With safety assured, Zephyr wanted to test a few magical concepts. First was a simple mana gathering formation.

The reason he picked up the carcasses was to see if he could use the blood to draw a formation array. After all, the berserk rabbits were technically mana beasts.

"Moss, you can stop collecting carcasses," he said, walking over to the pile of rabbits next to him.

They were dead. The wounds on their bodies were leaking blood.

"You did well."

The pile near Moss was smaller, consisting of about eighteen carcasses. They all died to Gale's sword, thrown down by Moss. The blood was leaking continuously, so he had to use it fast.

"I will take it from here."

Zephyr grabbed a rabbit carcass, leaking blood, and walked to the centre of the stone platform.

The body was still warm to the touch. The bloody fur rubbing against his palm was not a pleasant experience. Still, Zephyr carried on and stood near the middle of the platform. Then, using it as a writing brush, he began to draw a rune.

"A formation is just a spell expanded in scale. I can mirror the mana gathering spell to make a formation in real life. If you think about it, charms, talismans, formations, artifacts, and other magical tools all come down to the same principle, but are used differently. So, there is no reason for it not work."

Zephyr spoke aloud.

Moss, who was interested in it, stood by, patiently looking at what he was doing.

"Formations typically use complex materials to balance mana qualities according to the intended purpose. An example would be the fog formation of the necromancer, which must have required water, wind, and dark elemental materials to create. It was also self-sustaining, capable of sucking mana directly out of the atmosphere to maintain itself."

"I don't have the luxury of using specific materials for the formation. And I don't need to when I have enough blood and require no specialized formation."

He touched the rabbit dangling off his palm to the platform. Then, waiting for the blood to color the grey stone, he moved.

"Mana beast blood is one of the best materials to draw a formation in. Often, they are not used because the quantity needed would be large, depending on the scale."

As he was speaking, the shape of a rune formed below him. It was the primary rune seen in mana-gathering formations.

"Instead, anchoring material that can connect, like a formation flag, is used to link up the rune-engraved materials," he added as his memories about formations surfaced.

"My attempt at the formation is similar to the creation of a charm or a talisman, but bigger."

"The material used for the creation is blood. And the spell it replicates is Mana Gathering."

The mana gathering spell is a continuously operating spell that will absorb mana from the atmosphere. It is supposed to store it in the core after absorption.

"I will take on the role of the core," Zephyr commented while swiftly moving, drawing one rune after another.

In a few minutes, he used multiple rabbits and created a large diagram of the mana gathering formation on the floor. This time, he didn't remove the stabilization runes since he didn't know how well it would work without them.

"What limits my mana absorption rate is my sensory range and the density of mana in the atmosphere."

"Gale's mask already enhanced my senses a little. But it's not enough."

"So, I hope this formation can help."

Zephyr glanced at his work. The runes sprawled across the ground and were evenly distributed, forming a large circle. It was connected by blood as a medium.

"If the rabbits had mana cores, I could have used them to power the formation. Unfortunately, the mana they have is not enough to form a crystalline core upon death," Zephyr sighed.

"I have to do it myself," he added.

"Now, I have to try if it will work."

Zephyr walked to the centre of the 'formation' he created. He had no clue how much mana the initial activation would take, how much mana it would gather, or the rate at which it would do so.

Simply put, his way of making a formation was held together by dreams and duct tape.

"Test 1, commence," he mumbled, slamming his fist onto the floor. Immediately, mana seeped out of his body as intended, flowing into the bloody rune structure.

In a second, it began to glow pale blue.

"Hmm… half-successful."

The rune connected perfectly. The flow of mana was stable. But it hadn't yet activated.

Zephyr closed his eyes, feeling all the microchanges in the formation while slowly increasing the mana output.

His cores, one after another, began to empty. He was trickling down his mana into the formation, waiting to sense any changes.

However, as mana increased, the formation became unstable. The connection between the runes was beginning to weaken.

Zephyr expected it somewhat. He knew he would have to depend on his absolute mana control to stabilize it.

"Fortunately, I didn't take out the stabilization runes. Without them, the formation would have broken apart the moment it formed."

He was neither using external material nor formation flags. Thus, the overall structure was weak.

It was like trying to build a house on an unstable foundation. Zephyr knew he would have to reinforce the weakened area on his own.

"Let's do it."

The real innovation was this part.

He closed his eyes, exhaled, and concentrated on the mana. Normally, a formation was an independent structure working on its own. However, Zephyr began to actively control the mana flowing through it.

He reinforced the weakening regions before reining in the turbulent regions. Soon, the mana turned docile.

After that, he slowly increased the mana output. From 600 cores, it jumped to 1,200.

The consumption of mana was greater than he expected. If he had created a larger formation, it would have taken even more.

"It was a good idea, making a smaller one first," he commented.

When his words ended, the 'formation' activated.

Mana in the atmosphere trembled. Zephyr's sense attached to it expanded.

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