The sickly sweet smell of blood filled Eric's nose. He remembered them all.
Each one of his friends who died by his own hand, all because they were stupid kids who believed a stupid story.
The guilt never stopped eating away at him.
"Lift your head, descendant. You should be proud!" The voices encouraged.
"What?"
"You have the rune of Sense! That is proof that you have already passed one of our rituals! You have proven yourself by fighting through thick and thin! You have the chance to become the sole Rune Master of this new age!"
"I don't want it...."
"You...don't want it?"
Eric's jaw tightened! "No, you maniacs! Of course I don't want that title! Rune Master? You think I want to be the master of this thing that you branded on me!?"
"Th-that mark is a sign of our comradery! You shouldfeel-"
"Who are you to tell me how to feel! A bunch of voices in my head? Echoes of the dead devils of this clan's past? None of that matters to me! Your trust means nothing to me!" Eric clenched his fist until his hand bled.
"I'm not here because I want to be. I'm here...because completing this brand is the only way to rid me of this disgusting curse!"
His eyes narrowed into slits. His deep hatred for this clan for all that they did to him fueled his every word. "Don't treat me like one of you!"
...
The lack of response left the room hanging with a sweet, metallic smell that made his stomach turn. His entire body tensed. There was something more frustrating about them not having a response.
"Out of things to say? Then let me lea-"
"During wars, mortals are pit against one another," The echoes interjected. "People are united on the battlefield for the sole purpose of fighting for the cause that they believe in!"
"What's this? Are you changing the subject now?" Eric scoffed but his attempt at provocation didn't stop the echoes from speaking.
"Each war is made up of small scale battles happening simultaneously so no matter how alone you may seem, you know that your comrades are fighting just as hard as you! Even if the reasons were different, the ideals and things that they stood for are connected! War is where bonds are forged through the sparks of metal clashing and the sweet smelling pits of blood are left as a sign of the conflict!" The echoes end their speech with a proud chorus of cheers.
"So, to simplify things..." Eric gathered his thoughts before continuing, "You guys like war, because it creates a sense of never truly being alone?"
"That is correct, descendent! You have such a way with words!"
"Did everything that I just said go completely over your dead heads? I'm not like any of you and I don't want to be!"
"That is fine," The voices stated.
"You don't have to be like us. We have long since passed. Our time and beliefs are not important. We are simply here to act as your mentors through these ruins. Your reasoning for being here and wielding our blessed crest are not what we are looking for."
"Then what are you looking for? Because I'm getting sick of all this talk about Scarlet Glades and the beauties of bloodshed!"
Eric could swear that he heard the inner mechanisms of the echos' brains deliberating his question. "We want...more comrades to continue our legacy. To wield the mark and spread our cause to the rest of the world. Whether they accept that cause or not is inconsequential. Just that they hear it..."
Eric didn't know whether to be impressed or even more pissed off. 'They really just...don't care that they've become villains. That their magic is forbidden and they're viewed as basically demons-as devils!'
"Fine." He finally unclenched his fist, letting his anger flow out of his body like the blood dripping from his palms. "Then tell me what I have to do."
Eric could feel the renewed joy from the voices before they even spoke. "Head through the wall in front of you, descendant! Then we will tell youmore."
"What wall?" Eric's brows furrowed. He quickly scanned the room and it didn't take long to find the wall in question.
It was the wall at the end of this small platform. It's shade is darker than the rest, and all the red veins in the room seem to gather to this specific point.
"Oh, that wall." He creeped toward the wall. An unsettling feeling firmly secured in his chest. He was going through hell all over again and he could do nothing about it. He stopped directly in front of the wall.
Being closer confirmed to him that the walls were pulsating, an observation that made his skin crawl.
"Go on, descendant." They urged. "The path ahead is the true beginning of your journey to Runic Mastery. Hesitating will only delay the inevitable."
"Yeah yeah, I get it. You ghosts are so annoying." Eric could feel the blood in his body speed up. He rubbed his palms together, feeling the sticky remnants of blood on his palms. It made it hard to tell if they were sweaty or not.
Understanding further hesitation would get him nowhere, he finally placed his hands against the wall.
The wall twitched under his touch. It's dark grey color faded, becoming a deep red that matched the blood on Eric's palm. His hands sunk into the wall. It felt less like a wall every second, more like a massive beast that was trying to consume him.
"Still unsettling." Eric groaned, recalling his previous experiences with this strange building material.
His instincts told him to retreat but he held his ground. There was nowhere for him to run anyway so, he may as well just get this over with. He willingly pushed further in, the strange warmth of the wall surrounding him as was swallowed by the ruins.
First his arms, then shoulders, until he was completely consumed by the wall. The walls closed behind him, squeezing him so tight that his ribs felt like they were stuck to his lungs. His body become slick, not from the walls but from the sweat that now covered his body.
'Just let this be over! Hurry up!' He mentally begged, his eyes squeezed shut in hopes that the process would be quicker without him watching. He was in the wall for an agonizing length of time or maybe it just felt long due to the discomfort it brought him. Eventually, he was spat out, falling onto the ground gasping for air.
"Finally!" He breathed deeply, regretting the action in an instant. That thick, sweet, iron scent was in this room as well, making his stomach turn.
