Chapter 53: Date with lightning
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Hello, I said I would update every Saturday and Wednesday but then I forgot to upload on Saturday. Please forgive me! As an apology, I will upload the next chapter later today as well. If you've got any thoughts or questions, please pop them down below in the comments. I'd really like to hear your thoughts. I'm lonely!

 

A quick recap of last time. Marcel ‘ate’ a snake, gained its skills, and went to see Claude the Demon Lord’s secretary to learn a new skill. The skill he’s going to learn is ‘Thunder Rising’, an invented skill unlike any that Marcel has seen before. A skill so alive that it shocks him. And...  

Fast forward a day after that and Marcel is brutally regretting his decision to want to learn ‘Thunder Rising’ so badly and was also asking himself one question: Who’s fucking idea was it to train their body like this? And why did his training have to take place in Boltz, the world filled with nothing but thunder and lightning energy and mutated lightning-resistant plants and small critters?  

This training method was more torturous than what he’d endured at the hands of the elves, he thought. Hey, at least, their form of torture only lasted a few hours at a time but on this mission to acquire powerful lightning resistance, he’d already suffered a lot more than he did at long-eared folk’s hands. 

To gain the power to control the lightning of the physical world, he must first make his body strong enough to handle it but, um, why is he sitting atop a flat hill and allow himself to get struck by terrifying lightning capable of ripping apart his body?! 

Well, simple! There are two ways to gain resistance to various elements. One is to have the ‘lovely’ Spirit of the World gift it to you on a whim or to have it embedded within a blessing received from a divine being while the other involves having to earn the resistance by working for it. As Marcel is currently sitting in the middle of a world with the most bountiful thunder and lightning strikes in all the known worlds of the demon realms, he’s following the latter route. 

Right after Claude dropped him off at that hill, he disappeared, leaving Marcel alone to figure out the rest for himself. He came up with the idea of acquainting his body with the plentiful lightning strikes of Boltz until it got strong enough to resist its power.  

This isn’t going to be too hard, he thought, having complete faith in his body’s ability to withstand damage. This thought, however, was one he was going to heavily regret. 

Atop that hill he sat, awake every hour of the day, not sleeping a wink, eating, or even taking a rest. He looked awful; his clothes, in tatters after the continuous strikes of lightning; his face, pale and distorted as he grunted and braced himself for every lightning strike. He healed himself after each strike, regrowing dead skin after another, taking everything the Thunder Plains had to give. 

After a few days of quietly enduring the pain, he couldn’t take it anymore. He groaned in pain, looked up above at the dark clouds of Boltz in frustration, knowing that another painful strike was on its way. Atop that hill he sat, frustrated, hungry, angry, immensely stressed, and wondering where his regular logic-defying luck had gone. Seriously, where did it all go? 

Three days later after enduring more pain and Marcel was no longer in the mood to be civil anymore. Yes, the little guy started cussing. Firstly, he cussed at who other than the Demon Lord, the usual cause of his frustration, then Claude for creating this ‘stupid’ skill in the first place, then Alverona for giving him a useless blessing that wasn’t working although he was terribly in danger and then the elves. They had the worst. Poor elves! 

He cursed the fact that their blessing was a Power Seed like Alverona’s and did nothing to help strengthen his body just yet or the fact that all the Elven King’s torture only amounted to ‘puny’ resistances that will definitely save his life but not in that situation.  

He screamed out to the world who wasn’t favoring him as it usually did, “Why don’t the elves have a lightning nature and speaking of natures, isn’t lightning just a variant of fire?!! Why isn’t my fire resistance helping at all?!” 

Well, I can answer that question. It’s because the two elements in Tharrelan and Boltz have very different origins. Their divine origins differ and thus, so too do the elements, albeit their relationship with each other and thus, Marcel continues to suffer as he tempers his body against the lively lightning of Boltz. 

And so, Marcel continued to endure the lightning for 12 additional days where he frustratingly endured the lightning strikes that sought to destroy his body as he cursed anyone he could think of because, um, pain relief, and on the thirteenth day, he finally heard the sweet sweet ‘Ding!’ he’d awaited. 

 

<< Ding! You have acquired [Thunder and Lightning Resistance - Low]! >> from the Little Demon Lord that was his sassy Informer. After hearing that ding, he felt so happy that he almost forgot that he had to continue sitting through the thunder and lightning until he got it up to [High]. 

 

Yes, the lightning resistance he had as a human basically amounted to nothing in front of the lightning of Boltz. Damn human world! Even the low-level lightning resistance he wasn’t on par with that of the demon realm’s standards, which explains why he suffered so much. After he acquired the low lightning resistance again, however, things took a smooth turn, and the world began to favor him again. Damn two-faced world! Not helping when he really needed it. In two additional weeks, he managed to raise the resistance from [Low] to [High]; enough to practice ‘Thunder Rising’.  

