Earl quickly got off his bike as he parked it outside the school, he ran up the steps and ran towards his classroom bursting through the doors panting, " I'm....*pant*.....here", Earl said with sweat running down his face, everyone in the class ignored his existence, and pretended like no-one had walked in, however his teacher, Mr Adam closed the textbook he was reading and looked over at Earl, "It's nice for you to finally join us Earl, when my class is already over" he said while giving Earl a death glare, Earl seeing his upset teacher quickly bowed his head remorsefully, along with the top half of his body down "I'm sorry sir I just overslept", Earl said in an apologetic voice, Just then a female student suddenly spoke up, "It's not his fault Mr Adam, I heard that people who have zero mana have a brain defect, so they need more sleep or else their brains wouldn't function properly", laughter filled the classroom as she finished her sentence, and Earl couldn't do anything other than stand there, "Okay that's enough" Mr Adam said as he gestured Earl to take his seat, "Now before you all leave, you should know that, next month you'll be required to fill in a highschool that you'll be attending as alchemists, and submit it by then, but, you'll have had to pass your final exam, and if you haven't done that by Friday, you'll have to drop out", he said as he looked over at Earl's direction, everyone in the class knew who he was referring to, and it just had to be the manaless kid, the final exams are taken before getting into highschool, basically it was their report card or means of admission into a school, and although not all people had finished their final exams, Earl had failed all the physical exams, his outstanding performance in the written exam wouldn't be enough to give him a passing grade, because he knew all this, Earl just hung his head and gave a slight nod, Mr Adam seeing his response continued, "that's it, head over to your next classes".

Although Earl had come late to school, he had only missed the first period, and had managed to attend all other classes, although he had to endure the constant bullying, it happened everyday, so he just had to bear it. It was the last class before they were done for the day, and Earl, along with his classmates were sitting outside waiting patiently for their teacher to arrive, the last class was practical alchemy, and although the class didn't let the students perform too strenuous alchemy, it covered basic spells and a little advanced moves, primarily to prepare them for my advanced skills and spells which required prior knowledge of mana control and channeling.

Finally after 30 minutes of waiting, Miss Edna, their practical alchemy teacher came walking over wearing her usual high heels and makeup, along with a small red gown, "sorry I'm a little late kids, I had business to take care of", she said while giving an innocent smile, 'a little late?, we only have like 20 minutes left for this class, let's just get this over with', this was not only the Earl's thought, but the class thought this too, Miss Edna always came to class late, the students had gotten somewhat used to waiting for her, but today she came really late and ended up wasting most of the students time, "Anyway..., we don't have any time left for today, so I'll just have you guys do a quick exercise", Miss Edna said as she placed her purse down and pulled out an orb, she held it in her hands as she addressed the class.

"Okay then, class this is an alchemy orb, it is used to help you students with mana control, as you all know alchemy can only be achieved with a steady flow of mana, the steadier your flow the better you'll be at alchemy, and the better your flow, the brighter this crystal ball will glow, I'll now demonstrate", Miss Edna said, she then put out her hand over the orb, and soon a blue light could be seen leaving her hand and entering the ball, the ball soon started shining brightly, and was relatively hard to look at, the flow of the blue particles became less and less and eventually stopped, the ball too soon started to dim down, until it was back to its original transparent self.

All the students were in awe after witnessing what just happened, a few questions were asked here and there, regarding how the ball worked and how to maintain a steady flow of mana, Miss Edna gave a simple explanation which cured most of their curiosity, "this ball is made with a special beast crystal which can detect mana, it's kind of like a light bulb, when electric current flows into them, they grow bright, the more current, the brighter it shines, that's kinda like the same principles, the more mana you pour into this ball, the brighter it shines,... and as for the other question, it's all about concentration, a steady flow can only be achieved when you concentrate hard enough" a short and detailed answer, the students were still fascinated by the alchemy ball, so she called up each student, one by one to use the orb. Most of the students that had used the orb, made it glow bright enough to light up a room, but none were nearly as bright as Miss Edna's, they were a few talented ones who's orb glowed almost as brightly as Miss Edna's, this included Jake, who's orb shined the brightest amongst all his classmates, and Nora Huddersfield who was also one of the smartest students, each student had a turn, and eventually it was Earl's turn to use the orb, as he walked towards the front of the class, people started laughing, he could hear the comments his classmates made such as "dork, orphan, or grandpa", but he decided to ignore them, he walked up to the front of the class and stood in front of the alchemy orb, as soon as he touched it though a message appeared

[Intermediate beast crystal found, Would you like to take it?]

