Genetic Ascension

Chapter 2098: Too Close

The Royal Blue Troll Elder hurried to pull Six back, grabbing him by the shoulder. He yanked him out of the influence of Sylasʼ Will Domain and sliced down at his collarbone, taking a huge chunk out of his torso before he managed to save his life.

Six took heavy breaths, cold sweat covering his brow.

From start to finish, Sylas didnʼt even look at him, as though he was still waiting on Elder Veraleʼs answer.

To her credit, she recovered quickly, and her body didnʼt so much as twitch toward the direction of retreat that had been her instinct.

Sylasʼ Will felt overwhelming, and his spatial control was exceptional. His Rune Mastery was even better than that.

He was a threat, but he wasnʼt to the point of being entirely unmanageable. At most, he could protect himself. So long as he wasnʼt the sort she was helpless against, fear wasnʼt an emotion she would allow herself to feel.

Especially not at the expense of the momentum of her party.

”According to our reports you donʼt speak very much at all, but youʼve come here to talk smack, boy?” Verale giggled. ”Is this to prove a point? A warning? Do you think that you alone are enough to stop an entire Heavenʼs invasion?”

”An entire Heaven?” Sylas nodded slowly. ”I wonder why this entire Heavenʼs invasion only seems to involve a single Guild and their three Races alone. Is it because youʼre the useless cannon fodder? Or is it because this is your one-sided wishful thinking?”

Veraleʼs eyes narrowed. ”Bold, indeed.”

Sylas didnʼt reply, but Veraleʼs lack of answer told him quite a lot.

What kind of Heavenly invasion only involved a single guild? Sylas had lost count of the number of Clans, Sects, and Guilds there were in the Skai Heaven.

Unless the entire Cryst Heaven was made up of the Seeing Eye Guild alone, this was no invasion. At least not yet.

”I seem to recall that there are a lot of people here who want to see you dead. Are you sure this is the aggressive stance youʼd like to take.”

”People have been trying to kill me for a very long while now. Which of them have you seen succeed.”

”Indeed. Instead of that, you tend to kill quite a lot. Massacring women, children, and the helpless. What a man you are.” Veraleʼs voice came out in such a low tone it almost registered as a growl.

”Interesting.” Sylas said, clearly not giving a damn. ”So you arenʼt from the Cryst Heaven.”

Verale froze and Fourʼs eyes narrowed.

Sylas looked away from Verale and his eyes landed on Four.

”Are you?” Sylas looked her up and down and then slowly nodded. ”I see.”

Verale didnʼt even know what to say. One moment she was grilling Sylas for all the people he had killed with his Hollow Wingʼs abilities, and in the next moment he had exposed something he should have never known.

How would he know that?

It was simple to Sylas, though. He had always been good at reading people. Many thought that he was socially inept because of how cold he was, it was quite the opposite. It was quite easy to get a read on people, he just didnʼt care about their emotions. There was a difference.

He had, indeed, killed a lot of innocent people in order to escape from the Seeing Eye Guild back then. Stories about his massacring, genocidal tendencies spread far and wide. That roar of his had killed the most vulnerable of the Seeing Eye Guildʼs population.

But the thing was…

There was no way that a woman who had just arrived from the Cryst Heaven would give a damn about any of that.

If she was just using it to change the perception people here had of Sylas, it would make sense. But Sylas could feel her fury.

She was well and truly angry, and it wasnʼt about the 17thʼs death. She was reacting more fiercely to speaking the words she just had than she had to Alpineʼs death.

Yet, though Sylas had only been here for a short while, it felt like the woman was trying to pretend to be from a higher station than she actually was.

In fact, the woman by her side with the character ”Four” on her lapel was also pretending to be quite close to her.

But from what Sylas could tell, this ”Fourʼs” talent was far too high to have any true affiliation to this woman, and the pressure of their Genes and Bloodlines were too vastly different as well.

Even Alpineʼs pressure had come from a far higher origin than this woman.

That meant that… this Four, that Five, and that Six had come from the Cryst Heaven…

But the Elders that followed them did not.

This was interesting because this woman seemed surprised that this was exposed, and yet there were members of the Weaver Guild right behind Sylas.

The Weaver Guild had been battling the Seeing Eye Guild for centuries at this point. There was no way they werenʼt intimately familiar with every powerhouse of their ranks, whether in seclusion or not.

Even if they never met these people in person, they would have definitely been given information about them in some form.

That meant that these experts were both from the Skai Heaven and well hidden enough that they were confident even the Weaver Guild wouldnʼt know about their origins.

Now the questions were…

Why? For one, why pretend. Second, why hide like this. And third, as a bonus, how had they hidden like this?

ʼTravel between the Heavens should be very difficult… the experimentation with Salivar…ʼ

Sylas had Salivarʼs body with him. He knew that he wasnʼt naturally capable of using as many Comprehensions at a time as he had. He had been modified, experimented on, and changed.

And it had ultimately been done through Will. Which likely also meant it was something more likely to appear in the Skai Heaven which represented Will as opposed to the Cryst Heaven that represented Intelligence… ”I see.” Sylas said.

Before he could say more, Four suddenly attacked, and then Elder Verale followed up quickly.

Sylas seemed too close to do anything in response.