Su Yu hurriedly concealed himself, but it wasn't working as reality itself was shattering. He summoned his clones, but his clones fell apart almost immediately. Even transforming his body into an elemental form didn't work as he was instantly pushed out of his transformed state by the impact.

After a while, he reappeared about ten thousand meters away from the dragon with a bloodied and mangled body. 𝚏𝐫𝚎𝗲𝕨𝐞𝐛𝕟𝚘𝐯𝚎𝗹.𝕔𝐨𝗺

"Hu..."

He panted helplessly. How impressive. This fellow was probably good enough to fight three Venerables alone. He couldn't do anything against this dragon. He had only survived due to the sheer number of tricks in his possession.

Suddenly, all of Su Yu's hair stood on end. He hurriedly moved away, but before he could move far, a tail appeared noiselessly behind him before stabbing through his chest. With a roar, Su Yu vanished before reappearing elsewhere. But a burly man was already waiting before him.

A punch was thrown toward him.

Boom!

Su Yu blocked the punch with both his arms, but his arms were blown apart before the fist landed on his chest, sending him flying far away.

With a flicker, the burly man reappeared behind Su Yu and kicked, sending Su Yu flying even as a fountain of blood burst out of his back.

"Your Majesty!"

Everyone exclaimed with alarm. This enemy was too powerful. That burly man was none other than the humanoid form of the draconic beast.

After sending Su Yu flying with a kick, the burly man pushed on and said, "As I said, tricks are useless before true strength."

"Culture King!"

Suddenly, Su Yu exclaimed as he stared in the distance with shock. And as the dragon glanced over, a man in fluttering white robes appeared. Instantly, the dragon's heart thumped with fright and stopped.

But immediately after, the dragon's eyes lit up as a wave of chaos power rippled out and blasted the distant projection apart. When he looked at Su Yu again, Su Yu had fled far away.

While gasping for breath and bleeding from his seven orifices, Su Yu grinned, "Tricks can be quite useful, after all. If I had a similar cultivation level as you, that single distraction would have been enough for me to kill you. Old Dragon, you're behind the times. Brute strength alone is useless. You are basically a brute."

"Strength is strength." The dragon argued, "Yes, tricks aren't completely useless. At a similar strength, those with more tricks have a higher chance of winning. But you're not at my level. Collapse your dao and withdraw. I can still spare you."

Su Yu merely laughed and vanished again. A moment later, countless Su Yus appeared around the dragon. Once again, the dragon's eyes shone as he blasted all the clones apart with a single punch.

"Lock!"

But the moment the clones exploded, they transformed into a seal around the dragon. Once again, Su Yu reappeared. He was now deathly pale. With a pen in hand, he pointed it forward, "Five Element Purgatory, sealing the heaven and earth, suppressing all evil..."

Each word he spoke seemed to carry the weight of natural order itself.

"Only strength matters."

With a roar, Su Yu's decree was shattered. And with a kick, Su Yu's pen snapped as he coughed another mouthful of blood.

Finally, Su Yu lost his patience. "You're not even a proper Master of Law! You're only at the border right before that stage! How are you this strong?"

"You're not that weak either."

The dragon said, "There are indeed benefits to having more tricks. With your strength, you would have died long ago without all those tricks. Be proud that you managed to last this long.

"Also, at my level, I can instantly become a Master of Law by entering the Myriad Realms and connecting with the dao there. So why bother with the distinction? I am simply uninterested in shackling myself and turning into a slave of the Myriad Realms."

Once again, a saber and a fist clashed.

Boom!

This was their first direct collision. The blade instantly snapped, only to release a cloud of poisonous mist. Hissing sounds rang out. The dragon was light-headed for a split second before dark blood seeped out of his fist. He flicked the blood off his hand, only for the blood to corrode the chaos power in the air.

"Poison?" The dragon frowned slightly. "You do have a lot of tricks. How many more tricks do you have?"

"Plenty."

Su Yu sneered as a burst of healing power erupted from his body, fully healing all his accumulated injuries. Next, dozens of barriers appeared around him to protect his body. Finally, numerous clones appeared and charged toward the dragon. Some of them were divines, some were devils, and some were those from the other races.

