"Let's do it then," John said after thinking it all over as the two started to discuss the details of the plan.
Some time later, Laia, Kirri, and John stood together, just out of the notice of the Deathshroud Spider.
"Are you sure you'll be able to make it after us?" Laia asked, her voice tinged with slight concern.
"I am," John replied confidently. "Just focus on getting through the portal. Kirii will take you there safetly. I'll be fine."
Laia stared at John for a moment, her lips pursed slightly, but nodded her head in agreement after a brief hesitation.
"Mhm…are you ready?" she asked.
"I am," John replied firmly, prepared for the battle to come.
Laia breathed in deeply and closed her eyes, while her right hand moved towards her chest. Her fingers touched her chest just below her collarbone, at which point an incredibly profound aura began to emanate from her.
Her face scrunched up in strained concentration as she activated her innate Dao of Time rune as slowly as she could, freezing a thin layer of space around them in a bubble of time. She slowly expanded the bubble as calmly as she could, doing her best to avoid any slip up that would alert the spider. John stood there in silence as he felt the profound aura of time all around them.
As the bubble of frozen time appeared, the world seemed to freeze as well. The slightly swaying of leaves stopped, and the ambient sound of the dark forest ceased. It was as if the world around them had become frozen, a feeling that was quite stifling for John. To them, time was moving normally, and to the outside it was the same, but the two were separated by the bubble, as if existing in different realities.
The spider could have noticed them at this moment and begun its attack, but neither of them would notice at all, making John feel as though he had gone blind in a way.
He stretched out his hand towards the barrier of time and felt it unable to move forward once it came into contact with it. He could tell that if he wanted to shatter the barrier with his full power he could do so, but the inability to move forward at all through the barrier was quite bizarre.
The invisible bubble of time continued to expand for a short while, eventually forming a cocoon several dozen yards wide. Laia's face had started to become red with strain, and she muttered words through strained breath.
"You can start," she said. John nodded his head as a serious look appeared on his face, while Kirii appeared before Laia. The powerful aura that was about to explode from John would no doubt overwhelm her while she was focused on the time barrier if Kirii did not help her.
Boom!
John's aura suddenly exploded as he wasted no time at all to begin his channeling process. The bubble of time instantly flooded with a monstrous aura, while Kirii's own power flared to wrap up Laia with a proactive layer of Qi.
The monstrously powerful aura within the barrier continued to climb as John fed essence Qi from his dantian into the core of the battle art, which quickly began to condense with power. The Dragontail Decimation continued to greedily absorb whatever essence Qi could throw at it, as if the battle art had no limits.
John felt his meridians begin to strain from the building power, while his dantian fought with full power to contain the mass of condensed energy. Within the time barrier, the monstrous aura grew ceaselessly, while Kirii's own power fought back to protect Laia.
This process continued for a full minute, but to the three inside the barrier, it seemed as if it had taken a lifetime. Laia's face was flushed red, while her lips trembled as if she were about to collapse from fatigue. The barrier started to waver ever so slightly as she neared the end of her ability to separate them from the rest of the world, but she remained silent as she pushed herself to the limit.
John's eyes finally snapped open, his gaze flickering with uncontained lightning as if his two eyes were cores of lightning. Lightning flickered over his skin, as if ready to burst with absolute power at any moment.
"Now!" John exclaimed, his voice strained as his body and dantian were pushed to the limit.
The profound Dao emanating from Laia instantly vanished, and the strain from using the ability for so long finally overwhelmed her as she collapsed to her knees. However, Kirii grabbed her before she could fall down, wrapping her with his Qi and placing her on his back. Kirii flashed forward towards the portal without hesitation, entrusting the rest of the process to John.
Schreeech!
A horrifying screech boomed out from the spider as John's monstrous aura suddenly appeared from out of nowhere. Its numerous eyes locked onto him who stood in the distance, gazing at the spider with cold indifference. The spider's gaze quickly shifted onto Kirii and Laia, who were fast approaching its domain. A horrifying screech boomed out once more as it moved to capture them.
"Dragontail Decimation!"
A lighting node of unimaginable power appeared directly above the Deathshroud Spider, while the world suddenly seemed to become pure light for the briefest of moments.
A lightning beam in the form of a dragon's tail slammed out from the lightning node, directly onto the spider's back. At the same time, John recovered from the strenuous attack as fast as possible, and sped forward towards the distant portal as well.
Boom!
A horrifying explosion of lighting instantly destroyed everything in its path, swallowing the land for miles in each direction with its calamitous power. The massive spider web disintegrated from the explosion, unable to resist its overwhelming might, while the spider fought back against the monstrous attack that had appeared from nowhere.
Che!
A beam of lightning pierced directly through the explosion and into the spiders shroud of death. A brilliant golden light erupted as Laia activated her Dao of Life to resist the death energy, shielding both herself and Kirii from its lethal touch.
The golden beam of lightning pierced forward at incredible speed and darted past the Deathshroud Spider before it could recover from the decimating attack. John watched with relief as Kirii and Laia disappeared into the portal, safely making their way past the Deathshroud Spider.
His relief vanished as another horrifying screech erupted from the spider, who began to move once more as it recovered from his attack. Its back was charred with a massive wound carved deep within, but the spider was not lethally injured by John's ultimate attack.
"Tch, even something like that was not able to kill you," John clicked his tongue in frustration as he sped forward at his fastest possible speed. Based on the spider's rate of recovery, he was confident in making it to the portal before it could react.
His eyes suddenly widened as a horrifying aura of death erupted from the spider, far greater than it had displayed before. The spider seemed to realize it would not physically be able to stop John in time, and so had erupted with its strongest aura to kill him that way instead.
John felt the aura of death wash over his body, rotting his flesh and sapping his body of any source of vitality. This ability was the reason the Cinderflame Drake had avoided the spider at all costs, as it was something that consumed all life without regard, and was not something it was able to resist. It was truly a terrifying ability, and would have killed John incredibly quickly were it not for a singular thing; his master's training.
John's body, which had been bathed in Lilian's Dao of Death aura daily for months on end, had become resistant to the aura of death, enough to keep himself alive at the moment. Were it not for that training, he would have no doubt already been overwhelmed by the monstrous aura of death coming from the spider.
However, even with his master's gruesome training, John still felt himself nearly overwhelmed by the aura.
Che!
His body shot forward like a bolt of lightning, piercing right past the Deathshroud Spider which had finally recovered from the Dragontail Decimation. One of its legs slammed down towards John with overwhelming might, so powerful that it would crush him in an instant in his current state.
Boom!
The spider's leg slammed down onto the earth at John's location, shattering the already ruined land for miles in each direction. Another terrifying screech erupted from the spider, a screech which contained furious anger as it had watched John enter the portal just before its attack had landed.
After six long weeks filled with danger and death, John and Laia had finally made it out of the Dao Transformation trial.
