The "Survival on the Train" game has bugs, it's really laggy!

Outside the car window.

The fist-sized, black, horse-shaped chess piece floated in the air.

There were no unnecessary movements.

It only trembled slightly.

Just like that.

So light it's almost imperceptible.

But the next second, Su Yuan's pupils suddenly contracted.

From the bottom of the pieces, a path woven from pure black rules unfolds silently.

That road had no concept of width, nor any limit to length.

It grows from the void, every inch of it radiating a darkness deeper than a black hole.

It's not darkness caused by insufficient lighting.

It is the blackness of "the blank space left after existence itself has been swallowed up".

The road stretched out in the void for less than a second.

Then it precisely adhered to the front of the Emperor's Journey Devourer.

"Click."

The moment they made contact, an extremely faint metallic snapping sound came from the vehicle's exterior.

It's not a physical bite.

It is a lock at the level of laws.

The train suddenly stopped.

Su Yuan sensed it.

At that moment, the entire vehicle experienced an uncontrollable forward tilting inertia.

There is no force "pulling" it.

The road itself defines the rule that "everything that steps on it must move towards the end."

It doesn't need to pull you.

The path beneath your feet will guide you.

"Owner!!"

The little fire's scream and the red light bursting from the panel exploded almost simultaneously.

One scarlet warning pop-up after another appeared, so densely packed that the entire panel was stained crimson.

Xiao Huo's ten fingers slid wildly across the panel, his golden vertical pupils reflecting lines of rapidly rolling data, each line screaming the same thing.

"The power system is being taken over from the outside! It's not an intrusion, not an overwrite, but a direct replacement of the underlying logic by a higher-dimensional set of operating rules!"

His finger traced across the panel again.

Her face turned even paler.

"The spatial anchor points are also moving! It's not us who are moving, it's the spatial coordinates beneath our feet that are being rearranged!"

He raised his head, his golden vertical pupils filled with things he himself didn't want to admit.

"Something exists that is rewriting the definition of the space around us. In its rules, we are not a stationary train, but a prison van being transported..."

Before the words had even finished, the words were spoken.

Wang Hu's knees bent.

It's not that he wants to be gay.

The moment his body was laid out on that black road, he endured a pressure that could not be measured in physical units.

That pressure doesn't act on the muscles and bones.

It acts on "existence".

It is something from a higher level that is using the absolute fact that "you are inferior to me" to crush every cell, every nerve, and every wisp of consciousness in him.

"Creak—"

The joints of the robotic arm groaned under the strain.

Wang Hu knelt on one knee on the floor, veins bulging on his forehead, his teeth clenched so tightly they cracked.

He wanted to stand up.

I can't stand up.

It's not that I don't have enough strength.

His body, on some instinctive level, "accepted" that he should kneel.

That feeling made him want to vomit.

The miser was even worse off than him.

Its chubby body was pressed down onto the ground, and its short legs kicked twice but couldn't move.

The treasure chest closed automatically, and the newly grown dark gold runes on its surface flickered wildly, barely forming a thin layer of protection to shield its owner's head, which was about to be crushed.

The money-guarding spirit's eyes were wide open, its mouth agape, emitting a "ho ho ho" sound.

speechless.

I can't even cry.

Su Yuan sat in the driver's seat.

His body also felt the pressure.

But his reaction was completely different from others.

He simply straightened his back slightly, which was leaning against the chair.

Just this one action.

The pressure then slid off him.

It wasn't offset.

His body was telling that pressure—you've put pressure on the wrong person.

Just then.

The black horse chess piece outside the car flashed.

There is no displacement trajectory.

There was no spatial tear.

There are no transitional scenes.

In the previous frame, it was still in the void thirty meters directly in front of the train.

The next frame—it's in the cockpit.

It floats above the control panel.

It was less than a meter away from Su Yuan's face.

Xiao Huo's fingers froze on the panel.

His golden vertical pupils widened to their limit.

