The silver bird narrowed its eyes and looked at Gravis with bloodthirst. This beast had dared to disrespect it, its King, and all Emperors as a whole. It would enjoy killing Gravis.
Meanwhile, Gravis felt down. The realization that he couldn't continue fighting and slaughtering his way to the top weighed heavy on his mind. Gravis only looked at the horizon with a melancholic expression as he realized that, in the future, there would be a lot of aimless and boring sitting around.
He was not in the mood to fight. He had thought about a flashy and impressive way in which he could win the fight, but he just couldn't bother right now. This bird would die anyway, and who would even see his performance? The Red King? What was the point of impressing him?
In Gravis' mind, the Red King was just a bird close to its death. The Red King had suppressed Gravis, and that had severely crossed his bottom line. Even if the Red King acted nice now, it changed nothing. So, what was the point of putting up a performance for some bird that would be dead in the near future?
Before this fight started, one had to pay attention to a particular thing.
That thing was that Gravis had never fought someone with the lightning element ever since he had reached the Spirit Forming Realm.
In the Core-Continent, all the Lightning Cultivators were part of the Lightning Sect, which had a close relationship to Gravis. The priests also hadn't had the lightning element. The closest enemy in the lower world to having a lightning affinity had been the lower Heaven. Yet, it was more of a mix of all elements with lightning as its most powerful one.
As for the middle world? Gravis had seen some beasts with a lightning affinity, but they had either been too weak to count as his opponent or had been part of his River Tribe. This would be the first time he would fight someone with a lightning affinity after adapting his Spirit to lightning.
BANG!
The silver bird leaped off the stone and started circling Gravis with crazy speeds. It planned to strike Gravis with a dive. He wouldn't be able to evade something like that. The fight would be over in no time.
Gravis only sighed.
BOOOOOOOOOOOOM!
And the silver bird exploded.
No one could manipulate an element that had a will controlling it… except Gravis. Due to his unprecedented affinity towards lightning, he could control it wherever and whenever it was present. This included the body, dantian, and Spirit of all living beings.
Gravis hadn't been able to kill the lower Heaven with that since it had isolated itself with that weird egg-shield. If it hadn't, the fight with the lower Heaven would have gone down exactly like this one. Of course, the lower Heaven knew Gravis' powers, so it had taken precautions.
Yet, what of the beasts? Firstly, they didn't know his powers, and secondly, they didn't have the same powers as a Heaven. Beasts with a lightning affinity were helpless in front of Gravis. He could kill all of them with merely a command.
Gravis only needed to command the lightning inside of them to explode. This didn't even require him to use any of his powers since their own element would go against them and destroy them in the process. That was why Gravis could even kill Emperors if they had a lightning affinity. He, himself, might be too weak to kill them, but their own power was easily enough.
The Red King's eyes widened in shock. Did that bird just explode for no reason?
BZZZ!
The lightning consumed the corpse and shot at Gravis. In no time at all, Gravis absorbed all the lightning and powers of the dead bird. This was plenty enough for him to become a level three Lord.
"Do you understand now?" Gravis asked.
The Red King looked at Gravis in shock. Gravis hadn't even moved, but he had killed a Lord three whole levels higher than him. No one would even believe the Red King if he told them what had happened.
Yet, the Red King wasn't stupid and had a lot of experience. He saw the power of the explosion and had also noticed that the lightning had been different from Gravis'. He quickly concluded that Gravis had, somehow, taken control of the silver bird's lightning and had used it to kill the Silver Bird.
The Red King also realized that, following this logic, as long as Gravis was able to release a thought, he would even be able to kill an Emperor. He truly hadn't overestimated himself.
This was the first time the Red King had felt a bit of fear towards Gravis. He was thanking all his lucky stars that he didn't have the lightning element. If he did, he would already be dead.
Some minutes passed in which the Red King was still thinking about hypothetical scenarios while Gravis started growing. He was becoming a level three Lord.
The evolution only took a couple of minutes, and when he was done, Gravis' body had reached an impressive size of about 40 meters. Of course, such a size was only impressive when compared to cultivators. Gravis still counted as one of the smallest Lords.
"You're really the perfect counter to anyone using lightning," the Red King commented as soon as Gravis was done evolving.
"It's just a side-effect of choosing my path," Gravis said. This was true. After all, Gravis' goal was countering Heaven, not other Lightning Cultivators.
"What is your path?" the Red King asked.
"I'm not telling," Gravis said.
And with that, the Red King's frustration returned. Another thing that he wanted to know desperately was added to the pile. Sadly, he knew that he wouldn't be able to get a satisfactory answer from Gravis.
The Red King grumbled a bit and then looked at Gravis one last time. "We'll be leaving in around two years," he said before he entered his abode.
Meanwhile, Gravis sighed again as he looked at the sky. 'I have no idea what Law I should concentrate on,' he thought. 'I gained some insights into various things, but nothing that could come even close to an actual Law. The only direction I have is the Life Law with the CMO as a guide.'
Then, Gravis looked at the ground. 'But what then? When I comprehend a Life Law, what am I supposed to comprehend next? I only have an affinity towards lightning, but it's difficult to comprehend something I can't observe. I already know everything about my own lightning, which makes observing it meaningless.'
'I wonder, is this how everyone feels? Cultivators probably have a Law that is very compatible with them, and they can focus on comprehending that. Yet, as soon as they comprehend it, they will probably also be aimless.'
Gravis sighed another time, something he had been doing quite often today. 'Cultivation really isn't easy.'
Gravis stewed in his melancholy for a couple of hours until he shook his head wildly. 'If everyone goes through this, I can as well! I only need to comprehend and understand one thing at a time. At some point, I will have accumulated enough to actually comprehend a new Law.'
'Anyway,' Gravis thought as he summoned a ton of ore. 'I should first forge a more powerful armor!'
Gravis' melancholy vanished as soon as he concentrated on forging more powerful armor.
