Chapter 1220

Danger!

His pupils contracted suddenly.

In an instant, Lin An felt a meaning exploding from deep within his soul surge straight into his thoughts.

Goosebumps erupted all over his body; a fear he hadn't felt in ages was amplifying without limit in his senses. Unrelated to will or reason, in a matter of split seconds he realized this was the fear effect inherently carried by a high-rank supernatural entity.

It was a soul-shaking shock! Far more terrifying than the supernatural entities in the Silent Mountain Villa!

"Bang!!"

"Hum!!"

The vibrating sword's hum and the sound of the spirit-energy shield rang out simultaneously.

With a muffled grunt, Lin An strained to swing a backhanded sword strike, only to find his speed had slowed, as if moving in slow motion.

And almost simultaneously, his life force was being drawn from his body in an extremely eerie manner.

Death God's Halo!

Collapse!

Arcane Impact!

Destruction!

Without hesitation, realizing that physical combat alone could not contend with this vengeful spirit, Lin An unleashed all his attack methods, his whole body igniting like a torch as he instantly mobilized a vast amount of spirit energy.

Yet, whether skills or equipment effects, they all fell into a sluggish state at this moment, manifesting only bit by bit.

Four seconds later, the unleashed attack finally belatedly hammered the old man.

Before he could calculate the opponent's next move, Lin An's vision suddenly blurred, and the old man who had been right before him vanished instantly.

"Damn it!"

"Boom!!"

A mighty surge of spirit energy slammed into the void beneath his feet.

All of his attack methods actually produced no effect whatsoever.

What incredible speed...

Under suppression, I simply can't keep up...

His face darkened as Lin An subconsciously sensed his inner life force, but after that supernatural entity glanced at him, his life force had already been depleted by 3%...

And the constant rule shimmering on his surface had dimmed considerably.

"Shouldn't it be impossible to reduce the status?"

"Even if he withstands the attack, shouldn't the damage be spread within forty-eight hours?"

Upon first using the power of rules, Lin An couldn't help but feel his heart sink.

The effect of the rule was somewhat worse than he had imagined.

Is it because he lacks the power of rules? It can only minimally help me offset damage? As for the status being unable to remain constant, is it because the rule is being suppressed, or what?

Impossible to know.

In a situation vastly different from ordinary combat, Lin An also realized how tricky this was.

Compared to the helplessness he felt in past Supernatural Incidents, this time he clearly sensed a strange power attacking him, yet he had no way to determine what it was.

"Suppressive power..."

"Reducing speed..."

"Directly draining 3% of life force..."

"If we judge by the rule's normal effect... if I hadn't had the constant rule to mitigate damage, wouldn't I have just died just now??"

His heart jolted.

In an extremely short time, Lin An's originally solemn expression grew even graver.

No wonder the Awakened Ones of the Eastern Sea theater are so confident...

Upon entering, an ordinary third-rank would have his flesh crushed instantly; subsequently, under power suppression, he couldn't keep up with the old man's speed and would be killed in an instant, unable even to flee.

Moreover, this supernatural entity's mode of attack has absolutely no forewarning!

As the greatest 'weak point' of the Supernatural Incident, it has also been perfectly covered!

There is no information, no clues, and we don't even know what this supernatural entity's rule is.

In an instant, Lin An felt as if he had fallen into a predicament beyond ordinary comprehension.

"Bang!"

While contemplating defense, a chilling surge struck again.

The old man who had suddenly vanished seemed to also realize he wasn't dead yet, and in an instant reappeared behind him.

At a speed impossible to follow with the naked eye, the old man lunged at him like a withered tree.

"Bang!"

An unimaginable tremendous force and a special attack were generated simultaneously.

As Lin An's double-layered shield on his surface flickered violently, his whole body felt as if struck by a force of ten thousand tons, and he was instantly flung backward.

"Pfft"

A sweetness welled up in his chest.

Having not been injured in a long time, Lin An felt a pang of pain again after a while.

"A dual-effect attack!"

"Speed too fast to track!"

Straining to raise his sword, Lin An lowered his gaze to the dented impact wound on his chest, and a flicker of ferocity flashed in his eyes.

Although the bodily wound was rapidly healing, his life force is limited.

Each instance is 3%; if it stays at this intensity, after thirty-three times he will die.

If following an attack frequency of once every four seconds, that's one hundred thirty seconds!

No... factoring in the Causal Sequence and rule restoration, with three lives he can probably last about four hundred seconds!

Suppressing the agitation in his heart, Lin An simply stopped consuming spiritual energy, merely tensing his nerves, intending to hard‑endure the subsequent attacks!

To be honest, he indeed underestimated the hidden means of the East Sea War Zone.

