Genetic Ascension

Chapter 1628 The Sanctum

Sylas exhaled a breath and stepped down from the body.

There was a flicker of Runes around him, and he was pulled off of the arena and sent back to the top tier with the 073, 003, 002, and 001 Sanctums.

He didn't seem to notice, looking down at his own knuckles to assess what damage there might be.

Using his telekinesis to amplify his own physical strength was quite effective. It was practically like adding 350,000 stat points to his Physical. But the problem was that his base Constitution stats were too weak. Without a balance in stats, one was bound to drag down the other.

The good news was that this could be mitigated in two ways.

First, there were his Scorned Wraps that gave him a +100% in his base Constitution.

The second was to be more clever with his application of telekinesis. He could split it into two streams, one that was offensive and another that was defensive.

Unfortunately, for the time being, the former was the far better solution.

Just coating your body with telekinesis wasn't the advantage you thought it was. Every joint moved independently, and the timing also had to be perfect. You couldn't just treat the body as one object; otherwise, you'd lose Dexterity.

There was a give and take, a push and pull every time you applied telekinesis to yourself.

For example, if Sylas wanted to throw a punch, accelerating that punch at the tail end of the attack just before it landed was the easiest method, but it wasn't the most effective method.

Getting into the weeds could easily greatly complicate things. There was a reason though there were a large population of telekinetic ability users here, only Sylas was using his to amplify his body so frequently.

Others preferred easier methods.

It's its own martial art, Sylas concluded. One I'll have to figure out very soon.

As of now, there was no damage to his hand. But he bet if he could perfect his telekinesis as a true extension of his body, there would be no need to worry about his Constitution at all.

Sylas looked up and saw rows of gazes looking at him with fear and trepidation.

And then he looked past them, feeling a different gaze.

For the first time, Sylas saw Robareda. She had a calm to her at this moment, one that exuded complete confidence.

Sylas completely ignored her, giving her a sparing glance as though he didn't even register her beauty. The moment he sensed the scent of a Serpentes, he knew that she would be irrelevant.

It was someone else who he sensed as far more of a threat.

Amende.

Plumes of crimson rippled off him, and Sylas continued to observe him as though he was interested in something. After a moment, Sylas looked away.

What exactly was the point of getting into a pissing contest with a moping, petulant child?

Up in the skybox, Elbrum looked at the corpse that remained for a long while, not starting the next phase immediately. He could feel it—that wasn't entirely Sylas' physical strength. That was telekinesis.

But as shocking as that was, it still wasn't what he was the most concerned with.

Those below didn't know, but they, as members of the Emperor Sanctum... they did.

Maybe everyone thought it was simple enough. If you got a Summon who was a strong enough Rune Master, and you got a Profession that allowed you to Fuse with your Summons, then you could use as many Warlord Armors as you wanted. There were probably some fools down below wondering why they hadn't thought of such a method before and if they could get their hands on such a Profession.

In fact, they probably believed that finding the actual Profession was the easy part. Fusing Summoner Professions were a bit rare, but not to the point of being unfeasible. They certainly existed in large enough quantities that a Sanctum that wanted to move heaven and earth could find more than a few.

If they used them as rewards for the best disciples, maybe they could connect their Lineages more meaningfully.

What not a single one of them understood was just how impossible this was.

Time and time again, the same phrase was brought up when speaking of the Sanctum:

They weren't an organization of Rune Masters. They were an organization of Will Masters.

To master a Warlord Armor, and especially an Emperor Armor, meant embodying every bit of the beast you projected the Will of. To try and hold more than a single Will inside of you was like trying to serve two masters at once. To be capable of perfectly aligning with a completely separate Will just because you felt like it... it was almost like changing the very core of your being at a whim.

The Spirit Beast Race was a race of beings quite literally born to hold countless Wills inside of them. However, even they only picked a single one to follow. All but... a very select few of them capable of following more than

one.

These were the monsters that stood at the pinnacle of their Emperor Sanctum—monsters who either currently ruled, or would one day rule them.

In this entire generation, there were only two.

But Sylas was no Spirit Beast. If he was, Elbrum and the others would have already sensed it.

He was an odd breed of human, one that seemed to have a bestial aura that wasn't entirely clear. But maybe the reason it wasn't so clear was precisely because he had multiple beast Wills within him.

Could he be...

Elbrum's pupils constricted into pinholes, and he looked to the side to find the Emperor Dove and Emperor Lizard already looking toward one another. It was clear they had also come to the exact same conclusions.

The sound of their breathing was the only thing that echoed in the skybox for a long while.

"Contact the Sanctum," Elbrum said.

When Elbrum spoke of "The Sanctum," he could only ever be referring to one place.