Chapter 175 Bronze

Chapter 175 Bronze

Sylas could only try again, pulling at the uneven portions of his Aether skin bit by bit.

As he did so, he found that his control was really being tested. If it was because he had used Extricate on the Intelligence Gene, he wouldn't have felt it so clearly. But right now, it felt like he was slowly pushing a hidden muscle beyond its limit, no different than how he would lift a weight.

It was taxing, but not to the point of collapse. Ne/w novel chapters are published at novelhall.com

Finally, two minutes later, and barely a couple of minutes before his Aether skin succumbed to the heat, <Maddened Enlightenment> responded to his call.

Sylas almost let out an audible sigh of relief. Aether rushed toward him, and it was dense to a level beyond what he had experienced before.

He looked around the world he was in. This was the first time he was truly doing as much. Before, his mind was too foggy, and after that, he was too focused on survival.

Without any context other than the lava, he would have thought that he had ended up in an active volcano. But looking up, there was no obvious opening to the top.

This wasn't likely a volcano. Or, it was at least one that hadn't erupted yet to force an opening on the surface.

'I guess it's technically magma then...'

The magma stretched out as far as Sylas could see, but what he did notice were several islands. Embarrassingly enough, there was actually an island much closer to his original location than the one he had initially been running toward.

Sylas shook his head. His mind had really not been on his side.

That thought made him recall how this had happened to begin with. All he had done was wrap his Will around the disk he was standing on, then he passed out.

'This place seems endless. There's also no sign of everyone else, they likely got caught up in the violent change to the disk as well... but where is the portal in that case?'

The portal should appear on both sides, and without the disk, it should have expanded substantially.

In addition, the beasts around here should be attracted to the portal as well. But the region was quiet and there were no obvious surges toward it.

Unless there were no living creatures in this area at all?

By normal Earth standards, this was the obvious conclusion. There was no creature in existence, extinct or otherwise, that could survive these temperatures.

But the logic of this Aether Plane was obviously not the same.

'Pick a direction and move.'

This was Sylas's conclusion.

But he couldn't just leave the disk here, and he certainly couldn't use his telekinesis on it again.

Sylas thought of the solution quite easily. This forcefield seemed to be permanently in place. Why not take advantage?

First, he adjusted his Aether skin. He was much more familiar with it now and he managed to even it out well and appropriately thicken it.

Was he being too hard on himself? No one wanted to die, it was natural to fear it.

But this was how Sylas had always been. He didn't like sensing imperfections within himself. He preferred to stamp it, chain it, and bring it under his control.

The aura of Madness on Sylas fluctuated.

---

[Madness (F)] - Bronze

[The Madness consumes you, but does not control you. Instead, it becomes your tool to both control yourself and others. You, while steeped in Madness, maintain your wits about you. Your enemies, though, are not so lucky]

[+300% Charisma]

[+200% Will]

---

From +200% and +150%, his Charisma and Will boost, respectively, had increased by a large margin.

With this sort of boost, his telekinesis would be able to exhibit 153 Physical. The leap was simply enormous.

He had already been close to Bronze Mastery after consuming his reward from the Castle Main Quest. It seemed that life and death had allowed him to cross that threshold.

This was the good news.

The bad news was that he still didn't know how he had ended up in this mess.

He looked toward the disk. Something about imprinting his telekinesis into its runes had triggered all of this, but right now his telekinesis couldn't even penetrate the forcefield to check again.

Plus, considering how long it had survived in the lava unscathed, Sylas had no shot at breaking through this shield.

'After I recover, the only choice is to pick a direction and go.'

Sylas made his choice and settled down to meditate, activating <Maddened Enlightenment> to the greatest degree.

He should have noticed this earlier, but with the improvement to Madness, the Skill derivative was even more potent. In not even ten minutes, not only was all of his Aether replenished, but his mind felt refreshed.

Before, when his Intelligence was just 23, he could replenish his Aether in just five minutes. Though, this was while walking, so the Skill wasn't as potent.

This meant that it would have taken Sylas 50 minutes to replenish his current Aether stores. Even if he meditated like this, before his Madness improved, it would have still taken 25 minutes to replenish.

Now, that time had been cut by more than half. It was simply an enormous change.

Sylas looked up and stood. Taking the disk with him, he began to tread lava.