Genetic Ascension

Chapter 2304: Flailing

Sylas turned it over in his mind for a long while and came away with nothing.

There was no clever answer waiting for him. He looked at it from every angle he had, and the answer always seemed the same no matter what he was looking at.

It was like Gentrixaul had simply lost his temper and didn't think. Or maybe he didn't think that he needed to put any real effort into it because he was facing off against someone who had once been a mortal.

Maybe to Gentrixaul Sylas' ascent into the Demi-God Plane wasn't impressive at all. When you were looking at the world from on-high, did the ascent from one ant-like status to the next matter for much?

Of course not.

And yet, to Sylas…

It felt like flailing.

Gentrixaul had triggered the Quicktime Event because it was the largest thing he could do through the rules, and when it produced nothing but a string of corpses and an untouched Sylas, he had reached for the next largest thing without pausing.

Or maybe he had never actually paused and waited first at all. Maybe he had triggered them both at the same time regardless of the consequences simply because he was searching for an outcome that suited him.

He wanted Sylas dead, and he didn't care about what cost that came with.

Maybe from the very beginning, he was just looking for a chance to insert himself into the battle like he had tried with Sarethvane, and planned to end everything all on his own.

Sylas had said once before that no matter how intelligent he was, it was impossible to fully realize and scope out the mind of a stupid person. Logic only worked when it was logical, and as things stood now, it felt like Gentrixaul was anything but.

Unfortunately for Gentrixaul's "plan", the weak ones died too quickly under Sylas' hand for him to have a chance to interfere. He would find one, begin the work of settling into it, and the thing would be in pieces before he had finished. Sylas was simply too strong compared to these weaklings.

And the strong ones, the ones Sylas cared to take a second look at, the ones who had built their paths without the system's guidance under them, those were precisely the creatures who had spent their entire existences refusing to be held by anyone.

The irony was that one of them, that being Dry Mouth, had used a method that didn't even allow Gentrixaul to reach him in the first place. Gentrixaul hadn't even been aware that that battle occurred.

And the part worse than even that, with how many powerful Beasts were coming from the Beast Heaven now, Gentrixaul would certainly have a chance to deal a blow to Sylas… If not for the fact his stupid actions had allowed Sylas to essentially be protected from that very thing. Right now, no one above Level 200 could attack him without specially prepared means to avoid detection by the system.

And Gentrixaul was very clearly not the prepared type.

He had literally lifted a rock clean off the ground just to drop it on his own foot.

The beast was an utter fool. That was the only conclusion that Sylas could come to, the only one that made any sense given the information he had.

As much as he didn't want to risk looking down on a god…

Nothing else made any sense.

The complete idiot didn't even consider what might happen to the Beast Heaven's Karma, and how that backlash might come back to bite him in the ass especially.

Despite his conclusion, Sylas remained cautious. Ultimately, what he didn't know could, in fact, hurt him. The question was what he could do if— A notification caused Sylas to stop mid-step, his pupils constricting and his eyes narrowing.

It hadn't come the way the others came. This wasn't a notification of the system, not another Quicktime Event, or yet another foolish ploy by Gentrixaul. Instead, it had come through the Nexis, through a private line that he usually only received messages from Cassarae on.

But it wasn't Cassarae, it was Elara.

And yet, something was prickling at the back of Sylas' mind because he could feel that this Will wasn't purely his sister's own, almost as though it was tinged with the influence of someone else. It was only after he read the message that he realized that he was overthinking things… this person wasn't hiding that they weren't his sister in the first place.

This person wasn't hiding who they were at all.

The message was from Rhykan Purvon.

[Seems you've been doing well, Sylas. I'm glad to see it. It's a shame that we ended off on such a wrong foot before, but we can't possibly allow such an opportunity to slip out from right under our noses, right? If we work together this time, we can block both Legacy and their other Thryskai Clans from benefitting from our hard work. Then, it'll just be me and you when the time comes to settle who basks in the rewards of the Beast Sanctum… how about it?] Sylas read it through once.

He didn't move for a moment. The void sat around him the way it always did, and somewhere behind him a Serpentes he had killed an hour ago was still coming apart in the light of a dying celestial body.

There were very few things that could surprise Sylas, but a message like this was certainly amongst that list.

He read it through again.

The message was as straightforward as could be. It had a bit of fluff as though they were truly old friends, and then it capped off its words with a note he could almost feel a smile through.

It was enticing and it didn't explain everything. It was waiting for something, waiting very patiently… waiting for Sylas to reply.

Once again, it seemed like Rhykan wanted to ride the wave of a commotion that Sylas began.