A Cultivation Tale: The Godly Punisher

Chapter 279: Final Soul Tribulation

As all of his soul pillars crumbled apart, Alex felt a great headache in his head which jumped by great leaps in intensity.

However, before the pillars could finally crumble into pieces, Alex who gritted his teeth as he tried to endure the pain abruptly exercised his will on his crumbling soul pillars and soul fragments.

Once he did so, the soul fragments reattached to the places that they broke away from. And using his energy and essence attraction power to draw soulforce energy from many miles away into his body and into his soul-dwelling region, which was then infused into his cracked soul pillars, the numerous cracks that had appeared on them quickly vanished. And by doing this, the energy caused the soul pillars to be strengthened and toughened once again, becoming many times solid and dense than they previously were many moments ago.

Now, what Alex was doing was similar to body-cultivation. Through shattering and reformation, the numerous faulty areas in the structural integrity of his soul pillars which surely couldn't be perfect from the start of the formation of his Soul Cores were being removed or eliminated, and thus, this action caused his soul pillars to become perfected. The innate flaws in them; faults that were present right from their creation, and thereby prevented them from reaching or attaining perfection, were being quickly removed by the lightning-based tempering process that they were going through. 

So, due to the devastating, lightning-attributed soul attacks that his soul pillars were subjected to, they became more durable and resistant to certain levels of destroying power or shattering force. 

So, with his soul pillars continually breaking apart and crumbling into fragments which then rapidly healed in the next instant after they had reattached to each other and were infused with soulforce energy, they gained a great increase in the degree of resilience and toughness that they possessed. 

While the rampaging, wild arcs of black electricity that crackled as they moved about on the surfaces of his soul pillars were abruptly pulled into them and to their centers where they infused into the grain-sized, black cubic crystal of lightning that had formed in each of them moments ago.

***

A few seconds after his tens of thousands of shattered soul fragments formed back into towering and flawless-looking soul pillars, three large bolts of violet-golden lightning shot down from the soul-tribulation thundercloud in the sky towards Alex at tremendous speeds. However, these bolts each shot out at different times.

So, the fastest of the three massive, violet-golden lightning bolts which appeared some inches above Alex's head, vanished and reappeared in his soul-dwelling region.

Bang!

Once the bolt appeared in there, it went on to tyrannically strike Alex's soul pillars that it caused Alex to instantly get a splitting headache. Besides, because of the force his soul pillars were struck with, Alex was knocked to the floor of his room. And immediately he crashed to the floor of his room from his standing position, the second violet-golden bolt of lightning arrived before his body. Then it vanished and also reappeared in his soul-dwelling region where it went on to tyrannically strike many of Alex's soul pillars. 

BANG!

Argh!!

Alex couldn't help but screech in pain immediately after he was impacted by the powerful, extremely dense bolt of electricity that caused the headache which he earlier felt to increase tremendously in intensity. And to give an hint on how intense the headache that he felt was, it was like when a three hundred-foot tall giant stepped on his head, reducing it into paste and mist of blood.

Then immediately after the second bolt struck Alex, the third bolt which was dozens of folds larger and more dazzling in color than the two bolts that went before it, struck Alex's pillar-shaped Soul Cores.

Bang!!!

The instant that it impacted him, and since the massive, violet-golden, soul-annihilating thunderbolt came with a lot of momentum and struck out with great heaviness because of the high degree of density that it possessed, it caused many cracks to immediately appear on Alex's soul pillars which had being made highly resilient; due to the continuous tempering by complete mystical-level Ice and Frost envelopment, absolute devouring-type Fire engulfment, unmatched corrosion and finally lightning.

The two soul-inflicting, lightning bolt-attacks that went before the third bolt possessed a high degree of solidness and struck out against Alex's soul pillars with great amounts of tyrannical force. However, they couldn't cause any form of damage to Alex's refined and flawless pillar-shaped Soul Cores. But the third one which possessed a high level of denseness and struck Alex's soul pillars with a force that was many times destructive than that unleashed by the first two bolts on collision with his soul only caused a certain amount of damage to his soul pillars. However, the damages were insignificant.

So, with the absorption of a small amount of soulforce energy from the realmverse, the cracks that had appeared all over each of them instantly vanished like it was never there, returning the state of Alex's soul pillars to their previous faultless looks.

However, the intense unbearable headaches that he felt still caused him to groan loudly in pain. But despite his groaning which invoked feelings of great suffering, a wide smile surfaced on his lips. If one saw him now, one would think that he had gone crazy, or that he was simply a maniac and a psycho. How could one be going through this kind of torturous pain and affliction and still be able to smile? However, it was not that Alex was going insane from suffering too much traumatizing pains, it was simply because he just noticed now, how resilient his soul pillars were. Just upon seeing the astonishing degrees of resistance that they possessed towards the alarming soul-type damages that he was being inflicted with, he understood that his efforts were starting to pay off, and so, he gave a beautiful and radiant smile.