It's not because of fear.

It's because his detector didn't capture any penetrating signal from beginning to end.

The defensive barrier of the "sole territory" of the Level 8 Starfield Predators.

Within the territory of this train, no external laws should apply.

The black horse piece was completely ignored.

It's not a penetration.

It's not about bypassing it.

From a conceptual level, the definition of "impenetrable" for "unique territory" does not apply to it.

Because it is a "horse".

The knight in chess.

What are the rules for horses?

Jump.

Ignore all the pieces in the middle and jump directly to the target square.

This is not a skill.

This is the definition.

It is a more primal rule of existence written in the factory settings of the chess pieces than any acquired rules.

No matter how high your city walls are, they can't stop something that is inherently defined as "able to jump over the city walls".

Su Yuan's eyelid twitched.

He looked down at the black chess piece floating in front of him.

Nearly.

He was so close that he could see every line on the surface of the chess pieces.

Those patterns were not carved.

It is growing.

Each one was wriggling slightly, shimmering with a cold, black light.

Then--

The Law Tsunami is coming.

From the surface of the chess pieces.

A wave of law called "Forced Submission" instantly filled the entire cockpit, centered on the chess piece.

It's not a spread.

It means "fill".

Like pouring water into a sealed container.

The water level rose at an irresistible speed, submerging everything.

"Bang!"

Wang Hu's other knee couldn't hold on any longer either.

His knees slammed heavily onto the metal floor.

The robotic arm hung at its side, each joint emitting a cracking sound from overload, sparks flying from the joints.

His face turned bright red, and the veins on his neck bulged out.

It's not about fighting pressure.

It is about resisting the concept of "surrender" itself.

His body wanted to kneel.

His will was not to.

Pulled by the two forces, his whole body trembled violently, like a steel bar being twisted by two opposing forces at the same time.

"I...fuck...you..."

The three words were squeezed out from between his teeth.

There was a two-second interval between each word.

I'm not swearing.

It's a confirmation that you haven't completely lost control of your body.

The situation is even worse for the small fire.

He was pressed down so that his entire upper body was lying face down on the control panel, his chin resting on the edge of the panel, and his golden vertical pupils were out of focus.

It's not a coma.

His consciousness was being peeled away layer by layer by that force of "submission".

Just like a castle on the beach being washed away by the tide again and again.

Each rinse removes one piece.

His fingers were still resting on the panel.

But it's no longer moving.

His gaze went from unfocused to empty.

From emptiness to...

"Um……"

A faint glimmer of gold flashed deep within his pupils.

That was his instinct as the core of the train making a final stand.

But it was just a matter of barely surviving.

The guardian spirit has completely fallen silent.

The treasure chest was sealed shut, and the person was huddled inside, like a clam with its shell sealed shut.

It stopped shaking altogether.

It's probably because they're afraid that even trembling will be interpreted by the "surrender" principle as "still having a rebellious spirit."

I might as well play dead.

To play dead completely and utterly.

Professional-level feigned death.

A suffocating silence filled the carriage.

That silence is not quiet.

It is oppression.

It is a being from the highest level of the chess game, using its position to tell every living thing in this space—

You don't deserve to stand.

then.

The black light flowing across the surface of the black horse chess piece suddenly solidified.

A thought shot out from its core.

It's not language.

It is not a projection of thoughts.

It is the law itself that is speaking.

Every word carries an unquestionable, absolute command attribute engraved in the underlying code of the universe.

The thought exploded into Su Yuan's mind.

"White pieces".

"The king's decree cannot be disobeyed."

"Kneel down. Put on the shackles. Be led."

Nine characters.

Each word that landed in Su Yuan's consciousness would generate a miniature earthquake of the laws.

It's not a threat.

The threat still leaves room for negotiation.

This is an order.

It's an absolute law, like "the sun must rise from the east," written into the universe's factory settings.

Before he could finish speaking...

