*BOOOM* a thick cloud of dust was whirled up, enveloping the whole combat area while Till charged towards them, in order to see if Jason was fine because the black flame couldn´t be seen.
Jason´s Black origin flame was as strong as a peak-evolved ranked fire affinity and destroying the sword ray wasn´t considered a problem for it.
However, Jason had never used it before.
As such he was only able to summon the flame in the last moment before the sword ray arrived.
From the outside, it looked like Jason was about to block the sword ray with his hand, which was unimaginably stupid causing Till to charge towards them.
If something were to happen, he would immediately throw Jason into a freezing capsule and give everything he could to keep him alive.
However, right as the dust cloud vanished with Till standing where Jason should have been, he saw him right in front of Seron who looked down at Jason with widened eyes.
After using his soulbond's ability so many times in addition to his most threatening sword technique, Seron´s mana was completely used up, and seeing that Jason was completely fine was not something he could comprehend.
He couldn't even say anything before Jason stated "It's my win today" with a bright smile on his face.
Storing away the daggers in his hand, Jason supported Seron who was extremely exhausted to leave the combat area where they passed Till who looked at Jason with doubt.
'How is his strength so much stronger compared to three days ago? Seron's sword-ray should have already reached the might of the evolved rank attack!'
It was obvious that Jason couldn't destroy the sword ray with his bare hands, as such there had to be something different but Till couldn't get the hang of it.
window.pubfuturetag = window.pubfuturetag || [];window.pubfuturetag.push({unit: "64ce79d606107d003c23ea27", id: "pf-5140-1"})Jason and Seron were supporting each other as they left the combat arena while their classmates looked at them with widened eyes and traces of shock underlining their obvious astonishment.
Some of their classmates even dropped their weapons involuntarily while observing Seron and Jason´s intense spar.
They sat down at a nearby bank inside the hall and didn't talk for some time, not minding the onlookers.
The silence was awkward but the questions that stirred in their heads could only be answered by revealing each other's secrets and asking for something like that was not to be sought at.
In the end, Jason decided to not as Seron about his soulbond, and rather than that a praise was appropriate as Seron's soulbond was simple to cheaty
During the whole fight, Seron had at least refilled his mana ten times while Jason had to reduce his mana consumption even if he had the passive mana gathering technique.
Sighing, Jason said "Our spar was really nice and your soulbond´s ability was really unexpected!", trying to break the awkward silence and Seron replied earnestly:
"It had been a really long time since I was able to fight any of my peers head-on without holding back but your mana replenishing caught me off-guard!"
Hearing that Jason was a little bit confused.
"Hasn't Mr. Greil told you that I refined a sub-area inside my mind?" Jason said innocently while looking at Seron.
"Y-you mean the Splitting mind techniques first level? You've done that?? Did you want to die?!" Seron shouted, jumping up from his seat, looking at Jason as if he was a stupefied monster.
Refining his brain and splitting a small fracture from it to create a sub-area at the Adept rank...no! Probably even at the Novice rank?
window.pubfuturetag = window.pubfuturetag || [];window.pubfuturetag.push({unit: "64cc9e79c7059f003e4ad4b0", id: "pf-5109-1"})'Maybe there is something wrong with Jason´s brain? Or did he just want to die...?'
Jason looked dumbfounded at Seron´s outburst of emotion and chuckled lightly... One could say that the Mind division he underwent was comparable to a death wish at his rank, but thanks to the devilish valkyrie-shield fruit, he survived, even though he almost became insane, ending up in a small trauma…
Thinking back on the danger he underwent, Jason shuddered, before he looked at Seron once again.
"Well… I´m doing fine, right? Due to the sub-area and the automatic passive mana replenishing process, I was able to defeat you in the end." He said with a sly smile which infuriated Seron.
"That was only because Slimy was exhausted!" Seron´s tong slipped and he cursed himself inwardly.
"Slimy? Is your soulbond a slime?" Jason asked curiously as he couldn´t imagine naming a soulbond Slimy except it was either slime or some other "slimy" beast.
`I´m so stupid!` Seron thought but now Jason could find out what his soulbond was, once he researched a little bit.
