Chapter 294: A New Form

"Hm?" Hearing Argentum speak up all of a sudden amidst the silence, Herellia and Horell could not help but focus their senses of vision onto him, wondering what made their companion say that out of the blue. Noticing that the two of them were looking at him with an aura of curiosity surrounding them, Argentum decided to answer the questions in their mind as he asked them, "You guys felt that wave of destructive intent from a while ago, right?"

"Yeah," the two replied to his question simultaneously. How could they not feel it? It was a wave of destructive intent that spread throughout the whole area they demarcated as the zone where Herellia's tribulation would take place. Seeing as the two of them responded affirmatively, Argentum then connected the notification he had obtained from the system with the wave of destructive intent the three of them felt, saying, "Well, it seems that the heavens don't like me and Horell helping you out in your tribulation, Herellia."

"Eh?" Herellia radiated an aura of confusion as she listened to Argentum's words, wondering what he meant by that. Feeling that there was no point in explaining as he felt that the next round of lightning bolts was about to come pretty soon, Argentum added on his statement by saying, "Once the next round appears, you'll see what I mean."

"Anyways, we should still cast a few more buffs on Herellia," he said after that, his words focused towards Horell. In response, Horell asked him, "Should we cast all of our buffs on her, or save some just in case?"

"Of course, the latter," Argentum said without hesitation before adding, "If we give her more buffs this time around, the next trial after this one would experience a huge bump in difficulty."

Noticing that Horell was radiating an aura that felt like he was looking at a madman, Argentum could not help but let out an inward sigh and say, "You'll see what I mean when the next round comes."

Whoosh!

After saying those words, Argentum did not hesitate to cast the weakest movement speed boosting spell he had in his arsenal, sending a small green ball of energy towards Herellia as the dark clouds went silent after that wave of destructive intent. Stopping for a bit to check if the dark clouds were about to make their move, he then continued casting the next level of offense boosting and movement speed boosting spells he had in his arsenal after making sure that the next round wasn't coming down any time soon.

Whoosh! Whoosh!

With two slightly larger balls of red and green respectively, the amount of power coursing throughout Herellia's body had reached a new high, making Herellia feel like the previous round of lightning bolts wouldn't have been a problem if Argentum cast these spells on her at that round. Although she felt like Argentum was trying to test her limits, she thought that he had a good reason to do so, eventually correlating Argentum's words from a while ago regarding the next round to what was happening right now.

As for Horell, he looked at the buffs Argentum gave Herellia before pondering on what buffs he should give her this time. Fortunately, it did not take long for him to come to a decision as he went ahead and sent out two decently sized balls of light cyan energy towards Herellia. After these two balls were absorbed by her body, Herellia felt like the amount of energy in her body was starting to overflow while the vitality of the cells making up her body had reached a new peak as well.

'An HP and MP recovery rate boosting spell, huh…' Argentum thought to himself as he saw the buffs Horell sent to Herellia. He could not help but focus his sense of vision towards Horell, to which Horell responded by focusing his sense of vision onto him as he let out an aura of slight curiosity while he asked him, "What seems to be the matter?"

"Nothing, nothing," Argentum hastily replied as he let out a slightly awkward chuckle. After that, he focused his vision onto the dark clouds, waiting for the changes mentioned by the system to show itself in reality. Unexpectedly, it was only after ten minutes or so did the dark clouds undergo a change as a loud rumble resounded throughout once more.

Swoosh!

With the trio's senses of vision focused on the cloud, they noticed that a small part of the lightning bolts darting throughout the dark clouds had now fused as one, transforming into a bolt of lightning that radiated an intent of destruction far more intense than the crimson bolts. If an outsider were to give a rough estimate on how intense the destructive intent from the new bolt was compared to a crimson bolt, they would probably say that it was around hundreds to thousands of times more intense.

This new bolt of lightning took on a deep lavender hue, a great contrast to the large swath of crimson bolts darting around the dark clouds. Soon, more and more crimson bolts fused up and transformed into the lavender bolts of lightning, eventually occupying around one-fourth of the area the dark clouds had.

Bzzt…crash!

