Despite his rapidly deteriorating condition, Rui remained as determined as ever. He gazed into the depths of the Dragon Emperor's eyes with the blindingly bright red suns in his as a single realization dawned on him.

'At this rate, I will lose.'

Whether it was the Forge of Creation or his systems of thought or prophecy, none of them could save him at the moment. The Dragon Emperor's overdrive mode was so powerful that even the most powerful solutions he could muster up would fall short. On the other hand, Rui was dying each moment that passed as the Dragon Emperor ravaged his body with attacks beyond even his ability to defend against. Radiation flooded the entire world in all directions with such intensity that even his Hydro-Lens began failing.

The gap in the speed of their movements had reached such a high level that not even the perception of the future could allow Rui to evade them. The chasm between their outputs was even greater than that of a Realm, greatly exceeding the difficulty of when he fought Sage Himari or Sage Sekiei.

Such was the power of one of the most powerful beings in the entirety of the true world.

BOOOOOOOOOOOMMM!!!

The Dragon Emperor's attacks crashed into his fused domain of Wall of Water and Hydro-Lens, having lost just enough momentum to prevent Rui from crumbling.

BOOOOOOOOOOOMMM!!!

His bones cracked from the impact.

BOOOOOOOOOOOMMM!!!

His muscles tore.

BOOOOOOOOOOOMMM!!!

His flesh crumpled.

BOOOOOOOOOOOMMM!!!

BOOOOOOOOOOOMMM!!!

BOOOOOOOOOOOMMM!!!

His skin was checkered with wounds that bled into the ocean as Weaving Blood desperately tried to stitch back his crumbling constitution, barely keeping up with the damage he sustained with the help of the exotic pluripotent matter. He had hypnotized himself with a reverse Temporal Disharmony, allowing himself to perceive time at an extraordinarily slow pace, and had used Soul Retcon just to allow him to mitigate the astronomical chasm in physicality, along with Nemean Blossom and Neo Godspeed.

A single realization settled in him.

There was nothing within him that could turn the battle around. Many of what he once considered his trump cards simply fell flat before the Dragon Emperor. Despite being unfamiliar with hypnosis, the fact that his brain and neurology were highly advanced technological products that had their own terminals that he could actively tinker with greatly negated the power of hypnosis.

The gu, which was once nothing short of an absolute death sentence, struggled to move through the body of the Dragon Emperor as the sheer density of his organic life made the process akin to trying to drill through a mountain.

Technique after technique.

System after system.

All the adaptive evolution he had ever cultivated within him failed to allow him to push back against the Dragon Emperor. Almost eighty years, or almost one hundred and forty years, if he included John Falken's life, had failed to allow him to adaptively evolve to the Dragon Emperor.

And yet, the blood-red Suns in his eyes, shining with blinding brightness, remained resolute.

Within them burned an indomitable fire.

There was only one thing to do if nothing within him could bring him to victory.

"I must look outside."

And he did.

Even as he watched the Dragon Emperor unleash a tsunami of attacks, his attention moved outwards.

It moved to the ocean that they were submerged within.

It moved to the waters that they were surrounded by. The waters of the ocean roared in his ears with a violent rumble, shaken by the maelstrom of energy released by the Dragon Emperor and the rising lava and magma that boiled it.

He was surrounded by a nigh endless amount of water.

'Think.'

Rui's eyes closed even as he defended himself from the burning Dragon, who pushed Rui closer and closer to death.

'How can I use this environment, these circumstances, to defeat him?'

He had already used the water environment defensively and offensively to an extent. He had already developed, over months as he traveled with Amare, techniques that could allow him to leverage a water environment. He had even practiced with them to get some familiarity with those techniques, and now was using Soul Retcon, allowing him to fight as if he had been using those techniques his entire life.

He hadn't gone much beyond that, however. He had been certain that the ocean would be too antithetical for the Dragon Emperor to really win, crushing the chances of his victory.

Lord Shenlong had proven him wrong, of course. The Dragon Emperor was so powerful that even an antithetical environment was not able to whittle him down to a level where Rui could defeat him with his existing power. Simply teleporting him to this environment was not enough.

'I need to do more.'

The realization bore heavily on him even as time slowed down in his eyes. It wasn't enough to simply drag him to the depths of the ocean. He basically expected the ocean to do all the work for him, and then was shocked when it didn't.

'I am the one fighting this battle, not the ocean.'

He closed his eyes as he activated the Forge of Creation once more, but this time he narrowed his resolution to techniques involving the environment, involving the water, involving the entire ocean.

The Forge of Creation surged with power, astronomically improved by Gigabrain, as it coursed through countless possibilities.

And yet, he was running out of time.

The Dragon Emperor's eyes had already turned pitch-black, consumed by the gu, and yet his output had already faltered. He ignored the powerful poison, unleashing upon Rui a tremendous onslaught of destruction.

Each blow he unleashed ravaged Rui's fused domain with tremendous momentum, along with an astronomically intense flush of radiation, completely destroying the very medium upon which the domain was built. The Dragon Emperor was shocked by the fact that Rui hadn't been annihilated a million attacks ago, considering how utterly exponential the gap in their output was.

And yet, nonetheless, the Dragon Emperor sensed him drawing closer and closer to death with each passing moment. His eyes lit up with glee as he watched Rui close his bright eyes.

"Finally resigned yourself to your fate, have you? You should have done this from the start."

RUMBLE!!!

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