For the first time since he had come here, Alex laid his own eyes on the Northern Continent, and the first thing he saw was the purple bolt of lightning that shot down from the sky.
Even as it came down, Alex looked at it with a surprise on his face. He wasn’t surprised at the bolt of lightning, but rather how slow it was to his eyes.
The bolt of lightning was very fast of course, but he could easily follow its path as it came towards him.
The bolt of lightning struck Alex before he was prepared. Even though he saw it coming, his body wasn’t as ready as his eye was.
So, he took the full brunt of the lightning strike that destroyed the very peak he stood on.
The lightning trail took a second before it glowed down to nothing, and from the wreckage of the destroyed mountain walked out Alex, who looked rather worn out.
‘Dammit!’ he thought to himself. ‘That lightning strike ruined my clothes. I’m already on my 5th set now. Mother didn’t buy me that many after all.’
He took off the tattered clothes and a few storage bags fell to the ground, some fine, but most destroyed.
‘So much for wearing armor,’ he thought. But then, he had relied on this a bit too much in the Ancient Battlefield, so maybe that was why it didn’t have any durability.
Alex saw many items all over the ground after the lightning had struck his storage bags as well. Some of the items were burned, while others were destroyed completely.
Fortunately, these were items he kept in his storage bags, which meant they were not very important to him. Everything he wanted safe was in his storage ring, which had survived.
“I’m not going to take a risk with this one,” Alex said to himself and took his ring out from his fingers. He pulled out a single Saint-ranked sword from the ring before throwing it in Pearl’s direction.
“Catch!” he spoke directly into Pearl’s and Whisker’s minds.
Pearl saw the ring fly down and caught it before looking towards the naked Alex who now only held a sword in his hand.
He was ready to fight the lightning tribulations with only just that.
He saw the lightning crackle in the sky again. Once again, he was surprised by how slow it was to his eyes. However, when he really thought about it, that made sense.
After all, the first stage of the Demon Eyes gave extreme Dynamic vision. With these eyes, not only could he see very far away, but he could also see every single movement in crystal clarity.
Alex could see each of the snowflakes shine in the lightning’s glow as the lightning slowly made its way down towards him.
When the lightning bold fell down, Alex stood in his place, doing nothing. After all, with such weak lightning, there was no need for him to do anything at all.
He understood that the lightning was supposed to be weak as it was for a new Saint realm cultivator. But still, he hoped it would grow stronger so it was much of a fight.
‘I wonder how many times it will fall,’ Alex thought.
The lightning struck Alex directly, destroying more of the peak he was standing on top of.
Alex wasn’t hurt. His body was in pristine condition with not a single wound, and even his sword showed no damage.
The lightning crackled again, threatening to fall, but Alex didn’t give much thought to the lightning in the sky.
Instead, he used the moment to learn the properties hidden behind the lightning. It was unlikely he would learn the Dao of Lightning, but if he could even glimpse into the Dao of Lightning Conduction, that would be a major help for him.
He closed his eyes, trying to understand how the lightning moved through him, how it moved through the sword.
‘It’s too little,’ he thought to himself and stared back up. ‘I need some more information. Rather than lightning itself, I need the aura in it.’
With that thought, he flew off into the sky as the next bolt of lightning struck him from the heavens.
When the glow disappeared, Alex’s body sizzled a bit, but quickly healed itself back.
“Huh? That was stronger than before,” he thought. “Was that Saint Condensation 3rd realm level of power in the lightning?”
Alex’s body could handle the 2nd realm’s worth of damage, but the 3rd realm would start injuring him, and the 4th realm would gravely injure him.
By the 5th realm, if he had no other forms of protection, there was a high chance he would die.
However, when the next lightning crackled and it fell for him, Alex didn’t use his Qi still. He could sense that the damage was going to be painful, but not lethal.
Instead, he would use his raw body to handle it for one more time and learn as much as he could about lightning.
The bolt struck Alex, sending him tumbling downward with force this time. When the light faded back, Alex saw his body sizzling with skins torn off at places and even bones showing at some.
However, within a few seconds, his body healed to the point where it looked like he had taken no damage whatsoever.
“This is definitely getting stronger,” he thought. “I can’t just use my physical body anymore.”
Suddenly, his cultivation base of pseudo-Saint Condensation realm flared as he got ready for the next lightning.
The lightning struck from the heavens once again, but this time around he fought it.
All he did was swing his sword at the lightning, and the strength he put forth easily scattered the lightning away.
The destroyed lightning turned into a lightning aura as it lingered in the air, just like how Alex wanted it to. It would disappear soon, certainly, but not before the tribulation itself was over.
Alex would have plenty of time where he could learn from the aura after the tribulation was over.
A stronger bolt of lightning fell, one that he could feel was around Saint Condensation 6th realm in power. Alex easily fought it off once more. Such a bolt of weak lightning could do nothing to him.
However, the storm didn’t disappear and his lightning tribulation only got stronger.
‘How strong is it going to get?’ Alex started to worry. It was weak at first, and he didn’t think much of it, but as it continued growing, a slight fear grew in his heart.
Alex destroyed the next 2 bolts of lightning easily, creating more lightning aura in the air, but the tribulation still persisted. Now, the lightning was so strong that anyone not in the Saint Foundation realm would surely die.
Alex simply punched the next lightning bolt and destroyed it, completely shattering the lightning aura in the atmosphere.
However, the lightning continued to crackle again in the sky, getting much stronger again.
Alex couldn’t help but frown. ‘What the hell? How many times is it supposed to fall?’ he thought.
There had been 9 different lightning bolts already, yet it still continued to rain down lightning.
Alex prepared himself for the next bolt as it fell, not even giving him much breathing space in between.
He could feel that this lightning bolt was going to be stronger than the last, but not by much.
From what he could see, it was strong enough to defeat a Saint Condensation 9th realm cultivator but weak enough that a Saint Foundation realm cultivation.
The jump in strength for the lightning had slowed down quite a lot, but there was still an increase. However, if this continued, the damage would certainly be stronger and stronger.
9 bolts had already fallen for him, and he had fought it, but the tribulation still persisted.
“How many more?” Alex shouted at the heaven, and in response, the heaven struck back.
The bolt of lightning, slightly green in color this time, as opposed to the white bolt with a purple glow, fell down towards him.
Alex poured Sword Qi into his sword and struck back. It wasn’t hard to destroy the lightning bolt, but when he felt the aura around him, he realized that the aura contained mysteries, the answer to which he already knew.
The lightning strikes now had some insights from a Dao he knew. The Dao of Plant Growth.