Un-yuan Matter vs. Mercenary Tao

Boom!

The gale born from the atmosphere being shattered in an instant was like a massive shell exploding at close range. The primeval forest spawned by Deep Forest Emergence crashed down, enormous trees toppling backward.

Green divine radiance emanated from Aiva’s entire body, her eyes completely enveloped by that same holy light. Her golden hair streamed backward, yet Mercenary Tao’s terrifying aura could not overwhelm her.

She wielded the Authority of Earth and Life (Tier 6) and possessed an S-rank talent called Gaia Affinity. Even without using any abilities, she was already a powerful lifeform worthy of being called a saint.

Now that she had activated Sage Mode and awakened her Sage Body, she was practically a living Life Furnace.

Her vitality was as vast as a dragon’s. Divine power clung to the surface of her skin, leaving the gale capable of tearing apart the forest utterly unable to affect her.

Instead, she extended a hand toward the other three.

Beneath the ground, enormous blackish-brown trees emerged like giant hands. The trees she controlled likewise possessed Senju Hashirama’s ability to absorb an opponent’s power.

Emerald divine power separated her from the outside world like a barrier. As an Authority that had entered Tier 6, it had nearly begun to reveal the potential of a divine body.

Aiva was unlike her glamorous appearance. Her fighting style was exceptionally violent. She took the initiative to walk toward the two people standing motionless amid the chaotic battlefield, her speed steadily increasing.

Bai Cangshu clapped his palms together before him. After the ring-shaped shockwave exploded outward, everyone’s reactions fell completely within his sight.

He began to feel glad that he had been assigned to defend the arena from this position. Otherwise, if these former Supreme Experts had gone first—

Then, in order to keep everyone’s time on the field to around seven seconds, he would probably have had no choice but to go all out from the start and unleash his power to the fullest, blasting them to death.

He would not have been able to "savor" the abilities of these different Reincarnators as he could now.

Yes, although Bai Cangshu’s physical burden was nearing its limit, he was still enjoying this battle.

The traits displayed by these top-tier Reincarnators made him view the group of Reincarnators with a little more appreciation.

He enjoyed fighting, but he did not enjoy fighting idiots and fools.

His ideal battle had always been a life-and-death struggle against individuals as outstanding as himself, or even more outstanding.

Mediocre people could never enter his sight.

Step, step, boom, boom!

What had initially been ordinary footsteps became something else after only a few steps. Every time that beautiful woman from the South District stepped forward, the earth shook violently. The energy level and fluctuations beneath the ground far surpassed the Sand Burial used earlier by that sand man.

A peculiar power, distinct from energy, flowed through her body.

"Authority…"

As the most characteristic power system of the Third Tier, once Reincarnators reached this level, the space would directly grant them an initial Authority through missions.

Bai Cangshu’s Authority of Qi and Power had been obtained in precisely this manner.

But the vast majority of Reincarnators used Authorities only superficially. Unlike energy, Authority and power were far more mysterious things.

It was like an organ humans had never possessed. Trying to use and mobilize it was extraordinarily difficult.

Even Bai Cangshu merely treated the Authority of Qi and Power as a "passive skill" that could improve the efficiency of his judgments.

What he actively used more often was the Authority of Granting and Taking that he had acquired earlier.

Compared to power systems such as Tiers and energy, Authority seemed to possess an incompatible, repulsive quality toward humanity itself.

Bai Cangshu had seen quite a few Reincarnators of the Third Tier and even the Fourth Tier, but among those who could wield their Authorities at a relatively high level—

He had seen only Mad King.

And now, he had finally seen the second.

Bai Cangshu raised his head slightly and examined with his lower eyelids the woman walking toward him and the chestnut-haired youth through the blazing white, turbulent atmosphere.

Boom!

Bai Cangshu’s right hand suddenly rose before crashing down the next instant. His power was so immense that, unless he used his martial arts realm to control it, every swing would create a terrifying commotion like an atmospheric explosion.

The blazing white air current descended like a bolt of cloth and smashed fiercely into the ground, where an enormous blackish-brown palm burst forth from beneath the white jade floor.

The instant it appeared, it was smashed apart by the blazing white torrent.

Bai Cangshu’s current martial arts realm, combined with Sensen no Sen and Observation Haki, meant that ordinary attacks could not evade his perception at all.

Not only that, he stepped forward the next instant, curled his right fist back, and amid a series of creaks, a peculiar resonance emerged.

