Chapter 874: The second day of the evaluation trial (part 27)

Well, those two also followed the ideology of "the more sisters the merrier", so it didn’t surprise Aster, also the blond roc mother had taken both red haired sisters as well as Dahlia under her "wings" literally and figuratively earlier, so it wasn’t surprising that Sarina invited them to join them.

Though Lauren and Mira were indeed a surprise, but the same principle stands, Sarina is quite the motherly girl, so she also brought the badger girl under her wing, which is also understandable given how her relationship with Cassandra was more like that of a daughter and a mother rather than close friends which usually becomes like that of close sisters.

"Okay, since Sarina has our back when it comes to the main dish, then let’s prepare a lot of snacks and sides, Espi can be in charge of cutting the ingredients, Kana will work with the syrup and I will be in charge of frying things", said Aster as he petted the little wyrm as well, which contented that pretty white snake who happily hissed as she slid away from Aster and held onto a knife with her tail, to then start skillfully cutting potatoes that were washed previously by Kana.

She looked rather cute as if she was playing "swordsman" with a kitchen knife, it’s worth mentioning that there wasn’t any risk involved unlike what would be the case for young children when playing with a knife, because the steel knife would break before it could leave a noticeable scratch on the little wyrm’s scales.

"Espi has become quite skilled at using her tail right, big brother?", said Kana as she moved towards the area where Mylene had prepared the syrup for the fruits.

"Yes, she wanted to show you how her mastery over using tools with her tail has increased, so be sure to play with her in the smithy later", said Aster as he started heating the oil, next to Mylene, they as the "adults" here, of course took the activity that involved more "danger".

Speaking of "danger", Aster noticed that Mylene was in a brighter mood than normal, so while he put a piece of onion in the heated oil to prepare it before putting the cut potatoes that the little wyrm was delivering in large quantities, he said.

"How did the conversation with miss Cassandra and that merchant guy, go?", to which the pink-haired girl softly smiled as she answered.

"It went as expected, that idiot from the muscle giant family on Ryan’s group did come from one of the "neighbors" of my and Eris’s families and though he only knew that he was separated from his group, by crossing intel with Cassandra, I got to know that someone whose death would actually sting to the ones that tentatively put Eris and me against each other, is in this place", said Mylene.

She wasn’t worried about her past circumstances bringing trouble to the group anymore, after her little conversation with Aster, so instead she was now gathering intel regarding those that were for sure or possibly involved in whatever is going on between her family and Eris’s one.

"Also, one of my "sisters" and "brothers" were sent from my family and are here, the same applies to Eris, in fact they sent two of the ones that were always being a headache trying to overtake our positions, so chances are that we can learn quite a few things from them~", added the pink-haired girl.

Those two were only children as in their mothers had no other offspring with their respective fathers, but their fathers had more than one wife, so they had a few half-siblings both male and female, not to mention that they had cousins as well, and all of them used to be competition, since well, they are divine royalty but Mylene and Eris had gone past the point of being "mere" crown princesses, because apparently there can be more than one, not only on the female side but also on the male side and all are made to compete to decide who will be given territory and authority.

Eris and Mylene had already been confirmed to have their own territories assigned to them, and thus they would become divine queens at its given time, or that would have been the case if they didn’t end up "disappearing".

That was the difference between them and other crown princes and princesses, they had already been given an official position of power within their families, so they weren’t just prospects with great future, but already had authority.

This was pushed ahead by their respective grandmothers, who were their rune mastering and alchemy teachers too, and that was probably the sole time they encouraged them to participate in official matters of their respective families.

The previous is because the highest ranked representative, from each family when more than one co-rules a divine empire, also known as "divine kings", is chosen from those crown princes and princesses that have been granted territory, based not only in personal strength, but the forces they have raised and the performance of their respective territories, it’s a kind of test, a bloody one since obviously they are to be sabotaged by their competitors in all the possible ways, at least on Mylene’s side, since things are a bit more restrained in Eris’s ones, this is common for co-ruled divine empires, but we’ll deepen more into that later.

