Challenge

Needless to say the ponytail block head was absolutely furious with this turn of events. "You grotesque blood sack come fight me to the death for this dishonorable battle!" he yelled with all his might which showed that he was a cultivator at the peak of the the third gaseous stage just before his would Qi turned into liquid.

While Tral's vampiric body was exceptionally strong his Qi was in the first stage which greatly limited his ability to use Qi based abilities which is why he augmented them with the power of his blood. Due to the Righteous Calling his Qi could contend with someone's on one higher stage with equal strength.

He didn't back down despite this but insulted the man "You speak of honor but I know full well your body has a steel nature making you incredibly hard to kill while also being of two stages higher then me in cultivation but if that is what you want then you have to make it worth my while by letting me claim your fresh corpse afterwards."

The man was so angry that he roared back "You're a greedy fool but what could I, Helsmit Sturge get as your body is worthless to me to make a fair wager?"

"Well my sire is rather wealthy so how about I bring two gold bars tomorrow at the same time then the survivor keeps all. The company or you don't have to worry about my sire being upset as he claimed if I die in the ring it was ment to be." Tral challenged back which Sturge agreed to right away sealing the deal for the death match.

With that settled and one of the ten vials of blood from the now legless flame user Tral felt rather good about the day so he went off back to the shore to cultivate.

Since he didn't need to breath and thought that it could be interesting he proceeded to walk along the bottom of the ocean till the pressure started to become to much for him.

Down there the natures energy was far stronger then at the surface especially without other cultivators around to suck it up. He was only able to train for a short time before the sand nearby him swelled up to uncover a large oily head bigger then his entire body.

A great eel had decided that he would make a great meal. It soon opened its mouth wide to expose thousands of razor sharp needle teeth as it lunged towards him but Tral wasn't planning on becoming a snack here and created a clay boulder that wedged perfectly into its gaping maw causing it to be stuck.

While it was unable to use it's main weapon Tral went for the throat to slit it open to bath in the bloody water as the creature struggled it's last.

Not letting an opportunity go to waste after he had drank his fill he decided to test out a vampiric technique he had read about, blood manipulation.

By compressing blood into one of his fingers he used it to slit his skin from the inside before pushing it out with as much force as possible.

Underwater didn't allow it to have too good of an effect especially at the pressure he was currently under so it could barely travel very quickly but if it was the surface that attack would have been a bit weaker then and crossbow thus making it only somewhat useful.

This gave him an idea though which he could use down here at least somewhat which involved drinking more then having considerably more blood come out of his wrist but instead of shooting it out he kept it attached to slowly form a whip.

He practiced with it for a bit to get the hang of this style of manipulation before using it to grab the body of the eel. With the bloody body in tow he walked the ocean floor while cultivating using the body as an upsidedown fishing line to attract more prey.

It didn't take long with all the blood in the water to bring in a small school of sharks which he would casually practice his blood whip by roping them in to stab with his sword taking a blood sample of many of them.

After he had sampled a few one of the bigger ones had a peculiar memory where it had swam into a cave to find an elemental clam. These clams where very valuable as they would absorb nature's energy to refine pearls that were of great benefit to cultivators as well as most any other creature due to the pearl containing all the elements of nature.

He was excited about such a lucky find and as he had sampled quite a few creatures his body had adapted more to the pressure allowing him to go deep enough to reach this cave.

Inside sat this massive clam with its mouth firmly shut. Tral had dragged some of the shark corpses with him to try and bait it open but sadly it didn't seem to be that hungry. He even tried wedging a spear into the crack to pry it open to no avail.

Tral was about to give up and just resume cultivating but the moment he sat down to absorb in as much energy as he could handle the clam reacted to his increase in aura and immediately opened it's mouth to swallow him whole.

At first he was shocked when the shell closed in around him but he soon saw the most beautiful multicolored pearl and immediately reacted to make a solid pillar to keep the mouth open as he stabbed the soft interior flesh of the clam right under the pearl with his sword slicing the meat away from his new prize making sure to take a sample of the creatures blood in the process.

Afterwards he quickly swam out to find a place to process this pearl in piece. The blood from the clam really elevated his understanding of just how powerful this pearl was while giving him a significant edge in how to go about digesting the powerful energy it contained so as to get the best results which surprised him quite a bit considering the normal known process would have wasted nearly two thirds of the energy.

He spent the next dozen hours cultivating with this pearl in his lap to soak in a considerable amount of pure energy which caused the Qi in his dantian to undergo a transformation as it thickened from a thin mist into a cloud before finally settling into a drop of liquid putting him just in the first stage of liquid Qi slightly above Sturge.