GACHA SOVEREIGN

"Gotcha!" Alex smiled upon seeing nothing stood before him. The dragons continued to make a long tunnel for him until he felt it was safe to make another hole leading to the surface.

Seeing how the dragons didn't get destroyed proved that there were not any more barriers underground.

He followed the tunnel and peeked outside, finding himself surrounded by sand.

"I am on the coast right now." Alex looked at his surroundings, ensuring that no more barriers were coming to him.

"That wind barrier is not supposed to be destroyed?" Alex tilted his head in confusion. "Anyway, now that I am out, I only need to be careful. Wait a minute, I think each test actually has a meaning behind them, just like how the Potential Tower was built. Even Teacher agreed to the explanation.

"If that were the case, then the first stage would be how I adapted to a new environment, especially the sea and the lake. If I couldn't adapt, the lake would continuously attack me until I die. After that, I need to be daring to choose my action because if I hesitate, I will just be trapped inside a dilemma.

"The third stage is to test my strength. Even if I have the determination to go forward, it will be useless without strength. While the fourth stage wants me to know when to fight and when to escape." Alex thought for a moment and nodded.

"The Divine Tribulation is like a continuous story to have me learn what I should do… Now that I think about it, I will go to outer space as soon as I ascend. It means I will face a new place and challenge… I see, it's preparing me for this." Alex frowned.

With this thought, Alex finally leaped to the surface, watching how the wind barriers destroyed themselves.

He returned to the center while thinking about the next riddle.

"What will I do after I escape?" Alex thought for a moment and smiled. The answer was obvious. "I will—"

Before he finished his words, an immeasurable pressure hit him, pinning him to the ground.

"Kh!" Alex gritted his teeth. "As expected, it will be elementless. After escaping, I will train myself! This pressure is meant to be my drive to get stronger."

Alex understood the meaning of this fifth stage but didn't know how to clear it.

He looked around only to find himself being surrounded by this pressure. Even if he went to the coast, he would be trapped inside this pressure.

"I only have one thing to do!" Alex punched the ground, trying to create another hole.

*Bam!*

It created a small crater instead because this pressure made him unable to control his strength.

"I can adjust it first before…" Alex suddenly fell silent as he felt something change in his body. "What is this?"

The pressure didn't come to his body alone. Instead, it was enveloping his entire body together with his soul.

And it seemed the body was trying to absorb this pressure by itself. Even if he tried to stop it, the body wouldn't listen. All this energy flowed to his heart, specifically his soul.

A thought crossed his mind, making him gulp down. However, he chose to try it because he had nothing to lose.

His soul sat on the white cloud, absorbing the energy as if he was cultivating.

"Argh!" Alex screamed out of pain. Although he felt stronger, the pain was as if someone was grasping his heart tightly. It was hard to breathe and made his limbs feel limp.

He fell on his knees, enduring this pressure. However, he suddenly got confused as to which part of him was getting stronger. On one hand, the soul was the one absorbing the energy, but it also released its energy to his body.

"If I am not wrong, the latter part of the Divine Tribulation will prepare oneself to form all those Divine Things. From what I see here, this Elementless stage wants to reform either my soul or body." Alex took a deep breath, calming himself down from this pressure.

When he was able to do that, he finally saw what was happening inside his body. The soul was refining the energy from this pressure to turn it suitable to refine his body. All he needed to do was to withstand this pain until everything was over.

"I can endure pain just like the usual," Alex muttered to himself before sitting on a lotus pose. The feeling was as if he was sitting under the waterfall. However, the pain was not comparable to what he experienced with his Undying Body Refinement.

He let his soul do the work. His scream stopped, and the pain diminished until one point he opened his eyes, feeling refreshed.

"I have gotten stronger, but this is still not a Divine Body. I need to prepare the Spiritual Energy and Soul as well while solving the riddle. To be honest, a lot of work must have been put into this Divine Tribulation. Now let's continue the story." Alex smirked. "After I get stronger, I will test my strength…"

When he said those words, he suddenly felt the temperature going down instantly.

"This must be…" Alex gritted his teeth, having no time to react. Water particles suddenly surrounded him and turned into ice, freezing both outside and inside his body. "Argh!"

The freezing ability was too powerful for Alex, and the temperature was very low to the point it was burning him instead of feeling cold. And it was only his skin feeling that. As for the air inside his lungs and other areas, it also froze to the point it almost killed him.

However, his Pure Fire started revolving and warmed his body before gushing out of his body to melt the ice.

"As expected, the story is like this. Overconfident is a no-no. The world is attacking me where I least expected… In fact, the air in my body froze first, making me unable to react." Alex gritted his teeth. Although this was the easiest stage so far, it was the one that dealt the most damage to his mental health. He sweatdropped and still let the fire cover him lest the world attacked him in another way.

