At this moment, even the people who genuinely cared about Lu Yin, such as Yuan Shi and Sea King, were forced to retreat. Any attempt on their part to help would only make things worse.
Across the battlefield, Xu Qing and the astral beasts all pulled back as well. Not a single individual dared to get close to Lu Yin at this moment.
As the vortex forming the stellular tribulation grew larger and larger, everyone moved further and further away from Lu Yin.
“Why is it still growing? My stellular tribulation wasn’t even half this size!” someone commented in shock.
Elder Jiu Shen’s eye twitched, as Lu Yin’s tribulation had already reached a size that was three time as large as Jiu Shen’s, but Lu Yin’s stellular tribulation was still growing larger and larger without any end in sight.
The Celestial Demon was shocked. “This is just too big! How is it still growing?”
Xu Qing answered softly, “This child is beyond talented, and so his stellular tribulation will similarly surpass anything that others might face. We need to leave.”
They soon stopped moving back.
Qing Hua was stunned. “This is just too big!”
Lan Xian’s eyes flickered as she looked upwards. This tribulation was indeed far too large, and it vastly exceeded the size of her own stellular tribulation. In fact, the only time she had ever seen a comparable stellular tribulation was when one of the three Progenitors had passed their final tribulation.
Lu Yin was not happy when he saw that he was about to face his first stellular tribulation. His seal had not been completely broken by Sword King’s attack, but had merely disappeared. This meant that it would definitely reappear later, and Lu Yin was worried that it might even show up in the middle of his tribulation.
Thunder crackled overhead, and countless people were practically in a trance as they watched. Many of the people and astral beasts who were too close passed out. It was a suppression of spiritual force.
“Further back!” the Sea King yelled. Everyone fled further away as spiritual force appeared within the vortex and created a storm that looked to join the universe both above and below Lu Yin. It was like looking at a monster that surpassed the size of even the Void Wanderer elder, and Lu Yin was stuck in the middle of it.
Right after the maelstrom of spiritual force appeared, lightning swept through the entire Northcastle Weave.
The Celestial Demon was shocked yet again. “Physically manifested spiritual force? This is something that we Celestial Demons often face during our stellular tribulations. Why is he facing it?”
Xu Qing was solemn as he answered again, “Lu Yin’s spiritual force surpasses all of his peers, and even one of you Celestial Demons might not be his match at the same cultivation level.”
The Celestial Demon had nothing to say in response.
On the humans’ side, the maelstrom did not surprise the Second Nightking. He had already witnessed Lu Yin withstand a large portion of his spiritual force pressure. Even though the Second Nightking had been putting on an act when attacking the youth in Venom Flowzone, he had still launched a powerful spiritual force attack that should have even incapacitated an Envoy with a power level of 700,000. Despite that, Lu Yin had endured it. The youth’s spiritual force was terrifyingly powerful for his cultivation level.
The spiritual force formed a storm that spat out bolts of lightning that rained down upon Lu Yin, and at the same time, the maelstrom raged and tried to tear him apart.
Lu Yin made no attempt to recite the Origin Sutra. This was only the beginning of his stellular tribulation, and this level of spiritual force did not even compare to an attack with a power level of 600,000. Even the lightning had only reached a power level of a maximum of 700,000. This was not enough to threaten Lu Yin at all.
Although Lu Yin’s spiritual force was not as powerful as this oncoming storm, his steady practice of the Origin Progenitor’s Sutra had transformed his spiritual force. It had solidified and become as tough as a stone. The storm swept over Lu Yin, and although it jostled him around, it was unable to harm him. He was just like a rock in a flood.
Boom!
There was another explosion, and the lightning above Lu Yin began to coalesce into the shape of a bat, and it quickly released a shrill shriek.
“A Celestial Demon?” This change startled Ling Qiu. She stared into the far away sky as the manifested spiritual force suddenly formed the image of a massive Celestial Demon that completely covered Lu Yin as it stared down at him.
Celestial Demons were considered to be the greatest masters of spiritual force, and their species was the Astral Beast Domain’s imperial family. They actually fed upon and devoured spiritual force.
Whenever Celestial Demons were mentioned, everybody would immediately think of spiritual force, as it was publicly acknowledged that nobody could surpass the species’ dominance in that particular aspect. By this token, Celestial Demons similarly came to mind whenever spiritual force was mentioned.
