Apocalyptic Era: Starting from picking up a Bishoujo
Chapter 211 - 200 VS Chen Long 4

Chapter 211: 200 VS Chen Long 4

"I’ve conquered the ’Portal Armor’!"

But this victory is likely only temporary, perhaps even a one-time success.

Even with the most unique defensive tactics, Chen Long is essentially a demon hunter who underwent monstrous transformation surgery to enhance his physical combat skills, so his methods of perception have clearly focused on greatly strengthening his original physical senses. But before he betrayed Luo Mountain, he was an Evil of an achieved level, a veteran of countless battles, and I don’t think his perceptual methods are limited to visual and auditory senses, among others. He must have been using—and probably has already been employing—spells for reconnaissance to compensate for the disadvantages of his physiological senses.

Once he realizes how I’ve conquered his ’Portal Armor,’ he will surely abandon relying on visual means and switch to using spells for perceiving his environment, then become invulnerable once again.

I must kill him before he can regroup.

He’s still writhing in the flames that cling to him, furiously attacking me. Logically, my flames should have been enough to kill him seven or eight times over by now. The reason he hasn’t died is because of the power of restart.

The power of restart reconstitutes what should have been reduced to ash, and this unifying force, when seen from another angle, is also a power that makes matter bizarrely durable. The fallout from my battle with Chen Long should have shattered this secret base more than once by now, yet it still stands unbroken; the same with Chen Long himself, who should have been blown to smithereens by the flames that burst forth earlier, yet he continues to fight.

While my flames rapidly destroy his flesh and soul, Dr. Silver Mask’s power of restart is just as quickly healing his wounds. But when it comes to efficiency, I still have the upper hand. Chen Long, as if heeding the call of the Grim Reaper, becomes increasingly frenzied, enduring the hellish torment of his body aflame, throwing punches at me filled with white explosive light without regard for anything.

"I won’t lose... I can’t lose!"

Seemingly delirious from being burned, he still bellows out his oath, intermingled with pain and resolute will: "I... must save!!"

What deep determination!

As he speaks, his whole body bursts out with intense white light, and he lunges at me.

Is he planning a self-destruction attack, to perish together with me?

Even though I currently cannot increase the density of my Fire Element body to the limit and am also hindered in my movement speed by the power of restart, such an obvious mutual destruction tactic should still be unable to hit me. But at that moment, the power of restart acting upon me suddenly strengthens significantly, delaying my Flame Transmission by half a beat.

I immediately realize that Dr. Silver Mask, who’s covertly observing our battle, is coordinating with Chen Long’s mutual destruction tactic, focusing the power of restart that affects the entire base solely to suppress me. And Chen Long takes the opportunity to firmly grasp me in his embrace.

Their actions seem futile because, strictly speaking, I am not the Fire Elemental body fighting Chen Long at this moment; the Fire Sea that envelops the entire base is my body. Merely destroying this humanoid shell seems pointless.

But it’s not that simple; they have indeed found the correct method of attack. Perhaps Dr. Silver Mask relies on his outstanding knowledge and perception, while Chen Long depends on his exceptional sixth sense—they are both quite aware that this body is my "Achilles’ heel."

For one thing, this body is the part of the Fire Sea with the highest density; it’s also where most of my soul is concentrated, with even the surrounding Fire Sea existing to support this body. For another, my consciousness does have a focal point—were one to transcribe my mental activities during this battle, they could see that they’re centered around this body. So this body is not only the strongest part but also the most fatal. Attacking here is most effective.

However, they still harbor misunderstandings.

They probably think I’ve completely invaded this secret base when, in fact, I’ve merely set one foot in here, with the other still firmly in the real world.

In the instant of Chen Long’s explosion, I shift the center of my consciousness to my real world body and further intentionally withdraw most of my attention remaining inside the secret base. An explosion then erupts, the white light and shockwave sweeping and pulverizing the surroundings with more than half of the secret base reduced to nothingness—and that’s with the reinforcement from the power of restart; otherwise, several more bases would have been obliterated.

I don’t know exactly how powerful the blast against the soul is, but whatever soul remains of mine here is torn to shreds, and the state of Spiritual Synchronization with the girl Lu Chan is forcibly severed. Perhaps because my main body remains unharmed, even the remnants of my spirit, now like shredded paper, can extend my perceptions, allowing me to see clearly what’s happening inside the base.

Among the twisted, scorching hollows of the buildings, as if space itself were distorted, countless bits of flesh coalesce out of thin air, reconstructing Chen Long’s body.

