Raise eyes snapped open. His breathing was fast in his hands were wrapped around his throat.
"What the fuck is this? Who whose house is this, and how did they somehow bring a house into the void, and Why can I not feel my ether?"
he tried to roll Two his feet and kill any enemies he found lurking but the keyword is tried.
As soon as he made the attempt a feeling like lightning ran through throughout his entire frame.
"Fuck did someone poisoning me, no that's impossible. I would've noticed if someone did."
Ray quickly looked around the room he was in for anything that could be used as a weapon, and when his eyes locked on the 2 foot long piece of jagged wood in the corner he had been using as a training sword. His memories came back to him.
He was no longer in the void.
He was back in the past.
He wasn't 700,000 years old, he was only 12.
Also he wasn't a 12 fold cultivator.
he was only in the first ring.
His eyes went through a range of emotions while his face stayed blank.
At first, his eyes flashed with realization, before darkening with frustration, and then they were desolate, empty in a way that even the void couldn't compare.
Before the desolation turned into mild annoyance. This emotion, his face quickly reflected.
"Why the fuck does my entire body hurt?"
He attempted to grumble to himself. Yet the simple attempt at making any noise using his throat, cause the pain so severe, that he collapsed to his hands and knees. Nearly falling on his face.
Wasting no time he ran ether throughout his throat, and his eyes widen at the result.
"Damaged they're fucking damaged."
His vocal cords were damaged beyond repair, not just because Chuck's forearm nearly shattered his windpipe completely, but because the healing of advancing a rank was permanent, and it had healed wrong.
It wouldn't always hurt this much to talk, but it would never be the same as it once was.
Once again, for a split second that desolation took over his eyes, before disappearing the next second.
"The fuck doesn't matter, I don't need a voice anyway. I'll just let my strength talk for me."
Ray thought to himself, shrugging as if it was no big deal.
"Now it's time to see if all of that struggle was worth it."
As soon as he was fully in front of the mirror, he yanked off the disgusting clothes he had been wearing.
"I can't believe I somehow went to sleep in these."
Ray thought as he held the clothes he had just been wearing in his hands.
"I swear these clothes feel like they weigh 10 pounds alone. Just what the hell did I fall into in that trashcan."
Ray thought as he tossed the clothes into a corner.
He would have to remove those soon or they would start to smell, but that was for later.
Right now he needed to see the fruits of his labor.
"Damn"
that was the only thing Ray could think about when he saw what state his body was in.
He had grown, no doubt about it.
His shoulders have become broader, his height had grown slightly, and he was chiseled in a way no normal 12-year-old should be but.
"How the hell did I make it all the way back here?"
Ray thought and wonder as he saw the interlocking lightning like scars that covered his entire body.
The scars he had gained throughout his life in the Ironblood Manor were still there, but they were overshadowed by the new one.
"It looks like one big scar."
Ray thought as he ran his fingers down the labyrinth of scars on his body
."I knew the soul damage would affect me physically, but I didn't expect it to be this severe."
The scars didn't exactly hurt, they just throbbed with a strange cold, and Ray somehow knew.
No matter how much he advanced, no matter how much stronger he got the scars would never disappear.
This thought is what should have broken him, this thought is what should have caused that empty look in his eyes, but instead a vicious grin curled his mouth and he croaked out.
"Well it beats being dead, I suppose, and with a scar like this, it'll be impossible for anyone to forget me."
His voice sounded like the hissing rasp of steel sliding against steel.
"Enough, admiring myself, now it's time to see what I can do."
Ray thought as he raised his left hand in front of him.
He waited for the mirror to fly towards him, or shake or at least at least show any reaction to him using his ether, but it didn't. Then switching ether types.
He quickly tapped into his blood element.
Once again he felt his own blood rushing throughout his body, and that feeling of being able to control it but.
"It's fucking useless."
Ray growled out into the empty air.
The only real improvements he could see at the moment was physical, and nothing more.
"But you knew that when you first had a thought of awakening, didn't you?
You knew ether ability, wasn't what was gonna carry us in the start only physical."
Ray thought, as he glared into the silver eyes of his own reflection.
There were times where even he didn't understand his decisions, and now was one of them.
"I'm still alive, so I couldn't have fucked up too terribly in my decision-making.
"Then realizing this was his second life, he decided to ignore he had ever had the thought.
Attempting to clear his throat, the sound feeling like someone was trying to be head him with a rusty kitchen knife.
He went back to the dilemma of having no ether.