The Celestial Demon that had fought on the battlefield was not as powerful as the Second Nightking, and he was closer to Liu Huang’s level of strength. However, the astral beast’s terrifying spiritual force was more than enough for him to stand up to the Second Nightking and force a stalemate while simultaneously posing a massive threat to the rest of the battlefield. Without the Second Nightking’s presence on the battlefield, the Great Eastern Alliance would have struggled to survive this long.
The fact that the spiritual force from Lu Yin’s stellular tribulation had taken on the form of a Celestial Demon amply demonstrated the strength of Lu Yin’s spiritual force, as the tribulation had clearly taken on the form of the most powerful masters of spiritual force to deal with Lu Yin.
Xu Qing and the other astral beast powerhouses were all shocked, and they reflexively glanced over at the Celestial Demon in their midst.
The Celestial Demon himself frowned. A mere human had forced his stellular tribulation to form a Celestial Demon. This clearly showed just how terrifying Lu Yin was for his level.
A stellular tribulation was not merely based on power level. Otherwise, if every tribulation sent a trial for a power level of over a million, nobody would be able to survive.
The strength of each stellular tribulation was related to the strength of the person who triggered it. Stellular tribulations could almost be considered sapient, but they also seemed to follow fixed rules. Despite that, no one could guess what form a tribulation would take.
A stellular tribulation could be as simple as a blunt attack of stellular energy, or it could be a battle technique that had once existed in the universe. There was also the possibility of the tribulation manifesting as a replica of a creature or individual who had once lived. This perfect copy would then try to kill the one facing the stellular tribulation.
No one knew what sort of tribulation they would face during their tribulation.
At this moment, Lu Yin clashed with the Celestial Demon. The creature that Lu Yin was fighting against was formed from spiritual force and lightning, but it was absolutely a copy of a creature who had once lived, and it might even be someone who was still alive.
“Human, you should be happy that you’re talented enough to have the honor of being killed by one of our Celestial Demons,” Feng Lin casually stated.
The real Celestial Demon’s expression relaxed a bit at that moment. It was true—even if the fact that a mere human had managed to trigger a tribulation with the form of a Celestial Demon made him uncomfortable, realizing that Lu Yin would die to an image of a Celestial Demon caused the astral beast to relax.
Yuan Shi and the other humans all grew increasingly nervous. Celestial Demons were regarded as invincible among those with the same level of strength. The fact that Lu Yin’s stellular tribulation had taken this form indicated that Lu Yin had no path towards survival.
The Celestial Demon above Lu Yin grew more and more substantial. It eventually turned to face Lu Yin and opened its mouth. Space instantly shattered, and countless people started bleeding from their seven orifices and wailing in agony. They had already moved far away from Lu Yin’s tribulation, but they were still affected by it. They had no choice but to move even further away.
Lu Yin faced the spiritual force attack of the Celestial Demon with a frown. Sure enough, the strength of his tribulation was determined by his own strength. He set up an Inception Array, as it was a sourcebox array that protected one from spiritual force attacks.
The Inception Array blocked a portion of the Celestial Demon’s spiritual force attack, and the part that broke through the sourcebox array was too weak to pose any threat to Lu Yin.
However, the next moment, the spiritual force of the raging storm around Lu Yin started to condense into a visible sphere right above Lu Yin’s head.
Lu Yin’s complexion changed. This was bad! This was Force Explosion, the signature spiritual force battle technique of the Celestial Demons. Yao Xuan had used this technique during ZENITH, and its power had terrified Lu Yin.
The Celestial Demon sneered as he watched Lu Yin’s tribulation. Force Explosion was the Celestial Demons’ greatest technique. Lu Yin had only managed to block the spiritual force maelstrom with the use of a sourcebox array, which indicated that it would be impossible for him to block this Force Explosion.
“You can only blame yourself for cultivating spiritual force! Your level of strength has invited a disaster upon yourself due to you thinking that you can compare to the spiritual force tribulations of my Celestial Demons!” It would be impossible for even a Celestial Demon to survive a stellular tribulation that had such a powerful Force Explosion attack. In that case, who could possibly survive? The tribulation had judged Lu Yin’s spiritual force to be comparable to that of a Celestial Demon, or even greater than that.
The Celestial Demons could accept defeat, but not when it came to spiritual force. It was impossible for their species to admit that a human could surpass them in this aspect, and that meant that Lu Yin had to die from this Force Explosion.