The void in front of Su Yuan's throat distorted.

A shackle materialized from the distortion.

Black.

It is formed from "karmic fire," a kind of invisible flame that can be felt as burning.

The shackles have an ancient shape, and every part is engraved with dense high-dimensional inscriptions.

Those inscriptions are not decorations.

They are all saying the same thing—"All causes and effects of rebellion will be severed before they are even born."

The shackles hovered in front of Su Yuan for half a second.

Then, with an ultimate force that could sever all possibilities, it reached for Su Yuan's neck.

The air inside the carriage seemed to freeze in that instant.

Xiao Huo struggled desperately out of the depths of his hazy consciousness, and in the last moment before his spirit was completely extinguished, he caught a glimpse of the closing shackles out of the corner of his eye.

His lips moved slightly.

No sound was made.

But his expression said it all.

That's too late.

That's too late.

It's too late—

Su Yuan sat in the driver's seat.

It didn't move at all.

The shackles are closing.

It was less than ten centimeters from his neck.

Five centimeters.

Three centimeters.

The burning sensation from the black flames had already turned the skin on his neck red.

He didn't even raise an eyebrow.

The left eye is dark gold.

The right eye is pure white.

The two colors complemented each other on that calm, almost indifferent face.

He slowly raised his right hand.

The movements are very slow.

The slowness seemed extremely inappropriate at such a critical moment.

Palms facing up.

The jet-black crack running right through the center of the "elephant" character mark suddenly opened.

Dark gold. Pure white. Jet black.

Three colors emerged simultaneously from under his skin, converging, colliding, and exploding in his palm.

The three-colored halo expanded into a fist-sized area.

It's not lit.

But everyone who sees it will experience a burning pain deep within their retina that they can never forget.

Su Yuan's thin lips parted slightly.

"negative."

Two words.

The pronunciation is extremely soft.

So light it was weaker than breathing.

The shackles touched his skin.

Then--

No more.

It's not shattered. Shattered pieces are fragments.

It's not melting. Melting leaves residue.

It doesn't dissipate. Dissipation is a process.

The moment the shackles touched his skin, the concept of "shackles" ceased to exist.

The causal chain is denied at its source.

It's not that "the shackles have been broken".

It is the fact that "no shackles have ever been tried to be put around Su Yuan's neck".

This does not exist.

Because Su Yuan said "negation".

It's that simple.

The "forced submission" law fluctuations floating in the carriage experienced an extremely brief break the moment the shackles disappeared.

The fault lasted only a fraction of a second.

But that's enough.

Xiao Huo's consciousness suddenly snapped back to life amidst the fault line.

The golden vertical pupils refocused.

He saw Su Yuan's back.

The silhouette remained unchanged.

From birth to death.

From death to life.

The man sitting in the driver's seat maintained the same posture and the same expression throughout.

Even the frequency of his breathing remained unchanged.

Xiao Huo's eyes suddenly welled up with tears.

It wasn't just being moved.

It's something more complex than just being moved.

It is the absolute belief that "as long as this person is still sitting in that chair, the sky will not fall."

He gritted his teeth and, before the law rupture could be repaired, pressed his fingers hard on the panel, forcibly restarting the three core monitoring modules.

The data is back.

It's back in fragments.

enough.

In front of the control panel.

The black horse-shaped chess piece emitted a sharp, piercing buzz that seemed to shake the very air.

It's shaking.

The entire chess piece was trembling violently.

It's not anger.

Yes... I'm confused.

From the moment it was forged, from the Eternal Era when it was given the identity of "Royal Guard".

there has never been.

Nothing can ever erase its "royal command shackles" as easily as brushing dust off a shoulder.

The recoil force of the three-color imprint is transmitted back into the chess piece along the law channel.

The dark horse was forced back half a meter.

In the limited space of the driver's cab, half a meter is already the limit.

Its back was almost touching the rear wall of the driver's cab.

Billions of light-years away.

