When Naath saw the storm he shook his head and looked to the man who had brought him here. He spoke up with his soul energy saying, “senior, please just go back to your own world, the heavens and I have a bit of a grudge with one another. Don’t worry senior, I have a few tricks up my sleeve, I have survived one of these on my own world already.”
The man shook his head and stood his ground sending a message back to Naath. “No, I just found a good disciple. If the heavens want to get in my way, well I’ll just have to fight them.”
Naath let out an inaudible breath knowing the master would not give up no matter how he coaxed him. He turned back to the heavenly punishment and a look of firm determination appeared in his eyes. Naath moved forward using his martial energy and slowly approached the heavenly punishment. The master followed closely behind him, with the clouds also approaching them it took less than a minute for them to be surrounded by heavenly punishment clouds. When the master felt the raw destructive energy inside of the lightning streaks he turned stark white. He began trembling and sent Naath a question.
“Exactly what did you do to anger the heavens like this?! A single strand of this lightning the width of a thread is enough to destroy entire worlds!”
Naath shook his head and said, “the heavens wanted me to be their chosen child, I refused. They didn't like that, but I refuse to be used by anyone, not even the heavens themselves. If I die here then so be it, master, you should flee.”
The man finally seemed to understand and looked at Naath in shock and fear before speaking. “Kiddo if you survive this I, master Hal, will gladly take you as my disciple and impart everything I possibly can on to you. Good luck, I'll be on the planet below watching.”
Naath nodded his head solemnly and watched as the master left and went towards the nearby planet. When he saw him land safely he said inaudibly, “okay heavens it’s just me and you now, give me all you've got!!!”
When Naath finished ‘speaking’ the lightning converged into a familiar face that simply shook their head. A thought going into Naath’s mind “Child we have already given you a chance and it cannot be revoked, nor can your decision. We could not eliminate you last time without destroying an entire world, in doing so we would not be balancing the scales by eliminating you. We would be unjustly killing innocents, here however, we can wield our full power. You brought this upon yourself, goodbye child.”
With that the lightning figure disappeared and the lightning it consisted of spread out back into the clouds building in power. Streaks of pure destructive white lightning the thickness of Naath’s entire body and thousands of miles long began appearing. Naath felt a numbing sensation in the back of his mind, his every instinct telling him to flee and hide. But he knew it was pointless the heavens were everywhere, he couldn't escape now even if he wanted to. He adjusted his posture and channeled earth energy making a platform for himself to ‘stand’ on in the emptiness of space. He hardened his resolve and glared at the lightning streaks as they built. He knew if he wanted to make it to the planet he had to go through the storm.
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The lightning had ignored master Hal as he was innocent, Naath was not so lucky. The heavens’ rage was aimed solely at himself and nobody else. As he went to take a step forward the lightning struck his chest and a crippling pain tore through Naath as he felt his entire body being completely destroyed by the energy in this lightning. He clenched his teeth and retracted the step he was making, the seed in the middle of his three soul seas shook slightly and drew in the energy. The results of the lightning energy hitting Naath had already taken hold though as he was coughing blood continuously, all of his internal organs were damaged. Even his bones had hairline cracks all across them like spiderwebs, they threatened to crumble at any moment.
He was breathing heavily but still had a resolved look in his eyes, he wiped the blood from his mouth and went to take a step forward once more. Again the lightning struck, refusing to let Naath move forward on his path no matter what. This time the lightning that struck was twice as powerful as before, but Naath was undaunted this time and ignored the screaming pain in every cell of his body. He continued and firmly planted his foot forward completing a single step. As he finished taking this step he smiled in victory and looked mockingly at the lightning in front of him.
He spoke up “you heavens, you see that?! I can move forward even if you refuse to allow me to do so! You might kill me here, however I have already won! With this single step I have proven you are not absolute! No matter what I have defied you until the end, you heavens, you cannot stop me! If I wish to take a step forward, not even you have the power to stand in my way!!!”
Another lightning bolt struck in response to this twice as powerful as the previous one yet again. Naath looked at it and time seemed to slow for him as he saw it coming, he simply smiled and accepted his fate not closing his eyes in resignation. He planned to stand his ground until the very end and refused to bend a knee to anyone even the heavens themselves. The lightning struck and he felt pain through his entire body as everything was obliterated and destroyed. Naath eventually only saw blackness and nothing else and his body was completely obliterated into nothingness, not even dust remained.
With this the heavenly punishment disappeared and space returned to its former calm, the world destroying lightning had gone as if it never existed. Master Hal on the planet below had a sorrowful look in his eyes as he saw Naath being completely and utterly destroyed. He let out a breath and turned around dejectedly making his way back to his other students. He had lost a once in a billion year talent all because this talent had directly challenged the authority of the heavens. Like this a grand genius had been removed from this world never to be seen again. On the world Naath was from Elder Gui was conversing with the rune and making a deal with it.
The rune would guide and teach elder Gui and in return elder Gui would provide his soul sea for the rune to recover inside of. The rune did make a certain exception to the rule however. If and when Naath returned the rune would go back to him, Naath still had a task to complete for the rune after all. Baal was saddened by the loss of his friend but elder Gui continued to train him and he began to practice the whirlwind arts that Naath had passed on to him before he left. Brutus looked up to the sky and howled saddened by the loss of his master. Elder Gui suddenly went slack as he too looked up at the sky, he had placed a soul seal on Naath before his departure that would tell elder Gui whether Naath was still alive or not.
He fell to his knees as he felt the soul signature from the mark fade away indicating Naath had passed onto the next world. He had died. This time for only the second time in his entire life tears slowly streamed down the sides of elder Gui’s eyes. He sat there on his knees in a daze for an unknown period of time before the rune inquired as to what was wrong. Elder Gui remained silent and simply looked into the sky silently shedding tears. The other elders also appeared after two days when elder Gui still remained in this state but could not get a single response from him. After three days and nights of remaining in this state, elder Gui stood up with no energy or emotion and silently made his way to a nearby boulder.
He put out his hand and, using his soul energy, carved out a tombstone on it with Naath’s name and information on it. When the rune, the elders, Baal, and Brutus saw Naath’s image on the tombstone they finally understood. And for an entire day all of them mourned the death of a close friend, a perfect student, and a master. Naath had passed on from this world and they would not see him again. The heavens had indeed gotten their way and killed the young man that had refused and rejected them entirely.