The sky above the Mystic Cloud Sect had ceased to look like a sky. It had transformed into a bruising, swirling vortex of colors that did not exist in the natural spectrum. It was an angry, necrotic purple, churning like a grinder directly above the Desolate Cloud Peak.
The pressure was not merely atmospheric; it was spiritual. It weighed down on the soul like a lead blanket. Birds fell from the sky, dead from the sheer terror of the aura. The spiritual beasts in the sect's beast garden huddled in the corners of their cages, whimpering.
In the Hall of Divine Order on the Main Peak, the Council of Elders had abandoned their meeting. They stood on the grand balcony, clutching the railing, their faces pale as they watched the apocalypse unfold in their backyard.
"That is not a normal Golden Core Tribulation," Elder Pill muttered, her hands trembling so violently that tea spilled onto her robes. "A normal tribulation has three bolts of white lightning. It tests the body. That... that is Purple Destruction Lightning. It exists only to erase errors in the Heavenly Dao."
"Someone on that peak has offended the Heavens," the Sword Elder declared, stroking his white beard grimly. His own sword was vibrating in its sheath, fearful of the thunder. "Perhaps that fool Jiang Chen tried to refine a forbidden pill? Or maybe he tried to resurrect the dead? Either way, the Heavens are about to wipe that mountain off the map to correct the mistake."
Sect Leader Liu Cang narrowed his eyes. As a Void Treading expert, his senses were sharper. He felt the terrifying, chaotic energy radiating from the distance.
"It's not one person," Liu Cang whispered, a bead of cold sweat rolling down his temple. "Look at the vortex. It has three eyes. Three people are breaking through at the exact same moment, in the exact same location."
"Madness," the Sword Elder scoffed, turning away. "Tribulations amplify each other. If three people undergo it together, the power doesn't triple. It multiplies by nine. No Foundation Establishment cultivator can survive a Nine-Fold Punishment. They are already dead."
Back on Desolate Cloud Peak, the situation was indeed apocalyptic.
The wind howled with the voice of a dying god, ripping up the newly planted spirit grass and tearing tiles off the roof of the main hall. Bob the Ghost had long since retreated into the safety of the toilet pit (which was now the Dragon Pit), refusing to come out even if threatened with exorcism.
Jiang Chen stood on the roof of the main hall, his cheap white robes flapping violently in the gale. He adjusted his silver gloves, his expression calm despite the chaotic energy threatening to tear him apart.
"System," Jiang Chen asked internally. "What is the survival rate for three Foundation Establishment disciples tanking a Nine-Fold Heavenly Punishment?"
"Calculation complete: 0.001%," the mechanical voice rang in his head, sounding almost frantic. "The Heavenly Dao has designated your disciples as 'Anomalies'. Recommendation: Abandon ship. Run away. Take the hot tub and flee to the Northern Wastes."
Jiang Chen smiled, snapping his fan open despite the wind. "I like those odds."
Below him, inside the glowing, bubbling Dragon Pit, the three disciples opened their eyes. They were glowing. The sheer density of the Grade 9 Dragon Qi had forced their bodies to the absolute breaking point. Their mortal shells were cracking, shedding skin like snakes to make way for the Golden Core bodies underneath.
"It's coming!" Ye Kai roared, his voice sounding like grinding stones.
CRACK!
The sky tore open. It was a sound like the spine of the world snapping. Three bolts of purple lightning, each as thick as an ancient redwood tree, crashed down simultaneously. The heat turned the air into plasma.
"Tank it!" Jiang Chen shouted from the roof, his voice piercing the thunder. "Don't just endure it! Consume it! Use the techniques!"
Ye Kai stepped out of the pit first. He didn't dodge. He couldn't dodge. He planted his feet, cracking the bedrock. He looked at the pillar of destruction crashing toward his face.
"Atomic Collapse Fist!"
Ye Kai didn't punch outward. That was the old way. Instead, he grabbed the empty air in front of him with his silver-gloved hand and squeezed. He channeled every ounce of his massive strength, imagining the space between his fingers collapsing into a single, infinite point of singularity.
The air screamed as a vacuum formed. A small, unstable black sphere appeared in his palm.
The lightning hit the sphere.
Instead of exploding, the massive bolt of plasma was sucked in. The laws of physics groaned as the lightning twisted, distorted, and spiraled into the singularity in Ye Kai's fist like water down a drain. The heat was unbearable. Ye Kai's skin sizzled, his veins bulging like ropes.
"Collapse!" Ye Kai roared, crushing the sphere.
The lightning vanished.
Ye Kai fell to one knee, smoke rising from his gloves. He looked at his hand, stunned. "I... I ate it? I ate the lightning?"
"Don't celebrate yet! Next!" Jiang Chen commanded.
The second wave fell. This time, it wasn't a single bolt. It was a rain. Thousands of jagged lightning arrows, formed from condensed judgment, rained down, aiming to turn the peak into a sieve. There was no space to dodge.
