I managed to clear the first twenty-five percent of my Heart Meridian before an enormous paw dug at my arm repeatedly. As I came out of my meditation, I could hear the soft whining accompanying the paw trying to get my attention. When I opened my eyes, Rukia was sitting in front of me. “Hey girl, what’s wrong?”

Her eyes were full of worry, but as I spoke, her ears perked up and she quickly leaned in and started licking my face. I couldn’t blame the girl. I had been out of it for most of the day, being dragged in a stretcher, and as soon as we get in here, I sit and didn’t move for however long I was meditating.

Rukia needed some reassurance and loves, so I gave them to her. I gave her good scratches in her favorite places, really digging deep into her fur. I told her what a good girl she was and how I was happy to have her with me. The words themselves didn’t much matter, though she understood quite a few of them. But it was the tone and the clear affection I had for her she could feel through our bond that finally settled her and she grew content to lie next to me.

I looked around to see what everyone else was doing, and my eyes fell on magnus and his new bear pet. Magnus was using raw beast meat as treats while he trained Koda to sit, shake, and even roll over. It was cute as hell.

I saw Cody at a workbench. He was working on his leatherwork, turning leather pieces into armor, probably for Kiara, since she was the only one in the group with no form of protection.

Rowan was using a stylus from what looked like an old time doctor’s bag. She was drawing circuit-like diagrams on the silky robes she bought in the last town. Must be something to do with her enchanting, I thought.

My eyes fell on Kiara next. She had managed to clean herself up pretty well, given the primitive conditions we were living in. She was passed out on one of the kid’s cots. This was probably the first safe place she had been to where she could actually sleep since the Initialization. I could only imagine trying to snatch bits of rest while surviving in the wilderness, with no one and nothing to watch your back when you were so vulnerable.

With all the debuffs timed out, I felt better than ever and really wanted to get to work on my second hand-axe. But it would be a complete douche move to hammer on metal, making a racket while our guest slept. I could get to work on my Formations skill, maybe churn out a couple Ki batteries, and see if I could improve on the design. I had plenty of Demon Beast Cores after all. Speaking of cores… I pulled out one of the water Spirit Beast Cores and gave it to Rukia. She needed them to keep up with my cultivation, since I was using pills to clear my Meridians faster.

“Hey, Magnus. You ready to learn some formations? I’m about to make a couple of Ki Batteries if you want to watch. I can teach you as I go,” I said as I walked up to him. I had just remembered a conversation from before about how he wanted to learn it, too.

“Who’s a good boy, yes, Koda is. Koda is so clever. Sure, bro. That would be awesome,” magnus said after giving Koda one last treat and head scratch. They followed me over to the Formations bench and I looked over my available materials.

“Well, these should work,” I said as I pulled out the Knucklebones from Koda’s mom. “The system just calls them Knucklebones, but I think there are tarsals or carpals or something like that.”

Each of the bones was around the size of a golf ball and irregularly shaped. They were dense and heavy, too. I Used Identify on one.

Knucklebone

Quality: Exceptional

Rarity: Rare

Durability: 100/100

Weight: 1lb.

Traits: Earth Ki infused: x2 durability, +80% Ki effects if Earth based

Ki Pool: 0/40

“Too bad I’m not making something earth based at the moment, but we have twenty of these bad boys. I’m sure I have at least a few earth based Demon Beast Cores, and with the Elemental Socket Binding I picked up, we might make something bad ass.” I said to Magnus.

“Totally, bro. And it has a Ki pool of forty already. How will that affect making the Ki battery?”

“Well, we need to keep a few things in mind. The quality of the material or item limits how many Bindings we can put in it. Average allows for 1 Binding, and each rank up adds one more. This is exceptional, so it can naturally hold three Bindings, and since we are working in the Ki forge and using its tools, we get one extra binding. So, we can use up to four. If we use the Storage Socket Binding, we can add half of a Beast Core’s maximum Ki pool to the item.”

I pulled out one of the Body rank 4 Demon Beast Cores and held it up. “This has a maximum Ki pool of one hundred fifty. If I use it, it will add seventy-five to the natural storage capacity of the item. In this case, it would total out to one hundred fifteen.”

“That’s sic dude. How many Bindings do you know now?” magnus asked.

“I know eight now. Impact, Ki Condenser, protection, sharpness, shield, projection, storage socket and elemental socket. A basic Ki battery, using a beast core to boost its storage capabilities, only really needs two bindings to work. The Storage socket and the Ki condenser. This makes a self-recharging Ki battery that we can draw on as needed.”

“Wouldn’t that be a waste of potential, though? Using only half of the slots?” Magnus asked.

“I think so. That’s why I want to try a few things. It should be possible to use two Storage Sockets to increase the capacity, and I wanted to see what would happen if I used two Ki Condenser Bindings to increase the recharge rate. But before I get to experimenting, we need a more basic material for you to practice on. Have you opened your Mind Meridian yet?”

“No, not yet. I’m about a third the way through the Lung Meridian. I’ve been focusing on my more combat-oriented Meridians first, well, except my Spleen Meridian. That one was my first and an accident.” He chuckled.

