Chapter 544: Distributed Hunting Trials

Gunjin's promise was more than just words: Kai immediately received a scroll that could communicate to all its sibling scrolls, creating an elite network, which granted him the ability to request teleportation at will. It was a huge privilege, and he felt a grateful impulse not to waste it. So, as much as he wanted to go visit Zae Zin Nim, he restricted his teleportation to mission critical trips.

Exactly how much latitude he had was an open question. He had the support of some administrators, like Gunjin, and some elites, like Sheiri. But Yuinafal was actively working against him, and Kai had rubbed many people the wrong way with the revolution in Krysal. Best not to test those alliances.

Instead he relied on other connections: he sent a message to Razz, who was still in Krysal, to gather up all the students. Because some, like Mariyay and Tori, had clear plans of training, he ended up with Ankrastor, Kyridnyiam, Untariin, and Kifaela - more importantly, he got to see Razz himself.

"Kai!" The younger man rushed to shake his hand with a grin. "I've been wanting to talk to you, but you're always rushing around everywhere."

"And I'm afraid I'm rushing off again," Kai said. "Only time to talk business, because I have an elite waiting to teleport us to the Elemental Nations. Thanks for pulling everyone together."

"Not a problem, on either account. There will be time to talk after the incursion, right? There's a certain young woman... well, like you said, that can come later."

Kai managed to hide his wince - he really did look forward to meeting Razz, but he wasn't excited about giving the young merchant advice on women. Maybe asking made sense from the outside, there were just few things he felt he was less qualified to help with.

"You said that you had another request?" Razz asked.

"Yeah, I wondered if you could pull some strings for me back in Goralia." Kai explained his plans and Razz bobbed around, somehow both nodding and shaking his head at once.

"I can put in a good word for you, but I've been traveling too long. I suggest you go back to Rayakan and make arrangements there. You still have a good enough reputation, so we might be able to make it work, even this late."

"Thanks, Razz."

Turning away, Kai found his students all chattering with one another, reunited after some weeks in separate training. As soon as he arrived, however, they quickly settled and turned to him, waiting for their next assignment.

"Alright," Kai said with a grin, "who's ready to hunt some monsters?"

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..

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Kai sat atop a boulder, cultivating while watching his students fight monsters. Well, partially cultivating and partially swallowing disappointment, even though this was basically what he had expected.

Some monsters were endemic to Deadwaste, but the truly dangerous ones were left over from incursions, so this close to the next, there weren't many serious monsters left. The Bloodtails had been by far the exception, drifting as they had from the Blood Current for reasons unknown. So the monsters that the trainees were fighting were just ordinary, not even worth eating.

Still, he told himself that they were doing some good. The Elemental Nations might be in good shape, just as Gunjin had said, but that didn't mean that there weren't problems too numerous for their top fighters to handle. Kai's senses made it easy to hunt down hidden but dangerous monsters, then he left his students do the fighting - 200 Power might not be much to him, but it still made them much stronger than the local hunters.

Just when Kai was beginning to wonder if he needed to go back to Goralia and change his plans, he felt a portal appear beside him. Not Gunjin this time... instead it was Enalanis of Magma, which made Kai get up in surprise. He still felt like he had a strange relationship with Enalanis, since the man had conducted his elemental test, but the elite acted like he didn't remember.

"I have a target for you," Enalanis said. "Decades ago, a scared beast called a Bydra proved too difficult to eliminate, so it was sealed. Since it cannot escape its seal, there was no reason to risk fighting it, but since you could potentially benefit..."

"Exactly the sort of thing I was hoping for." Kai gestured out to his trainees. "Is it so dangerous that they'd be certain to die? Because I'm trying to set something up..."

"They would definitely be at risk." Enalanis observed the students with glowing eyes as they fought. "However, the Bydra's greatest strength is defensive, so they could last. It might be productive if you seek to train them."

"Fantastic. Will you be around to teleport us afterward?"

"No, Gunjin will find someone to send. I am here because I am one of the few who chronicles such sealed problems."

"Then let them finish the fight and we'll head out immediately."

Enalanis cocked his head to one side. "Wasn't there one more? A dryad from Cloudspire?"

"Oh, Kyridnyiam was surprisingly happy in the Water Union," Kai explained. "He practically begged for an elemental test... I'm surprised you didn't hear about it, actually."

"I am not the sole administrator of such tests."

"Well, he awakened Waterborn powers, so we left him to train his new ability. That leaves just these three who haven't found the synergy, hence..."

"Very well." Enalanis took a step back, folded his arms, and closed his eyes. "I hope they do not make us wait long with their battle."

It didn't look like it. Experience with these monsters had increased their confidence, so Untariin was showing off juggling knives, Ankrastor was trying to outdo him, and Kifaela was laughing at them both while stomping monsters. They'd needed to stretch themselves a little, but none of these monsters had outclassed them.

