The winds of the north blew across the Frozen Valas Tundra, freezing anything that dared to venture out of its hideout.

As time passed, blizzards became as common as trees in these lands and could appear at any time.

“Hah!”

“Agh!”

However, that didn’t discourage some, and instead, it made them even more diligent.

Deep in some valley in the forgotten corner, there were two bare-chested men fighting each other.

They danced around each other, hoping to make a hit at the other, but both of them were also being defensive.

The cold wind was tickling their backs, but they didn’t care.

With serious expressions, they had only the enemy in front of them in their minds.

One of them, the one with a spear, was trying to stab the other one with light but elegant thrusts while keeping his distance.

The other one, on the other hand, wielded an ax in one hand and a blade in the second.

Because of that, he was at a disadvantage as the other one had a longer reach.

Furthermore, the spearman was a little more dexterous than the dual-wielder, making it even more challenging to fight with him.

It could be attributed mainly to the fact that the dual-wielder had a cloth across his eyes and was fighting completely blind.

Despite this fact, the spearman was taking him seriously, as if he wasn’t confident in winning.

The blind man was entirely silent as if listening to the surroundings while the spearman was also trying to be as quiet as possible. However, he always grunted while giving his all into the attack, as it was hard to not do so otherwise.

The blind man was special for being quiet no matter what.

They circled around each other for some time. The ice on the ground made it harder to keep balance, yet they fought on it as if it was dry ground.

Hah!”

In the end, the spearman found the opportunity and attacked first.

The blind man, while less dexterous, seemed to easily predict this and with a small movement, he dodged the stab by bending his upper body slightly.

However, that was just a feint, and there was another attack coming in the form of a sweep.

This time he blocked and tried to get closer, but the spearman was faster and got back into a thrusting position.

This way they fought for hours.

Not caring for time nor wounds on their bodies.

Each of them aimed for vitals without any hesitation.

They clashed and tried to draw as much blood as possible, gradually turning the ground red.

Both of them got tired and so, wordlessly, they decided to end it in one fell swoop.

They faced each other and attacked with ferocious expressions.

The blind man threw his ax at that time, which was dodged by the surprised spearman.

He then used his palm to strike the shaft of the spear.

That wouldn’t do much normally, but an anomaly happened.

Little of the wind coalesced around the palm and deflected the spear.

The force was so strong that the spear fell out of the man’s hand as he was focusing on the ax aiming for his life.

He couldn’t do anything.

In the end, he ended up lying on the ground, knocked down by the blind man with the blade pressing on his neck while drawing a little blood, indicating the end of the sparring.

“That’s not f***ing fair!”

“Says the one who fights with a blind person.”

“That's the only reason why I can bridge the gap with you though.”

The blind man clicked his tongue and stretched out his arm towards the spearman.

The spearman laughed as he took the hand and got up.

“Anyway, this wind bending or whatever you do is extremely cool, you know, Stone?”

The blind man sighed.

“I told you to call me by name.”

“Haha, no way. In my mind, you will still be a Stone!”

With a shake of his head, Illyan went towards the ax he threw to pick it up.

Both of them spared the entire day so they were tired.

They were training like this lately, as normal training was mostly useless for them. The place they used was the same one where Illyan learned ‘The Way of the Body. It was quiet here, and there was enough space to fight, so they visited often.

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“In that case, I will continue to call you Urchin.”

“No! Don’t call me that! Zers is my name! I worked so hard to get myself a name!”

“In my mind, you will still be an Urchin!”

“Hey!”

They bickered like this every day. Illyan changed a lot over the years, becoming more and more solemn with blank expressions on his face. He started to be also more cruel and unscrupulous when it came to the enemies, making others worried. If before he was really like stone, hard but inflexible, then now he was like a blade made out of steel. Hard, sharp, and flexible, always prepared to draw blood.

Zers, however, never changed. Despite knowing themselves for over six years, Illyan never saw any change in him. He matured little but he acted in the same way as when he was a boy.

Always being a rascal who does whatever he wants. This, on the other hand, helped Illyan with his mental instability as he felt at ease when being with his only friend.

Both of them went to take their upper body clothing on and deserted the place.

They usually fought without it as they didn’t want to dirty it or damage it.

It didn’t matter to them as the weather could do anything to them. The Cold Energy from the baptism was almost absorbed at this point, as their bodies were stimulated to the limits.

Zers was quite a genius for being able to do that as young as he was. He was just 20 years old this winter and underwent the baptism six years ago.

On the other hand, Illyan was as always under average. It was only thanks to the horrible wounds he got in a lot of fights that stimulated his body cells that he absorbed everything in a similar fashion as his friend.

This made them already one of the best in the tribe. The more so when we count the fact that many elites died a few years ago.

The tribe was still living in the valley. It was two years after Illyan got his name that their hideout couldn’t keep up, and these days are the last ones here before leaving.

Nobody knows if they will ever return. So Degres commanded them to get the baptized weapons from the training cave. They then used them for the last sparring they would have here.

When they returned, they decided to part ways.

