CHAPTER 50: IS THAT PROOF ENOUGH?

"You act as if..." the huntress hesitated for a moment, taking a few seconds to find the right words, "as if increasing the spiritual Qi in the air was easy. And that alone makes your words hard to trust."

The huntress shook her head, sending her thick, brown hair into a flurry as she did so.

"You want me to pass on the message? Fine. But first," she leaned her head over to the side and crossed her arms over her chest, "I can only trust what I can see. Show me that you can do what you claim to do, otherwise I will consider what you said just an attempt to use fancy words to fool not only me, but my entire tribe."

The look of determination on the huntress’s face was... real.

And while not exactly hostile, her eyes made it clear she had no plans of backing off.

’It’s a good thing it’s a reasonable request, then.’

"That’s fine by me," Theo replied while shrugging his shoulders and then looking around the very spot he stood at.

Normally, one wouldn’t expect to find many stones or pebbles out in the middle of the steppe. Heck, even if there were some, finding them amidst the thick grass, be it high-standing one or the area where Theo accidentally or later intentionally flattened it during the fight...

And this was as normal of a situation as Theo could find himself in.

"Well, for me to prove it to you, three things need to happen," he said as he pushed his robes out of the way before crossing his legs and sitting down directly on the ground.

Then, as a series of small glyphs of low mana usage started to form all around him, Theo raised his face.

"First, to properly feel the effects while not endangering yourself, you need to be at least fifty steps away."

With the plan already in motion, Theo didn’t even bother to look out for the woman’s reaction. He didn’t care for her four tribesmates either, not with his barrier glyph still active.

And with how he planned for things to go, his defenses would only strengthen with time. In fact, just by having his glyph out, Theo already brought forth the very effect that he wanted the huntress to warn her folks about. Theoretically, even a random cultivator sitting down to meditate and practice would bring this effect about...

But just like with Theo’s personal defense glyph, the effects of doing so were too minor for anyone to ever notice them!

Which is why Theo resorted to using his field of expertise — formations. And while he lacked the pebbles to inscribe runes on to establish a proper array... Since when was there any need for the runes to exist on a physical plane?

’Spells are, in a way, just much smaller, more concise formations, after all!’

Just the memory of the theorem that he graduated the magic academy with was enough to put a small smile on Theo’s face.

And with his lips trembling a little, he got to work.

"Once you step away, I need you to start practicing, meditating, or whatever it is that makes you most sensitive to the density of the spiritual Qi in the air," Theo spoke again as he used a considerable chunk of his personal mana to push his smaller glyphs away from his body, planting them the same way he would plant a series of formation stones.

"And the third thing?" the huntress asked. "I need to stand on my hands and spin three times to the right?" she added in a mocking tone while rolling her eyes.

"No. I just need you to shut up and try not to overreact once it happens."

No longer paying any attention to the huntress at all, Theo closed his eyes and relaxed, switching off as many of his senses as he could to focus all of his attention on just the flows of mana.

There was a reason why mages hardly ever used glyphs or spells to construct formations out of thin air. Having the runes inscribed upon a physical object removed the burden of maintaining it from the mage, allowing him to focus on other stuff — be it managing the formation, absorbing the mana it gathered, or plucking filth out of their nose.

Having no physical crutch to rely on like that, however, forced Theo to remove his mental limits, pushing his concentration to its peak.

He had to maintain the image of every rune, every sub-array it formed with others, and then the blueprint of the whole thing all at the same time. In a way, doing so was pretty dang similar to wielding magic of roughly the seventh realm, a feat he was born never to achieve.

And yet, he did.

With years of preparation, he managed to construct a spell that could potentially reach the mythical tenth realm.

Sure, doing so didn’t unlock the areas of his brain he never knew he had, nor did it affect his ability to mentally maintain spells or glyphs like some sort of enlightening experience. But it certainly gave him the confidence boost necessary to do exactly what he was trying to do right now.

Then, it happened.

At first, it was like a slight gust of wind streaking through a room, barely strong enough to twirl a single strand of one’s hair. A taste of a wind only ever big enough to make one crave a stronger gust.

Then... another.

The glyphs Theo deployed were nowhere near the level of the one he used to keep himself protected. Their function was so simple, it was almost an insult for a mage of his level to wield them.

When it came to fulfilling their very specific task, however, there was hardly a better alternative.

Just like the magical netting Theo embedded into the ground during the fight to sense the location of his opponents, his series of glyphs actively consumed the mana from the air only to construct two replicas of themselves at twice the distance from Theo to the original point.

And with each point serving as a sink for the mana in the air, actively consuming it and then distributing it evenly throughout the whole formation with Theo as its nexus...

The first layer, second, and third came to be right away, all born from the mana Theo actively injected into their creation. Then, the fourth layer appeared roughly half a minute later, once the formation gathered enough mana to construct it.

By the time the fifth layer came to be, roughly three minutes later, the total of mana-hungry points within Theo’s formation came to a whopping three hundred and ten. And with each of them actively trying to absorb the mana from the air, the amount of energy that flowed through the formation grew to quite the considerable amount.

Then, as the sixth layer came to be, around the ten-minute mark since Theo started the process, it finally happened.

The innermost points of his formation could no longer withstand the mana absorbed by over six hundred of their copies. And as their entire structure collapsed under the flow of concentrated mana, pushing it all to rush towards the formation’s nexus, two physical qualities of the formation combined to create what could only be described as a magical vortex.

From one side, the area of roughly sixty steps around Theo now turned into one big and powerful mana-sink, sucking every last drop of it that happened to be nearby. And with the mana itself now suddenly rushing to the center of the formation, the added movement pushed the negative magical pressure beyond the point at which the formation could contain it.

Theo created a fragile yet also self-sustaining equilibrium, where the second layer of his formation had just enough points for each of them to withstand the pressure from the incoming mana. And now that his formation actively attracted mana from outside of its bounds rather than just absorbing all that could be found within...

The world responded.

And just like winds would flow towards spheres of lower pressure, the world’s mana flowed in to fill the artificial hole in the otherwise smooth gradient of the world’s mana.

’Haaa...’

With the task done and the formation reaching the point where it could sustain itself just on the existing flows of mana within, Theo opened up both his eyes and his mana-gate, allowing the energy to flow inside.

In just a single moment, he managed to refill his mana-sea to its brim, basking in the greatest amount of mana he experienced since his awakening to this second life.

And yet, it wasn’t his cultivation that drew his attention at this moment, regardless of how easily he could now try to advance it.

No.

The opportunity right now was just a distraction. The likeness of a chocolate bar just sitting in plain view when one wanted to go exercise. A comfy-looking bed in the corner of an eye of a student staying the night to learn just a little bit more before the exams tomorrow.

A bait that would drag Theo into a social faux pas of advancing faster than his sect master and the negotiation failure of forgetting about his goal when swayed by the allure of easy advancement.

And so, while staring at the wide-eyed huntress, shocked by the sudden and noticeable flow of mana in the air around her...

Theo took a breath and infused his formation with just enough of his own mana to break its equilibrium, shattering its whole structure and killing the very core of what attracted the world’s mana towards him.

He then stood up and dusted off his knees before casting his stare at the huntress.

"Is that proof enough?"