"Disaster!!"
"Misfortune!!"
"Black aura!!"
The Blind Witch let out a shrill wail and hurled the red shoe in her hand straight into Cicero's face.
"What are you doing?" Cicero cried out in shock. The red shoe fell from his face, leaving a shoeprint behind.
The Blind Witch panted heavily, extending a shriveled finger as her eyeless gaze stared hollowly at Cicero.
Then...
"Eh?" The Blind Witch slowly turned her head, seemingly examining Cicero. She rose from the booth's sofa, barefoot on one foot, and walked over to him.
Her branch-like fingers moved close to Cicero's eyes. He could even see the grime lodged beneath her long, deeply ridged nails, and smell the decayed, sickening, corrupted stench emanating from her body.
"What happened to Cicero?" Libo rose to his feet and walked over to the Blind Witch as well, frowning at Cicero.
But to him, Cicero did not seem to have any problem.
Cicero had already received the God of First Cry's blessing before the altar. Though it was not much, only slightly enhancing his perception, luck, and thinking within a limited range,
a blessing was still a blessing. Even the faintest blessing was protection from the heavens. If anything had gone wrong with him, Libo would definitely have noticed.
Unless the God of First Cry had abandoned Cicero—but that was unlikely. Cicero's way of thinking suited the God of First Cry's will very well. As long as he did not do something idiotic like insulting the God of First Cry, he would not be abandoned.
"Seems... there's nothing wrong." The Blind Witch hesitantly withdrew her finger. "How strange. Why did I just see a black pustule on him? Sticky, greasy, and screaming... It was probably a hallucination."
Cicero stepped back in disgust, putting some distance between himself and the Blind Witch. He truly hated this ugly, shriveled old woman.
But he truly needed her witchcraft.
"What about you, Cicero? What happened?" Libo looked at Cicero. "How much did he lose?"
"More than ten thousand Denar," Cicero said through gritted teeth.
"More than ten thousand Denar? Has that idiot gone mad?"
Libo frowned.
"You and Tull should wrap up the game quickly. The temple's money doesn't grow on trees..."
"He's already won more than ten thousand Denar," Cicero said, his throat working as his face twisted slightly.
Most of it had been won from him.
"...Mad!" It took Libo several seconds to understand what Cicero meant, and he could not help cursing. "Wouldn't that mean he's paid off all his previous debts?"
"He seems to have started believing in some religion. His luck has become freakishly good." Cicero's brow tightened.
His luck had become freakishly good... Libo's first suspicion was not some religion or some god's power, but Lucretius, Zhou Yun's teacher.
Libo looked toward the Blind Witch.
"I'll handle it..." The Blind Witch pointed at Cicero. "Go back to the gambling table."
Cicero nodded slightly, left the booth, and returned to the gambling table.
"Sorry to have kept you waiting." Cicero lowered his head in apology to Tull and Zhou Yun.
Tull merely smiled and waved at Cicero.
Zhou Yun, meanwhile, showed a faint smile. "You look a little constipated?"
Cicero froze for a moment, then forced a smile. "That's what a bad stomach is like."
"You could try changing toilets." Zhou Yun still wore that slightly teasing smile. "I once sat on a golden toilet. The suction was incredibly strong. It felt like it was going to suck out my soul."
"Sure, I'll definitely give it a try if I get the chance." Cicero brushed it off. The cards in his hand flew out, landing before himself, Tull, and Zhou Yun.
Zhou Yun smiled faintly and pushed all his chips onto the gambling table.
Eleven thousand five hundred Denar. One hundred and fifteen chips piled into a small mountain before Zhou Yun, creating quite an oppressive sight.
So bold. Had the Blind Witch already begun exerting her power?
A sliver of hope rose in Cicero's heart.
He flipped over one of his face-up cards... it was a 6.
A perfectly ordinary, relatively safe card.
Tull also revealed his cards at that moment: an 8 and a K, totaling 18.
Tull waved his hand, declining another card, and turned his gaze toward Zhou Yun.
Zhou Yun folded his hands, watching his two cards with a faint smile.
The first card was an A.
Cicero's palms began to sweat.
An A. If the next card was a J, Q, or K, Zhou Yun would hit blackjack and win immediately.
Although Cicero knew there were no J cards left in the deck, and only one Q and one K remained, making the odds of an immediate blackjack very low, Zhou Yun's freakish luck just now had truly frightened him.
Zhou Yun flipped over the second card... it was another A.
That subtle turn of events made Cicero breathe a sigh of relief.
But Zhou Yun shifted his gaze away from the cards, an intrigued expression appearing on his face.
At a table not far from the gambling table, the Blind Witch was silently looking in Zhou Yun's direction.