Headquarters of the Interstellar Parliament's High-Dimensional Arbitration Tribunal.

A pure white domed hall.

The eleven highest elders received fragmented information transmitted back from that distant spatial coordinate through the remaining links of law ripples.

The information is incomplete.

But enough.

The elderly man in the third seat slowly rose from the judge's bench.

His hands were shaking.

My whole body was shaking.

"The shackles of the royal guards..."

His voice was dry and hoarse.

"It was rejected."

No one spoke in the hall.

The seventh female elder opened her eyes, which had been closed.

The pupils were filled with the bright red of bursting capillaries.

"That's impossible."

There was no doubt in her words.

Only confirmation—confirmation that you are witnessing the impossible becoming a reality.

The chief arbitrator sat on the highest bench.

His hand gripped the scepter tightly.

The knuckles are turning white.

Expressionless.

But a bead of sweat on his forehead was slowly sliding down his face, which was etched with the lines of time.

Inside the Emperor's Path: Devouring Wasteland.

After the black horse piece was forced back half a meter, the buzzing sound suddenly rose.

Blood began to seep from Xiao Huo's ear.

The slowly creeping black lines on the surface of the chess piece all exploded in that instant.

It didn't shatter.

It is blossoming.

Black, thick, almost tangible flames of law erupted from every line of the chess pieces, tumbling, expanding, and roaring within the cockpit.

The chess pieces are getting bigger.

The size of a fist.

The size of a basketball.

One meter. Two meters. Five meters.

There isn't enough space in the driver's cab.

But it doesn't care.

It is rewriting the definition of space itself, forcibly creating a "hyperdimensional interlayer" at the level of laws within this limited physical space.

Ten seconds later.

A nightmare horse, standing thirty meters tall, stepped out from in front of Su Yuan, its hooves treading on dark patterns formed by the laws of the void.

Its body is formed from the purest black karmic fire.

Every inch of his mane is a burning thread of law.

Every horseshoe is engraved with a causal formula on a scale capable of destroying galaxies.

Its eyes—two bottomless black vortexes—were fixed on Su Yuan.

What's swirling in the vortex isn't light.

It is a royal decree.

It is "indispensable".

It means "You must kneel down".

The nightmare horse raised its front hooves.

The moment those two hooves, formed from black karmic fire, were raised above their heads, the entire spatial law structure began to collapse.

It wasn't destroyed.

It's making way for it.

All the laws—physical, spatial, causal, and conceptual—withdraw from the area where the hooves are about to land the moment the two hooves are lifted.

Because those two hooves are about to perform "concept trampling".

As the name suggests.

Crushing concepts.

Your concept of "defense", your concept of "survival", your concept of "existence".

After the hoof landed.

Even the concept of "Su Yuan once sat here" will not be recognized by the universe.

Wang Hu lay on the ground, raised his head, and saw the two giant horseshoes falling.

His mind went blank.

Since he started following Su Yuan, he has witnessed far too many unbelievable scenes.

But never before had he felt such a certainty, so deep within his bones, that "this time it's really over."

The power contained in those two hooves is something that cannot be measured by numbers.

That's the rule.

It is the ultimate means by which the chessboard itself endows the "horse" piece.

trample.

Crush.

Not even a trace was left.

The hoof landed.

With the ultimate power to tear apart all possibilities.

Then--

Su Yuan smiled.

It's not a smile.

It wasn't a sneer.

It was a loud laugh.

The laughter rang out amidst the roar of the Nightmare Horse, and surprisingly, it wasn't suppressed.

Instead, it got louder and louder.

They're getting more and more outrageous.

They're getting increasingly outrageous.

The laughter carried something that sent chills down the spines of everyone who heard it.

excited.

Pure, undisguised, and soul-deep excitement.

"OK!"

Su Yuan suddenly stood up from the driver's seat.

The chair slid back half a meter due to the force of his standing up.

