Lind had been fortunate enough to witness and study World Realms breaking through to the Gold Tier.
It had been instructive but he could not figure out how to do it for a 6 elental.
It had been the sa for the World Realm.
There was simply no known path and not even a partial path.
What the roc matriarch had done put their child in severe danger, but likely that was why she was kept so heavily protected.
The plan had likely been to watch over her and find so way to keep progressing her cultivation on the dangerous path because of their accursed pride.
Lightning of darkness seed an impossible thing, but it crashed into both of them.
Lind felt his danitan throb with pain as the power in that lightning was far beyond what he could handle.
It was only a glancing blow compared to hers, but she was alive.
The Heavens were not happy.
The black clouds beca murderous and Lind knew he was in for more pain.
"She is a child and her parent forced her to be like this!
I will not stand aside when she is innocent!"
His voice was distorted by his transformation but the pride of his soul shone like a beacon with his words.
The Heavens did not seem to care.
Lightning crashed but now it was targeting them both.
Her human shape distorted as a mighty roc flared briefly but Lind was dealing with his darkness font trying to burst due to the influx of Qi.
It was a dangerous situation but erald light flared and his other 5 elents combined into his own storm.
He had faced so punishnts due to his production and felt a tribulation, but it would be Lind's first true attempt to face tribulation.
His body felt like it was both numbing and on fire at once but his vitality quickly restored him but his charge was bleeding from her eyes.
She was not ready!
"This is a child!
She was not ready not due to her own actions, but the actions of her parent!
If you really are the Heavens, open your damn eyes!"
Lind knew he was being selfish, but despite how irkso she was, he understood she had no malice.
Only a monster would stand aside in his mind, but the risk was massive.
Lind prepared himself as a third strike ca down.
"It hurts, please make it stop hurting!"
Tears flowed down her face as blood flowed in ever greater amounts from her eyes, nose, and mouth.
"FIGHT!
You have to fight and endure if you want to live!
You have 3 elents, fire, air, and darkness!
Only 2 are complete while the 3rd was sealed in so way.
I am here with you!"
Lind's appearance began to change as he fought to control the wild Qi inside him.
As his harmony seed to increase in intensity, his body changed far more than ever before.
His scales thickened and actually began to shine while his nails began to curl into claws.
His muscles got larger a bit but beca far more flexible.
His teeth beca sore as they lengthened and his hair actually beca as dark green as his eyes once were.
The slitted erald orbs were fierce but srizing to the female roc.
Her instincts that hated dragons were muddled in the face of death and the mories of this man.
He was an ant to her but he still was taking her ho.
He offered her food and he was an elixir master.
Her mother showed elixir masters respect even if they were just humans.
"I-I will believe you!"
She channeled her fire and air into defensive Arts when another bolt of lightning fell.
Rather than pain, however, she saw an epheral erald shape take on part of the tribulation.
She suddenly felt pain flow in her body but she now understood what was happening.
It was darkness Qi.
She had always been told darkness was for the ants beneath their powerful flight abilities.
Why did she have it?
She had no idea what to do but then the darkness Qi began to flow through her ridians to the once invisible font inside her.
Her mind desperately tried to replicate what she felt and it was simply pathetic.
The masterful flow from before was barely repeated by her fumbling attempts.
She knew who was helping her, guiding her own Qi to teach her quickly what she had to do.
An ant was better at cultivating her own Qi than she was!
Her pride finally ignited as yet another bolt ca smashing down from the boiling sky but it was at with a maelstrom of all 6 elents.
If he was at her level, maybe it would have slowed it down, but as it was, it only barely mitigated the power.
Despite the injuries he suffered, he recovered quickly.
The vitality of a dragon was the only reason he still lived!
"I refuse to be less than an ant!"
Her molten gold eyes flared with power as she took control of all 3 of her elents for the first ti in her life.
The feeling in the heavens changed instantly.
The tribulation had been waiting a long ti and now that she faced it openly, the wrath from before practically vanished, but only for her.
A massive bolt of all 6 elents suddenly blew apart the earth where Lind had been standing monts ago.
She had no ti to worry as she had to finish her tribulation or she would die!
Lind was enraged.
He had finally felt the girl take the reins and he was about to help her finish when Heaven's wrath focused on him.
"You are angry at ?
You dare judge
after everything I have faced and been made to endure?!
How dare you?!"
Erald light flared as Lind had a ghost of a sinuous dragon flicker around him.
Tal was long gone but it still looked on.
When Lind had that ghostly shape envelope him, it nearly fled, but when it saw the fierce gaze of the dragon looking at the tribulation, it felt nothing but awe.
The wrathful clouds had already driven away nearly all manner of beasts but when Lind's dragon soul began to manifest, all of it froze as the majesty of it covered the world.
Dragons were apex predators, but divine dragons were objects of worship.
All divine beasts were.
No matter the strength or the realm, a divine dragon would be respected and feared in equal asure.
When a divine beast faced its tribulation, it was usually a celebration of Heaven and Earth welcoming its children down the path laid out for them, but now a divine dragon was against the Heavens.
