The contract was sealed with ink and blood. For Baekho, it was a gamble worth billions. For Seong-jun, it was a stepping stone toward a greater plan. The guild promised him five billion won simply for entering the Raid Gate under their banner, with another ten billion should he claim a place in the top three. To ordinary hunters, this was fortune beyond imagination. For Seong-jun, however, money was not the true prize.
What he sought could not be bought with coin or treasure. He wanted security for his family, recognition that would silence enemies before they dared to act, and the chance to display strength so undeniable that even the Five Guilds would hesitate to interfere.
Yet he pushed further. When asked about the rewards for victory, he demanded to know what he would gain should he take first place. Oh Kyung-hyun had laughed at first, thinking it arrogance. The rookies of the Five Guilds were prodigies honed for years, equipped with artifacts and battle plans. They were trained to face monsters in every form. By comparison, Seong-jun had no time to prepare.
But his gaze never wavered. Confidence born not from pride, but from knowledge.
Reluctantly, the guild master answered with gravity: if Seong-jun claimed first, Baekho would grant him anything—by the name of Oh Kyung-hyun and the authority of Baekho itself. With that vow, the contract was signed, even amended to include this daring clause.
The next morning, reality struck like a blade of gold. Five billion won appeared in Seong-jun's account, bringing his total fortune to twenty-five billion. It was enough to buy secure homes in Seoul's safest districts, enough to build walls of steel around his family. Yet he remained unsatisfied.
For him, victory was not a question of wealth, but a necessity. To reveal his strength openly, to etch it into the minds of hunters and guilds alike—that was the true purpose.
He turned to his status window.
Level 60. Strength, agility, and stamina now balanced with new points. His body tightened, muscles coiled with new power, senses sharpened like steel drawn across stone. And with that, he felt ready at last. Ready to awaken the art that had once crowned him as a sovereign of blood.
Seated cross-legged, breath steady, he invoked the ancient technique of his past life—Blood Spirit Asura Divine Art.
Blood surged through his veins like molten fire. Muscles tightened, bones resonated with unseen rhythm. His heart hammered as if struck by a celestial forge, each beat echoing with violent power. Pain threatened to shatter him, yet his will carved order from chaos.
The blood gathered in his heart, compressed into a storm. It was the first step in commanding blood energy, a path once feared across the thousand continents. Unlike ordinary cultivation that relied only on the dantian, blood arts required mastery over the heart itself. To falter here was to die instantly—shredded from within by one's own blood.
And yet, Seong-jun endured. He knew this agony. He had walked it before as the Blood Demon, lord of crimson.
Each beat of his heart sent waves of power racing through his body. His skin grew tougher, his muscles stronger, his very essence becoming something beyond the mortal vessel he once carried. Slowly, the blood energy bent to his command.
This was the true danger and beauty of blood arts—only by seizing control over the heart, the core of life itself, could one bend blood to will. It was not merely cultivation. It was domination over one's very existence.
As the last verse of the divine art whispered through his mind, his blood roared like a tide. His awakening had begun.