Chapter 469: Curse and the First Round of Confrontation

Jie Ming shook his head on the ground.

The motion was mostly instinctive.

With his current physical constitution, even if he fell freely from ten thousand meters without any protection and smashed into this dead-silent land, he would at most kick up a ring of dust—his skin wouldn’t even break.

Not to mention, only the innermost layer of Return to Ruins Armor had been shattered in that instant just now.

The seven outer layers of shielding, although damaged by the intense elemental turbulence, had already self-repaired to a large extent before he hit the ground, buffering the impact force to something negligible.

He stood up. Some grayish-white dust clung to his gray wizard robe, especially conspicuous under the dim sky.

Jie Ming’s first reaction was to scan the surroundings warily.

There were no traces of enemies within his line of sight. High in the sky, however, quite a few wizards from the Noren workshops had spotted his condition. They were rapidly descending while remaining on full alert.

But clearly, from their behavior, they hadn’t detected any enemy presence either.

And it wasn’t just the lack of enemy traces—even residual energy fluctuations were so faint they were almost imperceptible. The only exception was that lingering, nauseating aftertaste of malice in the air, like the smell of rotten entrails mixed with rust.

It seemed the enemy hadn’t attacked directly.

Jie Ming frowned and sank his consciousness inward.

That burst of protective power at the very last moment…

Without a doubt, it was the Mysterious Astral Mortal Dust Barrier.

Jie Ming quickly reviewed the sequence of events.

The Mysterious Astral Mortal Dust Barrier specialized in countering curses, divination, mental interference, and illusion techniques.

Among the seven layers of protection, the “True Sight” rune array specifically designed for illusions had not activated.

Prophecy-based attacks usually didn’t cause this kind of direct destruction.

And the Return to Ruins Armor had indeed taken effect—it had clearly absorbed an extremely high-intensity energy impact before shattering.

That left only one possibility.

“A curse.”

And one powerful enough to instantly shatter the Return to Ruins Armor.

“It looks like I was specifically targeted… No—it must be that all the geniuses from the Noren workshops were targeted!”

Jie Ming raised his head and looked toward the sky.

Just as he expected, beneath the lead-gray canopy of this desolate plane, countless points of light were continuously falling from on high.

Some wizards turned into handfuls of flying ash while still falling, scattered by the wind.

Others had their bodies twist and swell grotesquely, like overinflated leather bags, exploding with a “bang” in midair, raining down shredded flesh and blood.

Still others let out shrill, miserable screams—the sound laced with the agony of a soul being torn apart—before abruptly cutting off after a few seconds.

But far more wizards managed to stabilize themselves.

Blinding radiance erupted from their bodies, dense protective runes emerged across their skin, or they directly unfolded black-hole-like domains that devoured all energy—each displaying their own divine abilities, forcibly withstanding the curse’s sneak attack.

Jie Ming carefully observed those who had been struck down.

Without exception, judging from the remaining energy signatures, the strength of their mental power before the fall, and the quality of the wizard artifacts they wore, these were all outstanding individuals among wizards of the same rank.

“Targeted assassination of geniuses, huh…” The corner of his mouth twitched.

A very classic tactic.

In the early stages of war, expending high-cost, one-time-use curses to prioritize eliminating the most promising young wizards on the enemy side, thereby lowering their future growth ceiling.

And he himself had clearly been placed on the list of those worth spending a curse to kill.

At this thought, Jie Ming instinctively sensed the consumption within the Mysterious Astral Mortal Dust Barrier and couldn’t help but bare his teeth.

Half!

Fully half of the Incense Fire Divine Poison and baleful qi had been consumed in that single instant.

One must understand that, for this war, he had specially upgraded the Mysterious Astral Mortal Dust Barrier.

The high-quality baleful death qi and mortal dust qi aside, he had poured in every last drop of Flower Baleful Qi he had collected over time, along with the Incense Fire Divine Poison condensed from billions of black giants.

And now the stockpile had been cut in half.

Combined with how the Return to Ruins Armor had been pierced in a single moment, this pointed to a rather terrifying fact: the one who cast the curse on him was most likely a seventh-ring wizard!

“Looking at the dissipated energy from those other unlucky bastards, at most it was the work of sixth-ring wizards. How come when it’s my turn it becomes a seventh-ring wizard? Do they really value me that highly?!” Jie Ming felt his teeth ache faintly.

While standing up from the ground, he once again summoned Return to Ruins Armor to envelop himself in defense.

“But…”

The pained expression on Jie Ming’s face gradually transformed into something close to cruel amusement.

The Mysterious Astral Mortal Dust Barrier was a retaliatory treasure.

That half portion of poison and baleful qi hadn’t simply vanished into thin air.

While blocking the curse, it had already followed the invisible connection of the curse and poured straight back into the caster’s soul.

“Hope the other side enjoys eating this kind of dosage.”

Even if the opponent was seventh-ring, swallowing this reverse infusion head-on would—at best—leave them seriously injured; at worst, dead.

The most optimistic outcome was still soul damage and a drastic drop in combat power, effectively rendering them “no longer a threat” for the rest of the war.