But, it doesn't matter.. he dared to directly storm in because he was confident in his current strength.

Four hundred chances! He refuses to believe he can't find out what the opponent's rule actually is!

"The seventy‑seventh attack!"

Like a baseball constantly being hit away, in a expanse of Void, Lin An's face turned pale, thinking about the problem without any emotional fluctuation.

His attacks could not hit the opponent, his speed could not keep up, and his damage could not be defended against.

As of now, he has already used one opportunity of the Causal Sequence.

With vitality replenished, he let the old man continually launch attacks against him.

However, compared to earlier estimates, the old man's attack speed has clearly increased quite a bit..

The time left for him is already not much.

Repeatedly sensing the opponent's attack style, even though his physical strength at this moment is high to the point of abnormality, Lin An still felt a weakness coming from his mind.

Unexpectedly, this time he had no trump card to leave with, yet he showed no sign of decline.

Is it that he can still use the Dream Meme, or is it a mutation?

No..

Lin An asked himself..

Perhaps after being locked on by the Heaven‑Eye people last time, he vaguely realized that if a truly deadly desperate situation appeared, the Second Will and the System would emerge. Since they haven't appeared yet, this means he is still safe.

"My speed is slow, the Supernatural Entity's speed is fast.."

"Rule suppression.. the Void's space.."

Although the anomalous entity is practically unsolvable, it shouldn't be this unsolvable..

After enduring another soul‑stabbing spiritual attack, Lin An's eyes flashed silver as he relentlessly connected the clues.

From the attack pattern, he could see that this anomalous entity's method was quite conventional.

It didn't burst from within, nor did it wield any strange powers—it merely struck him using its own rules.

In this situation, he could hardly deduce anything.

"It shouldn't be like this.."

"If this is a space akin to an anomalous instance, then this anomalous entity must have a rule loophole!"

"No, it should be the breakthrough clue!"

"Any anomalous entity is, from a certain angle, a Fourth Stage being—it just hasn't mastered rule intensity that high, and its application is rigid."

"But this also means the system will also impose limits on them.."

Bearing the damage, Lin An rapidly linked together various logical chains.

After being attacked so many times, he realized this anomalous entity's toughest aspect isn't its damage but the lack of clues—no hints whatsoever!

Given the power of the Supernatural Incidents he'd faced before, specters normally leave a window for Awakened Ones to find a chance to survive before attacking—but this time he received no information whatsoever before being struck.

Obviously, this is absolutely unreasonable!

Besides overwhelming low‑rank anomalous entities with absolute power, any solution to a Supernatural Incident must necessarily involve finding its "weak point"; otherwise there is no path to survival.

"There must be something I've missed.."

"Given that my former strength would be limited by the system, the East Ying War Zone absolutely has no reason to wield a weapon capable of killing a Fourth Stage being!"

"The system pursues a perverse fairness! To gain something, one must inevitably lose something!"

"Is it the cost? No… a trump card that even I cannot resolve, the East Ying War Zone could never possibly afford such a cost!"

"So the only possibility is that a weak point is exposed, but I failed to notice it!"

Under the True Eye, Lin An repeatedly projected all surrounding information into his mind, attempting to construct a compendium of everything.

"Boom!"

After being blown away again, he suddenly realized something.

No, wrong! The town is not a void!

Although he was in the void, with everything around him shattered, as the images replayed over and over, Lin An instantly recalled the rapidly declining town.

When did the town disappear?

Was it during the specter's attack?

Faintly, a strange hue flashed in Lin An's eyes; he seemed to have found the key.

"Boom!"

After his vitality was drained once more, this time he did not fix his gaze on the vanished specter as before; instead, he stared fixedly at the spot where the town had once been.

One second later, Lin An's heart jolted violently.

It hasn't disappeared!

In his strained pupils, trying to capture the image, rapid flashes of the town's scene kept repeating.

It didn't vanish after the specter appeared; rather, with each of the specter's attacks, the sole existing town in the space would Blink at super‑high speed—shifting from intact to ruined, from rubble to basic atomic structure.

Because the speed was too fast—exceeding his perceptual limit—Lin An subconsciously mistook it for disappearance.

"Why does the town change every time it's attacked!? And why does it repeat!?"

"Speed… disappearance? Re‑enactment, appearance!? Void?"

"Boom!"

After again consuming the attack that erupted from the old man's seemingly light and airy body, Lin An's eyes couldn't help but flash a hint of realization.

"The attack on me is time!?"

"No, it's the rule that comes from speed pushed to its limit!"

"It's not that it's too fast, it's that I'm too slow!"

Instinctively gazing at his own body, in that instant, Lin An's eyes involuntarily flashed a hint of shock.

"Time.. can even be controlled like this!? This is the meaning of the rule!?"