As the fusion process of the bolts went for a temporary lull, the sixth round of lightning bolts eventually rained down from the heavens to smite Herellia down, bringing forth a total of 36 lightning bolts. This time though, the bolts were not purely crimson anymore. Instead, nine lavender lightning bolts accompanied the remaining 27 crimson bolts, with 3 crimson bolts circling each lavender lightning bolt.

Noticing that the speed of the lavender lightning bolts was more or less double than the crimson lightning bolts, Herellia went ahead and utilized the power of her mind to its maximum as she unhesitatingly went ahead and conjured a few more crimson thorns, bringing the total crimson thorns connected to her body to 10. Normally, Herellia would feel an immense amount of burden on her mind while controlling 10 crimson thorns at once. But thanks to the buff Horell gave, it alleviated some of the burdens on her mind, allowing her to break through what seemed to be a limit for her.

Swoosh! Swoosh! Swoosh! Swoosh!

Not allowing the lavender and crimson lightning bolts to make their way towards her body, she went ahead and manipulated the ten crimson thorns towards the oncoming bolts, with one crimson thorn defending against a lavender lightning bolt and three crimson bolts each. As for the remaining crimson thorn, she positioned it close to her body just in case any stray lightning bolt were to pass through the thorns and continue to make its way towards her body.

Fortunately, that did not happen as the buffs Argentum had cast finally showed its true colors, improving Herellia's offensive abilities to an exemplary degree as three offensive buffs were working in unison. Thanks to this, the offensive power of each crimson thorn was at an all-time high, allowing them to dispel the three crimson bolts surrounding the lavender lightning bolts without a problem while still having enough energy to weaken the lavender bolts by at least half!

Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!

With the lavender lightning bolts weakened, Herellia manipulated the nine extended crimson thorns to attack at the lavender lightning bolts once more, finally dispelling them as all of them transformed into purple strands that headed towards her body. After these strands were absorbed, the amount of power flowing throughout Herellia's body had increased once more.

Rumble…

As a loud rumble resounded throughout the area once more, Herellia could not help but look up at the dark clouds and notice that the crimson lightning bolts were being transformed into lavender lightning bolts yet again. Letting out an inward sigh of relief in response to the sight, she decided to conjure up a few more crimson thorns in preparation for the next round. While doing so, she went ahead and sent an energy strand to the two, who were watching her from afar, allowing them to speak with one another once more.

"I think I finally get what you mean, Argentum," Herellia said as she focused her sense of vision onto the faraway Argentum as she recalled the sensation brought by the lightning bolts from a while ago. "The purple bolts are a sign that the heavens don't want you two to help me out in my Existence Tribulation, right?"

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"Exactly," Argentum said as he lightly nodded before explaining, "If we cast all of our buffs from the start of the first trial, then the difficulty of the bolts you're facing right now might become higher. You could be facing against a wide array of purple bolts, or even worse, a far more terrifying type of lightning bolt."

"Wait a second…" Horell said out of the blue, prompting the two of them to look at him as he pondered over something for a bit. Eventually, he found his train of thought as he looked at Herellia and said, "Isn't this the same thing that happened in Zelefaire's tribulation?"

"To think that the bump in the difficulty of his trial was brought about by us helping him out," he added, letting out a soft sigh of regret. Soon focusing his vision towards Argentum, he then asked him after mulling over something else, "I was wondering…how strong are blue lightning bolts?"

"Incredibly strong," Argentum said without hesitation, taking into consideration the darkening of each bolt for Existence Tribulations when compared to Power Baptisms. He then added, "You'd be thanking the heavens if you faced a swath of purple bolts instead of a single blue bolt. That's how terrifying it is."

"I see…" Horell said after trying to wrap his mind around what Argentum said. But just as he was about to ask Argentum a few more questions, the seventh round of lightning bolts came crashing down towards Herellia, dispelling the connection the three had as she focused her attention towards the oncoming bolts.

The seventh round brought along 49 lightning bolts, with 16 of the oncoming lightning bolts being lavender. Noticing this, Argentum could not help but feel like something wrong was happening in the trial, but could not put his finger on what.

