Chapter 881: Breakthrough

Lao Hei rushed in front of Ao Zu, aiming to engage him in close combat and create an opportunity for Su Che and the others to strike.

“Haote people.”

Ao Zu sneered lightly, raised his left hand, and instantly a circular energy shield appeared less than three feet in front of Lao Hei. Lao Hei’s charge was too forceful; he didn’t have time to dodge and crashed into it headfirst.

Bang!

Like a wall of energy, the rebound force was immense. Lao Hei failed to penetrate it and was instead sent flying hundreds of feet back.

“Roar!”

Lao Hei stabilized himself, let out a fierce roar, and charged again. But instead of charging headlong like a bull, he tried to bypass the energy shield by changing direction. Unexpectedly, the circular shield could move on its own, always appearing in front of Lao Hei ahead of time.

With his hands behind his back, Ao Zu appeared relaxed as he sneered coldly, “Haote people aren’t hard to deal with. Just keep you at a distance. Go ahead and play around there.”

Lao Hei tried to dart left and right but couldn’t bypass the shield. After several attempts, he still couldn’t shatter it—the rebound force was too strong, seemingly reflecting all of his impact back at him.

“That old guy is insane. Everything he creates causes endless headaches,” Lao Hei cursed inwardly, but couldn’t think of any good solution right away.

Indeed, the Haote people’s greatest strength was their extremely abnormal physical defense, while their combat skills were rather ordinary—something that had already been evident with the Tiger-Striped Monster back then. Otherwise, Xiao Hei wouldn’t have been able to capture him so easily and turn him into a puppet.

Swish!

Manzi’s soul-control characters slipped through the gaps between the floating boulders, sneaking up behind Ao Zu.

It was called “sneaking” because only observers could see these control characters; Ao Zu, as the target, should not have been able to detect them. Yet, Ao Zu seemed to be prepared for this. Although he didn’t notice the control character in advance, as soon as it touched his body and before it could penetrate, an energy-based illusion of Ao Zu split off, neutralizing the control character and turning it to nothingness.

“Soul-control technique.”

Ao Zu turned his head toward Manzi’s direction, the slight smile on his face still laced with disdain. “I’ve encountered similar attack methods in the Chaos. All those travelers who used these spells became my victims. What can you kids possibly do to me?”

After hearing these words, Su Che and the others did not think he was just being arrogant and boastful. Indeed, this old man had traveled through chaos for countless years, possessing extremely rich experience. The fact that he had survived to this day meant that countless opponents had died before him.

Su Che immediately sent a secret message to the others: “We must find a way to distract him and give Manzi enough opportunity so that her soul control technique can succeed in possessing him.”

“Understood,” Tian Yin, Lao Hei, and Xiao Hei replied in unison.

The five of them had already agreed that, in addition to using the power of the formation to restrict Ao Zu’s time domain, they needed to rely on Manzi’s soul control technique to defeat him.

Of course, Ao Zu’s soul power was undoubtedly extremely strong, so the impact of the soul control technique on him would likely be minimal. But all they needed was a tiny bit of opportunity, a slight flaw.

Once Manzi’s soul control technique succeeded in possessing him, it could continuously harass Ao Zu’s soul. If it didn’t work once, it would be tried ten times, a hundred times, a thousand times—until he made a mistake.

Bang bang bang…

Lao Hei desperately struck at the circular energy wall blocking his path, shouting loudly nonstop, and sending all sorts of vicious insults at Ao Zu, all in an attempt to provoke him and make him focus more on him.

At the same time, Xiao Hei charged forward with his battle axe; Tian Yin’s sonic powers already surrounded Ao Zu, creating a vortex-like force that constantly drained his defensive strength.

Su Che, on his part, used various great arts from his own universe to carry out remote harassment attacks, hoping that one of the more than 2,000 great arts he knew might just be able to counter him.

Perhaps the seemingly most insignificant and weakest art could actually cause serious damage to a seemingly powerful enemy—anything was possible.

“Useless!”

Ao Zu seemed annoyed by these harassments. The moment Xiao Hei got close, a crimson shockwave erupted from his body with a loud boom.

The appearance of this shockwave made Su Che and the others nervous, as it resembled the precursor to the outbreak of a time domain.

Could he still release a time domain?

If so, that would be disastrous…

Boom!

