Chapter 5- Scarlet Rose

The crimson orb suspended before Jacob gradually glided toward his chest. As it made contact with his skin, the sphere detonated into an immense sphere of ruby waves that exuded a metallic aroma. Jacob quickly recognized that this red torrent was indeed blood, and despite his attempts, he found himself powerless to escape the fetters that bound him.

The surge of blood overwhelmed Jacob and engulfed him at its center. The blood coursed through his veins via every pore of his being, permeating his eyes, mouth, nose, and ears. A searing agony coupled with intense pain seized his body, inducing suffering so immense it drove Jacob to the brink of wanting to shred his own skin and fearing the fracture of his sanity.

He could feel his mind slipping and as much as he wanted to, he could not even cry under the amount of blood being absorbed into his body. Jacob sensed his bones shattering, his veins rupturing, and his skin dissolving. The sole force propelling him forward was that fleeting moment when he contemplated death as a companion, pondering the aftermath his mother and father would face upon losing not just the sheep, but him as well.

Jacob gritted his teeth and did his best to hold on. He was only 14 years old and had never experienced pain like this before in his life. He wished he could just die and it would be all over but he also wished to see his parents again.

Under such circumstances Jacob persevered on the precipice of death. His body was slowly deconstructed in a long drawn out and painful process where it was being reconstructed anew. New crimson lines that looked like nerves spread out like a tree blooming with branches and an ethereal design began to attach itself to his brain which was the only part of him that had not been annihilated in whatever process he was undergoing.

Jacob felt as though his mind was shattering as his brain began to glow with a red aura light. The metallic smell of blood in the room intensified. In a corner of the room, a ghostly outline of an old man in a luxurious black coat suit took form where he watched with interest. "this lowly creature may actually be able to handle the sovereign's blood" he thought to himself but it was to early to confirm.

It would all depend on if Jacob could hold out until the process was complete.

Jacob on the other hand couldn't see any of this as he didn't even have eyes anymore. He was barely conscious, just holding on to the thoughts of his parents and their smiling faces when he returned home after who knew how long of fretting over his absence in the storm.

Slowly his body began to be reformed around his brain, first his skull was reformed and the rest of his skeletal outline slowly took shape from his head extending down to his toes. Except his bones were not white as a normal persons but were now an obsidian black with a tinge of scarlet.

After his skeletal body was done forming, crimson veins began to take form and flowed along his bones through out his entire body. Then came his muscles which were being formed and densely packed, and lastly his skin. His skin reformed at a color slightly more pale than his original complexion. His hair which had previously been an auburn brown that stopped about shoulder length grew out in a lustrous red color and was a black color at the roots which flowed down the middle of his back.

Slowly his eyes were rebuilt, where his originally brown eyes were now black with a tint of dark red in the center and his ears a little more pointed at their tips. Still through all the pain Jacob did not realize that he could see again still trying his best to hold onto his sanity.

A black goop was expunged and expelled from the sphere of red surrounding Jacob which by now had noticeably lost its luster. Slowly the sphere began to be lowered to the ground with the barely conscious Jacob. Once it reached the ground the last of its essence was absorbed into Jacob where a tattoo of a scarlet rose stabbed through its center with an obsidian black sword lined with ruby edges took form over his heart. The tattoo then faded away, along with his hair and eyes which returned to normal as the power absorbed settled.