He wrestled the control of the mixed energy — and thus the Spiritual Energy it was controlling — away from the Timelady. Without her direct control, the spacetime opening to the place the Spiritual Energy was being taken from disappeared. The first thing he did was pushing a strand of Spiritual Energy into his mind.

She reacted to his actions by freezing him in time, but the Spiritual Energy in his mind and dantian kept him conscious where his Five Star energy wouldn't. She could've done multiple things next, and he might have reacted in multiple ways. She chose to run his way at top speed.

Aaron had fractions of instants to act.

He had to level up in those instants; there was no other way out of that situation. Spiritual Energy was powerful, but he had too little of it and had to struggle to control it, since it wasn't his. The best use of it at the moment was to win some time.

Spiritual Defensive Arts: Protective Dome!

He forced half the Spiritual Energy to create a protective dome around him. The Master-level Time freezing skill around him tried to resist his skill leaving his body, but it could do nothing in the face of Spiritual Energy. Nor could the Timelady, as her first attack failed to pierce the dome. She moved ridiculously fast and kept attacking though; she would be through in a matter of seconds.

Meanwhile, Aaron used the Spiritual Energy in his mind to think faster and analyzed the formation she had been drawing. It took him an entire second to conclude there was no time to erase it and start over with something else. But he had the time to hijack that back into something good. Something great, even. Something that would guarantee his future power in this world — if he survived the oncoming wrath of the heavens.

And so he drew. With the most care he could muster in the time constraints, with precision born out of limitless practice, he drew. And he also used most of the remaining Spiritual Energy to remove all imperfections from his being, for that was essential for his plans.

Another second passed, and the Timelady broke through the barrier. An axe appeared in her hand. It was on the way to beheading Aaron.

He connected the last line of the formation in his dantian. If it were wrong, he would explode into oblivion. It wasn't. At the same time, he finished perfecting himself, and True Lightning, moving at the very limits of the speed of light, fell from the clear skies above the bare desert, heading for him.

Those who improved too quickly what nature had created imperfect suffered a backlash from the universe itself, what was usually called tribulations. He had gone out of his way to prevent that from happening while improving himself with Divine Energy previously by keeping himself imperfect. Now, he took advantage of it to protect himself from the much more immediate danger the Timelady represented.

Tribulations were jealous things. They accepted no one to interfere with whatever they were doing. The Timelady tried to stop her charge, but it was too late. The lightning bolt that was coming for Aaron changed course and struck her head-on.

She was catapulted back at the same time a new True Lightning bolt came for Aaron.

He used all his remaining Arcane Energy, Vital Energy, and Qi to protect himself. They were all at the Five Star level and were nowhere near enough to defend him, but they softened the blow very slightly.

The bolt hit him. Lightning coursed through his body for the second time since he had come to this world. His veins burst, his arteries ruptured, his heart stopped. He became charcoal at once.

But his dantian was filled with energy.

He needed energy to level up, and True Lightning was great for that. Not as strong as True Fire, yet not weak enough to not be able to fill him up a single strike. More importantly, Lightning was a derived Law, and thus True Lightning was made of Spiritual Energy, just as Fire was a Divine Law and thus, True Fire was made of Divine Energy.

That made it possible to convert True Lightning back into Spiritual Energy, its fundamental energy. It wasn't easy, but doable. Aaron absorbed all he could, activating his new formation in the process. The converted energy nurtured him at the same time the raw power of the lightning tried to destroy everything he was.

He leveled up just before he died.

His fourth formation had been adapted to absorb Spiritual Energy and derive Qi and Arcane Energy — the energies closest to Spiritual Energy — from it. He wouldn't be able to level up Vital Energy this time, it was too different from Spiritual Energy, but he was more than willing to let it lag behind in exchange for immediate survival.

Not all of the Spiritual Energy was used. Some of it was stored away and locked into a kind of personal spatial dimension. None who looked for it would be able to find it inside him. That was a plan for the far future.

