Right now, we are travelling to this temporary fortress. Turns out this is a task in itself. We are entering deep into the Northern Wastelands, you see. The Northern Wastelands is the area right next to the mana desert. There is constant stream of ice mana from the Frozen Wastelands, that makes this land basically uninhabitable.
The mana here is chaotic enough that I cannot make use of an airship to travel in this area. The mana fluctuations here are strong enough that it can knock my ship to the ground. (Especially in that wreck that I call a ship.)
Hells, even under the many protections that I am presently under, I can feel a slight chill from the ice mana outside. I can feel a shiver crawl up my spine at the thought of being in this place without any protections.
That is why we are going to our destination in these caravans. While it is a very slow method of travelling, it is the only way in which we will be able to reach our destination safely. There is something very curious about these caravans, as well.
They are just like any other caravan that you can find on the continent. (I admit I have not seen too many of those, though, since I usually prefer airships.) The interesting thing about them is the fact that they are unnaturally solid. I think that I would not be able to break the thing unless I were to channel my vital mana.
This should not be possible without extensive reinforcement. Along with the protections against the ice mana, these caravans must be guzzling through mana. Yet, I can't see any mana source for powering them.
There I go getting distracted again. I guess that I should shift to something that the Head Office would be more interested in. Right now, the Scholars are behind me in a caravan much like this one. Behind them is another caravan containing the soldiers that the Commander could spare for us. (The remaining three people of my troop are in this carvan as well.) All three caravans will be together until a few days later. Then, I will take my leave and make my way to the temporary fort.
The remaining two caravans will end up in the damned ruin finally once they get there, I do not need to worry about the Scholar's safety. People tend to forget this, but they do not need us guards to protect themselves. (At least they don't need us to protect them physically.)
On top of that, they are making their way to the magical ruin. They will be able to use of the formations there to keep themselves safe. In the worst case, they will be able to blow up the entire ruin and take the enemy down with the ruin.
All of this is very unlikely to happen, though. The Commander was certainly speaking the truth. I will be able to send reinforcements to the magical ruin, if it comes to it. Having an entire fort to defend them is certainly better protection than I expected to give them.
The Scholars would have been safe even if I had ended up stuck in the Frozen Peak. Compared to that this is a significantly better situation. For all of their complaints they know how to take care of themselves. (If only the Head Office felt that as well.)
Now that I have gotten that out of the way, let's do what I started up this log for. It is an unofficial tradition to speak everything you know about cultivation, you see. Trevor has been very insistent that I cannot avoid this. After all, the Head Office only really needs an excuse to get rid of me. Only a fool would take chances.
The reason that I have been delaying this for so long is because it is embarassing. I am sure that the two Sworn under me will be able to do a better job than me on this particular topic.
As for why I don't have a lot of information on this, it is because I don't really tend to cultivate. (There is no greater blasphemy to a mage, I know.) I guess I should explain why that is the case. There are really three main reasons for it.
Firstly, the problem is that I don't really need a strong reservoir of mana. We formation mages are not able to make use of it, you see. Vital mana is mostly consumed to power spells. (And to enhance your body if you are a martial mage.)
We formation mages don't cast any spells of our own. It is just such a waste of time for us to learn spells. Instead it is better for me to make a formation to do the same thing. (I am better than most formation mages on this front, at least. I know how to use of a few elemental spells at least.)
Now, I can power a formation using my vital mana. It is wiser to make use of other sources to do so. (You could say, the world is my reservoir.) It is just a better utilization of my time to work on making better formations, than to waste my time cultivating for a deeper reserve.
Secondly, most of the other benefits that I might get from cultivating are pretty useless for me. My mana sense is already sensitive enough to inscribe runes. (For most people, they need to reach the seventh or eighth foundation stage to have a mana sense like mine.)
Benefits such as enhanced healing or enhanced strength are also useless to me. I already have an enhanced healing ability. The little boost in healing I get from cultivating is useless. As for enhanced strength, I am a formation mage. I have already screwed up if I have to depend on my strength.
Thirdly, a great amount of information about cultivation has been hidden from me. My master has given extremely clear orders. I am not allowed to even know about the stage beyond the foundation stage until I craft a class seven formation. My master's words can be considered to be the law in the Hexmountain. (This is to a point that most people are not willing to even speak about the foundation stage with me.)
The elves are extinct, and so is their magical path. Right now, the Black Mountain is the only force on the continent that has any idea about this magical path. The Black Mountain is the only place that I will learn anything about the Elven path.
It was another reason that I had to go on this shopping trip. I had hoped to get my hands on a few techniques related to the Elves. The Snowwind Empire is a bastion of the draconic path. The dragons have the most information of the Elves. (After the Elves themselves, of course.) After all, you would expect your blood enemy to know the most about you.
