We sat back in our seats. Lei stared at his paper intensely. There were several magical seals on the papers.

"Were these not there when you got them?" I whispered.

"No, they actually had very little written. They looked like permission forms more than anything."

Mr. Suzuran swung his hands behind his back and smiled. "Surprising that this is your first time seeing one of these." He sighed. "Then again, Mr. Obi did make sure to keep you kids away from the honor courses for your first year here."

"So, what is it?" I asked.

"They look like summoning talismans," Nyima said.

"Indeed," Xue said as she picked up her pen. As she wrote her name, prana flowed into the pen. Once she finished, the paper glowed bright violet and rose into the air. It curled into a ball and turned into smoke. Once it disappeared, a small purple cauldron with moons on it appeared.

"A cauldron?" Lei said, eyes wide.

Mr. Suzuran smiled. "In your first year, you had to share the same ones. As second years, you get your own. It isn't as good as something you might eventually produce using tool synthesis, but it should work for what we're going to be doing here."

"Well, there is a chance it might be better," Eien said, smiling.

"What do you mean?" I asked, tilting my hand.

He smirked as his paper rose into the air. "The ingredients within are the same, but the quality depends on the prana of the wielder."

"Ingredients?" Lei asked, blinking.

When had Mr. Suzuran put them in? While we were talking during note-taking?

"Yeah, the paper had invisible ink that summoned items pre-arranged for me and put them together using the charm I wrote down. I made it so that it would make cauldrons. It can also be used to make cheap weapons, but that's a different charm pattern."

Lei grinned. "So the printer wasn't a normal one?"

Our teacher chuckled. "It can work as one if we wanted it to, but its main purpose is for things like this. The ingredients themselves are procured from dwarves. I traded some cultivation pills for them. It's really simple."

"Dwarves?" Nyima asked.

"Yeah. They're a very entrepreneurial people. The invisible ink parts were a sort of receipt. Your sign calls them forward. I gave the dwarves all of your names, so if someone outside of this class signed them, it wouldn't do a thing. My charm activates as soon as they're present. It is a super quick process. Blink, and you miss it."

"I think I did see some items floating. There was some Ginoko ore and some crystals," Lei mumbled.

Eien smirked. "You must have some impressive vision."

Mr. Suzuran nodded. "Indeed. Wonder if it's his own or the abysmal."

My little bro crossed his arms and grinned. "Mr. Cat has nothing to do with it."

Mr. Cat? He named that creature? Couldn't he have gone for something better, at least?

I gasped. "Wait, but Lei's energy is behaving a tad odd. Wouldn't it affect his cauldron?"

Lei smiled as prana went through his pen. "I just need to ensure that what I channel is good." He wrote his name rapidly and stared at the paper.

I couldn't see it earlier with the other two, but with his, I could make out some things flying around as the paper crumpled and unleashed smoke.

They came together to form a deep-green pot with several spirals made up of zig-zags.

Lei hugged his new cultivation pot. "Seems it came out good."

I furrowed my brow. How could he tell that by a single glance?

Taking a deep breath, I channeled my prana into my pen as Xue, Eien, and Lei had done. Wait, how had Xue known to do this? Was this the process when it came to talisman-making? She had said it was similar to one.

My paper flew up and formed a purple pot similar to Lei's, except the patterns were of circles within circles like soundwaves coming out.

"Alright. Looks like everyone has their cultivation pots done," Mr. Suzuran said, smiling. He snapped his fingers, causing several ingredients to appear on the table. "Try to do as the notes you took earlier said. If you need a demonstration, I'll be happy to show you."

Kun's pot also looked like ours but with a pattern closer to Lei's. Was it because they were both boys? Or because earth and lightning had zigzags and jagged lines in common?

Lei scanned his notes repeatedly.

"Why are you nervous? Didn't you make pills before with your team when you took your Secundus exam?" I asked.

He smiled. "I'm not nervous. I simply don't wanna mess anything up. If anything, I have to be careful because I have more experience making cultivation pills."

Our teacher smirked. "Indeed. But if you know the process, it should come easy."

I picked up some of the ingredients on the table. These were pretty mid-quality from the look of things. Though, I might've been wrong. I was no Hal, Adela, Arima, nor Zelde. Hmm, I understood why Adela didn't have this class, but why had Hal not gotten it? Jude did say he wasn't living up to his full potential. Hmph, was he the type who wanted to coast in life? Where was the fun in that?

With a gust of wind, I lifted the ingredients into the pot. Right now, my focus had to be on making the stamina pills. Lei didn't always remember to carry his inhaler, so the chances he would make these when needed weren't the greatest.

***

I sighed as I stared at my jar of stamina pills. Mr. Suzuran said they were low-grade when I showed them to him for grading.

Lei patted my back. "There, there, Yen."

I pouted. "I don't need consoling. Tell me, how did you make a better one than me?"

"I followed the instructions, of course!"

My eyes narrowed. "I did too!"

He rubbed his chin. "Hmm, maybe you put too little prana. Or maybe your elements are a bad matchup."

I blinked. "My elements?"