Fortunately, Herellia had somewhat prepared for such a scenario, bringing forth a total of 12 crimson thorns towards the lavender bolts, which were surrounded by two crimson bolts each, with a special one being surrounded by three. To the current Herellia, 12 crimson thorns at once seemed to be limit to what her mind could handle while maintaining all sense of rationality.

Without hesitation, she made the crimson thorns charge towards the lavender bolts, dispelling a great portion of the crimson lightning bolts in the process. After dispelling those crimson bolts, she went ahead and manipulated the crimson thorns to congregate and turn into what looked like a larger crimson thorn from afar. She willed these thorns to move towards the remaining lavender and crimson lightning bolts from a lateral angle, allowing the fusion of each crimson thorn's power to do all of the work, dispelling the remaining bolts just as they were only a few meters away from her body.

"Huuh…" Herellia let out a sigh of exhaustion as she had a hunch that the next round was going to be far harder than the round she had just finished, even with the decent increment in power she had just experienced from the purple strands being absorbed by her body. Nevertheless, she continued to psych herself up as she knew that by finishing through all of the trials brought to her by the heavens, she would finally fulfill the wish she had been wanting to fulfill for quite a long time.

"I should try and form another crimson thorn," Herellia muttered to herself after psyching herself up. Unfortunately for her, just as she was about to start forming the 13th crimson thorn, the eighth round of lightning bolts came down from the dark clouds, not giving her a decent amount of time to rest. This time around, 64 lightning bolts made their way towards Herellia…with half of the group being composed of lavender lightning bolts!

"So that's what's happening!" Argentum said in a slightly loud voice as he finally figured what he felt was off from the lightning bolts a while ago. Noticing that Horell was looking at him with a slightly intrigued aura surrounding him, Argentum took in a deep breath before saying, "The purple bolts are slowly replacing the red bolts with each round. This means that the difficulty of withstanding through each round greatly increases as the number of bolts continue to increase, unlike the first five rounds wherein the difficulty only came from the increase in quantity."

"I presume that the last round of lightning bolts would be made up of purple lightning bolts," Argentum said not long after, prompting Horell to ask him, "Then what should we do? You've explained earlier that casting buffs on Herellia would increase the difficulty of the next trial to a greater degree. Is there any way to help her out without affecting the trial?"

"Unfortunately, there is none," Argentum said in a slightly despondent tone as he let out a sigh of slight disappointment. Looking at Herellia's current state, he then told Horell, "We must hope that Herellia can last as long as possible with the buffs we've given her. We can only sparingly give her buffs along the way. In other words…"

"It's more or less up to Herellia right now if she survives this trial or not."

At this moment, the lavender and crimson lightning bolts were heading towards Herellia in pairs, as if they were mocking the number of crimson thorns Herellia had conjured. Just as she thought that it was the best time to ask Argentum and Horell to increase her abilities once more, she remembered what Argentum told her a while ago, eventually deciding to not ask them as it would affect the difficulty of her subsequent trials.

She then hastily scanned through the skills she had in her arsenal, even taking into consideration the skills she considered as her trump cards. Eventually, her sense of vision was fixed on a certain skill she was saving for a later round. Looking at the crimson thorns around her body before looking at the oncoming lightning bolts, Herellia could not help but let out an inward sigh as she muttered to herself, "Good thing I acc.u.mulated enough energy from the members before undergoing this trial. If not, this might be the only trump card I can use."

Whoosh! Whoosh!

In less than an instant, the crimson thorns around her body had exploded into multiple pieces of shrapnel, slightly weakening the oncoming lightning bolts as a great amount of red viscous fluid scattered throughout the process. At this moment, it looked like Herellia was a branch that was used to kill someone. But in great contrast to her appearance, the aura surrounding her had experienced a great increase in intensity as the amount of power coursing throughout Herellia's body had ascended one more grade.

As the crimson veins surrounding her body started to emanate a faint white glow, she went ahead and conjured multiple crimson red tendrils before manipulating them to head towards the lightning bolts as she shouted…

"[Grand Sanguine Arts]…"

"[Amaranthine Release]!"

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