章 8: Exceeding expectations
Jason finally arrived at a decision as it was his turn.
He climbed up the steps and walked on the stage with slow but steady steps. Many students were displeased to wait and see his performance, as most of them were exhausted and wanted to return home.
"Trash, it's useless. You can't even see, how should you be able to demonstrate a decent sequence of a martial arts technique"
"That's true… Don't waste our time and come down."
"Do you want to humiliate yourself, mole?!?"
Jason didn't pay attention to the name-calling and he waited for the examiner to give him the verbal signal to start.
There were many examiners all around the hall and at least ten other students were also demonstrating their martial art sequence.
Before the examiner could give the signal Jason lifted one of his hands in the direction of the students who had insulted him and showed them his middle finger.
He would never meet them again, so Jason decided to cut ties, without any regret.
The whole gym went silent on seeing Jason's behavior. It was rude to do something like that directly in front of the teachers and the respectable examiners but Jason didn't mind other people thinking bad about him.
The students who had insulted Jason were flabbergasted.
'Wh-hat?? Who does he think he is??'
The students wanted to throw a temper but the examiner interrupted them and gave a 'start' signal to Jason, ignoring his rude behavior.
There were always a few students disregarding the examiner and sometimes a few students would fight each other over minuscule things.
Jason got into the Azure feisty Ape standard position in a swift move and began the demonstration of the first sequence he had learned.
He moved the small amount of mana inside his body directing it to the mana channels close to his veins and enveloped his hands with a fractional film of mana without wasting a second.
This alone was an astonishing feat because a certain accuracy and control over mana were needed to lead the mana to a certain body part and envelope it like a second skin.
Jason, meanwhile, had to take care of his distribution of mana because the amount of mana he had at the moment was marginal.
If his mana pool had been larger, Jason was confident that he wouldn't need to form a paper-thin skin-like membrane to cover his fists which took a decent amount of his focus.
Jason began to sweat slowly as he moved around smoothly with his enveloped fists, replicating the moves described in the Azure feisty Ape description.
The gym had gone eerily silent except for the light sound of his own movements as everyone was astonished by the exquisite sequence of movements demonstrated by Jason.
Even if Jason had never seen the sequence of the Azure feisty Ape technique, the first sequence had been printed in his mind as he had watched it countless times over the last week.
Almost nobody could understand how Jason was able to do it without seeing anything. It was impossible to know how to move if one couldn't see whether the sequence was being performed correctly or not.
Jason perfectly executed one move after another without any mistakes. His entire performance resembled a mesmerizing dance that ended after a minute.
This minute was over in an instant though Jason felt like it took an eternity.
Jason was sweating buckets and his back was drenched with it but his face boasted a radiant smile.
Demonstrating the Azure feisty Ape technique made him feel as if he had achieved freedom.
He couldn't see through the bandages but it didn't matter as his accurate and smooth movements made him feel ecstatic.
His stored mana was completely dried up and Jason felt empty but this didn't dampen his happiness.
The examiner looked at Jason in astonishment, with wide eyes.
He had often seen something like that but not from a blind 2nd Novice rank youth with a malnourished body.
'Does this student have an extreme sensitivity to mana?!
Did he sense the mana flow when the instructor taught his students and this youth remembered everything and executed it like that?
Pretty good.'
The examiner praised Jason in his mind but he remained calm and said in a monotonous voice,
"Exceeding requirements:120 points"
It was as if a large stone had dropped in the pits of their stomachs when the other students heard the announcement.
Greg got full marks with 100 points because his martial art technique was perfectly demonstrated but even he felt that Jason's demonstration was slightly better than his own.
At least Jason's accuracy and control over mana were on a different level than his.
Nevertheless, it was only a single sequence and nothing special if one worked hard on it, as the requirements were quite easy to meet.
Jason himself was even more astonished than the others as he wasn't sure if he had done everything correctly.
He had never personally seen the combat technique demonstrated by the school's instructor and only the outlines were seen by him.
But, he was happy that he had received more points than he had expected.
Though after his first wave of happiness had subsided, he was again reminded that his average score was still bad.
After doing some rough calculations, he believed that he would roughly score 34/100 points on average which was much more than he expected.
Adding the presumably 100/100 points from the theoretical exam his score was hovering around that of an average middle school graduate.
Unfortunately for Jason, the next test instantly worsened his mood as the teacher said
"Now that everyone has completed the practical exams we will scan your rank and rate you with points"
The examiners stood up from their chairs and gathered together while one old man announced in a loud voice.
"Everyone, stay calm, please. There will be an uncomfortable feeling which will invade you but don't fight against it. We will scan your mana core for a short moment and award points according to the guidelines."