"For starters I never regenerated the ether I lost killing that hound."
then suddenly he remembered something.
"Wait first rings don't regenerate ether, they have to re-establish it in their body manually."
After realizing this, raise expression became a kin to a fat kid watching the ice cream truck roll away.
It's NOT fair ."
Ray muttered, even as he dropped into a cross legged sitting position.
"It's not fair. I have to waste this much damn time just to get back what was already mine."
Ray whispered to himself.
He had found through trial and error that whispering hurt the least out of all the talking options he had.
When he was finally seated, he dove into his soulspace. Inside, he deliberately avoided looking at the void black walls and focused on the ring floating in the middle.
"Just fucking beautiful."
Ray whispered to himself, this time not because of his throat injury because of the wonder of seeing his first ring.
The ring of power floated in his soulspace sky, almost like a sun. The reddish silver glow it gave off, gave him the same comfort as one if not more.
"Now I can't tell if I hate this place or I love it."
Ray said, looking around and giving the void black walls, a glance for the first time.
Feeling his body, locking up and memories he would rather keep buried beginning to rise to the surface of his mind.
He quickly focused back on the ring, floating in the sky.
Remembering what he came here for He stside in annoyance.
"Come here will you, let's get this over with."
Ray said with a side to the ring as he put out one hand, but he froze when he saw sit hand.
First off, he shouldn't have had a soul avatar.
He could remember it vividly shattering not once not twice but three times. Yet that wasn't what made him freeze, it was a series of fracture line shaped cracks running throughout his entire hand.
Yet this wasn't the most alarming part. It was the fact that each one of these cracks were the same void black as the walls of his soul.
Quickly looking down at the rest of his soul avatar he realized it was the same all throughout, he had fracture shaped cracks, running throughout his entire form.
"Yet they don't hurt?"
Ray thought, his brow, wrinkling in confusion, even though his body looked like it was on a verge of collapsing. He didn't feel anything wrong with his body, if anything he felt better than ever.
" "I don't have time to dwell on this right now, the more I waste time thinking about random shit, is less time to absorb either."
Ray thought to himself as, with a twist of his Control HIS first ring descended in front of him .
With a soundless movement, the ring was surrounding his soul avatar.
Then wasting no more time he quickly began to absorb ether.
The process caused the ring to spin rapidly, ether being pulled into it like a cyclone.
The suction force wasn't even a 10th of what was produced when he broke through, but Ray didn't seem dissatisfied.
If anything, he seemed pleased with the result, because compared to normal first rings, this was fast.
This was due to both of his elements being easily accessible, considering they were in his body.
"I'm so fucking glad I found my true elemental affinities early this time.
Ray thought, shuttering at the years of cultivation he had wasted in his past life.
When the higher realms had come, he had barely been at the peak of the first ring.
Remembering his past actions caused his lip to curl back in discussed.
"How pathetic.
Ray thought as memories of a boy desperate for familial affection, ran through his mind.
"I promise, on everything I have and ever will accomplish. I will never be that weak again.
Ray thought, his mix of both self loathing and anger, causing his soulspace to shake.
Blinking back to the present Ray realized his ring has started, spinning slower, much slower.
He was just about to frown when he recognized the reason.
"It's done absorbing the ether I lost, right now it's just absorbing pure ether for cultivation.
Further cultivation and gaining more power should have caused him to rejoice, but.
"It's so fucking slow.
Ray thought, as he glared at the barely moving ring of ether surrounding him.
The slowness of closed door cultivation for him was due to mini factors.
One of them was the size of his first ring, with the ring itself, being abnormally large for its rank.
It would obviously take longer to fill.
Another reason was the lacking density of ether within Baradon, but altogether closed door cultivation was slow in general.
That was the reason most cultivators decided that killing was more profitable.
Besides, you could only gain Kingguy through altering or advancing someone or something fate.
"And what better way to do that then relieving them of their life, now that is a very fate altering event.
Ray thought, his lips curling into an amused grin at his own joke.
Quickly that grin faded as his browse furrowed
"no but seriously, I can't stand this slow ass cultivation speed. If my cultivation continues like this, I won't reach the second ring for another year and a half.
The very thought of remaining weak when he could make himself stronger caused a sense of revulsion to fill him.
"It seems I need to find a source of kill worthy people soon.
Ray thought, as he continued to observe the minuscule amounts of ether that were entering his First ring.
He would have just went out to kill random civilians, except for they barely provided any more ether than just cultivating normally.
