A Dragon's Curiosity

Two instructors watched as endless waves of [Yellow Banded Loam Monsters] congregated towards the boulders from the branches of a tree nearby.

Most of the time when the teachers accompanied the students on a trip, they made sure to stay out of sight and only interfere in the most critical moments.

Some parents had complained before that the academy should intervene before their precious children had been injured, but the [Royal Academy] insisted on their policy of non-interference.

When the injured teens in question recovered from their bruises and seldom a few broken bones, they rarely ever made the same mistakes that landed them in those predicaments in the first place, proving the stance of the academy right.

Earlier, there had been four instructors in total watching over the siege, yet two of them left when it became increasingly clear that the teams inside the small path safely made it through the worst of it.

“Ser Isaac, should we offer them some help at least? There are no more enemies around, so it doesn’t count as hampering their experience on the trip.”

Silas was one of the teachers that joined that academy this turn and happened to be a graduate of the same.

He addressed his senior instructor mainly because he also went through the warrior class trips and still had pity for the young men and women struggling below them.

“It’s fine, this is all part of their education. Fighting and killing is not everything there is when it comes to adventuring or campaigning in the Wilderness.

And someone already sent for one of the wagons to come over, at least the kids don’t have to carry back everything they harvest now.

That should earn us at least a bit of gratitude.”

Ser Isaac Dunlap, a grizzled veteran with greying brown beard and bald head, had seen too many generations of classes go through the same trials, he no longer had the same view as his young colleague.

Every tear they shed now and all the habits they learned in a safe environment would be one less accident that happened when the students were on their own.

“Yes, that’s a small boon for them at least. Still, it’s unusual for [Yellow Banded Loam Monsters] to converge on a location this much. Do you know what the cause for this is, Ser Isaac?”

As a new hire, Silas Martin respected his seniors in the same branch very much and strived to learn from them, just as he did in his own student days.

“It’s not a coincidence, this happens every turn at least once or twice.

Troublemakers appear in different ways, one of the kids probably had a genius idea and bought something that attracts monsters or brought it from home.

Generally, that only really happens later on, when the monsters they face are no longer as abundant as now, around mid third rank usually.

In this regard, we are quite lucky actually, since we were not forced to intervene and rescue the students this time around.”

In fact, [Lesser Lure Potions] were neither particularly expensive or rare.

Their limited effect made the demand for it low, adventurer teams often did not lack targets to go after, hence they did not need to attract even more prey.

Only a select few monsters had particular traits that made them worth much more than the average compared to their rank, hence the potion sometimes sold.

Other items also existed to attract monsters, so the current fight at the path through the boulder heap occurred nearly every turn in the academy.

Ser Isaac was correct, the idea to concentrate the monster population usually only started once the targets were of a higher rank.

Second rank monsters teemed and thrived around settlements and the [Adventurer’s Guild] branches offered many missions for this level of strength.

Third rank monsters, on the other hand, often did not enjoy too much company and began to thin out.

Plenty of them still existed not too far away from human civilization, but not in numbers that threatened the safety of villages and cities.

“Oh, I think I know what you mean. There’s been an incident when I was a student as well, but I thought it was an isolated case.

It makes sense now that you say it though.”

While the instructors continued to exchange their opinions, Nisha glanced around the battlefield down below.

The elf looked pretty much as usual, if not for one small change.

Below her elbows, she was drenched completely in blood, changing the colour of her leather combat jacket from brown to a rusted red.

Nevertheless, the dragon came out of the small scale monster surge in much better condition than others.

Leaning against the cool stone wall nearby, Unico had a cut running from the middle of his chest to below his navel, the result of a lapse in concentration.

The heavy blow thankfully turned into a glancing wound thanks to his fast reaction, but there were many small scratches and bruises all over his body, leaving his robes in tatters.

Similar to him, Lisa had collapsed to the ground and sat a short distance away from him, the small round shield strapped to her arm broken to pieces, the sword she wielded marred with nicks and pieces of gore stuck to it.

Thankfully, the dirty yellow patch of potion residue on her top had dissipated by now and no longer attracted more monsters to their position.

Due to the stark contrast between the elf and her team, it made it look like they went through two different experiences, but there were other examples that made Unico and Lisa feel sane.

As the monster siege progressed, other teams participating in the Warrior Class Excursion noticed the unusual movements of the monsters in the surroundings and followed their traces.

The potion was spilled at two places, leading the students to two different destinations.

While the first place only had a piece of overturned soil where the monsters dug into the ground, the teams checking out that place escaped the siege from the small scale surge, while most of the others that arrived at the boulder formation were forced to seek refuge with the defenders on the path leading through the stones once they started a fight, endless reinforcements from the monsters cutting off their path of retreat.

