BANG.
Sylas didn't get the chance to find a solution. The last of their group, a man he didn't recognize, slammed out an elbow, appearing by the woman in a blurring flash.
There was a flicker in Sylas' gaze. The man was quick, not in a reality bending, space folding sort of way, but just objectively so. He had grown so used to fighting people with odd, broken abilities and complicated bloodlines that he almost took too long to realize that this man just had... fast twitch muscles.
It was that simple.
BANG.
The woman rebounded off the steel walls an instant later, her body bouncing back and into the waters. She gasped for breath, but that sounded to be the last thing she should have done.
She started heaving at the air, trying to find some semblance of oxygen to take in. But every time she tried to breathe, more was ripped out from her by the waters, causing her to panic even further and leading to a looping, vicious cycle.
"Fucking bitch, what do you think you're doing? Does it look like I want to live or die based on your one-sided conclusions?"
The man slicked his hair back, licking his dried lips with a tongue that came across much too long for a human. But aside from that, he didn't look any different from a man Sylas might have found on Earth before the Summoning. If there was any oddity, it was just the redness of his skin.
It wasn't unnaturally red. That was why it didn't stand out. But for a man that neither seemed embarrassed, drunk, nor out of breath, the tinge of red was just a little bit too much.
Exhaling, the man looked at the group before his eyebrow raised when his gaze landed on Sylas. He had been just about to introduce himself when his words fell flat.
"What the hell is an E-tier doing here?"
Sylas didn't reply to the man. Instead, his gaze was still focused on the vault as the waters rose up high enough to hit the first valve.
As expected, the water flipped the valve open and water poured into the mechanisms of the vault. The gears turned and shifted, misaligning from their previous settings and twisting the formerly perfect solution Sylas had come up with into an utter failure.
Oddly, though, the man didn't pursue Sylas further despite the fact the latter ignored him.
"The name's Belly. I have a name my parents gave me too, but who cares about those fuckers at this point? You already see the situation we're in. Since all of our lives are dependent on the answer to the situation at hand, I think we should all vote on a solution we can all agree on-."
A bolt of emerald and violet lightning ripped through the man's chest.
His eyes opened wide as he looked down at the bloody hole where his heart had been.
His body shook and he slowly looked up toward Sylas as the flashing miniature arcs of lightning danced at the corners of his eyes.
And then his vision went dim.
Belly fell back into the waters with a slap of water and a slow sink.
Sylas' telekinesis churned and the vault gears twisted before anyone else could react.
Chi.
There was a click and the waters puttered to a stop.
The woman's pupils constricted. She had been so furious seconds ago, but the solution Sylas had used was completely unlike hers. Granted, the solution had changed due to the rising water. But she could tell that her previous solution was still very much wrong.
She was almost grateful toward Belly. Almost.

VERIFYCAPTCHA_LABEL
Comments
The readers' comments on the novel: Genetic Ascension