While I was chanting a curse, the system said I was Xiao Yan?

The office fell silent again.

The woman took something out of her pocket and placed it on the table.

It was a small crystal.

About the size of a thumb, irregularly shaped, with a warm, milky-white luster on its surface, it resembles a piece of carefully polished jade.

But if you look closely, you can see subtle energy flowing inside the crystal, as if something is slowly rotating inside.

If Tianyan were here, he would recognize him at a glance.

This is a Tier 1 magical beast crystal core.

Moreover, it is not empty; it is about to be filled, containing abundant energy.

She held the crystal core in her hand, gently stroking its surface with her fingertips, feeling the faint yet continuous energy pulse within.

Her gaze fell on the crystal core, her eyes filled with a contemplative, inquisitive light.

"Interesting," she whispered, her voice echoing in the quiet room.

She held the crystal core up to her eyes, looking through the milky white luster at the flowing energy patterns inside the crystal.

"Where did this thing come from?"

She was talking to herself, her tone suggesting she was asking the crystal core, or perhaps asking herself.

She flipped the crystal core over to look at the other side. The luster on that side was fainter than the front, and the patterns were sparser, but the internal energy flow was still clearly visible.

"It's common knowledge that cursed spirits don't leave behind a physical form after they die."

Her voice remained low, like a snake flicking its tongue: "But this... was taken from the body of the cursed spirit."

She was silent for a moment, then placed the crystal core on the table and tapped it lightly twice with her fingers.

"Who caused this new change?"

Her gaze fell on the crystal core, several names flashed through her mind, and then she rejected them one by one.

"Tengen?"

She shook her head.

"It shouldn't be him. His power system has been solidified for hundreds of years, so it's impossible for it to suddenly undergo such a mutation."

"Could it be the person who posted this bounty?" The corners of her mouth slowly curved up, her smile carrying a kind of pleasure, like the excitement of discovering a new toy.

"Offering bounties to non-sorcerer groups—the person who does this must be someone who utterly disregards the rules of the sorcery world. In a way, it's also a kind of 'change'."

Then she stood up, walked to the cabinet in the corner, and opened the cabinet door.

Inside the cabinet, there were several identical crystal cores, neatly arranged in a row, gleaming with a warm luster under the dim light.

She looked at the crystal cores, remained silent for a moment, and then the corners of her mouth slowly curved into a smile.

That smile held an irrepressible excitement, like someone who had been walking in the dark for a long time suddenly seeing a ray of light.

"Regardless of who caused it..."

She said softly, her voice filled with a determined confidence: "As long as we follow this line, we'll eventually find the source."

She closed the wardrobe and turned to walk towards the door.

"But the source is what I'm really interested in."

"I really want to see... what the new world will be like," she whispered.

......

"Uncle Yamamoto, are you the secret curse master of the Panxing Cult?"

The air in the alley seemed to freeze.

The man's grip on the dagger tightened slightly, his knuckles turning white. His expression shifted from gloomy to something more complex, like the embarrassment and anger of having his secret exposed, yet also like the relief of letting out a sigh of relief.

The silence lasted for a moment.

Then the uncle laughed.

This smile was different from before; it was no longer a carefree, unrestrained laugh, but a cold smile tinged with a hint of appreciation.

"Brother."

His voice returned to normal volume, but his tone had completely changed. It was no longer the carefree tone he had given before, but a more composed and dangerous low voice: "Your brain is indeed quite sharp."

He neither admitted nor denied it.

"You must have been suspicious of me from the beginning, right? I consider myself a pretty good actor, so where did things go wrong?"

Tianyan looked at his face, activated his defensive spell power, and bone armor climbed up his whole body, while the spell power circulated within his body.

"It's not that your acting is bad, it's just that I'm a very wary person and don't like making friends."

"That's not a good habit; people should make more friends!"

The man with the chestnut-headed hair chuckled, switched the dagger to his left hand, and twirled it: "I'm not actually Yamamoto. My real name is Arisaka Nissou."

He said his name in a calm tone, as if he were giving a very ordinary self-introduction, and then looked at Tianyan as if he were waiting for something.

Tianyan nodded, neither asking why the other party would say such foolish things nor replying.

He had seen the name Arisaka Jiro in the college's database. He used to be a sorcerer, but later defected for some reason and became a curse master. His spells were unknown, and he killed many ordinary people, but he had never been caught.

Arisaka Jiro scratched his head with the hilt of his sword: "What's wrong with young people these days? The older folks introduced themselves first, and you're still not moving?"

"Or do you really think that because I'm old, you'll believe I'm Sato?"

Tianyan curled his lip: "That's really hurtful. Is calling me Sato a fake name? Or is it...?"

He changed the subject, probing, "Does your spell require knowing someone's real name to activate? Like, if you call my name, will you suck me into a purple-gold gourd?"

"Hahaha!"

Arisaka Jiro burst into laughter: "It's not impossible!"

"How much is the price Panxing Sect is offering?" Tianyan asked.

Arisaka Jiro tilted his head, a slight smile playing on his lips: "More than you imagined."

"Looks like I'm quite valuable."

Whether it's valuable or not, we'll only know after we've fought it.

As soon as he finished speaking, Arisaka Jiro rushed towards Tenyan. His speed was much faster than that of an ordinary middle-aged man, so fast that he left only a blurry afterimage in the bushes.

Tianyan's pupils contracted slightly. He raised his right arm, and in a flash, bone armor covered his forearm. He spread his five fingers and blocked the afterimage.

"clang!"

The sound of metal colliding with bone rang out again.

When Arisaka Jiro's right sword struck Tenen's hand, sparks flew and a shallow white mark appeared on the bone armor, but it did not shatter or even crack.

"Wow, that's really tough! It's got the feel of my younger days!"

Arisaka Niro commented for a moment, and without any hesitation, he followed up with another slash, slashing upwards towards Tianyan's ribs.

Tianyan turned to the side, lowered his left elbow, and precisely blocked the knife with the bone blade at his elbow. At the same time, he threw out his right fist, a punch wrapped with curse power, straight for Arisaka Jiro's face.

Arisaka Niro did not dodge.

He didn't even blink.

Tianyan's fist slammed solidly into his face.

"Bang!"

The sound was dull, like someone punching an old bell.

Arisaka Jiro's head was knocked to one side, and his body leaned back slightly, but he didn't fly out or even take a step back. He just swayed and then slowly turned his head to face Tenyan again.

A red mark on his face was fading rapidly.

It wasn't healing, it wasn't recovery, but rather it was as if that power within him had been "eaten up" by something, leaving no trace.

Tianyan frowned.

No injury?

Although Tianyan's punch was just an ordinary punch, it was reinforced with curse power. A solid punch from a level one curse master is definitely not something an ordinary curse master can withstand.

Judging from his speed and force just now, his physical strength is clearly not at the level to withstand that punch without injury.

The power of the curse isn't anything special, so it can only be the spell that's at work!