Chapter 329: The Changed Anchor Point
With Li Qing's full force, the blade was so fast that it looked like a phantom.
A cold light flashed past, and the neck broke with a sound.
Before the blood could even gush out, Li Qing's head slid off at the rapid speed of the knife.
The head fell to the ground with a thud, completely exposing the smooth, flat black and red cross-section of the neck.
"Mr. Li Qing!"
Even Higashikata Josuke, who was naturally determined, couldn't help but be shocked at this moment:
He never expected that Li Qing would be so crazy and so decisive.
It was his own head that was chopped off !
Does he really have the confidence to ensure that this incredible plan will succeed?
Hot blood gushed out from the headless corpse in front of him.
Half of Higashikata Josuke's body was stained with blood, and his expression was shocked beyond words.
But he didn't stay stunned for long, because at this moment...
Li Qing's head that fell to the ground suddenly trembled, and then he glared at Josuke fiercely:
"Don't just stand there, it's too late!"
Although no sound was made, the meaning in his eyes was clear.
In fact, Li Qing himself just realized that his body is now so strong that he doesn't look like a human at all. Even if only his head is left, he can still survive for half a minute.
“…”
Higashikata Josuke shuddered when he was stared at, and then he reacted instantly:
"Crazy Diamond!"
He held on to his severely injured body and drove Crazy Diamond to pick up Li Qing's head and arrow together.
"Dulalaalaaaaaah!"
A phantom-like fist wind whizzed out.
Li Qing's head and the arrow were shattered into pieces by the wind from his fist, but they immediately merged into one by the adhesion of a mysterious force.
Soon, Li Qing's head was completely integrated into the slender arrow body.
He is no longer a human being.
He was just an arrow, like Angelo Rock before him, a dead object with a living consciousness.
“It’s such a wonderful feeling…”
"I still retain my consciousness and can even perceive the outside world with my soul."
"But now I am indeed a lifeless 'dead thing', without a body to control."
At this moment, Li Qing suddenly understood Angelo's feelings.
It felt fresh and new at first, but I soon fell into the great terror of "death and eternal life".
Fortunately, Li Qing knew that he had a good chance of turning back into a human being, otherwise the horrible feeling of having his soul imprisoned forever would be enough to suffocate him.
"The next step is to trick Diablo."
"It should work...it will definitely work."
That puzzling sense of self-confidence surged up in Li Qing's heart again.
And under his intense observation, the plan was indeed proceeding smoothly according to his ideas:
Diablo threatens Josuke with his mother's life.
Jousuke took advantage of the situation and handed over the arrow.
Diablo caught the arrow in his hand without any defense.
And after the predicted ten seconds of safety time was over, the cautious and fearful him could not help but activate the ability from the past.
"Ouroboros!"
The invisible force of time and space enveloped Diablo at this moment.
Diablo's body, clothes, personal belongings, including the arrow in his hand, were all transformed into some kind of higher-dimensional existence at this moment.
“Success!”
Li Qing's consciousness could also sense that unspeakable strange power.
His soul was hidden in the arrow and sneaked onto Diablo's time and space ship.
The emptiness is getting deeper and deeper. In just 1 second, Li Qing will turn into an arrow and follow Diablo into the long river of time.
But Diablo suddenly fell into deep thought at this moment:
"If this is a trap set by Li Qing..."
“…”
"Arrow! A trap... Could it be that arrow?"
Diablo's hand, which was tightly gripping the arrow handle, trembled slightly.
That bad feeling expanded to the limit at this moment. He believed that the arrow in his hand might contain a secret.
"King Crimson, destroy this arrow!"
Diablo made the decision without hesitation.
Anyway, he already has strong enough abilities, so the role of this other arrow to him is not dispensable, but it is not something that cannot be discarded either.
Destroying an arrow in exchange for peace of mind was not a bad decision for him.
So, at this moment, the Crimson King instantly attacked the arrow.
Although the arrow is in a virtual state of "untargetable", the so-called "untargetable" is only for other people.
At this moment, Diablo and the Crimson King were both in the same ethereal state as the arrow. They could both touch the arrow.
Otherwise, if he couldn't touch objects that were also in a virtual state, Diablo's clothes and the watch on his wrist would have fallen off long ago.
"To launch an attack at a time like this..."
"Has Diablo discovered me?!"
Li Qing felt a tingling sensation on his scalp, but now he had no scalp.
But no matter what, the Crimson King's extremely fast fist has already hit him.
Li Qing must show up and fight back, otherwise once the arrow is destroyed, he will die without any ability to fight back like Senior Angelo.
"Digitalization——"
"Open!"
With a thought, Li Qing instantly entered the data mode.
