Axe Mastery for Increased Damage While in Blood Stance

When I allocate the axe mastery that gives 30% increased damage while in blood stance, my tooltip damage increases even when I am not in any stance and have no gems blood/sand or flesh/stone gems socketed. It is acting as though I am in blood stance. The damage increase only goes away if I enter sand stance. I'm not sure if the aoe increase from the mastery is similarly bugged.

This is how it works, you're in blood stance by default. I dislike this design personally.

Thanks, that clears it up. I agree, the design seems bad because it makes using sand stance with axes quite prohibitive for no reason.