Above another floating island, the sea of clouds was slowly churning. The heavy and oppressive rules governing the heavens and earth suddenly began to vibrate with extreme instability. First, a very low and deep hum came from the depths of the high sky, like some ancient colossus slowly rotating on the other side of the universe. Then, fine cracks began to appear across the entire sky. These cracks did not spread but continued to deepen, as if an excessively large and heavy entity was forcibly pressing into this trial space from outside the boundary.
Chi Ninghua stood in the center of the island, her long hair whipping wildly in the wind. Her gaze never left the ever-changing sky before her. The next moment, she clenched her right hand, and her natal divine weapon was suddenly drawn. The sword's cry wasn't sharp, but it instantly sliced through the Ultimate heavy aura around her. A layer of sharpness flowed from the blade, forming a frozen river of cold. With a slight turn of her wrist, the sword's edge pointed diagonally forward, and her entire aura was fully unleashed at that moment.
Her cultivation at the pinnacle of the True Annihilation Realm · Peak rose layer by layer within her body. The edges of the island beneath her feet kept cracking and then recovering. The surrounding space began to enter a state of half-real and half-illusory, as if if she took another step, the entire island would be dragged into her True Annihilation Domain.
At that very moment, the sky suddenly shattered. It was not an ordinary void rift, but a huge gash that ran from north to south to be torn open in the entire sky. There was no darkness or light in the depths of the rift, only layers upon layers of nested pale light wheels slowly rotating, like the Dao Seal of Order that transcended the cognition of all heavens.
In the deepest part of the endless radiance and surging clouds, a figure slowly descended from the void. It was extremely tall and thin, its body covered by a pale white structure somewhere between armor and feathered robes. The surface was devoid of any superfluous patterns, yet it seemed to be forcibly forged from countless torn fragments of law intertwined together, each edge sharp enough to cut through space.
Its head had no clear features, only a deep blackness; all facial structures had been completely erased by some force. Above and behind its head, several enormous halos floated and rotated. The foremost halo was narrow and sharp, like a blade cutting through the heavens and earth, while the others behind it were layered and intertwined, making it appear as if it were a divine relic that had stepped out of another apocalyptic era.
Its robes were not made of cloth, but layers of scorched, grayish-white fluid that hung from its shoulders, constantly tearing and reforming in mid-air, the edges interspersed with dark red embers like sparks. These embers did not burn, but caused large areas of the surrounding air to collapse and distort, as if existence itself was being repeatedly polished to near nothingness wherever it passed. It had no ground to stand on, but simply hovered slowly in mid-air; with each inch it sank, the entire floating island sank a fraction of an inch.
The rock layers on the island's surface cracked extensively, and the sea of clouds was pressed into a huge, ever-expanding depression. The light and shadow of the other islands around it dimmed at this moment, as if its arrival had forcibly stolen away all the background.
Chi Ninghua's fingers tightened slightly around her sword, the blade suddenly gleaming with a chilling light. Her pupils reflected the descending figure; her eyes held no panic, only extreme solemnity and a suddenly ignited fighting spirit. She knew very well that what appeared before her was not one of those Primordial Beast Dao Divine Venerable who only knew how to suppress others with their origins, but a terrifying being truly standing at the edge of the True Annihilation Realm, who had even transformed "True Annihilation" into its very body and weapon.
It didn't display any overt power or pressure, yet the sense of solemnity caused the heavens and earth to slightly sink. The figure stopped there, and the several halos behind him trembled simultaneously, instantly illuminating countless suspended cracks in the sky.
An aura as cold as ancient ice, as still as a deathly abyss, and as empty as nothingness slowly spread out like an invisible tide, seeping into every inch of the island, freezing the air, causing Spiritual Qi to lie dormant, and even the wind seemed to be choked shut.
This aura carried no trace of violence, yet it was more chilling than the overwhelming demonic power, as if the true end had already arrived, silently gazing at Chi Ninghua with a pair of invisible eyes.
Chi Ninghua didn't wait any longer. She lightly stepped on the center of the island, and the entire floating island suddenly sank an inch. The air was compressed into layers of transparent fractures by the True Annihilation Power released from her body. She raised her sword, and before the blade could even be swung, large areas of the surrounding space had already silently disintegrated. Her voice fell coldly in this Ultimate world—"True Annihilation: Reverse Order Judgment."
The next instant, her divine power "occurred," the sword blade slashing horizontally from the void, yet without a trace. The sword didn't cut towards the creature's body, but rather towards its "order of existence." Wherever the sword touched, the order of heaven and earth began to flow in reverse; rocks turned to dust before they could crumble, light extinguished before it could shine, and even the halo surrounding the creature began to oscillate in reverse order.
