John's aura exploded outwards like a bomb, pushing away the nearby desert sand. A crater larger than before appeared, while Iris grit her teeth and struggled with all her might to resist John's power. If her body was in top shape, she would be alright, but in her weakened and damaged condition, it took her all to resist and survive.
Hovering high above, the mysterious man's gaze locked onto John, his blood pumping faster within his body as he watched John unleash his full power. The man's gaze heated up, as if he were staring at something beyond his wildest imaginations.
John's hand tightened around the shaft of his scythe, as an ominous, sharp, and overwhelming aura began to radiate from its blade. While his Asura Transformation was his strongest battle state, it augmented his body and body Qi.
His bloodline ability however was the complete opposite, as it flooded his body with an overwhelming amount of essence Qi, almost equal to the level of the Asura Transformation. With the Divine Reaping Scythe empowered by essence Qi, using his bloodline ability was the only way to unleash his strongest essence attack.
John felt his body begin to creak in protest as a nearly overwhelming amount of Qi began to surge through his body. Each blood cell of his began to unleash essence Qi, as his blood cells acted like billions of tiny dantians. The essence Qi surged through his meridians, stretching them to their limits, and threatening to shatter them completely.
John's powerful body fought back with all its might, as it did its best to contain the rampage essence Qi. The black and red aura on his scythe blade continued to grow, and soon had reached a level far beyond anything he had ever unleashed before.
His arm stretched out to his side and above his head, as his pained and cold eyes stared at the lightning warrior, who had managed to make its way quite close to John and Iris. Kirii still fought fiercely against his opponent, managing to slow its progress by quite a bit.
Suddenly, John's cold eyes widened, as his aura reached an absolute peak. His scythe slashed forward, as an apocalyptic scythe image appeared in the sky before him, as he unleashed his strongest ever Divine Reaping Scythe. His face turned white while his body cried out in protest, nearly forcing him to his knees in pain and exhaustion.
"Ahh!" Iris cried out in pain as her body was flown into the distance, unable to resist the might of the aura any longer.
'Kirii! Dodge, now!' John communicated through their soul connection.
Kirii's body flashed to the side without hesitation, its actions causing the lighting warrior to pause for a brief instant. The warrior's gaze shifted back down, at which point its vision was completely taken up by a black and red scythe image that had appeared before it. The lightning warrior raised its lightning lance in front of its body at the last moment to block the attack.
Che!
The scythe image seemed to cleave through space itself, as it reached the warrior and collided against its lightning lance. The lightning lance put up the briefest of struggle before it cleaved in half, unable to resist the might of the attack. The attack continued forward without pause, its sharpness and speed unmatched. The red and black scythe image slashed through the lightning warrior vertically, severing it from head to toe without any resistance at all.
John watched as the scythe image continued upwards, eventually reaching the tribulation clouds high above. It pierced into the clouds, its might and power severing the clouds of the heavens as well. A thin and long opening appeared within the clouds, the light from the sun above shining through. The beam of sunlight landed on the lightning warrior, who stood there motionlessly as its body parted into two halves.
Spatial energy lingered powerfully between the two halves, stopping the lightning warrior from regenerating. The lightning warriors' aura began to rapidly fade as it struggled against the spatial energy, which was slowly eroded away.
"Kirii! Now!" John yelled out as his remaining body Qi surged through his weary body, filling him with energy once more. His figure flashed up into the sky as he and Kirii appeared before the lightning warrior, which was struggling mightily against the spatial energy. Its aura was rapidly fading, but so was the spatial energy from the Divine Reaping Scythe. Although the Divine Reaping Scythe was beyond powerful and profound, so too was the heavenly lightning warrior. John had also not fully mastered the fourth form of the Divine Reaping Scythe, lowering its severing efficacy, which allowed the lighting warrior to fight back against it.
It was clear that eventually the lightning warrior would win out and erase all the energy, although its aura would rapidly fade by that time. However, it would still be strong enough to kill Iris, which John would not allow to happen.
