Chapter 1184: Push and Pull The sounds of the enhanced Tribulation raining down on Rowan were like a hellish drum being beaten by a legion of demons, a trillion strong. If not for the impossibly enhanced hold of Time over this region, then this Tribulation would have been heard and seen throughout the entire realm. Loud cracking sounds emerged from the bodies of the Calamity gods as they began to slowly break down. The flames covering them were a double-edged sword. Enhancing their powers, while burning away at their un-life. The bloodshot eyes of the Shiik followed every exchange like a hawk, she was agitated, and her gaze fueled these Calamity gods, the thoughts of failing the task set out by their Queen, the idea that the reason they existed in the first place would not be coming to fruition made them roar in rage and push more powers into their bodies, exceeding the limits imposed on them during their creation. Their weapons came down faster and harder. It was unknown if Rowan knew that the mental state of anguish he placed on the Shiik might have caused this unexpected growth in the difficulty of his Tribulation, but this was most likely the case, most things Rowan did were never by accident. It did not take long for this enhanced state the Calamity gods entered to begin to show results. Rowan felt his Ascendant body breaking down faster than he would have wanted, reaching some of his worst estimations, but it was also within his margin of failure and he adjusted himself accordingly. The force of the Tribulation raining down on him was not the problem, it would take a thousand times more power to shatter his Ascendant body if it was by force alone, however, it was the intense Calamity Aura that every single move brought with them that troubled him. His Ascendant body was pure unlike every other Ascendant in this realm whose essence and Aura had become inextricably linked with Calamity, which made them two sides of the same coin, yet this knowledge was hidden from them all. They never knew that the Calamity they fought was simply another side of themselves. Rowan feared that even the Ascendant Suns might not know they might be nothing but puppets against an invisible controller, who Rowan could only recognize because of the unknown green energy, and the fact that he came from outside this realm. Dealing with the Aura of Calamity was extremely difficult with the other things he had to be actively juggling at the same time, which included pushing his Ascendant Aura towards the first Dan, freezing time over this vast area, and handling the effects of the Tribulation so it does not spread out of the continent. All of these things could not be simply left to chance but had to be actively monitored, billions of permutations and unknown combinations were taking place with every moment that passed, and Rowan like a madman was choosing not to use his mind to analyze all of these changes analytically, instead, he was instinctively working through them using his soul. He was like a captain sailing through a hurricane with his eyes blindfolded and both arms tied behind his back, yet trusting his ship and crew to follow his orders to the letter, even while he was gagged, and despite all of these things, he was still making it all work. However, the truly difficult part in all of these, and what he feared could shatter his Tribulation was the fact that his pure Ascendant Aura wanted to merge with the Calamity Aura. It was well known that Ascendant Aura and Calamity Aura were supposed to repel each other, but no one in this realm ever had pure Ascendant power in their bodies. From the time they learned to draw Aura into themselves, which was most likely harvested from the bodies of Calamities, their Aura became tainted, no one could be like Rowan who sought to keep their Aura extremely pure. This tainted Aura could only stay together because of the unique Aura Signature of every Ascendant, thereby it repelled any Aura that was extreme from its own, and only accepted the ones that were closer to its nature. If there was any Explorer in the past or present who was bold and powerful enough to restrict themselves to only collecting Ascendant energy from the body of other humans it would still be useless, because they would never be able to gather enough to push them towards Ascendancy, and it would still be tainted by Calamity. All Aura was gained via the Will of the World which collects the Aura from the fallen, processes it, and passes it on to the receiver, normally the amount of Aura gained from this process is less than one percent of the entire Aura in the body of those that were slain. Rowan did not have to go through the World's Will to process the Ascendant Aura, so there was no waste in his harvest, and the pure Aura he gained from this process lacked any taint of Calamity that was present in the Aura given by the World's Will, despite the claims that it was cleansed. Even if the World's Will was capable enough to make every Aura it gave the Ascendants truly pure, Rowan was sure that such a thing would go against its will. It seemed that for some reason the World's Will wanted Calamity to win this war. All of these thoughts ran through his mind like lightning, as he tried to hold back his Ascendant Aura from rushing out of his body and embracing the Calamity outside his rapidly crumbling shell. The problem was that his Ascendant body was simply a powerful container for his soul, it possessed no enhanced characteristics that could aid Rowan in controlling his Aura, although it possessed all of these features of Aura manipulation in a limited manner, it could not aid Rowan when he was facing such a strenuous situation such as this one. He did not hesitate and ruthlessly sacrificed ten percent of his total Ascendant Aura to lessen the load that had become imposed on him. Ten percent of Rowan's entire Aura capacity was almost equal to all the Aura that could be found in the body of a billion Ascendant. The eruption of this power was like nothing this realm had ever seen. No single Ascendant since the beginning of their existence could ever hold this amount of Aura in their bodies. His Ascendant body rumbled and flared a bright blue that nearly escaped the bounds of the continent. The light destroyed billions of the tiny calamities struggling to enter the cracks in his body and destroyed tens of thousands of the Calamity gods. This eruption not only pushed back his Tribulation, but it also healed a lot of the cracks surrounding his Ascendant body, relieving a lot of the pressure he was under as the progress towards upgrading his Ascendant body finally reached the halfway mark. It would seem that he had made the right move. 𝐟𝐫𝕖𝗲𝘄𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝕧𝐞𝚕.𝕔𝕠𝐦 Rowan felt his soul rumbling, as the premonition of danger he was becoming familiar with began to echo all through his soul.