Thus, a contradiction immediately arises between Crazy Diamond's ability and the effect of the digitized model:
Crazy Diamond's ability to change mass is limited. The reason why Li Qing was able to merge with the tiny arrow was entirely because he chopped off his own body, leaving only his head.
But on the other hand, because of the rules of the system, Li Qing will always have an absolutely complete body when the digital mode is turned on.
It's like Dr. Banner can wear a normal person's shirt when he's not transformed.
Once he turns into the Hulk, the shirt designed for normal people will naturally be instantly burst by his huge body after transformation.
Now that arrow is "Dr. Banner's shirt."
Because of the digitized rules, Li Qing instantly turned back into a "wrong person", and the form in which he and the arrow were perfectly integrated would naturally collapse immediately.
So, in Diavolo's inexplicably shocked gaze...
Before the Crimson King's fist could hit the arrow, it suddenly shattered into powder out of thin air.
And among the wreckage of the arrow, an extremely familiar figure suddenly appeared in front of Diablo like a phantom.
"Li Qing?!!"
Diablo's eyes were filled with shock:
He originally just thought that there was something fishy about the arrow.
But he never expected that the strange thing about this arrow was Li Qing himself!
What shocked Diablo even more was that at this moment, he clearly saw:
Li Qing actually has the same virtualization phenomenon as him!
This guy was also enveloped by the power of time and space, and had quietly sneaked onto the time machine that was supposed to be for only him.
“Damn…how could this happen?!”
Diablo was caught off guard by Lee Sin's unexpected move:
[Ouroboros] is not supposed to be able to carry living things across time and space.
But Li Qing used some kind of magical stand ability to merge himself with the arrow, turning from a living thing into a dead thing.
He turned himself into a special being with consciousness but no vitality, thus bypassing the rules of the Ouroboros.
But once the power of time and space began to transform his body and lock onto his consciousness, it was already too late.
Even if Li Qing later changed back to his original form and became a living being, he would not stop traveling because he was already enveloped by the power of time and space.
This is like a ticket evader sneaking onto a high-speed train...
The train has already started, it's impossible to stop halfway and kick people off.
Now Diablo doesn't even have the ability to ask Li Qing to make up for it. He can only watch as Li Qing's body becomes increasingly ethereal and transparent just like his own.
"It can't be stopped..."
"This guy will soon enter the river of time with me and go back to the past!"
Diablo was horrified and felt a sense of difficulty:
The cooldown time of [Ouroboros] is a full 10 minutes!
Moreover, the epitaph that peeks into the future cannot be used in the past.
This means that in the 10 minutes he just went back to the past, the only ability he could use to deal with Lee Sin was [Time Reduction], and he couldn't refresh the cooldown.
"If this goes on, I'm doomed to fail!"
Diablo's brain was working rapidly in this almost frozen time:
The strength and speed of the Crimson King were indeed comparable to Li Qing's, but his mental strength was not enough to sustain that kind of long-term, high-intensity close combat.
Li Qing has thick skin and is very resistant to beatings.
After experiencing the explosion, the fierce fighting, the beheading and rebirth, taking into account the automatic life recovery in that short period of time, he now has nearly 30% of his health left.
Don’t think that his health is less than 30%.
Used to deal with the Crimson King who cannot use [Ouroboros] and cannot "fill up his health and mana with one click", 30% of his health is enough for Lee Sin to consume.
"What should I do... How am I supposed to survive those 10 minutes?"
Diablo was in a state of confusion.
The blurring process that lasted for 1 second has come to an end.
He was about to be sent into the long river of time together with Li Qing, to a certain "time anchor point" in the past.
"Oh yeah... I figured it out!"
"I really can't stop this time travel, but now we haven't officially entered the long river of time..."
"I still have time to change the [time anchor point] we return to!"
Diablo thought of his only advantage now:
He cannot stop this time train, but he can still decide where the train will go.
In other words, he cannot avoid fighting, but he can choose a time and place that will give him the greatest advantage.
“Where to go…”
"What time and place can I go back to so that I can stop Li Qing?"
Diablo's mind was working rapidly:
The [anchor point] must be a certain period of time that has been erased from his own past, and this is the target "time".
After the time travel, he and Li Qing will appear near their past selves, which is the target "location".
In order to find a battlefield that is favorable to him, Diablo must work hard to find the most suitable time and place from his memory.
"etc…"
"If you want to restrain Li Qing..."
"'There' would be the most appropriate word."
At that last moment, Diablo thought of the answer.
That memory was not distant, but when he thought about it carefully, it seemed so distant that it made him feel strange.
But no matter what, the time and place preserved in his memory is definitely a perfect battlefield that can help him resolve his urgent needs.
At that time, in that environment, Li Qing's abilities would be greatly restricted.
"Ouroboros, change the [time anchor point]!"
"Target--"
"March 26, 1999, 16:53."