The power of restart resurrects him from his self-destructive death and swiftly repairs everything in the surrounding environment.

"Did I kill him...?"

He hovers in mid-air, wheezing as he looks around. It is said that monsters can sense a soul’s aura; from his perspective, he must only feel that "Zhuang Cheng’s soul has been scattered." Yet, I am still alive. Chen Long, with his sharp sixth sense, seems to have a sense of it too, his expression filled with intense caution.

Without hesitation, he clenched his right fist. Shadow Power burst forth from between his fingers, rapidly covering his entire body to reconstitute the "Portal Armor." However, there was no way I was going to let him don his armor again. In the instant before the Shadow Power could completely envelop him, I activated Flame Transmission and appeared behind him.

My arm passed through the gap in the Shadow Power, piercing directly through his heart.

"What..." he turned his head in disbelief.

This time, he was truly going to die.

Since he was so sensitive to life-and-death crises, he must have sensed it by now. The look in his eyes conveyed not only shock but also intense despair.

I didn’t give him a chance to speak. I unleashed my flames without a second’s delay. He didn’t even have time to scream before his body turned into pitch-black char within the flames, and the Shadow Power enveloping his body instantly evaporated.

It was a point-blank flame burst attack. Although for me, with my ability to merge my Spirit with the Fire Sea and the heat of the surroundings, "attack distance" wasn’t objectively significant, I still unconsciously believed that targets closer to my body were easier to destroy. Therefore, the power of this attack was a notch above the previous ones.

The omnipresent power of restart was momentarily overwhelmed by the momentum of this attack, unable to come to Chen Long’s aid in time to resist the damage. I could feel a massive amount of "ash" appearing within my flames. This was Chen Long’s soul, refined by me.

Almost simultaneously, the process of the environment’s rewind repair came to a sudden halt, and all of the power of restart concentrated upon Chen Long’s charred remains, bringing bones and flesh into being once again. Even the "ash" I had just obtained was beginning to dissolve and vanish, poised to return to Chen Long’s remnants as a healthy soul.

Once more, I forcefully drove my flames to incinerate the charred remains, reducing the newly restored bones, flesh, and soul to char and "ash" again. The tug of war between the power of restart, attempting to resurrect Chen Long, and the Flame Power, intent on killing him, was like an endless battle.

However, this resistance wasn’t beyond my expectations. I was well aware that the power of restart would bring Chen Long back to life. And I also had firmly concluded—he was doomed.

While preventing the power of restart from reclaiming the "ash," I activated Flame Transmission once again.

The object of my transmission was not myself, but the massive "ash" corresponding to Chen Long’s soul.

In an instant, the "ash" was sent beyond the realm of the independent reality space. Describing it as transmission might not be quite right because this massive "ash" had never been materialized from the beginning; there was nothing apparent to transmit or not. However, since it was all stored within the flames, the principle was similar to transmitting one’s personal belongings from one place to another.

With that, Chen Long had no more hope of revival.

The dominion of the power of restart was confined to this independent reality space, unable to trace a soul sent to the outside world.

Chen Long, dead.

As if acknowledging its defeat, the power of restart retreated from Chen Long’s charred remains. Perhaps due to the loss of Mana support, the charred remains could only fall to the ground and, no longer able to withstand my flames, vaporized into nothing, leaving behind only a chaotic smear of blackened marks.

Within that smear, there appeared to be a small, gleaming object.

Upon seeing this, I descended to the ground and took a closer look. It seemed to be a silver badge. Possibly a small belonging Chen Long carried with him while alive, it had miraculously remained unscathed after being purified by the flames.

What on earth was this thing? Curious, I picked up the badge and observed it closely but couldn’t make out anything special about it. It seemed to be just a metal object, engraved with the character "one" in brush script, devoid of any detectable power. How could such a thing withstand my flames?

Suddenly, footsteps sounded from behind me. Someone was slowly walking toward me.

Turning around, I saw the girl Lu Chan. It seemed she had confirmed the end of the battle here and had hurried over at the first opportunity.

She stopped a short distance away, gazing at the empty, scorched mark on the ground, then fell silent.

I couldn’t imagine her feelings about Chen Long, the once-close friend who had betrayed her, nor could I fathom her emotional state upon witnessing his death.

Her face did not reflect the emotion of avenged vengeance; instead, it showed a hint of sadness and disinterest.

She didn’t say a word.

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