The circle stuttered as if an unseeable force shook it violently. Slowly, its movements solidified as it made its way towards Cain's feet and rotated until it became embedded in the ground.
'That was surprisingly harder than I thought it was. Let's see if increasing the size of the magic circle to a 5 meter radius would save mana instead of continuously discharging mana.' Cain examined his experience with creating, executing, and moving the magic circle while slowly increasing the size of the magic circle.
'From the past few hours, I've noticed that what affects spells the most is what you wish to do with it, or using your will. Perhaps visualization casting is the root of all casting, and it slowly evolved into chanting and using magic circles to lessen the burden on the mind and make it easier to cast.
'When I was trying to extinguish my flame earlier, the flame reacted to my thoughts in real time. Perhaps this is how chanting and silent chanting works, by infusing the so-called "will" with your words and thoughts. I wonder if the residents of this world know this, or if they just take it at face value.
'As for the magic circle, it looks like it can handle specific tasks and perhaps multiple tasks. By associating a certain magic circle with a chant, one can theoretically cast an extremely complex spell without having to visualize every step. This should reduce the understanding of natural and magical phenomena and the time required to cast a spell.
'According to Dresil, this type of casting isn't as efficient as visualization though. As time progressed, I'm guessing the number of people who could effectively use visualization casting in combat dropped as people favored the easy way out.
'Perhaps I should name this insect spell I just made to make it easier to recast, if need be. Insect Annihilator? Bane of Insects? Nah sounds like I'm in a game… Insect Repellant? Wait, this one could accidentally change the spell. Ugh, naming things is hard. Insect Destroyer? Insect Apocalypse? Insect Eraser? Oooh the last one seems good, it does erase insects from existence after all.
'Now on to magic circles as a whole. While I was failing at names, the Insect Eraser below me wasn't pulsing mana to erase insects that entered the radius. It seems like the magic circle stores some mana to keep itself maintained and the Insect Eraser used some of this mana.
'Since this is the case, then creating magic circles dedicated to storing mana should be possible. If I layer my body with these, I could recover mana from these circles and store 30 million mana within my body again.
'There's still the issue of only being able to control 3 million at once. In other words if I cast a spell that uses 3 million mana, I can use it 10 times before having to meditate to recover my mana. However, casting a spell that requires 5 million mana at once would be impossible for now.
'Maybe I could find a way to do partial casting, use 3 million at first and solidify it, then use 2 million mana to finish the spell. This might have a danger of the spell going out of control though.
'Hm… I'll have to shelf this topic for later. It doesn't seem like this will be much of an issue anyways since the most I've used at once on a spell was for creating Insect Eraser, and that only used about 20,000 mana.
'I wonder if this spell can be maintained indefinitely as long as there is mana. Oh, I should add a clause to the program that locks the spell's position relative to me in case it just stays here when I move.'
Cain added the clause to Incest Eraser then sat down and passively worked out the kinks as his mind wandered.
'Something that I've been wondering is whether or not healing is limited to holy magic only, as is suggested in some manga. I can create new mana veins and control my blood on a cellular level if I focus a lot, so I should be able to speed up my natural regeneration.
'I'll need to eventually heal my eyes since I don't have my glasses… It's not like natural regen would help though unless it's sped up by a crap ton.' Cain perfected the added clause around this moment in his note taking process. He leaned back on his hand and crawled forward, then backwards to test it out, too lazy to get up and walk.
Several small piles of ash appeared as the circle followed him around. Cain's mind continued where it left off once he sat in his previous position. His posture and mind prepping for what was to come.
'Hmm… I can probably just use mana to slowly shape it and the lens into the correct shape. I'm near-sighted, which means my eye is elongated and elliptical and/or my lens bulges towards the back of my eye.
'20/20 vision, or perfect vision, occurs when the eye is completely spherical and the lens is perfectly elliptical (from a side view). Another way to interpret this, is when the light condensed by the lens in the eye is focused on the back of the eye. Let's try it out and see if it works. This could also count as a low-level double casting since Insect Eraser is still being maintained.'
As Cain closed his eyes and directed the mana flow in his body towards them, Dresil put the finishing touches on her map. She looked towards Cain, expecting some praise, only to be greeted by a pained expression on his face.
