Logan activated a disintegration field with Myriad Laws to Ruin, but the chains were too fast. The spearhead punched through the gaps and slammed into his back.

His ribs cracked with a sharp pop. His vision went dark for a second as his body was flung backward. He crashed into the rocky wall at the rift's entrance, his back smashing through three meters of obsidian. Shards flew everywhere.

Using the momentum, he flipped mid-air and rolled deep into the tunnel.

"Damn…" Logan dropped to one knee, his right hand slamming into the ground to stop his fall.

His peripheral vision whitened. His knuckles spasmed from the sudden, searing pain.

He looked up. Observer No. 3 was chasing him like a ghost, his silver-gray chains weaving through the narrow space. Every strike sent rocks crashing down.

"Logan, you can't escape!" Observer No. 3's voice echoed through the tunnel, cold and lethal. "Space Rule has locked down every teleportation coordinate. There's no way out for you!"

Logan gritted his teeth and blurred through the twisting path.

He had tried to tear open a spatial rift three times, but each attempt was cut short by those silver-gray chains. The space coordinates were completely locked, and any teleportation attempt was shredded the moment it started.

"Can't shake him…" Logan cursed in his head. "This bastard's spatial lock is too tight!"

He fired Truth Chains from his palm.

Dark-gold chains shot out from his left hand, diving into the folds of the void. He set up three rule tripwires behind him. Each one linked to a rule node in the Eighteen Realms. If triggered, they would unleash a counterattack burst within half a second.

Observer No. 3 followed him into the tunnel.

His ankle caught the first tripwire. dark-gold chains snapped out of nowhere, wrapping tight around his leg.

The natural suppression of the Ancient Tribunal mark took effect. The flow of his rules stuttered for a split second.

Observer No. 3 scoffed. "Cheap tricks!" He shattered the tripwire with a pulse of silver-gray spatial chains, but the brief pause cost him momentum.

Logan used the opening to widen the gap. He fled to the edge of the Restricted Zone's core. His world essence perception pierced three thousand meters underground, and he spotted an ancient spatial rift buried deep below.

The rift was a spatial scar left behind by an ancient battlefield. Its structure was as fragile as a spider web, covering a ten-mile radius.

He ran the numbers quickly. "Every strike that cracks the space above this rift will triple in power from resonance feedback. Observer No. 3 is a Space Rule Controller. His own attacks here will just rebound on him."

"Since I can't outrun him…" Logan clenched his right fist until his knuckles turned white. "Then I'll make this place blow up!"

He formed a hand seal. Eighteen rule nodes materialized in the air directly above the rift.

The eighteen nodes linked together with Truth Chains, forming a hidden pulling array a kilometer wide.

As soon as it formed, the array folded into the space around it, camouflaged and waiting.

At the center of the array, he embedded a space-time rule to trigger everything at once.

This guaranteed that the moment Observer No. 3 triggered it, every part of the trap would detonate simultaneously at maximum power.

But he wasn't done yet.

To make it deadlier, he used his Master Mark to tap into the unstable zones deep inside the rift.

Spatial fragments that could collapse at any moment trembled around the nodes. They were as fragile as glass.

A massive explosion here would cause the surrounding space to collapse inward instantly.

One force would blast outward with pure energy and raw rules. The other would crush inward, collapsing the very space and time that held it.

Caught between those two forces, even a True God would be torn apart!

Observer No. 3 wasn't far behind. He tore through space and landed right above the rift.

The moment his feet hit the ground, his ankle snagged on Logan's first trap.

Suddenly, Truth Chains lashed out from thin air, wrapping tight around his leg.

Eighteen different colors of light raced up the chain. Wherever the light passed, his armor was covered in a dense web of cracking energy.

"Cheap tricks!" Observer No. 3 roared and yanked his leg back. The silver chains snapped instantly, but he had already lost his momentum.

Before he could react, another chain wrapped around his wrist. Then a third. Then a fourth.

The relentless chains unleashed a storm of wild energy, nearly engulfing him.

They weren't powerful individual strikes, but they were fast, dense, and never stopped.

Observer No. 3 was too busy blocking the attacks and healing his wounds to notice the air around him. A low, grinding crackle began to fill the space.

Rumble…

Finally, the sound of collapsing space reached his ears.

"Damn it!" The realization hit him. Logan had set up a chain reaction trap.

The energy surrounding him was now trapped in a tightening pocket of space. It compressed like a pressure cooker.

