Genetic Ascension novel Chapter 517

Chapter 517: Only the Beginning

SPLAT.

It was a grotesque, wet noise, one so resonating that the two Sylphs might have even heard it from the afterlife. They had both thought that they had taken Sylas more than seriously enough, but neither could have possibly imagined that they would actually die like this.

But there was no medicine for regret. And even if there was one, they weren't alive to take it. Sylas coughed up another mouthful of blood as he slowly stood, but there was the very same calmness to him. Even though that flame of rage was still flickering deep within his eyes, he was starting to understand more and more what this world needed from him.

It was still the same two words... Be Strong.

But for some reason, every time he survived a situation like this one, his understanding of those words would warp, ripple, and change as though it was becoming more tangible in a way that was hard to explain.

He reached up a hand and grabbed the branch that was ripping through his lung. Accumulating what small bits of Ice-Poison he had left, he poured it all in.

He was hesitant to do this earlier because he knew what it would come with. But there were some things that he could only face head-on... and right now, there was a surging confidence rolling through him.

Maybe it was foolhardy. Maybe it was him overestimating himself and the danger of the world.

And yet, his Will still felt so tangible coursing through him.

He had stepped through a threshold that few ever would, and somehow, though his Will seemed to not have changed, everything had changed at the same time.

Intangible Will... Flexible Will... Burning Will... Tangible Will...

They were all just stepping stones.

Neither was as real or formulaic as Rune Mastery, and two people who had both had Burning Will might have vastly different outcomes and strengths assigned to them.

Will was one of the most enigmatic stats that the system tracked. In fact, the truth was that before this current iteration of the system, Will was never something that was tracked because it was simply too difficult to.

Sylas' trouble with telekinesis and figuring out his quirks wasn't the only one of its kind. Many had faced the same struggles, and at best, the Will stat of the system could only be a general outline of your progress.

It was no wonder why even those so-called stat debuffs couldn't change the number on his stat screen.

But why was all of this so important now?

It was because Sylas had sensed something very particular when his Title evolved just now. His Will had taken a step beyond a threshold, but it wasn't the threshold itself that was so amazing... it was instead what it reminded him of...

A Progenitor Flame.

Was it truly one? No, of course not. Sylas had felt the real thing before, and the gap between his flickering flame of a Will and a real Progenitor Flame was worse than night and day. It might as well be like comparing the radius of a star and its size to a moon that could only reflect its light.