Weakest Beast Tamer Gets All SSS Dragons

Chapter 461: Chapter 461 - Tamers War - After Storm - 2

Ren was again carrying Larissa, who remained unconscious from extreme magical exhaustion. Her breathing was stable but her face remained pale, showing consequences of having forced her abilities beyond the limit.

The weight in his arms was not only physical but also emotional... transporting someone who had risked any safety to help him, whose sacrifice had made the difference between success and failure.

”Are you sure it will be safe?” Liora asked, looking toward the horizon where occasional flashes from the aerial battle could still be seen.

Julius smiled with confidence.

”My father may seem casual,” he admitted, ”but he’s not stupid and won’t be defeated. It’s... complicated to explain, but he has ways of handling situations others would consider impossible.”

The certainty in his voice carried a childhood of experiences watching the impossible become routine when Dragarion was involved.

Luna, who was still processing everything she had witnessed, asked...

”And if he has very bad luck today and something happened to him?”

”Then it would be the end anyway,” Julius responded with brutal pragmatism. ”There’s no one else in the kingdom with power to face the last tamers Yino has been sending. So heading to the castle will be safe because when we arrive, things will have already ended one way or another... that’s certain.”

The logic was unforgiving but accurate...

Sirius, who had remained silent while carrying Selphira’s unconscious body, finally nodded in agreement.

Ren was also going to ask something about the king but...

The conversation was abruptly interrupted by a massive explosion that illuminated the entire horizon.

Sound arrived seconds later.

Julius observed energy spreading across the sky and smiled uncomfortably.

It was quite ”Dragarion-like” in its approach, but he hadn’t expected something so drastic so quickly. His father had the tendency to find solutions that were simultaneously good and completely disproportionate.

”What was that?” Luna asked, helping Ren carefully place Larissa in a more comfortable position.

”He probably destroyed the bridge considering the direction,” Julius responded, trying to sound more casual than he felt.

”The bridge?” Liora repeated, not sure she had heard correctly.

The concept was difficult to process... destroying something that had existed for generations, that defined the relationship between kingdoms. Now completely broken and isolated.

”My father has... the habit of seeking simple solutions to complex problems,” Julius explained while they began walking toward the castle. ”If he saw many enemy soldiers entering, he surely thought of the most direct way to stop the war.”

Despite his father having proven even more hasty than Julius had remembered, breaking the bridge meant a significant pause in the conflict.

Yino, facing such a situation, would have to retreat completely and seek alternative solutions, or even consider abandoning the conflict entirely.

They had no choice. With their main invasion route destroyed, continuing the war had become logistically impossible for the moment.

”So... did we win?” Liora asked with a bit of hope.

Julius considered the question while observing the last flashes of energy vanish on the horizon.

”For now it’s yet to be seen,” he finally responded. ”But knowing my father, it probably means only the beginning.”

♢♢♢♢

Kassian and Ravenspire had arrived shortly before the bridge explosion at the academy, where very few students remained attending their summer extra classes.

The place was almost empty, with only some dedicated few who had decided to take advantage of the additional week to improve their skills while others enjoyed vacations.

And of course, some hadn’t been able to return home for various less upright reasons.

Ravenspire still felt uneasy with Dragarion’s arrival at the battlefield.

That madman was still something from another level completely. His mana aura remained concerning to him even after so many increases from his four abyssal beasts.

The memory of their previous encounter was fresh and humbling, being casually swatted aside like an irritating insect by someone...

’Maybe if Yino’s strongest warriors all fought at once?’

Ravenspire still didn’t know the total scope of the power from the new potions Venmont and Bloodwyn had received, but didn’t have too many hopes after experiencing Dragarion’s power head-on again.

Being launched like a rag doll... and the pain was still fresh on his face.

Still, he certainly wasn’t invincible. With the level they had now, after transformations... maybe the three or four best warriors would be sufficient to face him.

But were they willing to risk everything in such an uncertain battle?

At least he wasn’t.

Kassian pulled him from his thoughts, still annoyed by the earlier encounter.

”That damn brat must have used some clever trick again,” he murmured, unconsciously touching where Ren’s punch had connected.

Although it didn’t hurt physically, his ego on the other hand...

”There’s no way an eleven-year-old...”

He abruptly changed the subject when Ravenspire looked at him with what was clearly pity at seeing him make more excuses.