He suddenly grabbed forward with his right hand.

The three-colored brand on the palm burst open in that instant.

A dark golden skeleton of laws, pure white flesh and blood of creation, and a jet-black skin of negation.

Three forces surged forth from his palm, no longer ripples, no longer waves—

It is a physical entity.

One hand.

A giant hand of law, interwoven with three colors, formed within the superdimensional interlayer of the cockpit, which was stretched open by the laws.

The giant hand's five fingers are spread open.

One-hundredth of a second before the nightmare horse's hooves fell—

They grabbed its neck.

"Click".

Bring your five fingers together.

The soft sound was incredibly clear amidst the destructive energy about to be unleashed by the trampling of concepts.

The nightmare horse's forelegs stopped.

It froze in mid-air.

It can't fall any further.

It wasn't due to a clash of forces.

The causal premise of the action of "trampling" is "negated"—if your neck is being choked, then the physical premise of the action of "lifting your hoof to trample" is not valid, because your center of gravity is no longer in your own hands.

Your focus is in my hands.

Su Yuan's right hand made a grasping motion in the air.

But the three-colored giant hand firmly gripped the neck of the thirty-meter-tall nightmare horse.

The jet-black "negation" skin began to erode the giant horse's law structure the moment it came into contact with the object.

The outer layer of the black karmic fire was peeled away, deconstructed, and negated inch by inch.

at the same time--

The dark gold All-Unifying One starts at full power.

Analysis direction: Inward.

Towards the core of the nightmare horse, which is being gripped by a giant hand.

Su Yuan didn't want its life.

What he wants is its "rules".

The innate privilege of the "horse" that allows it to ignore all obstacles and leap according to the rules.

The analytical tentacles of the One Who Unifies All Things pierced through the outer layer of the giant horse's karmic fire, through the skeleton of laws, through the array of inscriptions, and reached its core definition area.

found it.

Right there.

A piece of extremely ancient, low-level code written in a high-dimensional syntax that Su Yuan had never seen before.

The code is only one line long.

"Marco leaps. Ignoring everything in between."

Simple. Pure. Primitive.

It is more fundamental than any acquired law.

Because this is not a "ability".

This is a "mode of existence".

Su Yuan's All-Unifying One grasped that piece of code.

It begins to tear.

Start copying.

Start...extraction.

The Nightmare Giant Horse let out a mournful howl that shattered the edge of the superdimensional interlayer.

That wail was not from pain.

It is fear.

It was a high-dimensional guardian who had existed for countless eons, and for the first time in his life, he felt his "core definition" being forcibly pulled out of his soul by a low-dimensional being.

It struggled desperately.

The thirty-meter-tall body of karmic fire twisted, rolled, and struggled wildly in Su Yuan's palm.

Black fragments of the law shed and scattered from it like a torrential rain.

Useless.

The five fingers of the three-colored giant hand resembled five welded anchor chains of law.

The harder you struggle, the tighter it holds.

A dangerous madness surged in Su Yuan's eyes, a madness that even Xiao Huo dared not look directly at.

"Get back in!"

His five fingers suddenly tightened.

The power of negation flowed from the fingertips into the core of the Nightmare Giant Horse.

Thirty meters.

Twenty meters.

ten meters.

five meters.

one meter.

The giant horse's fiery body rapidly collapsed under the strangulation of the power of negation, and all the acquired superimposed laws were peeled off, discarded, and negated layer by layer.

Finally, that once mighty, nightmarish horse—

Su Yuan forcefully squeezed it back into its original fist-sized form.

Black.

Trembling.

The patterns on the surface of the chess piece are mostly broken.

But the core remains.

The underlying code for "Marco Jump" is still there.

Su Yuan held the chess piece in his palm.

Tighten your knuckles.

The chess pieces made a "crackling" sound in his hand.

It's not breaking.

It is being rewritten.

Su Yuan's creative evolution seeped into every crack of the chess piece from the palm of his hand.