“Hey, I need to go meet that old geezer. Calling me a candidate this, candidate that. It is honestly annoying. Then I need to talk with Yii why I didn’t come sooner. Hah… Sometimes I envy you, Ill.”

“You could have refused back then. Your fault.”

“Oh come on. How could I refuse that!”

“Just like me?”

Zers became red as he pointed his finger at his friend.

“Like you?! You were out of the game from the beginning! There were no expectations for you!”

“Yet I have more merits than you.”

“Aaaagh!”

Zers ruffled his hair in defeat. Lately he couldn’t win any of his arguments against him.

“I liked your previous you more!”

“...”

Ever since seeing the ‘truth,’ Illyan learned that just being strong won’t cut it. He needed to be learned. Not just at a normal level but at the most excellent level.

If you are strong but do stupid things then no matter what you will fall sooner or later.

That made him study more. He learned the Bakur alphabet that was left behind by the ancestor of the tribe. Of course, it wasn’t the real name, but the original one was lost in history, so it was called Bakur.

Thanks to that, he learned to read and write, broadening his options.

He read all the recordings in the tribe, learning many things. Then used the merits to use the little skin parchments that the tribe had to use them for important things.

For example, the information he got over the years about his gift.

He can’t depend on the thing he doesn’t understand all the time. One day it would bite him in the ass. And so he experimented and wrote his notes.

And he found many interesting things and confirmed the others.

Firstly, his gift doesn’t grow as time passes. It grows as long as he uses it. The reason why his gift grew so much was that he suffered too much.

Secondly, as long as his gift has proper fuel it can go over its limits. Normally it draws stamina from the body, but it can use almost anything as fuel. That was the only reason why he could survive inside of the stomach. He fueled the gift with his wrath. Once his anger dissipated he absorbed the herbal essence of the herbs the monster ate and used it as fuel.

This immensely quickened the growth of his gift.

If he knew it before his fight with Triston he wouldn’t need to jump that cliff and could fight him fair and square. His anger towards him was quite high after almost burning to death thanks to him. Back then his survival instincts won over his anger and thus he couldn’t tap on this unlimited energy.

However, he knew that depending on his anger could be lethal and if he did this often he would turn into a short-tempered person and could make irreversible mistakes.

He also found that thanks to his body he almost emitted vitality.

This brimming vitality is the reason why his blood is more desirable by monsters and other creatures than others. But they cannot smell it until he actually bleeds so it is not so serious.

He had to find this out as he feared that the accident in his village was his fault. But it seemed that it was really just a coincidence.

He also learned to use his drops of blood to fertilize the herbs. They grow slightly more quickly than normally thanks to that.

That was even more desirable now as they grew the herbs for two years nonstop to get stash enough for a few years for the entire tribe.

They would like to accumulate more but the situation worsened. Two years ago, the monsters came from the north and started devouring anything that came under their claws.

Only the Bakur tribe that hid in this valley and the Blood Crow Alliance managed to do well. Blood Crow Alliance was fine thanks to their home advantage where they could fight off.

However, even them suffered heavy casualties.

And now it was Bakur Tribe’s turn. The monster's number grew too much lately and the place was not safe at all. That’s why it was decided to leave this valley and try to migrate.

Where? They didn’t have an idea.

But they will need to be quick else nothing will be left of the tribe.

Illyan returned with those thoughts into his tent and packed everything up.

He didn’t have too many things so it was quickly done.

Then he went to sit down to meditate.

Meditation was already carved into his body, and it was his instinct to do it minimally an hour a day. Without it, he wouldn’t feel entire.

He still couldn't accumulate the Spiritual Energy or any other into his body but already learned to somewhat control the freely flowing one around him.

He always wondered why he could absorb the Cold Energy and not the Spiritual one, so he once asked Kaoran.

The answer was simple. There is a difference in absorbing the energy directly into flesh and accumulating it in its pure form. The first one will just nourish the body, making it stronger and add some other benefits like affinity growth.

On the other hand, the second will allow you to do much more with the energy.

Unfortunately, that is impossible for Illyan for now.

However, he can at least affect the energy around him thanks to the martial art that Kaoran taught him. That, in turn, allows him to move the wind or air in close vicinity of his body.

When he moves a specific way it will spur the flowing energy in the air and move alongside the body when moving. It is highly inferior compared to the real control over the Spiritual Energy or any other form of energy, but for Illyan it was enough. He didn’t have enough talent, so even if Kaoran had this type of advanced techniques, he couldn’t learn them now.

With this, he could easily combine it with his close combat making it much more useful than if he could make a few gusts of wind with just his mind.

With enough time, Illyan believed he could also do many more things and overcome the issue of his talent to a certain extent. Maybe one day, he would be able to use it with other elements in the future

But until then, since the air was abundant with the Spiritual Energy and easily malleable it was the best candidate to become a medium to perform the Spiritual Arts.

It was the same for Kaoran. With his ability to see and be able to talk with spirits, he could befriend the wind spirits and do many things that were not possible with only Bakur’s inheritance. Because of that, some of the advanced techniques created by Kaoran were not applicable to anyone else. But it also helped him to become one of the strongest shamans that the Bakur Tribe ever had.