Lying in a pool of his own dark blood, Grave sat there speechless, in pain, and questioning the world. He had never lost a battle ever since he had met the Anomaly so many years ago when he was just a simple grave robber.
Even though he could see the look of concern in Blood Master Scarlett's eyes as she looked at him he couldn't hear a word from her as his thoughts drifted to his memories. He quickly found himself standing inside a giant tomb of an emperor.
There were countless bits of gold and jewels spread around the emperor's coffin. So much so that if he had taken it he would never have to worry about money again. Seeing such vast levels of wealth didn't make Grave's heart flutter as it used to when he was in deep need of money
What attracted his gaze was that standing in front of the emperor's casket was a young man dressed in dusty clothes and various types of gear needed for robbing graves. The young man's innocent face was filled with a mixture of feelings of sadness, regret, hope, and desire.
Grave remembered that he had lost all his grave robber friends in this tomb one after another but even though they knew many of them would still lose their lives they continued forward. There was just too much for them to lose if they went back.
Grave himself had a little sister that was incredibly sick and needed many expensive treatments to survive. Even though he knew that taking on this job was dangerous he didn't want to be alone in this world.
In the end, he was the last one to survive and reach the emperor's tomb. He should have been excited at the time as he had reached the goal that countless of his friends wanted and could finally save his sister.
Grave felt his face curly up into a smile as he saw his younger self shivering in fear as he was fixed on the giant bloody heart that was within the emperor's coffin.
"Badum! Badum! Badum!"
Every heartbeat that came from the giant bloody heart made his past self clench his heart harder and harder. As his face lost more and more blood became pale.
With every heartbeat, Grave felt his own heart start to grow closer to the giant bloody heart's rhythm. He could feel a strong yearning to drink blood quickly building up inside him.
"Badum!! Badum!! Badum!!"
Eventually, the heartbeats were too much for his past self and his unconscious body smashed heavily into the ground. Meanwhile, the giant bloody heart in the emperor's coffin stopped thumping and went silent.
Grave who was watching all of this happen in his memory felt confused. If this was all just a memory he was having in his mind why didn't it end when his past self fell unconscious?
"Badum!!! Badum!!!! Badum!!!!!"
Suddenly as Grave was having doubts about what he was witnessing, the Giant Bloody Heart exploded with new activity and sent waves of emotions to him.
Grave could feel that the Giant Bloody Heart was excited, angry, hungry, and longing for something, yet he had no idea what it was. He could only watch in helplessness as the Giant Bloody Heart thumped with increasing strength.
The Giant Bloody Heart thumped with so much power that he could feel that he was losing grip of control of his body. It was like the Giant Bloody Heart in his memories was trying to gain control of his body through his heart.
"No, you don't!"
Noticing that he was losing control, Grave clutched his heart and used every last bit of resistance that his body, will, and soul could produce. Even then it wasn't enough to overcome the Giant Bloody Heart's power and Grave quickly found himself falling unconscious just like his past self.
Meanwhile, in the real world, Blood Master Scarlett watched in horror as black blood started gushing out of Grave's heart. The black blood was extremely thick and had an overwhelming scent that was almost indescribable.
"Grave, wake up!"
"Shoot!"
Having her sense of danger blaring out warnings, Blood Master Scarlett gritted her teeth and jumped away from Grave. She quickly placed her palm on the ground and muttered a few words.
Soon after she muttered a few words the ground below her began to rumble as ten giant mounds of dirt grew. The dirt mounds grew taller and taller as they curved inwards to create an impenetrable barrier around her.
"Boom"
With the sound of her dirt barrier completely closed from the outside world, Blood Master Scarlett breathed a soft sigh of relief. After she regained control of her emotion again, she reached into her pouch in complete darkness to grab out an eyeball.
She then whispered a few words to the eyeball before controlling her dirt barrier to form a small opening enough to let the eyeball out. Once the opening form she quickly threw the eyeball outside and placed her hand together as if she was reading a book.
Magically on her palm, she saw the outside world from the eyeball's perspective and saw Yoze kneeling next to Grave who was bleeding out black blood.
"Incredible, this man's blood heart is so strong. In such a dangerous situation, it had transformed his blood to be even more potent and have better healing properties." Yoze said out loud, noticing that there was a floating eyeball staring at him.
"If there was any doubt before that he wouldn't survive before now it was certain that he would not only survive but come out stronger."
"Even breaking into the Martial Grandmaster realm is a possibility," Yoze said calmly as he watched Grave's motionless body slowly being covered in this black blood.
What Yoze didn't say was that he had the desire to take this black blood for himself to allow his own blood heart to absorb and transform his blood. He also was heavily interested in what would happen to him if he was in Blood Master Steel's situation.
Would his blood heart also start producing a new type of blood to save him? Would he get the same kind of black blood as this or would his blood be different?
He had many questions that he wanted the answers to but would only get in the future.
As for now he only had two goals in mind, the first is to collect some of this black blood. The second is to make sure Blood Master Steel stays in his control until he copies the second unknown talent.
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