I am returning to the frozen peak. They literally kicked me out of the fort first thing in the morning (or so I think at the very least). None of the soldiers were present at my send off other than the soldiers of the caravan and of course the three people that had come to replace me. This was almost immediately after my meeting with the starfalls too.

This time I do not have the luxury of cultivating en route so this is going to be an annoying week, along with a heavy dose of nervousness. There has been quite the bit of overthinking involved in the process too. This journey requires me to be in a ready state, ready to fight at a moments notice. If it were not for a couple of the injured soldiers taking care of patrolling for me, I would sadly have to forsake sleep too (which is quite painful to those that have never used meditation to replace sleep. It literally feels like somebody is splitting my head with a axe by the end of the second day. No way that I will be inscribing in this state.) I have no desire to be ambushed by any icebeasts.

I feel naked without the protection of the formation. It literally feels like I have been ripped from the fort and I still feel a phantom connection to the formation core. At the moment, I do not have anything other than this sword hanging on my belt, which while I can agree is a fine piece of work is no formation. Made of an alloy of iron and mithril, the sword is built in the shape of a standard snowwinder sword, though it is a bit smaller than the one that the soldiers use. The sword is about as hard and durable as a class eight formation core (which is not a good metric, remember the sky bamboo) and is about as mana conductive.

The sword is going to be very good at pushing mana and I might even be able to inscribe a few formations on it though the chances of that are ridiculously slim. Inscribing on a purely metal structure such as swords and anything of metal is such a slippery affair. Most runes won't simply form on it and even if they did there is a pretty decent chance that the rune would lose its structure the moment that I pass mana into it. Good luck would mean that the rune would dissipate and the worst case is that the entire thing will explode.

Getting back to the point, the sword is the reason that I am here sitting in a caravan. After all, it would be poor form if I were to agree to the snowwinders suddenly sending me to the frozen peak, far away from my formation especially when the enemy seems to have an disproportional interest in me without getting something in return.

The sword is my bribe, to return to the fortress and I am quite thankful the snowwinders had the sense to give it. Else, it would have been similarly quite easy for me to remain at the fort and make it seem as if I am the only one that can control the formation. The art of formation control is quite mystical to those that have never properly seen a formation before and even if they had, I am still skilled enough to fool any second rate formation mages. (These people might know how to build stuff, but formations are my domain.) I could have insisted to remain at the fort, though there is a risk of escalation with such things and I am in their lands. it would be quite easy to lose my little life due to accidents and my body could as easily be lost in the snows of this place.

I am at the moment sitting in this caravan only after extensive assurances from Ankon who I have to admit seemed quite keen to get rid of me. Firstly, they assured me that the enemy has simply no way of knowing that this caravan would be containing the formation master that has been such an annoyance to them. Ambushing a formation mage en route to somewhere is the best way to get rid of a formation mage after all. Still, I am at the moment suppressing my mana as much as possible, even though none of these creatures have a sensitivity similar to mine. Why take a risk.

I also have to note down another point before I forget about it, one of the snowwinders has basic formation control capabilities at the very least. They were absurdly quick to get rid of me and they did not ask for any information about the formation except Ankon. While my formation is not something that needs any kind of special control techniques, it is not something that a non formation mage can learn without asking.

That means that one of these three have access to spells like formation control at the very least, under my opinion. It is nothing advanced and nothing that would violate any treaties but it is the first step in that direction, I would think. I am thinking it could be Ankon.

Getting back, The second reason was this sword, given to me by Theo who certainly seemed to have brought it as a gift. Else, without a method of protecting myself I would not have left with these bunch regardless of how much anonymity that they promised me. (The ease with which this sword was given is another proof. The sword would be worth quite a bit to a normal mage but quite worthless to a formation mage.)

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The last reason for me leaving now would be at the moment other than me there are most of the injured soldiers including Elon in this particular caravan. That is another reason that I am joining these bunch. There is not enough resources or soldiers to send this bunch with a proper guard. These soldiers would have left anyways, with the severity of their injuries especially Elon who seems to have become completely comatose for a while now. According to Shamon, these soldiers had to be taken to the frozen peak before the chill would cause permanent damage to these people. We might have been too late in case of one soldier at the very least.

