Ciel was not looking forward to what lay ahead in the near future.
He had defeated the 4 Twisted Bears and taken their corpses into the Soul World. There was no time to absorb their Forsaken Cores.
He was currently rushing towards where Rein was.
'We will both need to do 2 hour shifts soon, she should be fine…' Ciel thought
Still, he could not help but worry. Would they really be able to escape from the Twisted Forsakened every 2 hours, for who knows how long?
[ Are you alright? What's the situation? ] Ciel asked
[ I'm good. I think we'll be able to handle the 2 hour shifts… probably. It's a Blood Tiger by the way. ] Rein replied
'A feline huh. Not that it really matters.' Ciel thought
It didn't really matter what the Blood Forsakened was, as any type would be able to overwhelm the duo.
But they would be able to figure out a weakness by its species.
'A tiger shouldn't have too much stamina and it depends on killing quickly with its stealth…'
'A Blood Tiger will have exponentially greater abilities than a regular one, but its strengths will be relative to that of a regular tiger.'
After running for a minute, Ciel climbed up a tall ice building.
It took a minute, but when he reached the top, he could see Rein in the distance.
She was on top of a smaller ice building, with the Blood Forsakened nowhere in sight.
There was no visible damage on her, and Ciel could tell that nothing much had happened, as their Spirit Essence reserves were near full.
'Damn… it's trying to ambush her. Our upcoming days would be much smoother if it just ran straight towards us.'
[ I'm here. Do you know where the tiger is? ] Ciel said
They had decided to use the ice building Ciel was currently on top of as a beacon to not get lost.
[ Yeah… it's camouflaging in the snow beneath us. Be careful. ]
'A white tiger?' Ciel thought to himself
If it was really a white tiger, it would be much more troublesome, as it would be able to camouflage in the snow.
'The Twisted Wolves and Bears were also white. Why wouldn't the Blood Tiger be white?' Ciel thought
Rein started slowly moving towards the ice building Ciel was on. They both didn't know the exact location of the Blood Tiger and had to be extra careful.
Soon, Rein was in contact with his shadow. She could enter at any moment.
Instead of entering, she made a loud noise. It was better to lure the tiger out before entering, as it would help them out in finding its location.
Once Rein would enter his shadow, she would be able to use her enhanced senses to better detect the Blood Tiger.
Ciel was currently about 400 metres above ground. From there, he noticed something moving in the snow.
[ It's coming! ] Ciel warned
Rein immediately entered the shadow, and a second later, the Blood Tiger was in her previous spot.
It was 4 metres in height, with majestic blue eyes. It had snow white fur, with grey stripes. Its claws and fangs were like lethal blades that could easily cut through iron.
The moment Rein disappeared in front of it, the Blood Tiger looked in Ciel's direction with uncontrollable ire.
'Why do Forsakened have so many anger issues?'
Those were going to be the last peaceful thoughts Ciel would have for a while.
The Blood Tiger jumped on the wall of the ice structure Ciel was on. It quickly started climbing towards him.
'We need to preserve our Spirit Essence for a while until we know its true capabilities.'
'I guess I'll start by testing its strength and speed.' Ciel thought
He summoned a few small boulders of Eternal Stone.
The duo had plenty of excess Spirit Essence during the past few days, and were thus able to feed the Stone of Eternity with it.
The Stone of Eternity grew a bit in size, but not enough for the growth to be considered high.
Since the Stone of Eternity could increase the capacity and gain of Spirit Essence, it was worth feeding it. Especially since they didn't have much to use it for.
Rein couldn't use the Spirit Essence to practice with her Void Manipulation ability, as it was too advanced for her.
She needed a greater understanding of the Void element before attempting to use it in different ways.
Ciel pushed one of the four small boulders he summoned off the edge of the ice structure.
The Blood Tiger dodged to the side before it could make contact with it.
The moment it dodged, three more were falling towards it at a high speed. Two of them were blocking its way from dodging to the sides, and the last one was going for its head.
'Can you dodge this?' Ciel thought
The Blood Tiger didn't dodge. Instead, it pressed its body into the ice structure, and tucked its head. The boulder hit it squarely on the back, causing the Blood Tiger to fall down a few metres.
Its claws scraped down the ice, making a loud, screeching noise.
'Looks like this won't work against a Blood Forsakened.'
'Time to get out of here.' Ciel thought
The Blood Tiger was relatively unharmed. It took a little damage, but there was no blood that could be seen.
It started climbing to the top even faster.
Before it could reach Ciel, he was already running away.
Mapping out the area and testing their mobility is what they spent most of their preparation time on.
Ciel jumped down onto a slope, and using it as a slide, flew towards a nearby ice building
The Blood Tiger would need extra time to reach him, as it wouldn't be able to use the slide. It was too heavy and lacked any technique.
'I need to make sure it keeps chasing me. If it runs away, I'll need to start chasing it. We can't have it regain any vitality.' Ciel thought
He had a bow and arrow in case he needed some long distance shots. A spear would be better, but he would need to keep summoning them for a constant attack.
That would drain their Spirit Essence too quickly.
Arrows were the same, but as they were much smaller, it would take less Spirit Essence.
The Forsakened Tiger jumped down from the original ice building Ciel was on, and started moving towards his new location.
He shot an arrow towards it, but the Forsakened Tigers' reflexes were too quick, easily dodging the arrow.
'I need to feed the Blood Tiger some Eternal Stone before I switch with Rein. That way, we'll always have a precise location on it.'
'It won't be able to hide or ambush us like it tried earlier.' Ciel thought
It was also because Rein was much less versatile when it came to running.
If she was driven into a corner, she couldn't use Soul Transfer to bring out something useful at the last moment.
Of course, Ciel would still be able to use that ability when in shadow form, as being a shadow didn't stop them from using their abilities.
It would just be more taxing on the body and mind.
'Let's see how this works.'
The Blood Tiger was about to reach him once again.
This time, instead of a slide, Ciel used a rope that he had summoned to climb down to a lower level ice building.
He had stuck many spears into the ice beforehand, allowing him to tie a rope to them in case of emergency and drop down quickly.
He could use Soul Transfer on the rope, making it so that as long as a spear was stuck in the ice nearby, he would have no problem with quick descension.
It worked quite well, and the Blood Tiger had the choice of taking it's time descending or take a little damage with a large drop.
Both were a good outcome for Ciel.
Ciel continued to run around and not lose sight of the Forsakened Tiger for the next 2 hours.
[ Sorry, there was no opportunity to place any Eternal Stone in its body. ] Ciel said with regret
[ Don't worry. We're still at our peak strength for now. We need to find an opportunity before we start losing strength. ] Rein replied
She exited his shadow, and he entered hers.
Their roles had swapped. They would be playing this endless relay until the Blood Tiger would be defeated.
Rein was currently on the surface level of the Special Gate. All the ice buildings around were looking tall and imposing.
'I'll get a piece of Eternal Stone inside its body this cycle…' She thought
[ Watch out. It's about to jump down from the Ice building to our left. ] Ciel said
Rein nodded and moved right.
There, to the right, was a plain Ice structure. It was not an ice building.
One problem they found when trying to create a good landscape to fight was that the ice buildings would be repaired once night fell.
Even if they were destroyed during the daytime.
However, that didn't apply to a plain ice structure.
It could be destroyed during daytime, but indestructible at night, while not repairing it's damage that was done during the day.
Using this knowledge, Rein had carved a few short tunnels in this specific ice structure while using the Void element.