Chapter 498: What Right?
626,000 Free Experience remaining.
Of his new abilities, Blood Essence Extrication was the most enigmatic, but the others were easy enough for him to understand.
Beacon allowed him to call forth any Serpentes within a kilometer radius to his side. At its current level, it wouldn't allow him to control them all perfectly like he would his Contracts, but they would still have a certain fondness for him and would be unwilling to attack him.
Of course, it would take a very specific situation for him to benefit from such a thing, and it would also take time to activate. In its current state, the beasts would need to run to his location, so its use was limited and had to be prepared in advance.
His Insight Path Talent also got a change. "See" Gene Sequence became Comprehend. Before, when he went through all that trouble of seeing the Basilisk King's Gene Sequence, he had only been able to vaguely understand it. In fact, he couldn't even stare at it directly but had to feed it through a computer instead.
But now, it seemed that he wouldn't need to go through so much trouble again.
The most convenient change of them all, though, was Semi-Fusion, a change to his Fuse Path Talent.
Now, he could accommodate just one aspect of his beasts at a time, and that was supremely useful.
For example, with Nosphaleen. He didn't dare to fuse with her not because he wasn't sure what would happen if he fused with a woman like that he didn't really care so long as it made him stronger-but instead because of the cancer in her.
But if he could just copy one of her skills or one of her Gene Talents, that was huge.
A Gene Talent might still be iffy because the cancer was involved, but copying one of her Skills might be more than worth it.
The best part about Semi-Fusion was that he could copy the skill to the grade of his Contract's Mastery.
The reason he only ever used <King's Bind> or the Basilisk King's other skills with the Stabilizing Bracelet was because it simply took too much time in the midst of battle, and the Basilisk King's Mastery was still too low.
Though that was something that Sylas shouldn't blame on himself more than not. He wasn't much of a Beast Master if he couldn't help his beasts improve, and there was more to improvement than just leveling and stats. If there wasn't, he wouldn't be nearly as powerful as he was now.
It was just a shame that Sylas simply didn't have such time. It felt like there was one problem after another that he had to face. In fact, right now he was rushing just so that he could get to Ragnar's city before the system's penalty let up.
He had been so busy lately that he hadn't even had the chance to continue increasing his slate of Comprehensions yet, let alone finding the time to help the Basilisk King.
Sylas used 600,000 of his remaining Free Experience to raise Taboo Bond to Level 12 and left the remaining 26,000 to the side.
Satisfied, he was about to turn to leave when he stopped.
Shaking his head, he pulled the Basilisk King out of the Hibernation Realm.
'I can't continue to neglect it too much. The strength of the Basilisk King is directly correlated to its mental state. If for no other reason, I should at least check on it because of this.'
By now, the Basilisk King was already fully healed. But contrary to the state Sylas thought he would find it in, it stood tall, staring right into Sylas' eyes. Its gaze darted around for a moment as though it was looking for the enemy, only to be surprised that there was none. Seeing this, the Basilisk King didn't let out a sigh of relief, but instead let out a hiss. It sounded almost sad, as though it was trying to guess what Sylas wanted or had already thought the worst.
Was Sylas going to let it go?
No... knowing this master of its, if there was a benefit to be taken, he would take it. Sylas would be more likely to kill it and turn it into a pill than just let him go for nothing.
Maybe that was what it deserved. It had been pathetically captured, and then it had to wait for Sylas and Morgan to save it.
A little weakling like Morgan was actually able to do what it couldn't and protect its life. Otherwise, it might have already died at Grin's hands.
The Basilisk King lowered its head for a moment before raising it. It hissed again, but this time it was far more determined. If Sylas was going to try and kill it, it wasn't going to go down without a fight.
It made itself taller, and soon its head was a meter over Sylas'.
Its Loyalty numbers flickered wildly as though it too didn't know exactly what it wanted to do.
Sylas didn't make a single movement, just observing in silence. But when he saw the Basilisk King take this posture, his gaze flashed.
This was the first time he felt that this beast... was more of a "he" than an "it." He could feel its series of emotions clearly, and in the end, Sylas couldn't help but have flashbacks to those moments in the lava world, trapped with nowhere to go, and believing that his life was going to end at any time.
It was the most pathetic he had ever been, and it was a stain that left him feeling uncomfortable every time he thought of it.
And for the first time, he identified with the Basilisk King. The only difference between the two of them was that his own path to growing stronger was in his hands, while that of the Basilisk King was in Sylas'.
One of them had a choice, and the other didn't.
What right did he have to look down on the Basilisk King?