Pure white threads of law drilled into the cracks and found the core inscriptions that defined the "Black Faction".

Then--

Overwrite one by one.

Imperial authority provides the framework for order.

Genesis and evolution fill a completely new definition.

The power of negation erases the original sense of belonging.

A three-pronged approach.

The black color on the surface of the chess piece began to fade in Su Yuan's palm.

Start from the outermost layer.

One inch. Two inches. Three inches.

The deep black, belonging to the "king," gradually faded away under the scorching heat of the tricolored flames.

Instead.

It is white.

Pure white, without any impurities.

It starts spreading from the bottom of the pieces.

Along those lines that have been rewritten by creation.

Upwards.

Upwards.

until--

The entire chess piece.

From beginning to end.

From the inside out.

From the inscriptions of laws to the core definitions to faction affiliation.

Everything turned white.

A dark horse.

It turned into a white horse.

Su Yuan loosened his fingers.

A pure white knight-shaped chess piece lay quietly in his palm.

The surface has a brand-new texture, with subtle patterns of dark gold, pure white and jet black interwoven.

No more trembling.

No more struggling.

It even exuded an extremely faint sense of...submission to Su Yuan.

It's on the white side now.

Su Yuan looked down at the white horse in his palm.

The corners of his mouth curve very sharply.

It's so big it's almost frightening.

"Have you changed your tune yet?"

The patterns on the surface of the white horse chess piece flashed.

Then a completely new, no longer cold and arrogant thought emanated from the chess piece.

With a stiff, awkward feeling, as if they had just been brainwashed and hadn't yet adapted to their new identity.

"...White-Haired Guard. White Horse."

"I am willing to serve the white pieces."

Su Yuan nodded in satisfaction.

"That's a good girl."

Billions of light-years away.

High Dimension Arbitration Tribunal Headquarters.

A pure white domed hall.

The scepter of law in the hands of the Supreme Judge fell.

This is the second time today.

But this time he didn't pick it up.

Because his hands were shaking so badly he couldn't pick it up.

The quantum monitoring interface in front of him finished playing the last frame—the black chess piece was forcibly dyed white in the palm of that madman.

The hall was deathly silent for a full second.

Then it exploded.

"He altered the faction affiliation of the chess pieces—!"

"This isn't a matter of ability! This is a matter of the fundamental rules of the game being trampled upon—!"

"The inscription of loyalty on the royal guards was personally carved by the 'King'! It's the absolute law within the absolute law! How could it be violated by a third-rate civilization—"

The elderly man in the fifth seat suddenly stood up from the judge's bench and smashed the armrest in front of him with a single palm strike.

His expression was no longer that of someone who had previously adopted a calm and composed "natural disaster" theory.

It is real fear.

"He didn't just kill the royal guards."

The old man's words silenced the entire hall instantly.

"He usurped the king's chess piece."

Six characters.

Each word looks like it was dug out of a grave.

"Do you know what this means?"

No one answered him.

Because everyone present knew it.

This means—

The player's lineup is missing a piece.

Su Yuan's lineup has gained one more piece.

In a game of chess with the universe as the chessboard.

Someone stole a piece from the opponent's camp.

Then I painted it my own color.

This is no longer just "not following the rules".

This is like flipping the table, snatching the chopsticks from the other person, and then using their own chopsticks to poke their eyeballs.

The highest-ranking official bowed deeply.

Pick up the scepter.

My hands are still shaking.

He was silent for a long time.

Then he said something.

The sound was very soft.

But everyone in the hall heard it.

"From today onwards... regarding the threat rating of VSE-0..."

He closed his eyes briefly.

"Cancel."

The elderly man in the third seat was stunned.

"Cancel?"

You cannot assign a 'danger level' to the ocean.

The Supreme Judge's gaze pierced through the quantum monitoring interface as he looked at the tiny train.

"You also cannot assign a 'safety level' to an ongoing genetic catastrophe that is harmless to humans and animals."

