Genetic Ascension

Chapter 2069: Ruthless

BANG.

Sylas didn't get the chance to find a solution. The last of their group, a man he didn't recognize, slammed out an elbow, appearing by the woman in a blurring flash.

There was a flicker in Sylas' gaze. The man was quick, not in a reality bending, space folding sort of way, but just objectively so. He had grown so used to fighting people with odd, broken abilities and complicated bloodlines that he almost took too long to realize that this man just had... fast twitch muscles.

It was that simple.

BANG.

The woman rebounded off the steel walls an instant later, her body bouncing back and into the waters. She gasped for breath, but that sounded to be the last thing she should have done.

She started heaving at the air, trying to find some semblance of oxygen to take in. But every time she tried to breathe, more was ripped out from her by the waters, causing her to panic even further and leading to a looping, vicious cycle.

"Fucking bitch, what do you think you're doing? Does it look like I want to live or die based on your one-sided conclusions?"

The man slicked his hair back, licking his dried lips with a tongue that came across much too long for a human. But aside from that, he didn't look any different from a man Sylas might have found on Earth before the Summoning. If there was any oddity, it was just the redness of his skin.

It wasn't unnaturally red. That was why it didn't stand out. But for a man that neither seemed embarrassed, drunk, nor out of breath, the tinge of red was just a little bit too much.

Exhaling, the man looked at the group before his eyebrow raised when his gaze landed on Sylas. He had been just about to introduce himself when his words fell flat.

"What the hell is an E-tier doing here?"

Sylas didn't reply to the man. Instead, his gaze was still focused on the vault as the waters rose up high enough to hit the first valve.

As expected, the water flipped the valve open and water poured into the mechanisms of the vault. The gears turned and shifted, misaligning from their previous settings and twisting the formerly perfect solution Sylas had come up with into an utter failure.

Oddly, though, the man didn't pursue Sylas further despite the fact the latter ignored him.

"The name's Belly. I have a name my parents gave me too, but who cares about those fuckers at this point? You already see the situation we're in. Since all of our lives are dependent on the answer to the situation at hand, I think we should all vote on a solution we can all agree on-."

A bolt of emerald and violet lightning ripped through the man's chest.

His eyes opened wide as he looked down at the bloody hole where his heart had been.

His body shook and he slowly looked up toward Sylas as the flashing miniature arcs of lightning danced at the corners of his eyes.

And then his vision went dim.

Belly fell back into the waters with a slap of water and a slow sink.

Sylas' telekinesis churned and the vault gears twisted before anyone else could react.

Chi.

There was a click and the waters puttered to a stop.

The woman's pupils constricted. She had been so furious seconds ago, but the solution Sylas had used was completely unlike hers. Granted, the solution had changed due to the rising water. But she could tell that her previous solution was still very much wrong.

She was almost grateful toward Belly. Almost.

But now the man was dead and she couldn't feel much more than a cold chill sweeping against the back of her neck.

Belly hadn't even been doing anything wrong, and yet he was killed on the spot just like that for wasting a little bit of time.

To say that Sylas was cold blooded was an understatement.

He didn't even look at her as he walked forward and out the vault doors.

The Sachi and Golmara didn't seem fazed by anything that happened. Instead, they, too, casually walked out of the vault doors, following after Sylas.

The woman could only drag herself along. What choice did she have?

...

The group didn't travel very far at all. Soon, Sylas found himself stopping in another cube shaped room. This cube shaped room happened to have many other cubes within it, each one carved with special symbols on them.

The cubes were neatly arranged and stacked into two eight cube high towers facing their corners at them. This allowed them to see two sides of each cube at once.

These cubes hovered in empty space, hanging above a fathomless darkness that felt endless.

Across the empty space was the entrance to what was presumably the next room.

[Objective Set]

[Objective: Path Building]

Once again, another challenge. But this one was very different.

Sylas' body was lit up by a glow.

[Please select the first building block.]

-

Sylas glanced at the cubes.

The symbols weren't Runes. Instead, they were separated into three categories as far as he could tell. Those three categories were color, shape, and angle.

The last category-angle-was the least obvious. Most people would only see two categories, assuming the odd angles were caused by how the cubes were stacked. But Sylas immediately saw through the fact that couldn't have been the case.

'I see.'

Sylas nodded and made his choice.

The block floated forward and then attached itself to the building path before them. There was a delicate green glow that formed around it that said Sylas' choice was correct. Then, the glow around Sylas himself vanished and someone else was selected to go next.

It was the Sachi.

Her tails bristled and she took a moment before she selected one of the cubes.

The instant she did, Sylas didn't even waste a moment, suddenly erupting with a fist.