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.

'I wonder how it creates all these things inside of it,' Gravis thought, 'speaking of, doesn't my body do the same when it heals? Wonder how that works.'

Gravis' Spirit was powerful enough to see the microscopic level, but he didn't find anything. He had the theory that maybe some small living things made up living beings, but that wasn't true. It was just one cohesive blob.

Yet, even though he had only seen slime 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 them to get reabsorbed or die later.

Yet, there was some kind of 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 some kind of tentacle to grab the fallen appendage or slightly moved over to it.

'It is 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 a little bit of Energy. When it creates something harder, it absorbs more Energy than usual. Truly interesting,' Gravis thought as his Self inside his Spirit Space scratched its chin.

Like this, Gravis just kept watching the CMO. Its continuous growth was rather interesting.

After a while, Gravis looked away and checked on his body.

'Already gone?' Gravis thought in shock. 'How long did I watch the CMO? How much time has passed?'

Gravis had no idea how much time had passed. His Life Ring didn't have any day and night cycle, and he couldn't discern the time by looking at the outside. There was just blackness.

His Self narrowed its eyes. 'I should be careful in the future. The CMO has distracted me for quite a while. However, it shouldn't have been too long. After all, I didn't get transported to my new body yet.'

Right now, Gravis was nothing more 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 orbiting around his Spirit Space.

It didn't look imposing from the outside, but from inside Gravis' Spirit Space, it looked as massive and imposing as the sun. Gravis made it move around a bit and noticed that he still had full control. It was like the lightning was still inside his body.

Seeing that there was nothing else to do, Gravis went back to watching the CMO.

Like this, time passed.

Whooom!

'Oh! Something's happening,' Gravis thought as he felt a 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 now.

'I'm ready!' he thought with motivation as he looked at his floating Spirit Space. He noticed that, as the force of the pull increased, his Spirit Space and lightning started to vanish. They became more and more transparent until Gravis could barely make them out anymore.

It felt bizarre to still be conscious and see your whole self vanish into nothingness. Did Gravis even exist anymore?

Psh!

An immense stabbing pain suddenly assaulted Gravis at the right side of his… chest? Gravis wasn't sure where he felt that. The pain made him open his eyes.

'Eyes? I can see!' Gravis thought as he realized that he was already inside his new body. He quickly used his eyes and Spirit to look around. Sadly, his eyes only saw blackness.

His Spirit covered only 10 kilometers around him, surprising him quite a bit. "Blub bub blub-"

Gravis had tried to say that his father had told him about his suppression of his Spirit, but only bubbles came out of his mouth. Apparently, he was underwater.

His Spirit showed him that he was lying down on the ocean floor, on some sand. Some kelp and other kinds of flora were around him. Yet, everything was completely dark. He could only see with his Spirit. On top of that, he felt an incredible pressure suppressing his body.

'This body isn't able to handle these depths. I need to swim upward,' he thought, 'But first, fuck that crab!'

The stabbing pain he had felt was a crab that tore a chunk off his new body. Gravis immediately used his Will-Aura and pressed the crab into nothingness. It was probably a ferocious beast, the bottom of the food chain.

Gravis had also inspected his body by now. His Spirit Space was residing in his head, as usual, while his Lightning was in the center of the lower half of his body. Everything around the lightning had been decimated. The body wasn't able to handle the lightning. So, the lightning resided in a destroyed part of his body.

Gravis quickly swam upward but noticed that his lightning wasn't moving along with him. As his body rose, the lightning burned more into his body. Gravis reacted quickly enough and used his Spirit to make the lightning stay in its usual spot.

The two injuries were already making Gravis feel weak. This body didn't have much Life Energy remaining. Luckily…

BZZZ!

Beasts also had some small inherent Energy inside their body. Gravis quickly repaired the damage, but the lightning just created some new space for itself.

There was also something else that assaulted him, a feeling of hunger and suffocation. Gravis quickly checked his body and found what he was looking for. By willing it, he made his gills move. The feeling of suffocation quickly vanished.

After swimming for a bit, Gravis finally exited the depths of the ocean. The pressure around his body lessened, and it felt manageable now. Some bubbles came out of his gills. That was supposed to be a sigh.

Gravis looked upwards and tried to narrow his eyes. Sadly, his body wasn't able to do that.

'Is this funny to you, Heaven?' Gravis thought in annoyance.

Why did he think that?

It was because of his new body. It was black and around six meters long. Some slimy skin coated his outside, and he had no arms or legs. He also only had a single fin at the back of his long, slithery body.

Gravis tried to groan, but only bubbles came out of his mouth.

He was a fucking electric eel.