Chapter 248: Sixth Rank

"I'm going to make your powers mine!", Rex shouted in delight.

Hearing this, Devo chuckles slowly as if he's underestimating Rex, "No humans in the past 10,000 years have managed to assimilate with me, What makes you think you're able to?"

Devo looks down on Rex while crossing his arms in front of him,

The look on his face is that of a mocking look, his lightning eyes blitz mockingly as if he's saying to Rex to back down.

But unknown to Devo, Rex is not a human.

NGIING!!

14 black dots appeared all over Rex's body as he activates his black lightning, 

The media all over Rex's body glows fiercely as it emits a horrifying amount of mana, the air started to tremble as the condensed place got filled with mana to the brim.

CRACK!

The barrier from the spikes started cracking, it can't hold the clashes between Rex and Devo.

Feeling the immensely dense mana surrounding the insides of the barrier, Devo's expression changed as he too felt threatened by such an amount of mana.

It's like the pressure underwater, the mana that Rex emits is very dense.

Looking at Devo's change in expression, a smirk appears on Rex's face, "Not so confident now huh?", he asks cheekily.

Devo's aura becomes even more powerful, splashes of lightning energy zap the barrier.

"Then we'll see who will have the last laugh!", Devo said before his body turns into misty energy and instantly infiltrate Rex's body.

Right after Devo enters Rex's body, "AARGHH!!"

Excruciating pain attacked every inch of Rex's body as Devo's energy got sucked into Rex's media, it was the most painful experience Rex felt in his entire life.

Veins bulged around his neck as his eyes glows blue lightning just like Devo's.

<Assimilating with Devo the Gatekeeper>

<0%...>

<2%...>

Rex saw the system notification for a split moment before the pain attacked him.

The others are watching Rex battle against Devo's energy inside the barrier in awe, lightning zapped around the barrier fiercely as Rex screamed in pain.

All kinds of thoughts went inside the other's mind while seeing this.

Edward is shocked to see Rex is shouting painfully, the pain he's currently going through must exceed the caliber of what a human can endure.

He was certain of it because he never saw Rex in this kind of pain.

During the night where Rex saved his life, 

Edward looks at his back for one last time and saw Rex's body is broken all over, and even then Rex didn't shout or even frown in pain.

But this time, Rex is screaming because of this process.

Adhara, on the other hand, is filled with worry, her eyes are glued at Rex fearing something might happen to him.

Even though she doesn't know how to reach the sixth rank,

She heard that many stayed at the fifth rank fearing for their lives, so this must mean that reaching the sixth rank has a possibility to die during the process.

"RAAARGHH!!", the glow on Rex's eyes glow brighter.

His whole body cracked with lightning even more chaotically until suddenly,

KABOOM!!

CRASHH!

A powerful lightning shockwave blasted from within Rex's body as one of Devo's media got locked, the barrier from the spikes instant shatters because of the shockwave.

SWOOSH!

Adhara and Edward got pushed back from the blast, the staff on the other hand got flung away.

Now that the barrier broke, the overwhelming energy Rex and Devo emitted went rampant without anything to restrain it.

Adhara and Edward stab their daggers on the ground trying to hold on.

Looking at this, Edward then shouted, "You! Do something! This room will not hold, find someone to contain this before the room crumbles apart!!"

Without wasting any more seconds, the staff runs out of the room hurriedly.

After the staff left to find somebody to contain this, Adhara and Edward marvel at Rex who started levitating on the air.

From Rex's eyes that are now blitzing with lightning,

They can somehow see that a battle is undergone inside Rex's body, and from the look of it the battle is fierce and violent.

KABOOM!!

Another shockwave exploded from Rex's body sending Adhara and Edward crashing to the wall.

The wind of energy inside the room becomes even more violent, it's clear that Devo is not going to let Rex conquer him easily.

Adhara opened her eyes slightly,

She saw out of fourteen black dots around Rex's body, two of them has already dimmed as Devo's presence becomes even fainter.

Meanwhile,

Inside the neighboring building from Rex currently at,

All of the people inside the building have a ferocious and sharp aura, they are all sixth rank or above who are training to further assist humanity against the Supernatural.