Lu Yin did not hold back since he was facing the Celestial Demons’ greatest battle technique. He immediately started reciting the Origin Sutra. His spiritual force solidified, and Lu Yin became as immovable as a mountain in the face of the Force Explosion.
Boom!
The Force Explosion erupted, and spiritual force swept out in all directions. Space shattered, and ripples swept across all of Northcastle Weave before spreading out even further.
The Second Nightking moved in front of the Great Eastern Alliance’s fleet to stop the spiritual force from affecting them. On the other side of the battlefield, the Celestial Demon did the same for the astral beast horde.
This shockwave of spiritual force that had erupted was more than enough to destroy the minds of most individuals on the battlefield. Even for some of the Envoys, such as Elder He, it was too much.
Was this really a stellular tribulation for a breakthrough to the Envoy realm? The Second Nightking could not believe what he was seeing. Who could possibly trigger such a powerful tribulation? There was absolutely no chance of anyone surviving this.
Ya Mavis stared at Lu Yin as she recalled her Mavis family’s records. They had records of countless stellular tribulations that humans had faced, and yet not a single one mentioned a person facing this level of power at the beginning of their tribulation, not even in ancient times.
She remembered the last battle of ZENITH and Lu Yin’s God of Death Transformation. If this youth had truly received the God of Death’s inheritance, then the strength of his stellular tribulation was not actually that surprising.
Peace slowly returned to the spot in the universe that everyone was staring at. The stellular tribulation’s vortex was still there, and Lu Yin was standing below it. He looked a bit miserable, but his face was as calm as ever, and he had actually survived the Force Explosion.
Lu Yin had faced a spiritual force attack that should have necessitated him being protected by the Second Nightking or some other powerhouse, and yet he had survived all on his own.
The Celestial Demon’s pupils instantly constricted. “Impossible!”
Xu Qing’s expression also grew ugly, as he similarly felt like he was witnessing something impossible. How had Lu Yin managed to survive? Even someone like Xu Qing had been shocked by the power of that Force Explosion, as the attack had been strong enough to wound an Envoy with a power level of 800,000. Despite that, it had not been enough to kill a mere Enlighter. How was this possible? It defied all reason.
Lu Yin was not truly strong enough to face an attack with a power level of 800,000, but spiritual force was an exception to this rule. By relying on the Origin Sutra, it was possible for Lu Yin to face even stronger spiritual force attacks and survive.
“Success.” Mountain God muttered to himself. He felt quite disappointed that Lu Yin had survived. This meant that the war would resume, and also that the Innerverse would remain under the control of the Great Eastern Alliance.
Close by, Ling Taizu softly said, “It’s still not over.”
Mountain God was shocked; the tribulation was not over? How could that be? He was certain that he could not survive the Force Explosion they had all just witnessed. How was that not the end of Lu Yin’s stellular tribulation?
Lu Yin looked up. This was just the start, so how horrifying would his tribulation become as it continued?
Kui Luo had told Lu Yin that Bai Xian’er’s stellular tribulation had shaken the entire Perennial World and that it had drawn the attention of Progenitors while also inciting the Aeternals to attack. In that case, what would Lu Yin’s tribulation be like? Would it be weaker than Bai Xian’er’s? Or would it be even more impressive? Lu Yin could not even begin to guess.
The vortex looked quite calm, but something was clearly brewing inside. Whatever it was, it caused the hearts of the Sea King and some others dropped. They were all aware of how stellular tribulations worked, and they knew not to fear when a stellular tribulation surged but instead when it fell silent. This was because the calmer a tribulation became, the more terrifying the next attack would be. It signified that the tribulation was searching for an attack that could kill the individual who had triggered it.
“Look, it’s growing again!” someone shouted in a panicked voice.
Everyone looked up at the vortex. Sure enough, it was indeed spreading and growing even larger.
Liu Huang’s expression changed drastically. “Fall back! Back further! Move NOW!”
The astral beasts also fled in fear. After all, astral beasts tended to be more sensitive to danger than humans.
Qing Hua was stunned. “I’ve never heard of a stellular tribulation growing stronger between stages.”
Lan Xian replied, “It’s happened before, but only very rarely. The Progenitor of Bloodlines’ tribulation did this.”
Qing Hua was even more startled. “The stellular tribulation grew stronger in the middle for the Progenitor of Bloodlines?”
Lan Xian explained, “That’s what he said, but I don’t know for certain. We need to move back.”
The Semi-Progenitor disappeared as she fled from the growing tribulation.
