Once again it was morning and once again Alwin skipped breakfast to catch a few extra winks of sleep—not like it was enough. Because once again, Alwin was fighting off the sleep fairies in the ever-prevalent war to whisk him away to dreamland and Milvus was unintentionally helping them.

"Morning, class. It's great to finally see you all back together again. How's life been since you've evolved?"

A chorus of goods, greats, and the occasional bad filled the room. The room was abuzz, the chatter amongst themselves didn't seem to dissipate in the slightest. It may have been a small class, but boy were they loud. So loud that they were chasing away the sleep fairies from taking control of his eyelids.

"Okay, quiet down class. You've all taken your first step to becoming a full-fledged member of the Human Hunter Corp. To become a member you'll need to graduate and complete your three years of training. In a couple of months, it'll be exam time and you better be prepared for it."

More exams, boo. Hopefully, it's a practical exam and not a written one. There was no way Alwin would be able to compete with Uchronia if that were the case. She'd probably spend her days in the library memorizing everything.

He looked over at her, she may have been annoyed with Milvus and the academy as a whole, but she still tried her best to pay attention. The same couldn't be said about Alwin, who was looking at her instead of listening in class.

"Just like the Forest of Beginnings, your task will be to eliminate the humans in the surrounding area. The primary aim is the elimination of humans, absorbing essence to evolve is secondary. The location you will be dispatched to will be revealed at a later date. In between your preparation time, there will be intermittent evaluations or 'Pop Quizzes' to determine how ready you are for your departure. More information will be revealed at a later date. Any questions?"

"How should we prepare ourselves for this final exam?" asked Uchronia. She may have been pissed but her instinctual nature to be a teacher's pet still lived on inside of her. No, this was not Alwin being jealous that she was actually a good student and may very well end up as Valedictorian instead of him.

"The best way to prepare for your exam would be to increase the number of skills you possess and strengthen your existing ones. The sparring room is now available to you so you'll be able to fight against each other. If you're feeling bored sparring against each other there's always the simulation room. Due to abuse by some of your seniors, the simulations have been locked away as part of the library challenge. The higher you climb the stronger foes you'll have access to."

Library challenge? Was it the Library Pass thingamabob that stopped him from ascending the stairs in the library? Now, Alwin knew what to do. Well, he was already planning on going to the library to expand his skill set. He couldn't rely on Spirit Blasts forever. Maybe he'd find a new type of Blast after he completed the next phase of the library challenge. Something that would transcend Yin-Yang Blast, Spirit Blasts, Spirit Scatter Blast, and Spirit Burst Blast, he'd gain access to the Blast Blast—assuming that was a real thing. He joked about the Spirit Feet and that turned out to be real, so maybe this was real as well. Back to focusing in class, because this was his good-student-serious-business arc.

"Same situation, morning lectures about combat and afternoon is free time. I advise you to use that free time wisely, if not in the best case scenario you fail your final exam, worst case you forfeit your life. That's all, now let's carry on with the lecture."

Lectures, the bane of his existence! But, the prospect of becoming a Minister was all too alluring. Why couldn't he just be consistent and stop bouncing back and forth like some sort of rubber ball? Get a grip man! Alwin had to redeem himself after his failures to defeat Gary Stew and the young masters—mostly Gary Stew. That encounter haunted his dreams, but good thing Alwin was an expert lucid dreamer and could turn them into popcorn with just a thought.

Alwin was laser-focused during the lecture and by that, he meant he was focusing on the small red dot produced by Milvus' laser pointer—a gift from Lapis apparently—as he droned on and on and on about the importance of using the terrain to your advantage. Today's specific terrain: the high ground.

By all means, he should be allowed to drift off into daydreamland, Alwin. Just look at his spar against Bion or even during the Forest of Beginnings. With the power of his Spirit Hands, he was able to launch himself and others straight into the sky and therefore he obtained the high ground. Wait, a second. Ground implies that it should be something that you can stand on, but Alwin couldn't stand on air. So did he really have the high ground? Better pay attention to class and... it's over. What a bummer. Good thing with the ability to multitask, he left part of his brain to actually follow along, while the other parts—this one here—had the freedom to start rambling in an internal monologue that only served to provide a deeper insight into Alwin's character.

This side of his brain was way more entertaining than listening to Milvus' stale lecture about the high ground and technically the low ground. It was just Milvus talking and talking for a few hours, only stopping to answer the occasional question and grab a sip of water—not fun to watch.

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Now that class was over, Alwin had to decide what to do today. Go and spar, train up his existing skills, or go to the library to conquer the library challenge. His heart told him to challenge the library while the serious-business-party-pooper brain of his insisted that he had to figure out the underlying mechanisms behind his Core Skill and species skills. The former would be way more entertaining, while the latter would consist of conversations between him and Milvus and maybe the occasional messing around in his Core. Unfortunately, the pressures of his self-imposed desire to be Valedictorian forced him to choose the latter.

