Genetic Ascension novel Chapter 2301

Orokhun breathed out. He was ready now.

It was only a small breath, no different from any other he had taken, and yet the planet shook beneath it. The tremor rolled out from the cavern and through the crust and up into the fog, and every layer of it turned over until it felt like the layers of the atmosphere might come undone, snapping open like a set of nesting dolls.

Then it stopped.

It looked like nothing at all had changed, and yet the flicker of light in Dry Mouth's gaze painted a completely different picture.

Orokhun rose through the stone, phasing through as though he was little more than a ghost. It felt like even the laws of earth and the physics that governed it had died along with the rest of the planet. It parted for him, severing its own bottom line, and a fog closed over his body as he came up into it.

He lifted his enormous head into the dead street to see what was left of Sylas Grimblade and yet… Sylas Grimblade was standing exactly where he had been. Hands in his pockets, scythe and brush on his back, eyes unbothered and indifferent.

Orokhun's eyes widened. His jaw came open a little. For a Vah as large as he was, he might as well have opened up a cavern in his mouth and invited Sylas in.

He lifted his tail and brought it down against the street once. He paused, waiting for something, and then he tapped again. It looked almost like he was knocking against the planet, waiting for it to wake up.

"Hey, hey, what's going on here?" Dry Mouth spoke aloud as though Sylas couldn't hear him. He knocked again, and the attempt was simply worthless.

But his senses weren't failing him. They hadn't failed, and the planet was responding to him just fine.

He could feel it in the stone. Everything was seated correctly, everything was holding, every meticulous brick of his plan was situated just right.

Sylas looked at him and nodded.

"You are a bit interesting too."

Orokhun's lip twitched.

What in the world was that supposed to mean?

Sylas' words made his skin crawl. It felt like he was a slave up for auction and Sylas was picking at his limbs and seeing how thick the muscle under his skin was.

And too? What did that mean? There were others? Who else was "interesting"?

Did he look like something a person could simply collect?

Orokhun's tail came around, whipping forward.

He didn't bother with anything clever. He built up his body brick by brick with the most violent and vicious of methods. He had killed the strongest of the Vah with this body. It was the only inheritance he had ever needed.

The tail came down with enough force to open the crust of the earth itself.

Sylas raised a hand and stopped it. It was casual in a way that broke Dry Mouth's mind. He was so huge and Sylas was so tiny. How could he be so strong?

Orokhun stared at his own tail resting in that hand.

"...Let go," he said.

Sylas glanced up at him.

"Let go," Orokhun repeated. "Let me try again. This is ridiculous."

And to his complete astonishment, Sylas opened his hand and stepped back, giving him the room.

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