He knew away to extract Kingguy from them, but he didn't have the resources at the moment.
Scrolling back through his memories, he looked for anything that could help him out of this predicament.
When he remembered a ritual, he once saw.
It had been a eighth ring cultivator that was surprisingly using the path of blood to advance.
For context, not many people in Austria knew of secondary elements.
The only elements that were publicly accepted in Austria were water, fire, earth, wind, lightning, light, and darkness.
Also, without them, even knowing it, they freely accepted the space element, but that story is for another day.
Yet somehow the kid had made it, and considering the aura he was giving off he was attempting to reach the ninth ring.
He had been sitting on a hill with a lake of blood surrounding him from all sides.
From what Ray was able to sense The blood came from hundreds if not, thousands of people and animals.
And using what look suspiciously like the intelligible characters gained when one reaches the fold rounm, he refined it all into ether.
"But that's not possible for me. Where the fuck would I find that many people that I can both kill and drain all without anyone in the family noticing anything is wrong.?
Ray thought his fist clenching, but it was his only option so he would try.
It wasn't like killing was anything new to him.
The road of cultivation had always been bloody, it had just taken the higher realms invasion to show him that.
Once again, memories came to him in flashes.
The sky shattering, the bright blue shards slowly fading out of existence, Before they could reach the Earth as if it was nothing more than an illusion. People once revered as the strongest swatted aside like flies, their strength amounting to nothing more than a slight annoyance to the invaders.
Then there was the laughter, a laughter that shattered minds and crushed hope.
It seemed to ring out across the entire world, as if distance was nothing more than a suggestion to whoever the owner of that laugh was.
Ray shook his head, clearing it of those memories.
He didn't have time to dwell on the past, considering he still had the problem of finding enough blood to speed his cultivation.
Pulling out of his mind space, Ray was about to get to work on throwing the disgusting clothes out of his window.
When a knock came at the door. Ray was just about to ask who was it, when he remembered the small issue of his voice.
"That along with a hell of a lot of other things.
Ray thought, as he looked down at his, overly scarred body.
It was the words he heard The maid speak that really caused him to freeze.
"Be presentable a message just came in from the front lines and master Leon will be home tomorrow."
Ray had one single thought for those words.
"What the fuck."
Because Leon wasn't supposed to be coming back tomorrow.
No scratch that, Leon wasn't supposed to be coming back at all.
From what Ray could remember Leon, the first born of the Ironblood clan, and also the oldest of raise other four siblings.
Should have died out on the front lines never to be seen again.
The report was supposed to come days after his father's return to the manor.
The news becoming the last straw for the Ironblood monarchs sanity.
Which also led to the cleanse immediate decline.
Yet things weren't going as they were supposed to, Leon was still alive, which meant that eventual snap of madness would never come.
"I don't understand, what, or who is changing the fucking timeline?"
Ray thought, his confusion turning into anger.
Standing from his bed, he thought quickly.
"At first, I thought I had months to prepare for that strange ass blood ritual with you, but it seems I'll somehow have to manage in less than 24 hours."
Ray thought as he rummage through his clothes for something that would fit him.
Luckily, after many minutes of searching, he found a black tunic that was somehow still too large for even his enhanced frame.
"One day I just have to learn, where the fuck are they getting the clothes they're giving me from?"
Ray thought, as he pulled the tunic in front of him, before remembering the state of his body.
He contemplated taking a bath, but realized he didn't have enough time.
"Every hour matters.
With that he yanked the tunic on before falling to the floor and swiping his arms under his bed.
As his arm came back from under the bed, they were full of vent and rusty nails.
They looked in significant and more like scrap metal than anything, yet when Ray laid eyes on them, he nodded in satisfaction.
"This should do nicely, now I just need to find some preferably unwilling victims."
Ray thought as his lips curled in a manic grin, and a dangerous light shined in his eyes.
The same light that used to show right before he killed a city just because he was in the mood too.
"I almost feel bad for anyone and everyone I encounter at this time."
Ray said, trying his best not to burst into laughter.
Because this he could understand, this was his element.
Because when it came to Drawing blood, no one was his better.
Because no matter how strong they were now or how strong they could become in time.
When they stood across from him on the battlefield, they had no choice, but to become a part of the great Crimson River he left in his wake.
"Don't be ashamed"
Ray said to The air in front of him, his rasping voice full of a menace no first ring should possess.
"You won't be the first to join The great River, and you most definitely won't be the last."