Chapter 535 - 331: Number One (Part 2)

Chapter 535: Chapter 331: Number One (Part 2)

’How did his power suddenly become so strong?!’

The situation in the spectator stands had reversed in an instant.

The spectators from the Lain Empire erupted in a deafening roar. "Li Wen’s unleashing his power!"

"I knew it! The God of Slaughter isn’t just an empty title!"

The cheers from the Tyrone Empire, however, turned to cries of alarm and concern. "Lord Sheng Moshi!"

"What’s going on? He had the upper hand just a moment ago!"

Sheng Moshi watched Li Wen approach step by step. His opponent’s aura was nearly thirty percent stronger than before, and the shadow of death had never loomed so clearly.

A fierce will to survive and a profound sense of humiliation collided and burned within him in this desperate plight.

"No! I can’t die here! I am Sheng Moshi, the prodigy of the Tyrone Empire! I am destined to make my name known across the cosmos!!"

A ferocious, hostile energy erupted from the depths of his heart. Pushed to the brink, some kind of shackle within his body seemed to be forcibly shattered.

The golden glow on the dark-gold scimitar suddenly flared, its sharp aura cutting through the air with a hiss.

An even stronger and more condensed fluctuation of the Metal Element Law rose from his body.

He had actually broken through at the brink of death, his strength increasing by a large margin as well.

"Hahaha! The heavens haven’t abandoned me!" Sheng Moshi wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth and got back to his feet, his eyes glinting with madness and a newly rekindled arrogance.

"Li Wen! Is that your trump card? It’s nothing special! Now, it’s my turn! If this is the full extent of your power, then it’s time for this farce to end!"

With a savage grin, he launched a furious counterattack.

After his breakthrough, the Power of Law of the Metal Element was even more condensed and tyrannical.

The flash of his blade was like a golden dragon, tearing through the air and lunging at Li Wen with destructive force.

The tables turned once more!

Sheng Moshi’s slashes were exceptionally fierce. He actually managed to suppress the silver, gold-rimmed light of Li Wen’s blade, which had been empowered by fusing Wish Power into his Dantian.

With every clash, Li Wen felt a slight numbness in his arm and was forced back again and again.

Sheng Moshi had seized the complete advantage, his onslaught like a surging tide that threatened to drown Li Wen completely.

"Lord Sheng Moshi is invincible!"

"Kill him! Kill that bastard from the Lain Empire!"

The spectators from the Tyrone Empire were ecstatic, their roars shaking the sky.

On the side of the Lain Empire, hearts were once again in their throats, and their worry was plain to see. "Li Wen is in danger!"

"How could that guy manage to break through?!"

Facing Sheng Moshi’s stormy counterattack, Li Wen’s eyes remained as calm as still water.

He felt the pressure from his opponent’s breakthrough and understood the situation perfectly.

’The boost from fusing Wish Power with my Dantian is no longer enough to handle the current Sheng Moshi.’

’It seems I can’t finish you quickly without fusing the Wish Power with my entire body,’ Li Wen thought, a sharp light flashing in his eyes.

ROAR!

Deep within his sea of consciousness, his colossal Primordial Spirit avatar let out a silent roar.

The light of the Primordial Divine Ring behind his head grew blindingly brilliant!

This time, it wasn’t a trickle, but a majestic, ocean-like torrent of Wish Power.

It was no longer confined to his Dantian. Like a golden flame, it burst forth from the core of his Primordial Spirit in an instant.

It surged tempestuously, fusing with every cell, every meridian, and every wisp of Primordial Power in his body!

BOOM!

An aura fifty percent stronger than the one from the Dantian fusion erupted from Li Wen.

His body seemed to be wreathed in a faint, almost invisible golden flame.

The very space around him warped slightly from the terrifying power.

His eyes grew incredibly profound, as if they held an entire cosmos of star rivers.

"Wh-what is this power?!" The savage grin and arrogance on Sheng Moshi’s face were instantly replaced by boundless terror.

He felt as if he were no longer facing a Saint Realm cultivator.

The terrifying pressure nearly suffocated him. The power he’d gained from his breakthrough seemed insignificant and laughable before this new aura.

The furious slashes he unleashed were distorted and slowed by an invisible field of Wish Power while still several meters away from Li Wen, their power greatly diminished.

Li Wen moved.

He used no complex Secret Technique—just a simple step forward and a swing of his blade.

RIIIIP—!

A gold-and-silver flash of blade light, seemingly capable of slicing through space itself, shot forth.

This slash contained more than just the profundity of the Time Law and the boost from the Dantian-fused Wish Power.

