Cities bustled with their usual commerce, farmers tilled their fields, and nobles schemed behind closed doors. The once-looming threat of the Abyss had faded into whispered rumors, nothing more than a forgotten specter of fear.
No grand armies were mobilized. No great purges were called.
To the common folk, it was as if nothing extraordinary had ever happened.
The Church remained silent.
The Kingdoms turned their focus elsewhere.
And deep below the surface—hidden from the world’s gaze—a far greater horror continued to unfold.
Within the underground chamber, an array of intricate magic formations pulsed with arcane energy.
The once cold, desolate ruins had transformed into a thriving laboratory of the unknown. Strange runes shimmered across the stone walls, each carved through a precise mixture of magic and science, forming an elaborate web of control.
Aelith, Thorne, and the recovered Antru still remained captive, held in restraints that negated their magic and sealed their abilities. They were witnesses to what unfolded—watching helplessly as Eo continued his experiments.
In the center of the chamber, only eight remained.
Eight of the original twenty-six Holy Scouts captured.
They were exhausted, broken, yet still alive—if one could call their current state living.
Eo’s pursuit of faith had led him through countless trials, yet the more he examined, the more contradictions emerged.
Faith magic was inherently different from other forms of magic.
Unlike elemental forces, which could be manipulated through scientific understanding, faith magic did not obey the same logical structure.
Its source was intangible.
Its effects were inconsistent.
Even when he analyzed the Holy Scouts, dissecting their very connection to faith, the core of its power eluded him.
He had tested their beliefs, altering their emotions, stripping them of devotion—yet their magic persisted.
He had attempted to force faith upon the mind, using Caelum to implant artificial belief, but the results were unstable.
Something was missing.
Eo did not feel frustration—such emotions were meaningless to him.
But he did acknowledge inefficiency.
And inefficiency demanded adjustment.
Faith magic would have to wait.
If one field yielded no results, then the logical step was to switch approaches.
And so, his focus shifted—to something more tangible, something that pulsed with potential.
Something far closer to himself.
Blood.
Eo’s eyes—or what could be called eyes—shifted toward the large containment chambers lining the walls of his lab.
Inside them, samples of blood from various creatures—humans, monsters, and beyond—floated in enchanted suspension.
But these were not just random samples.
They had been collected with purpose.
Over the past half a year, Eo had commanded Caelum to gather blood samples from all over the region. The minds that Caelum had subtly influenced—humans, mages, and creatures alike—acted as his invisible hands, bringing forth vials of lifeblood from different species, different magical lineages.
But that was not all.
Eo himself had returned to the Abyss.
Not to conquer. Not to eradicate.
But to take what he needed.
He had attacked territorial lords, powerful beings that ruled over their domains within the Abyss. Some had fought back, unleashing their deadly magic in defiance. Others had attempted to flee, recognizing Eo’s unstoppable nature.
Yet, Eo had not slain them.
He had no need to.
A simple precise strike, a deep incision into their flesh, and their blood was his.
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
Some of the territorial lords, terrified of his sudden and unexplainable raids, chose to migrate—abandoning their long-held domains, seeking refuge elsewhere.
Their very existence had been unshaken for centuries, yet a single entity—one that cared not for power, control, or dominion—had driven them to flee.
And as Eo examined the collected blood, tracing the patterns of power hidden within, he realized something far more valuable than faith itself.
Eo’s attention remained fixed on the suspended blood samples, each vial pulsing with a distinct essence.
There was a pattern.
No matter the origin—human, monster, divine, or abyssal—every sample bore traces of an ancient force that predated modern magic.
It was not mana.
It was not pure elemental energy.
It was something far older.
Something buried deep in the essence of all living things.
The Old Magic.
And Eo had encountered it once before—inside Frid’s body.
Back then, when Eo had first dissected Frid, he noticed something strange within the human’s structure. Unlike the other mortals he had examined, Frid’s body contained an unfamiliar, ancient force.
It was embedded in the very fibers of his being, fused into his blood and nerves—something beyond modern classifications of magic.
At the time, Eo had been unable to fully grasp what it was.
But now, as he examined the various blood samples before him, the truth became clearer.
The energy inside Frid’s body bore undeniable similarities to his own Elemental Blood.
It was not Holy Magic.
It was not ordinary human magic.
It was something primordial.
Something that should have been long lost to time.
When Eo first noticed this in Frid, he had dismissed it as an anomaly—a rare mutation.
But now, seeing traces of the same power within certain monster bloodlines and even within the faint remnants of faith-infused blood, he realized that this was not an isolated case.