With good enough luck, that seventh-ring wizard might have simply ceased to exist.

He had just entered the battlefield and already been ambushed once, yet in return he used one protective treasure to directly trade away an enemy seventh-ring wizard’s combat capability…

“Big profit.”

Jie Ming patted the dust off his robe, his mood inexplicably brightening.

Dozens of kilometers away, high in the sky.

Mentor Clark stood suspended in midair, his black robe completely unmoved by the chaotic elemental currents.

Watching Jie Ming lose control and plummet toward the ground, a faint, almost invisible silver-white radiance slowly dissipated in the palm of his right hand.

That was the lingering afterglow of a “Fate Interference”-type spell.

The moment Jie Ming had been struck by the curse, Clark had already prepared three different intervention plans.

But in the end, he did not act.

Because the kid had endured it himself.

A very slight arc lifted the corner of Clark’s usually indifferent mouth, then quickly returned to normal.

Almost at the same moment, a mental fluctuation came from diagonally above, carrying clear surprise and admiration:

“Impressive, Junior Brother!”

The sender was Dionysius Spencer.

He wore silver-blue robes and was currently floating even higher, hands forming a complex seal.

Before him stretched a semi-transparent light screen more than ten meters in diameter, with tens of thousands of data streams flowing across its surface.

A distance of dozens of kilometers was no different from face-to-face for seventh-ring wizards.

“I never expected your disciple still had such a move.” Dionysius’s mental fluctuation carried laughter. “The intensity of that curse just now had already touched the threshold of mid-seventh-ring. For an ordinary fifth-ring wizard—even one carrying high-grade curse-resistant artifacts—they would have been gravely injured and downed. But your disciple not only withstood it, he doesn’t even seem to have taken a light injury?”

Clark did not look up. His gaze remained calmly sweeping the battlefield below, yet the mental fluctuation he sent back unusually carried an unmistakable hint of pride that was almost boastful:

“Not bad. The kid’s foundation is quite solid. He’s just like his senior sister—always in a rush to advance before he’s fully prepared.”

“Hah!” Dionysius laughed out loud. “Well, as long as it didn’t affect his combat power, advancing quickly isn’t really a problem.”

At that moment, another mental fluctuation joined in. It came from a female sixth-ring wizard clad in deep-green vine-wrapped battle armor, her tone filled with obvious envy:

“Lord Clark, your disciple’s technical level is truly exaggerated… That protective treasure must have been refined using divine techniques, right? During the counterattack just now, my side detected fluctuations of extremely pure power of faith.”

Clark neither confirmed nor denied it. He merely shifted the topic lightly:

“How are the battle results?”

The moment the conversation returned to business, all the high-ring wizards’ mental fluctuations instantly turned serious.

A sixth-ring wizard who had just finished releasing a curse-countering spell—and had blocked an attack aimed at one of the targeted geniuses—quickly calculated and reported:

“Our side’s first round of curse attacks totaled three thousand seven hundred and forty-two curses, all directed at detected enemy ‘high-potential seeds.’ Hit rate… 89.3%.”

An astonishing figure.

It meant that in those mere few seconds, more than three thousand young genius wizards on the Chaos Secret Cult and Tower of Annihilation side had suffered fatal curses.

“What about the enemy’s interception rate?” Clark asked.

“The Tower of Annihilation’s interception efficiency was relatively low,” another seventh-ring wizard replied, voice carrying a trace of smugness. “Their curse-defense techniques lean heavily toward materialization and energy deflection. They have insufficient resistance against our new type of curse that mixes soul attacks and conceptual anchoring. According to feedback, they only blocked about twenty percent. Of the remaining eighty percent of targets… either dead or crippled.”

“And the Chaos Secret Cult side?”

“More troublesome.” This time it was a sixth-ring wizard specialized in divination and anti-divination who spoke, tone somewhat grave. “They seem to have made targeted preparations in advance. It appears a seventh-ring wizard personally presided over the release of a ‘Causal Confusion’-type spell. Close to fifty percent of our curses were misled or had their power weakened. Only about fifty percent truly achieved kills or severe injuries.”

Data continued scrolling across the light screen.

High-ring wizards from various sectors sent in real-time battle reports:

“Seventh squad, sixty percent clearance completed.”

“Eleventh squad, the enemy had two seventh-ring wizards who preemptively set up group purification barriers. Only forty percent achieved.”

“Third squad, failed to block everything earlier. Casualties somewhat heavy… sorry.”

“Ninth squad, perfect execution. All twelve enemy targets annihilated.”

Information rapidly aggregated.

Finally, Dionysius gave the preliminary assessment:

“Overall, this round of curses successfully inflicted casualties on roughly fifty percent of the enemy’s high-potential seeds. As for the similar curse attack they launched against us… based on monitoring, we intercepted about fifty percent.”

Fifty percent versus fifty percent.

On the surface, it appeared to be a draw.

However, considering the disparity in total participating numbers, achieving the same exchange ratio actually meant a small profit for the Noren workshops.

With fewer forces, they had traded away an equal proportion of the enemy’s high-value targets.

Though somewhat cruel, this could indeed be counted as a minor tactical advantage.