Eternal Emerald Dragon

Chapter 319 - 318 - Progenitor Tribulation

Black clouds gathered above the dark mountain.  Many beasts and clans noted the strange feeling.  It was clearly a Gold Tier tribulation but the strength was on par with the Sky Realm ascension tribulation.

Dierdra, thousands of kilometers away, felt the change in the air and expressed a mixture of fear with hope.  She had been right but she took no joy in it.  She sent a prayer to the spirits and wondered what was about to happen.

Far away, a tiny human looked up at the massive spread of black clouds as all colors of Qi danced in the skies.  The once glittering blue sky was lost as Lind took the final step.

Divine dragon soul was blunt, unforgiving, and frankly full of himself, but he was not wrong.  The power of the tribulation reminded him of his terrifying incident in the Dread Desert.  The wurm that ascended had faced a tribulation that nearly killed everyone in the vicinity.

His tribulation had the same terrifying feeling but it was only for the Gold Tier!

The 6 hues of lightning matched his fonts.  He would have to increase the quality of his fonts to condense his dantian to the next level.  He also could not do one at a time as most cultivators did.

Just as 6 elementals formed their harmony at the moment they became a Soul Realm, Lind had learned it had to be the same for each breakthrough.  The transformation from cores to fonts had to be all at once, and Gold Tier was no different.

Lind had faced the issue of how to do that exact step.  He had witnessed many Gold Tiers with his Heaven Eyes and saw the golden decorations each font gained.  He also noted that some cultivators did not have the same quality on each font.

Those cultivators often stopped at the Gold Tier.

Lind calmed himself as he became completely human.  The first step would be his fonts and his harmony.  He was quite confident about that step after a century of study and comprehension.

His time in the Rakathi Wastes also helped as the constant lightning storm challenged him in so many ways to maintain his stability he improved his theory of relationships on the fonts in his dantian.

The pressure was building far beyond any Gold Tier tribulation he had felt before and he knew it was finally coming.

Lightning bolts gathered strength as all 6 bolts of Qi finally struck him.  They were nothing like Fey or the others' tribulations he had witnessed.  Those had been singular elements one at a time, but he faced all of it at once.

The strength was also far above what he felt during others' tribulations.

The lightning arced through his body to his fonts.  The power was on a level that nearly shattered his fonts when it arrived.  Its power far exceeded even his most extreme estimates but he pushed his Heaven Touch to the maximum to corral the Qi to his will.

It strained his meridians and dantian to extreme but he was able to barely corral the 6 streams of Qi to his fonts only.  It was required to compress the quality of his fonts before his dantian and he forced as much pressure on each font all at once.

Each bolt was powerful but it was not enough.  As he settled the first round, another built up in the black clouds above.

Lind was ready as 6 more bolts crashed down to him.  Unlike other multi-element dantians, he could tell that he was only ⅔ of the way through as his fonts began to glow with a golden color all at once.

Unexpectedly, rather than 6 more bolts, the lightning changed to an emerald color and increased in power.  The single bolt crashed into his body and he finally felt pain in all his cells as Qi tried to rip him apart.

The emerald lightning Qi flowed in his meridians until it hit his dantian directly.  The emerald iron absorbed the bolt of lightning and began to shrink.  His fonts gained a gold tinge on each of their decorations as the pressure increased on the emerald iron.

It began to shrink but his tribulation was far from done.

A new pressure built for his elixir ability which he had pushed to low grade 5.  The black clouds had a flickering of all 6 colors but unlike before, it was a single powerful bolt of all Qi in the form of pure essence.

It seemed to touch a different part of his dantian but it accelerated the compression on the iron Qi in his dantian.  The damage to his body began to manifest as his blood flowed out of his mouth and nose.

He had no break as a heavy aura pressed on Lind as a universal Qi bolt built up strength that he knew was for his Forging as it was on par with his elixir bolt.

The lightning blazed far brighter as it struck him.  That time Lind was sent flying as he slammed into the rough stone of the mountain.

The tribulation bolt for Forging was more substantive than the elixir one.  Lind was stunned at its power.  He had now started bleeding from all of his orifices.  He was becoming lightheaded when he realized a much weaker bolt was building strength.