Till now, Alwin still had no idea how they worked. For his species skills, he just had to think and they would do, no need for any complicated paper mache or even molding clay. For his Core Skill... a paperweight would be more useful.

As everyone departed the class, leaving just Alwin and Milvus alone, it was time to suck it up like sucking on an orange slice and confront Milvus. Yup, Alwin used the word confront just so that the ensuing conversation would seem a tad bit cooler in his head.

"Hey, Milvus. I have some questions."

"What seems to be the problem, Alwin."

"Well, I still have no idea how to use my Core Skill and you did mention that I should give it some time before I ask you again. It's been more than some time now, it's been a lot of time, so here I am to ask you again."

"Yes, your Core Skill, Devolution. I'm sorry to say this, but my guess on how you would go about using it is similar to Minister Lapis' theory, about you having to fill up that Devolution Counter of yours. My assumption on how you would fill that counter is similar to how you fill up the evolution counter, which is to say absorbing essence. Unfortunately, you'll have to wait until Minister Lapis is finished with her conference before you can continue the experiments on her Refinement technique. Now, is there anything else?"

Well, that was useless—this was definitely not Alwin's sudden onset of social anxiety kicking in and judging the quality of his conversation. Now, he could ask him more about his species skills—Dark Tackle and Yin-Yang Blast—or he could actually take the time to figure them out instead of goofing off. If anything he could just come back to Milvus after he had exhausted all options.

"Nope, nada, zilch."

"Okay, take care, Alwin. And thank you for... you know." Milvus dragged one of his tentacles across his lip.

Time to run off to the canteen and wait for Milvus to vacate the classroom as it morphed into the training grounds. Also, Alwin didn't want the teacher to judge him as he attempted to improve himself. He was fine when the other recruits or students or friends or however you wanted to categorize them were present, but when Milvus was there he felt like he was being judged. In all honesty that was probably the case, he was probably picking out the most promising students within the batch of child soldiers he was instructed to instruct.

The reason that Alwin had finally decided to improve his species skills instead of finding a new shiny skill to learn? Well, he could spin a reason about how learning the mechanisms of Dark Tackle could lead to breakthroughs in his understanding of Dark Elemental skills and spells. In reality, Alwin was currently too lazy to go all the way to the library and start browsing for a relevant skill book that would suit his current needs. There were so many factors that he had to consider now that he was actually taking things seriously—relatively seriously. Factors include range, elemental type, desired effects, offensive, defensive, supportive, or maybe even skills are a combination of them, how skills would synergize together, and so much more.

So, why deep fry his brain on the first day of returning to school when he could shallow fry it in an attempt to figure out what was going on inside his core whenever he activated his Dark Tackle. After that, he could medium fry his brain as he uncovered the secrets of his Yin-Yang Blast. Then, if he failed he could just ask Milvus who may or may not flambé him for taking such a long time to ask questions about a fundamental aspect of every monster.

Now that some time had passed thanks to this brief internal monologue, Alwin could make his way back to the training ground classroom where he could begin to practice his species skills. The classroom had been transformed into training grounds mode and that wasn't the main point. The main point was that his arch-nemesis, the scourge of the world, and the harbinger of all evil was now there taunting him. It was none other than the wooden training dummy!

Step number one on figuring out his Dark Tackle was to use it and who else was a better test subject than that smug-nose, blockhead wooden training dummy. Alwin activated his Dark Tackle, taking care to properly observe the inside of his core. What he saw was mana from his mana pool surging outwards, transforming into what seemed like darkness itself as it traveled out of his core. Next thing he knew, Alwin was forced to jettison himself forward toward the training dummy. Of course, that stupid blockhead didn't even have a scratch on it.

Alwin moved away from the training dummy and got back into position. There had to be a better way to get a good look at what was happening inside his Core during the Dark Tackle. Well, he couldn't find it right now, but he'd get it eventually. Might as well take out his frustrations against the wooden dummy.

Dark Tackle after Dark Tackle, dark mana surging out after dark mana surging out, thoughts whirling around his mind as he attempted to concoct an idea that would help him understand the process. Then a lightbulb turned on within his core—literally. Alwin had been hoping for a eureka moment as he tackled the splinters out of the wooden dummy; it turns out it manifested as a literal mental lightbulb within his core. Now he had another tool in his arsenal.

Scouring through his core with a floating lightbulb next to his consciousness, he dived into the darkness as it began to manifest again. The lightbulb pierced through the darkness, and a small part of the black mana started to turn white—reminiscent of his Yin-Yang Blast. As the mana rushed out of his core the words that came out of his mouth surprised him.

"Yin-Yang Tackle!"