In seconds, its power multiplied a thousand times over.

What used to be mere grazes was now enough to tear his body apart.

"Logan... you... bastard..."

His voice cracked, then vanished into a screaming storm of energy.

"Heh. Hope that slows you down."

Logan kept moving toward Restricted Zone 33.

He knew his trap wouldn't be enough to kill a Demigod for sure.

As expected, the collapsed rift suddenly lit up with waves of silver-gray light.

[Time Return!]

With a deafening roar, Observer No. 3 pushed back with his own space-time rules. The collapsing rift was forcibly snapped back to normal.

As his body knit itself back together, a furious roar echoed across the ruins. "Logan! You really think a little trap will save you? When I find you, I'll crush you into dust!"

He stared at the subspace channel ahead, slowly raising his hand. Three hundred space chains shot out at once, piercing straight into the deepest part of the spatial rift.

In just a moment, Observer No. 3 reinforced the subspace channel ahead. It became rock-solid. Space collapses would never happen here again.

Meanwhile, Logan was taking a break at a subspace node.

Even while running, he had been monitoring his own body.

Thanks to the time he just bought, the eighteen-helix gene origin inside him had finally stabilized.

In just another half hour, his life level would undergo a complete transformation, perfectly matching the eighteen-helix gene structure.

By then, Logan was confident he could unleash the full power of all eighteen Divine Rules.

A faint smile touched his lips. "When the time comes, it's hard to say who's hunting whom. Observer No. 3, you're just a replacement ghost for The Observer No. 1!"

Back on another front.

Violet and her group had been retreating. They were just a short distance away from Restricted Zone 33.

Just as they stopped to rest, a powerful spatial wave suddenly rippled through the air nearby.

Violet's vertical pupils snapped tight. She felt three Demigod-stage auras chasing them through the channel. They were moving fast.

Moragas felt it too. The flames of the undead in his eyes Flash wildly. "Damn it! They're Demigods. Three of them!"

The Sky-Shattering Chieftain gripped his battle axe immediately. "Princess Violet, I'll hold them off with ten elites. Take the others and go!"

He knew their mission was to reach Restricted Zone 33 and ambush the enemy early. Neither Violet nor Moragas could afford to be stalled here.

But Violet refused flat out. "We go together. Besides, if you can't hold them off, leaving you behind is just a death sentence!"

After a brief pause, she gave an order. "Take ten Ancient Beast Clan elites. Carry Kane and keep moving through the eastern channel. You must reach the outer outpost of Restricted Zone 33 in fifteen minutes."

The Sky-Shattering Chieftain was stunned. It was clear: she wanted him to stay behind and cover their escape.

"This won't do!" The Sky-Shattering Great Chieftain grit his teeth, his eyes reddening. "The Ancient Beast Clan has no rules that make a royal heir stay behind!"

"Rules?" Violet smiled, her gaze steady. "I'm the acting master now. This is a direct order!"

He fell silent for a moment. Then, he dropped to one knee, punched the ground, and bowed his head respectfully. "...As you command, Princess!"

He stood up, waved, and led his ten elites away, carrying Kane with them.

Violet watched them disappear. Without a word, she turned around. In her hands, she now gripped the Staff of Creation and the Bow of Destruction. A fierce aura began to pour out from the explosive Creation and Destruction Rules.

"Moragas! Get ready for battle!"

Moragas stood beside her, swirling gray soul mist around him. "Ugh, you're going to get an old man like me killed!"

He complained, but he didn't dare to back down.

If he died here in battle, his soul origin could be used to revive him. But if he ran away, Logan would crush his soul core afterward, leaving him completely dead.

Violet saw his hesitation and smiled. "Don't fight it. After this battle, you might not even get to see me again."

Before Moragas could react, she ordered directly. "Later, lead seven bone dragons. Fake a retreat toward the western channel. You need to draw at least one Demigod away from us."

Moragas's heart skipped a beat. "Aren't you coming with me? Facing a Demigod alone will get you killed! If you die, Logan will still tear apart my soul core. I can't agree to this!"

"But if you don't draw them off, they might catch Kane. And you'll die anyway," Violet said calmly, like she was just stating facts.

Moragas knew she was right. He fell into a deep conflict.

Seeing his struggle, Violet smiled. "Splitting up is the best choice for us now. Relax, I still want to be Master's woman. I'm not going to die that easily."

…