Different Choices (4)

"It's deeper in," Lin Chen said in a low voice. "I can feel it. The spatial fluctuations are strongest there."

The two of them moved slowly along the canyon. The farther they went, the denser the spatial rifts became, until Lin Chen had to raise a Chaos Shield around them both. The gray barrier collided with the rifts, hissing as sparks flew.

After they had gone more than a hundred zhang into the canyon, a wide clearing appeared ahead.

A massive creature lay in the center of the clearing. Nearly three zhang long and shaped like a leopard, it was a translucent dark silver all over, as though pieced together from solidified fragments of space.

Its eyes were a fathomless black, tiny, chaotic spatial currents swirling in its pupils. With every breath it took, the air around it warped and twisted.

A fifteen-thousand-year Void Beast King!

It seemed to sense the intruders and slowly raised its head, its black pupils locking onto Lin Chen and Xiao Wu. A terrifying pressure bore down on them as though it had substance. Xiao Wu grunted, her face turning slightly pale.

Lin Chen stepped forward, and the Chaos Pearl blazed with light, blocking the pressure completely.

"Xiao Wu, get ready."

Before he had finished speaking, the Void Beast King vanished from where it stood.

It had not moved. It had disappeared into thin air, without warning or a trace, as though it had never existed.

Lin Chen's pupils contracted, and he pushed Chaos Perception to its limit. The next instant, a sense of deadly danger came from directly overhead. Without thinking, he grabbed Xiao Wu around the waist, opened his Chaos Shield to its fullest, and rolled to the side.

Slash!

Three silver-white blades of space fell from the sky, cutting past the edge of the Chaos Shield and plowing three furrows several feet deep into the ground. Their cut surfaces were as smooth as mirrors.

Lin Chen rolled to his feet, a layer of cold sweat beading on his forehead. If that attack had landed squarely, even the Chaos Shield might not have stopped it.

That spatial teleportation was fast. His heart tightened. It's even trickier than I imagined.

Having missed its target, the Void Beast King vanished again. This time, it appeared behind Lin Chen, its claws wrapped in chaotic spatial currents as they struck straight for his back.

Lin Chen neither dodged nor retreated. He unleashed his second Soul Skill, Chaos Suppression, at full strength.

Hum!

A gray force field spread out abruptly, turning the space within ten zhang as viscous as syrup. The Void Beast King's body stalled slightly in midair. Its claws were less than three feet from Lin Chen's back, but they were forcibly held in place for an instant.

That instant was all it took.

"Xiao Wu!"

"Got it!"

Xiao Wu had long been poised to strike. Her Second Soul Ring lit up, and a pink wave of light struck the Void Beast King with precision. The power of charm invaded its mind, causing the ferocity in its eyes to waver for a moment.

Lin Chen flipped his left hand, and the Heaven-Slaying Sword shot from its sheath. Its pitch-black blade gleamed coldly in the sunlight as he swept it toward the Void Beast King's neck.

A flicker of terror passed through the Void Beast King's eyes. It forcibly tore through space and teleported again. The blade skimmed its fur, cutting off a few strands of silver-white hair.

Lin Chen's sword missed, and his heart sank.

The Void Beast King was far stronger than he had anticipated. With fifteen thousand years of cultivation and the bizarre, unpredictable nature of its spatial attribute, capturing it would be no easy task, even with the Chaos Pearl suppressing it.

"Brother Lin Chen, there's a pattern to its teleportation!" Xiao Wu suddenly called out. "Every time before it teleports, the space to its left starts to warp first!"

Lin Chen froze, then understood. Xiao Wu's true form was a Hundred-Thousand-Year Soft Bone Rabbit that had taken human form. Although her perception of space was not as strong as his, her instinctive intuition as a Soul Beast was, in some respects, sharper than a human's perception.

Without hesitation, Lin Chen compressed Chaos Suppression's force field with all his strength toward the area ahead and to his left. Sure enough, the Void Beast King appeared there. The moment it showed itself, the viscous spatial force field trapped it, slowing its movements by three tenths.

It roared in fury, forcibly tore through space, and vanished again. But Xiao Wu caught the signs before every teleportation with precision, and Lin Chen blocked its path in advance, preventing it from using its advantage in speed.

A fierce chase unfolded between man and beast in the canyon.

The Void Beast King's figure jumped and flickered through space, appearing now in the east, now in the west. Its claws and blades of space intertwined into a net of death.

Lin Chen relied on Chaos Shield to withstand its attacks, while steadily shrinking the space in which it could move with Chaos Suppression. Xiao Wu supported him from the side, releasing her charm skill at critical moments and disrupting the Void Beast King's rhythm again and again.

The battle lasted nearly half a shichen.

The Void Beast King's breath began to grow ragged. Repeatedly teleporting at such intensity had taken a tremendous toll on it. Though Lin Chen's Chaos Soul Power was pure, maintaining Chaos Suppression and Chaos Shield for so long had consumed more than half his Soul Power as well.

"I can't drag this out any longer," Lin Chen said through gritted teeth, a flash of resolve in his eyes.

He suddenly withdrew Chaos Shield and poured all his Soul Power into the Chaos Pearl.

The gray Chaos Pearl burst with an unprecedented radiance. A vast force of suppression descended from the sky, engulfing the entire canyon.

"Chaos-Suppression!"

The Void Beast King let out a piercing, anguished cry. An invisible force pinned its body firmly in place, leaving it unable to move so much as a single claw. It struggled wildly, the chaotic spatial currents around it rampaging and shredding the ground and rock walls nearby, but it could not break free of the Power of Chaos.

Lin Chen's face instantly turned pale. Maintaining suppression at this level consumed an immense amount of his Soul Power. He could hold on for three seconds at most.

"Xiao Wu, now!"

Xiao Wu was already prepared. Her figure blurred, and she pushed off with both legs, shooting toward the Void Beast King like a cannonball. Her right leg rose high as she charged Waist Bow to its limit.

"Waist Bow-Break!"

A powerful roundhouse kick slammed into the Void Beast King's head. The blow sent its massive body flying sideways, smashing through several stone pillars before crashing heavily into the rock wall and leaving a huge crater.

But it still wasn't dead!

The Void Beast King struggled to push itself up, its eyes blazing with ferocity. It opened its mouth and fired a spatial cannon compressed to its limit, a silver-white beam shooting straight at Xiao Wu's chest.

Xiao Wu was in midair, with no way to dodge.

At that critical moment, a silver-gray figure suddenly appeared in front of her.

Lin Chen.

The Heaven-Slaying Sword in his left hand, he faced the spatial cannon capable of piercing a mountain. He neither dodged nor retreated, but brought his sword down.

The sword fell without fancy technique or dazzling effects, carrying nothing but pure sharpness.

The silver-white spatial cannon was split down the middle. It turned into two streams of light that swept past either side of Lin Chen and blasted two bottomless pits into the ground behind him.

The Void Beast King's eyes widened, as though it could not believe its attack had been split apart by a single sword strike.

Lin Chen gave it no second chance. He raised the Heaven-Slaying Sword high, dark red lines lighting up along its blade, and brought it down.