Lightning Is the Only Way

There was darkness as far as the eye could see. Everything was black around Gravis, and he felt an itchy sensation all over his body. It wasn't really bad, just annoying. Gravis lifted his hand and looked at it. Sure enough, it was slowly dissolving into nothingness.

Flakes of his skin left his body as they vanished into dust. Seeing your own body get dissolved into nothingness and vanishing would be a traumatic experience for every mortal, but Gravis had already been prepared for that. His father had told him what would happen.

'Sure enough, it doesn't hurt,' he thought, 'that's, at least, something.'

There was no air around or anything, but Gravis didn't need that to begin with. His body was also dissolving at a much slower rate than he had expected. At this rate, it would probably take a couple of hours. Though, that was hard to determine without any visible indicator for the passage of time.

Gravis tried to sigh but failed since there was no air. 'This will take a while,' he thought. 'I wonder how long I will stay in this space. Father said that I have to wait until a compatible body dies. The middle world is huge, but it might take some time until something with a fitting elemental affinity dies with a somewhat whole body. Most beasts eat the corpse, making it hard for the corpse to stay whole.'

Gravis sat down onto whatever he stood on previously and began to wait. There was nothing to do.

'Oh, right!' Gravis thought suddenly. 'I should retrieve my Life Ring and Obsidian Ring into my Spirit Space.'

Whoop!

And like that, everything was gone but his clothing. He had enough spare clothing inside his Spirit Space, but he really doubted if he would need those. After all, he was about to inhabit a different body. Since his Spirit Space would follow him into the new body, everything would remain safe inside it.

While waiting for the process to finish, Gravis looked at the CMO inside his Life Ring. The blob was just sitting on top of a stony mountain. Gravis had already ordered the mushroom to keep away from it, but he just wanted to be sure. So, he placed it outside its reach.

Speaking of the mushroom, without anything else threatening it, it grew at a rapid pace. It didn't become stronger, but it became bigger. By now, it covered a territory that was over 20 kilometers wide. That was quite impressive for a single mushroom.

The CMO just sat there, doing something. Gravis looked at it and concentrated his Spirit on it. His Spirit wasn't powerful enough to see the underlying Laws or Energy that created it, but he could see its effect.

It was changing color slowly. By now, it was completely red. Gravis expected that it probably had developed an affinity for fire. On top of that, it wasn't really a blob anymore. Some bone spurs broke out of its "skin" without any rhyme or reason. Other parts of the blob had weird appendages coming out of it.

creates all these things inside of it,' Gravis thought, 'speaking of, doesn't my body do the same

but he didn't find anything. He had the theory that maybe some small

when he first saw it, he could now see many different parts. Sometimes, it was creating some random scales. Other times, it grew some weird hair or nails. It was actually bizarre to see the blob produce these beast-like or human-like features just for

conscience or instinct living inside the blob. When some of its new appendages died off, they fell away from the body. Curiously enough, the blob either created

able to discern that it needs its own mass back to survive. If it doesn't reabsorb its own "meat", it would shrink. On top of that, I feel that it is absorbing

Gravis just kept watching the CMO. Its continuous growth was rather

Gravis looked away and

long did I watch the CMO? How

no idea how much time had passed. His Life Ring didn't have any day and night cycle, and

careful in the future. The CMO has distracted me for quite a while. However, it

than a minuscule flying orb. This was his tiny Spirit Space. It was huge on the inside, but on the outside, it was smaller than an ant. A couple-of-centimeters-wide lightning ball was

as massive and imposing as the sun. Gravis made it move around a bit and noticed that he still had full control.

to do, Gravis went back to watching

Like this, time passed.

Whooom!

pull. He had been watching the CMO for who knew how long. Gravis had utterly lost his concept of time, but apparently, he was about to enter a body

ready!' he thought with motivation as he looked at his floating Spirit Space. He noticed that, as the force of the pull

your whole

Psh!

chest? Gravis wasn't

his new body. He quickly used his eyes and Spirit to look

around him, surprising him quite a bit. "Blub

about his suppression of his Spirit, but only bubbles

on the ocean floor, on some sand. Some kelp and other kinds of flora were around him. Yet, everything was completely dark. He

body isn't able to handle these depths. I need to