The First Legendary Beast Master

When Karl left the Tiny World, he found that there was a pair of city guards waiting outside the empty store, waiting for him to appear.

They clearly hadn't noticed that Cara and Tian had been watching the area for the night. But that mystery was quickly solved when Karl realized that the two were in beast form for most of the evening, and only Cara had transformed to get breakfast, so that Tian could use the patented puppy eyes to get them a discount.

Not that they were short on money, Cara just didn't believe in paying full price for anything if she could avoid it.

"Guild Leader, good morning. Will the others be along soon?" The guard asked.

"A few of them. The others intend to travel in the separate space for the day. What is the situation around the city?"

"Stable. There were a few Crocolisks sighted and eliminated during the evening, but no concerted attacks. Most of the city guard have recovered enough to resume their shifts on the walls, but the Commander is advising that we remain on station for at least seventy-two hours, with additional time if there are deployments necessary."

Karl nodded. "Alright, the Prince will be out in a few minutes, and he will confirm all the orders and deployments for your unit.

I don't see any issue with your timeline, but he might have some insight that I do not."

"Where is your group planning to go next? We heard that you are just passing through on tour to eliminate the remaining beasts from the invasion."

"I'm not entirely certain yet. However, the closest options would be Narukthar in Zindab, or Bral, southwest of here still in Gathuzan.

Both are on this map as having an invasion that wasn't completely contained, so they should both be options for today's mission.

Do you have more information than the sheet does?"

The guard shook his head. "Not much. I know that the attack in Narukthar was responded to by the Dark Lady, but wasn't completely contained because she was called away to another attack.

But other than that, I don't know much more than what's on the documents.

I was busy up to the north during the initial wave of attacks. I was originally stationed at a road safety stop, but we were all recalled after the attack.

The roads in this region are all closed anyhow, and the farms have been evacuated."

"It sounds like things will take some time to get back to normal, even with the majority of the Crocolisks gone." Karl noted, but the guard just shrugged.

"Not much gets farmed out here anyhow. Mostly magical herbs from the swamps, but those are still being picked, just at a slower pace.

The farm teams that they've still got are just going out during the day to go get them.

It might not be as efficient, but it's still getting enough of them into town to keep most of the shops supplied, and that's what really matters."

"Alright, as long as you think that the city will be able to keep things operational after we leave. It's not impossible for us to hang around an extra day and keep fighting, but it would be better if we went somewhere that needs such a large force to deal with a major infestation."

The relief unit soldier chuckled. "Aye, an infestation is a good word for what it is. An invasive species infestation."

The other dragon, who had been silent until now, nodded with his chin toward something across the street.

"The guards are going for seconds at the sandwich stall." He muttered.

"You know, they can understand us just fine, if you had needed anything, they would have transformed so they could talk to you."

The man nodded. "I figured it was easier to just wait. It's been a long couple of weeks, and I'm not up to trying to negotiate with a badger."

"Understandable. When she has to keep watch for the night, she tends to get bored, even if she has someone to keep her company. Besides, Tian is shy, so he doesn't say much."

The soldiers definitely did not believe that. Those two beasts had been in some sort of animated conversation for most of the night, though they were communicating silently with each other.

If that was what shy looked like, they weren't sure that they could handle outgoing.

Or perhaps the description simply didn't apply to his interactions with the badger, as they appeared to be raised together. The guards weren't aware of the exact nature of Karl's skills, only that he was the one that the beasts answered to.

Prince Nathan exited the space with Rae, who already had an annoyed look on her face that said she had been informed of possible delays in her acquisition of additional corpses.

There were few offences more serious than that in her mind, but Birad wasn't in the best shape, and they could still use the help getting rid of the remaining Crocolisks.

"Your Highness. If you approve it, we are recommending three days on station before we move on. Starting after our men have rested, we will go on missions to clear the area, and that should be sufficient to bring the monster population back under control."

Rae smiled. Perhaps they were going to get to do something fun today after all.

Prince Nathan took out his copy of the deployment map, and stared at the options.

"Alright, I suggest that we head for Bral. They had a rather unique issue this time. They got an invasion of hippos, which isn't shocking given that almost all the invaders were aquatic to some extent.

But they didn't attack at all. They simply refuse to leave, and they're eating everything."

Rae snorted with laughter.

"Did you try asking them?"

"Unfortunately, we do not have anyone available who speaks hippo. But the gist of the answer was 'no'."

Hopefully hippos were tasty.