Weakest Beast Tamer Gets All SSS Dragons

Chapter 1319 - Taming the Old World - Last Dragon - 3

The chaotic crossfire on the northern peak raged on in a free for all...

But when the human Vanguard launched into the air to clear the mutant unexpected attack zone, leaving no viable human targets on the ground for the Light Guardian, the ethereal dragon seamlessly pivoted its aggression fully back toward the original trespassers. It funneled its entire offensive output directly back into the massive mutant swarm crowding its slopes.

The Vanguard artillery, having repositioned themselves at a safer altitude, actively supported the guardian's new focus. They did not drop heavy mana payloads with the intent to secure outright kills. Instead, they launched precise, crippling strikes designed to pin the mutants in place. They shattered kneecaps, weakened armors, and chained the beasts to the earth, forcibly immobilizing the Platinum horrors just long enough for the Light Dragon's fast beams to sweep across the staggered formations and finish the job.

In a twist of supreme tactical irony, the primordial guardian of light had become the single most devastating asset working against corruption.

It did not possess the highest ceiling for burst damage even here, Luna, Larissa and Selphira were examples of bigger explosive power, and that title still belonged to Ren's ultimate fusion overall, yet it offered something entirely different: relentless, almost perfect, sustain.

Its rate of fire was staggering, and its stamina pool was virtually bottomless.

Because it was fighting on its home turf, anchored to the very peak that birthed its final form, the dragon acted as a living conduit. It constantly siphoned raw mana directly from the mountain and the glowing atmosphere surrounding it, rapidly replenishing its reserves almost exactly as fast as it burned them.

While the human Tamers were forced to meticulously ration every drop of ether to avoid bankrupting their cores, the guardian enjoyed a near-infinite fuel supply. It weaponized that bottomless tank to castigate Selthia's elite swarm with a relentless cadence of fire that no human army could ever hope to match.

Of course, not even an elemental dragon was truly infinite.

Its internal mana channels were still bound by the fundamental laws of mana-biology, meaning they could suffer from sheer fatigue.

Like any physical creature, the structural architecture of its body was not eternal. The absolute worst fate that could befall any Tamer or beast was rupturing their meridians by forcing too much raw power through the system too quickly.

However, the internal channels of a true guardian were evolutionary masterpieces perfectly adapted to handle massive volumes of ether. The sheer density of the payload they managed would have instantly incinerated the mana system of any lesser creature.

Because of that flawless biological engineering, the guardian simply refused to stop firing. Despite the heavy damage it had sustained, healed, and despite the creeping fatigue settling into its translucent veins, it unleashed beam after blinding beam. It was a virtually tireless executioner, unwittingly slaughtering the very army Selthia had marched to its doorstep.

Caught in the merciless crossfire between the endless wrath of the dragon and the hit and run strikes of the Vanguard, Selthia's numbers continued to plummet.

♢♢♢♢

Another sixty Platinum beasts had been erased from the board…

Factoring in the energy permanently destroyed by the Academy Directors' spiritual flames before the horde could cannibalize the remains, it translated to a net loss of roughly thirty fully-grown Platinums.

More importantly, a second Diamond titan had fallen here.

It crumbled under the overwhelming coordination of four heavy hitters operating in full fusion: Victor's Winged Qilin, Taro's Stalking Khepri, Sirius's Serpent-Tailed Black Tiger, and Liu's Blood Wendigo. The four double tamers operated as a single, perfectly synchronized unit, flawlessly covering each other's blind spots as they encircled the walking mountain. They systematically dismantled the titan piece by piece, reducing another of Selthia's astronomically expensive masterpieces to absolute dust.

Yet, securing that kill carried a heavy toll.

Sirius was beginning to feel the weight of exhaustion in his bones.

He had pushed his internal energy reserves far harder than the younger commanders.

Between his grueling deployment on the southern front, where he had fought tooth and nail alongside Ren, and this grinding northern siege, Sirius had overdrawn his account. And the underlying reason for his rapid fatigue was rooted in the fundamental nature of his contracted beasts.

Sirius wielded deeply mature, thoroughly stabilized creatures.

They were significantly stronger than standard beasts of their tier precisely because of that maturity; his Silver 3 beast could easily trade blows with a Gold 2 or 3, a feat largely attributed to his completion of the thousand-day evolution method. His primary Gold-rank Tiger hovered near the absolute ceiling of its class, boasting the power output of at least half a Platinum or a bit higher.

However, that profound maturity carried a steep physiological cost.

His beasts lacked the mana plasticity of the younger, rapidly evolving creatures piloted by the rest of the younger squad. Sirius's fusions offered explosive power, flawless technique, and unmatched precision, yet they severely lacked systemic endurance and possessed a somewhat shallower ceiling for overall mana capacity.

The younger generation, piloting beasts that had rocketed into the upper echelons of Gold 3 without relying on the slow pressure of the thousand-day method, could sustain massive mana loads for significantly longer periods.

Sirius simply could not.

He was currently hovering around forty percent capacity, perhaps slightly lower. It was enough fuel to keep fighting, yet he could feel the hard limit rapidly approaching.

Recognizing the impending bottleneck, he made a fast yet already previously introspected decision.

During a brief lull between artillery barrages, he closed the distance to Luna. Without a word, he pulled the heavy, ancient artifact from his finger and held it out to her. It was the sovereign Shadow Ring he had used in Yino, the artifact that had amplified his dark ether by a staggering fifty percent all day.

"Take it," Sirius told her, his voice flat and practical. "You are going to put this to much better use than I can right now."

Luna stared at the ring resting in his palm, her eyes wide with surprise and confusion.