Lightning Is the Only Way

Gravis narrowed his eyes and turned around, looking at the person who had just shouted at him. Judging by the strength and imposingness of the voice, the person was definitely a Spirit Forming expert. The voice had awakened a sense of danger inside Gravis. Thus he was sure of the person's strength. Gravis readied himself for a fight.

A middle-aged man with flowing, fiery red hair came running. "Why do you stop me?" asked Gravis with a severe tone.

The person seemed to get even angrier as urgency radiated from his eyes. "Not you!" he shouted. "Your bird!"

Gravis eyebrows rose in surprise, and he looked to Skye. Skye was currently carrying an unconscious disciple in its beak, readying itself to swallow him. Gravis' eyes widened when he saw that. "Skye, Stop!" he shouted.

GULP!

Skye swallowed the disciple and then looked at Gravis with a questioning look. Wasn't it allowed to eat Gravis' enemies? What's his deal?

Gravis ran to Skye. "Spit him out, now!" he shouted at Skye, and it looked back at him with bitterness and unwillingness. "They were not my enemies, and they are still alive. Spit him out!"

Skye looked at Gravis and then at the new arrival, who was really close by now and conceded.

LURCH Clank!

The disciple's unconscious body fell out of Skye's lowered opened beak and hit the ground. The clothes had already been fully corroded, and even his skin looked a little burned. The Guild Master of the Fire Guild went to the disciple and checked his life signs. Only when he felt that the Energy and body were still vigorous did he sigh in relief.

Gravis scratched the back of his neck in embarrassment. "Sorry, Skye didn't do it on purpose," Gravis explained.

The Guild Master glared at Skye but then sighed. "Nothing major happened, so it's okay," he waved the matter off nonchalantly. He then turned to Gravis to look at him more closely. "You have impressive battle-strength. You even managed to defeat Red, the strongest person in Magic Gathering in our guild."

Gravis nodded to show his respect to the Guild Master's strength. While he didn't care about the status of the Guild Master, he cared about his strength. Just when Gravis wanted to turn around and continue on his way, he suddenly got an idea. He rubbed his chin in thought as he watched the Guild Master.

The Guild Master felt weird when Gravis looked at him without saying anything. What did he want?

"Actually," started Gravis. "Are you interested in a trade?" he asked the Guild Master.

The eyes of the Guild Master narrowed. "You can't win against me, yet," said the Guild Master directly.

But Gravis simply shook his head. "That's not what I mean," he explained. "I have earned many weapons in my fights, and I wonder if you are interested in repurchasing them."

The Guild Master was a little surprised by the idea. First, Gravis killed his disciples and stole their wealth and then offered to sell their own weapons back to them? However, as the Guild Master continued thinking about this situation, he started to realize that that was actually not such a bad idea, though a little in bad taste. All of those weapons were tailor-made for the Fire Guild, and some of them were really good.

"You know what?" asked the Guild Master rhetorically after a while. "Why not?"

Gravis smirked a little. "Alright, but I am only interested in body tempering pills. Is that okay with you?" Gravis asked in confirmation.

The Guild Master nodded. "That's alright. Is it okay with you if we determine the price of the weapons based on the Contribution Point System that we use in the guild?" The Guild Master asked.

Gravis looked unsurely at the Guild Master. "Could you elaborate?"

"Simple! Body tempering pills and weapons can both be exchanged for Contribution Points. You'll sell us the weapons, and we give you Contribution Points equal to the weapons' buying price. Then, you can use up those points, like a normal disciple," he explained, and then his eyes narrowed in thought. "I think I'll also give you the same discount as someone with your strength would have in our guild, which is someone with an elder's strength."

Gravis eyes widened in surprise. "I killed about ten of your strongest disciples, and you are even willing to give me a discount? Why?" asked Gravis, confused.

Surprisingly, the Guild Master only laughed. "By offering a fair fight, you have given our disciples a chance to temper themselves," he explained. "The fights had been fair, and you never acted weak to lure in more, weaker people to make more money. From the beginning, you have stated your strength."

The Guild Master sighed. "The first couple of disciples didn't realize their strength difference to you, even though you loudly stated that only people at the ninth level of Magic Gathering had a realistic chance in defeating you."

