I was far away from the city when the first lightning bolt came down, and by the gods was it big. This heavenly tribulation made the one I saw when Meng Hao was facing look like a joke. Not that I'm underestimating his tribulation, but it seems that this one overinflated due to the fact that I was apparently 'hiding' away from it.
And now it's pissed, and the thundering booms of lightning surged as the first bolt shot at my head, seeking vengeance for being disregarded.
But I was not going to bow down to the heavenly tribulation.
I flew down to the ground and thankfully didn't break my legs as I stomped on the dirt with both my feet, though I felt like an electric shock went up to my spine as the ground cratered from the crushing impact.
'That was kinda dope," I mumbled then looked up, in my hands were several black metallic rods I pulled from my inventory.
"You may be heavenly tribulation, but you still follow laws of physics." I grinned as I brought up the electrodes and threw them all around me.
The first lightning bolt swerved, forcefully so, and struck one of the rods, turning it to cinders.
This both made me thankful I tried this, and shook from the fact that the lightning bolt was strong enough to turn an electrode into ash.
Seeing this happening, I knew that if I didn't prepare any protective measures I would have died in this tribulation.
More tribulation lightning surged down and this time there were three.
I still have more electrodes to pull the lightning bolts away from me, but I know that the moment the tribulation's danger level increases they will be useless against it. So I might as well prepare for the second phase.
I then pulled a talisman and slapped my hand on it, extracting law lines of extreme complexity and density, then began projecting them using my own Qi into the world creating a massive protective gravitational dome.
The second volley of the lightning tribulation came down, and disintegrated the electrodes I had, leaving me with nothing but the gravitational law barrier I created.
Though one could wonder, how can gravity impact electricity?
Usually, it can't, and won't. But here, the Heavenly Tribulation Lightning actually had a weight behind it. And if it had weight, it can be controlled.
The third lightning volley came down with vengeance, as it shot nine thunderbolts at me that were the thickness of oak trees.
But the moment they came in contact with the gravitational barrier, they were stopped, forcefully crushed into themselves, and then dissipated against the incredibly dense gravitational law within the gravitational barrier.
This caused me to worry however because though the barrier worked, the damage from the Heavenly Tribulation Lightning to the barrier was apparent and clear. The law Lines I had were scorched and destroyed, though they served their purpose, they won't be able to stop another volley.
Cultivators from all over the city came out to watch the tribulation. Most were confused on how a Nascent Soul cultivator was facing something this big, and the rest were more interested in the things I just pulled out.
The skies rumbled indicating another increase in the power of the incoming tribulation, as lightning began to dance under the belly of the storm. It moved like dragons were peeking down on the underworld then dove back into the clouds.
Then finally, lightning manifested, this time in the shape of swords, spears, and arrows, and then shot at me.
On each of my hands were four pills, one between each of my fingers. I looked up, grinned and threw the pills upwards as I crossed my hands.
The eight pills flew high up, and once I judge they were high enough, I slapped both my hands together in a prayer motion, "Explode!"
And immediately the pills blew up creating a staggeringly thick and wide wall of green poison. This poison wasn't aimed to fight the tribulation, but to act as a dampener. Because this poison layer was entirely made of Breath Sealing Poison.
Which ate away at the Qi making the Heavenly Tribulation whenever an arrow, a spear or sword tried to pass through the poison barrier.
And whatever managed to bypass the smokescreen, was too weak to even cause me to care about it.
The poison barrier held on, and soon, this volley stopped, since it couldn't affect me in any sort of shape.
"C'mon, I know you have something hidden there," I mocked.
And there it was, the thing I knew was waiting for me. The heavenly tribulation clouds began condensing their size, and instead of clouds that covered hundreds of miles, it was a single blood-red cloud above me.
Suddenly, the sound of clouds muffled down, the wind no longer blew and everything was extremely quiet.
"This presence…, this isn't right!" a cultivator said," EVERYONE BACK AWAY!" he shouted.
The faster, and more acute of cultivators immediately disappeared from the area, while others asked the cultivator who spoke on what this was.
"This is Heaven's Gate, it's something of a curse that befall any cultivator who over achieve below a certain grade. It can happen in any cultivation stage, but it means death to those who cannot resist it."
"Then wouldn't it be better to stay and watch, we can learn more form watching that."
"The heaven's gate is merciless and present the world with its secrets, sights of what lays beyond the gate is forbidden to anyone who isn't going through the tribulation, if you were to see what it shall challenge him with, the gate will kill you!"
"Oh, that's convincing enough, to hell with this," the man said and moved away as fast as possible.
Due to the people's words, I learned that I'm in a little pickle right now.
"Y, is this thing dangerous?" I asked.
"If you wish my assistance I can decimate it, but I believe you can surpass this challenge," Y said.
"Well, good to know you have faith in me, alright, let's see how bad this is," I mumbled and pulled Creeping Demise.