“Ok, it will be tricky creating the formations without it. I normally circulate Ki through my eyes so I can see what I’m doing and how it flows. Without the Mind Meridian open, it will be a Stamina and Ki hog. When I did it without the Mind Meridian, it burned one Ki and two stamina per second.”

“Well, I can last close to two minutes that way, longer if I use it a little at a time. It should be fine for now.”

I pondered for a minute. I didn’t want to waste too many materials doing this, “Ok, the Formation tools allow you to carve the Ki channels on the surface of the item and it works pretty well. The bindings are trickier and need Ki Sight to form them properly. If you used yours only during the carving of the Bindings, it should work.” I pulled out my Beginner’s Guide to Ki Crafting and held it out.

“This book gives some good examples on how to form the Ki channels and where to place the Bindings in relation to each other. Why don’t you study it a bit and practice on some of that wood we collected? The end results won’t be as good as with the high-grade materials. But it will let you get a good feel for it.”

“Sounds like a plan, bro,” with a grin, he took the book and wandered over to the woodworking bench. We had already stacked up a bunch of the lumber we procured over there so he had plenty to work with.

Settling in, I first tried to create a Ki battery with two Storage Sockets and two Ki Condensers. At first, it seemed to work. It had a storage capacity of two hundred and fifty after the tool and skill bonus. Essence was being sucked in to each of the Condensers at a rapid rate. But as I watched it with my Ki sight on and refreshing the Identify, I saw something was out of balance and the durability plummeted.

I quickly pulled out as much Ki as I could from the battery and used my Ki to disrupt the Condensers, cutting them off from the Storage Bindings before disabling them. With power removed from the Formation, it quieted down and the durability stabilized.

I went over it in microscopic detail until I found the problem. The two separate Storage Sockets worked against each other. I had each Storage Socket paired with one of the Condenser Bindings, each filling at the same time. But the two different storages created a resonance between them that destabilized the entire formation.

For my next experiment, I used two Storage Sockets and one Ki Condenser. It wouldn’t fill faster, but it would hold a lot more. This one, too, failed. It worked just fine at first and seemed stable, so to speed the experiment along, I filled Ki pool three quarters of the way, full with help from the smithy.

It looked like the storage was too high for the material itself. Looking over it, it seemed to be a bad idea to more than double the item’s durability with Ki storage. Once the Ki supply reached two hundred one, the durability dropped by one per second for each Ki point over two hundred. I once again drained the Ki pool, transferring it back to the Smithy, before disabling the Formation again.

With this new information, I pulled out my first Ki battery, the Manticore claw.

Name: Ki Battery

Quality: Above Average

Rarity: uncommon

Durability: 39/39

Weight: 3oz

Ki effects: gathers, condenses, and stores Ki from Essence

Ki Pool: 75/75

Recharge Rate: 3/hour

I was so lucky on my first attempt. If the Ki pool were only three points higher, this thing would have deteriorated and possibly exploded with all the Ki it held. And Ki was quite destructive.

I put it away and considered my possibilities for a few minutes. I don’t need to have a massive battery right now; I’m more interested in a quickly recharging external source of Ki. I could use one of my larger Demon Beast Cores. No, not the Spirit Bear. It was too good to use just for a battery. I had my untouched exotic spear in mind for that beast. But I had a body ranked five beast core, with my bonuses it should net me about a hundred sixty storage. I could include two of the Ki Condensers and throw in a Protection Binding to boost the durability even higher.

I’m a little worried about bringing that manticore Claw battery into battle now. It would only have to lose a few points of durability to start a cascading effect that could have it explode while around my neck. That much Ki would literally blow my head off.

With that thought, I put the claw into my storage, where it should be safe. I planned out how I would draw the Ki channels and the Bindings and set to work.

Congratulations, your skill Ki Formation Mastery has increased.

Ki Formation Mastery Rank 6 +12% formation strength, +6% increased quality

I did it, it worked quite well, especially in the Wellspring.

Knucklebone Ki Battery

Quality: Exceptional

Rarity: Rare

Durability: 142/142

Weight:

Traits: Earth Ki infused: x2 durability, +80% Ki effects if Earth based

Ki Bindings: Protection +42% durability, Ki condenser x2, Core Socket (Storage)

Ki Pool: 0/163

Ki Regeneration: 2 Ki /15 minutes (x3 in Wellspring)

While in the wellspring, this Ki battery would charge itself to full in just under seven hours. Elsewhere, it would still take most of a day, but it would almost fill up my personal Ki pool in one shot. Not too shabby, if I say so myself. The Battery would have to lose sixty points of durability before becoming a ticking time bomb… could I? no it would be insane. Who in their right mind would make a bomb out of a Ki storage device? Would the storage ring even stop the durability drain while inside? I didn’t know enough to continue that train of thought. It was too dangerous out in the wild as it was, let alone adding explosives in the mix.

I pushed the thoughts away and set about making a second Knucklebone Ki battery. That way, Magnus would have one as well.

Once I finished the second Ki battery and gave it to Magnus, I went back over to my bed and pulled out my copy of “Beginners Guide to Cultivation (Elemental)” I wasn’t very far from having all eight Meridians cleared and needed to ready myself for the next stage of my cultivation.