CHAPTER 120: CHAPTER 120: FIRST TRIAL

Ved took a heavy breath, he had finally reached the top. It took him 2 years and 9 months to climb the mountain.

The first four thousand kilometres were manageable. While the essence density and pressure did slow him down, he was still able to climb at a relatively fast pace.

However when he reached the 5000 kilometres mark things change. The essence still grew thicker like before but dealing with it was nolonger much of an issue.

He had even gotten used to the pain of being burnt. The issue was with the pressure, it was as if somebody suddenly dropped a mountain on him.

Every step after that was a battle, he managed to brave through that pressure using his traits like herculean strength even though it drained too much stamina and the pressure kept getting stronger the higher he climbed.

However when he reached the 10 000 kilometres mark, the pressure grew significantly stronger all at once, it was so strong his bones cracked.

Each step felt harder than fighting Vermilion, he couldn’t even remember how many times his body shattered and rebuilt itself over and over again. On the latter part he even resorted to using ignition but only burnt viral essence and not soul essence.

And the density of essence energy was so high, it had turned into drops of blue liquid. Ved was unfortunate enough and one of those drops landed on him.

That was the most excruciating pain he had ever felt in his life but it helped, his regeneration trait kept him alive and his resistance to essence energy grew significantly stronger after that.

The challenge was more arduous than he had initially thought but fortunately he completed it in time, after his body healed and his stamina regenerated he stood up.

The top of the mountain was flat and stretched a few kilometres across, at the centre stood a black tower whose peak was hidden beyond another layer of clouds.

Ved didn’t even know which layer this was, he stopped counting after he needed to direct his entire attention into keeping himself alive.

Ved approached this tower and stood before it towering gates. He felt himself being scanned then he heard a mechanical female voice.

" Greetings challenger, welcome to the Tower of Dragul." The gigantic gates swung open, a powerful gust of wind filled with dust hit Ved on the face forcing him to close his eyes.

He nervously took a step forward and entered the tower then the gates closed shut behind him.

He turned around and tried to force them open but even with all of his strength he couldn’t even make them budge, eventually he gave up.

" Welcome to your first trial of Dragul, the trial of speed. This trial will test challengers base speed without the enhancement of essence.

Your results will be graded from E to S, D being the minimum passing grade, good luck challenger.)

While the introduction was brief it was also pretty simple, what confused him was that the voice said it was the first trial, but he had already completed the first challenge no?.

The world suddenly shifted and Ved found himself standing on a long bridge of light. On either side of the bridge was an endless dark abyss.

Ved’s body shivered in fear when he looked at this abyss. The mechanical voice sounded all around him.

( It had been detected that challenger is an early rank 4. Trial will be adjusted to challenger’s rank. Note- Failure will result in death.) The last statement made him sweat bullets, he regretted agreeing to taking this trial almost immediately.

If he knew the stakes were his own life, he would’ve refused to come here with everything he got but it was too late to regret now.

A wall of light appeared behind him and started approaching him, it was slow at first. Ved didn’t wait for it, his instincts told him if that wall touched him he was dead.

He started running, he didn’t run at his full speed but fast enough to keep a wide distance from the wall. However the wall started speeding up.

Ved sped up as well, the longer they ran the faster the wall became and the faster he was forced to run as well.

At some point they broke the sound barrier there were no sonic booms in this space but Ved knew they were atleast moving at 6 times the speed of sound now.

Mind you this was before he used his flash trait, with his flash trait alone he could move at around mach 25 to 26 but he couldn’t maintain that speed for long.

He couldn’t even maintain his current speed for long let alone his full speed. Then he noticed no matter how fast he moved, his stamina did not drop at all, this brought a wave of surprise and joy.

That meant he could run at his fastest without worry. The voice said he couldn’t use essence which he assumed it was talking only about world essence and not vital.

That meant he can use his trait as well as his lightning, yes, his lightning was able to enhance his speed, especially the first order extinguishing tribulation lightning.

At some point Ved reached the limit of his base speed which was about 16 times the speed of sound, most rank 4 creatures couldn’t reach this speed without essence enhancement.

Ved was moving so fast the bridge blurred below him but he was not done, he didn’t just want to outrun the wall he wanted to leave it far behind.

He was certain he had reached the passing grade by now, there was no way this was below D grade, most rank 4 couldn’t even reach this speed.

However when he turned to look he saw the wall still behind him, he hadn’t opened the distance at all, fortunately it was also not catching up but maintained a constant distance from him.

This terrified Ved, that meant his top speed without the enhancement of his traits or lightning was the minimum passing grade.

He couldn’t even imagine what type of monstrous beings this trial was designed for. Then a possibility dawned on him.

Ursela said this trial was left for dragons, then would that mean every true dragon of the same rank was stronger than him?

Then wouldn’t at minimum a true dragon be legendary grade? This realisation shook him but it made sense. To begin with, Ved’s body is only this powerful due to certain coincidental factors.

He’s stronger than what either his bloodline grade or rank suggest. He was grateful he was weird or he would’ve failed this trial and died.

With that in mind he activated his flash trait.