Evolution Begins with Elemental Domination

An ape-like shadow tore through the sky.

After crossing the tree barrier, the entirely silver-gray gorilla glided more than twenty meters through the air. Several sharp Arrows shot toward it, but when they were less than three feet away, they seemed to hit an invisible wall, and all of them snapped in two.

Someone else cast Lightning Chain. A frenzy of silver serpents danced, yet they couldn’t get anywhere near the gorilla.

In the flashing electric light, some sharp-eyed people could see an invisible, curved force field protecting it.

”A light shield?” someone asked in surprise.

Terrifyingly, all the rubble and broken Arrows on the ground were seized by an invisible force. Propelled by an accelerating Power, they pelted the crowd in a chaotic barrage.

The figure who had just cast Lightning Chain was instantly killed, a stone piercing through his head. The attack was so fierce that no one dared to look up.

”Watch out!!” Everyone was dumbfounded.

From then on, the silver-gray gorilla moved as if through an unguarded land, leaping right over the tall wooden fence.

Its body, which had started to descend, suddenly accelerated again. Like a cannonball, it tore through the curtain of rain and flew toward the sloped roof of a three-story villa ahead.

”That’s Spirit Telekinesis! Don’t let it get away!”

At this, Feng Yuanjie’s eyes lit up with a hunter’s excitement. Realizing the nature of its Rune, he fired a blind shot at the shadow in the night sky, then immediately led several people in pursuit.

Su Chen watched from a distance, taking everything in. Without a change in expression, he cast a lightning shield on himself.

In the next instant, he activated his Shadow Jumping Skill.

Ink-black Shadow Power enveloped his body, and he vanished from the spot. With a second consecutive instant cast, he leaped directly onto the roof of the villa.

Before the gorilla could turn, Su Chen flicked his wrist. A Flying Knife shot out like a fiery meteor, aiming straight for its back.

But just as it was two meters from its target...

An invisible wave of Telekinesis formed a barrier in front of it. The Flying Knife slammed into it as if hitting an iron wall and was detonated prematurely.

BOOM!

Flames erupted, and a wave of fire rolled out. Thick smoke and fiery air currents blocked all lines of sight, but a faint, furious roar from the gorilla could still be heard.

Immediately after, a highly condensed Telekinesis Shell forcibly tore through the curtain of fire, striking straight at Su Chen.

The blast wave sent roof tiles flying and carved a trench across the roof. The invisible collision caused the charge on his lightning shield to flare violently. A burst of lightning blocked the invisible impact.

Su Chen didn’t try to tank the full damage. With that buffer, he easily dodged to the side.

Taking advantage of the gap, the peculiar gorilla had no intention of fighting. Its silver-gray, steel-like back was scorched black—it had clearly been hit by the aftershock of the Flame Burst. It suddenly pushed off with all four limbs and, with a massive leap, jumped to the roof of a distant villa.

But Su Chen wasn’t about to let it go.

In the darkness, which was his home turf, potential jump points were everywhere.

Drawing a Flying Knife from his waist, he immediately activated the Awakening effect...

HUMMM!

With another Shadow Leap, he landed like a ghost on the edge of the rooftop, not even splashing a single drop of collected rainwater. Gazing at the nearby figure, which seemed to be bound by time, he flicked his hand, and a streak of crimson fire shot out in a straight line.

It wasn’t just his focus that granted him perfectly steady hands; the release of his full potential, coupled with the doubling of his Strength Attribute, more than doubled his throwing speed. It was as if the Flying Knife had also been accelerated by Telekinesis.

With such a boost, the gorilla was struck from behind again. The Telekinesis Barrier it hastily formed failed to block the attack completely.

BOOM!!

Caught in the fiery explosion, its powerful, massive body was thrown forward like a puppet with its strings cut, falling hard from the balcony into the villa’s ground-floor courtyard.

Su Chen didn’t hesitate. He raised his Thunder Scepter and summoned a Thunder Strike. A pillar of lightning as thick as a courtyard column descended from the sky, piercing straight through its head.

Seeing the shattered remains of its head, he finally relaxed.

