Chapter 217: Lightning Sphere (1/2)

”Let's see,” Gravis said, readying his saber again. ”Let's try with something small, like 5% of my Spirit.”

Gravis summoned a mixture with only five percent of his Spirit, yet something unforeseen happened.

POP!

The mixture wasn't able to stabilize and scattered into the surroundings. This hadn't happened before, so Gravis was confused for a second, but he quickly noticed the difference between this time and last time. ”The last couple of times, I always used 10% of my Spirit. I guess I need a minimum amount of Spirit to make the fusion work. Funny, the manual hadn't mentioned that,” Gravis muttered.

Then, Gravis summoned another mixture with 10% of his Spirit. Like the first three times, it remained stable. ”So, it really requires a minimum of Spirit to stabilize,” Gravis muttered while scratching his chin in thought. ”I wonder how lightning interacts with it.”

Then, Gravis started slowly infusing the mixture with lightning.

WHOOOM!

Suddenly, all the lightning in his body started crazily going into the mixture. He tried stopping the lightning, but it was hopeless. It just wouldn't listen! Gravis immediately started sweating with nervousness.

BOOOOOM!

After the sphere had absorbed 10% of Gravis' lightning, it couldn't take anymore and violently exploded. The surrounding 30 meters got completely decimated and a crater formed, which was around five meters deep. Luckily, Gravis was immune to his own lightning. An attack like that could have killed him otherwise.

Gravis continued standing there, unable to process what just happened. After some seconds, he finally calmed down and started scratching his chin again. ”It felt like I didn't have enough control over the mixture when the lightning entered it. In the beginning, it was no issue controlling the sphere. Yes, I lost control over my lightning, but I hadn't lost control over the sphere at that point. Though, why did I lose control over my lightning in the first place?”

Gravis started thinking about the concept of Spirit, will, and lightning. How did he control lightning in the first place? This question appeared in Gravis' mind for the first time. He had actually never questioned how he was able to control lightning. One shouldn't forget that he already had control over lightning when he had reached the Energy Gathering Realm, though not as precise as now.

”I think it should be my Spirit,” Gravis said as he continued thinking. But didn't the Spirit only appear at the Spirit Forming Realm? How had Gravis controlled his lightning in the Energy Gathering Realm then?

The answer was actually pretty simple. The Spirit had always existed, as the Spirit was the soul and the mind of the cultivator. If one didn't have a Spirit, they wouldn't be human. The Spirit Forming Realm didn't actually ”form” the Spirit in the sense that it was created, but in the sense that its form would change.

The Spirit Forming Realm only made the Spirit adapt to Energy, or in Gravis' case, lightning. This allowed the Spirit to manipulate Energy, or lightning, with substantially increased precision and power. Before that, one only had rudimentary control over an element.

CLAP!

Gravis clapped his hands together as he got the answer. ”Of course!” he shouted. ”If I combine my Spirit and my will, the created thing is basically another me. My lightning didn't listen because this sphere was adapted to lightning and, therefore, tried to absorb it crazily. So, when it started absorbing the lightning, it basically overate itself and collapsed.”

Gravis looked to the ground in deep thought. ”So, in order to stop my uncontrollable mixture of Spirit and Will from exploding, I need to make the amount of Spirit in the mixture bigger than the amount of absorbed lightning. Though, the issue is that I can't keep my lightning from being absorbed. Hmmm.”

After some seconds of deep thinking, Gravis found a solution. ”If it absorbs all the lightning in my body, then I only need to put in more Spirit than I have lightning remaining. Currently, my Spirit reserves are at about 55%, while my lightning reserves are at around 90%.”

Gravis had a plan, but he was a little worried about it. ”What if the sphere doesn't stop absorbing when it ate all my lightning? Will it eat the lightning in my Spirit as well? If that happens, I'll lose several weeks of progress. I need the lightning in my mind to increase my cultivation, after all,” he muttered with worry.