Chapter 8 A Bond With Earth

There was still the problem of vision.

The area to hit the machine was very small, so I needed to be accurate.

This precision was only possible with my eyes or observation Haki.

I thought of a technique but felt unsure about its success.

There was no record of what I was about to attempt; none of my predecessors had formed a fully functioning technique like this, so I could only experiment.

I quickly transformed back into human form and felt control over the massive ball of destruction slipping.

The formed lightning began dissipating from my control, wildly rushing outward and smashing into different particles.

Understanding what might happen next and thsi was never made into a proper technique, I quickly acted, sending the ball of lightning directly into the small opening.

There was a chance the out-of-control lightning that I had restricted to my will would lash out and hit other particles in the air, containing elements that were unknown, resulting in unpredictable events.

But I needed [100,000 volts] or at least 90,000. This ball of lightning was going to hit like a bomb.

Tony's Arc Reactor attack had hit the outer shell, blasting it apart and leaving the insides completely open.

At lightning speeds, the ball hit it, followed by an extremely rapid, continuing explosion of the visible parts of the machine going deeper in.

I wondered if I would be fine if I just stood there since I was invulnerable to such things, but I couldn't bring myself to find out.

The consequences would be dire if I couldn't ignore the explosion or the lightning that was going to spread outward, smashing into particles containing different elements I wasn't sure of.

Transforming into lightning, I began flying upwards into the sky.

It was a weird experience.

Willed by my body, it simply began moving up as if gravity didn't affect me, and I could freely move any way I wanted.

Flying upwards for about a minute, I felt like I was probably high enough. I formed two lightning blocks below me as I transformed back into human form.

I felt all of my body's weight returning, and the gravity I had ignored sent a direct impact, pushing me down to Earth.

I felt the weight of my normal body return and I could barely move a muscle.

Quickly controlling the lightning blocks, I stopped my descent.

My body hit the lightning block, and the momentum I gained was quickly dissipated onto the lightning blocks.

Turning my my body around my back on the block, I let out a sigh of relief.

Rubbing my eyes, I felt something was odd.

There was no sound around me.

Where is the explosion? I thought to myself. Looking at the sky, I had to rub my eyes to make sure I was seeing correctly.

"Why is the sky dark?"

Wasn't it just day? I thought as I slowly regained control over my body.

Immediately, I felt that my surroundings had a lack of buoyancy, and the air was quite thin.

Forcing myself to sit up, I began looking around me. The silver rock we call the moon hung silently in space in front of me, while the brightly blazing sun hung far in the distance.

The wide Earth below me, its ozone layer emitting a blue hue, covered the entire planet visible to my eyes.

The brightly shining stars in the night sky, almost impossible to view due to pollution in the atmosphere, were clearly visible, shining brightly, scattered across the dark space.

Taking a deep breath, I tried to calm my heart down.

Standing up, I looked all around me once to make sure my eyes were not deceiving me. Yet everything remained the same.

"I am in... space..."

"No, not quite in space" I said feeling the gravity trying to pull me closer to the earth.

Sitting back down, I looked at the wide Earth that shone with radiance.

Blue waters encapsulated a large part of the land, yet the land maintained its own colors: green, brown, white, yellow—all representing different cultures, histories, alliances, and politics, yet all on this one planet.

A sense of bond began sprouting inside my chest. A bond with humanity and the planet.

Wars at this moment seemed so petty, I thought to myself with a chuckle.

I felt the urge to protect this planet filled with such life within it, almost as if it was my responsibility.

"What a crazy day this has been. Feels like a dream," I said out loud as I controlled the lightning blocks, now more like a small carpet, to begin descending.

The image of Elizabeth appeared in my mind at this moment, and subconsciously a smile appeared on my lips.

My longing to look for her increased as I sped up my descent.

Getting closer to the Earth's atmosphere at high speeds, the resistance offered by Earth was high, but gravity seemed to be on my side this time.

So I quickly descended, the clouds below soon appearing in my vision, my smile widening as my heart beat faster.

A funny feeling in my stomach appeared that I couldn't describe, but it felt good, like anticipation. Getting closer to the clouds, the sounds of deep thunder finally reached my ears.

I wished to speed up to see what was going on, but I was already going as fast as I could, so I could only patiently wait it out.

Going through one of the thick clouds, I felt the precipitation coat my body, leaving a very damp feeling that I didn't quite enjoy.

The cloud started getting thinner as I was finally able to see what was going on below.

All I saw was dust.

A whole lot of dust.

So much dust that it dwarfed the dust produced in the movie Interstellar during the baseball game.

Along with the huge amounts of dust, streaks of purple lightning were constantly flashing, which was odd because my lightning was blue.

It must have mixed with an element, causing its attributes to change a little.

But the first thing I did, instead of figuring out what was going on with the lightning, was look for the huge floating aircraft carrier.

Using my powers I set up general checkpoints forming a circle stopping the lightning and the sand cloud from spreading towards other places.

This was easily done but actually controlling all that lightnign within was an impossible task for now.

Looking around for a bit, I finally found it, and it was like a pebble compared to the dust that didn't seem to be settling anytime soon.

What was really unsettling was that even though there was all this dust and thunder, there were no sounds of parts of the land crashing to the ground.