34: Chapter 34 The rain is getting heavier!

Hum!

The dazzling red light on the creation terminal cast a bloody hue across Lin Yunfei's already pale cheeks.

He stared unblinkingly at the ten-square-kilometer wasteland in the holographic projection, where wind and clouds were surging turbulently.

According to the basic theories in school textbooks, the transition of a Tier 1 divine kingdom to a Tier 2 divine kingdom was usually just a simple spatial tremor and spiritual Qi tide.

During this process, the area of the divine kingdom would expand accordingly, and its ley lines would become sturdier. As long as the Creator prepared enough Faith Points in advance to stabilize the edges of space, it could basically be weathered smoothly.

However, the scene before him completely subverted Lin Yunfei's understanding.

Above the firmament, the originally clear sky was tightly blanketed by a layer of pitch-black tribulation clouds so thick it seemed impenetrable.

Yet peculiarly, the lightning did not strike down, plunging the entire heaven and earth into an oppressive atmosphere of impending darkness.

Amidst this suffocating dead silence, the first drop of rain silently plummeted from high above.

It was a droplet of an eerie grayish-black color, "Plop."

The grayish-black raindrops landed on a vibrant nine-leaf soul-condensing flower.

The next second, a scalp-numbing scene unfolded.

That mutated spiritual plant, capable of increasing the upper limit of spiritual power and regarded as an invaluable treasure, actually emitted a pungent white smoke in an instant!

The previously tender and alluring deep blue petals rapidly withered and dissolved, finally turning into a pool of foul-smelling black pus that seeped into the ground.

[Warning! Your mutated spiritual plant 'nine-leaf soul-condensing flower' has suffered unknown corrosion and has died!]

This cold system notification sound was like a fatal death talisman.

Immediately following that.

"Cascading down—"

The torrential rain, resembling a heavenly river pouring backwards, descended with a roar!

This was not a sweet dew nourishing all things, but a world-destroying rain aimed at obliterating all vitality!

The grayish-black curtain of rain instantly shrouded the entire divine kingdom.

"Roar—"

On the grassland, that flock of originally docile Purple Lightning Xuan Bulls let out shrill, miserable cries.

The grayish-black rainwater hit their proud, tough fur, actually burning straight through skin and flesh to reveal gleaming white bones. Over a thousand mountain-sized Xuan Bulls completely descended into madness amidst excruciating pain, their eyes red as they rampaged wildly across the pasture, trampling one another.

Those deep brown fertile soils painstakingly nourished by the altar of the abundant spring began to bubble and ulcerate frantically the instant they came into contact with this rain.

Large swaths of fertile soil were stripped of their vitality, degenerating back into highly toxic, foul-smelling mud.

"Enemy attack! All units defend!"

On the martial arts training ground, Leader Yan Er's eyes split open in fury as he let out a hoarse, desperate roar.

Three thousand heavily armored soldiers rapidly formed a military array, driving the violently surging vital blood within their bodies in an attempt to condense a shroud of blood qi above their heads to resist this bizarre downpour.

However, the thick vital blood that was usually invincible now seemed to have encountered its nemesis.

The grayish-black rainwater falling upon the blood qi barrier actually emitted a teeth-aching "hissing" sound, peeling away and devouring the soldiers' protective true qi layer by layer like melting snow!

"Ah—!"

A young soldier standing on the outer perimeter had his shield shatter, and a few drops of rain splashed onto his tough skin—which had been modified by the Azure Dragon Tyrant Body Fruit—instantly corroding several bloody holes deep enough to see bone, causing him to roll about frantically in the muddy water in agony.

"What on earth is this damn thing?!"

In front of the stone hall, High Priest Xi raised the bone staff in his hand high, frantically squeezing out his spiritual power.

A circle of pale green light erupted from within him, barely enveloping the core area of the Megalithic City-State, but under the scouring of the torrential rain, that light barrier was growing dim and cracking at a speed visible to the naked eye.

In mere breaths of time, the divine kingdom had suffered immeasurable, heavy damage!

Lin Yunfei gasped a breath of cold air, his back instantly soaked with cold sweat.

"This isn't an upgrade; this is a heavenly punishment!"

Without any hesitation, he immediately cut off the pain link with the creation terminal, turned, and dashed over to another optical brain, quickly logging into the internal top-secret database of the Interstellar Expeditionary Army.

As a military specially-invited strategic cooperation officer, his clearance was long since incomparable to before.

