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Rhys kept on fighting without caring for his physical injuries.
In the 10th wave, he almost lost a leg, his inner organs were damaged so badly he lost control of his body from the pain. Still, he won by using Aether to disrupt their energy flow and damage their dantian and meridians with the chaotic aether.
After that, he got a month time worth of rest.
During his 12th wave, Rhys's glaive shattered, he had lost his trusty weapon. He took so many injuries that wave he had to use his physique to destabilize space and destroy his enemies with aether. But that almost got him killed since the formations around the trial tried to fix the space to make sure nothing went wrong, making Rhys take on a drawback from his ability being forcefully canceled.
During the 15th wave his scales were destroyed by a barrage of attacks, he lost his most useful defense.
Afterward, he got 3 months' worth of rest. Which he used well to sleep, let his energy recover, his body heal, and process his fights. In fact, Rhys felt it was too little time for rest. But during that time he broke through into the Mid Earthly Saint level.
During the 19th wave, the current one, Rhys lost his left arm, it was chopped off. The use of his right arm had also slightly decreased from the nerve damage. His bones had been broken in multiple different places, overall, Rhys was a mess.
'If I survive this I will heal my broken body with one of the pills in the Jade ring, I just have to wait... one more wave and I'll be done.' Rhys thought as he panted, his bloody, battered body stood still on a battlefield with 10 corpses. If one were to look closely they would see that their energy undulations were that of High-level Sky Saint.
'But... I fought 10 in this wave, so what about the last? I only got 10 opponents on my 5th, 10th, and 15th wave...' Rhys was feeling some fear from what he might face next.
It had been over 4 months since he began taking the inheritance trials and Rhys was honestly exhausted. The only reason he survived thus far was that Ina would warn him of dangers from time to time, his body could not keep up with so many powerful opponents.
'Damn, I really, really regret not training more!' Rhys cursed in his mind over and over as his only source of sanity was Ina, his mental state was very sturdy thanks to the constant torture he went through back in his past life.
Before Rhys could complain any further, an announcement by the same monotonous voice shocked him.
[Congratulations on passing the 19th wave. The last and final wave, wave 20 will begin in 6 months, good luck and prepare, for it will be the hardest yet.]
With those words, the voice went quiet as everything went still.
Rhys who heard those words felt like pulling his hair out in frustration.
"Fuck." Rhys could not help but curse at the change, he welcomed it. But that meant the final wave was hard enough to give him double the time of rest as the last, but even the monotonous voice wished him good luck.
"I'm fucked aren't I?" Rhys felt like laughing at his misfortune, at this point, the only chance of winning was to break through into the High Earthly Saint.
Rhys's tired, battered body collapsed on the ground as he lost consciousness, but that did not mean his body did nothing. Naturally, it used the energy in his body to heal slowly, closing the wound on his arm and fixing his broken bones and body.
Rhys slept for 3 whole days before he woke up, but his body hurt all over, the flames that healed his body were still burning after all, meaning he still wasn't fully healed.
"Hello, sleepyhead." Ina spoke in his mind. Her body contained much more warmth, that was because Rhys had only her to speak with, and since she basically knew everything about him. They had gotten closer, before they were considered acquaintances, now they were friends.
"Ah Ina... how long was I out for?"
"3 days, focus on healing before you do anything else. You have time to breakthrough, with the experience you gathered, you should be able to breakthrough in around 3 months. You still need to spend some time comprehending fire laws. So focus on healing to do what's important." Her voice was filled with care, making Rhys smile. He had not talked to her much before, but now, only they remained.
So Rhys used this time to talk to her to make sure he did not go mad from only fighting, he could endure torture, but solitude was too much for him.
It took around one more week for Rhys's flame to stop their healing. During that time, Rhys had to stop healing himself so he could recover his energy to power his Flame Regeneration.
Once he had regenerated, Rhys spent his time breaking through into the High Earthly Saint. Just as Ina said, it took Rhys around 3 months to succeed and enter the High-level. Once that was out of the way Rhys spent his time getting used to his new strength before he focused on comprehending the Law of Fire.
...
As Rhys sat in a lotus position on the ground, his body was engulfed in flames that flickered with life, intelligence, and strength. The flames grew stronger over time, as Rhys's comprehension of fire progressed.
"Fire. It can nurture. Destroy. It is a force of change. It represents both destruction and creation. Flames can bring froth life and death depending on their use."
"Flames can..."
Rhys kept on muttering the comprehension he obtained over the law of fire. His vision was filled with different use of flames, used by different individuals. Even the will of worlds and the universe use it as a form of tribulation.
Many different images flashed in his head as different colored flames, different sizes and with different properties were shown.
Red, Blue, Black, White, Purple, Lavender, Amethyst, Green...
During this time, his body was engulfed in beautiful flames, the flames changed color depending on the vision Rhys saw.
Time slowly ticked by as the six months came to an end, by that time Rhys had consolidated his comprehension over fire. He felt much better. He had also made sure to regenerate his aether reserves by destabilizing space just enough for aether to enter but not enough for the formations to detect.