As such Seron decided to tell Jason the truth.
Clearing his throat, he began
"My soulbond is a mutated mana slime without any affinity. Rather than that because of the slime's innate attributes, my malfunctioned mana channels could be fixed to a certain degree.
Due to its mutation, I received the ability called [Mana Injection] which can immediately replenish my mana to a certain degree.
Normally, I can use this ability only once a day but the mutated mana slime can store the usages to a certain degree.
window.pubfuturetag = window.pubfuturetag || [];window.pubfuturetag.push({unit: "663633fa8ebf7442f0652b33", id: "pf-8817-1"})During our fight I used up too many stored [Mana Injections] at the same time, causing Slimy to end up extremely exhausted...
It was unfortunate that I couldn´t win against you but what makes me more curious is the fact, how you defended against my sword ray!! This sword ray should have been at the evolved rank!"
Seron explained before he decided to ask Jason, what he was curious about.
Both of them already told each other a few secrets and Seron thought it was useless to hide the other less secretive things.
Jason knew more about him than most people from his own clan, except his parents and siblings.
While Jason´s knowledge was already relatively vast, he didn't know that an ability like the [Mana Injection] existed, so he was astonished and a "cool" escaped from him accidentally.
Seron looked at Jason before he began to laugh heartily.
Thinking too hard, Seron had thought Jason could tell his secrets to other families, their own clan had enmity with in order to gain credits but looking into Jason's eyes, he knew that there wouldn't be a single problem to tell him the truth.
Jason´s eyes seemed more trustworthy than his own close family, which was somehow scary but at the same time reassuring.
Due to Sermon's laugher, Jason was also infected by it and they began to laugh sincerely, causing their surroundings to look at them extremely weird with complex expressions.
'Are you two combat machines even aware, that we have combat lessons right now?'
And not long passed before Seron and Jason noticed that they were enveloped in thick mana and dragged through the hall until they arrived inside the Comat arena once again.
"If you can laugh, honing your skills shouldn't be a problem! Continue sparring!" Till said, trying to show a serious face, but both Seron and Jason noticed that Till was also amused by them and rather proud about their combat prowess.
But Till´s next announcement, caused both Jason and Seron to frown deeply.
"We will now make Team battles, as a small mission, each team that is capable of defeating Jason and Seron will receive 10 Lace points while surviving for 5 minutes will reward you with 5 Lace points"
Suddenly the whole combat area turned into a bunch of hyenas eyeing Jason and Seron, that stood inside the combat arena not knowing what was going on.
There was nothing to lose for their classmates as not a single lace point would be deducted and they began to queue up to fight Jason and Seron, with greed, overwhelming their emotions.
There were only 5 to 10 Lace points they could obtain but converted it was still a fortune of 100.000 to 200.000 credits.
Both he and Seron were confused about how their conversation turned into a battlefield against all of their classmates.
However, Jason had not fought against many elemental affinities, as such, he was expectant to fight his classmates, that eyed them carefully.
He himself was only at the 1st Adept rank but his strength and mana core was comparable to the common 4th Adept rank, as such not many of his classmates had an advantage in this field.
After fighting Greg and Seron for weeks, his combat experience was much higher than before, even though there were quite a lot of unfamiliar abilities and affinities he had yet to come in contact with.
Most classmates decided to wait for the first few rounds to finish until they would challenge Jason and Seron in order to prey them once they were exhausted.
As such the exhaustion should overwhelm them after some battles because they would definitely not win over 100 spars in a row.
Being able to accomplish something like that, would require a vast amount of energy, mana, and concentration, which could hardly be afforded at the Adept rank.
Maybe one would be able to fight for a long time once one reached the magus rank or similar ranks, but at the Adept rank, one was still considered a drop in the ocean.
But rather than feeling demotivated, a black fire burned within Jason´s golden eyes, unknowingly to everyone while the fighting spirit released by him filled the whole room, driving away Seron´s slight hesitation through the emergence of a fighting spirit, that was unknown to him.
"Let´s go!" Jason calmly said as the first battle started.