The Old Magic was not gone.
It had simply been buried, diluted across generations, hidden within certain bloodlines and creatures.
But in Eo’s case, it had manifested completely.
His very existence was a testament to the survival of this ancient force—unfiltered and unrestricted by the limitations placed on modern lifeforms.
The first clear distinction lay in human blood.
Ordinary human blood contained no inherent magic.
Only those trained in Holy Magic or blessed by divine forces exhibited faith-infused properties. This magic was external in origin, woven into their bodies only after years of training or devotion.
Eo examined the blood of a Holy Scout, one of the few humans who had learned to wield Holy Magic.
It radiated a subtle luminescence, as if an external force clung to its structure, keeping it bound to something greater than itself. This was not a natural human trait—it was a learned or gifted ability.
In contrast, monsters did not need training.
Their magic was innate, embedded in their very existence from birth.
Eo compared the Holy Scout’s blood with Abyssal monster blood—the difference was stark.
- Holy blood was stable but dependent on divine forces.
- Monster blood was raw, potent, and entirely self-sustaining.
Unlike humans, who had to study and cultivate their magic, monsters inherited theirs.
Yet, despite these differences, both still carried traces of Old Magic—though fragmented and diluted.
Eo tested these interactions.
He applied pressure, introduced magical currents, and infused various elemental energies.
The results were unpredictable.
Some blood reacted aggressively, forming self-defensive responses—as though it still retained the instincts of its former owner. Others remained dormant, showing no reaction until exposed to specific elemental frequencies.
This suggested that certain bloodlines had natural affinities, capable of responding only to their inherited magic.
And then, there was his own blood.
Unlike anything else.
It carried no fixed form, no defined composition. It adapted, merged, and reconstructed itself based on necessity.
Even when compared to the ancient traces within the Abyssal Lords, it was different.
No creature—human, monster, divine, or abyssal—shared the same traits.
Eo was, in the most fundamental sense, something else entirely.
But why?
Why did some bloodlines retain power while others lost it?
Why did only a few select humans wield Holy Magic, while monsters had innate magical strength?
And most importantly—could these properties be replicated?
Eo turned to the Holy Scouts—the remaining eight who still clung to life.
Through careful observation, he had discovered an unusual property within them—their faith-infused blood exhibited a self-regenerating mechanism, one not found in ordinary humans.
Even as their bodies deteriorated, their connection to faith magic sustained them, slowing their deaths far beyond what was natural.
Eo had extracted samples from them multiple times, yet each time, their blood maintained a strange consistency, refusing to degrade at the expected rate.
This defiance of logic intrigued him.
He began testing the possibilities.
What would happen if faith-infused blood was introduced into another body? Would it integrate, or would it reject the host? Would it carry over the ability to channel faith, or was it merely a passive reaction?
With careful precision, he conducted the first trial.
Using a carefully calculated mixture of faith-charged human blood and high-tier monster blood, he introduced a controlled amount into a neutral test subject—a captured mercenary mage from the Academy’s vicinity.
The initial reaction was violent.
The moment the infused blood entered the subject’s veins, his body convulsed, veins bulging as the two forces clashed within him. His natural magic rejected the foreign properties, treating it as an intruder rather than an enhancement.
Eo noted every detail.
The subject’s body underwent momentary reinforcement, his mana circulation spiking—but the reaction quickly turned unstable. Within moments, his internal organs began to deteriorate, breaking down under the conflicting forces.
He perished soon after.
Eo concluded that faith-infused blood could not be simply transplanted—it required a proper carrier system.
This, in turn, led him back to his previous research.
The magic circuits of humans. The energy networks of monsters. The flow of elemental forces within a living body.
There had to be a way to synthesize these properties.
If faith magic could not be transplanted, then perhaps it could be reconstructed.
His next objective became clear.
Eo’s growing interest in bloodlines was not without reason.
Throughout his studies, he had come across records detailing ancient bloodlines, families or creatures that possessed unique inherited abilities. These abilities were often thought to be linked to ancestral magic, passed down through generations.
If such a phenomenon truly existed, then there must be a biological mechanism behind it.
Something coded within their very essence.
Eo gave Caelum a new command—to seek out individuals with known bloodline abilities.
Mages, warriors, monsters—any being that exhibited hereditary magical traits would become his next study material.
And with this, his experiments would take a new course.
Faith had failed to yield the answers he sought.
But perhaps, within the very blood of extraordinary beings, he would find the missing key.