MIGHT AS WELL BE OP Chapter 978: Endless Spatial Blade

A wide smile spread across Lucian's face as he gazed at Aaaninja, savoring the turn this fight was taking. For three full years, he had endured endless days of readiness and quiet expectation, and at last, the moment he craved was unfolding directly in front of him.

Right then, he refused to restrain himself, not even a tiny bit of his power, since his sole focus was Aaaninja alone, and no force in the world could pull his attention from that one clear goal.

Tremors ripped through the air near Lucian, howling with terrifying power as mana burst from his center like a burst levee, fierce and uncontrolled, surging out with brutal force that warped the surrounding air. His dark eyes fixed on Aaaninja while he uttered words and triggered yet another power, his tone steady but echoing, laced with clear murderous intent that gripped the area like sharp talons.

In the instant that followed, space complied. It warped, cracked, mended, and molded into countless crescent blades that multiplied without end. Their numbers swelled every second, growing so fast that vision blurred trying to follow, as space itself swelled like it was bursting at the seams, unable to restrain its own onslaught. Reality's weave shook like taut fabric on the verge of splitting from the intense coercion.

Then, the strikes launched, all howling toward Aaaninja with ear-piercing wails that shredded the atmosphere like wailing spirits. Aaaninja reacted without pause; his response came quick and sharp, mana wrapping around him like a coiled viper, the air crumpling like thin sheets while time flecks swirled to his command as if he ruled them utterly.

All motion ceased nearby—space, light, noise, mana, specks, atoms—they all stopped dead. The assaults hung motionless just shy of striking him, as space yielded to time, turning into a rigid statue locked in total quiet, confined in an unseen barrier under Aaaninja's sole dominion.

His mana surged once more, bursting forth with commanding might. Reality jolted back to life, yet now the horde of crescent space blades dissolved as if wiped from being, erased so thoroughly that no trace lingered. As the strikes faded, Lucian closed in on Aaaninja, his katana slashing at the Celestial's throat with ruthless accuracy.

Yet Aaaninja had caught future flashes through his Eyes Of Genesis, which supplied details without effort, strands of chance unfolding in his thoughts like a revealed scroll. He lifted his blade to parry, sure of the planned block, but right as the steels neared collision, the katana turned ghostly, slipping past the guard like a specter through fog.

At that, a gruesome rip of flesh rang out as Lucian's edge sliced into Aaaninja's torso from close range, the blow hitting true since he couldn't evade or counter the impeccably timed assault.

Crimson sprayed through the sky as the katana ripped through Aaaninja's tissue, but it didn't end there. Instead, Lucian's weapon stayed lodged in Aaaninja's torso, and he channeled extra force into the thrust, driving the blade down as if to sever a chunk from the shoulder, aiming to split him in two.

Aaaninja's brow furrowed, his free hand gripping the katana to stop its slide. He skipped using Temporal Slip to fade away. Instead, he shifted to attack. Mana yielded to his command anew as he unleashed another technique, the specks nearby humming with timeless power.

Right away, time flecks submitted like divine messengers to their deity, and in the blink after, a box-like cage forged from packed time particles clamped shut, trapping both Aaaninja and Lucian inside its unseen but unbreakable walls, blocking all paths out with unyielding resolve.

Lucian's dark gaze flicked to the emerging cage. No warning was needed for him to act. Space curved around him as he geared up to warp away before Chrono Imprisonment could trap him, but Aaaninja's voice rang out once more, steady and commanding.

Instantly, Lucian's form locked up. Then his movements reversed, not only his body but his mana too. He appeared to retreat, as if time had rolled back, replaying the exact steps from his recent chest slash on Aaaninja.

Once snared by Temporal Displacement, Chrono Imprisonment finished forming, and inside this trap, Lucian Darkheart found himself confined. Chrono Imprisonment went beyond just holding the physical form, or else it would mimic Temporal Halt.

Far from it, it froze the body, the thoughts, the spirit, the awareness, and the very sense of self. Ideas turned impossible to grasp, like slipping into flawless suspension, the eerie equilibrium between living and dying where being neither advanced nor ceased.

Aaaninja wasted no time. He struck fast, his sword flashing toward Lucian Darkheart's throat, the gleaming tip mere breaths from parting head from shoulders in a single stroke, but just as decapitation loomed, utter quiet descended as if all purpose in being had vanished.

The hush intensified, then warped into clamor. Light flipped to shadow. Mana turned wild and unstable as if the core of existence was rotting at its base. Next, Lucian's figure stuttered like a flaw in the system, pieces of him blinking like faulty code, until he blinked out completely, as if Chrono Imprisonment failed to hold him—and truly, it couldn't.

Aaaninja's eyes tightened as his strike whiffed, the blade slicing only void space and stalled time. He couldn't suppress a tongue click at Lucian's stubbornness. Since Lucian had clawed back from oblivion to reality earlier, Aaaninja held nothing beyond his reach.

Regarding Lucian's breakout from Chrono Imprisonment, the reason was straightforward. Reality Anchor had functioned flawlessly. He had tied himself to reality so that any binding would trigger automatic release by whatever reality conjured, provided it didn't harm him.

Aaaninja's gaze shot upward as he detected vast mana swirling around Lucian like a tempest, dense and choking, the heavens quaking fiercely as if the skies yearned to crumble from the weight.

'He retains such vast mana?' Aaaninja wondered in shock as he gaped. One must realize Lucian's moves weren't standard strikes. He was deploying world-altering arts in succession, twisting rules and truths freely. His mana pool ought to be drained heavily by this point.

Yet the volume he amassed suggested he hadn't touched his supply at all. And truly, he had barely spent any, since each major drain prompted him to deploy Event Rewriting to restore his mana core fully, resetting to peak state as if no loss occurred.

Thus, he effectively wielded endless mana, defying Law and Order via this outrageous trick, looming as a glitch that even reality faltered to fix.