Lightning Is the Only Way

When Shira returned, Silva grew even more frustrated. He had thought a long time about her effects on the Tribe and had concluded that he would kill her, even if it slowed the growth of the Tribe. He just couldn't forgive her for what she had done.

Yet, this plan was thrown out of the window as soon as he saw her.

Shira had become a level three Lord.

Silva and Orthar had decided to only temper themselves against level three Lords. Sadly, that decision had impacted the growth of their Realm. After all, there hadn't been many level three Lords that had attacked their territory.

On top of that, they had only reached the area with the level three Tribes recently. They had intended to go out and temper themselves soon, but Shira had returned before they could start. Shira's new power infuriated Silva to no end.

As soon as Shira returned, she went to visit Gravis in their new headquarters. The new Spire was many times bigger and harder than the previous one. A Spire was a symbol of status, and the bigger and harder it was, the more powerful the Earth Movers inside the Tribe needed to be.

A gigantic and powerful Spire like this required an Earth Mover that was, at least, a level three Lord. Yet, the most powerful Earth Mover inside the Tribe was Orthar, who was a level two Lord, wasn't it?

That was not entirely true.

Sometimes there would be fights when both enemies died. At that point, there would be two corpses that no one had killed. Gravis didn't want his Tribe to get free food, which was why he forbade the beasts to eat corpses that they hadn't killed.

Yet, would Gravis just waste these corpses? Of course not! So, he fed the corpses to his fungus. He never intended for the Common Fungus to fight, which was also the reason why he had it eat all these corpses. Its Battle-Strength was irrelevant. Gravis was using the fungus more for manual labor.

Thus, the fungus had become a level three Lord, and with its new power, it managed to create this impressive, new Spire. It was fully made out of some kind of powerful ore and stretched far into the sky. The Spire was over 25-kilometers-tall.

Gravis also decided to live on top of the Spire now, instead of in its middle. The reason for that was that terrain wasn't important anymore, starting at the Unity Realm. There was no reason for the Tribe to create an Abyss at this place. After all, only Lords lived at this new headquarter.

The immense amount of Spirit Beasts that the Tribe had gathered over the months all lived further outside. The reason for that was that the current headquarters resided deep in the territories of the level two Tribes. Spirit Beasts wouldn't even be able to temper themselves here and might accidentally die when Lords fought.

On the coast of the continent, the Spirit Beasts could temper themselves against each other and some newly created Tribes. When they became Lords, they would travel to the new headquarters if they were interested in becoming more powerful.

Yet, one shouldn't forget that level two Tribes also generally had several level one Lords. What about them?

Gravis had also found a solution for them. These new level one Lords couldn't compare to the level one Lords of the River Tribe. Because of that, he couldn't keep them at the headquarters. If he did that, all the level one Lords that had risen from the River Tribe would just harvest them to raise their level. Yet, such a fight wouldn't benefit their Battle-Strength.

Because of that, Gravis created a camp between the coast with the Spirit Beasts and the headquarters. There, the level one Lords that came from other Tribes would go through the same thing as the Spirit Beasts. The only difference was that they would fight other level one Lords instead of Spirit Beasts. With this, the survivors would be able to compare to the other Lords inside the Tribe.

Shira had heard about all this and narrowed her eyes. The Tribe had become even more powerful than she had imagined. She had thought that it would slow down as soon as more level two Lords rose, but that hadn't been the case at all.

When she returned, she saw over 20 level two Lords, which had surprised her to no end. On top of that, she knew that there were more of them. After all, some of them were probably tempering themselves outside of the Tribe right now.

So, Shira and Gravis met on top of the Spire. Shira first asked if she was still part of the Tribe and Gravis nodded. It had been her choice to fight, and he wouldn't throw her out just because of that. Yet, he also warned her that Silva had become incredibly powerful.

When Shira heard Gravis describe Silva's power, her eyes showed a fiery motivation. Right now, Silva was not a level three Lord, but that could change very quickly. She also trusted Gravis' knowledge about power. When Gravis said that Shira would die the day that Silva became a level three Lord, she believed him.

Gravis had also told her that she needed to temper herself more if she wanted to stay alive. If she didn't, she only had two options: die or flee.

Shira fell into thought when she heard that and then sighed. After that, she looked at Gravis. "Or, I kill him right now," she said.

Gravis only smiled, but before he could say anything.

BOOOOOOOM!

The whole top of the Spire exploded as Shira shot at Gravis. Gravis wouldn't allow her to kill Silva, and she knew that. So, in order to survive, Shira had to kill Gravis first! This was the decision she had made as soon as she decided to return.

