Friend was hungry for knowledge. There was only so much you could find out on your own in a forest. While metallurgy was also interesting for him, the alchemy and circle diagrams were the main point of interest. Sirius showed his notes, gave demonstrations, listened to Friend's ideas and answered questions.

"That is incredible! But I notice one common thing among all that, so just to clarify: can you show me how you cast your spells?"

"Sure." Sirius quickly manifested the ice shard in his hand under watchful eyes of Friend.

"Just like I thought. Your method is that of the kingdom, I can't use it. Maybe I need to adapt your knowledge to utilise it properly..."

"Why?"

"Hmm?" Friend was torn out of deep thoughts. "Oh, my body is too resistant to mana. It can't store enough to cast myself, so it would be hard for me to create new diagrams, even if I had materials."

"Is till don't get it."

"Hmm, let's put it this way. When you weave and manipulate mana, you are akin to breathing. You take in mana around you and use it afterwards. And since you had the Mana Pool first, your body adapted to this. Your body as a whole stores mana, along with Mana Pool. Got it?"

"I think so. Are you different?"

"As I said, my body resists the flow of mana. If I try to take in too much, I will hurt myself."

"And if someone from kingdom tries to move too much mana through them?"

"I don't know. They might rip a part of themselves or something."

"And what is the way behind Thought Constellation?"

"Hmm? Spirit Mind? Druids usually start with Spirit Eyes, for traditional reasons that is. But, if your ideas about connection of metals and first-circle organs is correct, they must utilise the mana flow inside their bodies. Our weaving is about interacting and communicating with a world energy, without taking it inside us, so I can't be sure."

"Wait..." The puzzle in Sirius' mind was coming together. "Like this?"

Sirius stood up, and took the staff in his hands. The hut was cramped, but he tried swinging his staff nonetheless. Carefully, so as not to bump into the furniture, Sirius stirred the mana with one end of the staff, moving it in circles, pushing and pulling, kneading like a dough. In the end he pushed it into the floor, creating an icy layer on floorboards. By the look on Friend's face Sirius knew that Father Gregor was right, and he indeed re-invented the druid magic.

"What is it made of?"

"Iron and bronze."

"And wood?"

"Oak."

"The ironwood would work better, but it is heavier."

"Ideally the core must be out of silverwood, and bronze cap replaced with gold."

"Two iron caps is better. It is harder and you actually don't need the gold at all."

"The bronze is better at gathering clumps."

"You just didn't figure out how to do it with resistant material."

"The combination of both worked better for me when I had no Astral Body."

"Oh wow, you invented this without Spirit? Praiseworthy."

Sirius sat at the table and stared at the dissolving ice crust. His mind, tired from recent events, wandered, and he began daydreaming, reminiscing of yesterday.

"Are you crying?"

"Hmm?" Sirius quickly wiped his cheeks. "No."

"Hey, you can tell me." Friend put his hand on Sirius' shoulder, making him flinch.

Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.

"I had to kill."

"It was a first time?"

"Yes." Sirius began sniffling.

"Unfortunately, he was no longer a human. He died the moment he overloaded his Spirit. After that it was an uncontrollable chain reaction."

"He looked like a boy..."

"Among Crusade members it is common. They undergo a ritual when they are kids. At least I was told so."

"Their Astral Bodies were... Awful."

"Must be very painful for them."

"He asked me to kill him."

"Look at it like a liberation from his pain."

"Thank you... I really needed that." Sirius wiped his cheeks again. "What if they find me here?"

"What do you mean?"

"They are scouring the area. Day after day, I escaped them, covered my traces. When they found me, I survived by the width of my hair. The members of the Order were human, and some of them were sympathetic with me. These... are like mindless animals. Even willing to sacrifice themselves only to kill me."

"You can't run forever. You need a place to stay."

"Whoever helped me was viewed as a traitor. First uncle Verden, then uncle Gregor..."

"Verden? Verden the Blasphemer? I should have guessed so... Only he dared to study healing in the open..."

"Did you know him?"

"We were in the same settlement. He saved me from a pack of wolves. I still don't know how he achieved those terrifying crystals..."

"Green crystals? And glowing from the inside?"

"Did you got healed as well?"

"His Final Flash made a tree out of them." Sirius took out a jar with a couple of purple leaves from his backpack. "They still have their healing powers when... Mixed with blood..." Sirius absentmindedly looked at Friend's terrified expression. "Blood is the key."

"You will be killed if someone hears you say that. Without question."

"I don't care. I heard that more than you think."

Sirius took out several bottles, metal powder, plain chalk and a knife. He put materials in bowls, heating some of them, mincing things into dust, or filling with mana. In the end he sliced a shallow cut on his forearm, letting a blood drip in all bowls, mixing with the distillates inside. Sirius began forming separate streams of mana, merging them and exchanging their properties. He moulded them, mixed with the ingredients, and shaped the mana clumps and streams into shells and rings, clumps and tubes. When he was ready, he put a clump of mixture with his blood inside a shell made of dense mana, coiled the ring of fast-moving stream around, and poked a hole in a shell and stuffed a small tube inside. It completed the circuit, and the device whirred to life, like a diagram. Greedily it sucked mana from the environment, making it denser and sturdier. Sirius felt all his mana in the air seep inside, making him unable to control the process, but he didn't have to. With wide eyes he observed the air in front of him sparkle with metal shavings and liquids being mixed and altered with mysterious force. The dense clump finally lost its support, as it consumed the mana supporting it mid-air, and fell on the table with an ethereal ringing. The clump vibrated, bulged and swirled, dancing across the table, and gaining size. The murky and dirty-looking blob slowly dissolved into a glassy surface, as if digested by the cloudy crystal. The last heavy thunk announced the completion of the transformation, leaving a teardrop-shaped multifaceted glassy shard with purplish-blue tinge and constantly-swirling milky insides.

Sirius excitedly looked at his creation. The insides of this crystal still contained the shapes he created with mana, constantly powered by the environmental mana, slowly consumed by its pointy end. Out of curiosity Sirius manifested some ice needles, and was delighted to see the stray mana getting sucked inside the glassy contraption.

"Get out."