This shock wave did not form a domain; it was merely pure force. Lao Hei and Xiao Hei, who were closest, were hit first. Without any chance to resist, they were thrown backward, crashing into several floating boulders before they could stabilize themselves.
Tian Yin’s sonic powers, as well as several spells unleashed by Su Che in succession, were also shattered by the shock wave and vanished completely.
“That old guy is too strong. That punch he threw was simply overwhelming,” Lao Hei shouted from the Immortal Prison.
The others felt relieved inwardly. At least this kind of shock wave wasn’t the worst—so long as it wasn’t a terrifying time domain.
Boom!
Immediately afterward, another shock wave sent Lao Hei and Xiao Hei flying even further. Several nearby floating boulders were shattered, surely causing damage to the entire sealing formation.
“We can’t let him keep destroying it like this. Otherwise, the formation will be completely ruined soon.”
Su Che had no choice but to unleash a thousandfold increase in strength and join forces with Lao Hei and Xiao Hei to counterattack.
Seeing Su Che flying toward him, Ao Zu did not release another shock aura. Instead, he smiled darkly and said, “Good. That’s exactly what I wanted—to make you come here on your own.”
Ao Zu raised his hand, and a crimson beam shot out from his palm, hitting Su Che head-on.
Su Che did not dodge. Instead, he used his Chaos power to deliver a fierce punch.
Hiss!
The violent punch force collided with the crimson beam. Instead of the expected energy explosion, something quite strange happened.
The crimson beam trapped Su Che’s Chaos-powered punch along with him, as if tied by a long string, firmly anchoring him to it.
“Come here.”
Ao Zu retracted his arm, beginning to pull the string.
Originally, Su Che had rushed over on his own, but now, being uncontrollably pulled by the other party was a completely different situation from deliberately charging forward to attack.
As the distance shortened, Su Che could clearly feel an invisible restraining force growing stronger on his body. If he got any closer, he might turn into another motionless human statue.
“I don’t believe you can use Chaos Protection a second time.”
Ao Zu chuckled. His goal was to capture Su Che alive. Tian Yin and the others meant nothing to him. Whether they lived or died didn’t matter at all.

At this moment, Su Che didn’t have time to carefully analyze the nature of that highly sticky and bizarre force released by Ao Zu; he only focused on unleashing all his chaotic energy to shatter this restraining force and break free. But in a fraction of a second, he suddenly changed his mind: “I just want to charge over—fine, I’ll just go with this pulling force.” Ao Zu’s strength was unfathomable, and his tactics were endless; Lao Hei and Xiao Hei couldn’t get close enough to launch close-range attacks. That’s why Su Che made such a decision: live or die, he’d just have to get there first.

He went all in! In just an instant, Ao Zu pulled Su Che close—within less than ten feet, almost within reach. Ao Zu’s right hand, emitting crimson light, twisted violently, and a tremendous force of distortion was exerted on Su Che. His bones cracked like firecrackers, as if invisible hands were trying to twist his body into a spiral. In this life-or-death crisis, Su Che roared in fury, his body swelling dozens of times larger—shifting from normal human height to that of a giant over ten feet tall.

Pfft, pfft, pfft… Blood gushed from every pore of his body as he used his witch clan’s transformation ability to counteract the distortion force and break free from Ao Zu’s restraint. Yet the cost was high—such forced transformation caused severe self-damage. If he went any further, his body would explode.

There were downsides, but also advantages. The power unleashed by this forced transformation, combined with his original thousand-fold enhancement, became berserk, drastically boosting Su Che’s attack power.

“Die!”

Su Che, now a giant, swung his arms and slammed his palms together—*smack!* Ao Zu, who was right in front of him, was hit like a fly. The terrifying force Su Che unleashed shocked Ao Zu, causing the defensive forces surrounding his body to collapse and shatter. Though he wasn’t severely injured, Manzi, who had been waiting for an opportunity, didn’t miss this precious moment.

Swish! Swish! Swish… One of the dozen soul-control symbols circling around finally found a gap and slipped into Ao Zu’s body.

Possession succeeded! The soul-control technique took effect instantly. Ao Zu, who was about to counterattack Su Che, froze—his soul had already been directly attacked by Manzi.

Whoa!
Su Che’s enormous body, towering dozens of feet high, shattered in an instant, breaking down into tiny particles as fine as dust. It resembled a cloud of golden dust floating in the wind and dissipating.
What was going on? Had Su Che’s physical body been destroyed?
Tian Yin almost cried out in shock. Fortunately, she saw Su Che’s figure reappear in mid-air, back to his normal height and size.
That extreme and violent attack had indeed destroyed a body, but not his physical form—the most important one—but rather his Mythical-level Great Golden Body Technique.
To save his physical body, Su Che had to make the painful sacrifice of giving up his Mythical-level Great Golden Body Technique, thereby offsetting the nearly unbearable self-harm caused by the attack.
With his Mythical-level Great Golden Body Technique completely ruined, Su Che’s defensive power dropped by one level.
Although in the chaos, facing various super-strong opponents, his original defensive power wasn’t very impressive anyway, so a drop of one level might not make much of a difference. Still, it caused Su Che deep distress.
To regain his Great Golden Body Technique, he could only wait until he returned to his own universe, capture some True Immortal criminals, and extract the skill from them once again.
“Well then, whatever I’ve lost, I’ll get back tenfold, even a hundredfold, from that old guy Ao Zu.”
Taking advantage of Ao Zu’s unstable soul state, Su Che launched another attack, punching straight at Ao Zu’s forehead…