Lightning Is The Only Way

"Bored now," Gravis said as he suddenly shot upward into a sitting position. He had been looking at his surroundings for five hours now, but the novelty had worn off. His concentration had recovered during that time, and, by now, he felt completely rested and awake.

Gravis quickly stood up and smirked. 'Time to test my power a bit,' he thought.

So, the first thing he did was look at how much he could see with his Spirit. As soon as Gravis concentrated on his Spirit, he realized how far he could see. His eyes widened in shock. It was way farther than he had anticipated.

'I can see the whole Core-Continent and nearly all of the Middle-Continent. This is ridiculous!' he thought. His Spirit had expanded and encompassed thousands and thousands of kilometers. Traveling to the edges of his Spirit would probably take him nearly a whole day, even if he considered his new speed.

One had to know that the Middle-Continent was many times bigger than the Core-Continent. The fact that he nearly saw all of it shocked him immensely.

Yet, one shouldn't forget that Gravis' Spirit, due to its peculiar affinity, had always been far wider than everyone else's. The High Priest had been able to oversee the Core-Continent, so in actuality, it wasn't that weird that Gravis could also see the Middle-Continent.

Gravis always had a Spirit with a radius five times bigger than someone at his current Stage. One shouldn't forget that quintupling the radius of a sphere didn't just quintuple the volume. Quintupling the radius actually increased the volume of a sphere by over a hundred times!

"This is incredible!" Gravis involuntarily said.

Then, he checked his lightning. It was just as big as before, but that didn't represent its power. It had absorbed a ridiculous amount of Energy, but his stronger Spirit had concentrated the lightning further. Even though it didn't look to be much more than before, the quantity and quality were around four times higher.

Gravis also inspected his body for a bit but saw nothing surprising. It just became harder, stronger, and heavier again.

'Speaking of heavier,' Gravis thought. With an order from his will, his physical power entered his Spirit. It was as simple as pouring one glass of water into another. His body became weaker and lighter as Gravis moved more and more of his physical power into his Spirit.

After moving all of his physical power into his Spirit, Gravis felt weak. 'What a wondrous feeling,' Gravis thought. 'My body has definitely become weaker and lighter. I wonder, is my physical power actually not the physical matter of my body, but something else? How else would I be able to move it into my Spirit? It's not like I just shove blood and muscle in there.'

Crk!

Gravis punched a boulder beside him and unceremoniously broke his hand. The boulder didn't even react to his punch. Looking at his bloody and malformed hand, Gravis thought about something else.

With another order, Gravis moved his physical power in and out of his Spirit while always keeping watch over the inherent Energy of his body. After a while, he stopped and simply healed his hand with some Life Lightning.

'Interesting. The inherent Energy in my body is always equivalent to its power. When I reduce my physical power, the inherent Energy also gets reduced.'

Gravis sighed.

'Sadly, this means that I can still only fully heal myself once. Even when I make my body weak, heal myself, and then shove physical power back into it, the percentage stays the same. This is really weird. Shouldn't there be additional inherent Energy stored in my Spirit when my physical power is all in there?' Gravis thought as he scratched his chin with his healed hand.

After some minutes of thinking, Gravis sighed again. 'No use thinking about this right now. Let me first stress test everything.'

Whoooom!

All his physical power and all his lightning were shoved into his Spirit. Only a frail body and a small spark of lightning remained. Meanwhile, his Spirit expanded even further into the distance. By now, he could even see a massive chunk of the Outer-Continent.

Yet, something else made Gravis furrow his brows. 'Just as I thought. My Spirit has only increased to a power of about 235%. My Spirit and lightning are, in their normal states, about equally as strong. This means that shoving all my lightning into my Spirit would raise my Spirit's power to 200%.'

Gravis looked at his body with his Spirit. 'Yet, my body is only around a third as powerful, maybe a little bit more. This means that shoving my physical power into my Spirit doesn't help as much. So, instead of increasing my Spirit to 300%, I can only reach 235%. I don't like that one bit!'