That wouldn't be the case with the Bydra... Kai decided not to tell them.

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..

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The Bydra proved to be an unusually large serpent-like beast, with a menacing flared head rising above a tangle of tails that went in all directions. Kai was a bit nervous sending the students against it, but they were hardened warriors, and if he couldn't trust them now, there was no point training them at all.

Immediately they realized that this was a more serious fight and began working in unison instead of competing. Ankrastor created a rain of liquid flame that Kai hadn't seen before, which battered back the Bydra, Untariin hovered knives to intercept its movements, and Kifaela took point with raw Physique. It was a decent strategy that would have taken down most monsters in this range.

Not the Bydra. Kai realized a little before his students did that even though its fangs were the most dramatic part of it, the real threat was all the tails: each one had a sharp tip at the end and they could attack in huge rushes that no normal hunter could block. Only careful coordination between the three prevented them from being skewered. As he watched, Kai wondered if the flared head was actually a decoy, meant to distract prey from the real threat. Since it was a sacred beast instead of a monster, it might follow hunting logic.

While they fought, Kai spent more time looking over the Fire Union, since he hadn't spent much time there. The landscape wasn't as red as he expected, instead it had a wide array of black and gray plants that would have been at home in Irun. There were some massive red flowers, though, and great pillars of red volcanic stone across the landscape.

Eventually the three students managed to get through: Ankrastor suppressed the tails, Kifaela struck a great blow to the Bydra's neck that sent it reeling, and Untariin decapitated it with a massive crystal blade. The severed neck twisted violently, but not as violently as the mass of tails.

One of those tails contorted and blossomed, transforming into another head.

To their credit, they weren't taken off guard and managed to escape the counter-attack. They also began a logical strategy, trying to sever or burn off all the other tails. Unfortunately for them, Kai could feel that the Bydra was regenerating tails as fast as they could destroy them.

This thing was no Bloodtail, but it was still one of the strongest things he'd encountered since returning to Deadwaste and Kai felt his hunger rising. He considered consuming its regeneration ability, except that he wasn't sure he could effectively feed it to Behemoth's Heart - that fusion had been far ahead of his level at the time, so this wouldn't help much. Another possibility was to fuse it with Isulfr's Bite, since he'd long wanted to upgrade that ability, but he wasn't sure the Bydra had a potent enough bite to be worth it.

As he watched the three students struggle against the Bydra, Kai realized that the obvious path was likely the correct one: the Bydra's most potent quality was its tails. They were agile, strong, and dangerous, with a variety of different stingers. Even if he didn't urgently need a tail ability, it made too much sense to skip.

Meanwhile, his students weren't looking too good. Kifaela was bleeding from many wounds, Ankrastor was struggling to generate flame, and Untariin was down to a few knives. To their credit, they might have glanced toward him, but they never once begged for help.

Before Kai, after all, the world had never given the three of them anything, only put them through terrible situations. They'd shown far more grit than most of the warriors Kai had met on Rosemount or Cloudspire, they just didn't have the fortune to be born in a stronger region. That unfair fate would have gotten them killed, if this was a real battle.

Kai remained still, letting them believe it was real. Watched them push themselves to their limits, coming up with new ideas and even some new techniques. But in the end, it wasn't enough, because it all came down to the world's unfair math in the end.

Then Kai came down like a meteor, consuming the Bydra's head in one bite. It must have sensed that he was a real threat, because it didn't play dead, it attacked with all its tails at once.

And they froze under Void Gaze. Kai grinned, and his grin widened as he moved to the still beast and consumed it bite by bite. In the end, unlike a mindless monster, it stopped struggling to regenerate its tails, and so Kai finished it off as quickly as possible.

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Bydra's Tail - I (alpha)

>

He enjoyed the feeling of the Bydra's Tail essence settling in his stomach, but there was no time for that. The essence had always been a secondary goal - what really mattered was the three trainees who were now staring at him.

"What was this?" Kifaela asked. "Another exercise to humble us?"

"No, it was a real incursion scenario." Kai gestured to the land beyond the Bydra. "Imagine that this had been a monster menacing a city. You managed to fight it off until reinforcements arrived, just as you'll need to do in a few months. And more importantly, you pushed your souls far enough for an awakening."

Ankrastor jerked upright, realizing first. "Wait, do you mean...?"

"That's right, it's time for the three of you to awaken a Goralian Class. These were your Hunter Trials, and you'll never be more ready than now."

"But we'd need a mana pool..."

On cue, an elite jumped down beside Kai and began to open a portal. He grinned and gestured through, to the green fields of Rayakan. "I made some arrangements, so if you'll just step through..."