Su Ling jumped out of the pit. She didn't look like the cowardly girl from a week ago. She looked manic, her hair flying wild, her glasses cracked.
"Infinite Talisman Gatling!"
She didn't place flags. She reached into her bag of holding and threw a brick-sized stack of paper slips into the air.
"Scatter!"
The paper slips exploded outward, carried by her Qi, covering the sky above them like a shield of confetti.
"Calculate. Intercept. Detonate!"
Boom! Boom! Boom!
Thousands of tiny golden barriers ignited in the air simultaneously. Each barrier was positioned perfectly to intercept a lightning arrow. The sky became a fireworks display of gold and purple. The sheer volume of arrays overwhelmed the lightning rain. It was a brute-force calculation defense, a wall of logic against the wrath of nature.
"I am the Matrix!" Su Ling cackled, her hands moving in a blur as she threw another stack.
The third wave was silent.
The chaos stopped. A single, thin line of white light descended. It made no sound. It had no thunder. It was the "Soul Severing Bolt," designed to bypass the body and cut the spirit directly. It was the deadliest of all.
Wei Wu stepped forward. He drew his rusty sword.
He didn't look at the sky. He closed his eyes. The noise of the thunder faded. The heat faded. In his mind, there was only the Void, and the white line cutting through it.
"The Linear Death."
He waited until the white light was inches from his nose. The static electricity raised the hair on his arms.
Then, he moved.
Draw. Cut. Sheathe.
It happened in less than a blink. A thin, black line appeared in the air, bisecting the white lightning.
The silent bolt split in half. The concept of the attack was severed. The two halves of the lightning passed harmlessly on either side of Wei Wu, scorching two deep craters into the ground behind him, but leaving him untouched.
"Perfect," Jiang Chen nodded from the roof.
The disciples cheered, collapsing to the ground. They were burnt, bleeding, and exhausted, but they were alive. They had survived the Nine-Fold Punishment.
But the sky didn't clear.
Instead, the vortex stopped spinning. The purple clouds condensed. They turned a deep, blood red.
A giant red eye opened in the center of the storm, staring directly at Jiang Chen.
"Warning," the System buzzed urgently, red lights flashing in Jiang Chen's vision. "The Heavenly Dao has detected a 'Bug' in the matrix. The Tribulation has upgraded from 'Punishment' to 'Worldly Wipeout'. A Tribulation Dragon is forming. Survival chance: 0.000%."
A roar shook the mountain, shattering the windows of the Main Hall. From the red clouds, a dragon made of red lightning slowly descended. Its claws tore the fabric of space. Its pressure was immense—equivalent to a Nascent Soul Level 9 full-force attack.
Ye Kai, Su Ling, and Wei Wu froze. The joy of victory vanished, replaced by absolute despair. They were just breaking through to Golden Core. This was an execution. This was the Heavens saying, "No, you are not allowed to exist."
"Master!" Su Ling screamed, clutching her head. "It's too big! My arrays can't calculate that density!"
Jiang Chen sighed. He adjusted his collar.
He stepped off the roof, walking on the empty air as if it were solid stairs.
"You three did well," Jiang Chen said, his voice calm, echoing across the peak. "You passed the test. You proved your worth. But the Heavens are cheating."
He floated up, placing himself directly between his shivering disciples and the descending Lightning Dragon.
"Hey!" Jiang Chen shouted at the sky, cupping his hands around his mouth. "Are you blind? They are just kids!"
The red eye seemed to focus on him. The Lightning Dragon roared, speeding up, opening a maw wide enough to swallow the mountain.
Jiang Chen sneered. "Fine. If you want to play unfair, I'll show you unfair."
"System. Activate [Emperor Aura]."
ZOOM.
For twenty seconds, the world stopped.
A golden phantom appeared behind Jiang Chen—a giant figure sitting on a celestial throne, taller than the mountains, looking down on the world with absolute disdain. The aura of an Emperor Level 9 exploded outward.
The Lightning Dragon paused in mid-air, confused by the sudden appearance of a supreme being. Even the red clouds seemed to recoil in fear.
"You want to bully the weak?" Jiang Chen whispered.
He raised his right hand. The silver Hands of the Star Crusher began to glow. But this time, it wasn't the silver light of the artifact.
It was an apocalyptic red light.
This wasn't the disciples' technique. This was the Cashback Reward Jiang Chen had received for teaching Ye Kai.
[Divine Technique: The World-Ending Purgatory Fist.]
"If you want to come down," Jiang Chen pulled his arm back, the space around his fist shattering like glass, "then come down."
He punched.
He didn't punch the dragon. He punched the sky.
"GET LOST!"
A beam of red force, compressed to the width of a needle, shot out of his fist. It didn't look like a punch; it looked like a laser beam of pure deletion.
It pierced the Lightning Dragon's head instantly. The dragon didn't even have time to scream. It shattered into millions of harmless sparks.