His weaving apparently warranted a tribulation bolt but it was nothing compared to the other 2.  Even so, he felt like it enlightened him on which meridians focused on the weaving skill.  Lind tried to use the reprieve to heal but then the real tribulation began.

All Gold Tier cultivators faced their elements, enlightenment Daos, and bloodline tribulations.  Up to that point, Lind's research supported him with great confidence, but his tribulation was not done.

Pressure began to build up as blue lightning blazed like the sun.  It gathered together until a lightning dragon was formed.  It had no wings but four limbs were present.  Its fangs were easily the size of Lind's leg yet he stared up at the beast.

It was finally time to face the trial of his new fate.

"Let's dance."  He spoke the 2 words and the boiling black clouds seemed to hear him.

The lightning dragon roared as it shook the world.  Lind felt fear as it flew down from the clouds right at him.  He summoned all his strength as his skin gained scales and his eyes became cold slits when it slammed into him.

His skin cracked open in many places as blood flew on the air.  The pain wracked his body as the beast of lightning tried to shatter his dantian.  His soul rose up to the challenge as an emerald dragon faced a lightning one.

The battle inside his dantian further compressed the emerald iron but a new pressure built in the clouds above.

Blood flowed like a river from his orifices, but he did not bulk as yet another dragon took shape, but this time it was made of all the elements.  Lind felt trepidation as the new lightning dragon was clearly coming for his fonts, not his soul.

The battle in his dantian was not resolved when the new dragon came down from the Heavens.  He braced himself as best he could but his meridians tried to crack as the power of lightning blazed once more through them.

If the previous bolts had been simply increasing the quality of his fonts, the new trial pushed them even farther than any human.

The golden decorations were slowly transformed as pain wracked Lind's body.  They became serpentine shapes on each font like a supplication to dragons twinned on each font.  They encircled the half circle part of each font while a dragon face took center stage at the top of each fonts' open cover.

The compression on his emerald iron was massive as he finally understood even his Iron Tier dantian was not normal during the last century.  It had been reinforced by his dragon soul so extra pressure was needed to take the final step to Gold Tier.

Just when Lind hoped it was over, a final crushing pressure formed in the skies above.  It was the final test, he could feel it.  It was also the warning the divine dragon soul had brought to him.  His 6 elemental breakthrough had been followed by his dragon soul enhancement.

What remained was his divine progenitor tribulation.  He felt true fear as the clouds thickened and lightning began to dance in an ever terrifying level.

It was not elemental nor was it Dao lightning.

It was something hard to judge and even harder to understand without guidance.  Crimson, black, and gold lighting combined into a bolt of death for any other cultivator.

Lind summoned his full draconic aura as his scales thickened and his hair changed.  The powerful bolt sent him flying up the mountain and destroyed a large part of it as Lind was pushed out the other side.

The bolt did not stop until he was nearly 500 kilometers away before the roar of a dragon came from his throat.  His eyes were now pure emerald as his skin became all scales.  He had to put his all into containing the terrible lightning of testing a progenitor.

It tried to rip his cells apart but his transformation barely contained it.  His blood was now nearly burnt from his body as his dantian finally compressed his emerald iron into a tiny core that went through a transformation.

The iron was changed into gold.  It was an alchemic transformation from one metal to the next but Lind was barely holding on.  His body was ravaged and his meridians were nearly shattered.

Still, he tilted his head back and roared in defiance of death.

His draconic aura had risen as his body changed.  His throat, heart, and spine gained the scales or quality of a dragon permanently.  His eyes became slits permanently as well.  His hair was still dirty blonde but became a mane down his back.

His strength increased a hundredfold as well.

Lind finally saw sunlight as the clouds broke up but the Inheritance strained to contain him as his dantian stabilized with gold at its core.  Gold Tier, he had finally done it.  He finally understood all aspects of not only himself but all 6 elementals.

He was about to celebrate when darkness closed in.  The world he had lived in for nearly 5 years was cut off without any warning and Lind collapsed in the empty space.

The high quality Qi was gone, the Divine Realms were gone, and his companions were gone.  His ravaged body was healing but the sadness of his loss began to overcome his bodily pain.

Finally, he collapsed as exhaustion overtook him and just as he was about to let go a voice spoke to him.

"Finally, I see a way forward."  Skinwalker's voice was all he heard as sleep claimed him.