"It exceeds the upper limit of our assessment system."

"All levels are meaningless to it."

"Therefore, it is cancelled."

Silence fell over the hall once more.

This time, no one objected.

Inside the Emperor's Path: Devouring Wasteland.

Su Yuan held the white horse chess piece and examined it for two seconds.

Then toss it casually.

The white chess piece traced an arc and landed in the "mouth" of the pitcher plant engine, which was half-closed and emitted a dark green fluorescent light, below the control panel.

"Gurgle."

The engine was swallowed.

It was swallowed very cleanly.

They didn't even chew it.

next second.

The train jolted violently.

It is not a physical vibration.

The underlying architecture is being restructured.

A brand new system notification popped up on Xiao Huo's panel.

The lettering is in gold.

He had never seen a system notification in gold font.

[The train has absorbed the core privileges of the higher-dimensional chess piece. It has gained a new ability—"Rule Jump".]

[Rule Jump: Ignores all spatial barriers, law blockades, dimensional folds, and causal traps between the starting point and the target point, directly descending to the target coordinates. Cooldown: None. Number of uses: Unlimited.]

Xiao Huo looked at the line of text.

Then he turned to look at Su Yuan.

His eyes were filled with four big words.

"Is he even human?"

Su Yuan ignored him.

His attention was on something else.

The "elephant" character imprint on the palm still bears the trace of cause and effect left by the black horse chess piece when it arrived.

As fine as a spider's silk.

As weak as a candle flame.

But the direction is clear.

It points to the other end of the chessboard.

Pointing to the location of "King".

Su Yuan clenched his fist.

The spiderweb-like causal connections were firmly grasped in his palm.

"Small fire."

"exist!"

"Can you trace that line of cause and effect?"

Xiao Huo glanced down at the panel.

He made two swipes with his finger.

"Yes. The direction is known. The distance... is incalculable. It crosses at least seven known dimensional levels. It's impossible to reach by normal means."

He stopped abruptly halfway through his sentence.

Then his golden vertical pupils slowly widened.

"But now we have 'rule-jumping'."

"right."

Su Yuan's lips curled up.

He kicked the engine start pedal.

It's not about stepping on someone.

It's a kick.

It was filled with 100% malice and 200% violence.

The engine of the Emperor's Path Devourer roared, shattering the void.

That roar was not a boom.

It's a declaration of war.

Hundreds of dark gold propulsion ports on the bottom of the vehicle simultaneously spewed out blazing residual flames of the laws.

The obsidian scales made a crisp metallic clanging sound as the engine vibrated under overload.

The ramming horn at the front of the car, made of ultra-high-density bone, gleamed with a bloodthirsty cold light under the illumination of the Law.

The train started moving.

It's not about speeding up.

It's a jump.

"Rule Jump" is activated in this second.

The entire train flickered in the void for a moment.

Just like that.

Then it disappeared.

Ignore all spatial barriers between the starting point and the target point.

Ignoring the rules and restrictions.

Ignore dimensional folding.

Ignoring the causal trap.

The instant the train disappeared, the roar of the engine transformed into a shockwave of laws that swept across all realms, spreading wildly along the network of laws in the void.

In the distance. At the edge of a collapsing galaxy.

A high-dimensional being that had been dormant for thirty million years slowly opened its enormous eye, which was made of nebula.

It sensed the shockwave.

It understood the information contained within the shockwave.

Then its pupils contracted.

It witnessed an incomprehensible fact—

That paradox.

They did not run away.

It actively attacked.

Following the cause-and-effect lines left by the chess player.

He plunged headlong into the deepest part of the chess game.

Further away.

In the cracks of another dimension.

An ancient will that had slumbered for countless eons was awakened from its dormancy.

It interpreted the meaning of the shockwave in an almost instinctive way.

Then it trembled.

It's not because of fear.

It's because of excitement.