The smarter groups directly fled the scene once they noticed the high monster count and never looked back or spared a thought for the reason, pushing all responsibility on the academy.

Contrary to that, the first of the three groups that joined Nisha’s team did not intend to render them assistance and only got excited at the prospect of having monsters to hunt without needing to search through the Wilderness.

Armed entirely with heavy weapons, the team consisted of young men that dreamed of being knights.

Bastard swords, two handed Flamberges, a heavy spear, tower shields, there was not a single type besides heavy hitters.

Even the shield bearer of their team wielded a longsword besides his shield, not consigned to being on the defense.

Their leader, Jehu Blacktalon, the heir of a branch under a Count directly reporting to the Blackburn family, had ripped muscles and a figure that made him look like a buff war veteran instead of a youth just starting his academy life.

Even the hunk of metal he called a claymore looked short and thin in his massive pranks.

Still, he never complained about the role they had to play in the defense of the stone path and always stood at the front line, cleaving a path of survival with his own hands.

The second group similarly had a theme to their weaponry, almost to prove that their direction was entirely opposite to Jehu’s band of prospective knights.

While most of the students enrolling in the aura courses offered by the [Royal Academy] were young men with grand dreams, there were also quite a few female applicants.

Veilia Sternbloom gathered the young women around her to form their own team when the Warrior Class Excursions started, those unaccustomed to the coarse youths and zealous punks.

The third child of a small barony without nameworthy lands, Veilia clawed her way to the top as the leader of her clique and worked harder than anyone else to keep their group going.

Inspired by their idol and leader, most of the girls in her team followed her choice of armament and they brought a group of fast and agile rapiers on the trip.

Usually a weapon used for duels and martial exchanges in high social circles, rather than a tool for slaughtering monsters, their composition worked for them due to one of the girls bearing an Earth blessing granting her greater strength than others of the same rank.

Using a giant version of their weapon of choice, their tank held off monsters while the other girls flitted around their target and sought for weak points and fatal flaws with their fast blades.

The team originally did not intend to join the small monster surge defense, yet they fought against a lone [Yellow Banded Loam Monster] in the vicinity and were surprised by the large groups of enemies surging in their direction.

Fleeing from the overwhelming encirclement, the group around Veilia Sternbloom eventually ended up on the stone path as well.

The last group fell into neither extreme as the others and was closer to Nisha’s trio.

Three boys and two girls that knew each other prior to enrolling to the academy and made friends recently agreed to go together during the excursion.

The highest noble title any of their parents held did not make it higher than Viscount, meaning that nobody was slated to inherit a Countdom in the future.

Seeing that several fellow groups of their academy struggled against a horde of beasts, the boys chivalrously proposed to help them while the girls agreed after some thought.

At that point of time the monster surge already neared the end, yet their help was still much appreciated by all groups.

Since the beginning, Nisha held the side facing the other concentration point of monsters, growing increasingly violent as time went on.

In the heat of battle, the dragon used one hand to wield her [Taurith Short Sword] like a sickle reaping oats of wheat, striking down frog-like monsters one after the other, while her other hand crushed bones and ripped flesh off their bodies.

The bodies of dead [Yellow Banded Loam Monsters] stacked all around on the stone path between the boulders, while Nisha pushed the attackers further towards the entrance over the course of the fight, needing the space that opened up, not yet stained red flowing with streams of blood.

Most students would have been deadly afraid of such an efficient and ruthless killing machine, but most of them were busy fending for their lives and actually appreciated the girl that almost single handedly held the defense for one side of the path, they did not really notice her methods.

Unico and Lisa took turns to guard the other direction at first and might have collapsed under the pressure, if it was not for the reinforcements that joined them later on.

Nevertheless, the two of them never saw the elf in serious distress, so the blonde girl harbored a secret suspicion that they would have been fine even without the other students.

She just chose not to say or ask anything and accept her silent belief as the truth.

Nisha still ran her eyes over her companions, despite her [Spirit Sight] telling her they were largely fine.

Her cultivation at the peak of the third rank made it look like the dragon stagnated at her current rank, but in reality her strength, endurance and similar attributes rose higher with each passing day.

The [Dragon Force] possessed by her unearthed more potential and perfected her physical body and soul, leading Nisha to believe that her breakthrough would only happen once her power reached the absolute limit for her rank.

She evaluated this as a good thing, since it meant that her limit for the third rank had not arrived yet.

Compared to her unlimited fighting prowess and stamina, Unico and Lisa had to take breaks frequently and looked just as worn out as they felt.