[Yes/No]

This was a surprise to him, he had mostly forgotten about the system, but what surprised him was the options the message had given him, the system was asking him if he wanted to take the beast crystal in the alchemy orb, an intermediate beast crystal was not hard to come by, but he had a feeling that if he took the beast crystal they would definitely find out, due to the fact that once a beast crystal left an alchemy item, it would immediately shatter, not to mention he wouldn't know what to do with it, and if they discovered that the beast crystal was missing, all blame would definitely fall on him, it was a risk that wasn't worth the reward so he declined

[No]

[Intermediate beast crystal found, would you like to absorb its mana?]

[Yes/No]

Yet again the system had given him another option, only saying this time he would absorb its mana, this seemed more profitable because if there was no physical reaction to the alchemy ball, it would make sense since the beast crystal was still technically inside, and no-one would notice if all the mana was drained, plus if it did work, there was a chance that he would be able to perform alchemy, after pondering for a moment he decided

[Yes]

Just then he could see the blue particles Miss Edna had used in putting her mana into the orb, only now the reverse was happening as mana came rushing into his body, He could immediately feel a rush of power flooding his body, he could suddenly feel all his senses come alive and soon his system started flooding with messages, but he ignored all of them as the feeling was overwhelming, he tried his best to maintain his composure, but all his classmates along with Miss Edna had seen him struggle to stand up right

"Young man, are you okay??" Miss Edna asked while looking at Earl as he began to sweat, seeing this Miss Edna quickly spoke up "Young man, you don't have to push yourself so much you can let go and try again next week" she said while walking towards Earl, but before she could get close he saw a message

[Mana successfully drained]

[Mana: 250/250]

[Quest complete: absorb mana]

[Reward: 15 Exp points]

[Congratulations You are now level 2]

[Congratulations You are now level 3]

[Quest complete: open system 5 times]

[Reward: 5 Exp points]

[Exp: 5/20]

He looked at the system messages confused, as to what happened, an intermediate tier beast crystal was so powerful that it had not only leveled him up twice, but had also gave him 250 mana stat points, he was sure that his mana was just zero before but now it was all the way up to 250, which meant one thing

'I can perform alchemy now', the realization had hit him, and a giant grin appeared on his face, "Yes!!!!" he screamed in excitement, "Ahem" Miss Edna who was behind him quickly interrupted, "I don't know why your so happy even though you failed but please go back to your seat", Earl's face went red with embarrassment as he walked back to his seat and sat down, "Well with that we finish, don't forget, to submit the highschool application forms, and with that you guys are done for the day", everyone then went on to their homes.

On reaching home, Earl remembered all the other system messages he had ignored, and decided to open it once he would get home. On getting home, he didn't see his grandpa at the counter, so he just walked on upstairs to his room and locked the door behind him, he then opened his system and read the messages that he had skipped

[5 stat points obtained]

[Can be used in enhancing speed, strength, agility, stamina, defense, resistance or mana]

He decided to use his 5 stat points on defense and resistance, as they were do lowest, not to mention his mana was currently at 250, bringing up each stat to be

[Strength: 5]

[Speed: 5]

[Agility: 5]

[Stamina: 4]

[Defense:4]

[Resistance: 2]

[Mana: 250/250]

He was satisfied with the stats he saw, as he preferred a more balanced look, than an unbalanced one, but he still couldn't quite wrap his head around one stat

[Spiritual Energy: 50/50]

He didn't know what it meant or how it affected him, due to the fact that when he tried reading the tab under it, it just showed an error message, he still tried to figure out what was going on when he heard a knock on his door.

