章 370: Boundless Dao Trial
Under the Heavenly Dao, there had once been 3,000 earthly daos, now reduced to 2,995 after Yaan destroyed the dao of karma. Even with this destruction though, the karmic tribulations remained in the Boundless Dao Library Trial, since the Heavenly Dao imbued these tribulations into this trial at the beginning of the Origin Era.
Yaan passed through the first tribulation and the first layer without any difficulty. Although it was a Heavenly Tribulation, it was a tribulation of predetermined strength that had not been adapted to deal with specific individuals. An illusion tribulation like this couldn't harm Yaan in the least.
When he examined the 3,000 layered trial from the outside, Yaan guessed that the tribulations should appear in a completely random order. After experiencing the illusion tribulation in the first layer, he felt uncertain of this guess.
Ignoring whatever might be happening with Defiance and the Sage outside of the trial, Yaan entered the second layer. As soon as his foot landed on the surging seas that suddenly appeared when he entered the second layer, he narrowed his eyes.
"Storm Tribulation? Is it really just random then?"
The storm dao was one of the 3,000 earthly daos, it was a derivative dao, connected mostly to the dao of air and the dao of water.
High-speed winds cut into Yaan's flesh, leaving laceration after laceration across his body. Occasionally a few drops of blood would be torn from the wound by the wind, but a strange force always dragged the blood back into his body. This was all thanks to his illusory Divine Step body cultivation, which provided him with vitality so immense that his body refused to let go of a single drop of blood, even under these conditions.
The wind didn't weaken, but only became increasingly intense. Wind and rain cut apart his skin, and as the temperature dropped, resulting in the rain transforming into hail and snow, the wind picked up even further, until Yaan was struggling to move forwards.
Eventually, the build up of water reached such a level that the stormy waters below him were thrown into turmoil, resulting in a giant wave rapidly growing right in front of Yaan's eyes. The wave continually grew larger and larger, until Yaan started to feel a sense of danger. At this point, he didn't hesitate to retrieve the wooden sword and slash down.
CHI!
With a single slash, not only the wave, but the entire storm was cut in half.
The world of storms created by the tribulation trembled as one half of the storm dissipated into Heavenly Power, leaving the trial and shooting towards Defiance Sovereign.
Outside of the trial, Defiance Sovereign stood above the trial grounds. He had just beaten down the illusion tribulation with ease, then shattered the following illusion retribution. Even with all this, he kept half of his attention focussed on the Primordial Sage.
'She really isn't going to get in my way?' Defiance Sovereign pondered as the storm tribulation rapidly manifested around him, submerging his giant body in a turbulent ocean.
Bang!
The storm exploded with so much force that it almost seemed unreal. As soon as the tribulation was defeated, a deafening eruption of power emanated from directly above Defiance Sovereign's head. The storm retribution struck down at him, hiding his body within a typhoon the size of a solar system in an instant. Unlike the tribulation, which was predetermined and created three million years ago, this retribution came straight from the Heavens, striking Defiance for his transgression against the Heavenly Dao - interfering in someone else's tribulation.
Bang!
After a few moments passed by, the terrifying pressure of the storm retribution was swept away and Defiance Sovereign's aura replaced the aura of the Heavens. When he was once again revealed, he was covered in blood from head to toe, but his wounds rapidly healed over.
Defiance continued to watch the Primordial Sage, not hiding this fact and staring directly at her. The Sage ignored him and continued to watch Yaan silently.
'Will she really stay her hand until the very end…?'
After cutting the storm in half, the pressure Yaan faced dropped by half. Like this, he was able to push through the winds and the rain, reaching the next layer.
The ember tribulation.
The ember dao, derived from the dao of fire. Giant, meteor sized embers filled the world, burning Yaan's feet as he walked along the ember-paved path. Embers rained down from the sky, creating fireless but extremely hot explosions.
Once again, as soon as the tribulation reached its peak and Yaan started to struggle, he cut it in half, deflecting half of the tribulation to Defiance Sovereign and allowing him to walk past the most difficult hurdles that he would usually need to face.
Layer after layer, tribulation after tribulation, dao after dao.
The majority of the 3,000 earthly daos could be classed as derivative daos. There were eight elemental daos, four principle daos and eight partial-principle daos after the dao of karma's removal, several unique daos, and the remaining derivative daos were derived from these daos.
Yaan cut through half of each tribulation, but he cut through the most tedious half, the peak power of each tribulation, offloading all of that onto Defiance Sovereign. Defiance didn't seem to be having any issues, somehow, but Yaan was still careful and kept an eye out for any potential retributions coming his way.
