This Beast-Tamer is a Little Strange

Since Kain had gotten a taste of the sweet life in delegating tasks to others, upon learning what Bea and the others did when he woke up, his first thought was not fear at having almost been disqualified, nor was it self-reproach for failing to get up, but rather…

"That could be done?! Great! We'll continue like this from now on!"

For one thing, he would not have to waste his time attending matches in the early group stage, only needing to attend Phase 2 of the competition where the first place of each group will compete against one another

Moreover, Kain had been quite worried about what would happen if he went on a Pathfinder Mission for a prolonged period of time and missed the re-ranking. However, knowing that he doesn't need to be present means that he could always leave one of contracts stationed at all times at the College to participate. While it may be difficult for that one contract to fight one against many, Kain firmly believed that any one of his contracts could at least maintain a top 5 ranking even if competing alone.

Not to mention that Kain is now a 4-star beast-tamer and needs to find a fourth contract, which would give him even more options to select from.

Yeah it'd suck being one spiritual creature down within a relic, especially since every one of his contracts can have a practical role in a relic: Bea for obtaining information and controlling spiritual creatures in the relic; Queen is the team's healer while her guards serve as the best scouts; and Aegis is the team's shield during unexpected emergencies.

Every single one is indispensable. But Kain is really not willing to replace Aria as the last ranked student of their year…

There is a possible extended leave option, but during that period he'd have to forfeit all of his resources, room, rank and retake many of his courses—this was the absolute last choice!

Over the following days of the group matches, Kain continued to not show up. And while there were many voices of discontent at his choice, Kain wasn't exactly around to hear it, and even if he did hear their grumblings, he still wouldn't care.

He felt as though he was extremely close to making a breakthrough in his research on the Silkworm evolutions, and didn't even bother to show up during the first couple matches of Phase 2.

His first match of Phase 2 was against the current rank 8, and Bea and the others were able to defeat her without any issues.

However, god knows what progress Kairos had made since he'd last fought him, but it had almost caused Kain's team to capsize in his absence.

Kairos' affinity is to cursed constructs, items that had been contaminated by dark-attribute energy for a prolonged period of time and eventually gave birth to a consciousness.

Due to their manner of birth, they are extremely rare, but their abilities and potential will vary greatly.

Therefore, a legendary shield may become a powerful spiritual creature with high potential, or you may have a can opener that also opened up its consciousness with extremely low potential.

This is why, despite being a 3-star beast-tamer for a long time, Kairos still only had 2 contracts. Now Kairos recently advanced to 4-stars, and while he still doesn't have all his contract positions filled, he did manage to find a third contract that meets his standards—and strangely, this third spiritual contract makes Kain feel like it was targeted at him! Or, more specifically, Bea!

Kairos' new contract was a sword that seemed to be capable of precisely cutting only whatever it or Kairos willed.

Bea shared the scenes of the match directly into his mind, and so he was able to see what happened in the match through what she transmitted and feel her intense feelings of frustration and helplessness.

The cursed sword exuded an oppressive aura that seemed to sap the light from the surrounding arena. Its blade was sleek and pitch-black, appearing almost liquid.

Along its edges, faint streaks of crimson pulsed like veins, giving it the illusion of a living animal with a beating heart.

The hilt was simple, wrapped in what looked like aged leather, but its pommel held a redeye-like gemstone that glowed faintly.

The sword floated and moved on its own, reminding Kain of those flying swords often described in cultivation novels. However, rather than its creepy appearance, it was its intangible cutting ability that sent shivers down Bea's metaphorical spine—and, through her, Kain's.

The sword's ability to cut physical objects wasn't extraordinary. During the match, Aegis blocked its physical attacks with ease, even reiterating to Kain that its cutting ability was not a threat to him. Its blade struggled to leave more than surface scratches on his stone body.

But its true power revealed itself when facing Bea.

Most attacks were completely unable to affect Bea's mental attribute threads—however, this sword was able to easily cut through.

However, that wasn't the worst part. after all the threads just carry the splits and increase their mobility, while the splits can still exist without the threads. In fact, in the past Kain had employed other strategies of having the split on an ejected stinger or on a surface he knew that target would make contact with, in order to discretely infect them.

But somehow this sword was even able to "cut" the connection between Bea and her splits.

Bea could feel the exact moment it happened: a split-second of sharp pain, as though an invisible cord tying her to her extension had been severed, leaving that part of her completely isolated. It wasn't destroyed, but the bond that allowed her to control and sense through it was gone.

But the sword wasn't limited to cutting off the connection between Bea and her splits, it could also precisely destroy the splits themselves.

When she finally managed to infect Kairos with one of her splits in a desperate bid to eliminate the opponent's leader, the sword seemed able to accurately sense the split's position once it was inside Kairos—which was something Bea had never experienced before, her skills had always ensured that upon infection, even blue-grade spiritual creatures should find it almost impossible to sense her presence unless that have a special skill.n/ô/vel/b//in dot c//om

Kain watched the memory from Bea's perspective as Kairos, unfazed by the infection, allowed the sword to strike at him directly.

Bea was shocked at the sword's action of seemingly turning on its beast-tamer. But the moment the blade made contact with Kairos' head, it didn't harm him physically. Instead, it struck the split hiding within his brain.

The infected split dissolved instantly, its presence eradicated so thoroughly that Bea couldn't even sense a fragment of it remaining.

The memory continued, showing how the sword disrupted not just Bea's abilities but the cohesion of their entire team.

To better coordinate the movements of everyone in the absence of Kain, Bea had always infected Aegis, Queen and the Vespid guards with a split as well so that they could communicate in battle mentally.

However, that infuriating sword upon realizing their connection also made great pains to cut her connections to everyone else as well.

With her essentially rendered useless, and the others unable to coordinate as well as before, they'd only managed to win by the skin of their teeth.

However, Goddesss of Victory eventually smiled down on Kain's team and the sacrifice of several guards was able to take Kairos' puppet and book out of commission.

Meanwhile, due to the sword's lack of physical offensive ability, Aegis was able to imprison it into a stone prison before tossing it off of the stage.

But in the process of the battle, Queen had lost several of her guards while some kind of corrosive skill emitted by Kairos' cursed book in its efforts to free the imprisoned sword had managed to erode quite a lot of the stone composing Aegis.

Thankfully, Kain always kept suitable stones that Aegis could easily incorporate on hand, so he should be able to restore himself by the next day. However, Kain was definitely not expecting for his spiritual creatures to end up so embarrassed in a fight against peers of the same age. After all, they'd been on challenging Black missions and partaken in battles to the death with beast-tamers and spiritual creatures of a higher level.

However, it seems like Kain had underestimated the talent and determination of his peers. While he was improving, so were they. Absolutely nobody, aside from Serena that is, was satisfied with their current rank—everyone was striving for a higher position.

Kain was a little frustrated upon watching what had transpired through the scenes transmitted by Bea.

To think that Kairos would contract a spiritual creature that so perfectly counters Bea—did he actually seek out a spiritual creature for that purpose or was it a happy coincidence?

Kain was more inclined to the former. After all, while practicing as a team in preparation for nationals they'd all gotten to know one another and each other's contracts much better.

Kain was sure that the other members of the top 5 also had similarly targeted strategies against him as well as each other.

Kain's mouth couldn't resist twisting into a sneer. "Should I be honoured that you factored me into the decision of your lifelong contract? But if you guys think you've figured us out…"

Kain sat up straight from where he was previously lounging on the couch and smiled, his exhaustion completely forgotten.

"…we'll just have to prove you wrong."