A weird and chilly pressure radiated from the examiner and spread out throughout the gym.
The pressure affected every student as they began to shiver slightly before the chill left them.
"Number 1 Aamin Arion 8th Novice rank - 60 points"
"Number 2 Alina Arte 9th Novice rank- 80 points"
"Number 3…..
"Number 158 Greg Fler- 2nd Adept rank- 140 points"
"Number 2374 Jason Stella 2nd Novice rank….- minus 40 points"
As he heard the examiner's voice he felt a sting in his heart. He had been aware of the deduction of points earlier but it was more painful than he thought.
His presumed score of 134/200 points was now 94/300.
The last chance for him to receive points was the soul awakening and Jason who was previously relatively happy and floating on the ninth cloud with his score was now dragged back to earth.
Everyone was exhausted and waited for the examiner to finish the distribution of points.
Afterward, he announced that the exams had officially ended and excused himself without another backward glance.
Jason, meanwhile, slowly started to walk his way back home slowly without minding anyone around him.
He didn't even notice Greg's gaze following him with curiosity shining in his eyes.
It was already evening when Jason arrived in his small apartment.
Entering the room, he went into the bathroom to shower and rid himself of the sweat. Slumping down on his bed, exhaustion took over his body and mind, making him fall into a deep sleep.
クリエイターの想い 
HideousGrain
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章 9: Shopping tour
It was early in the morning when Jason woke up.
When he opened his eyes they shone brightly as he rubbed them to get rid of his tiredness.
Jason accessed the federation network and opened the middle-grade graduation site where he entered his serial number.
As he looked at the score in front of him, a torrent of emotions struck him.
These included happiness, sadness, and most importantly frustration.
Jason had received the exact score he had thought that he would.
'Theoretical Exam 100/100 Points
Practical Exam 34/100 Points
Blood test: Passed, Remark: Blind
Mana Core: 2nd Novice rank -40/100 Points
Soul awakening: ?/★★★★★'
It was annoying but Jason couldn't change it anyway so he checked the mail section and saw a notification about the soul awakening.
'Scheduled Soul awakening: Sunday 2. August 10:25 am'
Sighing, Jason noticed that the date was still more than two weeks away and he wasn't really sure what to do until then.
The only thing he was able to do was to gather mana and integrate it into his mana core to improve his rank. He wanted to be fully prepared for the day he would enter the beast pagoda.
His theory about the colored hues around some beasts was still being constructed and Jason was eager to find out if he was correct.
Fortunately, his soul-awakening wasn't today, which was a somewhat positive outcome of his bad exam result. Hence, there was more than enough time for him left to prepare.
Jason was eager but also a bit scared because the soul-awakening and the subsequent step of choosing a soulbond were the most important things every youth had to go through.
He had enough money to purchase an average beast but he didn't know how high his soul energy would be, so Jason stopped thinking about unnecessary things.
Thus, he sat on his bed and gathered mana until lunchtime which led to his mana core being almost replenished.
Somehow, Jason felt that the time required to replenish his mana was extremely long. But he didn't have any good circulation manuals with detailed explanations to help him speed up the process.
Before he would get his soul-awakening done in two weeks, Jason wanted to change a few things which were previously unnecessary.
He wanted to shift into a decent-looking apartment, buy nutritious food, new clothes, and do many more things.
As it was still unknown what soulbond he would get, Jason had to wait to lease a new apartment as the soulbond could be gigantic and thus too big for a small apartment.
It was a small possibility but it could happen nonetheless and he didn't want to waste both his time and money.
Jason had a huge amount of credits left but he wasn't sure of the selling price of most of the things. The rent for his apartment was extremely cheap and he usually bought bread loaves, instant noodles, and snacks at the market with the help of his AI before he gained his eyesight.
He had zero knowledge of how to handle his finances so Jason had to look up some things online.
In the afternoon, Jason compiled a small list of things that he wanted to purchase with an approximate price beside the article name on his phone.
Now he didn't want to purchase these things online anymore, so he went outside heading straight to the shopping district.
Jason wanted to see everything around him and it was boring to sit inside the small smelly apartment for the whole day without anyone's company.
He carried a bandage with him for emergencies, in case he would bump into someone from his class. However, he believed that they had more important things to do, than going on a shopping tour right now.
They were probably thinking about the soul awakening and their future soulbond all the time or lamenting about their low exam scores.
A few minutes after leaving his room, Jason entered a crowded street with many stalls lined on either side.
There was a huge variety of items being sold in the stalls such as food, clothing, magical devices, mana resources, weapons, alchemy resources, and so on.
