CHAPTER 64: REGRET!

But even as the heat and tension rose in the air, Dido’s voice rang out again, still not letting Beast Slayer get any of his own words in...

"And now for the real reason we’re here."

Everyone fell silent once more.

Dido nodded to Beast Slayer, who, for once, gave her a look of reluctant acknowledgement.

"We aren’t stupid, naive people though. We know that Star Rank beasts are beyond the capability of any gang or force." She continued.

"We might have some rivalries between us. We might even hate each other. But if we let our pride get in the way of us this time..."

She paused.

"It will kill us all."

Nick swallowed hard at her words. She wasn’t exaggerating one bit.

’So she’s considered this too, I guess that’s expected for someone with as much experience as her. I bet this was the first thing that came to her mind the moment she heard this news herself.’ Nick thought inwardly.

"Countless other forces in countless other Sanctuaries are all thinking the same thing as us — all preparing the same or similar strategies as us in an effort to find and kill a Star Beast."

Beast Slayer spoke, stepping forward with pride when he noticed that Dido no longer suppressed his voice.

"The Federation doesn’t know why they haven’t shown themselves in the previous fifty years, but its a fact now that they are no longer hidden. However, we are still at a major disadvantage."

Beast Slayers’ words didn’t inspire much confidence among both his men and Dido’s.

Because they knew that he was absolutely right.

For the Federation to have released this news to the public, they must have already known about them for a while now, or at least the original person or people who’d discovered the Star Beast in the first layer had.

They must have studied it and attempted to take it down countless times already before releasing the information about their presence publicly, and nobody doubted that they probably knew for months already.

In fact, they didn’t know if they were successful in taking one down either — but something must have happened for them to choose this timing to reveal it.

Either they had seen significant progress, becoming confident in their ability to take one down before anyone else, or they had taken one down already!

Heck, even the fact that they were the only ones who knew the current only known Star Rank Beast’s location gave them a huge head start.

Dido, Beast Slayer and the other Sanctuary leaders all across the first layer of the Beast Domain were already lucky enough that they were informed before the rest of the public, which gave them a small window to get a head start themselves.

Maybe days, maybe hours, before this thing became unstoppable.

Dido took back control of the conversation.

"This is a temporary alliance between us two. We will divide into two units, take a scouting approach for the deeper regions of the Beast Domain. Judging by what we already know about the Beast Domain’s inner workings, stronger beasts are always located further away from populated areas, whether they be Sanctuaries like ours, or high density beast territories, so we’ll likely have to venture farther and deeper into unknown territories than we ever have before!"

"We’ve got mere hours or days to do the impossible," she said with her voice still ringing through the area.

"So let’s get started before we lose our lead!"

The energy in the air was flipped again, with the people’s shock quickly becoming replaced by adrenaline.

The War Beasts and Radiant Slayers all straightened like soldiers ready for deployment.

They came together as one despite their differences, and a lot of them even realised that they weren’t so different from each other after all — since most of the enmity between the two forces was between their leaders alone, rather than the subordinates who were forced to suffer the consequences of their leaders’ actions.

Even Beast Slayer seemed to look at Dido with less hatred than normal, probably too focused on how they were going to manage finding and hunting a Star Rank beast than how he might be able to one up, or even sabotage her.

He knew that trying something like sabotage against Dido, or the War Beasts in general, was basically just shooting himself in the foot for the moment.

Since they were temporarily one force, so hindering her was the same as hindering himself.

Though, if his side managed to be the first of them to find a Star Rank beast, he was obviously going to try and take it down without informing anyone else and without the assistance of their temporary alliance.

Even if the chances were near zero, it was still worth a shot at getting one up against her.

But all the while...

Nick just stood there.

Still sitting on the broken tree stump.

Still acting like he belonged.

Only now?

He was beginning to regret his decision of joining in on this discussion!

His act was too good, everyone assumed that he was in on it too!

From the corner of her eye, Dido glanced at Nick again, with her lips pressed into a thin line.

’We are bound to be the first to find a Star Rank beast if we have... him with us! I need to do my best to make sure he follows my group...’

She didn’t say anything aloud, but her mind was already starting to reevaluate his importance. Though she did realise that she didn’t even know his name yet...

Everyone still called him the Waste, even though that had clearly changed in recent times, since everyone was used to it by now. It was hard to change something once it became the norm.

But Dido knew that she couldn’t just keep calling him ’Waste’ if she wanted to get on his good side and recruit her into her group to find a Star Ranked beast...

Beast Slayer did have one up on Dido in this case, but unfortunately for him, he didn’t know of Nick’s uncanny ability to attract calamity wherever he goes.

If he did...

He wouldn’t have even hesitated to force him into his side, whether forcefully or through some sort of deal, regardless of whether he was working for Dido!