Chapter 1052: Dao Heart

Ink Painting became the "leading older brother", but this year, being the leading older brother is tough.

Especially the disciples of the Four Sects, Eight Gates, and Twelve Streams – they are all the elite prides of their respective sects, with good backgrounds, good talent, and high, proud hearts. Each has their own thoughts. When they are gathered together, people's hearts are chaotic and difficult to manage.

They are all "enemies" of Tai Xu Gate, having been defeated at the hands of Tai Xu Gate during the Sword Discussion Assembly.

At the same time, there are also grudges between them.

For example, during the Shura battle, Duan Jin Gate launched a sneak attack on Ling Xiao Gate, severely wounding Ling Xiao Gate's vitality.

Gui Shui Gate sneak attacked Zi Xia Gate, also causing many deaths and injuries to Zi Xia Gate.

Other sects also engaged in chaotic battle, each with killings.

And their biggest "enemy" is Ink Painting, this "leading older brother".

It can be said that the majority of geniuses from the sects present, especially the top prides, have almost all "died" at the hands of Ink Painting at least once.

Some people have even "died" more than once.

Under the current circumstances, they have to bow to Ink Painting, but in their hearts, they are absolutely unwilling.

They submit in words but not in heart.

And the evil path great array is constantly stirring their evil thoughts, hate, and kill intent.

Only now that Ink Painting's power is great, they dare not question him.

But between them, there are inevitably verbal conflicts, and quite a bit of mutual targeting, with some minor skirmishes occurring from time to time.

The most prominent among them is Ye Zhi Yuan.

Ye Zhi Yuan was once the top imperial sword genius of Da Luo Gate. He is handsome and talented in appearance, but his temper is very arrogant, and his mouth is also foul. He just sprays people he sees, and his interpersonal relationships are very poor.

At this time, the Four Sects, Eight Gates, and Twelve Streams are mixed together, and his mouth just doesn't stop. For a while, he ridicules this sect's sword arts as not good, and for a while, he mocks that sect's inheritance as not good, as if in all the world, only his Da Luo Flying Sword is the strongest.

The crowd is also stirred up by him, with endless noise.

Even several disciples of Tai Xu Gate are affected.

But Ye Zhi Yuan's mouth is foul, plus he is shameless, so simply no one can out-spray him.

Ink Painting then turned his head and asked Ye Zhi Yuan:

"Ye Zhi Yuan, does your dad know that your imperial sword doesn't fly far, so he gave you this name? To make you fly your imperial sword a bit further?"

This one sentence directly silenced Ye Zhi Yuan.

Ye Zhi Yuan, who was originally very arrogant, instantly looked like he had eaten a fly, unable to utter a single word.

Ye Zhi Yuan was silent, but the crowd was still noisy without stopping. After all, hundreds of people were gathered together, each with different intentions, making it difficult not to have disputes.

Ink Painting then coldly said: "Don't blame me for not reminding you, this is in the evil path great array."

"You all had best shut up, clear your hearts and concentrate your spirits. Don't say useless nonsense, and don't accuse and complain to each other, or dredge up old accounts."

"Disaster comes from the mouth."

"Careless words will amplify the evil in your own hearts, and will also cause hatred in the hearts of others."

"These are evil thoughts, karmic fire, and sinful fruits."

"If this continues, the grudges in your hearts will amplify, hatred will breed, kill intent will sprout, and your minds will also gradually become abnormal. Finally, you will become bloodthirsty, and in the evil path great array, step by step fall into evil demons..."

"Don't think that matters of words are small things. Many times, this is the root of disaster..."

The evil path great array will take words as the guide.

Planting a demon in the dao heart will also take words as the seed.

Only this seemingly ordinary but extremely profound and treacherous dao is something these proud disciples are completely unaware of.

Ink Painting's tone was very serious.

The crowd of proud disciples from the Four Sects, Eight Gates, and Twelve Streams were all startled upon hearing this, realizing the seriousness of the problem.

"One more point..." Ink Painting warned, "Don't easily have kill intent towards me."

"If you have kill intent towards me, no matter how hidden, I will know."

"Having kill intent doesn't really matter, but I kindly advise you, absolutely don't truly make a killing move against me, otherwise, the ones who die will only be yourselves."

Ink Painting's gaze calmly swept over.

Many people in the crowd lowered their heads, fundamentally daring not to meet Ink Painting's gaze.

Ink Painting nodded, "One last point..."

"Don't feel that I am a 'big good person' and get self-affectionate, thinking I must lead you out of the great array."

"If you listen to me, everyone works together, and we will get out alive."

"If you don't listen, then whether you live or die has nothing to do with me."

