After waking up early in the morning, Jason had to think carefully about his plans for the next 30 hours.
Without Artemis, his chances to hunt a five-star wild beast reduced drastically and Jason wasn't confident to kill one with his current strength.
His injury wasn't grave and wouldn't restrict his movements but his strength was the biggest problem, at the moment.
Thinking carefully, Jason decided to use the remaining energy within the mana stone to force a breakthrough of his rank.
Throughout the last two weeks, he had stabilized his mana core and in a week at most, he would be able to naturally enter the 4th Novice rank without issues but he didn't have that time right now.
The small mana stone Jason was left with was half-filled which was probably enough to force a breakthrough of his rank.
After forcing a breakthrough, his energy would be quite unstable for a while, before he could advance again, but it was his best option at the moment.
Once he advanced, his physique and mana core would grow in size, and he would be one step closer to the strength of a five-star wild beast.
With that thought in mind, Jason sat down. But before he would breakthrough, he still followed his daily routine and entered the soul world to practice the Heaven's Hell technique.
Due to his determination to practice the soul technique thrice a day, his soul energy increased slowly but steadily. Jason was hopeful that he would be able to get a soul energy of four before Artemis advanced again.
Leaving the soul world, he took the mana stone in both hands before releasing the remaining stored mana at once.
A small storm of thin mana enveloped Jason as his pores opened instinctively.
Absorbing the whole mana in his surrounding greedily, Jason´s mana core ached. His eyes turned red when drops of blood sprinkled the sleeping bag he was sitting on.
Blood oozed out of his pores while his head turned red.
The amount of mana he had absorbed was almost too much for him to handle at the moment when the mana core forcefully accepted the mana and increased in size.
The core however could only slowly enlarge its size, while Jason had to endure the agonizing pressure for quite a long time.
Fortunately, due to the enlargement of the mana core, the pressure slowly subsided and after an hour Jason could handle the pressure without any problems.
His body was enveloped with a white cocoon and only when his mana core reached the 4th Novice rank, did it completely disappear His physique also followed suit and reached a higher rank.
Because of Artemis' additional amplification, Jason had a mana core of a larger size and it was almost comparable to the 6th Novice rank while his physique was at the 5th Novice rank.
He was still much weaker than average five-star wild beasts but his chances to kill one with a crafty assassination or some other tricks increased by a lot.
Eating a small breakfast, washing up, and changing his clothes, Jason left the tent and entered the one-star plains' wild zone once again.
The increase of one's strength caused by the novice rank was minuscule, but Jason still felt much stronger today.
One could say that the wild beast and novice ranks were not even the beginning of one's journey in the vast world as each increase in level gave only slight enhancements in strength.
If Jason had a soulbond like Greg he would bash up all wild ranked beasts without any problems, but, unfortunately, that wasn't the case.
Almost a month had passed since Greg had formed his soulbond and the bull calf had most likely matured, with its strength at the later awakened rank or first evolved rank.
The amplification the bull provided to Greg was definitely a few times larger than Artemis' enhancement, even if Greg´s soul would only give him 1% share.
Even if Greg was at the 1st Novice rank with the enhancement of a strong soulbond like the reinforced horned bull, he would be able to easily crush numerous wild beasts just with his physique.
But luckily Jason didn't waste his time mulling over the what-ifs otherwise, he might be extremely frustrated and demotivated.
Strolling around the wild zone with his dagger firmly gripped, Jason felt lonely without his companion, Artemis.
To avoid that, he focused even more on his surroundings.
Many groups of youths were fighting large groups of beasts and Jason couldn't find any solo five-star beasts, so he honed his dagger skills while fighting three- and four-star wild beasts.
Until lunchtime, he hadn't found a single five-star wild beast. Disappointed, he went back into the dome in order to practice his Heaven's Hell technique.
After finishing lunch, Jason went out again straight into the wild zone where he saw a pack of 9 five-star greater horned wolves besieging a group of four youths who were trying to get into the dome.