Now, he knew that very soon, soul-lightning cores would form within each of his sixty soul pillars, while the soul pillars themselves would become nigh-indestructible; they would become too strong or tough for cultivators at his level, or for those that were two to three levels above his to shatter or demolish. That was just how he felt, as he comprehended that no soul cultivator, except probably an overpowered one that was a fearsome genius would be able to put out a devastating soul-based attack that could match the destructive power of the soul-tribulation lightning that he was being faced with.

Therefore, with this thought, he knew that any soul-cultivator in his stage, or that were two to three stages above his, who then discovered the uniqueness of his body and tried to possess it might not be able slay his soul. Even if they were able to destroy ten to thirty of his soul-beings which would form from his soul pillars after they pass through the Soul-Tribulation that he was currently facing, they still wouldn't be able to take over his body as he had too many soul-beings. Besides, because of the tempering, they had gained a certain level of toughness, resilience or imperviousness to soul-based damages which shouldn't be available in any form or degree to any soul-cultivator until they got to a stage that was comparable to that of a Sage Lord. Also, one shouldn't forget that Alex's soul had been bestowed with quasi-immortality. So, if eventually they were all destroyed by senior-class soul cultivators, they would instantly reform back again from billions of tiny or miniscule fragments into his flawless soul-beings once again. And this was something that was nigh-impossible to do by any soul-cultivation expert, only until they reach a soul-cultivation stage that's equal in ranking to the energy-cultivation stage called 'Immortal' stage.

With nose that had blood continuously stream from it, and red eyes that looked larger than normal, which was because of the intense headache that he was being afflicted with, Alex who retained his smile that radiated unfathomable gladness, immediately deployed the divine-tier, soul lightning refinement method mentioned in the Great Empyrean Seven-Hue Lightning Methodology which was a profound soul technique meant for the user of the technique that was at the Lightning Sage stage. And the instant that he did so, he released the vast-scale pulling power of his divinely body and focused them on the rampaging violet-golden electricity arcs that roamed about on his soul pillars. So very quickly, the wild and berserk electricity arcs that moved about on the surfaces of his soul pillars were rapidly pulled into them, and then channeled to the heart of each of his sixty soul pillars, where they then infused into the black lightning crystals within everyone of them.

After he absorbed the violet-golden electricity arcs, Alex decided to taunt the realmverse.

"Hello Realmverse, it's me again. I see that you are trying your best to destroy me. But just why? If I may ask. Haha. I know that you can't respond, I am only trying to pull your stinking legs. Anyways, since you are so bent on destroying this gorgeous and peculiar boy which I know and believe that you hold the power to do so, this boy would simply never give you the chance to do such a cruel and emotionless thing. So, if you wanna destroy me, I suggest that you give it your best shot!!" He uttered with an aura of confidence and indomitability emanating from him.

Immediately after Alex said that, a determined gaze that erupted the unbridled intent to absorb and devour the essences of all things in the realmverse radiated off his eyes. Then he stretched both hands out to his side and began to push the devouring power that he possessed to the highest extreme that he could possibly reach.

While Alex was seated in his room awaiting the final attack of the soul-tribulation, every mortal that were in their homes out of fear that a powerful and exceedingly arrogant, primal celestial god was descending from the highest heavens, saw how part of the sky in the city changed from the blue color that it had to blood-red. Then their hearts shook and turned cold and stiff. Same with their bodies that turned cold and extremely rigid out of horror due to the appearance of the blood-red sky.

Then with a single deafening boom that suddenly rang out from nowhere and caused many of the buildings to violently shake and instantly develop massive numbers of cracks, an enormous blade that was blood-red in color suddenly appeared.

Radiating an intense blood-red light that dyed the earth surface and everything on it in it ominous color, and also exuding a terrifying physical and soul-trembling presence, and ultimately, an overwhelming aura of ominousness, everyone, especially the mortals, suddenly felt that the world would be fully destroyed today, and that their lives would be reaped away by the terrific ominous power of a wrathful, devilish god that they believed had been unleashed upon them. And upon thinking this, all their bodies became pale-white and intensely trembled from the fear of the irrevocable doom about to fall on them.

People in schools such as principals, instructors and students noticed this and became shocked to the extreme.

What sort of phenomenon that looked and felt so devilish was this?

This question rang in their minds like gigantic bells that were unstoppably rung.

Then the principals flew out of their academies to get ready for anything. And very quickly, they activated the hidden mega-defensive formations of their schools.

With the colossal blade now pointing directly downwards at the building that Alex was in, blood-curdling ghostly wails, shrieks and terrifying thunderous booms began to rampantly ring and peal out from it.

When Alex heard the upsetting and disturbing demonical sounds, his heart shook in fear.

However, his determination and resolve to absorb all things in the realmverse couldn't be erased or broken.

Then with a mighty bellow from him that evoked the feeling that they came from multitudes of gigantic, furious dragons, Alex shot through the high ceiling of his building to the roof.

Now looking at the massive blade that suddenly exerted a powerful pressure that acted on both his body and soul, Alex shouted with boundless determination in his tone. "Come!!"