It was the product of a perfect fusion of three things: the Time Law, his Primordial Power, and the vast, surging Wish Power that burned throughout his entire body.

It was too fast for Sheng Moshi’s eyes to follow, and its power was so immense that the thought of blocking didn’t even have time to form.

"No—!!!" was all Sheng Moshi had time to scream in utter despair.

The flash of the blade passed by.

Time seemed to stand still at this moment.

Sheng Moshi remained frozen in his forward-lunging, blade-swinging posture, the terror on his face solidified.

The next second, a fine red line appeared between his brows and traced its way down his face.

Then, his entire body, along with the dark-gold scimitar in his hand, silently split in two.

The cut was as smooth as a mirror. No blood sprayed out, as all signs of life had been instantly and completely obliterated by the attack.

The two halves of his body dissolved into motes of light and vanished into the air of the giant tree world.

[Points Update: Contestant Li Wen (Source Net Internal*, Lain Empire) has killed contestant Sheng Moshi (Tyrone Empire). Points Gained: 56,965,030. Current World Ranking: 1.]

The cold system notification from the Virtual Cosmos rang out across World #13, the giant tree world, echoing through all the spectator stands as well.

Dead silence.

Absolute, dead silence fell over all the spectator stands for the Tyrone Empire.

The hundreds of millions of spectators, who had been cheering wildly just a second before, were suddenly silent, as if they had all been choked at once.

All their cheers died in their throats, leaving only looks of utter shock and bewilderment.

These expressions eventually faded to a deathly, ashen pallor.

"L-Lord Sheng Moshi... was... was killed in one hit?" a trembling voice, full of incredulous despair, broke the silence.

"The G-God of Slaughter... Now *that’s* the real God of Slaughter..." someone muttered, dazed. The immense shock left them weak in the knees.

In sharp contrast, the Lain Empire’s spectator stands erupted in a fanatical cheer so loud it threatened to blow the roof off the virtual dome!

"We won! Li Wen won!"

"A one-hit kill! It was a one-hit kill! The God of Slaughter is invincible!"

"Did you see that?! That’s the prodigy of our Lain Empire! Your number one is nothing special, you Tyrone bastards!"

All their previous anxiety and tension transformed into unparalleled excitement and pride.

Li Wen’s final, godlike strike was deeply seared into the minds of every spectator from the Lain Empire.

At that moment, with the fall of Sheng Moshi, the name "God of Slaughter" resounded throughout World #13 of the Alka District.

Li Wen hovered in the air as the faint golden flame around him slowly receded back into his body.

He calmly glanced at the spot where Sheng Moshi had disappeared.

His expression was completely untroubled, as if he had just crushed an ant.

He raised his hand. On a virtual screen, his score had become a terrifying number, placing him firmly at the top of the World #13 rankings and leaving second place far behind.

...

「At the same time.」

The Virtual Cosmos system broadcast announcing Sheng Moshi’s demise was like a boulder dropped into a stagnant pond.

It instantly sent shockwaves through every corner of World #13, the giant tree world.

"Sheng Moshi... is dead? Killed by that God of Slaughter, Li Wen?"

"How is that possible! He just reached number one!"

"Was he already injured and someone just finished him off? Or did Li Wen team up with others to ambush him?"

"The God of Slaughter... just how strong is he? Even Sheng Moshi couldn’t survive against him?"

"We’re done for. If even Sheng Moshi is dead, what does that mean for those of us struggling on the edge of the top 100...?"

Whispers filled with shock, fear, and disbelief echoed everywhere.

The weight of the broadcast—an announcement reserved only for the fall of a top 100 expert—cast a heavy shadow over the hearts of all remaining survivors.

...

Beside the skeletal remains of a behemoth strangled by giant vines, the second-ranked Nash Glen had just cleanly pulled a blood-stained bone spike from an opponent’s chest.

He moved with the agility of a cheetah, his actions possessing a raw yet efficient, deadly grace.

The opponent vanished in a flash of white light. Nash’s score flickered, but his face showed no joy.

Just then, the broadcast announcing Sheng Moshi’s death rang out across the sky.

Nash froze, his pupils constricting.

Without hesitation, he pulled up the rankings. The top spot had already changed to "Li Wen (Source Net Internal*, Lain Empire)"!

Sheng Moshi’s name, meanwhile, was grayed out and had vanished.

’Sheng Moshi... taken out this quickly?’ Nash’s expression grew incredibly solemn, tinged with a hint of dread he was reluctant to admit even to himself.

’This Li Wen... is far more troublesome than I anticipated.’ A powerful sense of danger gripped him.

He immediately suppressed his aura, his figure melting into the deep shadows of the giant trees as he cautiously began to relocate.