The Ascension

 

The pain had been unlike anything she had experienced on this world to date. Extreme heat. Rigid muscle cramps as all her muscles wanted to contract at the same time. Chest pain as her heart hurt.

The after affects were not nearly as painful as her life elements worked hard to heal her torn muscles. Her lungs had been collapsed from the blast, and she struggled to breathe.

It all happened over several seconds, which made the pain all that much more intense.

"Haaaah Fuck." She swore as air pushed back into her lungs. Her vortex frantically sucked up the lightning elements in her body, the earth where the arc struck, and the surrounding air.

It was her channeling that brought the bolt straight to her in the first place.

Lightning is discharged energy. Just like an electrical circuit, it wants to follow the path of least resistance. Air is not a good conductor, but when there is rain in the air, there is a better chance of it discharging from the air to the ground.

The closer the target, the more easily it overcomes the air resistance. Aila had suctioned elemental essence into her body greedily. Water elements headed for her in a surge around a certain diameter.

As the water elements surged inward from a distance, so did the lightning elements.

Another reason for the arc was her frantic channeling of the earth and metal elements. She helped to increase the static buildup in the surroundings, and basically painted a large red target on top of her head.

The first lightning strike had shocked her, and injured her heavily. Life elements rushed to the injury sites, and repaired the damage, while her vortex sucked away the lightning elements voraciously.

Nuri saw her eyes turn white with yellow, as did Elena. Both wanted to run out to help, but Elena knew they could not.

"Fuck." Aila sat up onto her knees. "Not like a cultivation novel. Fucking ignorant bastards write about lightning like it's easy to overcome!" She growled and felt the surge in the air.

"COME ON! YOU THINK I AM AFRAID?" Aila bellowed out angrily.

"FFFFFFUUUCCKKKKKKK!" She cried out as the lightning made another arc through her body again.

She wasn't afraid. She was terrified.

 

* * *

 

All of her loved ones were at the windows now. They watched as each lightning bolt fell from the heavens, and heard a tortured scream.

With each bolt, she seemed to get weaker, but at the same time, did she also appear to get stronger? They couldn't understand what their eyes told them. The air shimmered around her, glistened with energy, and each time she was driven to the ground, she rose a few seconds later.

Nuri could detect a massive amount of life essence surge within her Master's body. Her figure looked strong before, with extremely hard muscle all over her body. Now, the ripples could be seen along her arms and thighs. Her shoulders seemed to bulk a little bit more than before.

"Nuri, what is happening? Why is she able to continue rising?" Elena asked.

"Life essence. She's repairing herself after each lightning strike." Nuri said softly. "So much damage, again and again."

"A lot of heat too." Kaala said.

"Master is using a lot of water element." Ellie said quietly. "I think she's cooling herself off after each lightning bolt."

"Is she being punished?" Alara asked quietly. They each had the same question.

Is their precious Master being punished for her actions?

 

* * *

 

The elemental beasts of the forest were under cover, or in their caves. They were restless as it was the first time in over a century that there was a lightning storm in the forest.

During the nights, a mist would rise from the river, and water the entire forest. The water elements in the ground would continue to water the trees and plants during the day.

It was humid, but not stifling, and never rose to the point that it needed to rain in the forest. Winds would rise to blow away the stagnant air. Excess humidity would be absorbed by the massive trees, which would drip from their branches to cool off the trees.

It was a well regulated system that fed the soil, and kept the moisture at a reasonable level. Not too much, and never too little.

The reason for the lightning and the black panthers moving into the area was related, but nobody knew the reason yet.

Nobody would guess either, not until the event occurred. When the calamity happened, it would be so obvious, the signs and the reasons why the animals moved, that everyone would wonder how they missed it.

Even Aila.

 

* * *

 

"Whoever wrote those fucking novels, I hate them I hate them I HATE THEM!" She spat out her curses while still recklessly enduring the lightning strikes.

Aila could feel that the lightning was more easily absorbed now, but each strike was so sudden, there was no way to steel herself for it.

Each blast was like a heavy hammer that blasted her to the ground, and tore her muscles like old cloth. Each time she repaired herself, she knew she couldn't keep doing this for much longer before her focus was overwhelmed.

However, the dark cloud did slowly dissipate, and the sun resumed its lonely vigil in the sky.

"Fucking bastard." She said weakly. "Main characters endure lightning tribulations like it's nothing. Some get turned into fried chicken, but heal due to their high cultivation. Fucking bullshit." Her words were low, almost a whisper due to the way her body had been stressed.

Lightning was not something that forged a new body. It was not a test of endurance. It was raw primal energy that had forged the world itself.

This was something she just learned. With her metal essence being at a reasonable state, and had just absorbed up the lightning essence, she felt she knew a bit more about the world she had been brought to.

Imera was a living planet, and all the elements were used to create her. The basics seeded the world with its foundation. The advanced forged and reformed the barren rock into a living planet, perfectly balanced in all regards.

As Aila had a strong foothold in all the basic elements, she hadn't been able to understand a lot. After life had been added, it revealed some things to her that felt incomplete. She knew how life behaved, but didn't have a strong knowledge of the earth element, nor of light.

Now that her basics had been strengthened, and life elements had grown, she could see a part of the whole picture. After death was added, old quotes from Earth began to make sense.

From life comes death, and from death comes life.

That was especially true on Imera. Death elements converted life into death, while living things turned the dead things into components for life again.

From dust you were taken, to dust you shall return.

Though it was a condemnation of Adam, and how he would return to the dust for his sins, it also revealed that all life, and all of the physical universe was built with that simple dust, the most basic grain of earth elemental essence.

Lightning elements helped to forge the other advanced elements from the basic ones. Earth was combined with unimaginable amounts of energy in order to transform it into metals and minerals.

Life was dependent upon light, fused with the tremendous amount of energy of lightning to transform into life elements.

Death was dependent upon dark. Ice was the opposite of lava, which was super-heated flame elements that liquefied earth and metal.

Ice element was water super-cooled with wind. All the advanced elements relied on a basic to exist, but also relied on a secondary and complimentary element to be forged.

As to how much Aila could learn, only time would tell. Right now, she felt that the cultivation novel writers lied through their teeth.

Lightning was not a tribulation. It was a tool of creation, and of the gods who built this universe. That tool was a heavy handed bastard that sucked the energy right out of her.

"Fuck." She swore one last time as the final clouds disappeared. She fell over and passed out.