The old man sitting on the lotus leaf had been watching the young man lying at the bottom of the lake for a long time; then for some unknown reason he stood up and left the yellow paper appearing in his hand to the water.
"Drip your blood onto the talisman and find who you are!"
When the old man's words ended, a fog whose origin was unclear settled over the lake; you couldn't see your hand in front of your face. This situation continued until Count Jashua dripped the blood flowing from the cut he made on his finger onto the yellow paper.
Suddenly the entire environment changed; the young boy feeling his back hit the hard ground couldn't remain indifferent to this either. When he straightened up and looked around, he saw rivers of blood flowing from within the cracked earth and the fog turned red covering everywhere like a thin curtain.
A shadow was approaching him from afar; getting up from where he sat, he welcomed the incoming person standing. When a distance of fewer than ten steps remained between them, he saw someone matching his height, carrying a sword wrapped in a cloth resembling a rag on his back.
"Greetings friend!"
The young boy possessing coal-black hair greeted Count Jashua; in response to this, the Young Count couldn't speak.
He waited for an answer for a while, but since the person he called out to didn't respond, the incoming person took offense.
"You are not very friendly I see, anyway, I am going on my way!"
When the young boy in plain homespun clothes took action, Count Jashua leaped in front of him; the weapon he used in the first stage appeared in his hand.
"Fight with me!"
In the face of the reaction he didn't expect, he jumped back with a sudden movement and drew his sword; there was an expression of astonishment in his eyes.
"Did you lose your marbles friend?"
Count Jashua responded to this question with laughter; blood energy had already started accumulating on his weapon.
"So the Founder of the Holy Blood Sect was such a youth; I would never have believed it if I didn't see it with my own eyes!"
The Young Count had understood that the power inside the blood circulating in his veins and the energy of the youth standing across him were the same. There was no room for doubt; this person was the youth state of the man who bequeathed him his power.
"You really lost your marbles, where is the Holy Blood Sect, who is the founder you mentioned?"
Count Jashua slowly understood what was going on; the old man had brought the Founder Sheikh at his own age across him. This person coming to life from the talisman knew what he lived until that moment, and his power level was probably limited to his state at that moment too.
"You can't go one step forward from here!"
Count Jashua swung his weapon hard; although his opponent, unable to fully understand the situation, raised his sword, the heavy weapon drove him before it too and landed on his shoulder. The young boy looked affectionate and friendly, but after receiving the first blow, things changed completely.
While getting up from where he was thrown, red energy starting from all his feet grasped his entire body; when it came to his weapon, things would get out of hand. Protrusions on the back of the wide cutting part resembling a machete reached twice their length.
Now both sides of the weapon had taken a deadly state; Count Jashua gave his attention completely to meeting the incoming attack.
"Since you want to die, so be it!"
Not only his words but his tone of voice and the growl coming from his throat changed too; the youth of the Founder Sheikh shot forward leaving cracks under the foot he pressed on the ground. Closing the distance in two breaths, he swung his weapon, which he pulled back almost to his back from above his head, from top to bottom.
Count Jashua met the blow with his thick weapon but what he expected didn't happen; the metal club resembling a pole, which didn't bat an eye despite killing hundreds of opponents before, bent almost enough to break.
The effect of this on its owner became being thrown backward violently and falling to the ground; meanwhile, the sharp-thorned machete was right above his head.
Bending his knees and using his stretched leg, Count Jashua was thrown backward once more, but this time it was by his own will. He was forced to; otherwise, the weapon descending on where he was a moment ago would tear him apart instead of opening a pit possessing a depth of more than a meter.
Throwing his weapon that lost its function at the face of the Founder Sheikh's youth, he gathered himself, and Count Jashua reached his right hand to the river of blood flowing right next to him.
In these moments, the black-haired youth whose attack was cut halfway was watching him too; when the version made of blood of the weapon broken in the hand of the Bloody Moon Fiefdom Lord appeared, two words spilled from his lips.
"Essence Materialization!"
Although there were tones peculiar to surprised people in his voice, he didn't look like he fell into terror; a breath later extending his left hand, he would materialize a weapon just like his opponent.
Now there were two identical weapons in his right and left hands; apparently, the Founder Sheikh had already broken through the Essence Materialization stage at those ages.
While the war inside the formation where Count Jashua was passed the simmering stage and started boiling, things were about to get out of hand in the other formation inside the Sixth Circle.
"How can you come across me with this little power; are the eyes of these instructors blind?"
When Mora shook the blood on her daggers off, her opponent was lying on the ground; Nora was suffering due to deep red lines on her arm and leg.
She had a pair of daggers she used when she didn't want to reveal her identity in her hand; there was a painful expression on her face. Spitting the blood filling her throat, she stood up and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand.
"I wanted to fight with things not belonging to you, but it didn't take me long to see this wouldn't be possible. Brace yourself!"
The moment she finished her words, two blood daggers took shape from her wristbands; Nora went on the attack like lightning. Mora hadn't realized the suddenly developing event; until she raised her training weapons, the orc who was her opponent cut her from her injured places.
The black war armor was stained with flowing blood; the young girl seeing this let out an ear-piercing scream.
"I will flay you alive!"
While the flowers on her daggers were shining, she performed a swing from top to bottom; the address of the blood flowers scattering into the air was Nora.
"Blood Dome!"
Symbols starting at the orc warrior's feet spread in a short time and turned into a dome-shaped structure that would take her inside.
While the incoming attack melted on the defense-purposed technique, Mora couldn't believe her eyes.
"Is this a joke; a wretched orc possesses the Essence Materialization skill and can use blood energy too?"
Since Nora knew the end she would live if the flowers coming out of the dagger hit her, she protected herself with the strongest defense technique she knew. As for Mora possessing the same skill, she was busy looking for a logical explanation for what was happening.
Although she possessed the exact same of the daggers in her opponent's hand, Nora wouldn't use them; weapons her father made were another matter, using training daggers against her was another matter.
Nora inside the dome and Mora who came to the point of going mad from anger outside were eye to eye; one was aware of what was happening, the other was under the restrictions of the talisman she was formed from.
Mora made one or two more attack attempts, but Nora could maintain her state for days relying on the blood essences she accumulated in her wristbands. While the young girl whose attacks didn't find a response was gradually going crazy, the only thing the orc warrior could do was watch her.
"Coward, if you have courage come out and fight. You can't hide inside that shell forever!"
Nora was feeling something would happen, but she couldn't guess what this feeling she couldn't make sense of could bring. Fortunately, there would be no need for her to wait long; Mora crossing the daggers in her hand in front of her chest started murmuring something.
Meanwhile, Nora's eye caught the ring on the young girl's finger; it was the exact same of the ring inside Mora's legacy, maybe Mora had really left this ring.
As thoughts matured, Nora felt a coldness on her back; if it was the same ring, she was aware of how much blood essence would be stored inside, and the new state the daggers took had started frightening her.