The war between parent and child made all shake with fear and wonder.
Cultivation already defied fate, but for a divine beast to defy Heaven?
It was completely unheard of!
"ROOOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRR!"
A massive dragon roar shattered branches and made nearby beasts bleed from pain.
Only Tal was spared but none knew of it.
"You think I am afraid?
I have struggled through the mud and horror you allow to exist!
I will not bow to you!
I will forge ahead on my own path!"
Lind's voice echoed on the winds and the black clouds seed to thicken in rages as all 6 elents now gathered.
It was not a tribulation, but punishnt.
He was being punished for his interference and now his defiance.
He could still survive, but it would be difficult.
Six bolts blasted out at the peak of the Gold Tier.
If they struck him, he could withstand it, but only once.
Lind stamped his feet into the ground and caused it to shatter as he welcod the lightning.
His fonts shook harshly in his dantian as his harmony worked overti to maintain the balance inside him.
His ridians strained to channel the massive influx of Qi and disperse it quickly.
A new round was building in the skies above.
Blood flowed freely and his vitality could no longer keep up.
Heaven knew Lind, so it was not just a human punishnt coming at him, but one ant for a nascent dragon.
There was no fear in his eyes as his sanity began to fracture.
The dragon inside him wanted to rage up into the storm itself and make it bend to his will, but he had no such power.
Iron Tiers cannot fly on their own.
The dragon refused to use any artifact as well so he was at an impasse.
"I am not 2 beings, but 1.
I am not going to stop being who I am just because you disagree with my thods.
I will help those I can help, and I will break the shackles you put on 6 elentals.
I swore it!
I will never stop!"
His oath passed his lips once more and it seed to make a difference.
The clouds seed to be considering a Dao Oath as a valid reason, yet it was not enough in the end.
The power built once more and Lind used every Art, technique, and trick Wyndam and he had co up with to prepare, but the aura was in the Diamond Tier.
Even if he lived, his cultivation would be crippled.
Rage rose but it did not make him blind.
Lind prepared to fight like never before to hold on when a massive shadow appeared in the sky.
Its power was far above his own and the Heavens were not pleased.
All 6 bolts unleashed on it yet did no harm he could see.
How strong was that bird?!
"Impertinent!"
A powerful female voice ca to his ears that hurt once more.
He did not know them but their power was clear enough.
At least an Immortal Realm was here!
The feeling of being targeted faded as the shadow quickly dispersed the power of the punishnt from Heaven.
For so reason, it did not gather strength to fight back and blue skies returned to the jungle once more.
The area was massively damaged.
A large stretch of the jungle was just gone and the plant showed no interest in reclaiming the open ground as yet.
Tal made a beeline for Lind to catch him as he collapsed.
His Qi was gone, his body riddled with injuries, and he was only human once more.
He was defenseless but Tal got him and stared at the new arrival hovering over them.
"An ant dares challenge the natural order and endangers my daughter.
You will pay with your life!"
A platinum roc dove from the skies right at Tal that looked defiantly up at their death.
It would die with Lind but it did not mind that.
It only wished it could save Lind instead.
Just when death was certain an smaller shadow swooped between them.
The massive roc nimbly changed course without issue before circling back around.
Tal glanced at the girl and was about to bray when it froze.
Her once beautiful face was covered in dried blood and her molten gold eyes were no longer vapid.
Her body was heaving due to being injured but she was in far better shape than Lind.
She had only faced tribulation, not punishnt.
Between the 2, hers was much easier by far.
"Mother, you would kill the savior of my life twice over?
You would harm the only human to risk his life to save
from certain death when I invited it on all you entrusted to watch over ?"
The tribulation had been more than just the darkness elent.
She had also faced a heart demon.
Compared to many, it was not a bad one, but for her, it had been sobering.
It stripped away her rose colored glasses and forced her to accept reality or forever run away.
A pair of dark green eyes had woken her up and forced her to fight.
Strange, she had only known the human very little, but in that short mont of danger, she felt closer to him than anyone save her own mother.
"Child, you are in enough trouble as it is!
I lost many subordinates because of your–"
The large roc lost its speech as her daughter used fire, air, and darkness in equal asure.
Aether beasts had a benefit humans did not.
Innate skills like aether children were awakened.
A set of wings colored black, red, and green ford from Qi picked up the small girl to look her mother in the face.
"This man saved , mother!
From your foolishness!
I nearly died because of what you did to !
Now stop, or I will leave with him!"
Tal noticed the larger roc shared the sa molten gold eyes with her daughter.
They were stunned and a little happy, but why?
"Very well, let us see what this human with a dragon's soul is worth when he awakens."
Before Tal could stop it, Lind was whisked away in the claws of the larger roc.
It brayed over and over in panic but then its other companion returned to it.
"Don't worry, I will bring you with .
I can do it now.
I can fly like I am supposed to!"
All 3 elents enveloped her as her humanoid form dispersed and a large roc replaced her.
Her feathers were still platinum and gold but Tal noticed there was a hint of black at the tips.
They flew after Lind and Tal hoped they could get out of the lair of the rocs intact.
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