"One night has passed, and the nightmare has ended.

Yechen stared blankly at the morning sun for a long time. After freshening up, he went straight to the hall of the church, where his teacher, Lyle, was still sitting on the front row of wooden chairs as if he hadn't moved all night.

"Teacher, I had a nightmare," Yechen said.

Standing beside Lyle, Yechen began to describe the strange scenes he had seen in his dream last night. While Yechen's face was filled with nervousness and anxiety, Lyle remained calm.

"A blood pool, thick fog, weapons, and voices. Are these the components of your nightmare?" After listening to Yechen's trembling narration, Lyle succinctly extracted the key points.

"Yes," Yechen nodded, suddenly remembering something. He raised a question to Lyle, "Teacher, you mentioned before that once I had a nightmare, I would become noticeably stronger. But when I woke up this morning, I found that the concentration of arcane power flowing within me was about the same as yesterday, with no obvious increase. Why is that?"

After hearing Yechen's question, Lyle remained silent for a moment. Then, he suddenly reached out his hand towards Yechen and changed the subject, "Load a bullet into your revolver's chamber and hand it to me."

Although Yechen was extremely puzzled, he obeyed his teacher's command. With skilled movements, he loaded a bullet into the revolver's chamber and carefully handed it to Lyle.

Unexpectedly, as soon as Lyle took the revolver, without even cocking the hammer, he raised the gun barrel directly at Yechen's chest and pulled the trigger forcefully.

“Bang!"

Yechen, caught completely off guard by Lyle's action, had never anticipated this outcome. He was sent sprawling backward and ultimately crashed onto the cold marble floor of the church.

Thud.

As Yechen lay on the ground, he incredulously gazed at the faint patterns on the floor. He then reached out and gingerly touched his throbbing chest.

However, after a few seconds, he felt no wetness resembling blood. Through his fingertips, Yechen discovered that there was only a hole in his shirt on his chest, and his flesh underneath had not been pierced by the bullet from the revolver.

"How is it possible to survive being shot at such close range?" Yechen sat up with a stunned expression, touching his slightly swollen chest. He then picked up the deformed bullet from the nearby ground, his face filled with disbelief.

Lyle, sitting in front of him, spoke again.

"The initial nightmare differs from future ones; it doesn't significantly enhance your aura power, but it directly strengthens your physical body and reveals the essence of your abilities. These two points are the most crucial."

"So, now ordinary ammunition won't cause fatal damage to your body anymore. You've officially taken the first step."

"Although I could tell you all of this verbally, experiencing it firsthand will be more profound."

After Lyle finished speaking, he showed a rare smile, with no hint of regret for his prankish actions.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

Yechen listened to his teacher's explanation in silence, then curiously drew out his long knife from his waist and made a careful cut on his arm.

He then discovered that although his skin was still soft, unlike tree bark, the blade was unable to draw blood on the surface. Only when Yechen infused his internal aura into the blade could it cut through the skin, drawing tiny droplets of blood.

Yechen found it difficult to understand how his body had been enhanced or mutated after that nightmare.

"I don't know the detailed principles, and no one does. You just need to understand that this is the law of the Aura Maze. We, the beings called by the maze's summons, once we come into contact with its aura, our bodies naturally transform according to the law's guidance."

Lyle turned to look at the broken statue ahead, responding calmly.

"The Aura Maze and its laws," Yechen repeated Lyle's words, his thoughts racing.

Since childhood, Yechen had been told by Lyle that the Aura Maze was a ring-shaped zone encompassing all things in the universe, including the sun, moon, and stars. It divided the world into two parts: the outer abyssal purgatory and the inner sacred light paradise.

The small world where Yechen currently resided, named Eternal Winter Domain, was one of the hidden spaces within the Aura Maze, akin to a small and secluded puddle of water. Yechen, Lyle, and the residents of the White Frost City outside the mountain area were all members of this small puddle.

In short, this Eternal Winter Domain was narrow and unreliable, destined to be eventually eroded by the abyss and face annihilation. When that time came, it would be Yechen's moment to leave this place, exit the maze, and enter the sacred light paradise, officially entering the realm of human civilization.

"The moment my teacher talked about in the past should be approaching soon," Yechen thought, recalling the sight of the abyss drawing near that he witnessed at the border cliff yesterday.

"Yechen, give me a few drops of your blood," the teacher instructed again, interrupting the youth's contemplation.

Yechen nodded, carefully collecting a few drops of blood from the cut on his arm with the blade's edge, and handed them over to Lyle.

Lyle took the long knife and stared intently at the blood droplets on the blade, while Yechen watched quietly by the side. He soon noticed that deep within his teacher's pupils, there were constant flashes of light, as if trying to thoroughly analyze the components of his blood.

After scrutinizing for about ten minutes, Lyle finally withdrew his gaze and returned the long knife to Yechen.

"Well, your Aura Magic core is blood. Judging from the incomplete weapons in your nightmare, it's possible that the two need to be combined to be properly executed," Lyle said, rubbing his brow with a slightly weary expression. It was unclear how much microscopic detail he had actually examined in those tiny blood droplets.

"What is Aura Magic?" Yechen tilted his head. He knew that Aura Power could temporarily enhance his physical abilities, but Lyle had never explained the concept of Aura Magic to him.

"It's similar to magic in fairy tales, an advanced use of Aura Power. Different people will have different nightmares, and different nightmares will give birth to different paths of Aura Magic usage. The essence of each person's soul is different, so the mediums and effects of Aura Magic they unearth will also differ. For some, the medium is hair; for others, it's skin. Yours, however, is blood. The effects still need to be experimented with to be determined," Lyle explained.

Listening to Lyle's explanation, Yechen gazed thoughtfully at the blood on the blade. At that moment, a strange intuition surged into his mind, causing his fingers to unconsciously smear the blood along the edge of the blade.

As Yechen took this action, the tiny blood droplets suddenly began to swell and deform, instantly transforming into extremely thin ribbon-like objects that tightly adhered to the blade of the long knife.

Observing this, Lyle remained silent. After inspecting the reddened blade several times, Yechen tightened his grip on the handle and aimed the "Blood Blade" at an old discarded bench in front of him, then forcefully struck it.

Crack!

The wooden bench was split into two by the young man's direct blow.

Feeling the wood break like mud under his hand, without any apparent resistance, Yechen could almost immediately conclude that his blood had the power to enhance the effectiveness of weapons.

To put it simply, it could at least enhance the cutting power of weapons like swords and knives. In the past, Yechen had chopped through many pieces of wood, but none of those previous strikes had been as smooth, precise, and comfortable as this one.