"Alright, I'll start. You ready?" Old Man Lightning transmitted to Gravis.
"Go ahead," Gravis sent back.
BZZZ!
Old Man Lightning released a small amount of lightning and shot it towards Gravis. Even though he believed Gravis, he wanted to be careful. After all, he was four entire Stages higher than Gravis. The lightning hit Gravis, making him feel energized. As the lightning hit him, the Destruction Energy was absorbed by his inherent lightning while the filtered Life Lightning went towards the closest thing, which was the Freya's Birch.
The tree released a feeling of joy as it felt the pure Life Energy coursing through it. It absorbed it quickly, but that small bit of lightning was not nearly enough. It wanted more. When Gravis felt the hunger of the tree, he smirked. "No worries, more will come shortly!" he transmitted to it.
Old Man Lightning saw that Gravis was still fine, so he increased the output to multiple times higher. Gravis felt the lightning and noticed his lightning steadily growing more powerful. This bit of lightning that Old Man Lightning released was already more than those 5,000 Energy Stones had given him.
The lightning kept pouring into Gravis while the filtered Life Lightning went into the tree, which also greedily absorbed it. Yet, greed took ahold of the tree, and it extended its branch into the lightning that came from Old Man Lightning. When Gravis and Old Man Lightning saw that, they gasped in fear and shock. "NO!" they shouted.
BANG!
Old Man Lightning immediately stopped his lightning, but it was too late. The branch went into the lightning stream and immediately exploded while a lot of the lightning went through its body. In a panic, Gravis immediately converted all his inherent Energy into Life Lightning and shot it into the tree, barely saving its life.
The tree remained scorched and black for only a short moment before it regained its vitality, yet it transmitted pain and fear into Gravis now. This was the first time where the tree felt the power of destruction on its body, and it immediately got scared. The whole tree swayed violently, and some kind of scream echoed throughout the Sect.
"Calm down! It's over! No one will hurt you!" Gravis shouted at it with his Spirit, trying to soothe it. It was just like a newborn baby and knew nothing about the world. The only thing it felt was pain and fear after this trauma.
Meanwhile, the disciples had first watched in shock as the old man shot lightning violently at Gravis. Was the old man trying to kill him? They didn't know that this was what Gravis wanted since he only talked with Old Man Lightning via his Spirit. Then, when the tree extended its branch into the lightning stream, their faces blanched. Did the tree have a death wish?
Old Man Lightning looked with a bit of fear at the tree, but after noticing that it survived, he released a sigh of relief. Killing their new treasure just after it had been created would have been horrible for the Lightning Sect. Luckily, Gravis had acted quickly enough.
It took Gravis over five minutes to finally make the tree calm down. During that time, he had to latch onto the tree to not fall off since it was violently shaking. After it finally calmed down, Gravis explained what happened.
"The lightning of other people is dangerous!" he transmitted severely. "Their lightning has Destruction and Life Energy. First, it needs to pass through my body so that I can convert it to Life Lightning. You can only eat Life Lightning, or you will get hurt again. Understood?"
The tree transmitted back that it understood. It didn't understand the full concept of Destruction and Life Energy, but it understood that it could only eat the lightning that Gravis produced. That was already enough.
After Gravis made sure that the tree understood, he told Old Man Lightning to continue. The old man continued shooting lightning at it while the tree, still afraid of the recent painful experience, pulled its branches as far away from the lightning as possible. It had no intention of feeling the sensation of pain again.
The lightning hit Gravis again, and its intensity started increasing with time. After a while, Old Man Lightning was shooting with everything he had, which made Gravis feel as alive as never before. His lightning storage was growing violently. Some stray bolts of it were already breaking through his skin.
Old Man Lightning quickly noticed what was happening to Gravis, and he grew astonished. 'So that's where he stores all his lightning,' he thought. He had already thought multiple times about how weird Gravis felt to him.
Gravis had nearly no Energy, yet had an abundance of lightning inside of him. Only now did he see the answer. Gravis was carrying his lightning in his dantian, while the Energy Old Man Lightning felt was only the inherent Energy that a body had. His interest in Gravis grew.
