Lightning Is the Only Way

Gravis immediately noticed a beast standing just a couple of meters away from him. He hadn't noticed that beast at all with his Spirit, but he managed to see it just fine.

It was a harmless-looking red hawk. It wasn't even a meter tall and looked like the pet of someone. It simply didn't look dangerous at all. On top of that, Gravis felt no danger and no power radiating from the hawk. Yet, this made him nervous.

Usually, Gravis only wouldn't be able to feel the power of someone else if they were either much weaker than him or way more powerful than him. Sadly, the fact that Gravis hadn't noticed the hawk showed that the second case was true this time.

When Gravis had been back in his homeworld, he had been able to feel the power of someone at the Early Nascent Nourishing Realm. By now, he had risen by one Stage, and his Will-Aura had also become more powerful. Yet, he felt absolutely nothing from this red hawk. This meant that this hawk was, at least, in the Late Nascent Nourishing Realm. That Realm would also be called a level four King in this world.

"Why is someone as powerful as you interested in me?" Gravis asked directly.

The hawk only smirked and gently flew closer to Gravis. "You reacted very quickly and noticed my power. Tell me, how powerful do you think I am?" the hawk asked with interest.

"You're probably a level four or level five King," Gravis said with narrowed eyes.

The hawk was a bit surprised. "Not bad. Yes, I am a level five King. Quite impressive that you can place my power with such accuracy. Tell me, how did you manage that?"

"When I was weaker, I was able to feel the power of a level two King once. By now, I have become more powerful, and I guess that I would be able to feel a level three King too. Yet, I can't feel your power. I don't think that an Emperor would come to this place just for me, so you had to be a level four or five King," Gravis explained.

The hawk laughed a bit. "Impressive, really," it said. "I am the Red King, Leader of the Red Kingdom. The two beasts you just killed were part of my Kingdom," it said.

Gravis had a sinking feeling. He had just killed this hawk's underlings. Would it want revenge? Yet, Gravis realized that it could have saved them if it wanted. Right now, Battle-Strength wouldn't help him to survive.

"You wanted to test me, right?" Gravis asked.

The hawk smirked as it circled him slowly. "Yes," it said. "One of our associated Tribes has received some news from a two-headed snake around two months ago. It said that there is a beast leading a Tribe made up of sea and land beasts."

"Originally, I didn't care about that. Let the weaker Kingdoms deal with that. Yet, I was interested in the news about your Battle-Strength. Apparently, you are able to jump two whole levels. Something like that is only possible for some very rare Divine Beasts."

between you and a wolf. After that, the agent returned to me and informed me of

level three Lord that Gravis

Shira had been away, she had, apparently, not only tempered herself. 'My constant suppression of her probably annoyed her to no end. She also couldn't be sure that she could kill me.

the sharks he had killed had

with an incredible affinity for battle. Additionally, their

realized several things. "So, Divine Beasts could be considered as powerful, young geniuses. Yet, as soon as they become Emperors, all their advantages

Of course, there are still a lot of Divine Beasts out there

words and nodded. Then, he looked at it. "I presume you don't want to kill me right now?" he

hummed for a bit. "It depends on how you define 'right now' and how you define 'kill',"

heard that. He had expected that this situation wouldn't resolve itself that easily. The fact that such a powerful King arrived in front

so incredibly weak in front of this hawk that he could probably only act as a toy for the King. Gravis gritted his teeth in frustration. He had no control over his life right now. This

that it wasn't the smartest choice to sound rude, but the lightning inside of him was

grinned. "I like that aggressive tone of yours. Maybe you can entertain me some more." Then, the hawk leisurely flew to a big stone and stood on it. "You're probably interested in the reason why I've come

Gravis only nodded.

very interested in peculiar and powerful beasts. You could say that's one of her hobbies. If I bring such beasts to her, I will be rewarded. So, as soon as I heard about you, I grew interested. The Empress would love

looking at him like he was some slave or commodity, and he

test you out. Of course, they didn't know what the reason for

I died?" Gravis

bit. "Then you would have died, but I was

eyes in skepticism. "How?" he asked. He wasn't even sure if he would win, so how could this hawk, which didn't

that are two levels higher than you. This means you see a good chance of victory in such fights. So, I wanted to see

had managed to kill two level four Lords, but he had only wanted to fight one of them. Yet, hadn't he managed to survive against

higher than me but have tried to avoid fighting anything more dangerous. I think, deep inside,

Morn, Silva, and Orpheus into

was quite surprised when it saw Gravis' actions. Then,