The lightning meditation is the third exercise in the ancient book of the Art of Nature. It is one of the most grueling and intense practices, testing the practitioner's physical and mental limits.
Unlike the previous meditations, this exercise spans an entire week and must be completed in a single sitting, like the fire meditation, without any interruptions. The practitioner must remain focused and endure extreme conditions for 168 hours to complete it, two extra days from Fire Meditation!
Moreover, to begin the Lightning Meditation, the practitioner must find an environment teeming with potent lightning energy-typically in the heart of a thunderstorm or an area known for constant lightning strikes. The atmosphere should be thick with electric charges, with lightning crackling incessantly, providing the raw energy necessary for the meditation. When Jacob saw the details of his exercise in his previous life, he naturally didn't believe it. It was utterly ridiculous, as no human could endure lighting for such a long time. Not to mention, to reach this point, one needed to complete the fire meditation fires, which was impossible on its own.
Yet, now that he was in the Zodiac Plains, this impossibility became reality. He had already completed two meditation exercises and was about to start the third one, which seemed like a fantasy before.
As the lightning swirled around his entire body, Jacob's mind was calm as he focused on the breathing technique. The breathing technique for the Lightning Meditation was similar to the Fire Meditation but far more perilous.
The practitioner must inhale the charged air, drawing in raw lightning energy. Each inhalation electrifies the body, causing excruciating pain as the lightning courses through the veins, threatening to tear the body apart from the inside.
The first breath was the most crucial. The practitioner must inhale deeply, allowing the lightning energy to surge through the body, electrifying every cell. This initial shock is the most intense.
After the initial shock, the practitioner must continue to breathe in the lightning-charged air. Each inhalation brings more lightning energy into the body, while each exhalation releases excess energy, preventing the body from overloading.
The process must be continuous and rhythmic, with the practitioner maintaining a delicate balance between absorbing enough lightning energy to progress and not overloading the body.
Yet Jacob was now a skeleton, so he wondered if the same rules applied to him, but soon, he realized the difference.
As he started the breathing exercise, his breathing shifted, becoming erratic and unpredictable, mimicking the chaotic nature of the surrounding lightning.
Each breath was a strike of thunder; each exhale a crack of lightning. He aligned himself with the rhythm, letting the chaotic energy flow through him rather than resist it.
As Jacob entered the meditation state and the lightning meditation started, almost instantly, the gravitational force around him appeared and began to increase until it reached over 1000- G!
Jacob had already guessed this from his early experience with the Fire Meditation. But for the current Jacob, this much G-force was nothing as he focused on breathing while enduring the pain of the lightning.
As the lightning wreaked havoc within his body, Jacob suddenly felt his water core and fire core activate. Potent water and fire mana began to spread through his form, creating a strange harmony with the destructive lightning. The combined energy of the three elements weakened the force of the lightning, allowing him to endure it more easily.
This phenomenon reminded Jacob of the fire meditation, in which the water core had similarly counterbalanced the fire's destructive power. These exercises had an order, a strict pattern that had to be followed to reach completion.
Time lost all meaning. The days passed in a blur of purple lightning and crushing gravitational force. The entire stone chamber was now completely lit with pulsing purple
runes, and the stone altar discharged massive amounts of lightning.
The purple lightning outside the mountain began to vanish as it was drawn into the chamber, leaving the surrounding area eerily quiet.
A corporeal violet bubble surrounded Jacob, filled with crackling lightning. The bubble was impenetrable; anyone who dared approach would be crushed by the intense G-force or incinerated by the destructive lightning.
As Jacob continued his meditation, an arcane aura began to emanate from him, spreading throughout the canyon and beyond. The lightning beasts outside were drawn to this aura, their instincts compelling them to charge toward its source, mad with the desire to reach it. But Jacob was oblivious to the chaos he was causing. His mind was merged with the lightning, his breathing steady as the energy continued to pour into him.
Then, the nature of the lightning began to change. As it flowed through him, the dark runic lines of the Longevity Schema started to surface on his skeleton, pulsing with a crimson glow. The wild, chaotic energy began to converge, drawn towards a single point within Jacob's skull, where his spiritual nebula resided.
A singular violet point started to condense around his cursed heart, surrounded by the water and fire cores. It was like a tiny star revolving around the cursed heart, slowly growing in intensity. The singular point soon turned into a vortex of violet lightning, a swirling mass of raw, concentrated energy that pulled in every stray spark from the environment.
After an indeterminate amount of time, the lightning energy began to condense into a small, dense core within the vortex. Initially, it was a chaotic swirl of lightning, but it gradually stabilized, the mana directing the energy into a cohesive, spherical form-the lightning magic core was forming!
Just as with the fire and water cores, tiny white stars-rectified stars-began to appear within the lightning core. These stars signified the successful conversion of chaotic lightning energy into a structured, controllable form. The number of stars increased steadily as the core solidified, eventually reaching 100-the hallmark of a unique-rank magic core.
But the process was far from over. The moment the lightning core reached the unique rank, it released a powerful ripple that made the fire and water cores tremble. The next moment, more rectified stars appeared in all three magic cores.
199... 499... 999...
The limit of the unique rank, but it didn't stop there. The three magic cores began to shake, the rectified stars within them shifting and gathering into the center of each core, forming a disk-like structure. This was the sign of a breakthrough a transformation into a Legendary Rank Magic Core!