Chapter Seventy-Five: An Unexpected Turn

The Apostle’s overwhelming power was far beyond what Xie Jing had ever imagined. Or rather, he had never expected an Apostle to be so formidable—even Antuen, the so-called Great Turtle, the one players had milked dry with all manner of strategies.

A sudden burst of yellow light erupted. The immense shockwave sent Xie Jing, who had been charging forward, hurtling violently backward, crashing straight onto the wharf’s deck and crushing who knew how many unsuspecting players beneath him.

Many of those crushed players stared blankly at their now-black screens, utterly confused. Why had they died when they hadn’t even entered the dungeon? Helpless, they paid a resurrection token and continued to spectate.

Click, click, click...

While no one was expecting it, the colossal turtle, as large as a continent, actually stood up.

Antuen was standing.

What kind of move was this?

At the TX Game Department...

A crowd gathered around several computers, crazed grins plastered on their faces. Their fingers danced madly across the keyboards, cackling eerily from time to time. Coupled with their dark, heavy eye circles, one could easily mistake the office for a zombie lair.

“Quick, quick! Input the adjusted data!”

“Think you can take me on in my own game? No matter who you are, you’re still too green!”

Their sinister snickers echoed throughout the TX headquarters. From that day on, rumors began circulating: ghostly laughter had been heard in the TX building even in broad daylight...

Some even claimed it was the mournful wails of players who couldn’t afford to pay-to-win.

In the world of Arad...

Under the watchful eyes of countless people, a sudden mechanical whir sounded from the sky, as if a girl’s coy voice was echoing across the heavens.

“Transform…”

With a rumbling, the massive turtle planted its two legs firmly on the ground. The shell split down the middle, shifting to cover its front and thick forelimbs. Its body sank lower, and a tan armor encased Antuen’s head, leaving only two enormous eyes exposed. The jagged, spiked carapace deformed and wrapped around most of the exposed flesh, and the excess shell even morphed into a longsword in its hand.

Flames erupted in a flash. In that instant, Antuen was wholly transformed into a blazing, mechanical giant.

Like all the nearby onlookers, Xie Jing’s eyes went wide in disbelief.

What he didn’t know was that, even in the eyes of the concealed Herad, this spectacle was just as unfathomable.

“When did Antuen acquire such powers?!”

“Is this the power of the rules?” Herad had previously noticed several great and oppressive forces transmitted into Antuen.

“Fight, fight, fight! What’s the point anymore?!”

Xie Jing spat into the sky, gesturing rudely in a universally understood manner.

It was obvious who had enabled Antuen’s transformation—the folks at TX, of course.

To be fair, Xie Jing had stirred up quite a commotion, and the tech team had run out of options, resorting to a data tweak to give Antuen a boost.

But Xie Jing’s refusal to fight didn’t mean TX would let him off the hook.

With the look of a Decepticon straight out of a blockbuster, Antuen thundered forward on its massive legs, charging straight at Xie Jing.

What started as Ultraman vs. Apostle had now turned into Ultraman’s ultimate move against a Transformer.

Spectators watched, rapt with excitement, shoving forward to get a better view, declaring, “Go ahead and fight; if I have to move back, I lose.”

Getting squashed wasn’t a big deal anyway—they had plenty of resurrection tokens.

Boom!

A head-on collision!

The two-hundred-meter-tall giant crashed into the now-upright Antuen, whose height defied estimation.

Seawater surged, a storm arose, the sky darkened, and the wind howled in fury.

Xie Jing felt his strength was now far inferior to Antuen’s. Even stabbing his lightsaber into the armored shell produced nothing but a few sparks.

This was blatant cheating!

Meanwhile, the technicians at the row of computers watched with satisfaction as their modified creation clashed with a bug, their exhaustion from several sleepless nights instantly dispelled.

That’s right! We’re cheating!

After a few more exchanges with Antuen, Xie Jing realized it was futile.

He pursed his lips; in a situation like this, he had no desire to keep fighting.

Still, a retreat had to be done with some flair—he couldn’t just run away, or what would become of his noble and heroic image?

He gathered his strength.

Pooling every ounce of power in his body, Xie Jing prepared to give Antuen something big.

His lightsaber was the perfect conduit. Xie Jing concentrated a limitless radiance into it—brighter than the sun, dazzling like a supernova.

“Go!”

Whoosh—

Sensing danger, Antuen gathered an immense energy of its own. From its back, countless dark red rays unfurled like wings, converging before it.

In an instant, Xie Jing’s thrown lightsaber arrived.

No explosion—only an infinite, blinding light.

Every player’s screen turned white, the storm clouds were blasted apart, and it was as if only a single color remained in all the world.

Within the white light, as Xie Jing was about to turn and slip away, he saw several items suddenly drop from Antuen, their golden glint still visible even through the brilliance.

For a tenth of a second, Xie Jing hesitated, licked his lips, shored up his defenses, and then rushed toward Antuen.

But just as he touched the golden glow, the long-silent system suddenly blared a cascade of warnings.

“Beep beep beep beep…”

“Warning! Warning! You are entering a zone of chaotic world rules. Protection protocol will activate in three seconds… Warning! Warning! You are entering…”

Sweeping up the golden glow, Xie Jing barely had time to glance at the system’s alerts before the world went black and began to spin…

A long while later, the white light faded. Countless players stared up at the sky, wide-eyed.

There, the gigantic Transformer Antuen towered high, but the golden Ultraman had vanished without a trace.

…

“Beep… Protection protocol deactivated. You have been randomly teleported to a safe world.”

“Beep… Congratulations, you have obtained Light of the Rules *1. You may now wield and use it.”

“Beep… Your understanding is insufficient. The Light of the Rules cannot be used. Please comprehend further.”

“Beep… You have been infected with the Aura of Death. Life points will be lost continuously every second.”

The system’s endless chatter rang in his ears.

A putrid, rotten stench assaulted his nose.

It seemed to be raining; thick, sticky droplets fell upon him from above.

Xie Jing, feeling the pain radiating through his body, didn’t rush to get up. Instead, he used light to mend his broken bones and torn muscles.

Damn those rats at TX—they really were something else, to have conjured up a Transformer Antuen.

All Xie Jing wanted now was to shout, “I’ll be back!”—though where he’d be back to certainly wouldn’t be the continent of Arad.

It wouldn’t be a bad idea to drop by the TX building and enjoy the scenery for a change…

After a while, Xie Jing noticed the rain hadn’t stopped, and the sticky feeling on his body was becoming unbearable. He opened his eyes.

And then he screamed.

A golden shockwave exploded in the darkness-shrouded forest, startling who knew how many undead.

Letting out a long breath, Xie Jing looked at the deep ravine carved out by the blast of light before him.

Honestly, anyone who woke up to several giant skulls staring at them with hollow eyes would scream, wouldn’t they?

It absolutely wasn’t fear! No way!