Lightning Is the Only Way

"Tch, here he goes again," said one of the onlookers to another one in disdain.

"Yeah, I sometimes even wonder if he is actually part of our guild," another one said.

The issue of why those disciples didn't like that particular one was what he was famous for doing. This was not the first time this disciple had done something like that. He would run out of a blind spot and purposefully collide with people. Then, he would grow angry and demand compensation. He had actually earned a lot of money from doing that because no one wanted to offend someone from the Fire Guild. The other disciples looked down on him because of this dirty, shameless habit of his.

"Do I look blind to you?" asked Gravis evenly.

"Ye-"the disciple wanted to speak immediately but stopped. That was often how it went. He would call the person a blind fuck, and then they would often counter with them not being blind. He would then say that they looked blind because of their dog-eyes, and then he would tell them his status, making the other side retreat. Like this, he could get compensation.

Yet, when he looked at Gravis, he realized that something was not right. The issue was that Gravis actually looked like he was blind. His eye color was silver or grey, depending on the person one asked. On top of that, it looked like his eyes had received several cuts. Gravis looked blind from his point of view.

This was not how it was supposed to go. Did he actually block the path of a blind person? All the drive of the disciple left him as he felt genuinely guilty. He had no problems doing that to other people but doing that to a blind person actually made him feel guilty.

"Hey, I'm sorry for calling you blind, okay?" he said apologetically. "But you really need to watch… ehm… you should look out for… fuck… you need to be more careful on the street," the disciple said, fumbling over his words.

"Do I look blind or not?" asked Gravis again, this time, with more heaviness in his voice.

The disciple didn't know how to act. Gravis sounded like a non-blind person would speak in this scenario. The disciple didn't know what to say for a second. He does look blind. Why was he asking?

"Hey, I'm sorry for blocking your path, okay?" he said.

This was all Gravis needed to hear. Only people with a Will-Aura could feel the Spirit of others when they were in the Energy Gathering Realm. This disciple, obviously, didn't have a Will-Aura. Therefore, the disciple didn't know that he had just blocked the path of a Spirit Forming expert. His evasive attitude could only mean one thing. He thought Gravis was blind.

Gravis looked into the sky with a sigh. "So I actually look blind," he lamented. This proved that his concerns hadn't been baseless. He really didn't look forward to future encounters like that. After some seconds, he looked at the disciple again. He wanted to punch him in the stomach and just be done with this, but he got another idea.

Instead of punching the disciple, Gravis rubbed his chin in thought. 'This should work, right?' he thought. After a second, Gravis looked into the disciple's eyes again. "Hey, what did the unconscious person say to the blind person?" he asked.

WHOOM!

The earth under the disciple got pushed down by an invisible dome, and he fell over, unconscious.

"Exactly!" said Gravis.

Gravis had thought about the way he could utilize his Will-Aura with his newfound Spirit. With his Spirit, he could release his Will-Aura anywhere he wanted. Sadly, he wasn't able to compress it yet. If he released his Will-Aura just like that, he would destroy the surrounding kilometer of the guild.

So, why not just activate the Will-Aura in the air? Like this, only the bottom of the ball-shaped Will-Aura would hit anyone. He tried that just now, and it had worked. The bottom had hit the disciple, making him unconscious, while none of the others felt it. Gravis smiled in satisfaction.

The other disciples looked in shock at what had happened. How did the earth beneath the disciple get destroyed? Why did he suddenly lose consciousness? Gravis didn't even move! Everyone was too shocked to react to Gravis' lousy joke.

Gravis looked around to the other people, hoping they understood his joke, but he was disappointed when no one reacted. "Ah, fuck that," he muttered and quickly left the area. He didn't want to remain there.

The other disciples looked at Gravis leaving with unreal speed and took deep breaths. This expert was mysterious and powerful. They must not offend him!

"I get it!" one lone disciple shouted while laughing, eliciting strange looks from the others.

Gravis quickly arrived at the smithy. It was a rather tall tower in the form of a hammer. Gravis admired the building for a little bit and then entered. When he went inside, he only saw a hall with many different forging equipments strewn around. He also didn't see any banks or chairs to sit. 'Not even chairs?' he thought.