But unlike the building Rex is currently at, the number of people in this building is fewer.

In the lobby, there are only four people that were chatting with each other.

Because only a few humans manage to reach sixth rank and above, these people tend to know each other fairly well.

"Are you going to Eqosa City tomorrow? If so, you need to prepare"

"I heard that Eqosa City is hopeless to maintain"

"My guild told me to go there to assist, I don't know if anything will be left when I arrived there"

While they are all chatting, 

BOOM!

A loud explosion can be heard from outside catching all of their attentions,

But what grabs their attention was not the loud explosion sound, but rather, the spirit energy that comes right after the loud explosion.

It was like a cold wind brushing their back, and their senses caught it.

"Do you guys feel that too?"

"What the heck was that! My spirit got suppressed!"

"It seems it's coming from outside, my god! Such amount of mana can't be from just one person right?"

"Let's check it out"

After noticing the energy, the four of them went outside of the place.

They all are curious about the powerful energy that came out of nowhere, it's nothing that they have ever seen before.

Right when they got outside,

They notice that the sky is rumbling with lightning, 

KABOOM!!

KABOOM!

Two explosions sound can be heard again, one of them saw where the energy come from and shouted, "Look there! I think someone is assimilating with a spirit!"

"What?! What kind of spirit does this!", another added while looking at the sky.

Above the neighboring building, the clouds are swirling in a circle creating a vortex in the sky, the tongue of lightning can be seen rampantly striking down creating a thundering sound.

Even the wind turns cold, it was a phenomenon that they have never seen before.

CRACK!!!

BOOM!!

The four Awakened glance at the building in horror, they just never heard any spirit that can create this kind of bizarre occurrence.

But then suddenly, amidst the rumbling of the sky and the explosion.

A man can be seen running towards them, he has a panicked look on his face.

The cold wind becomes even harsher,

Beautiful blue Mana Sphere got blown by the wind as they brush past the man.

Looking at this, the four Awakened came over to the man before one of them asks, "What happened? Is someone currently assimilating with a spirit?"

"Yes and I need help!", the staff said hurriedly.

Hearing this, the four Awakened looks at each other before the staff continue, "The Spiritual Chamber can't lock the spirit! I need you guys to create a barrier until the assimilation process is finished or the whole building will rumble!"

Back to the Spiritual Chamber, 

"RAARGHH!", Rex's body started bleeding all over.

The lightning that came from Devo's energy is attacking Rex's body, it's as if the lightning doesn't want to let Rex win.

"Six!", Edward shouted after another shockwave hits him.

He and Adhara got planted flat on the wall because of the energy, they can't get down from the wall no matter how much they tried.

Edward counted the shockwaves, it reach six times and still counting.

KABOOM!

The spiritual chamber shook as it was now almost destroyed, the spikes are already broken and the walls are already cracked under the energy's might.

After the seventh shockwaves, the mist around the room started inching closer to Rex.

Blood splattered around the place from Rex's body, but it instantly dissipated because of the chaotic lightning that attacks everything around the place.

It's a miracle for Adhara and Edward to not get hit by the lightning.

KABOOM!!

While this is all happening, Rex is currently inside his head fighting mentally with Devo.

"Give up!! You will die if you won't let me go!!", Devo shouted angrily.

But instead of giving up, Rex tries to lock Devo's media harder, "Your power will become mine whether you like it or not!!", Rex shouted back.

"Then die!!", Devo replied threateningly.

The mist around the place started to envelop Rex's body, it twirls around under Rex's levitating body creating somekind of a white vortex.

KABOOM!

Rex becomes even more daring in locking Devo's media, he's now on the ninth one.

He remembers that Chandler told him that a ninth rank Awakened spirit has 7 media resulting in seven shockwaves, but now, he's currently in the ninth one.

Devo is a strong spirit Rex knows that, but he doesn't expect to be this strong!

Although the lightning hurts his body greatly, Devo notices that Rex has an unbelievable healing ability that exceeds his imagination.

Knowing that he started to change his plan in making Rex throw in the towel.