"Qi puppets!"

With a roar, even more clones emerged from chaos before charging toward the dragon. Su Yu was using everything he had.

"Beans into puppets!"

With a wave of his hand, he tossed even more puppets out, but his earlier puppets had all been destroyed.

"You're wasting your dao power. These puppets can only slow me down for a slight moment, but so what?"

"I'll kill you off slowly."

With a roar, Su Yu summoned even more puppets. This time, the puppets self-detonated around the dragon instead of charging toward him. But these explosions only left a small number of minor wounds on the dragon. They didn't even last as the dragon was fully healed in mere moments.

Seeing that, Su Yu was feeling quite helpless. Damn it. He couldn't find a way to properly hurt this dragon.

***

Further away.

Everyone watched nervously. After some time, Heavendoom yelled, "Your Majesty, whack him with your staff!"

At that, Su Yu turned into a gigantic staff before descending upon the dragon.

Boom!

With a punch, the dragon blasted the staff apart and sent Su Yu flying away. Everyone glared at Heavedoom with fury. Heavendoom was feeling helpless as well. How was he supposed to know that his staff dao was so weak? No, Su Yu's staff dao felt even weaker than his version of the same dao.

Heavendoom asked, "Just what is His Majesty's strength right now?"

It was too hard to judge.

Wan Tiansheng answered, "Venerable."

"Shouldn't His Majesty be laying down the life and death daos before blasting this fellow apart?"

Since Su Yu was already a Venerable before laying down the life and death daos, wouldn't he reach the level of a Master of Law the moment the life and death daos were in place? Why the delay? Wan Tiansheng had the urge to rip Heavendoom's mouth apart. Su Yu would have done it long ago if it were possible.

Right at that moment, the dragon stepped forth and stomped down on Su Yu. "Are you trying to comprehend life and death through me? That won't be easy. I won't kill you, but I'll destroy your myriad daos. And without your myriad daos, what can you do even after comprehending life and death?"

"Looks like there are quite a lot of smart ones among chaos beasts." Su Yu pulled back again. With a bitter smile, he said, "No wonder. I keep feeling like you're only trying to drain my dao power. So this is your goal. You're trying to destroy my myriad daos."

The dragon did not deny it. That was indeed his intention. There was no need to kill Su Yu. He only needed to end Su Yu's dao pioneering to end this matter. Meanwhile, killing Su Yu might result in an escalation from the people behind Su Yu.

"However, your plan depends on my cooperation as well. I have no fear since you can't actually kill me either."

With a roar, Su Yu opened his Heaven Gate. Instantly, his entire bearing changed. When he looked at the dragon again, he saw openings everywhere. With a flicker, he shot forth before stabbing forward with a sword.

The tip of the sword found a crack between the scales of the dragon, stabbing right through the arm of the dragon.

"Heaven Gate?" The dragon was alarmed. "You're forcing me to kill you!"

"In a battle, it is taboo to hold back. Even a lion should use all its strength to kill a tiger. Do you really think your delaying tactics work on me?" Su Yu sneered.

"Since you seek death, so be it." The dragon reverted to his original form, turning back into a gigantic beast.

"Break!"

Once again, reality shattered around them. This time, Su Yu did not withdraw. Instead, he pushed his teleportation power to the maximum and stabbed forth with his sword again, plunging the sword deep into the eye of the dragon.

"Roar!"

The dragon roared and spouted a mouthful of chaos fire onto Su Yu's body. Su Yu attempted to resist with the power of water, but he failed.

"Ahhhhhhh!"

As he wailed in pain, he transformed his sword into a spear before smashing it into the dragon's horn. As the horn snapped, poison seeped into the dragon's body through the wound left by the broken horn.

The battle grew more and more intense.

Su Yu displayed his mastery of numerous different abilities, but the gap in their strength was still too big. Before long, Su Yu was clawed apart by yet another claw attack.

"Your Majesty!" Someone roared in fury, "Let's go together! Kill the dragon!"

The gap between the two was too big. Su Yu was no match for this opponent.

However, Wan Tiansheng maintained his calm as he said through voice transmission, "Wait. He wishes to die once. He wants to experience death. Do not interfere."