Yet the moment I pulled the sword, it shook and shuddered, the weapon itself began rattling in my hand.
'What the heck is going on?' I mumbled. Then suddenly the sword began forcefully sucking my Qi.
"Oi! What the fuck! Stop that! I need that Qi to fight this shit!" I said and tried to throw away the sword, but it was as if the sword was glued to my hand.
"GOD DAMN IT!" I cursed let go!"
But Creeping Demise didn't listen and still sucked my Qi.
Suddenly, the skies rumbled and the clouds began shaping into a massive gate that looked like it had no end to its length as it seemed to expand all the way to outer space.
Unbeknownst to me, there were tens of thousands of cultivators outside the planet Si Xue, who were waiting for the time period to end before they could invade. And the moment they saw the gate, many of them felt rather uncomfortable.
Agitation and talks happened along the enemy lines and troops due to the appearance of a Heaven's Gate. And this also brought some even more annoying events that I didn't know were linked to my own insignificance.
The gate then suddenly opened up a crack, and Saint Qi, so much of it poured out that I was shocked at how generous this was… but at the same time, I realized, that if this was Saint Qi, whatever would come from the gate will probably have some of it… and I highly doubt I can beat anything that uses Saint Qi.
Suddenly, a soldier in golden armor who carried a heavy staff came out, he had no expressions, as in no eyes nose or lips, it looked like a puppet but didn't feel like it.
The man looked like it was a messenger of a divine embodiment, and behind him, was the gate, and from the small crack that slowly expanded, I could see an endless staircase, that had many of this very soldier aligned on its side, and it seems that there were even higher beings the higher one goes through the staircase.
The soldier raised his heavy staff up, and a red thunderbolt shot at the top of his staff transforming the weapon into a Spear with a Tribulation Lightning Bolt as its tip.
"Damn, that thing looks dangerous, I probably don't want it touching me, but YOU STUPID ASS SWORD STOP EATING UP MY QI! I'm feeling dizzy." Damn it.
The soldier came towards me without any warning, his spear aimed at my chest and I immediately felt the threat of death looming above me.
I immediately teleported away only to find the spearman right in front of my face, with the spear too close for comfort.
Y's sword swung slapping the spear away and he came out from the poison god's book.
"Master, I shall aid you in this battle."
Yet before Y could even finish speaking, the spearman looked at me, then all the aura, saint Qi and power in him began dissipating and returning to the gate.
I immediately understood what happened.
"X come out! Go collect as much as you can from the escaping Saint Qi! Here!" I said and then X came out and took my holding bag.
He flew up using his thrusters and cut into the flowing Qi and began absorbing it into the holding bag.
The soldier once again deflated and lost even more of its Qi when it faced me, then it moved forward
"Y, don't help, I got this."
The battle was a joke after this, as the soldier was far too slow, far too weak, and far too easy to deal with than before.
I dodged the incoming spear with ease, even with my depleting Qi, I still had enough energy to evade the slow downed soldier.
And since I had Creeping Demise in my hands, I might as well just use it.
I went for a forward thrust using Creeping Demise, but the soldier managed to jump back avoiding it, only for both me and the soldier to be stunned at what happened immediately after.
Creeping Demise's length increased stupidly so and thrust into the soldier.
I pulled back and the sword returned to its former size.
I then tried to swing again, and the sword cut a clean arc in the air, turning into a massive whip made of a very sharp blade.
The soldier dodged, but Creeping Demise didn't feel like missing, the tip of the sword's head curved forcing the whole length of the sword to follow the soldier who tried to dodge the snake-like sword that kept chasing.
The more the sword elongated, the more Qi had to give, but the second it touched the soldier, I managed to inject my own poison Qi into it which began acting immediately.
The puppet's face began melting and so did his clothes and armor as it had received fatal damage.
Not a moment later, X who was still collecting the escaping Saint Qi came back, bummed out as he pointed up.
When I looked, I realized that the gate had closed and was disappearing, and all I have left from this tribulation is the decaying carcass of this soldier.
The moment the body fell down, its Qi surged forward towards me.
But I knew I couldn't use this one. So I pulled the Lord of Lord's pagoda token and pointed it at the incoming Qi which sucked it inside and began ejecting the Qi into the five biome domain where it will infuse with the unnatural Qi there, and perhaps create somewhat of a different Qi, later on, this, of course, was nothing but a test I was planning on using.
I looked up, and it felt like the Heavenly Tribulation has ended. This one was slightly disappointing, but I must admit, if I didn't figure out that the Soldier calculated my own power based on everything, I hold on me, then I would have definitely died.
"That was too close for comfort. Anyway," I looked at the sword in my hand, "You look very hungry still… I have a few heads that I want to see roll, how about you eat their Qi and leave mine alone for a while?" I spoke.
Though I only jested because this was nothing but a sword. Imagine my reaction, when I heard.
"Okay."