Yet, there was nothing he could do. He wasn't about to make a scene because he had to remain standing for some minutes. Gravis walked to a wall and leaned on it, closing his eyes. He might as well use the time to think further about battle applications for his new control over lightning.

Like this, around five minutes passed until the door to the inside of the forge opened. The Vice-Guild Master, that Gravis talked to earlier, came out, smiling at Gravis. "Hello, Gravis. Please follow me to a side-room," he said, beckoning him to follow. The Vice-Guild Master had long black hair and red eyes. His eyes looked friendly yet hid deep explosiveness inside them. If he got angry, he would probably lose all rationality.

Gravis left the wall and followed the Vice-Guild Master. They walked up some stairs and went into a side room. In here, Gravis could see four chairs and a table. This was probably a place for negotiations. They both sat down on one chair each. "Alright, so tell me about your unusual request," the Vice-Guild Master said, taking out some paper and writing utensils.

"Alright, so, where to begin," Gravis started saying. "Since I've reached the Spirit Forming Realm, I noticed that I could use the magnetism of my lightning to move forward. Unfortunately, my lightning is too strong, thus creating an instantaneous acceleration that always throws me off my saber when I want to ride it."

The Vice-Guild Master didn't know what Gravis' goal was in telling him that, but that only showed that this was really an unusual request. He continued listening in interest.

"I basically want something magnetic that I can ride on without falling off," Gravis said.

"Oh, that's interesting," said the Vice-Guild Master. "Did you have anything particular in mind?"

Gravis nodded. "Yes. I need something like a small magnetic board with wheels. For stability purposes, it should have four wheels, one on each corner. I don't want something like a handlebar since I want to keep my hands free for any unforeseen events. It should also have something like an elevated railing or wall at the back. Like this, I can brace myself on the board when it accelerates."

The Vice-Guild Master tapped his chin in thought with the pen. "I think I get what you want," he said. "The Lightning Sect uses a similar method of transportation, but a little different. Most of them use a spear, so we only put a small wheel at the back of their spear. Like this, they ride on their spears while it remains on a 45° angle. For stability, they hold the spear's shaft. Though I like your idea better."

The Vice-Guild Master started drawing on the paper until he finished a draft. He showed it to Gravis, and Gravis' eyes widened. This was precisely what he wanted! It was a small board made of metal, maybe half a meter long. It had four wheels on its corners, making it pretty stable.

Gravis grew even more surprised as he saw some springs at the bottom. Gravis was pretty smart, so he quickly realized why they were there. These springs would allow him to jump and land with the board without destroying its wheels.

The backside of the board had an about 20-centimeter-tall small wall. With this, he could lean his whole weight on it when it accelerated. When the board drove forward, he could make a jumping motion to make the board jump with him, thanks to the springs. Like this, he could ignore any minor elevation.

Gravis nodded with a smile. "This is perfect!" he said.

The Vice-Guild Master also smiled. "Alright, so how durable should it be?" he asked.

"I don't want it to get destroyed by a random blast from a Spirit Forming expert. It needs to remain intact. Also, I will need five of those, in case one of them gets damaged. I think you can imagine how much speed and force they have to be able to endure since I am a lightning cultivator at the Spirit Forming Realm," Gravis explained.

The Vice-Guild Master nodded. "No problem. We will need to make these boards about as hard as Spirit Weapons, though we don't need to include Formation Arrays. With this being a special request, we also need to forge it without any already created forms or molds. Do you have enough money for that?"

Gravis nodded. "I pay with gold. Is that okay?"

The eyes of the Vice-Guild Master narrowed a little in a bitter expression. "I think you might not understand how much this costs. This comes to about the price of two full Spirit Weapons. You would need over a hundred thousand gold coins to pay for that."

Gravis thought about this. "Could you tell me the equivalent in smelted, pure gold? Due to space restrictions in my Spirit Space, I smelted all my gold coins down into a cube."

The Vice-Guild Master lifted an eyebrow but quickly started calculating. After some seconds, he answered. "That would be a cube with the dimensions of 30x30x40 centimeters. Do you have so much gold?"

Gravis quickly cut a cube of gold off with those specifications and summoned it.

CRACK!

The table broke as the gold hit it. Gravis had forgotten how heavy so much gold was. "That should be enough, right?" he asked.

The Vice-Guild Master was first shocked but then grinned.

"That's enough. I'll get right on it!"