The eye will only change by fractions of a millimeter due to the force of gravity or adjusting to the environment. What Cain was attempting was equivalent to growing a meter in one day. He changed the shape of his eyes several millimeters at a time, ignoring the pain and the expression it forced on his face. Dresil hastily scanned Cain's memories she absorbed earlier, looking for a way to help.
After looking through his memories fervently, she found a solution and sunk into the ground as if it were water. By the time she got back, Cain had already fainted due to the pain.
A familiar scent greeted Cain as he slowly woke up, a scent close to one of his cherished dishes, yet slightly off. 'Ugh, what happened? I think I was trying to change the shape of my eyes… then I fainted?' Cain looked around as he tried to cancel some lingering pain. Yes, cancel. As in he stopped the pain signals from reaching his brain.
We were truly mad lads back then, or is it right now? Anyways… back to the boi's thoughts.
'It looks like my vision has been restored. There seems to be… some sort of river or stream floating through the air though.' Cain stretched his hand out, trying to interrupt a floating stream of blue and teal. He focused on the mana within his hands after no apparent changes appeared in the stream, using the mana as a nerve receptor to extend his senses.
'Woah, these streams seem to be natural mana. Interesting, how did this happen?' Cain's simulated thoughts were back at it again. He sensed the mana within his eyes and discovered that the lens and some muscles in his eyes had fused with mana.
Similar to what he did to his blood when he absorbed natural mana for the first time. The mana seemed to have created a new lens that merged with the original one while strengthening the muscles to accommodate this change.
'Sweet, this should help with my experiments too.' As Cain was discovering the new feature to his eyes, they unknowingly wandered towards the source of the familiar smell earlier. Dresil cautiously maintained a fire and what appeared to be some sort of meat hanging on some sticks.
'Woah, that's a sight you don't see every day. A former tree is using fire to cook meat.' Cain got up and joined Dresil by the fire. She glanced at him astonished, her eyes expressing concern yet her face remained stiff.
"Master, you looked like you were in pain earlier, so I made dinner. According to your memories, whenever you need to heal you would always eat a lot of red meat." Dresil gestured towards skewered semi-cooked meat stuck in the ground.
"It's dinner time already? Dang… What kind of meat is this and are you sure it's safe to eat?" Cain gazed upwards at the sky as he said this. A full moon lit up the meadows as a light wind passed through the fields.
'Brr… Wait, where's my shirt?' Cain shivered as he looked at Dresil, seeing her leaf-covered body. His shirt seems to have disappeared, something he neglected to notice when he woke up this morning.
"Yes, Master. This is a demon wolf, found within Hellion Forest. Adventures will sometimes cook them if they are short on food." Dresil responded as Cain observed her leaves. "Oh, I sort of… ate your shirt…" Dresil immediately avoided his gaze, attempting to mimic being flustered.
"Wait, you what?" Cain picked up a skewer hesitantly, then slowly took a bite. 'Oh dang, this tastes so much like beef. It's even cooked rare, just the way I like it.' He nearly devoured it in that instance, almost poking a hole through his cheek since he forgot the skewer existed.
After watching Cain's delighted expression while he ate, Dresil's happiness outweighed her shame as she proudly said, "The fabric in your shirt just felt so good and before I knew it, it was absorbed through my skin." Right as she said this, Dresil realized how she said it and hastily tried to cover it up. "Wait Master, I didn't –"
Cain cut her off as he picked up another skewer. "I know what you meant. If you can absorb my shirt does that mean you can merge with my clothes as well? If so, this would help until we find some proper clothing for you.
"You can hide in my clothes until we pick out a decent set for you and whenever people are around." Cain picked up a third skewer while glancing at the loosely collected leaves on her body. 'There's no way the people in the city will let her in like that. On the other hand, I have something to practice creation magic with now.
Oh wait, I forgot to experiment with that earlier. I should probably do that now while I'm eating.' Before Cain could begin his experimentation, Dresil responded to his previous question. "I should be able to, would the Master like me try it right now?"
"Nah, we can do it tomorrow. I'm going to finish eating, test some things out, then get some sleep." Cain responded as he picked up a fourth skewer.
Dresil walked behind Cain, the mention of sleep reminding her to do something. "Ok, I'll set the shelter up again." 'Shelter?' Cain thought as he looked behind him. Dresil sunk into the ground, knee deep. She stood there unmoving for a moment, until the ground slowly broke as massive roots arched over both of them like a makeshift cave. She then wandered off deeper in the cave to prepare a bed.