The bald old man's figure dissolved into specks of dim light that sank into the churning Thunder Sea below.
Mu Chen lowered his fist and stood still as the surging blood and lightning around him slowly subsided.
He rolled his neck and wrists, his bones cracking crisply. The blazing battle intent in his eyes had not faded; instead, it burned even hotter.
"Senior," he raised his head and looked toward the endless darkness deep within the Thunder Sea, his clear voice piercing the thunder, "I feel... that wasn't quite enough!"
"Would you fight me with your full strength?"
Opportunities to gauge the limits of his fighting prowess were rare. How could he let this one slip away?
The instant his words fell-
The churning thunder slurry froze. The racing lightning stopped. Even the ceaseless, low rumble of thunder seemed to have its throat seized by an invisible giant hand.
ROAR-!!!
An indescribable roar exploded from the deepest reaches of the Thunder Sea!
The dim space suddenly blazed as bright as day!
Countless bolts of pitch-black lightning, thick as mountain ranges, erupted from the void, tearing apart the sky and crisscrossing until the entire space was sliced to pieces!
Thunder slurry surged backward, and a tsunami soared into the sky!
At the center of that scene of destruction, the Thunder Sea bulged upward as though some invisible colossus had thrust violently against it from below, swelling into an unimaginably terrifying curve.
Then an enormous creature burst out of the sea!
His entire body was a profound, shadowy black, so deep that it seemed capable of devouring all light. His body stretched for untold tens of thousands of miles. The mere section of his back exposed above the sea resembled an ancient mountain range spanning the starry sky.
He resembled a fish yet was not a fish, resembled a dragon yet was not a dragon. The pair of cloud-draping wings at his sides unfurled, obscuring most of the visible sky!
His wing membranes were neither flesh nor feathers, but interwoven pitch-black lightning condensed to its utmost limit. Every slight beat stirred hurricanes that swept across heaven and earth, accompanied by the roar of ten thousand thunderbolts!
Bei Ming Dragon Kun!
The Northern Heavens Spiritual Academy's Academy Guardian Beast, a pinnacle expert at the Ninth Grade Sovereign realm!
The upheaval caused by his mere appearance seemed enough to shatter the tenth level of the Thunder Domain!
His enormous body gave a gentle leap.
The entire space went mad.
The Thunder Sea erupted into utter frenzy, raising waves a hundred thousand feet high. Their crests held no spray, only hundreds of millions of roaring giant lightning pythons!
Spiderweb cracks appeared in the spatial barriers. Pitch-black spatial turbulence seeped through the fissures, only to be shredded by still more violent lightning.
An aura of destruction filled every inch of the air. Any ordinary Supreme here would likely have their mind shattered and their body reduced to ash in an instant.
Bei Ming Dragon Kun's eyes, like pools of lightning, slowly turned and fixed with cold indifference upon the black-clad figure below, as insignificant as a speck of dust before him.
I am an ant.
That would surely have been the sole thought of anyone below the Supreme realm facing Bei Ming Dragon Kun at this moment.
Yet as Mu Chen looked up at the immense divine beast blotting out the sun and sky, there was not a trace of fear on his face. Instead, his smile grew even brighter, almost ecstatic.
"Now that's more like it!"
He laughed aloud and advanced rather than retreated, his figure becoming a streak of black light that tore through space as he charged straight toward the towering, churning Thunder Sea and the ancient colossal beast above it!
Seeking death?
No.
He sought battle! He sought to prove his Dao! With an ant's body, he would shake a pillar that held up the heavens!
"Come!"
Mu Chen let out a long cry that shook the thunder.
Radiant light erupted from his pores once more. His blood surged skyward like beacon smoke, while the chaos-colored light beneath his skin circulated madly, roaring like rushing rivers.
He drove his innate chaos saint body Dao embryo to its limit!
The One-Qi Chaos Tower thundered within his Qi Sea, releasing streams of chaos qi to empower his body.
The Divine Firmament Calamity-Averting Thunder Body circulated of its own accord, ravenously drawing in the violent power of lightning around him. Instead of weakening, his aura climbed steadily within the Thunder Sea!