"Even if someone falls into evil spirits and 'demonizes' because they didn't listen to me, don't blame my hand for being merciless..."

"Do you really want to fall into evil demons?"

The faces of the crowd of proud disciples turned pale.

Especially the words "evil demons", which made their hearts feel a chill.

Not long ago, they personally saw their sect senior brothers, who had been with them day and night, suddenly have blood-red eyes, ferocious faces, violent breaths, become mad, become bloodthirsty, and even like wild beasts, devour human flesh...

This completely subverted their common sense.

Previously, they were immersed in killing, their hearts full of evil thoughts, and their minds were not very clear, so they didn't think so much. But now that they have calmed down and recalled carefully, they are all shocked and terrified, with cold sweat on their backs.

The words "cultivating wrongly and entering demons" might not be a joke.

Once they fall into evil demons, their lives are completely ruined.

They will go from being admired by thousands of people, future unlimited righteous path elites, to taking one wrong step and falling into an abyss, becoming demon path "maggots" who personally slaughter their fellow disciples, gnaw on human flesh, are not tolerated by sects, families, and parents, and cannot see the light.

And all this is only one step away.

Thinking of this, everyone was dripping with cold sweat.

Some people were puzzled:

"We are good and proper, why would we suddenly... cultivate wrongly and enter demons? Because... the evil path great array?"

Ink Painting nodded: "Partially because of the evil path great array..."

"This evil path great array uses human blood as ink, human flesh as the medium, human bones as the pivot, and despair, regret, and killing karma to refine evil power and activate the great array."

"Within the great array, evil desires overflow, and there are formless evil spirits roaming. As long as you are contaminated, you will gradually demonize..."

"But this is only one aspect. Another reason is the dao heart."

"Dao heart?"

Everyone was startled, then all frowned.

Almost everyone says that cultivators must have a firm dao heart.

But the so-called "dao heart" is just an illusory concept.

The dao heart does not enhance spirit roots, does not increase talent, will not speed up cultivation, will not reduce cultivation resources, and is not a threshold for sects to accept disciples.

Big sects will not break the rules and accept you as a disciple just because you have a so-called "dao heart".

Worldly family elders will not look at you with new eyes just because you have a dao heart.

If your spirit roots are bad, even if you have a dao heart, your cultivation will still be difficult.

If your strength is weak, even if you have a dao heart, you will still be slaughtered by others.

Therefore, the so-called "dao heart" fundamentally has no practical meaning.

Big sects and big families also fundamentally will not put "dao heart" on their assessment list.

The so-called "dao heart" is just a "useless" thing.

In the past, even if they didn't say it, they would surely scoff at the words "dao heart" in their hearts.

But now, they have fallen into this evil path great array through the evil god's scheme, and have personally witnessed various bloody scenes around them, their feelings are completely different...

Ink Painting said: "Dao heart, that is the heart that seeks the dao."

"If the dao heart is not firm, people will be dominated by vulgar desires such as fame and fortune, power, and material desires."

"These杂念 vulgar desires precipitate at the bottom of the heart."

"Usually, it might not matter, but once external evil is induced, desires amplify, the dao heart is obscured, or even extinguished, cultivators will cultivate wrongly and enter demons, falling into 'evil demons'."

"The weaker the dao heart, the faster the speed of 'falling into demons'."

Ink Painting glanced at the crowd, "Why can you still remain clear now? One reason is that you are lucky and haven't encountered major evil or major spirits. Another reason is that your dao hearts are relatively stronger than other cultivators."

"Those with weak dao hearts, at the instant they touched evil spirits, had already lost their heart defense and were thoroughly demonized."

Some proud disciples' hearts were shaken, finding it hard to accept, and murmured: "Impossible... we are clearly righteous path cultivators..."

Ink Painting's gaze calmly looked at him and counter-asked: "You... are you really righteous path cultivators?"

"Are your hearts truly 'righteous'?"

"Do you cultivate the dao to comprehend the heavenly dao and help the common people? Or is it purely for seeking the great power of heaven and earth, gathering it in one person's body, scheming for fame and fortune, scheming for power, scheming for one person's eternal life and longevity, and enjoying immortal riches and honors?"

"Will the things you seek truly be 'immortals'?"

"Haven't you noticed that 'demons' also seek the same?"

Ink Painting then thought of Elder Zheng's teachings to him and slowly said:

"You may be righteous path disciples, but righteous and demonic are originally one body. The so-called demons are not born from the womb, not born from eggs, but are transformed."

"Demons are transformed from the righteous path, and also transformed from your dao hearts..."

This speech caused the faces of all the sect's proud disciples to turn pale, their hearts filled with terror.

Previously, they had never heard such words, nor had anyone ever told them this.

