only after being drawn into the domain of the not-yet-fully-formed Serpent God Curse Embryo that the situation reversed.

It had been an enclosed space with extraordinarily complicated rules.

He had expended tremendous effort and cursed energy within it, exhausting every trump card before forcibly tearing open an exit.

Yet the moment he stepped beyond the domain's edge,

at the instant his mental guard was at its weakest, he walked straight into the illusion technique set by the Mountain Spider without any defense.

"The moment I escaped was the moment I got hit. The last time I was this unlucky was the last time."

Suguru Geto brushed the mud from his sleeve, his voice carrying helplessness and self-mockery.

Listening to you was like listening to you.

Lu Ping gave the precise assessment inwardly.

Still, being able to stand here intact was already a blessing amid this chain of killing traps.

Kamo Chitsubaki led the way ahead, heading toward the village entrance.

Seeing her companion unharmed, the heart she had been holding in suspense finally settled.

Suguru Geto's actual combat strength had not been substantially weakened. He had merely been forced to sleep for a long time.

Instead, it was Lu Ping beside her whose condition made her feel inexplicably worried.

Her gaze fell upon the boy's somewhat slender back.

He had carried out prolonged, high-intensity, multi-threaded operations at the limit.

Unlike the Six Eyes constitution required by the Gojo Clan's [Limitless Technique], or the Reverse Cursed Technique suited to the Kamo Clan's [Blood Manipulation],

the [Ten Shadows Technique] was inherently the most cursed-energy-demanding technique among the Three Great Families.

Controlling powerful shikigami in battle, even fusing multiple shikigami to create higher-level beings, required an enormous supply of cursed energy.

Prolonged battles against stronger opponents could very likely overload and damage a sorcerer's cursed energy circuits.

If an irreversible hidden injury was left behind, even the efficiency of activating his cursed technique would be affected in the future.