”...I sense what little remains of my blood in the direction of the student building,” Kassian announced, pointing toward where his senses detected Klein’s familiar presence.

Ravenspire followed his gaze toward the student dormitories.

”Aren’t you worried that monster will follow us here?” he asked. ”Wasting time here after what happened to take a simple child...”

”Don’t worry,” Kassian reassured him with confidence. ”My perception is very sensitive when the threads aren’t connected... He surely won’t follow us because things at the bridge are completely out of control.”

Ravenspire remained skeptical, but concentrated and began sensing Venmont’s massive power even from here... now that they had gotten closer to the bridge área.

Now he had to agree with young Kassian.

The energy level being released there was sufficient to keep even that King occupied.

”Maybe I underestimated the next phase of our King’s plan,” he murmured, reconsidering his previous evaluations.

’With that power distributed among three tamers like us, would it be a safe battle against Dragarion?’

The mathematics were becoming more favorable, but that crazy old man still carried risks that made strategic withdrawal seem increasingly attractive.

Kassian pulled him from his thoughts again, clearly anxious to proceed with his plan.

”Klein will serve me well now that Kharzan ’broke’,” he explained with a disconnected and cunning expression. ”And although he’s not very remarkable, my pathetic brother...”

He paused, considering possibilities.

”I can surely mold him into a better figure now that I have one free space to work with. If I shape Klein or Leonel well, one of them can drag that Luna girl toward her inevitable destiny later...”

Ravenspire nodded, seeing the logic of securing more long-term options, but remained worried about more immediate matters.

”But if we can’t contain Dragarion,” he murmured, ”future plans for the gates can go down the abyss along with everything else.”

♢♢♢♢

Klein was sheltered along with others in the academy’s refuge.

Han stayed close, along with the six guard girls who had developed a monitoring routine around the area where Klein studied.

Academic staff auxiliaries helped organize supplies while other teachers and personnel remained vigilant, all waiting for news about the war’s development.

Classes had been definitively canceled due to the growing problem, and students had hidden along with staff, hoping good news would arrive about the conflict that had been escalating.

Normal academic life had ended for the foreseeable future.

Although Klein didn’t interact directly with Han and the guard girls, they did maintain constant observation of him. It was subtle but constant surveillance of the son and younger brother of characters they knew were problematic in the war conflict.

Everything remained in the same tense routine.

Klein had focused on improving his skills with intensity that bordered on sickness, taking advantage of every available moment to train and study.

Han continued sending ”harmless” intelligence reports to Yino, information he believed was low value. Although today he would realize it hadn’t been as unimportant as he believed.

The situation of Klein being constantly monitored would have been crucial information for Yino planning to take him. Or that’s what Han would think in the end, when he realized the implications of his apparently insignificant reports in today’s events.

But in reality, Klein would be dragged by his brother for reasons completely unrelated to Han’s reports... Information about ”purification” maintaining itself for a long time without exposure to abyssal energy was, in itself, something completely expected.

The irony was bitter... careful intelligence gathering rendered meaningless by family bonds that operated according to principles beyond planning.

Among teachers who had stayed to deal with students during the crisis were teacher Mei and almost only young auxiliaries who tried to improve their curriculum with great enthusiasm.

Lastly, as every year, some few veteran professors who literally dedicated their lives to the school also remained, refusing to abandon students regardless of danger.

One of them was the temporary auxiliary teacher who had covered Zhao and late Song’s place in classes that had been left uncovered. He was an enthusiastic young man with a stealth owl, somewhat weaker than Zhao’s mist owl but compensated in aura with pure dedication.

He wasn’t the one who felt the air’s disturbance first since Han had enhanced abyssal senses... But he was the first to raise his voice when everyone perceived it.

”Do you feel that?” he murmured, his owl moving with evident agitation.

The bird’s distress was infectious.

Han immediately went on alert. The guard girls instinctively positioned themselves together in defensive formation.

Everyone was tense except Klein... who had been too absorbed in his studies to notice the initial change in atmosphere.

It was then that the refuge doors shattered.

Kassian entered first, his presence immediately recognizable but transformed by something that made the air itself feel heavier. Behind him came Ravenspire, and it was his aura that made everyone in the room feel deep terror they couldn’t explain.

”Hello, Klein,” Kassian said casually, as if he had arrived for a normal social visit.