For now, Aaron used his extra power to survive. Champion Qi coursed through his body, healing him fast, while Champion Arcane Energy left him to create layers upon layers of defenses above him. The skill freezing him in time had been destroyed together with the lightning bolt that struck the Timelady. He could even teleport away if he wanted, but that would only cause the universe to send a harsher tribulation his way, for it hated cowards.

Tribulations were part of the path of any cultivator who reached far enough. Sooner or later, they had to perfect themselves, and the universe demanded perfection be met with power. Anyone who didn't reach the threshold was eliminated. Aaron didn't know why the universe was like that, but he had accepted it.

Cultivators usually postponed their tribulations up to the last step before Immortality, because only then was it required — one had to be a perfect mortal body to receive a Divine body. So, Aaron would now fight something he had expected to fight when he was a Sage, the ninth level. He was three levels below.

A second True Lightning bolt — not counting the one that had turned to the Timelady — came his way. It broke through all his defenses and his still-healing body. He almost died again, but he was a bit further away from death this time than the first time, for he was now stronger. He used the energy to fill his dantian again and his Qi to heal himself.

Then came the third True Lightning bolt.

Three-three tribulations, nine-nine calamities, thirty-three-thirty-three hells to the heavens, so the saying went. Perfection in different states of existence came with different tests by the universe. Mortal perfection was about three True Lightning bolts.

He needed to survive one more bolt. Only one. But of course, the last one had the power of three bolts together. The universe was many things, but merciful wasn't one of them.

Aaron was almost at full health now. His energies were the strongest they had ever been in this world. He had a chance, a tiny one, of surviving. Sincerely, he had no idea if he would.

True Lightning fell from the heavens to destroy the ant below. The ant used all its might to defy it like a warrior.

If he died, he would have done so in glorious battle against the universe itself.

Bymor watched in awe as the herald Ascended.

That had to be it, hadn't it? That was the Test of Gods, and it only descended when Grandmasters Ascended. But how could the herald Ascend at the Champion level? That was impossible!

The last thing the guardian thought before the shockwave from the lightning bolt knocked him cold was how the herald was truly a man of wonders.

Spiritual Energy wasn't as strong as Sage-level Time Energy, not in a direct clash. Many of that world's energies had traces of Divine or even Prime Laws on them, like Space and Time. That gave them power.

However, they were impure. Spiritual Energy was created by the Dao and followed an order superior to anything sapient minds could produce. That made local energies susceptible to being redirected or pierced by Spiritual Energy. They couldn't withstand such purity if concentrated in a single point, nor easily move it away if it wasn't a head-on collision.

That meant Aaron had no chance at all of blocking a True Lightning bolt, much less one that came with the power of three of them combined. Unlike the previous ones that had been white as any lightning bolt, this one was an angry red that made the ire of the universe clear for all to see. His Champion Arcane Energy was ignored as if it weren't even there, and his body crumbled under its mighty.

The pain was excruciating. Everything he was became a conduit between the fury of the heavens and the uncaring Earth below. He was still mid-air, and seeing the red bolt enter him, then turn into multiple white ones as they reached for the desert below would let anyone think he was nothing but a tool being used to spread the destruction.

Bymor was sent flying away as one bolt hit close to where he lay. Another one killed the confused Timelord that had been unfrozen when Bymor fell unconscious; he didn't even have the time to think about how to escape before being annihilated. Others went the Timelady's way, but Aaron was too focused on himself to see what had happened to her.

His body started disintegrating into nothingness from its extremities. His head above started getting obliterated from existence at a faster pace than his feet. Soon, his head was completely gone, and so were his feet. The destruction kept going.

Fortunately, he had just reached perfect mortality. He could be killed, but not by something as simple as beheading him. Physically, his two vital spots, heart and brain, had to be destroyed or at least heavily damaged. Unless one crippled his dantian first, which would revert him into a common mortal to be killed in multiple ways. And of course, destroying his mind or soul would also be the end of him.