"Lei has a point there. One's elements have to be taken into account when grading potions and pills. You probably forgot since it has been a while. As I mentioned early in my Potion class last year, not everyone is adept at the same stuff. In general, fire and plants are the best to have. If you have both, then you've got yourself the cultivation jackpot. Water, metal, and earth are also good. But fire is the best when it comes to refining. A soup with good water isn't very good unless cooked. Light and electricity work too, but the latter is much more unruly." He smiled. "Thankfully, your brother has some good prana control."

Lei beamed.

Eien grinned as well. No wonder he had produced the best one in the class. The guy had fire magic. Nyima, Kun, and Arima did well too. Although all but the latter had an element that was great for cultivation and prana restoration pills. Then again, spirits were the most supernatural element. And she had access to ghost fire.

"Bet Cart can make some high-quality pills," Lei said, grinning.

True. His fire magic wasn't impressive in terms of scope, but it was intense.

"Adela really hit the jackpot," Nyima said, smiling.

"She is great. I felt like there wasn't much I could teach her," Mr. Suzuran said, laughing.

The bell rang.

I put away my jar of restoration into my backpack. "We should get going."

"Okay," Lei said, standing up.

I sighed. "I'll just have to make you restoration tea."

Lei grinned. "Sounds good! I prefer tea. Less bitter. Plus, I can add honey to it!"

I smiled slightly. Good thing potions came easier to me. It would have been nicer if my sound were more useful for making them. Hmm, maybe I should've used my sound waves to heat up the cauldron as I did with my potions. But that was a difficult task without a medium like water to trap and channel the resulting heat. Air sadly had a lower storage capacity than water.

I might need to get some heating stones like ignistone. Actually, why didn't Mr. Suzuran give us heating stones? He did in his potion class last year. Could he be trying to make us realize our strengths and weaknesses? Or perhaps test our craftiness. Or maybe that's just the difference between honors and a basic course.

"I'll be sure to make you some as soon as possible," I said as I opened the door.

"Wai-" Lei called out, but he was too late as I bumped into something. Or rather, someone.

"In a hurry?" the person I had bumped into said, laughing.

I grumbled as I looked up at Hal. "Why are you here? Wait, how did you make it here so fast?"

"Uh, I can teleport."

"Why did you walk around with Jude earlier?" Kun said, laughing as he walked over.

Hal grinned. "I was showing him around. That way, he can teleport to them too!"

"I thought teleportation was against the rules except in emergencies," Nyima said, shaking her head.

Sarah narrowed her eyes at Hal.

He laughed nervously. "It is, but I was too excited! I even finished my last class super early. Got to take a nice nap, so I'm raring to go!"

Lei chuckled. "I would do the same too. Well, except if Mr. Obi's the teacher. He would probably scream at me or worse."

Mr. Suzuran laughed. "That does sound like something Akinari would do."

He was on a first-name basis with that ogre? Well, they were coworkers. Even Ms. Zettai and Ms. Key, who hated each other, called one another by their given names.

"Why were you excited?" Xue asked, tilting her head at Hal.

Hal grinned and pointed at our teacher. "I got an internship with Mr. Suzuran."

"Ehh?" I said.

"What? Is it that surprising?"

"Wow, doesn't that put you at the same level as Adela?" Lei said, grinning.

Hal put his hands on his hip and nodded. "Yup!"

"Hmph, you look like a penguin right now," I mumbled.

Nyima snickered. "You're right."

Sarah looked away, trying not to laugh.

Xue sighed. "You would think he would become a bit more humble after everything he's been through."

Hal's cheeks reddened, but he continued grinning like an idiot. It really was no wonder that he and Kun got along so well.

I grabbed his arm and pulled him to the side. "Psst! How do you heat your cauldron?"

"Oh, that? I usually add water and use a chemical reaction to heat it."

I sighed. "That makes sense, but we had to make a pill with no water provided, so only Sarah and Nyima got to use it."

He rubbed his chin. "So you used prana as a medium, huh? Hmm. That can be hard to do with your elemental mix."

I crossed my arms over my chest. "Tell me something that I don't know."

He tapped his head. "Hey, I'm thinking here. Oh! How about making a whirlwind within the pot and using vibrations?"

I blinked. "Will that heat things up?"

"Not exactly, but you can probably make a high-quality powder. Then it's just a matter of turning it into a pill. In a real-world scenario, the powder itself will probably serve the purpose you're after."

I smiled and patted him on the arm. "I see! Thanks a lot, Hal!"

He winced. "Hey, careful! You're going to break it."

"Ahh, sorry!"

He smiled. "I'm just kidding, but you do have a mean slap."

I copied his pose from earlier. "Well, I do love to train my body! Unlike a certain someone."

Hal laughed. "Kun?"

"Yen, Hal," Kun said, glaring at us.

"Uh, I better get going! See you later, Hal! And thanks again for the advice!"

He waved. "No problem! Any time!"

Come to think of it. This was the second time that guy had cheered me up. Though, he had an odd way of doing so. Still, it was nice to know that I could count on him.

**Solar Note: Hope that you enjoyed the chapter ^_^**