Judging by its size, this silver-gray gorilla’s weight was definitely more than double that of a tiger or leopard. Just from its gnarled, muscular limbs and back, it was clear its own melee power was not weak.

With that much weight, it was a wonder it could use Telekinesis to glide at all.

Hearing the sounds of people approaching from all sides, and to avoid any unforeseen complications, Su Chen used a Shadow Leap to jump to the gorilla’s corpse. Reaching down, he grasped a faint gray Rune in his right hand.

At the same time, he noticed something special about this mysterious Rune.

Although it also shifted between the forms of a character and a totem, its emerging patterns were not interwoven with the three elements, and its structure resembled a pyramid.

Before he could think about it further, HUMMM! The very special Rune was successfully devoured. It rushed up from his palm through his meridians and entered his mind.

Along with it, a flood of information poured in.

[Telekinesis] (Lv4): The Spellcaster’s spiritual will can be used for external Perception, manipulating objects, generating force fields, and releasing Strong Will impacts.

Synthesis Formula: None.

Promotion requirements: 5/8 Telekinesis Runes, 2/3 Spiritual Dust Sand

’It really is Telekinesis.’

Su Chen was pleasantly surprised, but he also discovered that this Spirit Element Rune had no three-element synthesis components.

In other words, this was a Spirit Element Skill that existed outside the elemental system.

With this Rune, his Perception suddenly expanded. Within a 15-meter radius, the faint rustle of falling debris and the crawling of insects under the courtyard’s lawn were all captured with perfect clarity.

It was as if he had grown an invisible eye on his back; his field of vision was no longer limited to what was in front of him.

This brand-new, wondrous sensory experience was truly novel.

Just then, approaching figures appeared all around the entrance.

WHOOSH!!

One figure, wrapped in Wind Fluff, leaped into the courtyard. Another transformed into lightning and warped into the yard in a flash of arcing electricity. More figures rushed in through the villa’s main door.

”Damn, we’re too slow!”

”Someone already snatched the prize!”

When they saw the gorilla’s corpse lying in the courtyard, they were not only startled but also found it hard to believe.

Feng Yuanjie found the result hard to accept, his expression resentful and unhappy. The Archery Hall coach next to him immediately stepped forward and said accusingly, ”Young man, he just shot an arrow at it. Did you just swallow the entire Rune Essence? Isn’t that a bit shameless?”

The base had an unwritten rule for distributing loot: in team efforts, whoever dealt the most damage got the largest share.

”Don’t tell me his arrow pierced its heart, and you just swooped in to claim the kill,” another person questioned.

In response, Su Chen’s expression was indifferent. His cold eyes swept over the restless figures around him as he said, ”Why don’t you open your eyes and see if there are any arrow wounds on the corpse? Aren’t you clear on whether it was hit by an arrow or not? Or have you just gotten used to extorting people like this?”

His tone was flat, yet it held a hint of provocation, deliberately getting on their nerves.

When someone stepped forward a few paces to argue, a blinding arc of electricity suddenly licked outward, startling him into taking several steps back.

”Fuck, it’s a lightning shield!”

Seeing the high-density glare from the active charge on the shield around him, the man who was about to press the issue turned pale. This was far stronger than the effect he remembered.

The already on-edge crowd began to tighten their grips on their weapons as the electricity arced.

”Sorry, it was our mistake.”

At that moment, however, Feng Yuanjie stepped forward to make his stance clear, quelling the conflict. He was more or less certain that his blind shot had missed, and even if it had hit, it likely wouldn’t have been a fatal wound.

Besides, while he was focused on observing this strange young man, he had unintentionally overlooked a threat from behind.

In the thick darkness to his right rear, something was definitely hidden in the deep shadows, staring at the back of his neck.

Just then, more sounds came from the doorway, and Yan Ziqian, Pang Peng, and others appeared. With such a disorderly mix of people, a conflict that might have had a small chance of erupting was silently extinguished.

Nothing happened!

At this moment, the rain grew heavier and denser, gradually blurring their vision. More and more people retreated from the steel-frame shelters at the front line, forced to take up defensive positions inside the villas.