For now, while the little girl happily hummed as she prepared the desserts and the little wyrm followed her rhythm by happily hissing as she "slayed" those potatoes, the group had a fun time preparing the sides for the picnic later.

This continued for more than an hour because well, there were going to be quite a few girls with big appetites in the picnic, considering that even those that weren’t beast descendants meaning that they naturally needed larger amounts of nutrients, also had quite the appetite, Nina is the youngest of the three sisters but just like her physical strength would surprise people, so would her appetite, as for Lina, she loved snacks and had no problem eating a lot of them, given that she moved around the most too.

’Luckily, Sarina and the girls in kitchen duty today will prepare the portions for the others, otherwise we wouldn’t finish until actual lunch time’, amusingly thought Aster, it was midday at this point, and Aster had to leave, despite those two little girls giving him puppy eyes while holding onto his arms, to try and have him stay until it was actual lunch time, since they were going to remain here to play with Mylene who had changed to make beverages at some point.

"Don’t look at me like that, we’ll be together from lunch and until Alice and the others return, so out of all your sisters, you two will spend the most time with me today", said Aster as he petted both Kana and Espi who smiled in response.

"Mm, see you later big brother~", they said as they let go of Aster’s arms, "allowing" him to leave Mylene’s workshop, not without Aster saying.

"Ah right, miss Mikaela asked for some bottles of strawberry wine to be reserved for her", which made Mylene sigh.

"I already have a lot in my schedule, this is exploitation you know", mumbled the pink-haired girl to which Aster chuckled, he would have believed she actually was annoyed if Mylene hadn’t gone full alchemist mode the next second as she added.

"Speaking of which, I’ll need you to "donate" some more blood later, my reserves are running low~".

"I’ll take some more before going to sleep and hand it to you tomorrow morning, I trust you have enough to play around for today at least, right?", said Aster to which Mylene pouted, he saw through her little scheme, since Mylene indeed likes to experiment with random things and Aster’s blood to see how they react.

"Fine", mumbled the pink-haired girl as she returned to her beverage making, while Aster left the workshop as he thought.

’Luckily I’ll be visiting the mind space, I don’t directly replenish blood like on the outside world, so one of these days she is going to bleed me dry’, he jokingly thought.

Thanks to his insanely high vitality and endurance, Aster wouldn’t really feel anything even if he lost half of his blood, which in total surpasses that of a normal human by quite a bit as well, instead of the almost six litters that an adult has, he triples that amount, and that is not a generic dragon trait, because while Alice also has more blood than a regular human, the difference in her case is only of three to four litters, that’s probably due to Aster’s specific lineage and the paragon body which in his case focuses in defense and survivability instead of combat power like it does for Alice.

Even then, following the normal routine, a human can only donate around a 10% of their total blood and then they have to wait for almost two months to be ready to donate again, but Aster can give half of it safely and be fully recovered in half a day, normally, or even less than that if he stuffs himself with food, though he prefers the former method, which is why entering the mind space, will fulfill double goals tonight, to spoil the jealous dragon mother as well as the sword empress, and to recover from extracting blood from himself before going to sleep, in preparation for tomorrow’s "match".

Aster who was lost in his thoughts, returned to the real world as he arrived at the western area outside of the camp, where Eris, Angela, Valentina and Mikaela trained the girls from the battle formation units.

Speaking of which, seeing Aster arrive, made the purple lightning princess give Aster a "wary" gaze, she raised her guard thinking he came to mess with her, very much to Aster’s amusement.

"Before miss Valentina comes at me with her sword in hand, I only came to see how was Nim’s training doing", he said which made Mikaela softly laugh at her friend, at least until Aster added.

"Ah right, I also requested the bottles of strawberry wine for miss Mikaela from Mylene already", he said which made Angela and Eris gaze at the core elder from the white sword who was laughed at by Valentina this time, Aster was always fair, so it wouldn’t be fine to just tease one of those two childhood friends who were having a headache dealing with the side effect of that rejuvenating elixir Aster’s godmother made.

’He might not be a lustful piece of trash like a lot of guys from the Drage, but his sense of humor is rather "twisted" if you ask me...’, thought Mikaela as she sighed to her insides.

