Basic Formations

The next day, John walked into Beginner Formations yawning loudly and trying his best not to freak out. Today he would take the test to be promoted to a Basic-Level Formations Master. Professions work similarly to techniques, everyone starts off as a Novice and advances to the Basic, then Apprentice... all the way up to Grand Master. So far only one person has ever managed to make a Profession into a Dao, the leader of the Maker's Guild, so Grand Master is considered the height of a profession.

After settling his croc into the his new sleeping chambers at the Tamer's Club and having the meat he'd bought from Mike and Bronson delivered last night it was already dinner time. Realizing that he didn't have much time left to study, John freaked out and skipped the meal all together to frantically go over his textbooks. Finally he'd fallen asleep at 1 AM; he'd dreamed of showing up to class and sitting down only to realize he wasn't wearing any clothes. Then the floor had dropped out from under him and formulas of all the formations he'd been studying turned into monsters and attacked him viciously until he jerked awake at 5 when his alarm went off.

Now, he walked into Beginner Formations to find the class buzzing with excitement. He was too tired to deal with it so he sat down and he laid his head on his arms, closing his eyes and trying his best to ignore the chatter.

Unfortunately this was easier said then done as a girl sat down in front of him and started chatting excitedly with her friends. "Wendy did you see them?"

"Of course, its impossible to miss a brand new building filled with nearly 300 new students!"

"I heard they were shoe-ins for the elite section, and did you see the Academic Credit totals? The top earners all shot up mysteriously overnight."

"Screw the credits, did you see that one called Tian Ji?" Wendy fanned herself as she swooned, "The hotness factor at the school just increased exponentially."

"I heard they setup a special trial for the new transfer students and the top of the freshman class, a lot of people apparently died."

"No way! The school would never allow students to die like that!"

At this point, John gave up on resting and groaned as he sat up and rubbed the bags under his eyes. "The dichotomy of the school's reaction to death is interesting." He thought to himself. "The normal students are treated like glass that will break if put under too much pressure, while the Elites are offered more resources and shoved into life and death situations on a regular basis."

Before he could think anymore deeply on the subject Mr. Johnson walked into the room. "Settle down, settle down." Mr. Johnson said as waved for everyone to sit down and stop talking. "Today is an important day. If you manage to pass the test and become a Basic Formation Master at such a young age it'll open doors for you in the future and aid you immensely in finding a job and earning scholarships."

After making sure everyone was seated, he nodded in satisfaction and began handing out papers. "I've decided to change it up a bit for this test, these are a list of materials that are available to you and where to find them. The test will be to design, create, and activate the best formation you can within 5 hours. Each list is different and you can only use the materials that are on your list for the test. This is a pass/fail test. If the formation works you pass, if it doesn't you fail!"

As Mr. Johnson was talking, several upperclassmen from the Maker's Club walked in. "These will be our exam proctors, they'll monitor and record everything you do during the test so don't even think about cheating... I'll know!" Glancing at his watch Mr. Johnson waited for a moment before saying, "It is no 8:05 AM, you have until 1:05 PM to finish the exam!"

Quickly glancing through the list of materials in front of him, John frowned in concentration as formula after formula ran through his head. "100 grams of crushed Spirit Stones, 3 viper gallbladders, 58 grams of crushed Metal Spirit stones, 129 grams of..." Reading through the list, John discarded several of the materials immediately. Items like viper gallbladders and sheep intestines where useful in cooking and alchemy but were incredibly difficult to use in the art of formations. Instead, crushed Spirit Stones when carefully laid out in a circle or mixed into an ink are incredibly useful. Finished memorizing the materials list he looked up to see that he was the only person left in the room.

"Ready to go?" One of the upperclassmen asked, looking bored.

Glancing at the clock, John realized he'd sat here studying the list for the last 10 minutes. Everyone else must've taken off as soon as they could. "Sure, can you take me to where I'll lay down the formation first?"

Eyes flaring slightly in surprise, the upperclassmen nodded his head and lead the way out. They walked briskly past several sheds where his classmates could be seen digging through piles of materials as they muttered to themselves and continued on to a practice field hidden behind the building. Ropes marked off squares of land 15 meters wide by 10 meters long, with the name of each student drawn in fire hovering in mid air above their square. The Basic Formations cover 3- 8 meters so we'd all have plenty of room.

"Here you go." The upperclassmen waved his hands and one of the ropes fell to the ground letting John through. After he'd entered the rope returned to its position and a barrier activated blocking anyone else from entering.

Crouching down, John carefully examined the ground while talking to himself. "The easiest formation to make given the materials would be a Basic Energy Gathering formation. However, there is a ley line running through this area that'd overload the formation within a few minutes." Picking up some of the soil he examined it carefully before letting it go and carefully walking through the entirety of the roped off area for half an hour. Finally, he stood up and jogged over the the materials shed.

The other students had just started to arrive at the roped off area as John ran past them and he smirked as he realized most of them were planning on making an energy gathering formation. Finally arriving at the sheds, John ran to the only one that hadn't been opened so far and waited for the upperclassmen to open it up for him. As soon as it was open he dove in with a vengeance.

"No," John said as he picked up a vial of crushed Metal Spirit Stones and tossed it outside the shed. The reinforced glass container bounced off the grass a couple times before coming to a halt. A second later he said, "No," yet again and bucket filled with sheep intestines flew out the door and tipped over spilling its contents all over the upperclassmen who stood there glaring at John's back...

A couple minutes later John ran out of the shed using a makeshift backpack to carry all the materials he needed, passing several others who'd just realized their Energy Gathering Formation wouldn't work as they sprinted back to the sheds. Finally back at his roped off section he carefully placed all of his materials down in order of use then pulled out a stick and began to write in the ground while mumbling to himself. "Carry the 5... add 13 grams here... divide by multiples of 3... add 10 grams of Spirit Stones..."

Done with the calculations he slowly and carefully marked out a circle on the ground. The calculations where to take into account the changing in slope and material so that despite looking lopsided and jagged at places the circle was actually perfect. Then, John carefully took out 80 grams of crushed Spirit Stone and mixed it together with snake blood and a bit of venom before carefully pouring it so that it created the outline of a circle 3 meters in diameter.

After finishing the circle John carefully minced the viper gallbladders together with more snakes blood, the rest of the crushed Spirit Stones, and various types of plants to create a redish-purple ink. Inside the circle he began drawing runes and linking them to the magic circle. Finally, he drew a rune outside the circle that linked it to the ley line and connected them all together while acting as a limiter so the energy wouldn't overwhelm the formation.

Standing up, he quickly backed off as he watched the energy from the ley line slowly gather. John smiled in accomplishment as he saw the energy rush into the limiter rune and slow down until it trickled little by little into the formation. It took nearly 5 minutes to completely power up and turn on, but when it did a bubble of energy encased the three meter circle.

"Try and enter the circle." John ordered Snakey.

Leaping from John's shoulder, Snakey landed on the ground and slithered towards the circle. When she was about 2 feet away she started slowing down, at 1 feet she shivered and backed off a bit before forcing herself to continued. Sticking her head into the circle she hissed and shot backwards and slammed into the barrier surrounding the roped off area at an incredible speed.

"It works!" John smiled. Like the others he'd planed to create a Basic Energy Gathering formation originally but after noticing the Ley Line he realized that would never work. So, he went over all the ingredients that'd been offered to him and decided to create a Basic Snake Repelling Formation.