Chapter 199 - Tame beast (1/2)
A few moments later, the mud lizard came into the visible range of the team. It crossed past the muddy area and even moved on the grass of the forest in the same manner as it did before. All of them placed themselves over trees located in the forest and noticed it moving towards the cage.
Shadow asked them to continue to maintain their surviellance of the areas so that no other distractions are seen by the beast. The mud lizard rode up on a wave of earth hardly moving its legs as it slowly followed the trail and came near the cage where it stopped.
”I don't think it will enter the cage on its own,” said Agua as it stopped by cage without moving forward. ”Hope you have a way to make it move if it decides to not get into the cage. The way it is gliding over the earth, I doubt if our usual tactics would be effective in cornering it.”
”No. The usual tricks wouldn't be sufficient,” said Balthazar as he started to smear the poison of the horned toads on one if his bolts. ”My poison would slow it down. I doubt if it would have an effect on its magic, but that is what I am thinking of. If that fails, we will probably need to cripple it and push it in ourselves. Tell the guardian to be on ready and the warlock if he can use any spells to disorient the beasts.”
”Only got dark bolts that can slow it down,” replied Agua. ”Shall we get down then?” he asked.
”No. It will detect any objects or footsteps on the ground. They are quite sensitive to any moving objects on the ground upto a certain range. It was definitely able to do it in a muddy environment, but I doubt its capabilities would extend even to the harder soil of the forest,” explained Shadow. ”Let the warlock shoot his dark bolts if I shoot my poisoned bolt. Then, we will try to physically wrestle it into the cage.”
About half a minute later, the mud lizard started to move into the cage for the meat, when they got another announcement that more mud lizards are heading their way from the archer who was closest to the waterfall where the mud lizards resided. He was making a map of that area for the Divine Swords guild.
”We are having other beasts joining us,” reminded Agua again as there was no response from Shadow. Balthazar had previously informed them that it will get harder if other beasts get involved and they will have to keep other beasts at bay.
”Don't attack before this one gets into the cage. There are no other beasts in the vicinity. If other mud lizards are coming close, it might affect this one to get into the cage faster,” said Shadow. ”If they come too close let the two fae get to attack them and keep them away.”
In another few seconds, the beast finally entered the cage. Shadow quickly shot two poison bolts into the beast and it was followed by warlock's dark bolts as Shadow went to the cage and locked it before the beast tried to get out. He quickly summoned out the two horse that he had and told the others to distract the mud lizards as he connected their saddles to the mobile cage. He also had the warlock to join him to secure the cage to the horses and the pair of them got on top of the mobile cage as the game didn't yet introduce mounts and prevented players from mounting onto beasts.
”Let us move,” said Shadow as he commanded the horses to ride through the forest. Though the previously made their way through the forest, it was on foot. For the cage which was about 2 metres long and a metre wide with two horses side by side attached to it, they need proper space and the horses couldn't move through the same path they used to get to this region.
Balthazar had already expected this and through the journey when he was scouting the path for the others to move, he had already marked a path for the horses to have enough space to move. It was a bit zigzag and curvy and not a straight path as they had used to reach the mud lizards. So, there were bound to be a few monsters that would notice them. Even if they could use the same path that they traversed to get to the waterfall, some monsters would still be respawned in that area.
So, Balthazar requested the fae and others to keep them busy while he rode on the way back. He had already given the path he would follow to Agua who was coordinating the team to just attack the beasts and lure them away from the horses. It wasn't a hard task as the horses led by Shadow moved quite fast even with the cage strapped to them.
The rest of the team actually had a hard time to maintain their pace with the horse, so it was similarly difficult for the monsters to follow up with the horse. He already had warlock beside him on the cage to slow down any beasts that came too close to the horses.
This way, they moved through the woods towards the town. In twenty minutes, the horses and the cage were out of the woods. The rest of the team were still behind. Balthazar decided to wait for them before proceeding ahead. With a pair of horses and the mobile cage, he was sure to gather attention and he wanted to make sure that he had some extra security before he did so.
Agua led the rest of the team from the forest in a few minutes. They joined and made their way to the town. On the way, the players started to stare at them as Balthazar had expected. The cage as well as it being drawn by the horses was a new thing for them to see. They had seen horse drawn carts and carriages in the city but not one which is managed entirely by players.
The cage was also a new sight to most of them. The tamer profession and use of pets hadn't yet become a common thing to most players. So, they found the cage to be very interesting. Quite a number of them began to ask about it and by the time they reached the town gate, posts were already made in the forums about the incident.
Balthazar had expected a bit of publicity, but it was more than what he expected. With this small incident, the local guilds were already notified of them. Balthazar had put on a disguise when they were travelling on the cart, but the others were noted by the people and that they ended their journey in the direction of the tamer in the town. As they reached Kiran's office, the secretary immediately took them to Kiran.
”Ah! You got the mud lizard I asked for,” said Kiran with a smile. ”Faster than I asked and no physical injuries,” he continued as he walked around the cage observing the beast.
Quest Completed: Kiran's acknowledgement
Description: Captured a mud lizard alive.
Rewards: Tame beast skill and instruction from Kiran in taming.
He held out two books in front of Balthazar as finished examining the beast. One was the tame beast skill book that Balthazar immediately recognized. The skill could be used to tame wild beasts when their health is very low or they are dying, but it has a very small percentage of success. The skill basically sends mana to an animal at very low health as a friendly offer. Sometimes, the beast would accept it and become tame but most of the time it fails. The beast could even take the mana and use it to attack him. Thus, it was a very risky skill that could even have adverse effects to the person that used it.
The other one was something different as it had the name of Kiran on it and had a title that said, 'A guide to taming beasts', on it. ”I got the idea from the guide written by the alchemist Arius. It is a better way to let a person learn, give an option for experimenting and getting to have a practical knowledge without a monitoring personality over your head. There would a chance that one could die, but to immortal adventurers, it isn't much of an issue. With this you could be considered an in-name apprentice of mine. I hope you wouldn't disappoint,” said Kiran pointing to the book.