Gravis grumbled in his thoughts for a couple more minutes but then tried something else.

BZZZZZ!

Gravis' lightning became way more intense as its power increased. He had shoved everything he had into his lightning, increasing its power to around 235% of its normal output. 'The amount and density of my lightning increased proportionally. It takes up just as much space, but it has become way denser, and therefore, more powerful. Just as expected.'

Then, Gravis shoved all his power into his body, but…

'Stop!' Gravis immediately shouted in his mind in panic. He had tried moving everything into his body, but it soon started crackling as muscles tore and bones cracked. When he saw that, he immediately moved everything to its original place again.

'That was close! Just this short moment already made me sore all over,' Gravis thought.

BZZ!

Gravis used some of his Life Lightning to heal his body. It was only a minor injury, so it didn't take much to heal him. After taking a deep breath to calm down, Gravis analyzed the situation.

His hand went to his chin again. 'As soon as the relative power of my body went above 300%, it started breaking down. Since my lightning and Spirit are both about triple my body's power, they could theoretically increase my body's power by 600%, to a total of 700%, relative to my body's normal power.'

'If I shove a third of my lightning and Spirit into my body, my body would reach 300% of its output, rivaling my Spirit and lightning's normal power. Yet, by taking power away from them, they would be lower than their normal output, creating another imbalance.'

Gravis did some math in his head. 'To get an equilibrium, I would need to keep my lightning and Spirit both at 77.77777%. This would increase my physical power to 233.33333%, which is equal to 77.77777% of my lightning and Spirit.'

When Gravis came to the conclusion, he grimaced. 'This feels so awkward and weak. It's like the wasted potential of my power is kicking me in the face. If my body were as powerful as my lightning and Spirit normally, I would be at 100%, but now, I am only at 77.77777% of my potential. This feels absolutely disgusting!'

After some minutes of grumbling, Gravis sighed. 'I should ask father when I return,' Gravis thought. 'Anyway, time for something much more interesting.' With an order, Gravis shoved most of his physical power into his Spirit again.

Then, Gravis used his powerful Spirit to move his body around.

"Wow, hey there, calm down!" Gravis involuntarily said as he got shoved into the distance. He had completely misjudged the disparity between his body's weight and his Spirit's power. His Spirit had thrown him into the horizon with ridiculous speeds.

What a joke was this? His body's weight could be described with kilograms, while his Spirit could lift things many tons heavy, nearly effortlessly. A small shove of that was already very powerful. If Gravis had moved all of his physical power into his Spirit, his body would have, at least, become severely injured.

On top of that, Gravis' body normally wouldn't move when he used his Spirit to move something. He would just will something to move one meter to the side, for example. Yet, by moving himself, he would also move the position of the relative target. Due to this, the "one meter" that he wanted to go to would always be one meter away from him, and therefore, he would never reach it, even if he had already traveled a much farther distance.

Like this, his Spirit just kept on shoving and shoving, creating this ridiculous scenario.

Gravis' body moved erratically around in the air as he tried to regain control, and after a couple of seconds, he succeeded. By now, he was able to stand in the air without an issue.

'I'm a little unused to this, but it's just a different mindset. Instead of looking at the goal, I only need to apply force to my own body and then just stop when I want,' he thought.

After some minutes of practice, Gravis was perfectly comfortable in the air like a fish in the water. He also watched the world below him, but he quickly grew bored. After all, he had just watched his surroundings for five hours. Doing it again, but from a different angle, didn't give him enough variety to make it interesting again.

After some minutes of testing and warming up, Gravis closed his eyes in the air. He remained like this for some minutes until he opened them again. Yet, instead of his lighthearted curiosity, they only shone with resolution and battle-intent.

"Heaven!" Gravis shouted, his voice echoing throughout the surroundings.

"Fight me!"