The First Legendary Beast Master novel Chapter 351

351 But Is She?

The longer they sat at the table with the Generals, the more people they gathered, mostly Professors, but some of the Commander Rank Elites from the army unit who came to scope the kitchen for leftover barbecue, and a few High Priests, who were pretending they hadn't come for the exact same reason.

That took a lot of the weight off Karl and Morgana, who now rarely had to answer questions for the Generals, but they were at the table with them, and there was no polite way to excuse themselves for the next three hours as they finished their question session.

Then the Generals finally excused themselves to go to the line and check the veracity of the answers they had gotten, and Morgana could finally begin her lessons. But by then it was almost time for Karl to go on duty at the line, and it was time for lunch.

So, she wasn't happy to have lost a large portion of her already reduced teaching time to the questions of the Generals, but the other students who hadn't had to study today didn't mind in the least.

Karl headed to the line for his afternoon shift, and spent most of the first two hours trying to decide if Tessa had actually advanced to Commander Rank. It felt like she had, but the beasts were split on it. She felt more dragon, and that was messing with Hawk's ability to tell how powerful she was, while Remi thought she just smelled fantastic, so it was down to Thor and Rae's opinions that she had advanced to Commander Rank.

It was certain that something had changed after that last surge of divine energy, though.

There wasn't much else to do along the line that day. The Hill Giants had pulled back to the point that the artillery was only sporadically firing, and the weather was mild, so everyone just sat around watching the horizon for signs that something was about to happen.

That was the opposite of what was going on along most of the line, where the Hill Giants had renewed their push and even sent extra troops forward to see if they could cause a breach and push the Elites back, forcing them to regroup further into the formerly human held territories.

They weren't normally as aggressive as the Frost Giants had been with their cloning program in place, but the Hill Giants had the power advantage, with so many of the powerful Elites dealing with the Mountain Giants.

The Mountain Giants had a comparatively miniscule population, and a much smaller territory, but their absolute power made sure that none of their neighbours would dare to mess with them.

It was a strange situation for Karl and his team, who had gotten so used to being behind enemy lines in the Frost Giant nation, with constant targets to attack, that they didn't really know what to do with themselves in a situation where the order was to hurry up and wait.

But it was a bit like a vacation, just leaning back against Thor, who was napping in the sun. Dana was leaning up against his side while Lotus had turned Thor's head into a sun lounger, resting against his crest and between his horns, while Tessa lay on Thor's back, watching the horizon.

"You look mighty relaxed for a combat deployment." One of the other students noted. "We can still see the horizon. But you are right, this is much better than standing around doing nothing. In fact, if I don't go too deeply into meditation, I can even work on my mental focus while we wait for the Hill Giants to decide what they're doing." Karl agreed.

"As long as you're not actually slacking when the attack comes. We've all got bets on how many giants they're going to send at you after you taunted them yesterday." The warrior laughed.

Lotus looked over from her resting spot. "The average from the battle reports says that in two days, four Royal Rank Giants will be sent to test us again.

That's how the Hill Giants usually operate, they double their force if an attack fails. But we've been getting smaller attacks than most other portions of the line, so perhaps they will leave us for a while longer."

"That doesn't sound like a solid answer, Priestess." The warrior joked.

Tessa looked down from Thor's back and laughed. "She's a Nature Priestess, if she makes a prediction, it will likely come true, simply so that she's not made into a liar. Do you want her to give a solid answer?"

The warrior shook his head. "I forgot to factor in Divine Favour. What do we have to kill to get an entire week off?"