Chapter 853 The Grimblade
'I see…'
Sylas hardly reacted to the appearance of the ghosts. Unlike the other challenges, he didn't seem all too eager to rush this one to a conclusion. That was because he could only think about one thing…
The zombie-men of the Grimblades.
Those heartless husks of men who walked around, simply doing everything they were ordered, without thought of pain or fear.
How could this still be a coincidence? From the very beginning, the secret of Blade Aura… no, the secret of the Grimblade had been right in front of him all along.
The ghost dove for Sylas, crashing into his forehead… only for it to scream out in pain and be shredded to pieces.
Sylas didn't even use the Grimblade; it was entirely unnecessary. These ghosts, or more accurately, Will Projections or Will Echoes, were far too pathetic to even put a dent into his Will.
'It should be possible to… perfect…'
Sylas' Will Ability pulsed with life and the scattered Will gathered together into a bunch, feeding into his own Will and directly onto the flickering flame of Blade Aura.
'This should be the true Grimblade. Blade Aura should be nothing more than a facade. If I had known this…'
Sylas' intent blazed. He could feel that maybe he had underestimated the Grimblades too much.
No, that wasn't exactly accurate. He never looked down on the Grimblades. What he had looked down on was how much their Lineage had helped him.
While he acknowledged that they were the reason for his foundational 50 point Stat Limit, he felt that it had pretty much held him back in all other aspects.
But was that the case?
It seemed here… that the Grimblade Lineage just might have helped him open up the door to true Will control.
Another ghost crashed into Sylas, only to be shattered apart. Every time it happened, Sylas calmly added more Will to his Blade Aura.
The load on his own body began to lessen considerably.
Sylas had had the ability to crush the Will of others, to poison, even to freeze, for a while. But what he had never been able to do was snatch those Wills for himself and turn them into his own Strength.
What he could have never expected was that the ability to do so had actually been within him the entire time.
He spared Malachi and Astrid a glance for a moment, only to find that they were only able to take small percentages of the Wills they cut down, and they certainly weren't confident enough to allow it to crash into them like Sylas was doing.
By comparison, Sylas was able to take over 50% of the Will and distill it into his own Blade Aura. In addition, because he wasn't using his blade to attack, he wasn't losing any of it in combat just yet either.
Soon, the flame had become so boisterous and hot that it blazed white, only the faintest tinges of green remaining.
It no longer even looked like a short sword. Instead, it looked like a true Grimblade, an enormous great sword that looked akin to a towering soul.
The weapon it originated from was barely visible within.
'Fascinating…'
Sylas walked to the end of this fourth trial without even noticing. The gap between himself and the other two heir candidates only seemed to be widening. It wasn't even much of a competition at all.
At some unknown point, they went from struggling along his side to watching his back get perpetually further and further ahead.
The blade spun vertically and then hovered to Sylas' back, its form so large it would have obscured the view of almost anyone else. But Sylas' shoulders were so broad, his hair so wild, his Will so towering, he was impossible to miss nonetheless.
He should have been on his last legs given the state of his body, but at that moment, the two heirs began to falter. Had they really just come here… to lose?
Sylas stood in silence, a confidence brewing deep within his chest. His breathing was steady and even, the howls of souls and spirits pounding against his ears, and yet hardly harming his psyche in the slightest.
A white-green flame danced in his eyes and those souls seemed to shudder into a deathly still obedience. At the same time, the raging fires of his Grimblade calmed into a controlled ember, the bouncing, echoing lights becoming not quite steady, but still far more restrained than before.
He lost track of time. He didn't know how long it took for the two heirs to finally catch up again, but once they had, he was certain that his Blade Aura Gene Talent had undergone yet another change.
The constant evolution only seemed to cause it to resonate with him all the more. Soon, it had reached a point where he was certain.
There was no longer any suspense in this trial.
It was time to end things.
The two heirs caught up, heaving for breath. They only had the time to regain their bearings for a brief instant before there was yet another flash.
…
The three candidates found themselves in a completely different situation. They stood across from one another in a circle, separated by maybe 20 or so meters.
Astrid and Malachi gripped their weapons, facing off against Sylas who stood in silence, his thick curls hiding much of the flaming white-green in his eyes.
Astrid took a breath and composed herself. What she didn't expect was for Sylas to suddenly speak at this time.
"How much longer?" he asked calmly.
Astrid's eyes narrowed, not understanding Sylas' meaning.
"How much longer are you going to pretend you haven't already turned your cousin into a puppet on your string?"
Astrid's pupils constricted, her heart skipping a beat. However, after a few seconds, she slowly straightened her back.
Malachi, once again, didn't reply. But this time, it was pretty obvious why. He wasn't just a silent man looking for a chance to overturn his situation, he was hardly a man anymore at all.
This third heir of the Grimblades lost the luster in his eyes, becoming nothing more than an empty husk before their eyes.