Genetic Ascension

Chapter 1516 No. [Bonus]

[Bonus thanks to Lost917. Do me a favor and lose your phone, your wn password, and your credit card, bastard] BOOM. BOOM. BOOM.

The moment Sylas had the thought, he pulled on the Death Seal, turning his senses to the inside of his body.

At that moment, a hovering reaper with a scythe of black appeared. It reached forward, grabbed at Sylas' body, and yanked something out.

Sylas convulsed, feeling as though he was losing a part of himself, and yet feeling the exact opposite at the same time.

The reaper wasn't a separate entity; it was a manifestation of a new part of his Will. What it took was akin to passing something from one of his hands to the other. And as it did so, things that he couldn't sense before suddenly became all too clear.

His mind was blasted wide open, the roar of a Great Ape hovering at the back of his mind returning in earnest.

But it was more than just that alone.

The reaper not only grasped the latent Will within Sylas' own Great Ape Lineage, but it also grasped at the seed of the Ape Emperor Armor, re-establishing the form of the original warring ape it was formed from. And then, as though it wasn't satisfied with this alone, it pulled on what was none other than Sylas' True Pride Seed.

It was then Sylas felt the truest intent of the Ape he ever had.

The Ape and the Monkey—they were two separate entities. As far as Sylas had ever known, the Ape was the far cleverer of the two species, the Monkey lagging far behind. However, his conversation with the King Serpent had flipped that completely on its head. Was it really that the Monkey was the inferior creature of an already mostly ignored species... Or was it that without the Monkey's leadership, the Ape lost its way, having forever lost its rulers?

Broken, ridiculed, slighted by the annals of history, the Monkey had become lost— forgotten to time.

What was interesting was that Earth actually had legends of its own—legends that raised the Monkey to the height of Deity. But Sylas had gone through the entirety of the Golden Grove's directory... He had never seen a replication of those legends anywhere outside of Earth.

Why was that? What did Earth know that other worlds didn't?

Sylas' eyes went completely white, his irises and pupils vanishing. However, in his mind's eye, he could only see the image of a single figure.

A Monkey King, standing tall on two legs. His fur was gold and shimmering, a staff in his hands with the skull of a plated dragon on the end of it. A ribbon of stark red, marred by the blood of his enemies, danced from it.

The eyes of the Monkey King turned as though piercing through the veil of time and space to land on Sylas. Its irises were a crimson red, layered in lines and wiggling sigils of ancient meaning.

And then it grinned, its canines glistening with saliva and murderous intent. Even seeing a descendant, it wanted nothing more than to do battle, as though it wouldn't stand for even its own son to surpass it.

That Pride, etched deep into its bones—the Pride that had it standing atop the mountains of the world and peering down with a majesty that made the skies feel far too low... It drilled into Sylas' very being.

BOOM. BOOM. BOOM.

Sylas gasped as though his lungs were filling with water, his chest rising from the ground like a string had pulled from his sternum. Blood of gold pulsed in his veins, roaring waves threatening to shatter his heart to pieces.

Despite the changes, Sylas' mind remained sharp, his Runes beginning to form even faster.

He felt the Will so clearly—the Will of the true Ape Emperor.

No.

The Will of the Monkey King.

F-tier or not, it left the Ape Emperor so far behind that Sylas didn't need to stand on the same height as that existence. He didn't need to be an A-Grade Rune Master.

The Pride of the Monkey King stood above all.

Golden shingles and Runes began to fall onto Sylas' body, his comprehension of Strength, Constitution, Dexterity, Speed, Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma all coming together to form a Rune Armor unprecedented in the F-tier.

His body shook wildly, and deep in his subconscious he realized...

He could do this for the Scorpion Emperor when the time came as well.

The little girl was more than right.

The Reaper Sealwright was his path to Godhood.

Sylas' heart roared, his body shaking as the last shingle of his Armor snapped into place.

An unprecedented Unique Gene formed within him, but soon, so too did a Gene Talent. [Ancestral Gene Talent: Pride of the Monkey King (Legendary)]

BADUM.

The entire world fell into silence, the echo of a single heartbeat radiating with gold being all that was left.

And the moment it echoed, the barrier to an A-Grade Race shattered to pieces.

Sylas gasped again, this time feeling the water sputter out from his lungs.

The ring of gold around his emerald eyes became more prominent. His hair flashed gold for a moment before returning to its original color, a band of ancient writings forming around his forehead like the metallic headband of a king before it too faded.

A second heartbeat echoed, and the impurities of his body were forcefully expelled in waves.

The Grimblades across the universe began to return to their origins—their true Origins. And right then, Sylas felt an unprecedented amount of danger. A danger that told him if he continued, he would certainly die. A danger that whispered warnings of the eradication of everything he had ever known.

It took no more than a moment for Sylas to understand.

If he continued, the slot in the universe the Thryskai Demi-Gods had vacated would be taken by the Grimblades. But if that happened... The only path forward would be death. He was still too weak to carry such a task on his back.

Unwillingness pulsed through his veins, his True Pride Seed shaking his body from head to toe. It wanted to continue. It wanted to stamp itself onto the world as it should be. "No." Sylas' voice brought the calm to the ocean's tsunamis.