"Thud!", luckily for both Valentina and Mikaela, everyone’s attention was drawn by a loud solid sound produced by a tall tree falling within the small forest which was used for training purposes, which was used by Eris to take the lead and explain how things were going.

"It’s going quite well, Nim’s possession is quite useful to train the unit’s reaction to environmental abrupt changes and hidden obstacles, earlier I asked her to randomly make pits with cushioned bottoms whenever she saw any of the members of the units not being fully focused, so after a few "scares" those girls have improved their spatial awareness skills", said the heavenly rose princess, which made Aster bitterly smile to his insides.

’I feel bad for those girls, if Mylene goes full crazy scientist when it comes to my blood and its special effects, then Eris goes full trainer from hell mode when it comes to battle formations in this place’, he thought and Eris’s next words further confirmed that.

"Now, they are to dodge the trees randomly falling while avoiding the pits appearing in their way as they cross the forest, later we’ll do some climbing and aquatic combat training too~", it’s clear that Eris was having a blast now that she could easily change he "stage" with Nim’s possession ability, it was good for the chatterbox runic as well, since her manual didn’t limit her to be the spirit of a tree, she was the spirit of the "Immortal Living Forest of Legends", instead and that will probably allow her to posses each and every thing that would be found in it, like the soil, plants, animals and many other things.

Leaving aside those poor girls, there was another thing Aster had come here for, and that was both to check on the matter regarding the special plants that was entrusted to Angela, and to spend some time with her in specific, why, because she deserved it, since Aster could tell that she had just completed her unique mission, how, well, that receptionist girl who normally has a poker face as she likes to gather and manage intel, couldn’t help but show that she was in a happy bright mood, since earlier in the morning.

"I’m going to borrow Angela for a bit, is that okay with you three?", asked Aster which made the receptionist girl who was taking notes, suddenly freeze for a second, but her fate was sealed because Eris, Valentina and Mikaela directly nodded.

"No problem, I can manage just fine until we change the training stage", said Eris.

"It’s fine, she needs to take a break from time to time", said Mikaela.

"Mm", limited to say Valentina, the three agreed that Angela needed a break and they also tacitly agreed to "sacrifice" her, so that the big bad dragon would satiate his teasing needs with someone but them.

And so, after Eris took over Angela’s notebook and pen, the receptionist girl was "kidnapped" by said big bad dragon and taken away.

"I finished preparing the special areas for the thorny bushes and the pomegranate tree, earlier, so let me show you", mumbled Angela as she stole a gaze at Aster, she looked cute waiting for him to "discover" that she had completed her unique mission, as she obviously wanted to show him what she could do and be praised for it.

"Sounds good for a little break, while we arrive there, how are you doing in your unique mission?", asked Aster, feigning ignorance of the previous, which made Angela’s face brighten as she directly accommodated her glasses.

"I just completed it and obtained my profession type technique "Transcendental Wisdom Library", basically it allows me to use all the knowledge I have gathered, to generate, extrapolate and quantify extra detailed information of anything I see, for example... when I see you, I know that your progress in your attack type manual which is of 40% for the current volume you are studying, is the highest not only in the camp, but in the eastern zone as a whole", she said which legitimately surprised Aster.

The absolute field becoming much more precise and basically undetectable which is what he used at yesterday’s match, was the mark of Aster reaching 40% progress in his profession type manual.

Each 10% gave a noticeable improvement, the "slash" which was the prelude for the absolute sword came at 10%, absolute field came at 20%, absolute sword came at 30% and the advanced absolute field came at 40%, that was Aster’s current level of progress.

"That’s amazing, what about my profession type manual, I have been quite constant in my training but, there is a certain poison princess whose progress must be monstrously high", said Aster which made Angela giggle.

"Mm, for profession type manuals, Vivian is the highest in the whole eastern zone, with 40%, while you are at 28%, I think you’ll reach 30% today", said the receptionist girl.

