Sylas felt his body freeze in place, an icy cold peeling through him. It felt like a cross between a chilled knife scraping just beneath his skin and a prickling, intense, almost blaring resonance with something far deeper than he could quite sense.
It was an odd feeling, especially since with Taboo Bond having finally reached Level 50, there was unlikely to be any part of his body that he hadn’t sensed in one way or another.
Inwardly, though, Sylas was still able to follow that process and feel it out slowly.
There was a connection formed between his eyes and the rest of his body. The former was dictating the actions of the latter, and the technique itself was adapting to the changes that were dictated by the former as well.
Sacred Oculum Transmutation could be used in two ways. The first was just to steal the abilities of the eyes that you had taken in, but this wasn’t the way that Sylas was using them. Rather than this, Sylas was using it to amplify the abilities of his current eyes—abilities granted to him by his Runeweaver Profession.
He hadn’t originally thought that there would be much of a difference, but the moment the resources pooled together, melting akin to lava into the deep grooves he had pressed into the ground, he felt a resonating sort of difference.
Right now, his eyes were like add-ons, external items he popped into his body. But much like the rest of him, they weren’t well and truly part of his foundation.
This wasn’t the first time Sylas had faced such a problem. All of his Genes, Unique Genes, and new abilities he gained, for that matter, were exactly like this. And they would continue to be until he completed his F-Grade Foundation.
This was the gap between those born with their Talent, and those that had to shift and change things around in their bodies, slowly adding to themselves strength that wasn’t originally their own.
But right now, the blood vessels that connected Sylas’ eyes to the rest of his body were deepening and becoming more numerous and complex. Slowly, rather than being reliant on themselves and themselves alone, his eyes were actually learning how to work in conjunction with the rest of his body.
This alone would reduce the strain he faced in using them in the future considerably, but it also went to point out something else.
If he tried to use this technique to steal the abilities of other eyes, but lacked the Genes and Unique Genes to support it, then he would just be doing himself a disservice.
Unless he could steal the Unique Genes of the Thryskai, taking their eyes’ abilities was worthless to him. And, even if he had the opportunity to…
Sylas wasn’t sure if he would.
His intuition was telling him that his eyes were far superior to what Mortal Thryskai could live up to.
He didn’t have enough experience with stronger Thryskai to make an assessment, but at least for Mortal Grade ones… he had no desire at all for their strengths and abilities.
These Runeweaver Eyes… were on another level entirely.
…
When the first wave of the mutation process was completed, Sylas began to feel that the eyes were slowly commandeering more and more of his reserves.
His State of Wealth ratio decreased. Because of this, his Healing Factor likewise also became weaker.
It was a fascinating thing to watch in real time. As though he was an engine that was going from fueling a convertible to an SUV, and then a full-on truck, how far his tank of gas could stretch was diminishing before his eyes.
There was a great amount of nourishment that poured into his body at this point as well, almost massaging his body into a state where it could handle this.
This made Sylas realize that he had actually done quite a good thing by gaining two Silver Gene Classes before he did this. If not, and he went ahead and evolved his eyes to Tier 2, wouldn’t he just be turning himself into a zombie?
‘It seems like the second step will be finished soon… here comes the final step…’
The first step rewired Sylas’ blood vessels and deepened his connection with his marrow. This happened on the level of Blood and Bone Essence, and it relied heavily on the King Beast Blood Essences that he had gotten as well.
It was thanks to those items that he was able to keep his concentration of blood elevated, nourish himself properly, but also provide enough control and Potential to actually change and grow new vessels in his body.
Then there was the second step. This happened, ironically enough, at a higher level, and not nearly as deep. This was where the eyes took over much of his Genes, using them to fuel themselves and deepen the connection with the body. But this was just prep for the third step.
The odd order confused Sylas initially, but it made sense to him after feeling it out. It would have been impossible to fuse a connection with his Genes first because there would have been no strong enough connection established in the first place.
But this next step was where things could get dicey, because this was the moment he would be using the E-Grade Skai Eyes of the Thryskai.
Now that the connections had been deepened and fully formed, he would be taking a risk by doing this without a doubt.
There was still reason to be confident, though. He was Level 50 and not very far from the E-Grade. In addition… this last and final step, because of the uniqueness of his eyes, would be happening at the Will Manifestation and Will Core level…
And Sylas was nothing if not confident in his Will.
“Now.”
He spoke out these words with command, and two Skai Eyes floated up, reflecting a ruby light that slowly broke them down into complex Runes.
These Runes floated before Sylas for a moment before rushing into his eyes.