Regaining his senses, Jason left his soul world, where he was still stuck, only to figure out that he was laying inside a basin.

The basin was filled with a strong medical solution that supplied him with nutrition and a calming sensation, while multiple high graded mana stones were placed around him additional supporting the provided nutrition supply,

Looking down at him, Jason noticed dried blood on his chest and arms.

However, rather than feeling weak, he felt extremely vigorous, full of energy, as he noticed Shane in the center of the magic circle, taking care of Dalia who looked similarly wrecked like he probably did.

`Shit! What happened?!` Jason almost shouted out only to notice that he was unable to talk, with a screeching voice leaving his mouth.

The vigorous energy within him, diminished slowly, replacing his energetic self with exhaustion.

Looking at Dalia´s well-being, his mana eyes told him that she used up a lot of mana, while the whole mountain of mana stones crumbled, without a single tiny mana particle left.

However what worried him even more right now, was that he couldn't see Scorpio, who should be directly next to Dalia in the center of the magic circle.

But there was nobody except his masters and it almost caused his heart to skip a beat, if he wasn't assured that his second soulbond was alive due to their connection, which seemed to have consolidated.

This shocked Jason quite a bit, but it was less important for him than figuring out Scorpio´s current well-being.

His soul connection with Scorpio seemed to be unstable but already fortified, while his soul world was a mess, to put it simply.

Jason´s soul world core increased in size, blurring his senses within the soul world, which worried him even more.

Releasing his mana, Jason wanted to search for Scorpio as his mana eyes noticed something directly next to him.

Following that, Jason heaved his body out of the basin, only to see Artemis sleeping next to him.

Scorpio, an 80 centimeter long, Scorpion with razor-sharp claws was next to her, while his whole body was enveloped with an overlapping exoskeleton with dark green and blue shining parts.

Sleeping next to Artemis, he seemed to have grown by almost three times in size, which shocked Jason, as he would have never imagined that something like that was about to happen, even if he imagined a small change.

Scanning through his second soulbond with his mana eyes, the first thing that jumped straight into his view was the color radiating from it, as it was dark-green, indicating the potential of an unblemished beast.

This caused Jason to frown lightly, as he couldn't even imagine how the following mana core cleansing would be, as the first one was already that devastating to his soulbond, himself, and even Dalia.

Now that he was standing, Jason cleansed himself, before he put on some clothes which Shane most likely took off, before he continued to inspect his soulbond, ignoring the searing pain inside his soul world, that continued to ravage its way throughout his body.

If Jason was sure the searing pain within him was bad, he would probably panic, but he knew that his soul energy was forcefully increasing in size by a few units, which caused the pain.

This was apparent, as he noticed Scorpio reaching the mid-awakened rank with a need of 60 soul energy units, amplifying his own soul energy by 15 units, thanks to his innate amplification of 1/3.

Previously, Scorpio only needed 15 soul energy units, but that more than tripled just like that which shocked Jason slightly, as he only wanted to cleanse his soulbonds mana core from impurities.

Instead, it seemed like Scorpio evolved in an incomplete form, as its exoskeleton showcased. 

This evolution was solely forced by the vast amount of mana and holy radiating light infiltrating him, changing his cells and it seemed like Dalia´s physique was the cause in addition to his soulbonds will to become stronger.

Frowning, Jason wasn't sure what to think of this incident, as everyone had to endure enormous pain due to the sudden metamorphosis.

Suddenly he remembered Dalia´s pale face with dried blood covering her whole body, as he stood up to look out for her.

Scorpio seemed fine, even though his evolution was only halfway finished which would complicate things somewhat, but it was nothing permanent, as he found Shane and Dalia once again.

Rushing towards Dalia, Jason noticed that she seemed unconscious, as he gazed at Shane, asking in a quiet voice.

"What the hell happened there? Scorpio would have died without me sharing his pain and why is Dalia unconscious? Is she fine?"

But Shane seemed as if he hadn´t heard his question, as two magic circles appeared next to Dalai with the dryads appearing within them.

Releasing their nature affinity mana and innate abilities to heal their contractor, Shane sighed in relief as he noticed Jason next to him.

Realizing what Jason asked, Shane sighed deeply in order to calm down his torment emotions as he was about to shout at Jason, which would not even remotely help either of them.

"Well….I´m not entirely sure because something like that has never happened before, but it looks like the holy radiant light that was supposed to solely cleanse your small Scorpion's mana core from impurities, caused a metamorphosis, changing its genetic model, enhancing it substantially.

Obviously, your soulbond evolved into a higher being, or at least it tried to which increased its rank.

As you might have noticed, Scorpio´s mana core is cleansed, but I doubt it can reach the magical rank with the utilized amount of mana stones, as most mana was most likely used for its evolution.

Both the cleansing and the evolution happened simultaneously, causing this devastating situation.

Fortunately, you forcefully transferred your soulbond´s pain towards yourself, because I doubt it would have survived otherwise. 

As for Dalia, she is fine and only unconscious because she tried to forcefully take the lead over her physique in order to change the trajectory of the holy radiant light to help out Scorpio.

But that's everything I know, Dalia should be able to tell you more, once she wakes up."

Shane explained before he returned his gaze back to Dalia before he picked her up.

"I think you should go home now. The last few hours were most likely extremely exhausting for both your mind and body. Take some rest and come back once you're fine.

Dalia will also need some rest."

Opening a spatial portal for Jason, he added quietly 

"By the way, congratulations on forming a fortified soul conjunction with your second soulbond, Little Monster!" 

As he released his mana to throw Jason through the portal.