MIGHT AS WELL BE OP Chapter 977: Temporal Paradox Creation

When Aaaninja triggered Time Splintering, the time particles submitted to him just like kids in front of their dad, while reality yielded as if he was its very maker, and right after, the fabric of being and the world shattered into numerous streams of time, every single timeline forming a streaming golden current that unleashed a brilliant golden glow capable of blinding folks right away, though solely Aaaninja caught sight of it, with everything appearing totally unchanged to all the others.

All that fell under Aaaninja’s awareness transformed, as time dragged to a crawl, existence lagged behind, order crept slowly, reality inched along, and it felt like he had stepped through to a whole new level of the world, almost as if he’d escaped the world’s limits and entered a secret realm visible and manipulable only by him.

Countless situations unfolded across these endless timelines, but one fact stood firm: in every one, Lucian and Aaaninja clashed in combat, except they weren’t merely fighting—they were stuck in a single halted instant. Each version of Lucian across the timelines unleashed the Nothingness Technique, whereas the multiple Aaaninjas from those timelines experimented with endless ways to block, dodge, retaliate, or endure.

Without question, several Aaaninjas made it through Lucian’s Nothingness Katana Technique. The main Aaaninja’s Eyes Of Genesis fixed on one of those gleaming golden streams, and he instantly brought it to life through sheer will, picking it out like drawing a lone strand from an endless weave.

The instant he imposed his choice, the world turned upside down, as if it had bugged out against itself, time quaked wildly beneath Aaaninja’s absurd command, and in the following beat, the strike poised to hit Aaaninja’s form disappeared completely, like he’d never occupied that space to begin with.

Zero occurred, the ground failed to rip apart, no blade scars slashed the heavens or earth, no rift opened up, no blast wave surged out—nothing at all. Only pure destruction and obliteration, quiet and total.

Lucian’s gaze sharpened when he noticed his assault had whiffed. ‘Did this fellow just tweak reality?’ he wondered inwardly, since he’d sensed the world twist in that final fraction of a second, and even though it was mild, vague, and almost undetectable, he’d picked up on it anyway.

Time Splintering let Aaaninja divide instants into diverging multiple timelines, granting him the power to pick which path to pursue, and once selected, the events from that chosen timeline at that exact juncture would be thrust into his reality as if they’d always been the genuine sequence.

Aaaninja drew inspiration for this ability from observing the River Of Time up close. Sure, he remained too feeble to dominate something like the River Of Time or harness it to boost his strength outright—if he could, he’d have used it against Lucian ages back—but that didn’t stop him from gaining insights just by lingering nearby and watching its endless current.

In the end, how many folks could fork timelines so effortlessly? Even if any did exist, you could tally them on a single hand.

‘My mana’s dipped quite a bit,’ Aaaninja mused to himself, having burned through almost twenty percent of his mana pool for just that one move, since crafting and imposing timelines before overriding reality with their results wasn’t a simple task by any means.

Yet even so, he showed no pause, and with eighty percent of his mana still in store, his total capacity stayed immense and way past normal understanding. A fresh surge of mana burst from his frame, time particles swirling around him in frenzied loops and eddies, and Lucian wasted no time, blurring back at once because he had no clue what Aaaninja might unleash next.

As soon as the words escaped Aaaninja’s mouth, a savage explosion of time particles surged out in a force that wiped away all and unleashed devastating might. Over a span of hundreds of kilometers, time went wild and unchecked, slowing down, halting, speeding up, causing aging, flowing backward, breaking down, splintering into chaos, transforming the battleground into a disordered zone where the rules of time had utterly broken.

Lucian clenched his jaw as his life force drained away before his eyes, his form growing old at a horrifying rate and rhythm. His muscles lost strength, his bones turned fragile, his mana dwindled fast, and even his katana rusted under time’s assault, as if ages were flashing by in just heartbeats.

He swiftly drew on space to attempt teleporting outside this mad Time Storm’s reach, but it proved useless, since space too fell under Aaaninja’s ability’s sway and warped beneath time’s dominance, rendering getaway all but impossible.

Aaaninja dashed ahead in a streak through the tempest, his sword slicing toward Lucian’s throat in a quick silvery curve. After all, right then, Lucian could hardly budge. Lucian eyed the incoming blow aimed at his neck, yet no fear sparked in his stare, for being unable to shift didn’t mean he lacked a backup plan ready.

A grin crossed his face as he whispered, his lips pale and weak, his tone aged and raspy, his once-dark hair now fully silver as he’d hit the brink of his life span, only moments from the end.

His mana detonated in a world-shaking rush, crashing into Aaaninja like a charging beast, but Aaaninja just faded away via Time Slip. The instant after, Event Rewriting reshaped the whole field of battle, Aaaninja’s Time Storm power crumbling as if it had never been there. Usually, anything harmed would keep its injuries, but Lucian’s Event Rewriting erased them all, flipping back every effect.

Vitality rushed back into Lucian, his body surging with vigor anew, his sallow and creased skin fading as youth surged through him once more, his stature restoring itself, his silver locks shifting to black again, his elderly timbre becoming youthful and firm.

His dark eyes turned to Aaaninja, a broad grin spreading across his features as he declared, since now it was his chance to strike back, after all.

Lucian had whipped up this technique right there on the fly. It was essentially Aaaninja’s Temporal Erasure skill, but Lucian’s insane aptitude let him forge a counterpart in a flash, molding ideas into truth with scary simplicity.

Right then, mana blasted out from his center like a burst levee. Aaaninja sensed his whole being under threat, and he didn’t require warning to grasp he’d soon face the very doom he’d tried to inflict on Lucian.

With zero delay, he called up yet another ability, his mana erupting from within as he countered the approaching technique.

Time particles heeded his order, space shook fiercely as he conjured a Temporal Paradox right away, letting Lucian’s move take effect while Aaaninja himself persisted in time, both wiped out and intact at once, thus pulling off survival against the strike.