Chapter 828

Yuwen Heita took a deep breath, his arm stopped trembling, and he stared deeply at that demon louse, severing all distracting thoughts with the 'Soldier' character seal.

Within his sea of consciousness, the 'Soldier' character seal shone brightly; above his head, that golden mark also split open, revealing a golden eye resembling the great sun—that was Qian Chen's Heavenly Eye, gathering all cause and effect, pointing toward the end of karma.

It could be called the "Ten Thousand Karma Dharma Eye"!

Heita released the bowstring, and the arrow turned into a stream of light and vanished in an instant.

Inside the Great Hero Hall of Nantu Temple, Lena Tilo felt the center of his brow becoming increasingly itchy and finally could not help but reach up to scratch it. Patriarch Dalabatu had intended to act, but seeing this scene, he stopped and sighed in his heart, "Once the thought of killing arises, this retribution follows!"

A long arrow pierced through the window paper and, in an instant, nailed itself into the center of Lena Tilo's brow.

A giant roar suddenly came from within Nantu Temple: "Who dares to kill my disciple!"

A crowd of monks rushed to the Great Hero Hall, only to see Patriarch Dalabatu sitting upright on the lotus platform, like a true Buddha in the hall.

The Patriarch's eyes were wide with rage—even a Buddha has fire—staring at the person kneeling on the prayer mat below. That person had been pierced through the center of the brow by a long arrow, the cold, gleaming arrowhead protruding through the back of his head, with yellow and white fluids flowing out.

He lay face up on the prayer mat, a pool of filthy blood already flowing across the floor.

A monk gathered his courage and stepped forward to examine it.

He suddenly raised his head and said, "Master, it is an arrow from the town garrison!"

"Audacious! Daring to kill someone from our Nantu Temple!"

"It is Senior Brother Lena Tilo; he was actually shot to death before the Patriarch..."

Many of those who joined Nantu Temple were noble Xianbei from the city; they lacked the courage to be soldiers, but joining the sect of a high Buddhist monk with great cultivation and great magic power was a remarkable stroke of luck.

They were still hoping that one day Patriarch Dalabatu would be summoned by Chang'an, so they could follow him back to that prosperous imperial capital instead of wasting away in this bitter, cold land.

For a time, the Nantu Temple was filled with righteous indignation, wanting to go and demand an explanation from the town garrison.

Over there, Yuwen Heita had shot that arrow and knew he had caused a great disaster; he put away the Goose-Cry Bow, his face ashen and gray.

Many of his comrades saw this and came up to comfort him, saying, "Hahaha, Heita, you kid, how old are you? To have such skill is truly remarkable! Come, follow behind me and be a personal guard for the commander; that is also a very promising future. When your father finds out, he will surely be overjoyed..."

Pojuliuhan patted Heita's shoulder hard, thinking: This little brother is quite sensible; if he had won the archery contest in front of so many people, where would I put my old face!

Others teased, "Told you, kid, to shoot at the sky and the earth with your first two arrows; if you hadn't missed those two, you might have had a chance!"

"Haha, you missed!"

"Shooting a louse on a hair is already not easy, let alone shooting it across the city. Unless it was the commander back when he reached manhood, no one else has such skill!"

Someone else tried to flatter but ended up kicking the horse's leg, causing Tuoba Tao's face to darken.

The good mood from the original contest, which had solved two problems, vanished completely. He had let the demon louse crawl on Lena Tilo's brow, which was indeed because he had heard this petty person distorting the truth and stirring up trouble, but it was also a test for Yuwen Heita.

Now that Yuwen Heita dared to follow his hint and shoot a disciple of Nantu Temple, greatly offending Patriarch Dalabatu, he was indeed a usable person.

Although a bit arrogant, he was, after all, just a child, and it was natural for his depth of character to be shallow.

As long as he was obedient, Tuoba Tao felt it was not a big deal.

Only Yuwen Heita's heaven-shaking divine ability, which came from nowhere, made Tuoba Tao feel a bit envious, and even difficult to understand.

"How can there be a divine ability that combines riding and archery into one? And to be able to capture divine weapons, establish a Heavenly Dharma Eye, and then command comrades to form a qi-array—isn't that the four arts of the military strategist? Can all of them be cultivated with this divine ability?"

Tuoba Tao could not figure it out and could only say that Heita indeed had some Buddhist affinity, having cultivated several orthodox Buddhist divine abilities just by relying on a few Buddhist sutras written by his own grandmother.

Should he go back and take a good look at those sutras himself?

This thought flashed through Tuoba Tao's mind, and he suppressed it for the time being; now, how to handle this murder case was a test of his methods.

He had to let Yuwen Heita suffer some lessons to wear down his arrogance and ambition, but he also had to protect him in time to avoid truly losing the boy's heart, and also to prevent his subordinates from thinking he couldn't protect his own people.

Just as he was pondering this.

He saw Yuwen Heita turn his head to look at the little novice monk beside him, and the little novice monk pointed to his heart and said, "Look with your heart!"

Tuoba Tao couldn't help but shake his head; this monk probably hadn't guessed that it wasn't that Heita couldn't shoot the demon louse, but that under his own coercion, he had been forced to shoot someone and cause trouble!

What was he pretending for?

Tuoba Tao had the intention of seeing Qian Chen make a fool of himself.

But Yuwen Heita felt a shock in his heart like a great drum; in his eyes, this person was incomparably mysterious, related to that terrifying place of reincarnation, and as a Reincarnation Traveler, he was likely a Nascent Soul-level existence; now that he had spoken, there must be a deep meaning.

What exactly had he forgotten?