The mist infiltrate Rex's lungs making him hard to breathe, 

Rex gasps a couple of times feeling that breathing becomes harder, he knows that this is all Devo's doing and he won't let Devo win.

Amidst the chaos, Rex gritted his teeth desperately.

He tries to calm down his mind amidst the excruciating pain before his body glows with a yellow aura, Rex is trying to use his force manipulation ability.

Rex somehow manages to gather yellow force, he then guides it to his lungs.

The force infiltrate his lungs and reinforced them before clashing with the mist inside, and slowly but surely the force started to push the mist out of Rex's lungs.

Not long after, four people arrived at the scene.

Upon opening the door to the Spiritual Chamber, the four Awakened are greeted by the sight of Rex levitating on the air while lightning zapped his body repeatedly.

Mists also gather around Rex creating a spiral as it tries to infiltrate Rex's body.

They also saw Rex's body glow with a yellow hue, and they know that the yellow hue is not an elemental aura but rather a force aura.

Devastating energy pushes them back a couple of steps but they held on.

Their bodies glow with elemental aura as they forcefully get inside the room and close it.

Without waiting any longer, the four Awakened stretch their hands forward and gather all of the mana that they can gather to create a barrier around Rex.

Sweats flow down on their sides as they try to keep the energy locked inside the barrier.

Right after the barrier envelop Rex's body and the powerful energy that came out of Devo, Adhara and Edward fall to the ground with heavy breaths.

The energy holds them on the wall, and it presses their chest heavily.

Thanks to the four Awakened, they manage to catch their breaths and move to the back of the four Awakened.

"Thank you for saving us", Adhara thanked.

Hearing this, one of the Awakened then asks, "Do you know who that person is? How come he managed to get such spirit and have the gut to assimilate with it?"

"He is Rex Silverstar", Adhara replied while looking in Rex's direction.

Upon hearing Rex's name, the four Awakened widened their eyes because the name is familiar.

Then, another Awakened asks, "How many shockwaves has it been since he started assimilating? Is it 4? or 5?"

"It's the ninth one", Edward replied.

Hearing this, the four Awakened widened their eyes in shock.

Their eyes almost popped out of their sockets upon hearing Edward's reply, it was unbelievable news but the evidence is right in front of them.

KABOOM!!

KABOOM!!

KABOOM!!

Every time the shockwaves come, the four Awakened struggle to keep the barrier.

They already use all of the mana they can gather, but it's still a hard job to keep the barrier from breaking and destroying the chamber in the process.

KABOOM!

It's the thirteenth shockwaves, all of the black dots on Rex's body dimmed except for the one located on Rex's head.

By now, the four Awakened are starting to feel tired.

The shock and the current force from the shockwaves take a toll on them, and in just a matter of minutes, they might not able to maintain the barrier anymore.

"RAAAARRRRGGHH!!", Rex shouted loudly as the mana got concentrated on his body.

The lightning becomes even more ferocious before suddenly,

CRAACKK!!

KABOOM!!

A bolt of thick lightning strikes down from the sky destroying the chamber's roof in the process and hitting Rex directly, it looks similar to his spell Sky Rupture but more deadly.

BLITZ!!

The barrier exploded as sparks of black lightning burst from the barrier to the surrounding.

All of the four Awakened, Adhara, and Edward got blasted towards the door and went through the door after destroying the door in the process.

Smoke covered the entire place as they stands up strugglingly.

Adhara and Edward stand up with scratches all over their bodies, their eyes look in the chamber's direction in worry.

The smoke slowly but surely started to dissipate.

All of their eyes are glued onto the chamber's direction in anticipation,

Tap...

Tap...

The sound of footsteps approaching can be heard lightly, this makes their hearts drum faster.

Not long after the footsteps, a figure emerge from the black smoke as black lightning cracked around the figure's body chaotically.

Bzzztt!!

The air trembles as Rex came out from the smoke slowly.

Adhara and Edward's eyes widen as they saw Rex's bloodied body, it is clear that the assimilation process that Rex went through is hazardous even by seeing his current state.

Feeling the immense lightning mana from Rex's body, the four Awakened look at each other.

They then said in a union, "Congratulation in reaching the Sixth Rank, Rex Silverstar!"