*KNOCK*KNOCK*, hearing the sound of knocking on his door, he quickly went and opened it up and saw grandpa Ollie standing with his trusty clay pipe in his hand, he puffed out a cloud of smoke before speaking "may I come in?, or are you still too busy with your er..... business?", "I told you I wasn't-" Earl tried to clear things up but was cut off by his grandfather "That's not why I came here, I came her to give you this", he then pulled out a pendant from his pocket, it was a beautiful blue gem, it had diamonds going round it, and a normal iron lace.

"What is it?" Earl asked, he hadn't seen such a beautiful gem before and it just looked captivating, "Your mom told me to give this to you when you were about to get into high school, but I can't hold onto it any longer so here, take it", Grandpa Ollie then grabbed one of Earl's hands and placed it into the palm of his hand, and started leaving the room, "T...Thank You" Ollie said as tears ran down his face, he never thought his mother would leave something as beautiful behind for him, and seeing as how expensive it looked, he could tell that it was something of great value, "Don't cry boy be a man" grandpa Ollie said without turning back, as he left the room 'how did he know I was crying?', Earl thought, but it didn't matter, his grandpa was right, this wasn't the time to shed tears, he had to concentrate on his goals and be a man, Unknown to him grandpa Ollie was referring to himself.

Immediately after grandpa Ollie gave the pendant to Earl, he started crying waterfalls, so much so that he had to remind himself verbally "Don't cry boy be a man ", he didn't look back, because he didn't want Earl to see him crying so pitifully, so he just rushed downstairs, to lock up the shop. Meanwhile in Earl's room, he put on the pendant and began sorting through his system messages when he saw a message

[Skill unlocked: Third eye, level 1]

[Skill is always active, gives the user a feeling of danger, to alert him/her for an incoming threat or attack]

The description was perfect and explained everything Earl needed to know, all he needed to do was test the skill, but he couldn't right now, because according to the description, he had to be in danger to for it to work, he then continued looking through his system till he realized something,

'If I have mana now, doesn't that mean that I can perform alchemy?', it made sense, because all an Alchemist needed to perform alchemy was mana and now that he had that, he could perform alchemy, with that needed his grimoire, and just like last time, by thinking of it, it appeared, when he opened it up, he was quickly disappointed as all the pages were still blank and empty, but then a message appeared again

[Vlad Talisman activated, please select one type of Alchemy]

[Earth Alchemy]

[Air Alchemy]

[Fire Alchemy]

[Wind Alchemy]

[Lightning Alchemy]

[Water Alchemy]

[Wood Alchemy]

[Metal Alchemy]

[Beast Alchemy]

[Food Alchemy]

[Rubber Alchemy]

[Strong Alchemy]

...

...

...

...

[Create New Alchemy]

The list was long and didn't go into detail into most of them, but when he got to the bottom of the list, he saw the 'create new alchemy' option, and was so tempted that he didn't even know when he clicked on it.

[Input name of new Alchemy]

A message suddenly popped up, he was shocked at the fact that he clicked on it, but wasn't totally disappointed, so he gave it some thought and decided on its name

[White Alchemy registered successfully]

He then noticed that in his Affinity tab, it now displayed White Alchemy as his affinity, another message then appeared

[Quest completed]

[Skill unlocked: Spell Weaver]

[Skill allows user to create new spells from either the combination of two already existing compatible spells, the enhancement of a current spell, or of the users imagination]

[Grimoire will only display spells created by you]

After reading everything, and processing the information, he understood what it meant and soon had second thoughts concerning his choice, creating a new alchemy all by oneself is one of the hardest things to do, but there's nothing he could do, and would only make himself worry even more, "Earl, It's time for dinner", grandpa Ollie yelled from across the house, "okay I'm on my way" Earl replied as he put away his grimoire and went to have his dinner, and after that he went straight to bed.

A knock came early in the morning on the door, Earl lazily got up as his grandpa was still sleeping, and walked down the stairs as he was annoyed at who would come to disrupt his Saturday morning, he opened the door to see Mr Adam there, " Mr Adam?, what are you doing here so early?, if you wanna buy anything, you'll have to wait for my grandpa to wake up" Earl said while rubbing his eye with his hand, "Actually I'm here to grade you on your final exam", Mr Adam said in a very serious tone, Earl's eyes suddenly bulged out at his teacher, "Huh!!!???"