Genetic Ascension

Chapter 516: Slight of Hand

 Nôv(el)B\\jnn

The Sylphs braced themselves for an attack, only for the arm to suddenly change directions and touch the frozen corpse of the Woodland Spider Queen.

At the same time, Sylas' Beacon activated once again, agitating what remained of the spiders and calling in more. He couldn't give them any true commands, but they knew enough to know exactly who it was that he wanted to target.

The swarm of serpents rushed toward the Sylphs as the Woodland Spider Queen disappeared into Sylas' Madness Key.

As for Sylas himself, he had already turned to run, a burning pain in his chest.

There were only two possibilities as to why the others hadn't shown up yet.

The first was that they wanted to bait him and spring yet another trap.

The second was that they were setting up an area defense around him, trying to create an inescapable net that he would be hard-pressed to fight his way out of... especially in his current state.

He had already deduced that Lucius and Ragnar, though they seemed to have the same goal of killing him, weren't actually working together. That meant that this group wouldn't have known that he would be trapped in this Field Dungeon, which also meant that they would have had to set up a separate set of defenses to force him to keep fighting the spider queen. But by extension of that, thanks to his Beacon Path Talent, those defenses had more or less been shredded apart, so they would have no choice but to set up new ones or rely on another contingency plan.

If he was lucky, they had only just started now.

If he was unlucky... well, he really hoped that he had suffered enough for the system to leave him alone for a bit, or else he might well and truly be screwed.

His Speed was already cut in half by the Warrant placed on him, and his injuries only took another major cut out of it.

Luckily, while they had to be careful weaving in and out of these paths, he did not. After all, this entire web was a poisonous hell trap, while to him he was practically immune.

Well... he was immune for as long as his beaten and ragged body could hold up.

Beacon lit deep within his soul, and he called for more help on top of what he had already received. However, he was quickly running out of steam.

With a quick check to his status page, he realized that his Will was actually somehow still at 1999. However, he could feel a great fatigue coming from his mind as though its elasticity was really being pushed to the limit.

The use of Beacon was a huge weight on his mind, but it was something he could normally easily withstand. But if his continuous use of Rune Soul was stacked on top of that, it was a miracle that he hadn't passed out already.

Kalden and Rylen were hot on Sylas' tail. They were caught off guard by the sudden change, not expecting such a prompt decision from Sylas. But it was only a moment before they were a mere meter or so behind him, ready to reach out and grab him.

Sylas would have cursed if he had the mind to. At a time like this, one more use of his Planar Convergence Gate would have been a miracle sent from above. Unfortunately, he had already used them all up.

The timer on his Fusion Path Talent was up, but now his body was too heavily injured to even use it.

He felt a hand swipe at him from behind.

He tried to activate <Cyrobane Elevation>, only to realize that he simply didn't have enough Aether. He had pushed out everything he had in that battle, and he was running on fumes. The only thing he could do was dive to the side to avoid a grab, but the gash cut across his back deep enough that even the ice he had used to protect his pierced side fragmented.

Sylas coughed up a mouthful of blood, a deep fury hidden in his eyes. He truly hated this feeling, more than he could describe in just a few words.

The worst of it was that even if he managed to find the miracle waiting to give him a path of survival, this likely wouldn't be the last time in his life that he would have to deal with such a situation.

How far would he have to run? How much blood would he have to shed? How much pain would he have to experience before he could finally walk through this universe without a single hint of fear?

His waning Will suddenly sparked and flared with life.

[Title Evolved]

[Title Sequence Shake of the Die has changed]

[Surge of the Die > Slight of Hand]

[The Odds shift ever against you, but who cares for Odds when you have Will]

[When entering Heavily Injured status or facing off against ten or more enemies, decrease enemy stats by 20%]

[Note: the stronger your Will, the lower the requirements]

The moment Sylas saw the Title change, he remembered that he was actually in the middle of

a Title Sequence for Surge of the Die, but the requirements for the next Title were tall.

He didn't think that it would mutate before he even got a chance to complete it.

At the same time he saw this Title, he reacted on instinct. He used Semi-Fusion and activated the Basilisk King's <Voice of a King> Skill at the same time.

The synergy between his Title and skill was forced when his Extricate was pushed into the picture. A subconscious understanding of Blood Essence created a unique resonance that he couldn't quite put his finger on and simply didn't have the time to.

At that moment, Kalden and Rylen felt their bodies shiver as though they had been stripped of all their clothes, just in time for a heavy stone to swing down from above.