BZZZZZ!

Gravis immediately transformed into lightning and shot into the sky. Shira became enraged when she saw that. She had assumed that, with her speed, she would be able to kill Gravis with a sneak-attack. Yet, Gravis had reacted like he had already expected such an attack.

The whole Tribe went into a frenzy as the top of the Spire exploded. Silva and Orthar appeared beside the Spire and looked at Shira. Orthar wasn't surprised at all, but Silva nearly lost his mind in rage. "How dare you!?" Silva shouted.

Shira only smirked. "Isn't that why our Leader has invited me into the Tribe? He wanted me to become powerful enough to pose a threat to him. I am only doing what he wanted me to do in the first place," she said with a bloodthirsty smirk.

"Yet, our dear Leader hasn't seen what I have gone through in these last two months. I went through hell, and I have become more powerful than he would have expected. He has played with fire for long enough, and it's high time for him to get burned."

Silva grew enraged, but there was nothing he could do. He knew Shira's combat power very well, and he knew that she couldn't be compared to the other level three Lords that he and Orthar had killed. If those two fought her, they would definitely die.

"Hahaha!" Gravis laughed from the sky. "Man, when it comes to you, I really make one mistake after the other," Gravis said in-between laughs.

Shira only continued smirking. "Yes, you do. You wouldn't have expected me to grow this powerful in such a short amount of time, but that is your own fault. I am not like the other level three Lords you have killed. This time, you have bitten off more than you can chew."

Gravis only continued laughing. "Oh, Shira, Shira," he said with a shake of his head. "This is not what I meant. I am not talking about your power, but about your personality."

Shira only sneered. "What do you mean?" she asked in a mocking tone.

Gravis shook his head again with a smile. "I have expected you to be a beast that can estimate the power of your enemy without much problem. Yet, you have disappointed me. I would have thought that you were smart enough to realize that you're not my opponent right now."

Shira only scoffed at Gravis. "Your tricks and battle-experiences won't help you this time. You are two whole levels below me, and I am experienced enough to defend myself against everything you can use. As long as I don't commit a mistake while defending myself, you won't be able to even hit me with your slow speed."

Shira laughed a bit. "After all, it was you who taught me that power is everything. In front of supreme power, schemes and experiences won't save you."

Gravis only smirked. "Right, that's what I said, and that holds true," he said, but then, Gravis' smirk disappeared. "And that is also the reason why you have no chance against me anymore."

Shira narrowed her eyes at Gravis and shot at him.

Meanwhile, Gravis continued transmitting his thoughts. A voice transmission was instant, after all.

"Three months ago, my lightning was only powerful to injure a level three Lord."

"Two months ago, my lightning became powerful enough to kill a level three Lord."

"One month ago, my lightning became powerful enough that not a single level three Lord in this world can withstand a single attack from it."

Then, Gravis smirked again. Shira was still charging at him with quite some speed.

BZZZZ!

Gravis transformed into lightning and shot at Shira with incredible speed. Gravis' lightning was now over three times as powerful as when he had reached Unity. This meant that his speed, while being lightning, had also become a lot faster.

Gravis' lightning caught Shira off guard, but her battle-experience was incredible. Instead of just looking at him, she immediately used one of her two heads to bite him.

"I'm disappointed in you," Gravis said as he summoned a saber and slashed forward.

A Lightning Crescent with 100% of Gravis' power shot at her, and there was no way for her to evade from such a distance.

He had intended to use this fully-loaded Lightning Crescent on one of his two enemies when they appeared. Like this, he would be forced to only fight with his own power. That would create a challenge again. Sadly, that plan had fallen out of the window.

She felt the power of the approaching lightning and knew that she couldn't possibly survive that.

"What a disappointing death," Gravis transmitted one last time.

BOOOOOOOOOM!

An explosion nearly ten-kilometers-wide appeared in the sky. All watching beasts had their eyes burned and lost their sight. They needed to regrow new eyes to see again. The shockwaves also destroyed the whole Spire and threw chunks of them far into the distance.

With their senses, the Lords were able to evade the chunks. If they hadn't, they would have helplessly died under their incredible hardness and weight.

After a second, the explosion vanished.

Only Gravis remained hovering in the sky, a gigantic saber in his hand. At the same time, the lightning from the explosion gathered together and entered his body.

Then, Gravis only smirked as he put his saber on his shoulders.

"And that's that," he commented.

Shira had died before she could even put up a fight.