Aiva, striding forward, widened her eyes. Divine radiance shone brilliantly within them. She suddenly stomped down, and the earth sank like some kind of spring before shattering apart the next moment.

Bang!

Aiva vanished instantly. The divine power covering her body directly pushed aside the air, making her speed unbelievably fast while preventing even the slightest breeze from rising.

She had already seen Mercenary Tao’s punch once. It was undoubtedly terrifying, but… no matter how frightening a fist was, if it could not be thrown in time, it could accomplish nothing.

Boom!

Aiva appeared out of thin air before Mercenary Tao. Her right hand clenched into a fist as green divine power instantly transformed into earthy yellow. The moment she landed—

Bai Cangshu, who had assumed the stance of a Normal Punch, heard the surrounding earth release a roar like an azure dragon.

Bang!

Incomparable energy and a dense, solid force crashed directly into Bai Cangshu’s front. The distorted Three Parts Return to Origin Force shattered in an instant. The woman’s brows and eyes were fierce, green divine radiance trailing from the corners of her eyes.

Yet Bai Cangshu opened his mouth slightly, and white mist streamed backward from the corners of his lips. The Satsui no Hado that had wreathed his body like flames vanished instantly.

Boom!

The White Jade Plaza exploded outright. The earth’s roar and its spikes extended all the way to the edge of the White Jade Arena. Massive earth spikes stretched hundreds of meters into the air, nearly passing over all the candidate seats and piercing straight into the Gods watching the battle.

But Aiva’s expression changed.

She missed?!

Divine radiance flowed through her eyes as the will of the earth fed everything back into her perception. Before she could turn around, she felt a stabbing pain at the back of her head.

That was likely an attack powerful to the extreme. Merely being targeted by it made the divine power around her body react as if under stress.

Mercenary Tao, this guy…

"Ah!"

Aiva roared furiously, her body swelling again. Yang-natured Chakra combined with her Sage Body, and the power of life surged with incredible intensity, nearly offsetting the power of death raging behind her.

Boom!

The cyan sky reappeared. All the blazing white clouds and mist within the arena, along with the fragments and dust of the White Jade Plaza, vanished together.

It was as though a gigantic cross-section had appeared before Mercenary Tao’s fist.

The walls surrounding the White Jade Plaza shattered, revealing a void-like scene behind them.

It turned out that this plaza had been floating in the void all along, disconnected from the candidates’ seats behind it and the seats of the Gods watching above.

Streams of light flickered within the void, redrawing the boundaries of the arena.

Before that void, only the portion below the waist of the woman who had been standing there remained in place.

Her entire upper body had been completely obliterated by a single punch.

Emerald divine power burst apart in the air like mist.

This sight left the candidates watching above utterly stunned.

Bai Cangshu stepped forward. He had sensed it: the divine power within that woman’s body had offset his Death Intent Senluo.

She had nullified the instant-death effect.

He curled his right hand back once more, and dreadful creaking rang out.

Itzpapalotl, hanging upside down from the primeval giant tree above, frowned. Could this ability actually be used consecutively…

Mercenary Tao’s abnormality exceeded her expectations. Her inverted body abruptly stretched, and the next moment, an enormous Serpent Body dangled down from the primeval giant tree.

The serpent head opened its mouth and hissed.

Silent, illusory ripples spread across the entire arena in an instant.

Not only did Bai Cangshu’s steps pause, but even the chestnut-haired youth, who had scarcely moved at all, frowned and looked up at the giant serpent in the sky.

Bang!

Bai Cangshu threw a punch after being disrupted, but Aiva’s body had already exploded into smoke. The next moment, thousands of clones appeared and scattered in every direction.

Bai Cangshu was not angered. He merely felt the pressure upon him increase considerably once more, as though a peculiar light was enveloping him from every direction.

He looked up and saw that the massive figures above seemed to all be watching him. These so-called Gods were focusing their attention entirely upon him.

Something stirred in Bai Cangshu’s heart, and he suddenly formed a more detailed guess.

Could the formation of the Crown of Supremacy be related to these so-called Gods? The longer one defended the arena in this White Jade Arena trial, the greater the attention one would receive from the Gods.

Although the space described it as increasing pressure, perhaps… this was the true form through which the Crown of Supremacy condensed and came into being.

Invisible ripples spread from behind Bai Cangshu’s head as the Limit Break Spiral activated.

He took a deep breath. A massive amount of information, accompanied by countless scents, flooded into his body.

The scent of divine power, the aura of flesh magic, traces of ancient witchcraft, and… a black hole that devoured everything!

