I am once again stuck in the sewers of this fort. I honestly don't know how I dragged my injured body from the battlefield to the sewers. All I remember was that it was painful. I remember struggling to take each step forward and then finally falling to the ground, my body not responding to me. it wasn't due to only my efforts that I have managed to escape from the pursuit of our enemies. The organisation had a big hand in it, though trevor refuses to tell me even how they have done so.

I have been left with strict instruction not to leave the sewers by trevor. He himself should already be up there, doing whatever it is that he has been doing.

Well, I am sure that the people of the organisation are still debating whether to kick me out or not. I certainly seem to have caused a storm up above and whatever the organisation is, I have to assume that chaos is not good for business. The bloodheart gang have been ripping through the city looking for me. Thankfully nobody seems to have a solid idea of how I look.

Well, I don't like to think about things that are out of my control, but to think that vampires have managed to infiltrate this close to the hexmountain. Well, the blood heart gang is not exactly prime property. The only thing that they are really good at is scurrying in the outskirts of the hexmountains.

Vampires have always been a pest, hiding among the people and causing massive pains to the people that have to deal with them. Most of the higher vampires are quite indistinguishable from humans, you know. Even a grunt, who has the least control over its physique can hide itself in a human village as long as it is wise about it.

Well, the grunt called as steve certainly caused me a great deal of pain. Right now, I am bandaged up and my body is hurting like hell. The claws of a vampire are coated with a poison that keep the victim bleeding and Steve has been Converted into some kind of a grunt. That much I am certain of. There are many varieties of grunts so it is quite hard to predict exactly which kind.

The most obvious sign of a grunt is their above normal speed and their hands which can grow strong enough to fight against metal weapons. One naturally can't discount their ability to absorb blood to accelerate their healing process.

Fighting a grunt might not be hard, but killing one is a claim I can't take. I can't say that I have personally killed a grunt like that on my own, but my team and me have fought against them a few times. That was a very long ago though.

If it were me I would have retreated to the hexmountain on getting this information, but trevor seems to have a plan so following it for now is wise. Honestly speaking, the man knows more than he is letting on.

If the vampires are getting involved in this matter than I have a need of getting stronger quicker. Even their grunts are such hard foes to fight. Thankfully it is impossible for any of the higher vampires to make it into the region surrounding hexmountain. While we are not inquisition we still have our methods of defending against the vampires.

Anyway, it is related to this prospect of growing stronger that I have been going into my masters book. The man has left me all the basics that you might need for the maintainence of the ship, but more importantly my master has been using it to describe the process of what he calls as the true linking.

He has been explaining it in brief to me, but from the book I have gained a greater understanding of it, especially about the methodology of achieving such a thing. My master might be bad at explaining stuff physically but he is actually pretty good at noting it down.

True linking is essentially the process of fusing my cultivation with the formation I have picked which would be the bloody fang. The process is simple, as I construct my foundation slabs in my mana core, I will be able to selectively choose certain runes (when the foundation slab is yet to be built.) which will not be inscribed into my foundation. Instead, the missing runes will be replaced by a small formation called as the linker, which will link up with another linker to create a link between the two objects.

In this case the two objects are my foundations slab and the bloody fang. The benefits to this are very high. A foundation block becomes a part of your mana core, in ways that are beyond my understandings. That means that If I succeed in this process the formation sword will technically be a part of my mana core.

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While I cant exactly predict what exactly I will gain from doing such a thing, I can certainly guess. Firstly there should be reduction in the cost me using the formation. In the present case that would be the way in which I am using the bloody fang. I will be able to draw more power from the formation, at lower mana cost and I will be able to control the formation as if it were a part of me. Most importantly though, this should work very in reducing my thirst by quite the bit.

The thirst of the bloody fang is actually a byproduct of the way that people convert into grunts. A higher vampire will bite you, acting as the catalyst for your conversion. In this process, the vampires is injecting you with his own mana.

Then the bit person will experience the thirst, as absorbing the mana will slowly but steadily drive the other person thirsty. Once blood is drunk though, your body will begin to change. It will become faster, stronger and your hands will be able to morph into its claw form.

At this stage, the grunt will be able to bring his thirst under control. He can go days without having to drink any blood, even when surrounded by an entire city of people.

Right now I am at the very first stage, before the bit person drank the blood. Everytime I use the formation the mana in it is trying to turn me into a grunt. That is why I absolutely have to not drink any blood. The vital force from the sword is safe though. The sword acts as an filter.

Now that happens because the blood energy of the grunt is a external source of mana. The mana of vampire, which I shall call as blood mana for the lack of a better word will cause this transformation to occur. After all, there is no really difference between an ordinary person and me, except in the amount of mana that we have.

Now imagine if this formation become a part of my mana core. The mana it emits would then become a part of my vital mana. That would be like I am digesting an external source of mana and making it my own. While it won't be to the same level as what a grunt would be able to control, it will be quite close to it. Without the thirst, the bloody fang will become quite the useful tool. I can hold the transformation for way longer.

That is what the process of true linking should be doing to me, atleast in theory. Though since my master was the one to make this theory it being wrong is quite unlikely. The man knows what he is doing, except in teaching.

Well, the process is no walk in the park and this is especially the case since I have built up my foundation blocks. You are not supposed to be messing with your foundation especially after it has been built. What I am doing is essentially the process of selectively destroying my foundation and then replacing it with the linker formation.

To describe the pain, imagine someone is pulling your bones from your body or if somebody were to pull all your teeth at the same time. I think that would be enough to describe the pain that I am feeling.

Part of the pain is because I have already built the first foundation block which has become a part of my mana core. What I am doing then is break a small piece of my mana core. That is true for the second one too, though it is not complete yet.

Well, part of the reason that I have been making this log was to actually put of this work off for as long as I dare to. I am slowly losing that battle though. After this log is over I will be returning to this process though I have a feeling that I going to gain a new level of hatred for my master by the end of the day.

The last thing left to mention would be the formation mage. He is not in the sewers, to be honest barely half of the merchants that were here the last time are still here.

Since the organisation must have spent quite the bit in my protection, I have to assume that their operations must have slowed by quite the bit. So they have reduced the number of people that they are hiding in the sewers. It must be quite the extensive formation to be able to hide so many down here.

They must have moved these bunch to a safe house. I imagine that it would be some warehouse, old and disused with a hidden basement where all of these guys are huddled together.

I hope that is the case at the very least. The grimoire has protections on it. I will not be able to access it unless the man allows me to. I could try and break it, but there is a reason people use formations to protect stuff. It is quite effective at doing so. If I were mess it up, I am sure that every piece of content present in the book will have been destroying leaving me nothing to show for sacrifices.

I will need to ask trevor about the man's fate the next time that we meet. He must be fine.

Lastly, I hope that ship of mine is safe. It is still standing there in the wilderness with no protection except jacob and Andrew. Well, i have heard bo news among the merchants about the ship atleast, so I have to assume that the ship is still safe. The merchants have a vested interest in making sure that any black mountain ship succeeds in their work after all, so they must have kept a very keen ear on this topic.

Well, this just me delaying the inevitable now. I really don't want to try true linking, if I am to be honest. Just hearing about it is causing my body to ache.

I have to do it some day or the other though. The benefits it will provide me is too good to ignore. Anyways, it is not like I can ignore my masters order anyways. If not now then tomorrow, and knowing my master he will make sure that it will hurt even more.

So with steel in my heart, I close this log. If I do end up dying due to this, I hope that I become a ghost. It would be fun to torment my master one of these days.