Lightning Is the Only Way

Gravis took a deep breath to relax. The fight was finally over. Gravis' life had constantly been in danger during the last couple of minutes, and even at the end, Red had still nearly managed to kill him. Gravis had fought someone entirely out of his league. Deciding to fight Red was closer to suicide than tempering.

He had used everything in this fight. He had used his body, Energy, Will-Aura, pre-dodging, and also heavily relied on his Elemental Synchronicity. Without the first four, Gravis would have died before he and Red even left the clearing while the last one allowed Gravis to kill Red. Gravis narrowed his eyes and decided to stay a little safer.

BOOM!

Gravis absorbed Red's Energy and broke into the seventh level of Energy Gathering. Earlier, Gravis had decided against absorbing enough Energy for a breakthrough because he thought he would be invincible in the Energy Gathering Realm then. Yet, Gravis had made a grave error. He had underestimated the elders, who had remained on that level for decades.

Red's body had been too powerful, and even with Gravis now being at the seventh level of Energy Gathering, the fight wouldn't have been much easier. The advantage of rising a level in the Energy Gathering Realm was the increased density and reserve of Energy. The increased reserve was literally useless for Gravis since he could just refill his Energy with the one in his mind.

Yet, the density of Energy was also nearly no help in fighting against those people. For example, if Gravis had used 100% of his Energy instead of 50% to attack Red, there would be no difference. The lightning wasn't able to injure someone like Red just by itself. Gravis could only use the explosion's shockwave when his lightning exploded to sever Red's hand. An explosion double as powerful would only have thrown his arm further away. That made no difference.

So, the Energy, when breaking into the seventh level, surprisingly, didn't increase his fighting strength by much while fighting such monsters. The true help was the lower suppression against his Will-Aura. His Will-Aura had only worked once against Red since he had been three levels above him. Now, he could use his Will-Aura multiple times, and it wouldn't lose its effectiveness that quickly.

After absorbing all the Energy, Gravis only needed 60% more for breaking into the eighth level. When he reached the eighth level, he would genuinely be invincible in the Energy Gathering Realm. The higher density of his Energy would also allow Gravis to move faster with his Lightning Movement. With his new speed and Will-Aura, he wouldn't need to fight this passively anymore.

WHOOM!

started activating by itself, and Gravis couldn't manipulate it anymore. It expanded itself again from its compressed form until it encompassed everything in a 60-meter radius around Gravis. Then, it started

a rapid pace. Everything that had impacted his will before, like the situation with Wendy or Gorn's death, started to feel more bearable. Gorn's death was still an issue in Gravis' mind, and he would never forget his death, but his

his mind, her death had already been a certainty, and there was no stopping it. Gravis still wasn't a fan of using her death to further his power, but it felt like his feelings started accepting his logic. Logically, he knew that he should

and aura grew clearer, his Will-Aura expanded furiously into the surroundings. It was growing bigger

120 meters.

150 meters.

180 meters.

and then fell apart. The earth got pushed down for half a meter until it stopped. The water in the river was pushed down and out of the river, and no new water could come inside of his Will-Aura. The water outside, hitting his Will-Aura, overflowed like there suddenly was a dam in front of

210 meters.

240 meters.

270 meters.

a circular crater was created around him, several meters deep. Gravis regained the control of his Will-Aura and noticed that he couldn't compress it anymore.

weird,' Gravis thought, but he couldn't find any other reason. As he thought back, he also realized that it had been harder to compress his Will-Aura at the start. Compressing his Will-Aura

Will-Aura. 'This is probably a sign of growth. My Will-Aura has probably broken through some kind of bottleneck,