Chapter 824 A Warning
The ground became a glowing dark, the green leaves painted like golden leaflets, and even the white clouds above were spindled out from a long, thin wire of radiant gold as well.
Sylas continued to stare at the pillar it came from, his expression placid. There was definitely something wrong, as though the pillar of blazing fire wasn't enough to prove that. But it was something deeper than what was obvious on the surface.
He could feel a strong Will pervading the region, one that seemed to come from Professor Broussard, but was also much stronger than he should have been able to manage.
Sylas was certain that Professor Broussard's Will shouldn't be this strong—not just in terms of stat scaling, but in terms of quality as well. At best, the man should have been at the Sparking Will level, but this felt like it was a half-step above even Sylas' own Shaping Will.
But it also wasn't natural, at least not completely. The source was coming from elsewhere, almost like…
Sylas' gaze flashed as he recalled a certain magic circle-like platform. He had run into it in the Mountains of Giza Split Realm, and it was from that platform that he learned the Will Pressure Runes that Ulrik tried to use as an excuse to hold him back.
Luckily, Sylas' Rune Vitality was at a shocking level of Rune Mastery. Because of that, he had been able to activate the teleportation platform without the general need for consent quite easily and was gone before anyone could catch up.
But right now, this matter was beside the point.
What was more important was that this sort of Will transfer across space and time… Sylas was very much familiar with it.
Something clicked for Sylas at that moment, a wave of understanding and different thoughts strung across the nodes of his mind coming together in a shocking explosion of deductions and a single important conclusion.
In the history of the world, there was never just one city of gold. Although there might be one or two more famous than the others, the city of gold—a hidden well of wealth that one could find if you just searched long and hard enough—was a tale as old as time, one that could be found in several iterations.
Thus, there were two possibilities.
The first was that this city of gold was actually The City of Gold, a single entity that stood out amongst all the others and laid claim to the name all on its own.
But the second…
Sylas felt something tugging at his heartstrings, a Seed buried deep within his body stirring.
The description of the Rune of Enlightenment Quest never seemed to mention the Mountains of Giza or even the City of Gold directly. In fact, it just talked vaguely about the history of Earth and its lost heritage… but it was also trying to point out a lesson to be learned.
Sylas had felt that it was a coincidence that the Throne of Glass and the Mountains of Giza were linked, but was it one?
That dual path that had laid before him—one where he built his Throne on the blood, sweat, and tears of those that came before him, or where he forged his own path and bet on no one but himself…
Wasn't that a hint at something bigger?
And hadn't that been one of the main rewards of the Mountains of Giza?
What if the city of gold was also something similar—a reminder that he was very much human, that stepping into this world was akin to being forced to take on a burden and make a choice that could very well decide the fate of a world?
What if the city of gold wasn't any specific one mentioned in the annals of history? What if it was precisely because there were so many of them, spoken across so many iterations of time, that it had become important in this context?
And in that case, what did it mean?
What did the city of gold represent…
If not the Greed of man?
Sylas felt the Gluttony Seed within him churn, its fibers spinning as it steadily grew just the slightest bit larger.
Now he understood what Arcane Madness had meant. This region was special, but not for the reasons he thought. Instead, it couched and stored the truest kernel of this sin Earth had to offer… maybe even the entire Skai Galaxy had to offer.
That was why this place was chosen for the Slithering Madness Dungeon.
That was why Arcane Madness had chosen to guard this place.
A warning about the Greed of man…
Sylas looked up into the skies, feeling the world continuously change around him.
Something felt odd. Greed... and yet Gluttony was reacting... there was an overlap here and somehow, Gluttony won out... The Aether Plane shook, and Sylas could feel it as clear as day as the connection between it and Earth's dimension tied into one.
The integration was no longer so flimsy. And all at once, the Amazonian Wilds—or rather, the lost city of gold—manifested into Earth itself.
The skies changed, and soon they were beneath the vast expanse of York City's open waters. Gold spread out in all directions, the relatively small island expanding more and more until it suddenly became the anchor of a tipping point of Earth.
It seemed that things had changed around Sylas before he was ready for it. But maybe it had to be something so big for even Arcane Madness, given its insight, to say that he would likely die.
Standing high in the skies, watching the changes with a stoic sort of silence, it was hard to say what Sylas was thinking. Honestly speaking, he wasn't thinking many thoughts at all.
Be strong.
It was something he had gotten a small taste of today. None of Professor Broussard's schemes had mattered, and in the end, the man became a pawn in someone else's plan.
But he would need more of that now.
Because the final phase of the Summoning had suddenly begun.