The derivative dao tribulations weren't too difficult to break through, but there was a huge number of them. When the more powerful elemental, partial-principle and especially principle dao tribulations struck him, Yaan found himself struggling to fight through it. There was a reason that nobody had been able to defeat this trial before, it was simply too difficult. It was only because the Heavenly Dao had been damaged, resulting in some weaknesses appearing in these tribulations, that Yaan managed to break through each tribulation within a few moments, persevering until the end.
The final layer held the space-time tribulation. This layer was also responsible for sending defeated challengers out of the trial grounds, unwinding all that they had done, healing their injuries, and returning the trial to its original state.
Yaan wasn't sure if it was a coincidence, but prior to the last two layers, every tribulation was a partial-principle tribulation connected to the last two layers.
The last layer was space-time, the second to last was karma. After fighting through the damaged karmic tribulations along with the time tribulation and the space tribulation - all of which Yaan overcame by using the vague karma which he could feel ahead of him - Yaan finally stepped into the tribulation based upon the dao of karma.
As soon as he entered this tribulation, Yaan narrowed his eyes, feeling that something was wrong.
CRACK!
It was as if he had re-entered the karmic river, but the karmic river had already been destroyed. It didn't take long for Yaan to understand, and when he did, he felt shocked.
He found himself standing within a chaotic ocean of karmic chains. This was not the karmic river, because the karmic river had been destroyed. This was what was left of the karmic river, a devastated and separated portion of the river! This region of karmic chaos had been restrained until now, but the moment Yaan entered this layer and activated the Heavenly Tribulation, the entire trial trembled. Space split apart, and the karmic chains started exploding crazily one after the other.
Yaan's expression remained calm, but he was now extremely alert. He quickly rushed forwards, attempting to slip through the carnage that was collapsing all around him, but it was impossible to evade everything. As explosions of karma slammed into his body, he was thrown about like a rag doll. Blood erupted from his body and he coughed up even more blood time and time again. He was badly injured with every step, but Yaan's gaze never wavered and he kept his sights set on the end.
A dozen chains suddenly surrounded him and exploded without warning. Yaan didn't even have time to think, he reacted on instinct, summoning his Divine Power and releasing a shockwave of blazing killing intent in every direction. As his domain pushed back against the explosion, the karmic chains and the explosions of karma became illusory, but it still wasn't enough. In order to create an opening to break through, Yaan slashed down with the wooden sword, channeling a strand of Defiant Will into the attack.
BANG!
The world trembled, and the destruction of these remnant karmic chains became even more chaotic than before. Thankfully, Yaan managed to dissipate enough of the power that he was able to escape from this dangerous predicament, leaving the worst of the trial behind him.
He wasn't in this trial for long, but those short few moments were genuinely dangerous, and his injuries weren't minor. These were injuries that affected his very dao, it was likely that anyone else in his situation would struggle with these sorts of injuries. It was only because he had lived with a damaged Dao Soul for so long that he could recover from damage like this without much difficulty.
Before long, he stepped into the final layer.
As Yaan cut through the karma tribulation and weaved through the collapsing karmic chains, a portion of the tribulation left the trial and slammed into Defiance Sovereign's body. For a moment, his gigantic body became encased in a cocoon of karmic chains, but these chains were too unstable. With a single pulse of his Defiant Aura, the cocoon collapsed around Defiance Sovereign, breaking down into verdant fragments, before fading away into nothingness.
Defiance Sovereign looked up, and slowly, a smile spread across his face. Explosive sounds echoed out repeatedly above his head as a cloud of karmic chains tried and failed to form above him…
Something similar had happened when the karmic beginning, karmic link, karmic end and karmic fate retributions manifested, but this time, it was clearly much worse. The Heavenly Dao was trying to form a suitable retribution to strike Defiance down, but because the dao of karma and the karmic river had been destroyed, there was no longer any karmic retribution in this world!
The Heavenly Dao endured when it failed to properly form the partial-principle karmic retributions, but this time, after the cloud of karma failed to form for the hundredth time, the cloud collapsed into destructive ripples that spread out and caused the entire region to shake.
Yaan felt this shaking within the trial.
The Primordial Sage also felt this destructive trembling, forcing her to retreat several times before she escaped to a safe distance.
As for Defiance Sovereign…
Bang!
Blood swept out from his body in a wave so large that it could drown an entire life-planet, but the giant of a man stood his ground, unmoving, as he threw his head back and roared with laughter.
"Heavenly Dao, you truly never learn! Without stable intelligence, you're so stupid that you will rip yourself apart with your own failed retribution, hahaha!"
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