But Rhys realized that he was nearing the end of the 3 months only a few hours left, so he made sure to spend that time eating, which he had not done in a long time, mostly to feel the taste of food once more.
He also exchanged some words with Ina before he stretched his body and got his mind and heart ready for the last, and most difficult wave.
'This is the last.' Rhys took in a deep breath before his eyes turned steady.
[The last and final wave will begin.]
The voice once more sounded, sounding the same as ever. A flash once more blinded Rhys before a beautiful, blue-eyed, and black hair woman appeared. She outshone everything else, even her beauty seemed to make the surroundings better.
Before Rhys had time to realize anything, the same voice spoke again. Surprising Rhys since it would never do this.
[Your last and final opponent will be Divine Eternal Moon Goddess herself, you will fight the version of her when she was nothing but a Low-Level Heavenly Saint. Her skills, experience, and power will all be reduced to the said level. Prepare, the final battle will begin in 1 minute.]
Rhys who heard this couldn't help but curse out loud.
"Ah this fucking shit, how the fuck am I supposed to fight her!? This is some bullshit! I am so dead. Dammit!" His curses spread in the surroundings.
Even Ina was shocked by the change in difficulty, but she still made sure to support Rhys, "Survive and I will allow you to access more of the treasury from the Jade ring."
"Really!? Okay, but I think my chances are null. There will be no chance to hold back..."
Rhys felt exasperated, there was no way he would win, he already missed an arm, his body might have recovered but his balance was all messed up due to the missing arm. His glaive was gone, he could only use his fist.
Sure, he could make a glaive of flames with his fire law comprehension, but Rhys did not know how he would do with it when he only had one arm, he knew he would need both arms to defend against attacks from his final opponent.
The only option was to manifest a sword of flames, but he had little to no experience with them.
Flames coated Rhys's right arm, the only arm he had left. As a fiery sword appeared, it look normal, it was condensed of pure flames. The slicing power was high. It was also strong enough to compare to his broken glaive, that was only because of his current law comprehension with fire.
[Begin.]
The moment the voice spoke, Rhys's opponent vanished and appeared before him.
'Too fast!' Rhys's pupils dilated before his scales tried to clock the attack, they spread throughout his body, yet the pure ice sword of his opponent immediately froze the scales and broke through them.
"Kuh!" Rhys grunted in pain as a slash appeared in his chest, his scales stopped spreading, and returned into his body.
'Useless.' Rhys thought as he stopped using a defensive power that did not work. His flames immediately moved from his right arm to his chest to close and heal the wound.
Rhys used this chance to raise his arm and block the attack. His fire sword and her ice sword clashed and battled over dominance, but her condensed energy started to freeze his sword.
Rhys's flames tried to keep the ice still while light erupted from Rhys's body and manifested into light rays that rushed towards his opponent.
But they did nothing as pure ice energy turned into an ice dome and blocked the attacks.
Rhys tried harder but he was pushed back, it was only normal, his center of gravity was all messed up from his missing arm, his energy wasn't as pure, his body strength could still not compare, overall, Rhys was at a disadvantage.
In fact, he would have lost if it wasn't for his many bloodline powers and higher fire prowess due to flame affinity powering the power of his flames.
Rhys used Draconic Eyes and tried to read her movements, but they were too fast for his eyes to keep track of, even with his special eyes. His flames burned brighter as they lit up the surroundings, Rhys smiled as he now had less trouble keeping track of her movements.
It was natural, Light Sense was being used. Light Sence allowed Rhys to sense anything that light made by him touched. [1]
With light sense active, Rhys had a better time sensing her body movement. His eyes were still shining with a golden light as he tried to identify any possible pattern in her movements to take advantage of.
Yet it was not working, his eyes were being overused, the white of his eyes started to slowly turn red from the overuse of Draconic Eyes, yet Rhys only gritted his teeth and continued to use it despite the pain.
Foosh!
Their weapons met once more as Rhys was pushed back due to not being able to balance his body without his missing arm. Even if he did have it, his raw strength was lower than his opponent.
'Dammit!'
Rhys felt this was some joke, how could anyone besides him cross these many levels to fight? He only did it for his powerful bloodlines, he had four of them.
'Perhaps it adjusted to my powers after I revealed them!' Rhys had pieced together the reason why the trial sent stronger enemies towards him.
'That makes sense! It detected my prowess! Dammit.' Rhys cursed once more before he raised his sword to meet the icy sword of the illusion of the first eternal moon spirit of Zolorix.
Rhys and the younger version of the Divine Eternal Moon Goddess clashed, although Rhys kept on being on the losing end of the clashes. Yet he did not give up, his fires burned brighter as his will strengthened.
'I will win no matter what!'
Fwoosh!
The heat all around Rhys grew more intense as Rhys's eyes turned crimson and his pupils golden, Fiery Eyes had been revealed!
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[1]: Before the ability Light Sense had the description of anything any light touched, he would be able to sense it. But now I changed it to that only Rhys could sense what light made by him could touch. That is to keep the ability from being too overpowered.
Author's Note:
As stated in the first chapter uploaded today, the mistake in the story was on me for not remembering. As I said, I will make sure this does not happen again. Do forgive this inadequate writer.