Elemental Cats

Toz was elated about coming up with such an ingenious method of passively absorbing mana in a controlled and measured way. But he didn't let his happiness rise to his head, and he maintained a razor-sharp focus as he began developing the crease method even further.

The first thing Toz did was increase the number of creases covering the surface of the consciousness he had on his hand. He added creases so that his entire hand looked like a scrunched-up molerat.

Instead of two creases working together to swallow the mana they came into contact with, his entire hand wriggled like something out of a nightmare. Thankfully, his consciousness was invisible to everyone else. Even Toz had difficulty seeing the wrinkles' movements through the mana they absorbed.

As long as he disregarded the visual effect, Toz could consider his experiment a success. The only setback was that the wrinkles didn't all work together, and they moved in different directions, which led to them working against each other and decreasing the effectiveness.

Toz considered manually synchronizing the wrinkles and forcing them to work in tandem. But that would take too much effort and defeat the purpose of the method.

However, he quickly realized that there was a way to prevent the wrinkles from working against each other. By only using a single crease, Toz could prevent the different creases from interfering with each other's movements.

Toz facepalmed as soon as he tried it out. He couldn't help but feel stupid.

If the crease moved and pushed the mana down on one side, it would push the mana up on the other. No matter how Toz arranged the crease or how many creases there were, he still ended up with the same problem.

Reluctant to give up just like that, Toz tried to arrange one or two creases in some way that was at least noticeably better than just randomly creating them. And on the last attempt, when he created a spiral, Toz realized something.

He didn't have to push the mana downwards from the beginning. If he could direct it to a single spot and then direct it into his body from that point, he could use the creases to move the same way.

Toz created a spiral as if he had grabbed a point in the blanket of consciousness and twisted it. And after setting up the creases in that way, he put them to work and made them grab and push the mana into the center, where it entered a hole and was sucked into his body.

Toz cheered in joy, startling the cats. He had succeeded, and by the looks of it, he could even maintain it without actively concentrating since nothing happened even when he lost focus. The method also seemed to be quite effective, so Toz tried it out with his entire body.

After covering his entire body in a thin layer of his consciousness, Toz creased that layer the same way he had done with the tiny piece on his hand. But this time, he created a much larger spiral. It had its center on Toz's chest, but its creases stretched out and covered his entire body.

With that kind of coverage, Toz's training would surely rocket to the next level, even without him doing anything.

Positively trembling with nervous excitement, Toz tentatively began making the creases move and push the mana in the folds to the center.

Since Toz moved so slowly, it took a while until he began feeling the effects of his creased blanket method.

However, it quickly changed once the first wave was completed, and the spiral pushed the first bit of mana into his body. It wasn't an incredible amount purely compared to how much mana Toz had and how much he needed to train to reach the next level. But if he disregarded how much effort it had taken for him to reach and arrive at the creased blanket method and only focused on how much effort it took to maintain the method, it was amazing.

It had taken Toz several years. Not of actively trying, but since he first came up with the idea. And it still wasn't perfect. But he had finally devised a way to train while still being able to walk and do other things at the same time.

He could even do it without keeping his mana vision active, which significantly lessened the strain on his mind.

Toz still had to see if he could do it while fighting, but he was sure he could. And if it didn't work, he would simply make it work. Although Toz might expend more mana than he gained when he used the creased blanket method if he fought, he would still be able to extend for how long he could fight. And if he combined it with his already impressive mana pool and capacity, Toz would be an unstoppable fighting machine.

Toz felt all giddy after successfully creating a near-perfect blanket method for his passive training. He was sure that he could improve it some more, but Toz wasn't sure if he should do that now or if he should wait. One of the reasons he had developed his passive training method was that he didn't wantonly absorb the mana all around him in a way that alerted other mages with sensitive mana perception.

And with the creased blanket method, Toz could adjust the amount of mana he absorbed by decreasing or increasing the size of the folds and creases. Technically, that was all Toz needed at the moment.

If he ever needed a more effective method in the future, he could deal with that then. For now, Toz would be satisfied with what he had achieved and simply revel in the feeling of never having to worry about falling behind the cats.

If anything, they had to worry about falling behind him now. It had gone from the cats being able to train while Toz walked to Toz being able to train all the time, no matter what. The cats couldn't train their mana while they walked alongside Toz, when they ate, or when they fought.