Jason was in need of many new clothes, food and he wanted to buy a quantum bracelet that would replace his ancient-looking smartphone.
His current phone was an outdated version and extremely old but that wasn't the reason for him wanting a new one.
The quantum bracelets were sturdy and had a better resistance that could even withstand attacks from magical beasts. On the other hand, his phone would probably be destroyed soon if it fell a few more times out of his pockets, which wasn´t an uncommon occurrence.
Furthermore, Jason would have to be fast and flexible while traveling through wild zones. His phone was too bulky to allow such movements.
This was only futuristic thinking but still important to be prepared for.
The quantum bracelet also had another special feature which was spatial storage. The bracelets were comparatively slightly cheaper than the quantum watches that also had the same feature.
Jason had enough credits left behind from his mother's death insurance, the pay from his mother's murderers, and his allowance from the Cerus family, so he would be able to purchase a quantum bracelet.
Because of the integrated storage space, Jason wanted to purchase the quantum bracelet as the first thing.
Going around for almost half an hour, he roamed through the market checking the different items being sold. After satisfying his curiosity, he searched for a while before he found a 5 story building with a big quantum bracelet sign.
The shop looked luxurious from the outside and Jason stepped inside through the wide door.
An attendant rushed to greet the new customer with a broad smile. However, when he noticed Jason's worn-off clothes, his smile turned into a frown as he grew visibly disappointed to see him. Though, he tried to quickly mask his disappointment and asked him,
"Hello Sir, are you here to purchase a quantum watch or bracelet, or did Sir maybe enter the wrong shop?"
Jason felt the attendant's gaze on him and realized once again that he was wearing old, worn-off clothes.
He understood the attendant's question and didn't harbor any ill feelings against him as he answered honestly.
"I'm here to purchase a quantum bracelet. Can you recommend one with decent storage space and a high endurance that can withstand attacks from magical beasts? You don't need to ask if I have enough credits."
He added the last sentence to avoid getting in an embarrassing or awkward situation and the attendant understood the pointed remark. What he couldn't decipher was why this youth wore clothes like that if he was able to purchase a quantum bracelet?
The attendant nodded his head and retrieved a few quantum bracelets from a glass cabinet. He placed them on a large desk and explained their capabilities with a few simple sentences including the price, storage size, and so on.
These bracelets ranged from 10,000 to millions of credits. Jason, who thought his huge fortune of slightly more than 500,000 credits was enough to purchase one of the best quantum watches, was more than a little bit astonished.
After checking all of the available cheaper priced quantum watches and bracelets, Jason found a black one that met his requirements and seemed to fit well.
The Black demonic bull318 quantum bracelet was made of black iron and certain other materials.
It could withstand a blow of a Black demonic bull which was a strength-type magical beast enhanced with a demonification with a storage space of 2500 cubic meters.
The storage device was the most expensive part of the quantum bracelet. It needed to be forged by a blacksmith master with the help of an inscription master and the core of a spatial type mana beast.
If Jason wanted he could get his storage space enlarged but that would cost even more and Jason didn't need it at the moment.
Spatial-type mana cores were rare and thus the storage space made up at least 60% of the price.
Jason had to pay 199,999 credits which caused him a great deal of discomfort but he quickly transferred the required amount of credits to the shop's bank account before he could change his mind.
The attendant was astonished that such a poor-looking youth had so many credits as his pay wasn't even 1% of the youth's payment.
Most citizens were paid around 1500 Credits a month which was enough to feed the family and their younger soulbonds with some low-grade food.
They couldn't purchase high nutrition food with this income but surviving in a C-grade city with 1500 Credits a month was almost a wonder.
Jason's expenditure was way lower because he had a very low appetite and he was very frugal when it came to purchasing stuff for himself such as clothes and other things.
Thus, he only bought necessary things for his hygiene and health and lived in a smelly and hideous-looking room for 100 credits a month.
In addition, he told himself to buy more high-nutrition food to fix his malnourished body and become stronger.
The rent of the apartment was cheap as the building was about to get demolished in a few years and it was located in the vilest area in the whole city.
His expenditure was thus less than 200 Credits a month, so paying almost 200,000 was way too much for his fragile heart to handle.
Jason thought even if the expenditure would make him sad, it was required because he wanted to get stronger. He wished to adventure through the wild zones in order to earn some credits while thinking about his future.
He would have to decide soon, whether he should attend a trashy school in Artes to learn more about martial arts and knowledge that he was already aware of or gain credits by hunting weak beasts while improving oneself slowly.
クリエイターの想い
HideousGrain
HideousGrain
Shopping tour is done, but you forgot to add my novel to you library? Just do it now!
Thanks....kekeke
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