The Team leader said disdainfully, "Ironically enough, all the Beasts that ambushed us, except for one, all of them actually chased behind the fleeing Masters."
But at this moment, the Female mercenary interjected, her tone hesitant, "Leader, I didn't have the chance to tell you this before, but… that might not actually be the case. As they fled, I heard them say something… disturbing."
Everyone turned to the woman, looking at her intently, and she spoke, "The Beast Tide!!!"
She paused after those words, but those words alone were enough to fill everyone's hearts with incomparable dread.
Then she continued, "I heard them say that the southern rear of the Greenroot Guild's Base has been breached."
Everyone instantly stood up as panic spread among them the moment they heard the news.
Even Kale wore an incomparably grave look unlike ever before.
He narrowed his eyes, looking at the female mercenary in an almost threatening manner, and asked in a solemn tone, "Are you speaking the truth?"
She rebuked in displeasure, "I only heard them whisper those words; how can I know whether it was true or not?"
It was clear that the woman wasn't feeling great about that fact either. Kale closed his eyes and rubbed his temples in frustration. He was genuinely scared.
As for the rest of the members of that small mercenary team, it seemed like they were already losing their minds.
"Oh the Dragons, we are going to die!!!"
"We might as well bury ourselves in the mud, instead of being eaten alive by the Beasts."
"If the Southern rear is breached, It's only a matter of time before an endless number of powerful Beasts flood the entire forest."
"Damn, damn it, Leader, I fucking told you we should not risk ourselves for this damned job; the people on Base had already said that the Beast Tide would hit within a few weeks at most."
Despair-filled voices rose one after another; faced with the certainty of death, apart from the Mercenary Team Leader and the female, none amongst them were experienced people who had faced the threat of death before.
So, it was quite painful to see their real cowardly side in times of danger.
Kale turned towards them and scowled, his eyes flashing in blazing green for a moment, "CAN YOU ALL SHUT THE HELL UP…."
The moment the members of the mercenary team stared into Kale's blazing green eyes, an unknown fear gripped them. It was an incredibly faint feeling, but the fear existed nonetheless, and everyone went quiet.
Not having the courage to speak anymore.
Kale sighed and looked at the leader. "Why do I feel the presence of a Tamer in all of you, but it's so vague that I could barely sense it?"
The Team leader's eyes turned complicated; he revealed after a pause, staring at the ground, "We are what you call Failed Tamers; we have lost our first Beasts one way or another."
"And that, in fact, is the true reason why we took on this once-in-a-lifetime mission for going into the Swamp Hatchery, that maybe, just maybe, we could find Beasts that could suit each of us."
"After all, that might be the only place to have a second chance for people like us," he added in a lost tone.
Kale's eyes shone in understanding; he asked, "Team Leader and the miss, I still don't know your names yet."
The Buff man chuckled and said, "You can call me Fabio, and this is Paula."
Kale nodded; as for the rest, he ignored them, not because he was arrogant, but only because he didn't have enough time in hand.
The Cursed Tamer asked, "Do you mind if I scan all of your bodies with my mana? I want to see what Beasts you are compatible with."
Fabio nodded immediately, and so did Paula; the rest had no choice but to agree.
Kale put his hand on Fabio's shoulder and prompted mentally, 'System, scan him through the Gene Lab.'
[Scanning all biological and metaphysical data of the Awakened entity named 'Fabio']
[Scanning…. scanning…]
[Ding!! Scan completed, the Awakened named 'Fabio' only has compatibility to initiate bonding with the Beast species of Pyro Cobra.]
Then Kale moved to scan Paula and the rest; the system obediently displayed the same set of information, one after another.
With another mental command, out of nowhere, exactly 8 palm-sized creatures of various races appeared right onto the ground, and everyone from the mercenary team stepped back, shocked.
And when the 8 of those people's eyes landed on the creatures, their eyes went as wide as saucers; they only dreamed of these Beasts in the night, harbouring a false hope in their hearts that they might one day come to possess those extremely rare creatures.
"This… this, how could this be??"
At this point, Fabio was questioning the very reality around him, looking at the red flaming Cobra, one of the most powerful and rarest of the serpentine species, a creature with overwhelming growth potential.
A Tamer possesses 7 total bonding slots, and they can only tame one Beast with the ascension of each Awakened rank.
But just like how a Tamer could possess the highest potential depending on their first Tamed Beast, on the other hand, this Path also has great disadvantages.
With the loss of every Beast, the Tamer would regress to a rank lower.
To fill that empty Beast slot to recover their power, they have to find a very specific Beast unique to themselves, and this requirement is set at random for every such Tamer by Nergal's World Will itself.
It is the World Will's way of making sure to punish the Tamers if they lost their Tamed Beasts. Even without that, the backlash from losing a Beast is extremely severe.
Kale did not observe the shocked faces of the mercenaries; his gaze was fixed on the 8 newborn Beasts, after his bonding with Neo was over within the Hatchery.
Kale had naturally taken pretty much all the thousands upon thousands of Beasts that had just hatched from their eggs into the Gene Lab's system space, which could now store living beings.
From there, he brought out eight of the right Beasts suitable for these eight people, which were all amongst the newborn Beasts in his possession, fortunately.
The eight Beasts, all of them extremely rare and powerful species, stared towards him with lingering fear, or to be precise, they were standing still in fear of Neo.
The Cursed Tamer commanded his Hydra through the bond, 'Neo, make them advance to Feral rank; I know these things have more than enough energy to break through directly.'
As Neo was sitting atop Kale's head, one of its three heads bit him playfully, as if expressing annoyance or unwillingness to do such a tedious task. Still, the other two heads at the same time hissed threateningly at the eight fledgeling Beasts.
All eight of them trembled for a moment and looked at each other, but in the end, they could only relent against the monstrosity named the Nemesis Hydra.
Bang!!!
Bang!!!
Bang!!
One by one, from all of the tiny figures, power exploded forth; Kale could clearly see the different hues of colour contained in that energy oozing out of the Beasts, clearly different from the mana that humans used, or the worldly ambient mana available in the air.
Within a few minutes, as the creatures had all broken through, their size and power all grew.
All eight of them stared at Neo threateningly, now suddenly feeling courageous due to their breakthrough, yet when the three heads of the Hydra stared back coldly, they wore a condescending look.
It was as if Neo was intentionally provoking them; Kale could almost taste those words.
"Go on and attack, just try me…..!!!"
This time, Neo did not even growl, because the Arrogance of the Nemesis Hydra knew no bounds, and even then, all eight of those Beasts still lacked the courage to follow through and attack together.
Kale said to the mercenaries, "Go and bond with them; they won't retaliate."
At this point, the minds of these people had already gone completely blank, because Kale had just shattered all sorts of common sense right in front of their eyes.
Not only could his monstrous abomination of a summon command the species of these Powerful Beasts when creatures of far higher rank would not be able to do so, which in itself was absurd.
Then the Hydra forced these creatures to advance to the Feral rank so that the mercenaries could form bonds with the Beasts, even when the creatures clearly did not want to.
Sweat covered the back of Fabio; he was absolutely and positively sure in his mind that this kid in no freaking way was the same brat that carried the dead weight for his mercenary group for just some scrap money and did not have the coins to go to the capital.
Some ancient expert definitely took over this kid's soul, concluded the mercenary team leader, nodding repeatedly at his own hypothesis.
And just like the Cursed Tamer had said, as the eight mercenaries initiated the bonding ritual, the Beasts indeed did not reject them despite their immense unwillingness.
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