209 Headquarters. (1/2)

Though Rina was confused because of his question. In her mind, why would someone want to use formations without any Mana when it is present everywhere? Wouldn't it be the easiest way to use them?

However, she still answered his question, no matter how weird it was, ”I haven't heard about any formations being used without the use of Mana. But theoretically, it should be possible with any different energy that acts like Mana...”

Ozul realized that this was all Rina's expertise could tell him. She sounded unsure if the formations would really work without Mana or not. He could only sigh as he thanked her with polite words and went out of the room, planning to avoid Hana as much as possible. It wasn't hard to avoid her since he had locked onto her Mana signature.

Before long, he was out of the Auction House.

. . .

From what Ozul understood from Rina's hours-long lecture was that formations could basically be used for anything and almost everything as long as we have sufficient materials and Mana to back it up.

At least his understanding of formations had slightly improved, but Ozul wanted to know if there was some way that he could use them. Since he did not wield Mana, he wanted a method that could work without it. Well, there was another way, but Ozul didn't even think about it. For that, he needed to start cultivating like normal people did and create a Mana core inside of himself.

'I will just have to ask someone resourceful if there is a method, if not, then I will just have to drop the idea,' Ozul could only give up if there was no other way.

”Another form of energy, huh...” Ozul muttered while gazing at the unfeeling Ball of Purity. But it was not some energy or force, as far as he could tell. It always felt like a part of himself; not something foreign.

Just when he was thinking about this, another thing hit him. From the time he had born, everyone had assumed that he used Mana as well but used some rare technique or spell to hide its traces.

Maybe he had been doing it all wrong from the start. Maybe he should have inquired about other energies or matters that are magical but not because of Mana. There had to be some records about something like that previously. He couldn't just believe that he was the only one who was born different from the start of history till now.

However, he stopped his line of thoughts there. It was a big world, and before the organization had been completely set up, the chances of him to stumble upon something related were unlikely.

He arrived back in the town, deciding to ask Raymond or Alver if he ever got a chance later.

When Irvin noticed his arrival, he hurriedly came to his side to ask if he needed anything like a diligent butler, but Ozul dismissed him just as quickly.

Ozul spent the next few days working on improving his control over Ball of Purity and lazing around. It felt like filling an endless abyss with water that you knew must have an end, so he felt himself improving but he couldn't feel any end to it. This was actually a good thing since that meant he could improve to an alarmingly skillful degree that he couldn't even imagine right now.

Would he really be able to master it to such an extent that he could turn all of it into a gaseous state and spread it to hundreds of meters around him? Turning any small part into solid and back to gas instantly, with just a thought?

Although Ozul did not know its limits yet, he perceived that at least that much should be possible.

Fortunately, there hadn't been anyone from other organizations directly coming here to inquire which gave Ozul all the free time to do whatever he wanted.

He had given Irvin all the permissions to instruct people however he wanted.

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A month and a few days passed after they had started to work on the headquarters.

Opposite to Irvin's nature of depending on Haley to decide all the complicated matters, he did an excellent job in assigning everyone their task and then overseeing it all.

Today they had finally completed everything that needed to be done.

At one glance, the unimpressive tower seemed to be around 20 meters tall, but Ozul didn't care about the appearances. What he wanted the most in it was the mechanism of 'disappearing' with the formations that he had seen in the headquarters of the Order of Dusk.

They were an information-gathering organization, and such organizations operated discreetly.

They had already been improving at such a rate that almost everyone knew about them, but Ozul wanted to correct this in the future. They could either choose speed or efficiency, and he had chosen speed first.

Since almost everything was set up, Ozul told Irvin to contact Oliver and Haley. Alver did not order his men to come because Irvin had told him that their men had yet to arrive. Needless to say, Alver didn't want to trouble his nephew.