"I hate this place..."
He distracted himself from his stomach discomfort by looking around the new room. It was much more circular than the previous room, and the pair of blood pools had been traded for a single massive one in center of the room.
"Welcome to the beginning of your first Trial, descendant!" The echoes greeted, oblivious to the nausea that Eric currently felt.
Eric finger's twitched in annoyance but he didn't lash out. "So, what's the challenge that I'm supposed to be going through. If it's resisting the urge to vomit from all of this blood then you can just let me go now."
"Why would the delectable scent of blood cause you to vomit? Did you drink too much?"
"No, I-you know what? Nevermind. Just tell me what I need to do so that I can get out of here." Eric's sarcasm had fallen on ears far too dense to comprehend.
"The Mark of Control has been added to your set. It grants greater control of the rivers that fill the battlefield!" The voices informed.
"So...blood?"
"Yes!"
"Stop sounding so excited, it's disgusting!"
"Blood is what fuels us descendant. You need to learn to appreciate it's meaning and power!" The echoes chastised.
"I don't care! Just tell me what I need to do!"
"Of course! You must activate the Mark of Control to send the blood from the pool, through the veins to purify the sun so that we can be bathed in it's crimson glow!"
Eric's brows furrowed. "Sun?" He turned his head to the ceiling but didn't see any sun? There was a giant glass crystal that to emitted some sort of...light...
Eric noticed the veins of blood that were leaving the pool all ended at the giant ball!
"You want me to move all of that..." Eric gestured to the pool. "...into that thing?" His pointed up at the large ball filled with light.
"Not all of it, just enough to color the light red. This test is based on a moment of our history. The day that the Sanguine Devils first invaded a battlefield. The Day of the Blood Sun, is what it was called. A day when blood ran so freely, that the sunlight heated it into a thick mist that rose into the sky making the sun look blood red!"
"I didn't ask for all of that extra information!" Eric dismissed, studying the pool in the center of the room. He knelt beside it and dipped his hand in to see how deep the pool actually was. He watched his arm push deeper into the pool but never felt a bottom.
Eric's eyes widened. His arm was already elbow deep but he still couldn't feel a bottom.
He hurriedly pulled his hand out of the pool, hand and sleeve up to his elbow all dyed red. "Where the hell did you guys get this much blood?" He asked with a mix of disgust and shock.
"We as a clan do not always produce powerful fighters, sometimes we find people that wish to commit to our cause but are simply not fit to bear the mark. So, instead they are offered to our god. Their life blood is drained repeatedly until they can produce no more. In that way, they could continue to serve our comrades even though they would never see the battlefield themselves. And our god would still welcome them to the Crimson Valley after death, acknowledging their act of sacrifice for the clan."
The voices explained the horrific process so calmly that it would unsettle anyone else.
Eric, on the other hand, expected this much from these demented ghosts at this point. While he was disgusted, he did not even flinch while the process was explained to him. Instead he decided to focus on figuring out how to activate his new brand.
"Would it be like, what Mama Wolf and Alice do?" Eric did small dancing motions like Alisa does when she's manipulating the wind.
"Is that some sort of...celebration to the blood, descendent?" The voices inquired
Eric blushed and stopped dancing instantly. "No no, that's stupid! I was just...stretching is all!" Eric kicked himself mentally. He was stupid to try something like that, he wasn't a Spirit Savant so he doesn't understand what those movements represent.
He thought hard, trying many different methods to move the blood at his command but none seemed to work.
He let out an upset grunt. "This is impossible! How in the hell am I supposed to move this shit! There's no mana in blood, so there's no way for me to move it like a spirit savant and I didn't create the blood in this pool so I can't manipulate it like Mama Wolf!" Eric threw his hands into the air.
He was just about ready to give up when he felt a burning on his stomach. His runes were craving to be fed, likely because he was sitting right in front of a massive pool of blood.
"And now these greedy things are hungry. I can't stand this..." He reluctantly crawled over to the edge of the blood pool. He was so hungry, so much more hungry than he realized. His brand burned more than his old one ever had.
He winced from the pain. It burned so much that he barely move closer to the pool to feed the marks. "W-Would you calm down? I-I'm trying to get you some blood!" He ordered but his brand had no ears to listen. They burned more, demanding to be satiated!
He placed one hand onto his chest, breathing heavily. His vision started flashing red whilst he desperately fought against the pain. He fell to his knees, the pain becoming too much to bear.
The blood pool... it was so close but still just out of his reach.
"If I could just..." His hand stretched as far as he could, all of his focus on getting the blood from the pool onto his chest.
He beckoned the blood to come to him and get rid of this burning that he felt, this hunger! The pool began to ripple, it shifted and morphed as though it was trying to leave. Eric's eyes narrowed as his focus only deepened. He focused on his mark, focused on the blood and connecting the two.
Then, a quick, powerful stream of blood shot from the pool and slammed against Eric's chest with enough force to knock him onto his back. The burning in his chest, gradually subsided allowing the boy to breathe sighs of relief.
Eric lay on the ground in shock. The warm, sticky blood covering his torso still seeping into his brand.
"...Well, I guess I got it to work..."