"Query: Tier 1 divine kingdom transitioning to Tier 2, corrosive black rain, heaven and earth tribulation catastrophe!"

Lin Yunfei's fingers tapped out blurring afterimages on the virtual keyboard, his heart burning with scorching anxiety.

Because within this short one-minute query time, the several million Faith Points that had just warmed up in his account were plummeting frantically at a rate of tens of thousands per second! That was the system forcibly extracting his balance to fill the terrifying deficit caused by the corrosion of the divine kingdom's ley lines.

If he couldn't find the cause and a countermeasure, he wouldn't even need to wait until tomorrow; his divine kingdom would completely transform into a pool of foul-smelling stagnant water today!

The light screen flickered, massive amounts of low-level data were filtered out, and a file marked with bright red "SSS-class top-secret" characters slowly emerged in the center of the screen.

[ Creator Top-Secret File: Tribulation of Foundation and Elemental Annihilation》 ]

Lin Yunfei swallowed a mouthful of saliva, rapidly scanning the contents of the file line by line.

The more he read, the deeper his heart sank, to the point that even his fingertips began to grow slightly cold.

The file clearly recorded a cruel truth.

When ordinary Creators advanced to Tier 2, because the foundation of their divine kingdom was weak, the laws of the Heavenly Dao would only send down the most ordinary energy trials.

But if a divine kingdom's foundation was overly profound—such as possessing advanced wonders, top-tier divine items, or even possessing heaven-defying gold traits like Lin Yunfei, giving birth in a short time to an ecological civilization far exceeding the bearing limit of the current dimension—

Then, the tribulation targeting the divine kingdom would begin to exert its force!

This was known as the "Tribulation of Foundation".

The laws of the Heavenly Dao would send down annihilation disasters composed of the four basic elements of "earth, water, fire, and wind", attempting to completely erase this anomaly that might break the balance right in its cradle!

And what Lin Yunfei was encountering was precisely the one among the four tribulations with the most terrifying sustained lethality—[xuanming heavy water tribulation]!

At the end of the file, a conclusion was given in blood-red font.

[This tribulation cannot be avoided, nor can it be exempted using Faith Points.]

[If surviving the tribulation fails: The divine kingdom will be completely dissolved by the xuanming heavy water, transforming into a primitive chaotic poisonous swamp, the Creator's foundation will be completely destroyed, and he will be unable to ever condense a divine persona again for life.]

[If surviving the tribulation succeeds: The divine kingdom will complete the deepest level of marrow-cleansing and bone-washing, the world's quality will achieve a cross-class transformation, and there is a tiny probability of condensing an exclusive divine kingdom source law!]

Lin Yunfei clenched his teeth tightly, his eyes reflecting the blinding red warning on the screen, his chest heaving violently.

He finally understood why the descendants of those major financial conglomerates of the Wang family, despite possessing massive resources in the early stages, still had to carefully control the development speed of their divine kingdom.

A tree that stands out in the forest will be battered by the wind!

The deeper the foundation and the higher one climbed, the more gruesome the annihilation mechanism faced would be!

But he, Lin Yunfei, had no retreat.

He turned his head to look at the creation terminal beside him.

At this moment, the divine kingdom had turned into a living purgatory.

The deep blue sea of soul-condensing flowers had completely perished, and even their roots had been corroded into black water.

The priceless Purple Lightning Xuan Bulls fell in patches within the toxic mud, their physical bodies containing violent vital blood rapidly turning into pools of foul-smelling bloody water.

What was even more fatal was that the towering B-rank building in the center of the divine kingdom, the altar of the abundant spring, had its surface earthy-yellow halo dimmed to the extreme at this moment.

It was desperately releasing energy, attempting to repair the corroded land, but its repair speed could already far from keep up with the destruction speed of the descending xuanming heavy water.

"Crack—"

A heart-wrenching, crisp sound rang out.

On the altar's hard stone base, a tiny crack had actually split open.

[Warning! The altar of the abundant spring is operating under overload, and its main body damage degree has reached ten percent!]

[Warning! The divine kingdom's ley lines are collapsing! Current ecological damage degree: thirty-five percent!]

[Warning! Your dependents 'Human Race' have suffered heavy casualties, and morale is dropping drastically!]

A succession of red warnings almost flooded Lin Yunfei's retina.

The rain kept getting heavier and heavier.

The fate of the entire divine kingdom, amidst this world-destroying xuanming heavy water, was like a flickering candle in the wind, tottering precariously...