It waited for far, far, far too long.

Finally, there was a living creature that dared to walk in that direction.

The shockwave continued to spread.

It spread farther and farther. It became more and more widespread.

Countless ancient beings, dormant in the depths of the universe, hidden in the dimensional crevices, and slumbering at the bottom of the river of time, were awakened one after another.

They perceived the same thing.

They vibrated.

They are hiding in fear.

Excitedly awakening.

They remain indifferent and observe.

For the first time in seventeen minutes since this second, the underlying network of laws of the entire universe has produced a subtle, observable global tremor.

It's not that the rules have been attacked.

It is the law itself that is curious.

I'm curious to see just how far a monster from a third-rate civilization can go.

Inside the Emperor's Path: Devouring Wasteland.

The jump lasted less than a second.

The scene shifted from the void to a space that Su Yuan had never seen before.

The view outside the car window changed.

Everyone saw it.

Wang Hu saw it while lying on the ground.

The guardian spirit saw it through the crack in the treasure chest.

Xiao Huo looked up from the panel and saw it.

Then their expressions froze simultaneously.

That's not a planet.

It is not a galaxy.

It's not a single star system.

It is a chessboard.

A chessboard with nebulae as its grid.

Each square has a side length measured in light-years. Black squares are composed of collapsed dark matter. White squares are made up of solidified starlight. The crisscrossing lines are the absolute boundaries stretched from the event horizon of the black hole.

The boundaries of the chessboard disappear beyond the limits of visual perception.

The edge is not visible.

You can't see the edge in any direction.

It was so big that the word "big" itself seemed ridiculous.

On the chessboard—

White side.

There is only one train, the Emperor's Journey Devourer.

All alone.

So insignificant that it's not even a single pixel on a chessboard.

opposite.

Black's territory.

Densely packed.

Overwhelming.

Billions of black chess pieces, radiating divine pressure, stood on those dark matter squares.

Pawn. Horse. Elephant. Chariot. Rear.

There are countless quantities of each type of chess piece.

Each chess piece exudes a power that could crush galaxies.

They were arranged in a neat formation, with black flames forming a continuous line along the front, looking from afar like a black horizon stretching across the universe.

And at the farthest point of that horizon.

At the very back of all the black pieces.

A throne formed from the coalescing of a collapsing galaxy floated silently there.

A person sat on the throne.

That person's outline, build, and facial features were exactly the same as Su Yuan's.

But his eyes were pure black.

No pupils.

There is no white in the eye.

Only pure, absolute black.

He sat there.

He was supporting his head with one hand.

With those pure black eyes.

Quietly.

Looking down.

in the carriage.

Wang Hu's mouth was open.

His chin was trembling.

He wanted to speak.

His lips moved seven or eight times.

In the end, only one syllable was uttered.

"...Lie down."

I didn't dare say the last word.

Because he was afraid he would die after he finished speaking.

The boundless chessboard was reflected in Xiao Huo's golden vertical pupils.

A vast army of black soldiers filling the sky.

And then there was another Su Yuan, sitting behind the army, looking down on everything with a pair of empty eyes.

His fingers gripped the edge of the panel tightly.

The fingernail got embedded in the metal.

Su Yuan stood in front of the car window.

He was watching too.

Looking at the chessboard.

Looking at that large army.

Looking at the "king" with his face.

His left eye was burning with dark gold.

His right eye was pure white and spinning.

The dark crack in his palm was pulsating.

All three forces reached their peak simultaneously within his body.

His expression was calm.

It was calm to an abnormal degree.

Then he spoke.

The sound wasn't loud.

But on this chessboard with galaxies as its grid, every word he uttered was clearly transmitted.

It was transmitted into the core of each black chess piece.

The message reached the ears of the being seated on the throne.

"Yo."

A smile curved Su Yuan's lips.

The amount of information contained in that arc is richer than any declaration of war.

"Such a grand display."

"They seem to value me quite a bit."