Their hearts thumped. Could he really return from death?

This was too crazy!

Boom!

Once again, Su Yu charged forward as he roared, madness in his voice. "I experienced countless fake deaths, each feeling as real as real death. But none is real! Fellow Daoist, help me! Kill me!"

Boom!

Facing a reckless and mad Venerable with countless tricks, even the dragon was left with no choice but to stop holding back. Slowly, his aura grew.

"You're seeking death. Do you really believe that you can return from death?"

"Die!"

With a roar, a pearl appeared in his hand. He slammed the pearl down at Su Yu. With a rumble, Su Yu was torn apart. Just as Su Yu was about to rejoin his torn body, the dragon appeared above him and stomped down on his head.

"Since you wish to die, I'll grant this wish."

Boom!

At the same time, the dragon's tail shot down and stabbed through Su Yu like a spear.

Facing all the attacks, Su Yu's mouth enlarged as he roared, "I'll devour you!"

His mouth grew to an incomprehensible size. And then, he swallowed the entire tail. His abdomen had been torn into two, but the tail had seemingly vanished after entering his mouth.

And before long, the entire dragon was dragged into Su Yu's mouth by a powerful devouring force.

Boom!

The dragon was gone, but his voice rang out from an unknown direction. "Are you trying to devour me? Dream on!"

"Screw you!"

Su Yu gnashed his teeth and flew out with only his head. Then, the Heaven Gate separated from his head before turning into a proper gate.

"Killing me? I am not the type to die silently! I am not so useless!"

Then, he dove through the manifested Heaven Gate.

The dragon exclaimed in alarm, "Heaven Gate? Are you mad? Neither of us might be able to return from this! Stop, you crazy—"

Boom!

The moment the head shot through the Heaven Gate, it started falling apart. As of that moment, real death had seemingly arrived to claim Su Yu. There was only boundless darkness beyond the Heaven Gate. It was unknown if this was because death itself was dark. Or perhaps the world beyond the Heaven Gate was a dark world.

"Culture King!"

Suddenly, Su Yu roared loudly.

"Are you here?"

"Culture King!"

"Are you here?"

Boom!

And finally, Su Yu's head burst apart, releasing a gigantic dragon from within. The injured dragon glanced around with intense fear before turning back to escape from the gate.

And at the exact instance complete silence engulfed Su Yu's consciousness, a doubtful voice came from far, far away.

"Huh? Who is it?"

"A dragon? A dragon with a Heaven Gate?"

The voice sounded both doubtful and shocked. What the fuck was this?

Boom!

The dragon roared in panic. He didn't know if Su Yu was dead or not. He didn't know if Su Yu was hearing that voice. But he heard that voice. This was a terrifying place. In his desperation, the dragon ignited his body and slammed into the shut gate, triggering an explosion.

The tail of the dragon was left on this side, while his body was destroyed. Only his head managed to rush to the other side.

Boom!

And with the collapse of the gate, the sole source of light in the area vanished. Complete darkness and silence returned.

***

Boundless darkness.

The man in white was looking at the blood-soaked man beside him as he asked doubtfully, "Did you hear that?"

"What?"

"Someone called for me. A dragon, I think?"

The blood-soaked man cursed, "Is this funny? Why don't you say that you heard your sister or something if you wish to joke around like this?"

"No."

The man in white wanted to explain that it wasn't his sister, but he gave up. He was filled with sympathy toward himself. If he had Human Emperor, or Radiant King, or even Control King here with him, they would investigate or analyze his claim the moment he made it.

But, well, Martial King was different.

Unfortunate.

With boundless sorrow in his voice, the man in white said, "Sorry, my friend. I raised you too well, to the point you somehow lost your brain."

"Hmm?"

When the man looked at him in confusion, the man in white said, "Apart from fighting and killing, please start using your brain. Sigh. Why are you harder to raise than an actual child?"

"..."

The face of the blood-soaked man fell.

Was this fucker insulting him? The man in white ignored the blood-soaked man as he stared into the distance again. He was certain he had heard someone calling for him earlier. But that fellow resembled a dragon. How odd. A dragon?

A chaos dragon?

He was sure that was what he saw. His eyes were still quite sharp.