I can report to you that even in this regard, the trip has been a failure. The mages here have nothing that can be of aid to a mage in the Elven path. All in all, the only result of coming out for shopping is that I am going to a war.
Still, I will speak the little that I do know about cultivation. I guess I should begin from the absolute basics. Every human holds something called the mana core. The mana core contains all the vital mana of a person.
The process of growing this mana core is called as cultivation. Every power on the continent has its own method of cultivation, which is called a magical path. (Examples of this is the Draconic or the Elven path.)
At the Black Mountain, we follow the ancient elven magic path. There are nine stages in this path, and I am presently at the very first stage, called the foundation stage.
At this stage, I am supposed to be building the foundation. The foundation is made up of nine Foundation slabs, that work together to enhance the mana capacity of your mana core. Even right now, I am building a foundation slab in my mana core.
To explain the process, I am pulling mana from the air and mixing it with my vital mana. This mixture of mana will condensed to form a string. These strings I will then use to weave the foundation slab. (This is kind of like making a formation.) Once the slab is built, it will integrate into my mana core, allowing it to hold onto more mana. (There are of course other benefits such as an enhanced mana sense, increased strength and healing.)
This is how we are able to make use of other kinds of mana as well. For example, a fire mage will be able to make use of fire mana as his mana from the air. That way a person's vital mana will be oriented towards fire magic. (The other magical paths have their own way to increase sensitivity to a particular element.)
I don't need to do any of that because I am a formation mage. I don't use spells of any kind. Due to that, even using the ambient mana here for cultivation is not a problem for me. (Granted, my mana is attributed to a certain element. I don't dare to say more than this, though.)
Trying to create a foundation slab outside of the mana core is almost impossible. It is like trying to draw with your paintbrush attached to the other end of a staff.
To get back to my cultivation. I am presently in the stage of building the second slab. That is why I am considered to be at the second foundation stage. This actually a point of contention. Most people count the slab that they are building as their present cultivation. An equal number of people count the slab that is completed for this. (By that logic, I am in the first foundation stage.)
Other than my path, the magic I practice is also of two types, which are battery magic and formation magic. Right now, I will not be able to speak of battery magic. To properly practice it, one needs to be in the stage beyond the foundation stage.
I practice beginner-level optimizations that will help me reduce mana consumption, but that is not really battery magic. (To explain the theory behind that would take me a few hundred logs.) The only thing I know about battery mages is that they tend to have absurd amounts of mana. They can run on their mana reserves for weeks on end, supposedly. (I can't know more than this without knowing about the stage beyond it seems.)
As for formation magic, That is something that I can speak about. It is something that I practice every day after all. There are four spells that every formation mage is supposed to know. It is these four spells that allow us formation mages to differentiate ourselves from other mages. (otherwise, everybody is able to make use of formations.)
First we have the formation view. This spell allows one to study the runes inside of a formation. It is not an exaggeration to say that this is the spell that I make the most use of. Without it, I would be a blind man painting every time I inscribed a formation.
The second spell is called as formation decomposition. It allows a formation mage to remove a spell inscribed into a formation. This will allow me to reuse formation cores. (Granted that formation core is not burned.) It is not a spell that I can make use of much, right now.
The third spell is formation control. It allows me to create and manipulate 'control strings'. These control strings allow me to control the runes of a spell directly. This means that I can use a formation even without its control stick. With the strings, I will be able to push the formation in a manner that would be impossible using any other technique.
As for the fourth spell, it is one that I have barely any understanding of. (I have never actually used this spell. The damn thing is complicated enough to be a class seven spell.) It is called formation flow, whatever that means. It is supposed to greatly increase the speed at which I inscribe formations. How exactly it does this is something that I have not figured out, though.
As for me, I am going to keep cultivating till I reach the fort. After that, I will have to return to the problem of building a Class 8 formation. Once I get started with that, there is no way that I will be able to cultivate for the next few months.
I have built three class eight formations in my life. Two of them were built with assistance from my master. As for the last, it is something that I built completely on my own, but sadly, it is not with me here. I sold it to get a few materials. (including the core for my "Thalion's Vine") Well, these were my master's orders.
This formation was a pretty interesting one as well, known as the vine spear. The spear had the unique ability that anything struck by it will have its mana absorbed by the wielder of the spear. I had built it because I thought that it would be a very good supplement to my sword.
Turns out, there is little that a formation mage can do with extra mana. That is why I ended up selling it. (Also, using a sword and a spear together is harder than it looks.)
All of this I have explained to explain that I have experience with making class eight formations. (I can almost say that I am used to it.) Still, I am not sure if I will be able to pull this off in the middle of a battlefield though.