"Seeing the louse with the eyes, and having the louse fill the eyes, is indeed a very high level of archery, but for a commander, if one can only see the louse and forget everything else, one is not qualified. Therefore, after Han Zhuo cultivated his world-shaking archery, he didn't just see the archery; he keenly discovered that after Hou Yi ascended the throne, he became licentious and indulgent, and his archery cultivation gradually declined, which is why he decisively acted and took Hou Yi's life!"

Heita suddenly realized in his heart: "If a commander only has the tip of the arrow in his heart and eyes, he will never hit the vital point!"

"Then, what is the true vital point of this situation? Who is my true enemy?"

"It is the commander... the commander is dissatisfied with me, so he deliberately tested me with this. My goal is to rise in power and still retain my position under the commander. The commander controls my future and life, so I cannot greatly offend him, which is why I must shoot that person. But the commander holds power in his own hands, and I refuse to be manipulated by him, letting him completely control my life, death, wealth, and honor. A great man born between heaven and earth, how can his life, death, wealth, and honor be controlled by others?"

Heita understood: "Therefore, this arrow should be shot at the true vital point..."

At this moment, that wisp of black qi from before suddenly floated into his heart.

"That is..."

He pulled the Goose-Cry Bow empty again, and his companions beside him said, "Heita, what are you doing? You have no more arrows! Pulling the bow empty will damage it; if you break the commander's Goose-Cry Bow, your father will surely beat you to death!"

Pujuliuhan had been watching quietly from the side for a long time; he knew he was a Han from a humble family and could never stand out.

Seeing this scene, he quietly raised his hand and pointed a direction for Yuwen Heita...

Yuwen Heita bent the bow and shot an empty arrow, pointing in that direction. He opened his eyes, and this time, the Bodhi Heart-wood thumb ring in his hand, together with the 'Soldier' character seal in his eyes, forced open his 'Heart Eye'. In an instant, the entire Huaihuai Town was captured in his eyes.

That golden scratch in the sky opened an eye again, locking onto countless twisted shadows in the city.

"Stop!"

Just as Tuoba Tao shouted, the bowstring in Heita's hand had already snapped.

This empty arrow had only the momentum of qi, resonating with the minds of the comrades beside him, including them all in this arrow, as if becoming the eyes of everyone, carrying everyone's spiritual sense as it flew toward another military camp in the town.

The invisible arrow of qi, like a flying dart, instantly swept across dozens of miles and arrived in front of a tent.

The eyes of the onlookers also followed this long arrow as it pierced the tent curtain, arriving before a proud, burly man, a deputy general in the army, and then the invisible arrow of qi pierced through his face.

The deputy general's face revealed horror, and the eyes of the crowd followed the invisible arrow through his skin, revealing a twisted existence inside that could not be described.

"Moon Demon Painted Skin!"

Tuoba Tao roared, "A demon lord has infiltrated the military camp!"

He picked up his spare long bow and pulled a Demon-Breaking Arrow from his quiver; the arrow shaft of Buddhist Bodhi wood and the cold-gleaming arrowhead of Daoist Blood-Pattern Steel, forged into steel with the soaring qi and blood of the army, were best at breaking all laws!

Following the field of vision opened by Heita's arrow, the entire military camp was lit up.

At this moment, the personal guards beside Tuoba Tao all drew their strong bows, shooting arrows toward the military camp dozens of miles away.

In that instant, an invisible military formation of sharp arrows took shape, and the dozens of heavy arrows flying through the air were encompassed by an invisible momentum of arrows; their qi merged into one, and accompanied by the whistling sound of breaking through the air, the formation seals above the military camp were constantly burst open by the exploding arrows.

Until the layered seals were completely pierced through.

Above the sky, within that golden vertical eye, a strand of qi also turned into a golden long arrow, falling suddenly as Heita's invisible arrow of qi hit the demon lord.

Tuoba Tao's Demon-Breaking Arrow and the golden long arrow fell toward the military camp one after another.

The golden long arrow arrived first, pinning the human skin and firmly fixing the Painted Skin demon within, along with its skin bag.

Then the Demon-Breaking Arrow followed closely, piercing through it; the skin bag on its body split along the arrow mark, and the twisted demon, resembling an evil ghost, tumbled out.

"Heita!"

"Check if there are any more demon lords who have infiltrated!" Tuoba Tao said with a grim face and a stern voice, "Invite Patriarch Zong'ai to bring out the Demon-Revealing and Demon-Breaking Mirror, and expand the city's seals to the maximum; I want these demon lords to have nowhere to hide!"

He also ordered his family members beside him, "Report to Grandmother, hurry!"

As the arrow towers on all four sides were alarmed, Tuoba Tao soon held the military tally and climbed an arrow tower; the corpse of the Painted Skin demon had already been taken to be seen by the town's resident cultivators and many great generals!

Accompanied by sharp whistling sounds rising from all four sides, it was the Painted Skin demons, knowing they were exposed, trying their best to create chaos.

Tuoba Tao climbed the arrow tower, and the golden precious mirror flew up from a wooden building in the city; the mirror light swept across Huaihuai Town inch by inch, and Tuoba Tao drew his Goose-Cry Bow, moving the arrowhead bit by bit with the mirror light, and then shot an arrow whenever he saw a wisp of black qi.

Under the augmentation of the arrow tower, the arrows pierced through all seals, comparable to a full-force strike from a Yin Spirit cultivator.

Soon, five or six Painted Skin demons died under his arrows...

At this time, a family member came to report: "Old Matriarch asks the commander to return to the military camp quickly... something big has happened!"

Hurrying to the main tent of the army, he heard his grandmother say solemnly, "Those soldiers in the army replaced by Painted Skin demons are all people who returned from Wuchuanzhen in the last few days! Someone is intercepting and replacing them; Wuchuanzhen may be in danger!"