After Shi Yu got home, he started fixing dinner for Eleven.
That evening, after the little Iron-Eating Beast finished its Iron Bamboo, Shi Yu popped two Mind-Clearing Capsules.
Right afterward, Shi Yu called Eleven over, planning to teach it a new skill.
"Eleven, come here."
Full and well fed, Eleven was just about to celebrate today's victory, and its way of celebrating was to train extra hard tonight.
With food and drink provided, all it had to do was train hard, gain strength, and then win battles with ease. The little Iron-Eating Beast found this life fulfilling.
The only fly in the ointment was that its heart felt uneasy whenever Shi Yu used the Skill Index.
[Skill]: Super Vision [Skill rank]: intermediate [Description]: a mental-type skill that consumed mental power to enhance vision to its limit. [Status]: available to teach
Once again, Shi Yu taught Eleven the Super Vision skill under its bewildered gaze.
At that, Eleven's heart skipped a beat.
How it wanted to tell everyone, I, Eleven, owe all my strength to my own hard work!
Little Iron-Eating Beast: (°ー°〃)
Unfortunately, now it couldn't bring itself to say it.
Alas, this strength came too easily to feel secure.
"The skill I just taught you was Super Vision. You can use mental power to activate it. Your vision should have improved quite a bit now, and you should be able to see clearly at night too."
"Yip?"
Eleven had been conflicted, but after hearing that its vision had improved and that it could even see at night, its expression gradually grew serious.
"Awooh-"
Eleven rubbed the black circles around its eyes and immediately ran outside to look into the pitch-black night. Then its expression gradually grew excited again.
It hopped up and down in excitement.
Hooray!
Now training at night will be more convenient!
It would make up overnight for the hard work it owed from before, along with what it owed this time!
Meanwhile, as the Skill Index's cooldown returned to "48 hours," Shi Yu flopped onto his bed, looking like he had nothing left to live for.
He expected his mental state to begin recovering only by tomorrow morning.
All Shi Yu wanted now was for Eleven to stop smashing steel plates tonight and let him get a good night's sleep!
With that much energy, wouldn't it be better to save it for catching rats tomorrow?
In a home in a luxury residential complex not far from the Ping City Beast Tamer Association.
Chen Kai had just returned home and was about to call for people in the class group chat to go hunt rats together tomorrow, but just then, a private message popped up in his messaging app.
[Zhuang Yue]: I saw you at the battle arena this afternoon. [Chen Kai]: ??? [Chen Kai]: What did you see? [Zhuang Yue]: Everything there was to see.
Chen Kai's mouth twitched as he held his phone.
His lifelong reputation.
The bespectacled face of his classmate Zhuang Yue appeared in Chen Kai's mind, and blood rushed to his head.
She had seen it. Didn't that mean every girl in class would know? Then the whole class would know that a random passerby had taken him down in seconds.
[Zhuang Yue]: Do you know that Iron-Eating Beast's Beast Tamer? [Chen Kai]: Why? Want to ask him for advice on raising an Iron-Eating Beast? [Zhuang Yue]: More or less. He left too quickly yesterday, and I couldn't catch up. [Chen Kai]: ...You asked the right person. We're going rat hunting, and we're two short of four. Want to come? Oh, and find another Beast Tamer with a contracted pet beast that has a control-type skill. We have enough damage dealers, so no more of those.
The next day.
The usual place: the Beast Tamer Association's mission hall.
Shi Yu arrived early, but Chen Kai was there even earlier.
"Uh, didn't sleep well yesterday?"
Chen Kai asked in confusion after noticing that Shi Yu had been yawning all the way over.
"I didn't get a good rest, but it's fine."
Although Eleven had been well-behaved and considerate last night and had obediently stayed put all evening, the aftereffects of teaching an intermediate skill were still strong...
Still, Shi Yu could tolerate this state. After all, he had been like this for the entire school year in his senior year of high school, so he was used to it. A little fresh air later would wake him right up.
After all, no matter what, back in his student days before transmigrating, he had been a little superman who studied well, was in good physical shape, and was mentally healthy despite poor sleep and food, developing in every way: morally, intellectually, physically, aesthetically, and through labor. This little bit of weakness couldn't crush his will at all.
"Where are the people you found?" Shi Yu asked next.
Chen Kai said, "Looks like they're not here yet... but they should be here soon, soon."
After the two waited for a while, the people Chen Kai had called arrived.
They were two girls about his age, both wearing ordinary sportswear.
One had a small, round face, wore glasses, and had her hair in a single ponytail.
The other had a classic oval face, short student-style hair, and was fairly tall.
"Shi Yu, this is my classmate, Zhuang Yue."
"The other is her friend, Yu Jingjing, a Beast Tamer from Experimental Middle School."
"Hello," Shi Yu said with a nod.
"Hello, great master!" the two said in unison.
Shi Yu: "..."
What kind of greeting is that? So awkward.
Chen Kai coughed and said, "Both of them passed by the battle arena yesterday and saw our match..."
"All right, let's each introduce ourselves and tell everyone what we've got." Chen Kai didn't want to dwell on yesterday's battle and quickly changed the subject.
"My pet beast is a level-six Ice Armor Beast. It has Proficient Level Ice Crack Claw and Ice Armor."
"My pet beast is a level-six Iron-Eating Beast. It has Entry Level Hardening," said Zhuang Yue, the round-faced girl.
After speaking, she glanced at Shi Yu... after all, compared to his Expert Level Hardening, her own Entry Level Hardening was a little too embarrassing to show off.
"My pet beast is a level-six Thorn Monster. It has the Proficient Level Entanglement skill," said Yu Jingjing, the taller girl.
Thorn Monsters were plant-type, wood-element pet beasts. They looked like a thorny vine, similar to a snake, with thorns all over their bodies. They could freely control the thorny vines they produced, and prey caught in their Entanglement would either die or be maimed.
"My pet beast is a level-five Iron-Eating Beast. It has Expert Level Hardening."
Shi Yu introduced himself in turn, and when he finished, the three of them were speechless.
That growth level and skill proficiency were simply out of proportion.
"That's way too ridiculous," Zhuang Yue couldn't help saying.
Shi Yu thought it was fine. Once they saw how hard Eleven worked, they would probably understand...
Shi Yu looked forward to seeing their expressions when their worldview shattered at the sight of the Iron-Eating Beast's disciplined, round-the-clock training.
"You should hurry up and register for the mission first."
"We'll leave at eight o'clock sharp," Chen Kai said.
At eight in the morning.
The group boarded the bus on time, preparing to head for the countryside around Pingcheng District.
Their destination was called White Creek Village. It fell under the jurisdiction of Yuan'an Town in Icefield City's Pingcheng District and was a relatively underdeveloped village.
The area relied mainly on agriculture, so creatures such as Wind Locusts and Earth-Burrowing Rats were a particular headache.
On the bus, with some time on their hands, the four of them sat in a row and couldn't help chatting again. Chen Kai was the first to ask Shi Yu a question.
"I forgot to ask yesterday. You said you'd already graduated. Don't tell me you weren't a combat major, Beast Tamer?"
Not a combat major?
Beside them, Zhuang Yue and Yu Jingjing seemed to have heard another bombshell.
A pet beast could be this strong even when its Beast Tamer wasn't a combat major???
"No, I majored in pet care," Shi Yu said calmly.
Compared to fighting, breeding and raising pet beasts was his strong suit.
All that fighting and killing was so crude. Mastering pet care was the true path. It was perfectly reasonable for a Beast Tamer who majored in pet care to train a pet beast with Expert Level Hardening, right!
The other three fell silent.