But before he could do anything, the world turned dark as he couldn't see a single thing. Then a few lights came to his vision, turning into his memory in the past.

The memories about Sandra, John, Alicia, Firia, and many others. Some were sad, some were happy. Alex felt nothing when watching this because he believed in what he had experienced. It was true that his past looked dim, but he felt grateful to it because that past allowed him to reform with a stronger mental fortitude.

He watched these screens that seemed to want to bother his mind before he found a single figure appearing before him. It was another him.

"Yo! It's been a while since we last met." The other Alex waved his hand with a smile.

"It's been a while?" Alex furrowed his eyebrows and opened his mouth in surprise. "You are the previous me."

"Yes. I used a part of my power because I found the situation was quite dangerous. The Divine Tribulation will be much stronger if you have many things in your repertoire. I have predicted this and embedded a piece of my soul to warn you."

Alex nodded. "I know. From the way I experienced it, it's really like that. The one that almost killed me was the Ice Stage, but I would never fall on the same trick. That's why I am covering my body with Pure Fire… And I think I can cover all cells in my body with fire to prevent me from getting frozen like earlier. I believe those Gods and Goddesses possess this kind of ability, so I know my mistake and won't repeat it."

The previous Alex nodded with a smile. "That's good. I was a bit worried when that Ice Stage came, but couldn't do anything. Anyway, this Dark Stage will be trying to influence you. As long as you are prepared, your mental energy won't have any problem."

"Now that you mention it, this place must be trying to strengthen my Mental Energy and soul." Alex stroked his chin while looking down. "In that case, I will be careful."

"That's good. Since you know what to do, I will be going now." The previous Alex turned around, ready to disappear. However, before he realized it, a sword pierced him. "Gah!"

He turned around and saw the current Alex was the culprit. And yet, he smiled instead of feeling betrayed. "Since when?"

"From the start," Alex said with a serious expression. "My previous self has told me that I will be in charge and he won't bother me again. That's why I know he won't appear like this, especially with the current situation. If you appear when I withstand the Golden Lightning Tribulation, I might believe it, but it's not this stage.

"You said it yourself, this Dark Stage is going to influence me. Aren't you trying to do that this whole time?"

The previous Alex only smiled and closed his eyes as Alex's sword split him into half. "Excellent."

As soon as he killed the heart of this illusion, the previous him turned into a light that seeped inside his body, refining his soul.

Alex gritted his teeth, ensuring that soul wouldn't be a part of his personality. In other words, he only accepted the energy, not the personality. His Spirit Eyes confirmed that it was only energy.

After five minutes, he opened his eyes again. However, the moment he looked up, he found himself in another place.

Why was it another place? Because the world didn't look like the one he was in a minute ago. The crater and mountains disappeared, the forest spread all over the area, and he found a hut not far from him.

"This must be an illusion." Alex was convinced in a single glance. "At first, I wanted to believe I was teleported to another place, but it wasn't the case. I couldn't use my Space Element that much during this test, so no way the world gave the Space Stage as my tribulation."

Alex nodded and looked around with his Spirit Eyes before he doubted himself. "Wait. My Spirit Eyes allow me to break any illusions… Don't tell me it's not an illusion, but a different place instead?"

Alex gulped down, beginning to believe this was a Space Stage. And yet, it became another doubt because the ground suddenly rose, creating an earth spike.

Waving his sword, he cut the spike. Feeling the cut, a strange sensation rose in his brain. "There is no Spiritual Energy coming from that spike. It shouldn't be possible!"

A few more spikes were coming, only to get chopped by Alex.

He didn't get this test at all.

"What is the element?" Alex thought for a moment. "As much as I want to believe it is a Space Element, it's not. I am sure because of that earlier attack. It has a feeling but doesn't have Spiritual Energy. In that case, there must be another trick. I need to figure it out."

Alex decided to step forward and stumbled because of the uneven ground. This confused him because it shouldn't have anything like this.

The image of the previous place appeared before him as he remembered the slope continued for a few more meters. To confirm his suspiciousness, he walked for another few meters, realizing that the terrain in his eyes slowly turned, reshaping into a brand new world.

The small house was still there, but it was in the middle of the crater. He couldn't help but continue the story in his mind. "From the Darkness Stage, I know that it's an illusion. After getting beaten to a half-dead state by the Ice Element, I will experience an illusion where I question myself, or so the legend said.

"And what if I come back alive?" Alex furrowed his eyebrows. He had a few potential answers but didn't know which one was correct. He shook his head and took a deep breath. "I will search it one by one."