Gogo’s body slammed into the elevator, blood flying from his maw. Because of the switch, Sylas had ended up heavily injured. Then he reversed it for the sake of a quick victory.
Total Merge didn’t stop Sylas from fusing while heavily injured. But because Sylas had ended up so injured when he went to his main body and completed a Fusion, his injuries were transferred over to Gogo.
However, none of this stopped them.
Sylas’ senses darted around. He knew too little about the layout of this organization, but he had his senses. The flow of Runes in a place could tell you a lot about what it needed to do.
If one had x-ray vision and could see through the electric wires and plumbing in a house through the walls, there was a lot you could tell about it instantly.
Which places were drawing the most power, where the vulnerabilities were, the networks of hallways…
Right now, Sylas wasn’t viewing the world with his eyes at all. He was peering into the Mesh of Reality, seeing through the strands of life itself, and pulling himself through those secrets one step after another.
When others saw a wall, he saw through three, four, even five of them at a time. Because he could see the “wires” and not the walls alone, he knew exactly how this maze of underground networks was set up, and he knew exactly how to get out.
He could also deduce which regions had the most people by which locations were pulling on the most power, and he knew that this elevator was going to open up before he even got here.
Everything was under his control.
Even this elevator itself.
His intention pulled on a hidden card on Lise’s body, and soon he forced the Runes to activate. The doors slammed open just as the sound of figures rounding corners came.
Gogo curled his body tight, barely fitting into the elevator at all. It was clear that such a large vessel was designed for moving volumes of cargo up and down.
As for what this region was exactly, Sylas didn’t care. At least not for now.
…
Blaring warning sounds flooded Petals of the Seeing Thorn, confusing signals firing and throwing the entire lobby into chaos. The changes caught everyone off guard.
In one moment, they were all watching Nosphaleen take the final steps to break through the trial in record time, but in the next moment, all hell had broken loose.
Nyssa felt her heart skip a beat. She was the only one that knew the connection between Nosphaleen and Sylas, and she didn’t feel like this timing was a coincidence. In fact, even if it hadn’t been the case that Nosphaleen had just finished, she would have still put two and two together.
The Petals of the Seeing Thorn was a top organization of the galaxy. Even in these troubled times, there was no way that they would be attacked so flippantly and without warning. Especially since they hadn’t even chosen a side.
There was no reason for it.
‘Maybe…?’
Nyssa hurried to shake her head. She thought of her sister’s promise to the Trakar Prince, but that shouldn’t be enough either. This was definitely all Sylas.
As though to reply to her thoughts, the roar of a black serpent filled the skies. A menacing Will fell from above, and one after another, disciples of the Petals of the Seeing Thorn found themselves fainting in droves.
Gogo snaked through the hall, gliding so high his back nearly ground against the tall ceilings. Waves of suffocating aura flooded them from above, and from time to time, some E-Grades would die a horrible death.
Nyssa’s vision went white and she passed out much like the others. Her last thoughts were those of confusion, wondering just what was going on. Was that snake related to Sylas? And in that case, how could he ever possibly escape?
…
Matriarch Valeria moved with a frown on her face. She had sent more than enough E-Grades that this matter should have been handled already, but the information she was getting back…
Well, the main issue was that she wasn’t getting nearly enough of it in the first place.
There was no news. And no news in this situation was bad news.
The Matriarch stepped out of her vessel, her heels clicking along the stony surface of an asteroid as she faced off against a familiar portal.
It seemed that she would just have to handle this herself.
…
Sylas unleashed unholy hell on the Petals of the Seeing Thorn. To his luck, he didn’t sense any D-Grades, but he also didn’t cast the Beast Totem just yet.
With the Beast Totem, Gogo would truly be a one-man army, even with the injuries they had sustained. But Sylas found himself actually… having to hold back.
It definitely wasn’t because the Petals of the Seeing Thorn were weak. Instead, they were an information network, and most of their powerhouses wouldn’t spend time in the organization itself to begin with. They would instead be off doing what they did best, laying seeds and gathering information.
Because the organization was also out of conflict most times, their sense of danger and reactions to it were also limited. But that was exactly why Sylas knew that he could get away with this.
Gogo’s tail slapped down and a swath of lower-class E-Grades found their bodies shattered to minced meat.
‘Almost there.’
Sylas had just had the thought when he felt a sensory perception sweep over him.
It was like a strong, endless tide. Even when not aimed at him specifically, it felt like he would crumble beneath it nonetheless.
But Sylas’ gaze only turned steely. He knew that this would happen, and he was ready for it. In fact, his timing could have only been said to be perfect.
That perception only existed because his Luck was warning him. But this time, he directly ignored it, storming into the maze of Seeing Thorns at the very same moment Matriarch Valeria did.