Genetic Ascension

Sylas slowly awoke, unaware that every time he perfectly mastered a Path, a tone would ring out to the wider guild. It had only been a day, but it had happened twice now, each one barely separated by a few hours.

But even if he had known, he truly wouldn’t have cared because there was one more Rune Path he wanted to focus on.

The Fleeting Cloud Path.

Ironically enough, this Rune Path had nothing to do with flexibility like the first had. In fact, it had such a pretty name for something that was probably the most destructive of them all.

This Path focused on the deconstruction and systematic destabilization of Runes. It was quite similar to his Spatial Casting in that it allowed him to complete processes like shrinking Runes and using them as a method of attack.

But as with all things he had come across until now, he realized that his approach was convoluted without reason, while this method while no less and even more complicated-had a wide range of applications he had yet to think of personally.

Right now, Sylas could only use this destructive path by targeting the Runes of treasures. If he did this, he could force the structure of the treasure to destabilize and implode, causing damage to the wielder.

If, however, he tried to use it himself by, say, casting a Rune and then squeezing it in hopes of destabilizing it, the backlash would be to his own Will. If he pushed too far, he could even kill himself.

That said, if he focused on smaller Runes with fewer Foundations, and instead focused on keeping them stable rather than using this destabilization character, he could force weaker Runes to have much stronger power output.

This was all great, but Sylas very rarely used this in battle. Aside from making weapons explode, he never really used the other aspect of Spatial Casting because it was impractical.

It was so easy for him to draw powerful Runes, so why would he waste time drawing a weaker Rune, using the effort to compress it—not to mention weathering the danger of doing such a thing—just to craft a Rune of a power level he could already craft himself?

It might have been worth it if Sylas could do this with much higher-level Runes, for example those with 80 or more Foundations. But the danger at that level increased exponentially, and his skill back then wasn’t good enough to do so.

Now, Sylas felt that his skill level was just about there. But the trade-off for reaching that level was that now he had successfully drawn an E-Grade Scorpion Warlord Armor to perfection.

It just wasn’t worth it. At the current level his Spatial Casting was at, it would never be worth it, so it could only continue to be used as a treasure- exploding method.

And then came the Fleeting Cloud Path.

This time, Sylas chose this Path because of the Unravelling Pupils.

The Fleeting Cloud Path was one that focused on the ability of these eyes to unravel and deconstruct Runes, but it took it to a completely different level.

Following this Path allowed you to mitigate the risk of forcefully destabilizing Runes by making use of your ability to unravel them, keeping the most volatile pieces separated until it was time to erupt.

This reduced the risk by several orders of magnitude, and much like the others, this was still just the simplest application of the Rune Path.

What made Fleeting Clouds especially potent was how effective it was against other Rune Masters. When matched with Will Priming especially, it was possible to create large Domains of protection other Rune Masters and Will Masters could hardly breathe within.

Sylas’ Primus Luminaria Crown had this ability ingrained into it, but the trouble was that it was a Crown of an incredibly weak Sector. The further they got from the Milky Way Sector, the less effective it was on targets until it was completely ineffective.

But with the Fleeting Cloud Path, Sylas could create his own domains of absolute obedience.

A combination of destruction and defense, a delicate dance and melding of the two that left one with maybe the most powerful path of the three…

But once again, Sylas was only interested in studying it for the benefits it would give him toward comprehending his Runeweaver Class.

And then he was finished.

PING

[Perfection of the F-Grade Fleeting Cloud Path Achieved] [Reward: 36,000 Merits]

Sylas’ gaze was even slower to regain focus this time. This time, he wasn’t just focusing on one Path-he was combining them all into a single sweep… incorporating… swallowing… devouring… A dense darkness seemed to hang around him. But very quickly, it became clear that it wasn’t darkness, but rather a state of absolute nothingness.

While Sylas’ E-Grade Rune Mastery was improving, how could his F-Grade Rune Mastery remain stagnant?

Before, he had only vaguely touched onto the faintest corners of Void Rune Mastery. Now, however…

The situation was entirely different.

There was a dancing flicker in Sylas’ eyes, weaving lines of various shades of emerald swimming over one another and pulling back in a continuous flow as though approaching and receding tides.

The ring of gold around his irises became deeper and more prominent, the hidden Runes within flashing before slowly fading as though waiting for their time to make a next appearance.

Sylas made a move to leave. He had gained enough from this place for now. Whether he ever returned to the Weaver Guild in the future, well… only time would tell. He wasn’t opposed to it.

But the next time, he would have much stronger cards to play.

For now, he would take a look at the mansion Fanelei had put together. Maybe there was something he would care enough to take.

One would have thought by Sylas’ reaction that he had seen those sorts of resources all his life. But he was someone who adapted all too easily. If Fanelei thought that she could pull the wool over his eyes with something flashy, she was sorely mistaken.

That said, how long had it been since Sylas had seen a Gene Crystal?