Although they at this moment did not necessarily truly understand what Ink Painting was exactly saying.

But this speech, like a branding iron, sentence by sentence, was deeply branded in their hearts.

The fates of many proud disciples were also invisibly and completely rewritten...

Only they at this time still didn't know, including Ink Painting himself also didn't expect...

After Ink Painting finished this speech, he said nothing more.

And the hundreds of proud disciples of the Four Sects, Eight Gates, and Twelve Streams also quieted down, concentrating their spirits according to Ink Painting's words, no longer having desires, no longer rising kill intent, no longer having a heart of competition and winning, and no longer having verbal disputes...

Ink Painting saw that they were all "obedient" and also felt relieved. He had to consider his next actions.

Ink Painting's purpose was actually simple: just to save all these people out.

The great array was still operating, the evil qi was still deepening, and the evil spirits were still growing.

He himself was actually still okay. From the beginning, only he had been taking a "share" of the evil spirits. No evil spirits dared to touch his head, which was like touching "Tai Sui".

If there were any, they were all "eaten" by him.

But others were not. If they continued to wait like this, once the array operated to the extreme, evil thoughts would be as deep as the sea, blood water would turn into fog, and evil spirits would turn into rain. Even the god path array could not protect them, and everyone would still die, including his little junior brothers from Tai Xu Gate.

Even if they were sect elites, they were still only flesh and blood cultivators. The pollution of the evil god was still too fatal to them.

"But how to leave the great array?"

"Is there someone 'monitoring' inside this great array?"

"Are the movements of us people being managed?"

"Who is manipulating the great array, and where are they?"

"Is it that Mister Tu?"

"But where is that Mister Tu, why hasn't he shown up even once until now?"

Ink Painting frowned.

Now trapped in the array, there were too few clues. He could only infer based on his experience as a main "designer" and main "executor" of a first-grade five-elements slaughter demon great array:

First, someone must be manipulating the great array.

And the person manipulating this great array must be an array master, moreover, an evil array master.

Mister Tu should be the person who mainly built the great array.

But the person manipulating the great array now is not necessarily him, because he definitely has more important things to do.

This evil path great array was created within the borders of Qian Xue State, under the eyes of big families and big sects. Once activated, blood qi fills the sky, and it will definitely be severely struck by various forces in Qian Xue, including the Dao Court Division.

Even if Mister Tu can cope, he will definitely be stretched thin.

What's more, Ink Painting doesn't need to think to know that the purpose of this evil path great array is definitely related to the resurrection of the Great Wilderness Lord.

To resurrect the Great Wilderness Lord, a huge evil god ceremony must be involved.

As the "main array master" of the evil path great array and the "main sacrifice master" of the evil god ceremony, Mister Tu must be very busy and may not be able to take care of many things.

And his current location is definitely not the entirety of the evil path great array.

Since it is an evil path great array, it is definitely not so small. The scenes in front of his eyes, including the dead forest, blood swamp, etc., are at most a part of the whole evil path great array, a sealed sub-array area.

Moreover, this area is truly completely "sealed", otherwise, his many actions should have been detected long ago.

Those minions of the evil god should also have acted long ago...

This "sealed" aspect is probably related to the evil god's sacrifice itself.

The evil god definitely doesn't want others to see what it "eats".

But precisely because it is completely sealed, some array patterns and array structures are also very obscure and difficult to detect, making it impossible to start for a while.

It is also difficult for them to get out.

"A bit troublesome..."

Ink Painting calmed his heart and thought step by step according to his own attainments in array arts:

"The evil strangeness is only the appearance, the inherent logic of the array will not change..."

"The inherent array laws of the great array cannot be completely sealed. There must be some connection between them..."

"If this sub-array is a part of the great array, then there must be an array pivot connected to the main array pivot of the great array..."

"And this array pivot must have a corresponding array medium."

"The array medium of the evil path great array should be..." Ink Painting's heart trembled, "White bone steles?"

Hadn't he and Elder Xun Zi Xian seen those white bone steles in Yan Luo Mountain?

Ink Painting's eyes brightened.

He began to sit cross-legged on the ground, release his divine sense, carefully deduce, perceive the flow of evil power, ponder the nodes of the array law circulation, and the path of evil power's bearing. After a moment, he got up and walked directly to a dead forest beside him, pointed to a blood-colored dead tree, and said to the crowd:

"Cut the tree, dig up the roots, dig the ground three feet deep, and find a bone stele..."

The crowd did not understand, but they still did as Ink Painting said.

As for why, they also didn't ask Ink Painting to explain. Anyway, even if Ink Painting explained, they might not understand.

