Legendary Beast Master: Starting with Contracting SSS Rank Dragon

Kiona could have used her roar to lure out her enemies, but that would have alerted other beasts in the area, which she didn't want.

But Jon's entrance shook the ground along with the vegetation around them. As the Barkhide Stags were controlling the nature around them, when it was destroyed, they were also affected.

How could Kiona miss those slight fluctuations?

Kael had trained her hard for that.

She didn't think twice before using her high agility and dashed towards the location where she felt the fluctuations.

She didn't use her flames or any skills because she was being careful of her surroundings. Her Fire element was really a bad choice in this kind of environment.

But it didn't matter since she had very good physical stats too.

In the next second, she appeared before a stag that wasn't much taller than her. The deer eyes showed a flicker of surprise before he attacked her.

A poisonous spike came out from the ground right beneath Kiona. But she didn't even glance at it and stretched her hand toward the Stag's antlers.

The Stag instantly panicked and tried to make a run for it while using other skills to attack Kiona.

Seeing so many petals, vines, and plants coming to attack her, Kiona only snorted and waved her hand, as a burst of crimson flames burned everything down to ashes.

She had controlled her flames so that nothing else was burned. Just this was enough to show how high her mastery had reached in Flame Manipulation.

"Where are you going?" Kiona smiled and dashed forward, leaving a small burnt clearing behind.

The Stag was running at full speed, using the nature to conceal itself and also using its padded wooden hooves.

But Kiona had already locked onto him, so it just took her a few seconds to catch up to him.

However, she had to use [Lightning Mantle] this time, as the Stags were truly known for their speed. In just a few seconds, this guy had run far away.

Kiona dropped onto his back and held the antlers, making the stag shudder in fear. He truly wanted to cry to the heavens. What sin had he committed to meet this woman?

He had just come to eat his favorite fruits.

Just as he was slipping into despair, he heard a chilling voice from above, "Continue running if you don't like these horns of yours."

The Stag was even more fearful and instantly came to a halt. He stood there with shaking limbs, his head lowered.

He was dead. He knew he was going to die today.

He had already given up.

Kiona was speechless looking at his actions and asked, "You can resist a little, you know? Why are you giving up so easily?"

The Stag almost whipped his head backward hearing that, as fury burned in his eyes along with helplessness.

He was asked to not resist, so he did that. Now this unreasonable woman even wanted him to resist. What kind of being had he encountered?

[Kiona. Don't make things difficult for poor guy.]

Kiona pursed her lips and nodded, "Yes, Master."

Meanwhile, Jon was looking around too but couldn't find any signs of other stags. It was as if everything was just his hallucination.

There were simply no signs left of the deer.

If their Master hadn't told them, Jon would have likely really thought that it was just his hallucinations.

But his Master was never wrong, so it meant he was just too weak to even sense them.

He growled to himself, 'I worked so hard, and the first thing I meet is defeat.'

[Brother, since when did you become so pessimistic?]

Jon didn't bother replying to his brother and went to find his sister. Fortunately, she had left behind signs, so he easily found her riding a stag.

He walked patiently towards them and asked, "If you want to ride, then simply use my back. That small back can't handle your weight."

Kiona glared at him, making him flinch and feel confused. He asked, "What did I do now?"

"I heard from Master that you shouldn't ask a woman her age and weight, so you shouldn't do that too," Kiona taught her brother with a proud smile on her face.

Jon didn't even take her seriously and ignored her words. He looked down at the Stag, who seemed to have lost the will to live, and asked, "Master, we didn't find anyone else or rather we couldn't catch any of them."

[It's fine. They were just probing us anyways. I'll be more surprised if you managed to catch them when they specialize in hiding.]

Kiona tilted her head slightly and asked, "That reminds me, where are the two of you?"

[I am looking at something, so I can't come yet.]

The two siblings got curious as to what Seth found, but he didn't say anything else, so they dropped the subject.

They would go over and check on him later.

The next one to answer was Kael.

[I am going after our guests. Let's see where they led me to.]

"Ohh! Good luck. What should we do till then?" Kiona asked and looked down. "We did catch one of them."

[That's a sacrificial lamb most likely. He is just an E-Rank Beast. I'm pretty sure he doesn't even know that he was being watched.]

Jon shook the poor stag with his paws lightly and asked, "Oii! Do you know you were being watched?"

The Stag didn't reply. He didn't even move and simply lay lifeless there. Even though his vitals were good, he seemed to have lost the will to live.

Kiona was even more speechless looking at that and wondered how he even survived till now with such a mentality.

She shook her head and said, "Master, he isn't speaking or should I say he isn't in a state to answer anything to us. Can I use my methods to..."

[No!]

The answer came out as a flat "no."

Kiona pursed her lips but stayed silent upon hearing that.

[Just take him somewhere safe for now. He can be useful, but I doubt much. Let's see what happens to these stages first. Oh! Nice! These deer are actually good!]

"What happened, Master?" Jon asked.

[Let me focus on the mission. Why are you asking so many questions? Go follow every word of your sister.]

Jon gaped in disbelief and turned to look at his sister, who was flashing a smug grin at him. He gritted his teeth, but there was no way he would go against Kael's orders.

"Good boy!" Kiona patted his face and said, "Let's bring him to Seth."

[No! This place is dangerous. I'm fine alone here.]

Kiona was surprised and even more curious now. What did he actually find?

But she still followed his words and threw the poor lifeless stag on top of Jon. The mighty lion was fuming in rage, and even smoke was coming out in rolls from his nostrils.

It amused Kiona as she laughed to herself. Who didn't know that Jon hated anyone on top of him? That was why she intentionally did it.

After that, they left the place.

Meanwhile, Kael was patiently jumping from one tree to another while keeping a considerable distance from the stags. They were beasts who were very close to nature, so he wanted to keep some distance for now.

His [Beast Sense] could follow them anyway.

All of a sudden, he sensed the six Stags stopping near a small tree. It was the same kind of tree that grew in this region, with brown bark and beautiful red-tinted green leaves.

Kael was wondering why they stopped there when all of them separated and ran in different directions.

This was when his guess of them having an intelligent beast among them strengthened, and he decided to follow one of them randomly. E!njoy*in@g the s!tory? F.i%nd^ mor!e^ at M#V@-LEM*P^YR.

His skill covered a large area, so if the Stags thought they could fool him by taking different paths, then they were thoroughly mistaken.

Even if he was just following one, he could still sense the other five. They continued to run, and he silently followed them.

Patience was the key here.

Fortunately, they didn't run for long as the Stags changed direction again and began to follow different paths.

Sadly, it was all registered in his mind, and Alpha was even making a map of all the routes they visited. There was definitely a pattern here.

'Interesting! Really interesting!' Kael smiled to himself and still followed them.

This chase continued for quite some time, where the Stag tried to bluff a lot of times by taking different routes and even going back and forth.

But Kael waited patiently, and as expected, he was rewarded for it when one of the Stags finally entered a crevice on a small hill. It wasn't anything major, and if Kael had not sensed it himself, perhaps even he might have missed that small crevice.

"Can't wait any longer?" Kael chuckled but still didn't take any action.

He was waiting.