Sitting inside the shuttle, Scorpio appeared in front of him, pleading for mana stones, which wondered Jason.

Scorpio had only requested food until now, but Jason felt an itchy sensation coming from his small soulbond, causing him to feel expectant…

'Is it already time?' He wondered as he took a batch of small mana stones from his vast storage device.

Cheng would need some time to gather all materials but to comfort Jason he already received a `small` batch mana stones and he asked himself if it was already enough for Dalia to enhance Scorpio's potential but it was unlikely.

But that could wait for some time, as Artemis' evolution was more important than increasing Scorpio´s potential.

Once Scorpio´s potential increased, he would look out for a suitable evolution path for his cute scorpion who laid on the grade-1 mana stones on his lap.

Mana filled the whole shuttle and Scorpio absorbed everything greedily until they arrived in front of the school-gate.

Carefully holding Scorpio and the mana stones with both hands, he left the shuttle without disturbing his soulbond's mana absorption.

Searching for a tranquil place, Jason sat down, leaning on a tree before placing Scorpio once again on his lap.

Taking out some more mana stones, he began to absorb the mana inside them and his surrounding.

He had a mountain of low/mid/high& peak grade-1 mana stones and lots of grade-2 and they were most likely more than enough for him to reach the master rank.

They were worth a fortune but remembering Dalia´s words about the vast mana she required to enhance a beast's potential, Jason ignored this mountain.

Grade-1 and Grade-2 mana stones were pure and efficient enough for someone to reach the magus rank at a relatively fast pace, while grade-3 mana stones would be even purer and denser.

Meanwhile, grade-4 mana stones couldn´t be used by someone below the magus rank under normal means, except if there were special occasions like the splitting mind technique, Jason had undergone with the mana isolation circle.

Once the mana inside mana stones was released one had to either absorb it or it would slowly start to scatter and only because of the mana isolation circle, Jason was able to absorb everything.

This however was extremely dangerous and only thanks to the devilish valkyrie-shield fruit, he survived.

Remembering the pain, Jason shuddered involuntarily, before he distracted himself once again.

Time passed and it was already lunchtime when he noticed that Scorpio was molting once again.

The old green exoskeleton was slowly expelled while a darker and lusher shining exoskeleton could be seen.

Inside the exoskeleton was a faint blue trace vibrantly gleaming, as if it was alive.

Scorpio´s length increased to almost 18 centimeters and sensing through his incomplete mana core, Jason ensured that his soulbond reached the five-star rank.

Its exoskeleton was tougher and larger compared to the previous one and Jason thought that Scorpio might grow a little bit more, considering that the size of the exoskeleton had enough space for slight growth.

His own body expelled some old skin after his mana absorption finished, but overall not much changed, as he was already cleansed from most impurities.

It would wonder him if there were many impurities inside his body until he reached the expert rank. 

But his skin grew slightly tougher, while his mana core and physique strengthened a tiny bit.

However, compared to the amplification caused by the Black Origin flame, it was almost nothing.

What Jason confused about his Origin flame, was that every time he saw an Origin flame, his own flickered vigorously, transmitting him the thought of insatiable hunger.

Maybe his origin flame wanted to devour other origin flames but there was no way to test it out without searching for a different origin flame or experimenting with another one.

Nevertheless, considering the dangers, Jason had to disregard this thought.

It didn't take long for Scorpio to regain its senses after the molting was completed and it jumped around joyful as its strength advanced further.

It had the desire to help Jason out of a sticky situation and it grew stronger with each day passing after Jason  received the Origin flame´s baptism.

As such Scorpio wanted to grow even stronger and with the mana it absorbed, it would begin to plant a poison affinity seed, once it had accumulated enough.

It roughly understood that Jason´s new master could enhance its strength somehow but right now it had already a good enough potential to reach the awakened stage.

As such Scorpio wanted to gift Jason a poison affinity within his mana which meant that he wanted to create a poison affinity.

