Gilliam was mentally ready to give the Darkness crystal a go. He expected it to open wounds and draw blood, as that was how the spells seemed to work, at least the summoning ones.
Having sat down and mentally prepared he put his hands into the channelling position and gave it a go, his first goal was to make a tiny fragment, just in case this didn't go as expected.
Exactly as expected a small cut, no larger than a centimetre (~0.4inch) opened up on the inside of his left palm, it looked like a clean cut almost as if made with a blade. The expected red mist started flowing from the wound into the center of the focus and condensing into a blood-red crystal. Gilliam stopped after a very short moment as he wanted to test before he properly made anything. A quick burst of healing energy had the wound close without a hint of scarring.
He now held a tiny blood-like crystal, it had some streaks in it of black and other hues when looked very closely, but for all simple explanations it simply looked like blood in crystalline form.
To test that it worked, Gilliam made the simplest of magic circles, a spell to create an ant. Just a standard ant. The reason for no control or 'I am the master' logic to it was that.. It was an ant, he could step on it and get it over with.
The main difference to the magic circle was that he added a remote energy source circle to the input that went to a secondary circle which had the fragment gem in it.
It was all in all, the simplest of things one could make, given the complexity of summoning, or rather Creation magic and external power sources.
Activating the black magic circle made it pulse once as it drew the energy from the mana crystal before it collapsed into itself, spawning an ant in mid-air. It fell to the ground and started looking around and acted much like Gilliam assumed ants would in this situation.
The gem had disappeared as expected and all in all, this was a successful test!
A quick thought about what to do with the ant gave him another idea, since they were rather permanent until either killed or dismissed, he wanted to use this to test the storage ring a little. Picking up the ant, an ordeal that was not incredibly simple due to ants being annoying, he put it into the ring for now.
Mentally connecting to the ring clearly had it confirm that the ant was indeed there, though he couldn't confirm if it was alive or not. Since summoned creatures poofed away when they died he assumed it was still alive, but that remained to be seen.
Now, a second test, if he was able to keep a healing spell going at the same time as he was condensing a crystal.
This felt like a complex event, as his healing was unstructured, and the crystallisation of mana was also an unstructured concept, it was like having two going at the same time. As his introductory class showed; having more unstructured things going at the same time, even something as simple as a light source, becomes exponentially harder.
However, he needed to get this tested, so rather than thinking about it too much he simply gave it a go.
He started focusing on healing, having a steady, but weak, general healing spell going. Once that was stable he tried to focus on condensing a Darkness mana crystal again. A small wound opened as expected but as soon as it did, it was closed. Then another small wound opened before it was closed. This happened over and over and over again.
Each time a small wound opened a puff of red mist was condensed into the crystal, so though it worked the same as far as the end result was considered, it was incredibly distracting. Before it only felt like a slight cut but then it was just bleeding, this was like being cut over and over again.
In the end, after only a few seconds of this his focus failed and both spells stopped. He had made another fragment-sized crystal but it was much harder to control due to the repeated stabbing, so to speak.
Then, how did Nolis mean this was going to work? Should he heal himself after he is done casting or channelling?
Or perhaps it was different, he was focusing on wound healing, since this basically consumed your blood and life essence, was that what he was supposed to heal?
In the latter case, if he was to try this he would need larger wounds, or a larger channelling to notice a difference. Something as small as the fragment wouldn't consume enough that he could even feel the missing blood.
Since it seemed that a fist sized gem was about a litre (~33.8 fluid ounces) or so, though he was a bit unsure he thought it was something he could lose without much problems. Sure, he would probably be dizzy and a bit weak for a while, but if he was not able to fix that it'll fix itself in time with some food, drink and rest.
Refocusing his mind he gave this a go, the mental image seemed to me important here as when he started channelling, rather than a small wound in his hand, three deep gashes formed on his lower arms. The opening of the wounds hurt enough that he failed concentrating on the channelling, ending the attempt before it properly started.
"God fucking damn it!" he let out as the whole thing failed. The exclamation was both for the failing of the channelling itself but also from the sheer pain of the cuts, it felt like someone had taken a knife and cut along his lower arms, three times, hard and deep.
There was a lot of blood dripping, he didn't want to heal it and start over.
"What's going on?" Angela asked about his sudden outburst.
"Don't worry about it, it's not as bad as it looks, I need to test something." Gilliam didn't stop to consider this more, he wanted to test this properly before he lost too much blood.
Restarting the channelling from start, this time it didn't open up new wounds and rather started consuming from the existing ones. As the wounds were already open, though hurting a lot, it was easier to focus through an existing pain than a sudden new one.
At least this gave some validity to blood mages in media cutting themselves before casting spells, the initial shock and pain could be controlled before you needed to focus.