Bai Cangshu’s gaze passed over the countless Shadow Clones. A Reincarnator who had likely obtained Senju Hashirama’s Sage Body, paired with Authority of that level, was indeed not someone who could easily be killed through conventional means.

As for the great serpent above, it likely specialized in flesh magic and witchcraft curses. Judging by its current transformation, it also possessed a special bloodline carrying traces of Quetzalcoatl’s heritage.

Bai Cangshu was not surprised that these two had become Supreme Experts in the previous cycle.

But ultimately, in Bai Cangshu’s eyes, even if they were strong, they were only slightly stronger than the person with the Nephilim bloodline from before.

At their core, they were all on the same level.

Bai Cangshu had, in fact, divided the Reincarnators he had encountered so far into different tiers as well.

At the very top were the King of Miracles, Cao Qi of Azure Sky, whom he had never fought but who, several worlds ago, had given him a feeling of being completely impossible to resist.

In the same tier were the other two Kings, along with Black King Clark, whom he had encountered in the Marvel World. That man had suppressed him directly with the Life Equation alone, even after Bai Cangshu had climbed to the sixth stage of the Eternal Regression Ladder and activated Eightfold Kaio-ken.

As for Black King Luffy, whom he had encountered in the One Piece World, Bai Cangshu himself had been too weak at the time to properly comprehend that man’s power. Therefore, Bai Cangshu placed him in the same tier as Black King Rhongomyniad, whom he had only witnessed from afar.

Below them was Flowers Bloom, Flowers Wither, the Supreme Expert of the West District. Although Bai Cangshu had yet to fight her, rumors and battle records clearly showed that she was a level above the other Supreme Experts. The woman codenamed Ye was now being called "Ye Di" by many, who believed she had the greatest chance of breaking the order of The Three Supreme Kings.

Only after that came the other Supreme Experts. Among them, Bai Cangshu believed that Eternal Destiny, whom he had encountered in B711 World, was probably a little stronger than Life of Silence Seven Seven, while Great Sun of Finality ranked below both of them.

And this chestnut-haired youth before him gave Bai Cangshu a feeling similar to Eternal Destiny.

There was a peculiar bearing about him, entirely different from the other two women.

"Sure enough, you’re the strongest one here…"

Bai Cangshu began to ignore the other two and walked toward the youth who had remained standing in the chaotic battlefield, seemingly completely unaffected.

The "scent" around him was extremely peculiar. It was a scent of utter emptiness and nothingness, as though all energy and matter that approached him were swallowed completely.

That might explain why Bai Cangshu’s attacks had no effect on him at all.

The youth raised his head as well, meeting the gaze of the monster whose entire body emanated an aura of destroying everything.

His hands hung at his sides, while white mist from his mouth and nose lingered around his body.

His eyes remained calm.

"You really are a monster."

Buzz!

Bai Cangshu crossed the nearly hundred-meter distance between them in a single step and appeared before the youth. The Three Parts Return to Origin Force before his body shattered in an instant, silently.

Less than a meter separated them. The scorching blazing white mist from Bai Cangshu’s mouth and nose came into contact with the icy mist surrounding the youth’s body and began to condense.

The youth seemed entirely calm about Bai Cangshu’s speed.

"I advise you not to harbor such thoughts. The Crown of Supremacy is a weapon bestowed upon Reincarnators by the space, the vanguard of that future battlefield. We…"

Pfft!

Bai Cangshu pointed a finger, and a golden Ki Blast shot toward the youth’s face in an instant.

The moment the golden qi touched the youth’s body, it vanished outright, as though it had struck some nonexistent entity.

Bai Cangshu immediately sensed new information, and the Spiral within his body activated and turned once more.

An utterly unfamiliar kind of information began to emerge. It was a substance that simply did not exist in the real world.

Not only in the real world—even among all the mission worlds he had experienced, Bai Cangshu had never encountered such a thing.

It seemed to possess an immense capacity for assimilation and devouring.

The explosive qi was assimilated and absorbed in an instant, so completely that not even an explosion occurred.

Bai Cangshu flicked a finger. The force tore through the air and struck the youth’s face, only to vanish in the same way.

"This is…"

"A property that should not exist. You’re the Supernatural Ability User, Un-yuan Matter?!"

The youth lifted his eyes and carefully examined the monster from the East District. Not only was he powerful, but he was sharp as well.

The next moment, white wings burst from the youth’s back, and a terrifying pressure descended in an instant.