Lightning Is the Only Way

The group traveled for a couple of minutes before they arrived at the fourth trial. The area of this fourth trial looked different than all the previous ones. Before this, Gravis had only seen big arenas or just small rooms, but this one was a fusion of the two.

A one-kilometer wide, lowered arena was in the middle of the trial ground. Around the edges were benches, low-quality weapons, and even training dummies. The arena took up 90% of the area, surprising Gravis a little. Why wouldn't the arena just take up all of the trial ground? What was the point of this side area?

"Oh, cool," Joyce said with a smile. "It's just like the earlier trials."

Gravis looked at her with a lifted brow. "This is how your earlier trial grounds looked?" he asked.

Joyce looked at him with a questioning look. "Yeah, did your trial grounds look different?"

Gravis nodded. "Yes. The second trial was a small hall, while the other two were just an open area. There wasn't a specific area dedicated to fighting."

"Well, it wouldn't make sense to create a dedicated arena for only one person, would it?" Manuel interjected as he stepped forward. "How did you think we decided who would fight which enemy? In these kinds of trials, enemies will appear one after the other inside the arena while we wait outside. As soon as the enemies spawn, a sign appears that tells us which cultivator should fight."

BANG!

In the middle of the arena, a stele appeared. The group looked at it and read the inscription. "The four cultivators at the initial Stage of Spirit Forming will temper themselves against the appearing enemies. The cultivator at the Tree Stage will act as a guide and teacher for fighting," Joyce read aloud.

She smiled and turned to Gravis. "So that's why we are together in this trial. Gravis, you will teach us how to fight! Isn't that great?" she shouted with a smile while waving at him from beside the stele.

Gravis rubbed his chin in thought. "Is there really no trap here?" he mused to himself. "Am I really only supposed to teach them?"

Gravis narrowed his eyes and looked at the ceiling. "Did you actually learn from your mistakes? Did this really just happen?" he asked with genuine surprise. "Have you realized that you can't suppress me anymore? Are you actually intending on not making it hard on me in this trial?"

No answer came.

Whoom!

a one-time demonstration of his skills. One enemy at the Self Stage will appear with an equally strong dantian and body. In order to demonstrate his Battle-Strength properly, the cultivator will not use his Will-Aura, Lightning Crescent, or Lightning Bomb. The

enemies that they had fought in their previous trials had also been a Stage higher

in everything. The cultivators thought about how a fight against such an enemy would go, and they all concluded that they would

learned from its mistakes.

Bang!

that it was only there to block the shockwaves from exiting the arena. Joyce looked with worry at Gravis as she still stood inside the arena. She was worried that this fight might be too hard

to the outside of the arena with his head.

she nodded and

Whoom!

hundred meters away from Gravis. It had the form of a middle-aged man, utterly grey in color. His whole body was grey, including clothes, skin, hair, and eyes. He carried a large saber that looked less like a saber and more like a knife. It

BANG!

person shot forward while readying the humongous saber in one hand. His other hand was close to his body and pointed at Gravis. When

BANG!

exploded beneath his feet. Gravis' ridiculously fast acceleration made the puppet nearly unable to react. The huge

Gravis' head,

BZZZ BANG!

it quickly hit the fireball inside the puppet's hand before it could fire off. The fireball exploded, destroying the puppet's hand in the process. Gravis had noticed that the fireball had been compressed with Spirit,

been stopped by the puppet's hand and the Lightning Spear. Yet,

BANG!

by the sudden explosion, Gravis, who had already expected the shockwave, used another lightning explosion

CRK!

struck the puppet's head but didn't kill it. Instead, it

BZZZ!