Something that did not belong to the real world seemed to be reflected in those hollow eyes...
"No. This boy bears no trace of the Empyrean. He's simply lucky."
The Blind Witch said with certainty.
"Cicero, that useless fool." Upon hearing the Blind Witch declare that Zhou Yun was merely an ordinary mortal, Libo's face filled with disdain.
A mere mortal, while Cicero had already received the God of First Cry's blessing.
His mind should have been faster than a mortal's, and his luck should have been better as well, yet Zhou Yun had still won more than ten thousand Denar from him.
"I'll interfere with his thoughts and make him commit a mistake."
The Blind Witch slightly raised her shriveled finger, pointing toward Zhou Yun. At the same time, she drew from her robe a coiled-serpent pendant forged from pure gold and set with amethyst snake eyes.
The six pure-gold venomous serpents carved onto the pendant were exquisitely detailed, slender-bodied, and intertwined with one another. Their snake heads bore humanoid expressions, as though they were six beautiful men and women in the midst of coupling.
The Blind Witch's twig-like fingers clenched tightly around the pendant. The six coiled serpents on it actually began to writhe slightly like living creatures...
"I offer sacrifice to my Lord of Cries, to my Lust Exalted."
"Lady of Pleasure, grant me joy."
"Dark Prince, grant me power."
"Indulge my six desires, let desire corrode the six senses."
The six coiled serpents on the pure-gold pendant writhed more violently. They opened their mouths, exposing their fangs, stretched out their bodies, crawled up along the witch's palm, and bit the Blind Witch's wrist. Blood was drawn into the pendant, and the amethyst snake eyes emitted a faint glow.
Obscene, lustful, copulating, feasting, joyful, and abusive sounds issued from the mouths of the six venomous serpents.
One of them slowly raised its head and aimed at Zhou Yun's back.
A venomous serpent visible only to the Blind Witch, formed entirely from condensed psychic energy, appeared in midair and bit toward Zhou Yun...
"It's done." The Blind Witch lowered the pendant in her hand.
"It can—hm?" Libo was cut off halfway through his words.
The Blind Witch's body suddenly shuddered as well.
They saw it.
Zhou Yun, seated at the gambling table, slowly turned his head. A smile rested on his lips as his eyes looked straight in their direction.
"...Ah?" The Blind Witch let out a baffled cry.
The serpent only she could see, which was lunging toward Zhou Yun, suddenly froze in midair, as though Zhou Yun's gaze had pinned it in place.
Then the serpent's body began to convulse and distort. Its jaws opened wide in a silent shriek before it suddenly burst apart and vanished into the air.
At the same time, one serpent's amethyst eye on the pure-gold pendant cracked with a pop, and the gold forming its body rapidly dimmed.
The Blind Witch stared at the scene in utter disbelief, her breathing growing harsh.
She raised her head, and her hollow black eyes met Zhou Yun's gaze.
The smile at the corner of Zhou Yun's mouth remained gentle, while tiny points of light not belonging to the real universe flickered faintly in his eyes.
Within those eyes, the Blind Witch saw the shadow of fear...
He merely gave the Blind Witch a slight nod of greeting, then turned away again, as though he did not care about her at all.
Zhou Yun could not help shaking his head with a smile.
Why were there so many psychic country bumpkins in Macragge? It was unbearable.
At this level... such simple, crude, conspicuous, and easily countered Telepathy School psychic power,
how was this any different from trying to smash Zhou Yun in the back of the head with a rock?
And they had to shape it like a snake. What was the point? To increase the chance of being noticed?
Zhou Yun was, after all, something of an expert in Precognition School psychic powers.
Unless he suddenly became a psychic illiterate like Roboute Guilliman, there was no way he could fail to notice such a clumsy attack in advance.
And when Zhou Yun noticed them, that blind woman had actually looked utterly baffled, as though Zhou Yun discovering her was some incredible thing.
Was she really that confident in her psychic skills?
Honestly, from Zhou Yun's impression just now, that blind woman's psychic power was at least above Level 9 Theta, somewhat stronger than his own.
But her psychic power seemed to come from extreme stimulation, forcibly awakened and strengthened through intense emotions, and was not particularly under her control.
Besides, her technique was laughable. It was only slightly better than that of an Ogryn with psychic talent.
In Macragge, a world where everyone's psychic power was suppressed, the small advantage in psychic strength she possessed could not bridge the gap between her crude techniques and the psychic techniques the Inquisition had continuously refined over ten thousand years.
Zhou Yun returned his attention to the card table.
"I want to split," Zhou Yun said to Cicero and Tull with a smile.
Before you continue