The focusing was much easier now, though there was a sustained pain of having open wounds like this, the fear of bleeding out was luckily not even on his mind due to having healing magic. It did wonders for him to relax about the steady stream of blood that was being misted and then condensed into a crystal. This in turn let him focus on focusing rather than worrying.
He knew from donating blood in the modern world that he would get dizzy well before it started getting properly dangerous, and losing half a litre (~17 fl ounce) of blood was something one could handle as it was the rough amount they took during donations.
Deciding to not go as far as originally planned, instead of a fist-sized he'd go halfway, making a half-fist sized. Losing that amount of blood was something he had done before, and he functioned well enough the rest of that day.
The blood that had seeped into his clothing or onto the ground was not used as part of the channelling, perhaps that's due to him not knowing how to use it properly? He would have to look into that later.
Angela seemed to be a bit worried, as was Petal who probably had never seen this scene before. Gilliam ignored both of them and continued to focus on the crystallisation now that it had started working.
After a short while he stopped, he had a decently sized crystal, about 10cm (~4inch) in diameter, it was larger than he intended and closer to a fist sized than half of one. Immediately healing himself once the gem fell into his lap he closed the wounds easily enough. Though closed with healing magic these wounds left very light scars. Gilliam pondered if this was why Nolis looked covered in scars like he was.
He took a few moments to calm down once the healing was done, Angela and Petal looked a bit more at ease now that it made more sense what he was doing and since he was no longer bleeding.
In his lap was a deep blood-red crystal, it had a vaguely round shape like the other ones he made, the main difference was that where the others looked more like glass or just crystals this one looked like blood that had taken a solid form.
He felt a bit weak after all of that, thirsty and hungry. Gilliam finally realised that they had been there for a while without any sustenance so it might be high time to return. This also had him realise that it would be good if he just had a lot of food and water in the ring, for cases like these and if he randomly found himself in the Fractured Lands again.
There was always something new to learn, new things to consider.
Another thing that came to mind, since focusing on healing at the same time as fuelling darkness magic was a problem with the opening of new wounds due to healing, he might need to find a way to supercharge the way his body makes new blood instead. Just closing the wound isn't enough when you suffer the after effects of blood loss. So weirdly enough, to get the most out of darkness magic, he needed to get better at healing. He didn't properly know how the body generated blood so it wasn't something he could affect that well.
One way to work around this could be to just use downtime and create a lot of the blood crystals, or learn to use external blood from his enemies... Both could work.
"Are you ok, My Lord?" Petal's voice broke him out of his train of thought.
He didn't consider it until her worried voice hinted at it, but he might have looked weird sitting there, bloodied, with a blood crystal in his hands contemplating.
Chuckling as he properly got to his feet, in the same movement he put the crystal into the ring and somewhat turned towards Petal.
"I'm fine, though I guess it might look bad." Taking a proper look there seemed to be a bit of blood on the ground and his clothing. Luckily it was just spread out more than a large volume.
As soon as he got properly to his feet he felt the dizziness creep in, widening his stance a bit fixed the problems, but it seemed that getting up suddenly after losing the amount of blood he used for this was apparently a bad combination.
Petal took a step closer as a reaction, seeming to aim to catch him before he fell, but stopped herself as he managed to rebalance himself.
"Ok.... It seems I'm not as fine as I thought. I'm only a bit dizzy, this will fix itself in time..."
He looked a bit pleading to Angela. "You wouldn't happen to know how to speed up blood generation, do you?"
Angela smiled in a schadenfreude way. "Not in a way I can teach you, my healing only works for me, and I don't think about it."
She seemed to take some joy in Gilliam's self-applied misfortune.
Gilliam had realised that there was a lot of envy to his magical prowess, something he absolutely understood. He would be envious towards someone with this if he weren't this someone. And since his current problem was not really dangerous, it will just take a bit of time to fix itself, it was a good moment to take enjoyment out of it.
"Damn it..." Gilliam muttered to himself.
He knew he was not in any danger, but it still didn't feel right.
"I suppose I'll just relax until Aeris comes back. I feel for some food." Gilliam smiled as he walked over to a tree and sat down, resting against the trunk.
He had used a lot of mana already, the Star Lance, though not consuming all of his mana it still ate up a considerable amount of it. And since using and recharging mana seemed to affect his hunger as well, he was in a very low energy state when considering all of this.
Gilliam assumed that Angela and Petal would continue training, but Petal instead sat down next to Gilliam, slowly leaning closer to him as the seconds went.
He couldn't do anything but smile, she was apparently still a bit weird with these things but, he couldn't say that he didn't enjoy it.
Angela chuckled a bit to herself. "I'll meditate as we wait, come get be when she returns."
She didn't wait for a response and simply left them to it as she disappeared behind a boulder.
Not long after, Petals slowly leaned into contact with him, her head leaning against his shoulder. It was a bit odd having the solidity of her horns rest against his shoulder, it did have a strange 'her' feeling about it but it was unique to him.
