During the rest of the weekend, Jerry had gotten only 3 out of the 5 geodes since they had spawned somewhere in other people's property. The geodes also weren't special, unlike all the previous ones.
The first one was 450 Experience, the second was 50 coins, and the 3rd one was 300 Experience, Jerry was quite unlucky this time around.
It was now Monday, and at 2 AM in the morning a geode spawned, but Jerry didn't want to look for it since he had school again, plus it was somewhere out of his reach.
At school another geode would spawn exactly at 8 AM when the first lesson began, but Jerry didn't have even the slightest bit of stimulation to go look for it. However when he went to the restroom to look at something on his phone after the first lesson was over, he found the geode inside the toilet. The white coloured spherical stone textured object didn't seem to be wet from the relatively clean water in the toilet at all, but Jerry didn't want to touch it with his hands so he summoned the geologist's hammer and opened it with the pick side while it was still inside of the toilet bowl.
[Inside of the shiny geode were : 100 Coins]
Quast and Jerry's school days began returning to their normal and boring state, they had 5 lessons on Monday, the third and fourth of which were PE.
But those PE lesson would be a little different, as there would be a person from the authorities with a special ability in the sport hall, she introduced herself.
"There is quite a lot to talk about, but I'll begin with a greeting." the average looking woman that was clothed in typical female office attire said. "Hello guys, my name is Juliette Brooks, and I am here from a company that the World Health Organisation, and some very important and rich people own, called 'Sylon'."
Juliette paused to think about what she was going to say and then continued.
"Sylon researches Mana and abilities, it owns multiple buildings across the world, and it just so happened that one was seemingly close to this city, together with that.. this is the only school here opened right now at this time of day." "I was sent here to check if you guys have started developing abilities." she cleared her throat with an ahem "My ability specializes in finding out whether you have started developing a power, how strong your Mana is, development potential and et cetera."
A student from the group raised his hand, and the PE teacher picked him. "What happens if we have an ability?" the student, Martin, said.
"Well, that will be decided after I give all of the information that I'll gather today to my higher-ups. Most likely you will get a contract if you want to work for Sylon." Juliette said, and looked at the crowd of students, but no one was raising their hand anymore. "Alright, I want all of you to come to me one by one when the teacher calls your name."
The first student was Albert, so he walked out of the crowd and towards where the teacher and Juliette were standing, the Sylon worker put her index finger on his forehead quite unexpectedly. What Juliette was seeing when her ability was activated was a shining blue spot on the foreheads of people, and when she touched that spot, she could feel the persons ability and the properties of their Mana.
Albert had below average Mana, and almost no chance of getting an ability, but he didn't know that, and went back to where all the students were. Juliette wrote something near the name of Albert on a document that was attached to a clipboard.
The 7th student was Jerry, he knew how to conceal his Mana by now, because he trained it a lot at home and fighting enemies from quests whilst using Fire Magic was also viable, so his Mana could appear average or below average, if so required, but concealing Mana to a degree that it was much lower than his original required a lot of mental energy. That's why he just let it be average by comparing what he felt the Mana of the people around him was.
Jerry had a Mana ability and two skills from the System, he wondered and worried a little bit if the person working for Sylon would be able to sense them, but he still walked forward.
Juliette put her finger on where the blue spot on Jerry's forehead was. She didn't seem surprised at all when she used her ability on him, so Jerry relaxed. What she wrote on the document before calling the next student was that Jerry Dankworth had a Heat ability that could also make small flames, quite a rare power for this early into Mana's existence. The outcome of this scenario would've been completely different if Juliette had stronger Mana than Jerry, and that was because people with stronger Mana could, most of the time, sense when someone with weaker Mana is concealing their original power.
The penultimate student that was called forward was Quast, he walked towards the teacher and Juliette like all the students before him.
The Sylon Worker was confused at first, but then as she looked more and more carefully at Quast.. she realized there was no blue spot anywhere on his head, and neither his body. That was because Quast had no Mana. He was currently the one and only human, or quite literally the only creature that was exposed to Mana that didn't have Mana in the entire world.
Juliette didn't want to look weirded out and gather attention to her and the student, so she still placed a finger on Quast's forehead, even though there was no blue spot. He looked at her, a gaze of awareness and another incomprehensible emotion, then went back to the group of students as she quickly wrote something on the document that was held by a clipboard.
After the last student was done, she said her farewells with the 10a and speedily looked back at Quast, who was talking with Jerry about something. Juliette Brooks would certainly have an interesting report to bring back to her higher-ups.
The final lesson was Geography, it was over pretty fast, and everyone went home.
Only a day and some hours remained until the quests were refilled.
Something about Jerry had changed a lot in the span of getting the System, namely he was going outside for walks much more.
At 1:40 PM he went outside and walked down to where the old part of the city was. There was a really calming river flowing through it, the river was just 15 meters in width, and a bridge above it connected the seperated pieces of land. Jerry was on that bridge at exactly 2:00 PM as a geode spawned exactly next to his foot. The white sphere with a stone texture captured his attention instantly and he picked it up just a second before it would fall into the river from the bridge.
[Inside of the shiny geode were : 140 Coins]
"Where are all the cool stuff that I was getting before?" Jerry thought and summoned the round, purple and malleable Amethyst Candy in his hand he looked at it when he was on land. "I wonder when to eat this guy.." he continued thinking, but put it back in the Item menu soon after.
Quast was watching videos at home when he got a message from Jerry at 3:02 PM. [wanna play something] it read on the messaging app, and then on the second row followed a [?].
They got in a call, and after some time of playing Jerry didn't want to play the game anymore so he asked "Do you have some scary stories or something?"
"Hmm, no, not really." "But I have a story from that time I worked in that fast food place in the city center, for when I was saving up for my computer." Quast said and tried to remember the details before continuing. "So there was this middle-aged dude that came in like every second day when we worked, but one day he just suddenly didn't come anymore. So about a week later, when there wasn't really that much work, me and my co-worker were just trying to make ourself seem busy and clean the counters. Our boss is in the back making the last thing needed to complete a pickup order that was due in a few minutes. After some time he just comes in the front with the finished order and puts it on the counter while we wait for the person that ordered to come and pick up their food. The boss looks at us and says out of nowhere 'Do you guys remember the guy that came in quite often to order something from here?' and we responded with an affirmitive, so our boss just breaks the ice quickly like it's no biggie 'Yeah, he got a heart attack and is currently in the hospital.' Me and my coworker looked at our boss and just waited for everything to settle in." Quast finished talking. "Not really a scary one, but its a story nonetheless."
"Damn.." Jerry replied. "So what happened to him?"
"I dunno, but he's definitely recovered I'm pretty sure, he also wasn't in the hospital for just a heart attack, but also some other medical problems if I remember correctly." Quast responded. "Man, that year of working in the fast food place felt really short."
It was now 7:33 PM and Quast decided that he didn't want to talk anymore, so he disconnected from the call. With his phone in hand he watched videos in bed while it was still a little bright outside, because it was almost summer.
Back at the Sylon, the document was given to the higher-ups by Juliette.