A lightning bolt left the dark clouds, falling directly on Nathan's body. The strength of the attack wasn't very high, leaving only a few burns on Nathan's skin, but it was enough to catch the army's attention.

"What the hell was that?" asked a cultivator.

"They are attacking us from above!" shouted another one.

"Shields up! Prepare for the next strike!" Jason shouted to his men.

"Wait. I have to do this alone! Continue defending from the vegetation, and I will deal with the lightning bolts by myself." Nathan shouted as he gritted his teeth.

"Come on, do as he said!" Travis shouted to the cultivators before nearing his friend." Hey man. Are you sure you don't need anything?"

Just as he said that, another lightning bolt fell on Nathan, who only could try to disperse the attack's energy to reduce the damage.

"Yeah. Don't you worry. After I deal with this, I may be powerful enough to destroy the tree and the stone myself, so you only need to give me some more time." Nathan explained.

"Strong enough to destroy the tree? Wait a moment. Are you breaking through again?" Travis asked with an expression of shock.

"Yes, and this time it is going to be to a new realm that no one had ever witnessed," Nathan replied with a smile before gritting his teeth again.

The first lightning strike wasn't potent, but the second one was stronger. When Nathan felt the third, he knew it carried enough energy to hurt him, so he didn't dare take it as a joke.

Waving his hands above his head, Nathan created a barrier of energy.

The lightning bolt collided with Nathan's defenses, crushing the barrier and letting a weaker attack reach the cultivator's body. Before that energy could disperse, Nathan used his dantian to absorb it.

His dantian consumed most of the energy to heal his wounds faster, but some of it remained inside the dantian, and for some reason, Nathan found himself unable to consume it.

'What the hell?' Nathan thought after realizing what was happening.

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In the seconds between each lightning bolt, Nathan thought about releasing that strange energy from his dantian, but when he tried to influence it, he realized it had a heavenly aura.

'Maybe this is not a nuisance. Maybe getting this is exactly the purpose of the test.' Nathan thought as he looked at the clouds above him.

As the clouds cracked again, Nathan prepared another barrier above him, this one thicker and more resilient than the last one.

The lightning bolt hit the barrier with even more strength than the last one, breaking Nathan's barrier again. Still, before letting the energy disperse as the previous strike, he used his dantian to gather all the power the lightning bolt carried and absorbed.

Another chunk of that Heavenly-looking energy ended up inside Nathan's dantian, getting enough to fill half of it.

But Nathan still felt that it wasn't enough.

That energy was something above his level, and if he wanted to use its power, he would have to prove he was worthy of it.

While Nathan was passing his tribulation, the fight continued. Even though he had managed to steal a large amount of energy from the stone to increase his cultivation, it wasn't enough to instantly make all the enemies around them disappear.

Because of this, even if the vegetation lost a lot of strength, the army couldn't eliminate it as fast as they wanted as they were already low on energy for that kind of display of power.

When the fifth lightning bolt fell, it traversed Nathan's barrier without difficulty, burning a large area of his skin and muscles.

'Wow, that felt like someone hit my head with a hammer.' Nathan thought after receiving the strike.' But my dantian is almost filled. I need to survive another one, and everything will be over.'

Seeing how the clouds were about to release another lightning bolt, Nathan prepared to use all his remaining energy to protect himself.

This time, instead of creating a shield, he began to concentrate energy on his left hand. His bracelets activated, and he all the power they gathered to the same hand.

When the lightning bolt fell over him, he released all the energy to create a ray that collided with the lightning. Even though it wasn't enough to obliterate it, it still reduced a significant part of its power, making it easy for Nathan's dantian to absorb.

When all the lightning's energy entered his dantian, a reaction happened inside it.

Nathan felt the heavenly-looking energy begin to compress, becoming a small bright ball. At that moment, he thought he could change that energy's nature to any of his choosing, which didn't take long as he was sure what type of energy was the best.

'I mean, non-elemental magic is much more versatile than all the other types. How am I supposed not to choose it?' he thought.

Following his will, the energy ball lost all its properties, becoming non-elemental energy of more purity and concentration. Even the regular energy around it began to become influenced, burning the impurities inside it to aspire power similar to the small sphere.

It looked like a small blue flame had ignited inside Nathan's dantian.

Power soon filled Nathan's body as waves of energy healed his wounds.

"Did you do it? How do you feel?" Travis asked when he saw his friend recover.

"Better than ever," Nathan replied as his eyes shined with a dim blue light.