The trajectory that was spinning just moments before suddenly reversed, as if forcibly dragged back to its starting point by an unseen hand. Space was folded layer by layer, and one after another, afterimages of "not yet happened" were forcibly peeled away from the void. These afterimages were precisely the "path of existence" of that being in the future, in the past, and in countless possibilities.
Under this single sword strike, they were all pulled out, aligned, and torn apart, leaving tens of thousands of broken lines across the entire sky, like an ancient scroll that had been repeatedly erased and rewritten, with all the recorded traces being forcibly rearranged.
The supernatural power she wielded was not for annihilation and slaughter, but for disrupting the order of time, causing the sequence of all the target's actions to collapse completely, so that no matter what kind of power it was, it could not be used in the correct order. The moment the sword intent spread out, the light and shadow in the sky above the entire island suddenly became out of place, and even the surging of the clouds and sea of clouds jumped and flashed wildly between moving forward and backward.
The being did not retreat. It stood within the rewritten order, its faceless black head slowly rising. Several halos behind it suddenly trembled simultaneously, and an extremely cold and desolate power silently spread from its body. It did not wave its hand or raise its arm; its supernatural power simply "unleashed." The space around it suddenly collapsed, creating an extremely deep void, a void without boundaries.
Yet it swallowed up all the unfolding "sequences," its voice not transmitted through sound waves, but manifesting simultaneously in every inch of space—"Silent Ring, Return to Severance." In the next instant, its counterattack was already formed. It did not try to block Chi Ninghua's sword, but instead made that sword "unreachable." That void was like an abyss that devoured all order, sucking in all timelines, all paths of action, and all extensions of sword intent.
The lingering image of the future torn open by the sword's edge shattered the instant it touched the void. The trajectory of the past, Chi Ninghua back, completely lost its home upon contact. The "paths of existence" forcibly extracted from the space began to break one by one, like severed threads, turning into countless tiny fragments of light at the edge of the void. The power of that being did not clash with her.
It was as if she had "cut off" all the sequences she had rewritten, preventing them from continuing. The entire sky instantly Return to One heavier stillness. This stillness was not stability, but Limit contraction after all possibilities had been flattened. A huge ring of collapse appeared above the island, and all energy, laws, sword intent, and afterimages were pressed into it, forming a constantly tightening "termination zone."
Chi Ninghua's sword suddenly trembled at that moment. Her supernatural power was forcibly severed, and the Reverse Order light patterns that had been unfolding layer by layer on the sword extinguished inch by inch. Her figure did not retreat, but her chest suddenly tightened, and a reverse shock flowed directly back into her body from the severed sequence.
Her shoulders slumped slightly, and in the next instant, she was forcefully thrown back three steps by that invisible force. The island beneath her feet cracked open with a deep gash. She forcibly steadied herself, and with the tip of her sword touching the ground, the ground instantly turned into a grayish-white void.
The impact was partially averted, but a trickle of blood still escaped from the corner of her mouth. The blood did not drip; it lingered in the air for a moment before slowly dissipating. Her Fate Soul was shaken by this attack, leaving a very fine ripple. Although it did not collapse, it was truly shaken.
The creature remained suspended in place, not giving chase. Its halo slowly rotated behind it, and the collapsed space around it gradually returned to normal. Its presence remained heavy and oppressive. It looked at Chi Ninghua without any emotional fluctuation, yet it made the entire world seem even more cramped.
Its counterattack, though not explosively destructive, directly suppressed her first move, making her clearly perceive the gap in skill in that instant.
Chi Ninghua slowly straightened up, raised her hand to wipe the blood from the corner of her mouth, her gaze even colder than before. She raised her sword again, and her aura did not decrease. Instead, it became even sharper after that streak of blood. The space around the island began to fluctuate again, and a deeper level of confrontation was gathering again.
The creature's figure leaned slightly forward in mid-air, and the several halos behind it suddenly froze simultaneously, then all rotated in the opposite direction in the next instant. At this moment, space was forcibly flattened into layers of transparent cross-sections, and its divine power was unleashed—"Silent Realm: Collapsed Core of the Ring Domain".
With this silent declaration, the entire world seemed to be slowly closed from all directions by an invisible giant hand. Space was no longer three-dimensional, but folded into countless overlapping thin surfaces. Between each layer were Ultimate fine annihilation cracks. These cracks had no color, yet they were constantly devouring everything around them. The island beneath Chi Ninghua's feet began to tremble violently, and the rock layers collapsed one by one, compressed into fine gray-white particles that floated in mid-air.
