ACC Chapter 25 Tribulation (2)

Having been on the edge of a cliff before, gazing down into the abyss of death multiple times, I could feel danger with just my instincts. And right now, they were screaming at me like crazy.

With a thought, a blood red aura enveloped me, like a crimson flame that didn't have the property of burning. I was imitating one of my deity arts.

I pointed Renah at the dragon, placing both my palms upon its shaft, after which, I rotated it like a drill, with its speed churning and collecting the crimson aura onto its tip, creating a massive projection of a drill.

The lightning dragon's mouth opened, blinding me with light as a beam of lighting was ejected, clashing with my drill spear, which I had thrust out.

The force of the attack forced me back, but I didn't let Renah be flung from my hands. With each rotation, slivers of lightning were sheared from the massive beam, merging with the mist around me, enriching and enhancing it.

"Hah!"

With a shout, veins bulged along my body as I lowered my center of gravity before leaping out, cutting through the breath and dragon alike, making its lightning body to start breaking apart into flickers which merged into the red mist.

But before I could arrest my momentum after the strike, with my body still in the air, two more large heads appeared right in front of me, with each looming with fury.

My mind accelerated in its deductions as I beheld them at this point in time where even a second was as slow as an hour.

Their mouths opened in unison, with golden light spilling out as pillars of lightning hurtled my way, triggering my instincts massively.

With a thought, my skin became white, along with my hair, which elongated, twined around each other as it enlarged, solidifying into a large bone shield emanating a reddish glow.

It didn't even last a moment before shattering into countless fragments while I safely evaded the attack due to its bought time.

With clinking sounds emanating from my now clawed feet, I sprinted towards the side of one dragon, covered in head to toe in bone, only leaving behind my eyes.

With even Renah covered in bone, I lashed out horizontally, with the tip easily cutting through the lightning dragon's scales, inflicting a large gash before a sweep of a tail caused me to beat a hasty retreat.

Though I could block it, the force of the attack wasn't so easily disposed of. And that would make me lose significant momentum.

With a spin of Renah, I bashed away a claw that had been timed well enough to catch me offguard should I have neglected paying attention to my other dragon opponent.

Even as I clashed with the two dragons, activating some recessive or dormant genes within cells, like growing wings to fly over certain attacks, adopting a thicker exoskeleton, claws, scales, and many other traits, the excitement coursing through my veins continued to increase.

This was it! This was something I had been missing all along! The edge of life and death!

A claw knicked my cheek, sending a paralysing bolt within my body, but I pushed through it with will and my energy, using the shaft of Renah to party the entire appendage to the side, which was large enough to grip my entire body, with space to spare.

An opening appeared beneath the dragon in question, and I capitalised upon it by thrusting out ten times, creating large gaping wounds that leaked with liquid lightning, which turned into silver snakes that dispersed into the red mist.

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A bolt of lightning smashed into my back, sending me flying with its force, not to mention the paralysis that affected my body, thereby allowing a tail swipe to connect, sending me beyond the edge of the platform, towards one of the walls of the massive ring.

I hurriedly stopped myself by ejecting blood-red flames out of my back, stabilising myself in the void.

Massive fractures were running through my bone armor, whose structure had been sturdy enough to tank an all out strike by a Nascent Soul peer. Of course this was just a pale imitation of my deity art, so its defence paled in comparison to the true thing.

Within two teleports, I was back on the platform, charging towards the golden dragons, whose wounds seemed to lack the impetuous of healing. It seemed like even someone lesser in attack would be able to win over them in a protracted battle... Provided they could survive long enough.

Pushing that analysis aside, I scanned my energy reserves, which had gone just under the 50% mark.

I frowned a little at that, but ultimately, decided to let it go and just focus on ending the two beasts.

During a tribulation, pills and all manner of external items couldn't be used. That would only provoke the wrath of the Heavens.

The battle raged on as I wounded the beasts, a little at a time, making sure that I conserved the limited energy I had been left with.

After a few minutes, a chance presented itself and I lashed out with a horizontal strike that severed the neck of one of the beasts, with the tip and shaft acting like a sword.

With the downing of one, things went easier, allowing me to end the other dragon as well in the next few seconds.

Golden threads of lightning crackled within the red mist, tempering and evolving it to a higher level beyond my current understanding.

I was too winded and my body was aching. Due to the many injuries, I was using Renah as a crutch to prevent myself from keeling over.

The breath coming out of my mouth was heavily laden with vapor, which even through this void of space, had become visible.

My eyes went to the broken pieces of the platform, the last of those that were being dragged back to their original positions. This was the self repair function of the platform. The dense material had been way too expensive to make, so self-repair arrays had been included within its manufacturing.

Then my eyes trailed back into the churning dark clouds, which were roiling as if some massive beast was moving through them.

Even as I gazed at the workings of Heaven, my body was healing. The cracks within my bone armor vanished, only for the white substance to be reabsorbed back into my skin, returning it into the pristine pink that it had been previously.

I moved Renah to my left hand and flexed my right, which had been the one taking on the brunt of the dragons' attacks, while also serving as the core for my techniques. There had been minute fractures within, even with my many regenerations during the battle. And now that I had settled down, my focus had been placed upon healing them.

After that came Renah. The materials that had been used to create it at the beginning had been somewhat weak. But I had already infused more powerful materials at every chance I got.

That was why it had been in my spatial ring. I hadn't gotten around to refining it such that it could reside within my body due to how busy I had been.

So, when I closely scrutinized it, I was shocked to notice that the amalgam of materials had somehow managed to achieve some harmony.

"That's how it is. Even treasures can go through tribulations." I mumbled out, with the sound not carrying anywhere due to a lack of atmosphere. It seems that only the Heavens could change that.

The churning cloud stopped abruptly, with a hole, pushing aside the rest of the clouds, appearing.

Golden light spilled out, bathing me and the platform in its glow, which was somewhat warm and rejuvenating, even to my nascent soul.

Then a pressure came down, locking up my body, as if I was being trapped within amber. This was different from that of before.

I could feel it. The space itself had been fortified into solidifying.

Most people thought that because Nascent Soul cultivators could teleport, they were the origin of spatial rings and tools, thereby making them more expensive. But that was a wrong assumption that the Federation hadn't gotten around to clarifying.

All spatial tools were a result of arrays that used the runes of space. Nascent Soul cultivators like myself could teleport to a limited extent, but we were far from truly grasping the powers of space. We couldn't create pocket dimensions.

And now that I could feel space itself being fortified, I was somewhat shocked. The reason there was no horror was the simple fact that there were many records of those who made the attempts. So, this was one of the things that had been chronicled.

A large golden arrow, its girth equal to that of my body, had taken form above, with its tip aimed right at me. Then a blur of golden light blinded me upon its release, bringing a searing pain to my body that threatened to take away my consciousness.