Growing concerns
If you were to ask alex how he saw today going the phrase "covered in pink lizard pieces" wouldn't have come up in the conversation. yet here alex stood covered from head to tail in bits of viscera after his untested attack blew the anjanath literally in half. needless to say the thing couldn't be more dead as the orb attack detonated in its chest cavity. steam rose from the two parts of the corpse while the muscles twitched from the electricity left over after the explosion. 'note to self don't set this off near me.' alex thought with a few busted scales on his face and chest.
The energy itself didn't harm alex since he was basically immune to thunder damage but the same could not be said of the blast impact that slammed into him at point blank range. a good portion of his faces scaled had shattered from the force while the scales on the front of his claws and chest fared no better. the attack was very strong but at close range it was akin to mutual destruction so he filed that attack under "use with caution". alex didn't even bother bringing the horribly mutilated corpse back to astera and just ate it there on the spot.
Even raw the meat had a smoky flavor to it and was actually red instead of the white he was expecting. from what alex remembered most reptiles on earth were a type of white meat but that doesn't seem to apply here. the anjanath was totally worth hunting as it gave him twice as many points as a great jagras at a hundred thousand and that was with a good amount gone from the explosion. alex just shook off the damaged scales and regrew them nearly instantly like nergigante which was an ability he got due to how useful it was.
It wasn't even that expensive since he wasn't trying to regrow whole fucking spears but small scales. most of the blood and gore on alex came off with his scales and he just left the skeleton of the anjanath on the ground before leaving through the air. he went for a quick swim before heading to his nest to wash off before sleeping through the rest of the days as that attack really drained him. no one seemed to mind his behavior as they just chalked it up to him not finding a monster to hunt , a rare occurrence but it did happen.
Alex was a meticulous hunter as he tended to focus on targeting one specific type of monster until he could effortlessly hunt them. this lead to the next two weeks being very rough on the anjanath population in the ancient forest. the second anjanath alex hunted put up more of a fight since it dodged the boulder trap but not the electro cannon that alex hit it in the face with. that was what alex named his charged attack that he found suspiciously similar to the bfg rounds from doom.
The only difference alex could see was that his attack was white in color while the bfg was green as the shape was almost identical and even sent off stray electrical arcs as it traveled. when not detonated in an enclosed location like a ribcage the attack shot out very fast (it's lightning ,duh) and exploded with a radius of about twenty yards of pure white hot death. as a fire attribute monster anjanath are very resistant to heat but lightning is nearly as hot as the sun itself so image that but all over its head.
All that remained of the anjanath's head was a charred black skull that was cracking and crumbling into dust. the thing was dead before it even hit the ground , alex had gotten some very concerned looks when he brought it back with him. on one hand they were happy he was strong enough to kill an anjanath easily but on the other hand that also meant that he was more dangerous as well. no one was worried though since they all knew alex since he was a tiny little thing eating ants.
The big concern was that when the fifth fleet got here they might mistake alex as hostile and break the trust he had in them. the commission knew about alex and even encouraged the people of astera to keep him around but there was no telling if the fifth fleet would be briefed about him. to them alex was a huge easy going dragon that was exceptionally smart but to those not in the know he was just a menacing beast. this was the concern the people of astera including the admiral who was the one person who interacted the most with alex and was staunchly in defense of no harm coming to alex from the peoples hands.