The Guild Master majestically swished his long sleeve to the side. "If they can't feel danger, then it's their fault they died! As for the later disciples, you have never asked for backup and always fought by yourself. They knew what they were getting into, and you fought fairly. You have granted them this opportunity! That they couldn't grasp it is on them!"

Gravis also sighed. When Gravis had talked with Flern for a while, back when he was still staying on that tree, Flern had said that the death of their disciples only showed their weakness. He had also said that most of the Fire Guild thought like that. Initially, Gravis had been a little skeptical, but seeing how the Guild Master argued the same way as Flern, Gravis realized that Flern had told the truth.

The Fire Guild believed that if you died in a fight, you were too weak and were never destined to rise to power. Gravis thought that this philosophy was similar to the Heaven Sect. The Heaven Sect believed that if someone died, Heaven wanted them to die, and if someone lived, Heaven wanted them to live. Yet, the Fire Guild attributed this "catch-all" philosophy to strength and not to some garbage Heaven. The Fire Guild was probably closer to the truth than the Heaven Sect, but it was also not entirely right.

Supremely talented and strong geniuses could die to bad luck. If they hadn't had this bad luck, they would have probably risen, at least, into the Spirit Forming Realm. So, surviving is not completely reliant on strength. But in the end, Gravis thought that the Fire Guild had a better philosophy than the Heaven Sect.

"Alright," commented Gravis dryly, extinguishing any eventual, continued conversation about this topic. "So, I have this really long sword," Gravis said as he tossed the long sword to the ground in front of him. "Some peak Magic Weapons," he tossed multiple sabers out, including his old one, "those few weapons that I left behind in the initial fighting area, and that really heavy halberd."

The Guild Master looked at the pile of weapons and sighed again. Every weapon signified a dead disciple. Even though the Fire Guild had the philosophy of absolute power, those weapons still represented people that he had known or watched for years.

The weapons started floating one by one as the Guild Master inspected them for damage. The heavy halberd and the other weapons also floated in from the old fighting area. They were not that far from the old fighting area. After the Guild Master looked through the weapons, he nodded. "Alright, that's about 19,400 Contribution Points."

WHOOSH PACK!

The elder threw over a book, and Gravis opened it. It was an exchange catalog, similar to the one from the Heaven Sect. Of course, even though the Fire Guild was multiple times bigger than the Heaven Sect, their wealth and variety of items didn't even come close to the Heaven Sect's.

"You get 30% off because of the elder discount," said the Guild Master.

Gravis nodded and ignored everything else. He directly skipped to the pill section. To his surprise, he saw no mention of the Body Ascension Pill that he had taken back in the Heaven Sect. Of course, even if it were there, Gravis wouldn't buy it. It might be the best method to temper his body, but Gravis had no way to continually damage his own body right now. Yet, Gravis was still interested in why he couldn't find it.

"You don't have a Body Ascension Pill?" Gravis asked, not looking up from the exchange book. If he had looked up, he would have seen the Guild Master's eyes widen in disbelief.

"Body Ascension Pill? How could we have such a treasure? Those pills are even rare in the Core-Continent," he explained.

Now, Gravis looked up. "They're that rare?" he asked in an unbelieving look.

The Guild Master only nodded while Gravis just shrugged and continued checking the pills. He looked through the exchange book for several minutes, and slowly, some of the unconscious disciples started waking up. Usually, they would stay unconscious for over half an hour, but something made them wake up early.

They were underwater and couldn't breathe. When Gravis had used his Will-Aura again, he had still been in the surroundings of the new lake and the river. His Will-Aura created another crater, and after he deactivated it again, the water flooded into the even newer lake. As soon as they regained consciousness, they quickly jumped out of the water, coughed, and took deep breaths.

They all walked around, grumbling, but they shut their mouths when they saw their Guild Master. If someone said something wrong, their life would be ruined.

After around ten minutes, Gravis had finished choosing the pills. All those pills only strengthened a specific part of the body, and he had to make it balanced. When Gravis was finished, he only had 600 Contribution Points remaining, but he didn't care about those. The Guild Master had given him a discount, so he wouldn't try to use every last bit of those points to gain as much as possible.

Gravis told the Guild Master what he wanted, and the Guild Master nodded. The exchange book floated back to the Guild Master and vanished. Then, they both just continued standing there. Gravis was confused and waited for the Guild Master to do something, but he didn't move.

They continued waiting like this for several minutes, and Gravis narrowed his eyes.

'This feels kind of awkward.'