49 Apocalypse Rules

Chapter 311: Chapter 288: Despairing Superior Suppression

"No one else has been detected in the forest. Could it be that Shadow got the person out and left? That he’s not with Baqizi?"

Inside the task force’s command room, operators watched the detector readings on the main screen, which showed a total of seventeen detected targets.

Thirteen members from the action team plus three from the Chosen Team made for exactly sixteen people. If Shadow was hiding somewhere, the count should have been seventeen.

"We’ll just have to capture Baqizi first and see what happens."

"Switch to the action team’s live feed."

Every member of the action team was equipped with a camera to broadcast the live combat situation.

This wasn’t just for archival purposes; some ministers, and even the Divine Son, were to watch the battle with their own eyes.

After the switch, the screen immediately went dark.

"What’s going on?"

"Is it blocked? Switch to another feed."

The operator switched to another team member’s camera, only to find it was still a black screen.

Refusing to accept it, he switched through them one after another, only to find that every single one of the action team’s live feeds was dark.

The task force leader’s heart sank. ’Something’s wrong!’

Even if one or two devices were malfunctioning, it was impossible for all of them to be.

’Could it be that Baqizi has a signal jammer?’

Just then, the phone rang. The leader answered. It was a call from the administrative building, demanding to know what was happening, as they had also lost their connection to the team on the ground.

"Minister, we’ve lost the feed on our end as well. We may have to request satellite imagery from another country."

"Satellite imagery... By the time you get that approved, this will probably be over."

The voice on the other end spoke coldly before hanging up immediately.

「Meanwhile, in the forest.」

After the smoke dissipated, all the action team members put on their infrared goggles, allowing them to see Shangyuan Zi’s position in the fog.

However, they found their vision was suddenly plunged into absolute darkness.

"What’s going on?!"

"Can anyone see anything?"

"Everyone, stick together!"

It wasn’t just them; Shangyuan Zi couldn’t see anything either.

’Is this Shadow’s ability?’

Guan Tong now stood on a high branch, arms crossed, looking down on the crowd below.

The instant the action team was about to attack Shangyuan Zi, he had activated his standard Shadow Realm.

By sealing off all external light, the inside of the Shadow Realm was naturally pitch-black. Other than its master, who retained his sight, no one else could see a thing.

But this action team was well-trained. They immediately stood back-to-back and activated defensive items. Some pulled out illumination tools, but Guan Tong’s attack had already begun.

He channeled his Psychic Power, forming dozens of Shadow Spears that rained down from above. Simultaneously, he generated Shadow Thorns at the action team’s feet, attacking from both high and low.

Several defensive items were breached in an instant. Four people were immediately pierced by the shadows, dying on the spot.

Just then, someone activated a lighting device. The moment the light flared, they saw how their comrades had died and realized who their enemy was.

"It’s Shadow!"

"He’s over there!"

Aided by the light, they saw a humanoid shadow standing high above, its arms crossed.

"Damn it! What the hell is the intel support team good for? Why didn’t they detect Shadow’s presence and warn us?"

"This is Shadow’s ’Shadow World’! Everyone, attack his real body!"

At the Commander’s order, everyone used the light from the illumination devices to attack the humanoid shadow in the tree.

’Shadow World?’

Guan Tong had no idea when someone had given his Shadow Realm such a name.

After a moment’s thought, he figured the name must have come from Lucifer. So far, Lucifer was the only one who had entered the Shadow Realm and survived.

The moment she saw Shadow, Wuyan Clan activated her mimicry ability.

The ability was a success, but only partially.

Half her body turned to shadow while the other half remained solid. To her shock, before she could even try to manipulate the shadows, the imitation effect ended. It hadn’t even lasted three seconds.

"It’s no use! My ability is completely useless... His Psychic Power cap must be too high! He has me under absolute suppression!"

Her teammate, Moon Fate, also used her Moon Wheel item. A giant wheel appeared over Shadow’s head, trapping him inside.

But before the wheel could even begin to spin, it shattered with a loud CRACK.

Moon Fate’s face went pale, and she felt the same despair as Wuyan Clan.

’Just how high is Shadow’s Psychic Power cap? Why was my signature item completely useless against him?’

At the same time, a barrage of attack items struck the shadowy figure, but they were almost all completely ineffective.

’Just as I suspected... Their Psychic Power caps are too far below mine. Their items and abilities can’t even suppress a mere shadow of me.’

Guan Tong’s real body was actually somewhere else. The one they had found, the one taking all the hits, was just his shadow.

He wasn’t surprised by this. Even Ascenders trained by national governments—the ones who took first place under the Eighth Rule—were subsequently suppressed by the Mind Lock for a long period. As a result, their Psychic Power caps would stagnate between six and seven hundred.

He, on the other hand, was about to break the one-thousand-point cap. The gap of several hundred points created an almost total power-level suppression. Their abilities and items were drastically weakened against him, if not rendered completely useless.

This situation drove the action team to the brink of despair. Just then, two more members began to run and scream, frantically slapping at their own bodies.

"Snakes! There are snakes everywhere!"

This was an illusion created by Shangyuan Zi. Guan Tong immediately coordinated with her, using Shadow Thorns to pierce through the two men and finish them off.

"Quick! Suzuki!" the Commander yelled, grasping at straws. He grabbed the girl’s shoulders and shook her violently. "You can Profile people, can’t you? Hurry up and find Shadow’s weakness!"

"I..."

Suzuki’s face was blank. Half the action team had been killed right at the start, and one of the men impaled by a Shadow Spear had splattered her with blood, scaring her witless.

She tried to activate her ability on instinct, but a sharp pain immediately shot through her brain. She screamed, clutching her head as she crumpled to the ground.

This was nothing like Profiling Shadow from surveillance footage. Her Psychic Power cap was too low; even with spore reinforcement, she couldn’t Profile Guan Tong in person.

’Profile?’

Guan Tong glanced at the crouching girl named Suzuki. ’That ability sounds useful,’ he thought. ’I’ll deal with her last.’

The remaining members of the action team were at a loss. They had already used all the offensive items from their storage containers, but to no avail.

Before actually encountering Guan Tong, none of them could have imagined the gap in power would be so vast. They had thought that even though Shadow was formidable, surely more than a dozen Ascenders, specially cultivated by the Sakura Prayer government, would be a match for him.

An ordinary expert and a top-tier one are not even on the same level. The suppression of the superior over the inferior was utterly despair-inducing, and by the time they realized it, it was already too late.

’Time’s about up. I’m done wasting it on you.’ After deciding which ones to spare, Guan Tong invested a massive amount of Psychic Power, and hundreds of sharp Shadow Thorns shot out from all directions!

Five minutes later, reinforcements from Sakura Prayer arrived.

The scene they found was so gruesome they could hardly bear to look.

But they soon realized the body count was off.

The mission force, including Moon Fate and Wuyan Clan, had totaled sixteen members. But only twelve bodies were left at the scene.

The missing were the action team’s Commander, Suzuki, Moon Fate, and Wuyan Clan. Since their bodies weren’t there, it meant they had been taken by Shadow and Shangyuan Zi.

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