Unfortunately, they were hindered by the beasts.
Before Jason did something rash, he activated his mana eyes to check if the group could handle the situation or if they needed his help.
Upon observing the youths keenly, he noticed that all of them were at the 7th Novice rank which was above average for their age. He believed that they would be able to handle one five-star Beast each with their superior equipment and armor.
However, Jason noticed something in particular.
Their equipment was good but not extremely expensive and even while being outnumbered, nobody pulled out a gun to save themselves.
Thinking about the situation they were in, Jason concluded that they didn't own a mana gun or the ammunition had already been used up, so he wanted to help them.
Maybe their martial art techniques were also not at par with the instinctive movements of a five-star wild beast, but Jason couldn't bring himself up to just watch someone dying in front of him and do nothing.
His heart began to thump loudly as he was well aware that he was probably being naive and stupid given his low rank, but he couldn't just let his brethren die without even trying to help.
The wolves had almost surrounded the small youth group and a few had already pounced on them when a black-haired golden-eyed youth appeared between two greater horned wolves that stood only two meters apart from each other.
Jason had no time to hesitate as he used almost a quarter of his stored mana to enhance his lower body.
With his breathtaking speed, he appeared between two greater horned wolves that were unaware of him creeping stealthily towards them.
He enhanced his dagger with a layer of mana before stabbing with it, drawing a clean cut at one of the wolves ' throats before he pulled the dagger out that was slick with blood.
Not a single noise escaped the wolf's throat and only a loud thump could be heard. Blood spurted out of its wound as the dead wolf´s body fell on the side.
But this wasn't all as Jason's eyes lit up when he spun around only to pierce the dagger into the bewildered greater horned wolf's neck. A loud crack resounded through the whole battlefield as the blade cut through the bones easily.
Because Jason had equipped his dagger with a layer of mana, the dagger's sharpness and firmness were enhanced. It was definitely strong enough to pierce through the cervical spine without many difficulties.
Jason had single-handedly killed two five-star greater horned wolves without much difficulty due to his perfect assassination attempt.
However, the battle was still not over as seven greater horned wolves were still alive.
And only five of them were already in a battle with the youths while another one was jumping into the fray.
But one of the greater horned wolves noticed that two of its pack members were missing when it heard two loud noises only a second ago.
Turning around, it saw the two dead wolves and a youth standing only a few meters away from itself, rushing at it with a fast speed.
Looking at the black-haired youth with blood-stains on his face, the wolf was immediately consumed by rage before it saw the youth's deep golden glowing eyes.
Its rage dissipated almost immediately without leaving any trace of it behind as the wolf´s body began to shiver, looking into these cold golden eyes.
The wolf was intimidated and it felt as if the Grim Reaper knocked at its door welcoming it to the abyss.
It wanted to retreat and run away from the youth as far as possible but before it could even turn around, the youth had closed the distance between them and was only a meter apart from it.
Jason noticed the wolf's hesitation but he wasn't sure why that was the case, as it was an extremely unusual sight.
Not caring about the situation, Jason used the newly obtained opening to slide under its stomach to avoid a sudden attack from its head.
Its stomach was cleanly cut open and blood fountains and organs spilled out onto Jason who jumped up after wiping his face.
He had used up more than half of his mana and he supervised the battle of the four youths and the remaining six greater horned wolves to help if needed.
It was seen as an immoral act to kill the prey of another person and Jason provided only a little bit of support.
Only slightly more than six minutes later the last wolf was finally finished off.
However, before that happened, Jason had already left the youths to pick up his three five-star wild beast corpses.
He had killed them so they belonged to him, while the youths didn't even think about taking them from him because they were grateful for his help.
Jason wasn't really good with social interactions and he left the youths after a short chat.
The group of four youths mainly thanked Jason and they wanted to give him something in return but he declined politely before leaving the scene.