With lightning resistance received from enduring the strongest lightning in the entire demon realms, his body’s strength got a significant boost as well. His body strength had already entered the middle stages of C-class with his HP passing the 1500-mark already. Ha, sitting on that hill and suffering wasn’t for nothing. Wait, was this why the world didn’t help him?! Looks like not cursing the world during his time of suffering did come with benefits. Now finally, he can begin trying to achieve the next requirement before using ‘Thunder Rising’: finding a lightning bolt to nurture with magic. This is almost very much like finding a beast to become one’s summon. 

Now, how does he do that exactly? Well, Claude said this:  

‘Look up at the sky and convey your thoughts to the world of Boltz. If it hears you and a bolt of lightning wants to serve you, it will come to you.’  

Yes, very specific and vague at the same time but Marcel will figure that out, somehow. After all, he always does. Nothing is too much of an obstacle for the incredible hero loved by the world. If he sits down and looks for lightning, he’s sure that one will come to him eventually. He waited for so long to acquire lightning resistance and is sure that he can wait for a few more. 

Fast forward to three days after he began waiting patiently as he conveyed his thoughts to the lightning spirits of Boltz and Marcel still hasn’t found a lightning willing to serve him but that isn’t the only thing he discovered. He noticed that the bolts moved in the sky like beasts, coming down to the earth and striking it down anything that caught their eye. Claude was right. The lightning in Boltz seems strangely alive. Lightning struck everywhere and he could swear that the lightning strikes weren’t just randomly striking things on the earth, for the most part. They mostly target these weirdly battered trees growing around Boltz. 

The lightning bolts continued to rain down upon the earth, ignoring Marcel’s continuous pleas for a lightning bolt and just like that, two additional days passed. He looked towards the sky, waiting for the fated lightning bolt that would rush towards him like he was a lightning rod but alas, nothing happened until suddenly, he noticed a blue lightning bolt sort of look his way.  

It was strange! He could tell that the blue lightning had noticed him, even though he didn’t speak ‘lightning’. The blue lightning, after affirming that Marcel had noticed it, answered his call for a lightning companion. Huh, looks like the world can’t stop helping him when he really needs it.  

With the blue lightning answering his call, it rushed towards him and entered his body, shaking the little hero who was electrocuted by the lightning bolt. It headed straight for his magic pool and made itself at home, thus completing Marcel’s mission on Boltz. He not only got the powerful lightning resistance needed to practice ‘Thunder Rising’ but also a suitable lightning bolt to nurture in the future, although, whether or not the lightning will be able to handle living in Marcel’s body is still unknown. 

The lightning, after making its residence in Marcel’s body, tried looking around, greeting the old inhabitants inside his host’s body. The mysterious force inside him granted him territory and thus, the other forces didn’t interfere with it. It just relaxed in its new home.  

Meanwhile outside, Marcel was thinking of a name to give the blue lightning. Unlike the regular purple lightning, Boltz was a light blue lightning bolt. Something blue-sounding would work, he thought, or maybe something impressive and attention-grabbing will do. He didn’t know which to choose at first, but at last, he chose the name, Blitz for his blue lightning companion. It fit how fast and decisive it was unlike the other lightning bolts who’d ignored one loved by the world, however, he was not at all prepared for what happened after he named his new companion. 

 

<< Ding! Notice: You have acquired the title, [One favored by god Takemikazuchi]! >> 

 

Huh? What’s that supposed to mean? Why did he get such a strange title?  

Yeah, speaking of strange things, he doesn’t know why but he feels very strange after hearing the name ‘Takemikazuchi’. He doesn’t know this Takemikazuchi person but he felt like they’re someone who should be very important to him. As he thought about this unknown person and what they might have to do with him, he suddenly remembered the Spirit of the World’s words about not prying into things he should know about just yet, so being himself, he shrugged off the strange feeling he was having and continued on his merry way to focus more on his achievements over the past month. Sure, he’d like to ask his sassy Demon Lord Informer what that bizarre title entails but he can always do that later, so he wasn’t worried much. Since coming here, he’s trained his body, acquired the lightning resistance he desired, although it wasn’t complete immunity, and also acquired Blitz. What more could he ask for? 

Now that the mission objectives have been completed, he wanted to go home but um... where can he find a telecircle leading back home to Nephavion.  

Damn Claude! Why didn’t he just use the telecircle like a normal person instead of directly teleporting him to Boltz? Great, now how will he get home? Is he lost?! 

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