The air was completely forced out of its original trajectory, forming a series of inward-collapsed ring-shaped impacts. The being raised its hand, and an invisible "center point" was generated in its palm. All spatial dimensions collapsed madly towards that point, and time was violently torn apart during the compression. The afterimages of the past and future were drawn into it, forming a constantly collapsing vacuum core.
Any entity that touches that area will have its structural layers stripped away, from its outer shell to its Fate Soul, from its laws to its cognition, crushed layer by layer, until even the process of being "crushed" disappears, leaving only an untraceable void of Annihilation.
Chi Ninghua's figure was directly locked onto by the power of the collapsing core. The space around her instantly tightened, and she felt as if she were embedded in countless layers of spatial crevices. Her movements were greatly suppressed, and the fluctuations of her Fate Soul began to become chaotic. The power was not in a hurry to destroy her, but instead continued to compress her, dragging her into an irreversible convergence point.
Her breath hitched, and fine cracks appeared on her skin. Her clothes tore under the pressure, and her hair was pressed close to her skin. The world was slowly grinding her into a single point.
Just as the core collapsed and contracted to its Limit, Chi Ninghua suddenly looked up. An Ultimate gray-white light ignited deep within her pupils. The light did not radiate outwards, but it caused all the compressed space around her to tremble simultaneously.
Her fingers tightened around the sword, and the blade emitted a deep, resonant sound that seemed to pierce through countless realms from the farthest reaches. Her voice, though forceful, rang out under the weight of the sound—"True Annihilation: Return to Origin, Realm Splitting."
The next instant, her most powerful secret technique was unleashed.
Her entire being suddenly collapsed inward, then abruptly expanded in the next moment. An extremely pure power of True Annihilation exploded outward from her body. It wasn't an energy shock, but a direct tearing apart of the "level of existence." The island beneath her feet was no longer compressed, but instead shattered into dozens of suspended fragments, each fragment redefined by her power as an independent space.
At the center, she slashed horizontally with her sword, instantly tearing open the collapsing core with an extremely thin yet heaven-and-earth-piercing rift. The rift emitted no light, yet it caused an irreversible fracture in the entire collapsed core structure. The spatial layers that were originally contracting inward were forcibly reversed and began to explode outward. The core point in the palm of that being trembled violently, and all the compressed time afterimages around it dissipated.
Transforming into countless shattered fragments that scattered in all directions, Chi Ninghua took a step forward, her figure instantly moving into mid-air within the cracked space. Her sword slashed down once more, its sword intent piercing through the spatial layers surrounding the being, forcibly slicing through layer upon layer of space, directly tearing apart a cage composed of countless dimensions. Her power no longer resisted the oppression.
The direct rewriting of the oppression itself caused the collapse core to lose its logic of continued contraction. For the first time, the figure of that being trembled noticeably, the halo behind it suddenly shifted, and a fine crack spread across its structure.
Chi Ninghua didn't stop. Her aura exploded to its peak at this moment, and the entire sky above the island was completely torn apart into layers of gray-white domains by her True Annihilation Power. She stood in the center of the domain, her sword tip hanging down, and all the spatial structures around her were converging on her.
The suppression of that being was completely shattered at this moment, and the situation was forcibly reversed by her. The endpoint that was originally pressing down on her began to collapse in the opposite direction, and the dominance of the battlefield returned to her hands in an instant.
Meanwhile, battles broke out on other floating islands.
On an island, a True Annihilation Realm expert had just shattered the Beast Dao God in front of him. Before he could even regain his footing, the sky suddenly cracked open, and a black shadow fell down. The entire island was crushed in an instant. His figure didn't even have time to react before it shattered into countless fragments in mid-air. Even his Fate Soul didn't have time to struggle before it was completely wiped out.
On another island, a cultivator at the Mystic Void Realm · Supreme used his Ultimate power with all his might to tear apart a giant beast. Before victory could be achieved, the space behind him suddenly collapsed, and an invisible giant hand reached out from the void, grabbing his entire body into its palm. In the next instant, his entire body was compressed into a point and disappeared without a trace.
Further away, an island was burning fiercely. Two top experts joined forces to fight against a terrifying creature. Light crisscrossed the sky and earth, but the creature suddenly opened a dark domain, extinguishing all the light in an instant. The two figures were dragged into the darkness, and after a moment, only an empty island remained.
Throughout the entire Trial Realm, floating islands continued to sink, collapse, and disappear. One by one, victors landed, and one by one, the defeated vanished into Annihilation. The outline of the ancient palace became increasingly clear in the distance. More and more powerful individuals stepped into the final gathering place, while in the sky, the battles that were still ongoing were heading towards an even more brutal end.