"Alright, I'm nearly empty," Old Man Lightning shouted, this time, not transmitting his voice. Then, he turned to the surrounding disciples. By now, there were a lot of them since something major was going on. "Now, it's your turn! Go shoot at Gravis with everything you have! You don't need to use your Spirit. Just shoot your lightning."
The disciples hesitated, but some of them were rather quick-witted and directly shot their lightning at Gravis. If Gravis was able to resist Old Man Lightning's lightning, then he was surely able to resist their lightning.
BZZZZZZZ!
Multiple streams of lightning shot at Gravis, who had no issue in absorbing all of them. "Come on! Shoot!" Old Man Lightning shouted at the still hesitating disciples. After his shout, they also joined in. The lightning of over a hundred Spirit Forming experts shot at Gravis, making him feel energized beyond belief.
The tree also started growing violently, even quicker than before. It started growing rapidly until it was over five kilometers tall, yet it didn't stop. Most of the disciples were smart enough to use their Spirits to control the trajectory of lightning, yet there were bound to be some stupid people.
BANG!
Some lightning bolts hit the branch that Gravis stood on, making Gravis panic again. Luckily, since there was a constant stream of Life Lightning going into the tree, he didn't need to heal it manually. On top of that, it seemed like the tree didn't mind that lightning too much. On top of that…
WACK WACK WACK!
Some branches of the tree immediately whipped away the three offending disciples. The disciples hadn't been ready for an attack, so they got flung into some nearby buildings. Apparently, the tree was smart enough already to see who had attacked it and retaliate. Its rapid growth was also quickly making it smarter.
"Stop!" it transmitted into its surroundings, making many of the disciples lose control over their jaws. The tree was already able to transmit simple words. That meant that it had reached the level of a Spirit Plant.
"Alright, everyone! Stop!" Old Man Lightning's imposing voice echoed throughout the Sect, making the disciples stop. The last bolts of lightning shot at Gravis and got converted. Gravis released a happy sigh but was immediately surprised by how high up in the air he was.
'That's nearly ten kilometers high! The canopy of the tree is even penetrating the storm clouds. Wait, what about the lightning?' he thought in panic and looked around. Gravis was inside the storm clouds, so he could only watch the situation with his Spirit. Yet, what he saw, relieved him.
He saw how the lightning of the clouds moved around the tree. In the beginning, Gravis questioned how that was possible. Since the tree was connected to the ground, why would it be able to not get affected by natural lightning?
Yet, the answer came rather quickly. By now, the tree was feeling like lightning to Gravis. As Gravis noticed that, he came upon a realization. 'Of course! The tree has a very high affinity with lightning, basically making it one with it. Normal lightning has no intention of attacking it. Only when a will is behind lightning will it attack the tree.'
Gravis sighed in relief again and then jumped down. "That should be enough food for now," Gravis transmitted to the tree.
"Thank you, father," it transmitted to Gravis, making him nearly lose his balance in the air.
'Did the tree just call me father?' he thought in shock. No one had ever called him father before. Was it fine for the tree to call him that? After some thought, Gravis decided not to mind it. After all, he kind of was its creator. Calling him father wasn't entirely wrong.
Gravis fell for a while, accelerating to quite a high speed. As he saw the ground growing closer, he suddenly had a thought. 'I have no issue in getting through this fall uninjured, but what about the surrounding ground? I am kind of heavy, after all.'
"Hey, could you please help me down more gently?" Gravis transmitted to the tree mid-fall.
The tree quickly coiled a branch around him, slowing his fall. Then, it moved him down gently.
As Gravis broke through the canopy of the clouds, he realized something as he looked down. "Oh, that's why they stopped," he said involuntarily.
The tree had destroyed the ground in the surrounding 500 meters. Buildings were destroyed, and those that still stood, stood at an impossible angle, nearly vertical. The ground and the buildings in the Sect looked like someone had punched through a steel plate, while the Sect was built on the other side of the plate.
Buildings that were previously on the ground were now many meters in the air, their furniture falling through the windows and open doors. The tree was even rather close to the Lightning Tower.
The branch stopped around two meters above the ground, uncoiling itself and letting Gravis stand on it. "Thanks," he transmitted.
Gravis jumped down from the branch, landing on the floor.
BOOOOOOOM!
And everything around him exploded in a storm of violent Destruction Lightning.