Genetic Ascension

Chapter 1728 Why? [Bonus]

[Bonus chapter thanks to Ricky_D_Reader. I hope the D splits you like it splits your name]

Outside the battlefield, a woman with a collar around her neck shuddered, fear flashing in her eyes. But it was already too late. She knew from the start that she had been brought here as a sacrifice. If Salivar died... She died.

BANG.

The collar constricted, and her head exploded as though a bomb had been implanted into her skull. But before the blood could hit the walls, it was sucked into something.

Her body compressed into a single black point.

[Battlefield Cleared]

[Winner: Sylas Grimblade]

The Quicktime Event seemed about to conclude when it sensed the presence of Salivar returning. Confused, the system didnʼt make a decision immediately.

Sylas didnʼt react to the Seeing Eye Guildʼs internal system message. He didnʼt care about it at all.

His Quest needed him to kill a Cryst Emperor, not defeat them. The question was whether or not his Quest would consider this a kill or not. If it did, good. He wouldnʼt have to go as far as normal.

If it didnʼt...

It seemed he would need to take a wilder option.

And it seemed he wasnʼt so lucky.

His Quest didnʼt show any signs of clearing. He had known that it wouldnʼt be so easy to kill Salivar, but getting a chance to kill him as an F-tier would have been especially lucky, even for someone who wasnʼt him.

From the moment Sylas saw the woman Salivar had brought with him, he had become aware that things wouldnʼt be so easy. Salivar was taking a huge risk in trying to participate as an F-tier to begin with. If the system sensed him, then there was no way that it would allow him to live.

In that case, the best option for dealing with this was to have a failsafe—a failsafe that happened to be the very woman he had brought along, strapped to a collar.

The question was, then, if Salivar was alive, but the Quicktime Event was still ongoing, while the internal system of the Seeing Eye Guild had already designated that everything was long over... What happened now?

No, that wasnʼt quite what was happening.

Logically, the Quicktime Event should also think that things were over, as should the internal system of the Seeing Eye Guild. The only thing that believed that things were still ongoing was Sylasʼ own personal Quest, something that was separate from everything else.

That meant that while the internal system of the Seeing Eye Guild was sending Sylas notifications, it hadnʼt officially closed everything down.

If that was the case, then the reason the Quicktime Event wasnʼt labeled as over was almost certainly because of the Seeing Eye Guild.

And if it was the Seeing Eye Guild, that could only mean that they had a contingency plan in place for this very moment.

If they were going to go as far as to risk the life of a Cryst Emperor like Salivar, then they had likely decided that there was only one way to do things. In which case, Sylas would have to move on to Plan B.

This wasnʼt too much of a surprise to Sylas.

Originally, he felt that this plan would work because of Salivarʼs temperament.

Sylas was someone who considered things from every angle possible. Even if he could force the Seeing Eye Guild into a situation where their Karma was on the line, there had always been the very real possibility that they could punt their chances entirely.

If they chose to lose on purpose, that didnʼt mean that things would be over for them. After all, the Thryskai wouldnʼt just allow the Weaver Guild to slide into their position so easily.

They didnʼt know the type of ”relationship” Sylas had with the Purvon young master. In their eyes, the Weaver Guild would be digging themselves into a hole.

Of course, they would also see things from the Weaver Guildʼs perspective as well. In their eyes, if the Weaver Guild was willing to do this, they clearly had a contingency plan of some sort, and that fear might sway them.

Even so, the smart thing to do even in that situation was to allow the Weaver Guild to win. Reason being, while the Weaver Guild might have a plan to deal with the Thryskai, the Seeing Eye Guild being caught off guard-certainly would not.

That was all to say that the risk of losing Karma and lagging behind was less so than potentially having the ire of an entire Race falling on you.

In that case, there were better than 80% odds, by Sylasʼ estimates, that the Seeing Eye Guild would choose to quit and allow him the win.

The trouble with that was that Sylas didnʼt come here just to beat the Seeing Eye Guild. He didnʼt give a damn about any of this outside of how it might help him improve his Intelligence and Aether mastery.

The reason he was here was to kill a Cryst Emperor—any Cryst Emperor.

So why had he chosen this plan of attack?

That was because of what the report had said about Salivarʼs personality and his internal weaknesses. His challenge was the sort that Salivar might choose to take up all on his own because his pride would force it.

However, that was just the veneer of Sylasʼ plan. Originally, Salivar wasnʼt supposed to be able to participate in the F-tier competition at all. Sylas was originally going to crush their F-tiers, as he had, and then go on to challenge their E-tiers.

In that situation, there would have both been time for Salivar to hear about what was going on and make a unilateral decision on his own. And because it was a Quicktime Event, the odds that his Ancestors would be able to stop him would be minimal.

However...

That wasnʼt what happened.

Setting aside the fact Salivar managed to participate in the F-tier competition, his personality was far more restrained than the report said.

On top of that, the only way he managed to evade the system would be with help from his Ancestors. Meaning... they were supportive of this.

Why?