After leaving Akaza and the Iron Fangs, his next destination was Market Square.
Learning the two mental techniques of the Mad Lord was his next priority, and because he had little time left, he had to think of how to effectively manage his time.
At first, he thought of renting a room in the cultivation tower or going back to his dorm room to read the books of the Mad Lord, but this was not efficient enough for him.
Since he already knew that he would need beasts for the Eternal Mind Zoo technique, he chose to go to Market Square first to purchase a beast he could later kill.
He could have ordered for a beast to be sent to him, but he wanted to see the beast and be certain that it was a beast he’d like and not a pathetic beast he’d waste his money on.
Anything could be bought in market square, and purchasing demonic beasts was a normal thing for students in the academy.
Unfortunately for him, first years were not allowed to leave the clan unless they were given special permission by the clan.
Simon would have loved to search for his beasts on his own, but he could not leave the clan as a first year.
So, he had no choice but to go to Market Square.
When he got to the first store that sold beasts, he saw several beasts of different ranks.
He saw Lesser Beasts, Dire Beasts and Dread Beasts.
Out of sheer curiosity, he asked if the shop sold Calamity Beasts, and they did.
However, it was in a secure and hidden room in their shop, so he didn’t concern himself with it.
A Calamity Beast was equivalent to a Greater Demon, and even if his sea of consciousness might be able to subdue a calamity beast, purchasing it and killing it was a different matter altogether.
He wanted to purchase three beasts in total- A Lesser Beast, a Dire Beast, and a Dread Beast.
Although his sea of consciousness was unique and very powerful, he would definitely not start with a Dread Beast since that would be stupid in his own opinion.
Subduing the Will of a Lesser Beast was safer and would be much easier for him to do, and it would help him to understand more about the Eternal Mind Zoo technique.
He decided to pick the cheapest Lesser Beast and Dire Beast he could find.
As for the Dread Beast, he was going to pick the best he could afford.
The Lesser Beast he picked was a Gnawer.
A gnawer was basically a demon rat. It was thrice the size of an average rat, and Simon decided to pick three gnawers.
What better way to test a technique than to use some lab rats?
However, the moment he wanted to pay for the gnawer, he realized that he had forgotten something so simple due to the countless thoughts that were going through his mind.
He had forgotten that everything was three times more expensive for him, so he had no choice but to tell Akaza to meet up with him.
A single gnawer cost five (5) merits to purchase, and after Akaza met up with him, he bought three gnawers for fifteen (15) merits.
After getting a gnawer, Simon began to look for a cheap Dire Beast to buy.
A gnawer cost less than ten merits, but Dire Beasts cost at least a hundred merits.
The difference was staggering, and Simon knew that he was going to spend thousands on the Dread Beast he eventually chooses to buy.
When it came to the Dire Beast, Simon wanted the cheapest he could find, but after going through the beasts several shops had and seeing their prices, he decided to go for a beast that he would be okay with.
Simon also noticed something when going through the beasts. He noticed that many of the beasts, especially the cheap ones were docile and had been tamed by the stores.They had weak Wills.
And for some reason, he had a feeling that this would be detrimental to the Eternal Mind Zoo.
Though it would make it easier for him to subdue their Wills, he was fairly certain that the stronger the Will of a beast before its death, the stronger its offensive and defensive capabilities.
Because of this, Simon had to find a Dire Beast that was not too expensive and whose Will had not been tamed and broken by its captors.
It took Simon a little bit of time, but after going from one shop to the other, he finally found a suitable Dire Beast.
It was a demon dog, and it had just been captured by the shop owners.
It had not been tortured or trained by the owners, and this made it perfect for him.
He spent about four hundred (400) merits purchasing the demon dog, then he searched for the last beast he needed... A Dread Beast.
Just like when he was searching for a Dire Beast, he encountered the same problem where he had to look for a Dread Beast whose Will had not been destroyed or tamed by its owners.
And just as he expected, the price of Dread Beasts was in the thousands, so he had to look for a cheap Dread Beast whose Will had not been weakened.
This took him more time than he wanted, about an hour, but at the end of the day, he found a beast he was satisfied.
An Abyssal Grass Cutter.
Basically, a mantis.
The abyssal grass cutter was obviously not as small as a normal mantis. It was the size of Simon, and its appearance was also vastly different from a normal mantis on Earth.
The abyssal grass cutter cost Simon about five thousand merits, and this ate deeply into his account balance.
He was getting broke, and he knew it. For now, he was too worried to check his account balance and see how much he had left since he knew that he would feel an ache in his heart if he saw it.
When he first arrived in the academy, he thought that with Devour and a few other advantages he had over other Initiates, he would not have to worry about merits.
He thought that he would only need merits for food and a few other things, but now, he was beginning to feel the importance of having merits.
And he was very certain that he would need a lot more merits in the future, and this made him make a few changes to his plans.