He plunged straight into the towering waves of lightning.
Great thunderous waves capable of vaporizing refined metal battered his body, but they could only send arcs of electricity flying through the air. They could not hinder him in the slightest.
Like a swordfish swimming against the current, he tore through the Thunder Sea, heading straight for the colossal beast's head.
Bei Ming Dragon Kun was thoroughly intrigued now, eager to see just where this monstrous young talent's limits lay!
BOOM-!
The Thunder Sea ahead of Mu Chen abruptly collapsed, forming a terrifying whirlpool more than a hundred thousand feet across!
Endless darkness filled the bottom of the whirlpool, radiating a suction that devoured everything. Columns of black lightning, condensed to their utmost limit, shot from its center and reached Mu Chen in an instant!
This lightning column was only as thick as a bucket, yet it was thousands upon thousands of times more condensed than the enormous lightning dragon from before!
The destructive power within it caused the surrounding space to undergo constant annihilation and rebirth.
Mu Chen's gaze sharpened. Without dodging, he clenched his right fist, chaos light and lightning arcs intertwining around his knuckles, and punched straight at the black lightning column!
A terrifying shock wave swept outward in a ring, forcibly pressing a pit hundreds of thousands of feet deep into the Thunder Sea below. The thunderclouds above were shredded, exposing the pitch-black void twisting and writhing behind them.
Mu Chen was hurled backward from the heart of the explosion. His feet plowed two furrows ten thousand feet long across the Thunder Sea before he barely steadied himself.
His right fist trembled slightly. Its surface was charred black, and tiny beads of blood seeped out, only to be evaporated at once by the leaping electrical arcs.
The sleeve on his arm had long since turned to ash, revealing a smoothly contoured forearm covered in fine scorch marks.
It hurt.
But that was all.
He did not even need his double pupils to heal. Mu Chen shook his arm, and the charred dead skin flaked away, revealing fresh skin beneath with a jade-like luster.
The battle intent in his eyes burned still hotter.
Bei Ming Dragon Kun adjusted his enormous body within the Thunder Sea, then gave a fierce beat of his cloud-draping wings toward Mu Chen!
BOOM-!!!!
Heaven and earth overturned!
An immeasurable torrent of pitch-black lightning erupted beneath his wings-not a single bolt, not a swath, but a wall of lightning storm spanning heaven and earth, joining the sky above to the sea below!
The storm wall was of unknown width, reaching the void above and the Thunder Sea below. It swept toward Mu Chen at a terrifying speed that appeared slow, yet covered a thousand miles in an instant!
Wherever it passed, space shattered inch by inch like glass. The Thunder Sea was pushed completely aside, exposing the bottomless darkness beneath.
Its destructive aura made the entire tenth level of the Thunder Domain groan and tremble, as though it would disintegrate completely in the next instant.
This was a natural catastrophe! Divine punishment! A world-destroying tide raised by a single thought of an ancient divine beast!
Retreat?
There was nowhere to retreat. The storm wall enveloped every direction.
Block it?
With what? This was the power of heaven and earth, enough to annihilate mountain ranges and boil great lakes dry.
Mu Chen stood before the storm, as insignificant as a speck of dust in a gale.
But he smiled.
His smile was utterly exhilarated, utterly unrestrained.
He threw his head back and let out a long cry, carrying the sounds of a dragon's roar and a tiger's howl. His aura surged explosively, gathering outside his body into a phantom of chaos qi and blood ten thousand feet tall!
The phantom's features were indistinct, yet it exuded an ancient, supreme majesty that could suppress all the heavens.
Chaos Dao Diagram: Myriad Manifestations Return to the Origin!
He formed a Spirit Seal with his hands. The vast spiritual energy and blood within his body surged wildly according to the ultimate principles evolved within the Chaos Dao Diagram, and the thousand-foot phantom of qi and blood behind him moved with him!
The seal was complete.
Mu Chen and the phantom behind him simultaneously thrust a palm toward the crushing wall of lightning storm.
One-Qi Great Hand Seal!
Within the palm imprint, myriad manifestations arose and perished as chaos qi flowed!
The storm wall was blasted clean through!
Before you continue