Unfortunately, though his dantian was somewhat safe, the upper annihilation of his body reached his heart way too soon.

Aaron would've yelled if he had a mouth. His arms fell to the ground, for there were no shoulders to support them anymore. His legs had disappeared as his lower body started getting destroyed. And his heart started suffering the heaven's anger.

He used all he had, all his willpower, the extra protection of his soul, the very last strands of Qi, Arcane Energy, and Vital Energy. He cast all the best skills he knew, poured everything he could to protect his heart.

It helped, negligibly so. Millimeter by millimeter, his heart was consumed. Nanometer by nanometer, death approached. Over a third of his heart was gone. A little more and he would be gone forever.

That was it, the end of the road. Only once had he come as close to death as this. There was nothing he could do.

He would die.

But then the lightning bolt dissipated. It wasn't eternal; it had run its course. And Aaron had survived.

More Spiritual Energy immediately descended from the heavens. To the loser of a tribulation, the punishment was death. To the winner, the reward was glorious rebirth.

His body was reforged, his soul recovered, his life returned. His dantian was filled to the brim. He had survived, and he was in peak condition.

Aaron hated to use such a cheat healing at this point, when his enemies were so weak. Yet, he was glad to be alive.

He wasted no time regretting his loss or commemorating his victory. Instead, he turned to the Timelady. She was badly damaged, multiple lightning bolts that had come out of Aaron had hit her. She could easily heal herself at any time though, for she had enough Time Energy remaining.

Surprisingly, the ritual was still ongoing. The death of the Champion Timelord should have concluded it, but the energy that came from his death was merely surrounding her. She was in no rush to use it. Maybe she hoped to use that energy in a turning point?

He wouldn't give her time. She tried to take control over him because of the ritual energy he had consumed, but that energy — and its power — was all gone now. He counterattacked with his strongest long-range skill, to finish that fight for once and for all before she did anything else. She was too resourceful and he didn't want to fight her at all.

Arcane Ultimate Arts: Mortal Annihilation!

Arcane Energy left his dantian in a single beam that illuminated the nightly desert once more. It hit her in the middle of the body and penetrated it. Once inside, it blew up upward, destroying the upper half of her body with ease. Not even dust remained. Even if she had been a perfect mortal, she would die.

And die she did.

But Aaron frowned. She hadn't protected herself from his attack. Why? What was going on?

He got his answer when the distortion around her beast core disappeared. In fact, he now realized she had placed her core right below­­­ where his skill had pierced her. That was a clear sign that she had seen a future where he used the tribulation against her, had simulated a version of him that overcame it, and had guessed he would use that skill to finish her. Everything, from start to finish, had been manipulated by her, and it irked him.

What was revealed when the distortion disappeared, in the gory entrails of her corpse, surrounding her beast core, was something he hadn't expected at all.

A stillborn, not yet completely formed Mouth-Man.

That baby was the last Timelord, not the Timelady or the Champion Timelord whom Aaron had prevented from killing himself. Her death completed the ritual. Its energy surrounded the female baby and nurtured it. From a malformed humanoid mass, she turned into a perfectly healthy baby. Her heart beat, she breathed, she coughed.

And as the ritual reached its last breath, instead of dissipating, it surrounded her beast core, a prismatic ball, and crushed it. An enormous amount of ritual energy came from the inside. She had used it as a focus for another ritual, and it had stored the meaning. The ritual energy entered the baby and made her grow quickly. In less than a minute, a female Mouth-Woman stood on the desert sand.

And yet, it wasn't alive. Not truly. It lacked a soul. Her original one was long gone.

But the Timelady's soul wasn't. It entered the newly formed Mouth-Woman, immediately raising her level to Grandmaster. She looked at Aaron, smiled, and opened a new door to the place where Spiritual Energy had been.

A single strand of Spiritual Energy entered her dantian.

And then, an enormous hand made of golden light appeared on the skies and instantly crushed her like a bug.