Without knowing how long it would take, Scorpio clung onto a mana stone and continued absorbing it, without caring about Jason, who looked at Scorpio confused.

'Are you becoming greedy?' Jason wondered, but it couldn´t be considered bad if his soulbond was ambitious.

Even though Scorpio´s strength increment could be considered positive, the amount of soul energy it needed increased to 10 units, while Jason´s own soul energy was amplified to 16.75 units.

If Artemis needed 11 soul energy, Jason had to increase his own soul energy by more than 2 units for her to barely fit inside.

And even this as the worst-case scenario was not possible to achieve for Jason who could at most increase his soul energy by 1 unit until Friday evening. 

Because of that, he decided to disregard the possibility of increasing his soul energy to let Artemis fit into his soul world.

Even though he did not have enough space for her, she would most likely still listen to his orders.

The only issue was, that Jason couldn't really store her inside his soul world without having enough soul energy and due to that, she would have to stay with him the whole time.

He wasn't sure how much her appearance would change and if it was even allowed for Artemis to come out of the soul world while he was in school, as she would most likely attract more attention than Scorpio, who sat on his shoulder, inside his pullover bag or hidden somewhere to not enter the soul world with the Artemi´s ice aura caused by her evolution, around.

Thinking about that, he would have to inform Till about this and the problem would most likely be solved but it still bothered him that he didn't have enough soul energy for Artemis causing him to sigh deeply.

Jason took a bag out of his storage device with a large towel and a few additional mana stones.

Placing the mana stones below the towel, he laid Scorpio on top of the towel in order to avoid any discomfort, when he carefully put on the bag. 

Walking slowly towards the combat arena, Jason continued reading.

He figured out that his knowledge increased with each day passing, as Shane and Dalia´s wisdom and experience could only be called vast, which was definitely an underestimation.

It didn't take him long until he reached the combat arena and unsurprisingly he was one of the first to arrive, as there was still more than an hour left until combat classes would start.

As such Jason sat down and practiced the Heaven's Hell technique, to increase his soul energy by 0.1 unit with a single sitting.

When Jason opened his eyes, he noticed that Seron sat next to him, while most classmates already arrived.

Seeing Jason opening his eyes, Seron asked

"Do you think we have to spar all the time with each other? Hopefully master has something else to do, otherwise, we will adapt to each other´s combat style and it will become boring, don´t you thing so?"

Smiling slyly he added, "We need some stronger opponent with different combat styles...our classmates are too weak." 

And as if Till heard Seron talking to Jason, he walked into the combat arena next to the Instructor Brain, who taught them the `Weaponry Knight` technique. 

Looking around, Instructor Brain noticed Jason and upon inspecting his mana core, his eyes bulged and a trace of fear could be seen within them before he averted his gaze to the other students.

"From today onwards, I´ll be responsible for Class 54´s combat training. Due to the wide range of combat experience, the school decided to take the best combatants from every class in order to create a special combat class to further develop their respective combat prowess even more.

Jason Stella and Seron Gier please follow Mr.Greil. He will be responsible for the special combat class!"

After the Instructor finished his short speech, the whole class went into an uproar.

While Jason and Seron looked at each other with bright smiles, the weaker students gossiped with each other about what the special combat lessons were.

However, the loudest voices were the top students, who couldn´t accept this decision.

'Why weren't they taken to the special combat classes?? They were the top students of their class?!?'

And before the combat arena went completely into a chaotic chicken nest, one could hear Till stating.

"Right now only 2 students from every class will be selected to enter this lesson.

If anyone of you has the courage to fight either Jason or Seron, please come out. Otherwise, scram and wait until next week, where anyone is allowed to challenge the 150 special combat class seats.

In order to prevent too many students from challenging anyone, you´ll have to pay 10 lace points to do so anyone.

The 10 lace points will be deducted and not returned, winning or losing doesn't matter, the reward for winning will be the permission to enter my special course while losing will punish you with a two-week ban from challenging anyone.

Instructor Brian will proceed and explain everything to all of you."