The crowd of proud disciples joined hands and quickly cut down the large tree, burned off the roots, and then dug three feet downward, seeing the white bone stele underground.

The ground veins were a bloody red.

The white bone stele was soaked in blood, covered by the evil power of the ground veins. It was fundamentally impossible for ordinary people to detect.

Ink Painting carefully observed the constantly wriggling blood-colored array patterns on the white bone stele. After a moment, his heart jumped, discovering that these evil patterns were actually derived from the four symbols demon patterns. Even a part of them were variants of the four symbols "dragon patterns".

This was indeed Mister Tu's handwriting.

And after Ink Painting's research during this period on Dragon Chart Return Perform, the four symbols demon patterns and the four symbols dragon patterns were already considered "old friends" in Ink Painting's eyes. Whether it was to disassemble or trace their origin, it was much simpler.

Ink Painting indeed could not draw evil arrays, but judging the flow direction of the array pivot based on the connection of the array patterns was not a big problem.

After that, Ink Painting walked and deduced at the same time, digging out all the white bone steles along the way that were used to bear the array pivot.

Finally, after digging out more than ten bone steles, Ink Painting, who already had a clear understanding of the array pivot's flow direction, came to the "root" of these bone steles, which was the node connected to the evil path array pivot.

An ordinary mountain cave.

Ink Painting swept with his divine sense, confirmed it was safe, and then entered the mountain cave.

The mountain cave was narrow, with stone walls all around.

Ink Painting perceived for a moment, found the stone wall on the right side, used his pen to draw several big "x" marks, turned around and said to Ao Zheng and several other body cultivators:

"Demolish this for me, make the sound a bit smaller."

Ao Zheng was unwilling, but still did as Ink Painting said.

He was from Dragon Cauldron Sect, second only to Ao Zhan among the proud disciples. His Dragon Cauldron Body Refining Art foundation was extremely thick, with dragon essence and tiger fierceness, and extremely strong strength. The seemingly hard stone wall was like "tofu" in his hands.

The stone wall was demolished like this by Ao Zheng and several others.

As the stone wall cracked and rubble rustled down, suddenly a blood color flashed, and a terrifying blood basin-sized mouth suddenly swallowed towards the crowd.

This was the giant mouth of a huge evil spirit.

Ao Zheng saw nothing, but a bone-piercing chill surged into his heart. He wanted to retreat but didn't know where to retreat.

Just at this moment, Ink Painting, who had been prepared early, pointed a finger at his eyebrows, a sharp light flashed in his eyes, and his divine thought turned into a sword and chopped over.

The golden light flashed and disappeared, and the evil spirit was instantly erased.

The blood color dissipated, and along with the bone-piercing chill, it also completely retreated. Ao Zheng then slowly turned his head to look at Ink Painting. Although he didn't understand exactly what had happened, his heart was still fearful and his eyes were full of shock.

"I'll go in and take a look," Ink Painting said.

Ao Zheng and the others said nothing.

But Ling Hu Xiao and Si Tu and several others were a little worried, "Little senior brother, we'll go with you."

Ink Painting shook his head, "Rest assured, it's safer if I go alone. You wait here and don't move."

After Ink Painting instructed them, his figure gradually faded and just disappeared like that from the eyes of the crowd.

The crowd's expressions were solemn, their hearts uneasy.

On the other side, Ink Painting walked into the tunnel in the stone wall. Along the way, there were large and small evil spirits, deformed and strange shapes, ugly and terrifying, and extremely ferocious.

If it weren't for Ink Painting, and any other cultivator came in, their sea of consciousness would be instantly scrambled and gnawed clean by the evil spirits.

But now the situation was completely reversed.

Ink Painting deliberately restrained his aura, presenting himself as an ordinary, plain, physically weak, harmless-to-humans-and-animals, but with abundant and sweet divine sense, young cultivator.

Countless evil spirits drooled over him, one after another, madly drilling towards his unguarded sea of consciousness.

Then they were all grasped by the pure gold body of Ink Painting inside his sea of consciousness, instantly pinched dead, refined in a flash, refined into pure mind power, nourishing his own divine sense.

Just like this, Ink Painting, while using his body as bait for "fishing law enforcement", also hid his body and walked towards the end of the tunnel.

He didn't know how long he had walked, but Ink Painting finally reached the end of the tunnel.

The end of the tunnel was sealed by array law.

Ink Painting controlled the ink with his divine sense, quietly undoing the array law, then looked out and saw that the end of the tunnel connected to an array pivot great hall.

Inside the great hall, it was gloomy and bloody, bustling with activity. They were all evil path array masters holding human bone pens, dipping human blood ink, and using human skin as paper, drawing blood-colored ferocious array laws...