Tribulations

The crowd stood up shocked as they stared at the lifeless body in front of them. They couldn't believe the prideful and stubborn Zi Tian would kill herself like that.

They watched closely expecting an amazing counterattack, even the teachers were shocked they expected this to be a simple crushing of Ryul, never would they have thought such a lowkey person would be so cunning.

Samael's eyes turned translucent as he used Nihility's eye. He expected to see a small sign of life but even he saw nothing.

She was definitely dead.

However deep down he felt something was going to happen, he refused to believe Zi Tian would allow herself to die in such a place.

And if just on cue thunder began gathering in the sky, aura began to condense in the sky as the crackling lighting arced between the stormy grey clouds. The lifeless body on the ground began to turn to ash as it flew into the clouds merging with the aura.

The audience were now in disbelief; they had no clue what was going on and all they could do was force themselves to watch because if they blinked they would miss everything.

White particles flew out the clouds and converged to form a slender body, mist surrounded the figure making them look ethereal.

Robes with the colours jade, red and white materialised around the figure as they slowly floated down gracefully touching the ground. The mist dispersed and as expected we saw a familiar face, Zi Tian.

The Empress' pavilion members cheered till the sky shook, even if they had faith in their guild leader when they saw Zi Tian's lifeless body they still felt a sliver of fear and terror.

Even after they finished cheering the sky continued to rumble, the audience looked confused as they still saw clouds gathering strength and aura. The thick tendrils of lightning sparked across the vast sky as wind, fire and neutral aura condensed into the storm.

"It is time for you to disappear, you tried to stain me, a phoenix, with such filthy impurity!" Zi Tian snarled, "You should revere and worship me, you lowly cockroach."

Ryul was truly horrified now, Zi Tian felt like a reaper of death watching his every move, he had become the prey and her the hunter.

He was fucking shiting bricks.

Silence.

Lightning struck down hitting the elf.

Crack! BOOM! The thick log of energy slammed into the head of Ryul, his body spasming in pain as his skin turned charcoal.

Above him another person was shrouded in lightning, purple eyes pierced through the silver tendrils, Zi Tian was also struck!

However she seemed to have felt nothing as there was no expression on her perfect face. Taking a close look you could see that she had taken the brunt of the strike. All that Ryul was hit with was a mere offshoot.

And that 'mere' offshoot caused him so much damage once again showing the gap between the two contestants.

Another bolt gathered in the sky and before you could hear the thunder, another strike landed on Zi Tian. Most of the audience realised that this was a tribulation but why Zi Tian received a tribulation was still a mystery as there are many techniques that can bring you back to life without all of this hassle.

A branch of the lightning once again struck the charred and injured elf. His skin split and blistered, blood seeped out the cracks turning Ryul into a red and black figure, he looked like he just went through hell.

However it was not over, moments after the second strike ended another fell down from the sky.

The injured Ryul could no longer endure the lightning as his charming features disappeared under the silver lights leaving nothing but ash. Zi Tian was still floating above the dust that used to be Ryul, her face cold and indifferent.

Another bolt struck her, this time the lightning made her falter a little nevertheless she still endured as not a single noise came out of her mouth. Even though the bolts were getting stronger

so was Zi Tian's aura. It felt like her strength was going to continuously increase until the tribulation ended.

Even though she was growing stronger, so were the bolts and they seemed to be growing at a faster rate than her. Four more bolts of lightning struck Zi Tian, each one more powerful than the last, each one drawing more blood, breaking more bones, doing more damage..

Until silence. Absolute silence.

A quiet thump resounded throughout the colosseum. The dark clouds in the sky began to condense, the bolts of lightning turned orange as they became denser, the air began shimmering as the atmosphere began to burn. Wind aura was fed into the clouds turning them a teal green, while fire aura went into the dense tendrils of lightning turning them from orange to red.

The clouds formed into a teal green eastern dragon. It seemed that the dragon was going to devour the phoenix, Zi Tian. The red lightning flashed out of the dragon's nostrils with every breath it took and the deer antler horns shone red as they were made out of condensed lightning.

CRACK! BOOM! The dragon slammed down colliding with Zi Tian, tendrils of red plasma sparked towards the audience, clashing with the barrier erected by the teachers. Zi Tian or the dragon couldn't be clearly spotted as all you could see was pure white light.

Sami tried his best to spot what was going on but could only see mere flashes of the situation.

In what seemed like aeons the light finally began to die down, however two figures still remained. As the light continued to fade away you could see what happened more clearly. Zi Tian had survived however behind her was a huge phoenix, its body a vermillion red with teal green eyes, as its wings flapped, the ground was lacerated as if cut by a sword.

With every breath it took, its strength, majesty and presence rose. All were ants before it and its teal green eyes were filled with unadulterated pride and arrogance.

The phoenix gathered its power as it flew into Zi Tian's body, all aura and light converging into her slender figure. All of her injuries rapidly began to heal, her body becoming unblemished and pristine like jade.

Her strength began to climb, breaking through the peak of the mortal realm. Wind, Fire and Neutral aura began to rampage in her body as she continued to get stronger stepping Floor 1 of the Transcendence realm.

She had just become the first freshman to break through Transcendence, as even though Sami's physical body was Transcendence his actual cultivation wasn't.

Albert stood there shocked for a moment, before he exclaimed, "We have our winner, the undisputed champion of this match Zi Tian!!!!!"

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Info of the day : Tribulations

Tribulations are formed by heavenly powers and can not be blocked by anything, however they can be slightly affected by special physiques and can even be called upon by special physiques.

They come in 1s, 3s or 9s. And each one is stronger than the previous, the last strike will a lot of the time be a phantom image such as a dragon, phoenix or even a Titan.

The tribulation realm is where most tribulations occur however as seen in the chapter above they can occur when using certain techniques or even when heaven defying geniuses break through realms.

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Next Chapter: Quetzalcoatl