His hand stretched out and landed on the head of one of the lightning warriors half, while his remaining power flared out once more. At the same time, Kirii's mouth opened wide and chomped down on the head of the other half, as John and Kirii's power flared out.
High above, the mysterious man's eyes opened wide as he watched what John and Kirii were attempting to do. The battle thus far had been beyond his wildest imaginations, and yet the two were surpassing his expectations of what was possible once again.
"They're attempting to absorb the Divine Tribulation Guardian? Just how crazy is this brat?" the man muttered, almost unable to believe his eyes.
"Gahhhh!" John cried out in pain as his power flared while he began to absorb his half of the Divine Tribulation Guardian. A jade piece appeared in his hands as he activated his Celestial Lightning Script, while glowing blue runes appeared all over his charred and bloody skin.
If he allowed the lightning warrior to recover, he would have nothing left in reserve to stop it. This was the only way he could think of to once and for all eliminate the lightning warrior. With the lightning warrior focusing all its energy on eliminating the spatial energy, it was unable to resist John's power.
Tribulation lightning surged into his body, rampaging wildly within. It threatened to destroy everything, as his bones, muscles, meridians, and even blood began to char and be destroyed. John grit his teeth through the immense and nearly overwhelming pain as he revolved his Celestial Lightning Script to his utmost. Smoke and ash drifted out of John's gritted mouth as his body was destroyed from within.
The energy produced by activating the script surged through his body as well, washing over wherever the lightning had rampaged, doing its best to heal the wounds as well as neutralize the tribulation lightning. A battlefield formed within his body, as John felt himself nearly overwhelmed by the power of the Divine Tribulation Guardian. Its energy had been halved from its peak state, and John was only absorbing half of it.
Even with its power a quarter of its peak, John was almost unable to withstand the lightning rampaging within. Were it not for his incredible lightning resistance due to the Celestial Lightning Script, as well as monstrous body due to the Immortal Asura Body, John would have turned to ash in an instant for attempting such a thing. With the state of his body, John was unable to activate his Asura Transformation to protect himself. His body was already on the verge of collapse due to his battle before and using his bloodline ability, and using the Asura Transformation now would destroy his body with absolute certainty.
At the same time, lightning ramped through Kirii's body, as the Divine Tribulation Guardian was absorbed by him. The blue crystal on Kirii's forehead lit up brightly as Kirii activated its full power to absorb the guardian, and resist its might.
The tribulation guardians might flared to resist John and Kirii, as a stationary battle between the three took place in the sky above the arid desert. Both halves of the tribulation guardians' aura rapidly began to fade, while John's aura also grew weaker and weaker.
With one last yell of anger and rage, John's aura flared out one last time, as he pushed himself to the very limit. The remaining lightning energy of the tribulation guardian vanished as both Kirii and John absorbed it all, finally bringing an end to its existence.
John's breathing was heavy and raspy as he struggled to maintain his consciousness. His body was damaged almost beyond recognition, as blood covered every inch of his charred body. He gazed down to the ground below, his eyes locking onto Iris who was standing on the desert floor, safe and sound. The tribulation clouds above rumbled with absolute rage at what had occurred, and after a moment of pause, unleashed another lightning beam towards Iris below.
However, unlike the other tribulation beams, this tribulation lightning beam was filled with a vibrant life energy. It slammed into Iris, filling her body with vibrant energy, both healing her and transforming her body. Despite the fact that it wanted to kill her, Iris had survived her tribulation, and the heavens were forced to proceed with the last part of her tribulation.
John watched as Iris's body began to transform, being molded by the very heavens itself into a higher state of existence. The process continued for a short while before the lightning beam faded away, and the clouds above vanished in an instant. It was as if the heavens were beyond disgusted with what had occurred, and could not wait to leave this place.
Iris inspected her newly transformed body, her power far greater than anything she had felt before. An elated expression appeared on her face as she gazed up towards John, which was quickly replaced with panic and worry.
"John!" Iris cried out as she dashed forward, while John's unconscious body collapsed down to the ground below.
