“This is just not working!” Delia fell back and lay down. She had a huge headache. She had been successful in creating a flame like Yuki did, but when trying to move it out away from the body…. She just was unable to do it.

“Delia, don’t give up yet. Everyone is having the same problem. Unlike when applying it to an object, we are trying to apply our spiritual qi to the air around us. It’s kind of like my heavenly steps technique but even that requires your body to be touching it.” Yuki was no different from Delia or the others. She, too, was having issues moving the flame away from her hand. While she could tether some spiritual qi to the flame, it was still not what she was hoping to do. She wanted to shoot the flame out without anything attached. Even if she condensed it into a large flame, as soon as it lost the source of spiritual qi powering it, it would disappear.

“Hey, Yuki, I just had a thought. What if we take from the inscriptions that are used in the Buddah sects? From what I know, they are able to send out inscriptions. What if we create an inscription and then embed it into our flame, one that tells the flame what we want it to do?” Selene suggested. She did not know if her idea would work or not, but she figured it was worth a shot to suggest it.

“AHHH!!!!!!!! Why didn’t I think of that!?” Yuki held her head. What was the basis of all magic!? Magic circles!  If they used inscriptions and then formed them into a kind of magic circle, they could power it with qi. It could even work to create the fireball as well. And depending on how much spiritual qi you put into it, the stronger the spell. You could even put a symbol that would suck in the qi around it to keep the spell going. And once they got used manipulating their qi, they could easily do much more! 

“Selene you are a genius!” Yuki cried out. “A magic circle made with inscriptions!”

“Ah!” Delia was next to cry out. Now she felt so stupid but to be fair she had been in this world much longer than Yuki so something along the lines of a magic circle would be long forgotten in the pits of her memory. But now that it was mentioned she suddenly realized she could do just that.

Delia reached out in front of her and began writing symbols in the air using her demonic qi. Each symbol interlinked and by the time she was done it created what looked like a text book example of a magic circle. “Hmmm…. So something like this?” 

Delia’s magic circle was not all that big but it did look just like what Yuki was imagining. Yuki clapped her hands and looked excitedly at the magic circle that Delia created. “Can this do what we want?”

“Only one way to find out. Everyone move to one side.” Delia did not want anyone to get hurt. Even if the flame this thing was to produce was no bigger than the one Yuki created on her finger, she still wanted to be careful just in case.

Once everyone was standing to the side, Delia finally injected her demonic qi into the magic circle. The symbols began to light up one by one before they were all lit. A small flame appeared in front of the magic circle that began to move slowly through the air. It was not fast by no means. Even a snail could move faster than it on a hot day. But it was moving. Moving away from the magic circle with out any qi tethering from Delia.

“You did it!” Yuki jumped for joy. She had not felt this excited in so long. It brought back memories of when she first started cultivating when she was younger. While these memories would bring back images of that day when she lost her loved ones, she still thought back to those days fondly. They were very special days for her. 

“Hehe. I was only taking the idea you two came up with and put it to practice.” Delia scratched her chin in embarrassment. 

“No this all thanks to Selene. Without her suggestion, we would not have made it this far so quickly.” Yuki beamed a smile at Selene who lowered her head. It seemed she was not used to being praised so forwardly. “But now comes the hard part. Delia, you need to teach us how to create symbols and what each one of them means so we can begin working out a formula in created magic circles.”

“If that is what you want.” Delia did not mind at all. To her, this was a good chance to really integrate herself in with the other girls. She felt like she had gone back to the past on Earth, where the two were playing without a care in the world. Right now, she felt very happy.