Her unique ability was quite something and in case you think that while the previous is amazing, it’s useless in battle, you ought to read again, because the information Angela can see is not limited to progress and the like, fighting style, strengths, weaknesses, habits, and a lot of other aspects, are available for her to see.

Imagine having to fight an enemy that knows you even better than you know yourself, the trajectory of your attacks, your preferences at the time of charging, your dominant arm, how much experience you have in close, middle and long ranged combat, Angela can analyze all of that and represent it in an easy to understand qualified way, with a single gaze now.

Of course, there are limitations, first of all the "price" she has to pay, which in her case is mental fatigue given that it requires her to see through a lot of information, but, if Alice and Mira are monsters in terms of physical strength at mortal level, Angela is a monster in terms of mental strength at mortal level, she slept the least and worked the most without affecting her efficiency in any way for almost a week.

And while the human record is of around 11 days without resting, the workload and fatigue that should have accumulated in Angela’s mind, equaled five to six times that, because that’s how many matters she managed at the same time, and that wasn’t her limit, but Aster made her rest at that point, speaking of which, Angela was just reminded of the rain of questions, giggles and gazes she received after Aster carried her like a princess while she was sleeping towards her room while making it look like she was being taken to his, and couldn’t help but blush out of nowhere.

Which was of course noticed by Aster who slightly smirked.

"Such an amazing technique deserves a reward, how about we watch another sunset later?", he jokingly said, which nearly made the poor receptionist girl trip and fall.

"T-That’s not funny, those girls bombarded me with questions thanks to that!", exclaimed Angela, to then add.

"Besides, there is a 100% chance that Alice won’t let you alone since the very second she sets a foot in the camp later", mumbled the receptionist girl, which made Aster laugh.

"A technique wasn’t needed to know that though, but you are right, in that case for the next hour, you’ll have all my attention for you", he said as he gently patted Angela’s head, which made her pretty hazel eyes glow for a second.

’Direct contact with our heads, does indeed help us recover from mental fatigue... but more importantly, it feels so comfortable~’, thought the receptionist girl as she nodded, this was her reward for which she had worked so hard, so there was no reason to refuse.

"Mm", she mumbled as she nodded, they also had arrived at the area where the pomegranate tree’s seed was planted.

With a bit of help from the girls of the green lotus and Nim, the soil was prepared for the tree to grow, and the thing was also given some especial nourishment from Mylene’s alchemic products, the result was insane, because there was already a sapling of the tree coming out from the soil.

"It’s been around thee hours since it was planted, it’s growing progress is at 10%, in which case, tomorrow around this hour it should have finished growing, as for bearing fruit, I calculate that around 7 pm there would be a batch ready to be collected, though a few might mature before that... just in time for the match", said Angela to then add.

"We’ll have to wait and see how much "rest" does the tree need before it starts producing another fruit batch, or if the seeds of the tree can be turned into more of them, but chances are that only one or two will have the potential to turn into trees, based on the arrangements shown by the blue flaming board so far".

From the very beginning, those thorny branches and the pomegranate tree, weren’t normal plants, so they growing really fast was within Aster’s expectations, though not this fast, he thought it would need at least two days before they would grow, but the perfect environment to develop, as well as alchemic products to nourish them, further accelerated the previous, and without negative effects.

’Our ally might be "surprised" to see us getting the benefits prior to tomorrow’s match, though, but we aren’t breaking any rules here, so it should be fine’, amusingly thought Aster.

If things followed a normal schedule, then the results of the pomegranate tree and the thorny bushes would be available after the second match, but well, when has Aster’s group been able to be judged as "average" in any way or whatsoever.

After taking a look at the thorny bushes which were also developing at an insane speed, Aster took Angela to the top of Esmeralda’s jade mountain, where the scenery of the soft green wind breeze as well as Nim’s tree branches and the sight of the forest and the lake from a high altitude, created quite the beautiful scene.

This time Angela didn’t get sleepy in the slightest though, she enjoyed taking a break while chatting with Aster about other things she could see now instead, because this relaxed atmosphere and proximity to him, basically allowed the receptionist girl to use her technique "free of charge", given that her mental fatigue vanished as soon as it appeared.