But the beam didn't stop. It kept going. It hit the red vortex. It hit the giant red eye.
BOOM.
The sound arrived three seconds later. It was a sound that deafened half the sect.
The clouds didn't just disperse. They were erased. A massive hole, ten miles wide, was punched straight through the atmosphere, piercing the tribulation clouds and revealing the starry void of space behind the daylight sky.
Silence descended on the Mystic Cloud Sect.
On the Main Peak, the Sword Elder dropped his teacup, shattering it. Sect Leader Liu Cang stood up, his mouth slightly open, watching the hole in the sky.
"Did he..." Elder Pill whispered, her voice squeaking. "Did he just punch a hole in the ozone layer?"
Back on Desolate Cloud Peak, Jiang Chen lowered his smoking hand.
"System," Jiang Chen asked, shaking his numb fingers. "Did I overdo it?"
"Assessment: You destroyed the local weather system for the next three months. But yes, you looked very cool."
Jiang Chen waited for the tribulation to end. Usually, after the clouds disperse, the cultivator is left tired and empty.
But this time... something strange happened.
The hole in the sky didn't close. Instead, a golden light began to shine from the void. It wasn't the angry light of judgment. It was soft, warm, and smelled like lotus flowers.
"System Alert," the voice rang out. "Hidden Event Triggered: [The Heavenly Dao's Apology]."
"Condition: The Host destroyed a Worldly Wipeout Tribulation with a single hit. The Heavens are intimidated. To avoid further damage to the atmosphere, the Heavens are granting a 'Supreme Blessing'."
"A bribe?" Jiang Chen raised an eyebrow. "I'll take it."
Golden rain began to fall from the hole in the sky. It wasn't water. It was pure, liquefied Spirit Essence mixed with the Laws of the Universe.
The rain fell onto the three disciples lying in the Dragon Pit.
Ye Kai, Su Ling, and Wei Wu gasped as the golden liquid touched their skin.
"It's... it's warm!" Ye Kai shouted.
His body, which had just formed a Golden Core, began to vibrate. The Golden Core in his Dantian spun wildly, absorbing the heavenly rain.
Ding!
[Ye Kai: Golden Core Level 1 -> Golden Core Level 2.]
The rain kept falling. His muscles expanded, becoming denser, harder.
Ding!
[Ye Kai: Golden Core Level 2 -> Golden Core Level 3.]
His Titan Gauntlets fused with his skin, turning into tattoos on his arms.
Ding!
[Ye Kai: Golden Core Level 4.]
Next to him, Su Ling floated into the air. The rain soaked into her head. Her eyes glowed with data streams. The mental fatigue from calculating the arrays vanished, replaced by a terrifying clarity. She felt like she could calculate the trajectory of a falling leaf in a hurricane.
Ding!
[Su Ling: Golden Core Level 1 -> Golden Core Level 4.]
Wei Wu stood up. The rain washed over his rusty sword. The rust flaked away, revealing a shining, cold steel blade underneath. His Sword Intent, which was previously a sharp line, expanded into a domain.
Ding!
[Wei Wu: Golden Core Level 1 -> Golden Core Level 4.]
The golden rain lasted for ten minutes before fading away. The hole in the sky slowly stitched itself shut, the Heavens seemingly retreating in embarrassment.
Jiang Chen landed on the ground. The grass around him had turned into spirit herbs instantly from the rain.
He looked at his disciples.
Ten minutes ago, they were Foundation Establishment trash.
Now, they stood tall, radiating the stable, heavy pressure of Golden Core Level 4 experts.
Skipping three levels in ten minutes. It was a miracle that would make the geniuses of the Holy Lands cough up blood in jealousy.
Ye Kai looked at his hands. He punched the air casually. A sonic boom shattered a nearby rock.
"Master..." Ye Kai stammered. "I feel... heavy. But fast."
"I can see the equations," Su Ling whispered, looking at the floating dust motes. "I can see everything."
Wei Wu didn't speak. He just bowed to Jiang Chen, his reverence deeper than the ocean.
Jiang Chen dusted off his robes, hiding his own shaking hand (the punch had hurt).
"Congratulations," Jiang Chen smiled at his stunned disciples. "The Heavens tried to kill you. I punched the Heavens. The Heavens apologized with a gift."
He gestured to the messy, destroyed peak.
"You have skipped the early stages of Golden Core. You are now Level 4. You are no longer trash. You are now... slightly dangerous garbage."
"Now, clean up this mess. We have a shop to run, and I suspect the Sect Leader is on his way to ask why there is a hole in his sky."
Author's Thought
The Tribulation Arc concludes with a massive power spike!
Status Update:
Ye Kai: Golden Core Level 4 (Indestructible Body).
Su Ling: Golden Core Level 4 (Mental Processor Overclocked).
Wei Wu: Golden Core Level 4 (Sword Intent Domain).
Jiang Chen: Spirit Severing Level 1 (with a Divine Right Hook).