Lightning Is the Only Way

Some hours after Gravis left the Hunting Guild, he arrived at a destroyed village. All the wooden huts were broken into pieces and piled into a hill. This was The Demon's lair. No one could afford to place a bounty for a medium-grade demonic beast around these parts. So, most of the villagers had fled the village, while only the old, stubborn villagers remained. Sadly, by the looks of the destroyed village, their end was not peaceful.

The Demon had made its nest out of the remains of the village to demonstrate its dominance. Humans had exclusive living space and were the overlords of this world. Only in the wilderness, could beasts thrive. By occupying an exclusive living space of the humans, The Demon was demonstrating its dominance.

Gravis spotted parts of The Demon poking out from beneath the rubble. The Demon was a gigantic centipede, about 30 meters in length. Hooked legs grew from the centipede's segmented body, which they could use to stab and grip their prey. Their relatively small front, together with their many legs, made them incredibly fast. On top of that, every section of its body was encased in thick armor. Their bite was also incredibly venomous.

Speed, defense, power, and venom. All of this made The Demon a fearsome opponent. It was probably very powerful, even for a medium-grade demonic beast. All parts of its body were made to kill. At the start of their lives, centipedes were small and weak, which meant that this specimen had to work hard to get to its current strength. So, its will would also be very robust.

Under normal circumstances, Gravis couldn't even hope to scratch the centipede. It would outspeed him and surround him with all its legs. At that point, only death would await him. There were only two things he could rely on: His Formation Array, and his Elemental Synchronicity.

Gravis quickly retreated to the nearby forest and began his preparations.

About an hour later, he came back to the village. He could not win against The Demon in a fair one-on-one fight. This time, he had to use his smarts.

Gravis slowly entered the village's vicinity. When he felt that he was close enough, he instantly released his Will-Aura and ran away as fast as possible. His Will-Aura would provoke The Demon into attacking him since he had so arrogantly displayed his killing intent in its nest.

Just as he had thought, the mound in the village grew restless, and a big head with two humongous mandibles rose. The Demon felt the direction the Will-Aura was coming from, and sprinted to it, not making a single noise.

Gravis ran with all of his power, but The Demon was about three times as fast as him. If it caught him before he reached the forest, he would die. Gravis felt The Demon coming closer, and cold sweat came rushing down his back. He hadn't been this afraid since his fight with the tortoise, and he felt like he would die soon.

forest's edge, The Demon was only 20 meters behind him, and it was gaining ground, fast! Gravis continued sprinting

reached Gravis and tried to bite

Gravis, its legs ready to strike. "Let's hope this works!" Gravis shouted and threw the jade token with all his strength in the middle of the

many lines and drawings encompassed the surroundings in a ten-meter diameter. The centipede was

the centipede was confused, and jumped through a gap between two

anymore, but that didn't matter now. The deed was done, and the remainder of his plan

the Formation Array. The Demon was busy trying to break through the Formation Array and ignored the wood. Over a couple of minutes, Gravis filled nearly the

the restriction, he cut some more trees and laid them beside the formation. That took him another couple

a couple of trees had started burning already. In the hour, where he had retreated after initially seeing the village, he had created multiple campfires in the forest. After all this time, some trees had started to

the flames grow hotter and bigger. He willed the flames to start burning the "streets" of trees he had created, and slowly, the fire

thrashing around its body to throw away all the burning wood. It

the Formation Array, like they were in an intense storm. The Demon tried everything to throw those logs of burning wood away,

this, and his brows furrowed. The centipede might survive like this. He did not know how effective the surrounding heat was, but the centipede did

had thought, the Formation Array was enclosing the centipede not in a

Synchronicity and his incredible strength, it still took him about an hour to remove the soil completely. Now, the Formation Array looked like a flying ball. Half of the ball was filled with

what could leave. His newly dug

took some minutes. He had already broken down the earth on the underside, and it was not

the empty "pot" of earth. When he had finally filled the pot, only 20 minutes remained on the Formation Array. Gravis was breathing