Genetic Ascension

Chapter 1238: Killed

Sylas stared at the creature for a while before looking away.

“They’re powerful Demon beasts, aren’t they?” the Duchess asked with a smile. Her demeanor was like that of a fluttering fairy around Sylas, seemingly not caring much about the gazes of the others around them.

This was already about as muted as Sylas could make it without risking her breaking from Compelling Gaze.

The trouble with having her act like her real self was that she would too easily sink into the role. If that happened, she could break the compulsion on her.

Of course, there was only about a 10% or so chance of that happening, but Sylas didn’t want to risk it. She was far more useful as a willing pawn, even if her actions now would almost certainly put a target on his back.

That target would come not just from the other remaining suitors, but, of course, from her father.

There were countless gazes on Sylas now, but his reaction was much the same as it had always been—unbothered, unmoved. His only slight movement was to turn toward the corner where the Barbed Chain Gang was standing to find Ansla staring.

The moment she sensed his gaze, she immediately turned away.

Sylas looked for another moment before feeling his arm pulled almost a bit too strongly by the Duchess. The jealousy on the latter’s face was as clear as day. Clearly, she hadn’t forgotten that Sylas said he wasn’t interested in her, but had said all those kind words about Ansla.

However, under her nigh-enslavement to Sylas, she wouldn’t say anything out of turn. This was practically the best thing she could do. The trouble was that it was even more forward than anything else she had done until now.

“Come. We’re at the front,” she said with a bright smile—not that it could be seen beneath her black cloak.

Even now, all the Sanguara were wearing them.

…

The carriages rumbled and the Demonic Serpentes rushed away, leaving Sylas lost in his thoughts as though the Duchess wasn’t by his side and her father wasn’t right across from him.

Unsurprisingly, people seemed to just call him the Duke. Whether they had real names or not, Sylas didn’t know. But the fact they kept hiding them made Sylas wonder.

There were so many interesting things happening in this world that reminded him of Earth.

Apparently, the Charysm were the Incubus of legend, and even Incubi themselves existed in a weaker, inferior form. But then there were the Blazara, who looked like they had been copy and pasted out of every stereotypical drawing of the devil—right down to the pitchforks they chose as their weapons of choice.

The Sanguara… they were a bit more difficult to peg. But their cloaked figures, their pale, translucent, almost sparkling crystal skin and bone… their elongated canines and fascination with blood…

They sounded a lot like vampires.

So Sylas couldn’t help but wonder two things.

First, why did so many of these legends proliferate on Earth? In the wider galaxy, they made sense because those were the people that interacted with Demons in reality and were the descendants of people who had fought them off. But on Earth?

Could it be that these were the leaks of lore from previous Summonings, maybe? But only the weaker Demons should have had any access to Earth. The pig demons, the orcs, the various were-creatures…

But these Demons… had they appeared on Earth at their full power, they would have destroyed entire populations with flicks of their fingers. When could they have possibly appeared?

The Blazara might seem insignificant here, but it had to be remembered that they were suppressed just like the Sanguara. While at their pinnacle they were no comparison to the Sanguara, a single one of them could have laid waste to Earth at Level 0.

Had the First Race of Earth fought them off? But Sylas hadn’t seen any signs of that—just hidden details of battles with the Thryskai and machinations of Legacy.

And the second was…

How far did these legends go? Did the names of Demons hold power in the real world too? Is that why they went by Duchess and Duke? And in that case, why did the others go by their real names?

It seemed that he should ask the Duchess about this if he got a chance. Unfortunately, he hadn’t thought of this until just now, leaving him unable to explore it.

In the time he spent with the Duchess, he only called her father—which didn’t set off any alarm bells. And today was the first time Sylas had heard someone else address him, and it had been one of the other Sanguara.

“It seems you’ve enjoyed your time with my daughter,” the Duke said after the carriage had been rumbling for a while.

“Father, don’t—”

The Duchess’ words stopped as though they were cut off by something.

Sylas was only silently looking at the Duke.

“You want to kill me?” he asked calmly.

“Wouldn’t you?” The Duke leaned back just as calmly. “I’ve been scouring the continent for information about you. But can you believe it? Nothing at all. You’d think an Incubus capable of catching the eye of two princesses in the span of a few days would have a trail of broken hearts following him. But nothing at all.

“Even more curiously, the first story of you comes from the fishery of the Barbed Chain Gang. You just so happened to be coming from the same open waters the Golden Champion came from?”

“Maybe I like to swim.”

“Mm. You don’t have the scent of Water Aether affinity on you at all, but you want me to believe you spent all of your formative years in the water?”

“You said it, not me.”

The Duke chuckled. “I admire your ability to remain calm.”

“Is there reason for me not to? Are you a threat to me?”

The Duke laughed once more.

“Confidence is something I admire in a young man. Arrogance, though… Arrogance gets you killed.”

The Duke’s Will shook the space between them, and a suffocating killing intent gripped Sylas’ blood again, moving to yank it all out of him in a single tug, imploding him from the inside out.