They sat like this and rested for a while.
Gilliam woke to the feeling of something slapping him in the face, the sudden startling almost had him slap Savia into oblivion, luckily he realised it was her before he scraped her off his face and slammed her in the ground.
She looked super happy, not seeming affected by the sudden harm she could have received.
Letting out a relieved sigh he couldn't really be mad at her, well... he could but it wasn't really the place. Taking her properly off his face he placed her in his open hand.
"Don't do that when I sleep.. You startled me, I could have hit you."
It seemed that the emotions over their shared bond and his accidentally more reprimanding tone than expected had her happiness sour a little.
Gilliam noticed and decided to change the subject. "So, how did it go?" He sounded happier and curious at this point.
"Savia can teleport people!" She shouted happily and proudly. All hints of her happiness potentially fading had completely gone.
Aeris walked in closer, coming from wherever she had been hiding, she added a bit more to the explanation.
"It seems she's a natural, it only took a bit of explaining and a few tests for her to be able to teleport with people, she took me all over the island." She sounded a bit proud as well, which made sense; she was Savia's teacher.
Gilliam eyed the smiling microharpy in his hand, her smile was practically glowing.
Aeris walked closer and squatted down, talking at Savia.
"Savia, can you show your master and teleport to that big tree?" She smiled at her as she pointed at a tree in the near distance.
Savia shook her head rapidly in agreement and before anyone could react she blinked away.
Aeris looked at Gilliam with a serious expression, speaking faster than normal with an oddly warning tone.
"Savia doesn't know it yet, but she is able to offensively teleport, she can teleport people against their will. Not all teleporters can do that as it can become a dangerous weapon. I can do it and because of it I'm kind of on a list."
She inhaled to add something more but before she could start the next sentence Savia popped into existence near Gilliam.
"Savia can teleport!!" She shouted it happily again, but with renewed energy now that she had proven it.
Gilliam realised that he had to speak a bit more to Aeris about but currently there was a happy creature in front of him, she landed in his hand once he extended it and sat there with her super happy smile.
"That's great!" He complimented her ability, even considering that he knew from before that she could teleport.
"She should be able to teleport anywhere that she has been before, the more she knows the place the better. I think it might be best to test her a bit more before she starts teleporting groups over larger ranges."
Aeris was good at explaining and it was weird for Gilliam to listen to her speak, she was 10 years old but her way of being felt like a fellow adult.
"When we get back I can bring her to my teacher, she can probably teach her better than me."
Gilliam thought that Aeris was going to teach her, though it made a lot of sense to have an actual teacher handle this.
Gilliam nodded, he was very fine with training and testing before using her ability, though he didn't know for a fact what could happen, it was still the thought of how the media had portrayed failed teleporting... If Aeris had some weird bonus ability that made this safe for her, then he had nothing against her handling it!
Though, all of this had him wonder about something. Gilliam started his question with a wondering expression.
"If she has been teleporting around for a bit, how's her mana doing?"
Looking at Savia he sort of asked Aeris, as if she would know Savia's Boundary. Since she hadn't cast any spells until she started teleporting now he was a bit confused about how this worked.
Aeris smiled as she replied, seeming to enjoy being the one that knows the answers. "Personal teleportation doesn't use that much energy for a specialist, so she's probably one. Group teleports are a bit worse, that takes time to get used to. Teleportation uses two energy sources, your mana but also your physical endurance. For people who aren't used to teleporting, after a few rounds they tend to get very worn out, tired and perhaps even nauseous. This happens to the teleporter and the passengers."
She clearly spoke from experience, but based on just what Gilliam had seen her do earlier, she's quite used to it.
Looking back at the happy Savia in his hand he did wonder where her limits were, this would need to be figured out but perhaps it was a better idea to let Aeris' teacher handle that.
He also wondered if this would be covered under his Heptagon Mage scholarship that the headmaster mentioned. If not he was beginning to make some money on the side, so that remained to be seen.
"Well, I would love if she could get the proper training for this." Gilliam smiled as he gave Savia's head a little pat with his finger. Something she seemed to highly enjoy.
As he was about to start another question about the teleporting, there was a familiar uncomfortable feeling again. The gathering of mana to the level where it almost felt like heat in the distance. They could all feel it this time, it made sense for Gilliam, Angela and Aeris but this round it also seemed that Petal reacted.
They all looked in the same direction to see a familiar red orb forming in the distance, not far from the new crater that Gilliam created only moments ago.
Angela took immediate control and turned to Aeris.
"Go to the academy, inform them right away, bring anyone that can help."
Aeris nodded in response and instantly disappeared from sight.
The rest of the crew had worried expressions on their faces, except Gilliam who had an almost sadistic expression grow.
"I might have an idea." His smile grew a little more at his statement.