I have not dared to relax until now, in the third day of our journey (I honestly do not know, I am counting on the basis of the number of times we have stopped for food.) That is why I am recording now whem I am almost half way through our journey. We are at the moment solidly in snowwinder territory and if anybody were to attack us here, there is a decent chance that the disturbances will be enough to attract the commander if the snowlords were to come here and anything weaker than that I will be able to handle. I am not adding being attacked by a troop to that though. (There are still those three troop leaders unaccounted for. Shamon thinks it is more likely that they are dead.) These soldiers would not even be able to act like bait in this case.

That is a gamble that I will have to take I guess. While I have been spending all of this time worrying I have to admit that the trip has been going quite smoothly and I have to admit that this is the first time that I have properly noticed our surrounding plains. The time I came to this place I had not noticed the way in which the snowwinders move about this place and I have to admit that the way that they do so reminds me quite strongly of formation magic.

It is not exactly formation magic, but the bones of it still exist here. To explain this I will have to explain to you how exactly I think that the snowwinders are moving here. Normal travel of wooden carriages on these plains would be tantomount to suicide here. The storms here can collapse buildings, so you can imagine what it can do to wooden carts.

We do face storms during our journey, none quite as crazy as the one we faced at the fort and each time the damage to our carriages is almost negligible. Also, the carriages seem to be moving quite smoothly for a place that is essentially a frozen desert. I would assume that our trips would be a bit more jerky.

That would mean that they have formations for protecting the body of the cart like the iron skin, formations to reduce any sudden jerks and formations to hide all of this and very good ones at that since they are able to escape the sights of a formation mage. Maybe it isn't even a formation. It could be way more rudimentary than that.

And even if that is not true The carriages have methods of protecting themselves and any such method would be quite mana intensive for them to rely on mana batteries and I am certain that nobody but me would have the mana to run these hypothetical means of protection in our present caravan. (And ambient mana formations are not good for anything but lighting especially in this area, except maybe a formation that would freeze water. Not that you need a formation for that.)

So what I am assuming that is happening here is some kind of a leylining. Now leylines refers to mana that is being flowed in predefined streams, often as methods of transporting mana (you can consider elemental nodes to be a kind of a natural leyline.). It is used to power massive formations, the kind that can span cities or kingdoms. Leylines can be created by any decent formation mage and are often used to power magical carriages in most cities. Those leylines would be quite similar to any hypothetical leyline that might exist here.

I can't say for certain since I have only seen leylines only a handful of times and most tend to be quite distinct. Still, I cannot think that they would have any other method of transmitting mana over long distance especially in our locality.

I could also be completely wrong and the snowwinders just might be geniuses at designing carriages and they might have some method of guarding their carriages that I simply do not have an idea about. I still think that this might be something that head office would like to put under consideration. I am sure that the black mountain would benefit in some way with cards against the snowwind empire, especially now. Especially if that means that I am not coming here anymore.

With all of the key points completed it is time for me to admit something. I must admit that regardless of how much nervousness this journey has brought me, I have got the opportunity to relax finally. even I have not noticed how tightly strung I have been in the fort. This has been a strange experience if I am to be frank.

I have finally figured out The reason for that. The snowwinders do not have any respect for formation mages. The snowwinders as a society barely tend to rely on formations for any of their tasks. While I am sure that is not something they do by choice, it is also the truth that they are not really reliant on formations.

That means that they do not really have much need of formation mages too. Even me, who can barely be considered one can feel the way in which people change their behaviour when they come to learn of my profession. That respect certainly makes work very easy for us formation mages. If we had to explain every single action of ours it does tend to make life so much harder. People tend to look at our works like a piece of art and at us like artists.

That has been lacking with the people here and that could be one of the reasons that things have been so weird here. Regardless, my work as a formation mage is complete. I won't be building another class eight formation at least.