84: Chapter 84

The kind she could take back and drag straight onto the battlefield, not one that she had to hand-feed and raise for years before it was usable.

The Familiar Master's expression stiffened at the question.

He rubbed his hands together, pondering for a long time before speaking: "By the rules of the Underworld, there are very few adult creatures in the Familiar Forest, for fear they might kill each other. The rest are all guardians of the forest and already have owners."

Himejima Suzaku was about to reply when the Master changed the subject, chuckling: "However, there is indeed one ownerless beast. It just depends on whether you dare to disturb that lord's peace."

Rias Gremory suddenly interrupted, her tone surprised: "Master, please don't joke. Lord Tiamat is not a familiar that can be contracted casually."

Lord Tiamat?

Reya Kusaka and Bing exchanged a glance, their faces full of confusion. What kind of background must an existence have to make Rias Gremory call them "Lord"?

Minister Sona added calmly from the side: "You two have both seen her. One of the dragons that helped Luo Yu force back Zeus and his group, Tiamat, the Chaos Karma Dragon among the Five Great Dragon Kings. The guardian deity of this entire Familiar Forest, with raw strength at the Super Devil King Class."

"Rias Gremory, Sona, you might not be aware," the Familiar Master said slowly. "Lord Tiamat has always stayed in this deep forest, but she does not belong to anyone; she is an ownerless familiar. For these few hundred years, no one has been able to sign a contract with her. Even His Majesty Ajuka Beelzebub only has a cooperative relationship."

He paused, his gaze falling on Himejima Suzaku. "If you, young lady, have the confidence, you might as well give it a try. After all, you are the contractor of the spirit beast Suzaku; I can tell."

Himejima Suzaku quickly shook her head. "Master, you are joking. I dare not even covet an existence like the Chaos Karma Dragon."

Her tone was clearly humble.

She knew very well in her heart that she was aware of her own worth.

The Familiar Master sighed, a look of regret appearing on his face.

He was not trying to make things difficult for Himejima Suzaku on purpose.

Regarding the contract with Tiamat, he had mentioned it to every pure-blooded devil noble heir who came here to select a familiar.

He meant nothing else by it; he just wanted to see if anyone could actually take that lord out of the deep forest.

He remembered that the last one to have this idea was the successor of the Bael Clan.

At that time, the other party relied on the Sacred Gear Regulus Nemea and went aggressively to find Tiamat to discuss a contract.

And the result?

They were swatted into serious injury by a single tail swipe.

Seeing that she couldn't get a stronger familiar for the time being, Himejima Suzaku gave up.

Before she came, she hadn't held much hope anyway.

Just as she was planning to pick a decent enough familiar to sign a contract with—

"ROAR!!!" A violent roar suddenly exploded from the deepest part of the deep forest. "Red Dragon Emperor! You're fucking bullying me too much!"

The sound made Sona and Rias Gremory's eardrums ache.

The entire Familiar Forest went silent instantly.

Countless familiars were so scared they curled up into balls, trembling, not daring to even breathe.

"It's Lord Tiamat!" Sona widened her eyes.

A black giant dragon nearly a hundred zhang long soared into the sky, its dragon eyes filled with rage.

And opposite the giant dragon stood a young man. It was none other than Luo Yu.

Above the Familiar Forest, the atmosphere was as tense as a drawn bowstring.

The giant dragon named Tiamat pressed down with her aura like a tide, getting heavier and heavier, almost making people unable to breathe.

Not to mention those young familiars that hadn't grown up yet, even Sona and Rias Gremory felt their throats tighten, as if they had choked on water.

This dragon species had strength that had long surpassed the Maou-Class; the gap between her and them was simply heaven and earth.

"Tiamat, why must you be like this?" Luo Yu's voice was indifferent, and he casually blocked that violent aura.

Sona and the others immediately breathed a sigh of relief. "This can be considered an opportunity for you. You surely don't want to hole up in this Familiar Forest forever until you die of old age, right?"

"Opportunity? Heh..." Tiamat roared in a rage, the sound shaking the entire forest. "You are forcing me to go to my death! That place is simply a dead end!"

She roared heartbreakingly, as if Luo Yu's words had hit the exact scar that pained her the most. "You are the same as your ancestor! Arrogant and conceited! Is the Otherworld that easy to attack? Back then, I believed his nonsense and followed that guy to kill my way there, and what was the result? Total annihilation! My friends, my kin, all buried in that godforsaken place!"

"I escaped back with him like two stray dogs."

That expedition to the Otherworld became a lifelong wound in Tiamat's heart.

In that war, she had gambled everything. She had thought time could dilute everything, and after enduring a few hundred or a thousand years, she would forget it.

She really didn't expect that guy's descendant would still dare to covet the Otherworld.

It seems that bastard left behind the coordinates to the Otherworld before he died.

"So Tiamat also participated in that Otherworld expedition?" Ddraig's voice came from the Boosted Gear, full of shock.

He had vaguely known some things before, but he wasn't entirely clear about what Luo Yu had actually done during that time he went to the Otherworld.

However, regarding the Otherworld, Luo Yu hadn't kept it from him; after all, once he set off, he wouldn't be able to hide it anyway.

"Nothing to be surprised about," Luo Yu said in a flat tone. "My cheap ancestor failed in the expedition to the Otherworld, but that doesn't mean everyone died."

He paused, his gaze falling on Tiamat. "Look at the wounds on her; they are clearly not caused by the arts of this world. Haven't you noticed yet—she is incompatible with this world."

"Everything around her is repelling her, just like that world coordinate. She is simply not a creature of this world."

With Luo Yu's mention, Ddraig suddenly realized. Indeed.

The aura on Tiamat was very subtle.

It was like a foreign object that had suddenly intruded into this heaven and earth; space repelled her, matter repelled her, and even living things were avoiding her.

If it was like this in a small plane like the Familiar Forest, if she entered the Underworld, the Human World, or the Celestial Realm, the repulsion force of the main world would likely be so great that she wouldn't be able to move an inch.

Luo Yu quickly sorted through the matter in his mind. "She most likely had an accident while attacking the Otherworld. As a creature of this world, she would definitely be repelled over there. Since that was the case, she just went all the way, using some secret technique or other means to transform herself into an Otherworld creature. This way, she could avoid the suppression of the native world and also bypass the surveillance of the world's consciousness."

He voiced his judgment. He added in his heart: Tiamat dared to do this, which meant she had full confidence in taking down that Otherworld at the time. This also proved that the world they had previously campaigned against was not too strong.

It ended up like that because they most likely encountered an unexpected accident. That was why they escaped back from there in such a sorry state.

Below, Sona and Rias Gremory could only vaguely hear Tiamat's roars.

It was like being separated by a thin veil, hazy and unclear; they couldn't hear clearly what was specifically said.

They were suspicious in their hearts. How did Luo Yu get into a conflict with the "Chaos Karma Dragon" Tiamat? They hadn't heard before that Luo Yu was also coming to the Familiar Forest.

The Familiar Master was so scared his legs were almost going soft. He kept muttering in his heart: I pray to the four Devil Kings of the Underworld, please, Red Dragon Emperor, do not cause any major trouble here. Otherwise, the Familiar Forest will definitely be finished. By then, he, this Familiar Master, shouldn't even think about keeping his job.

Himejima Suzaku looked up at the figure in the sky that was both familiar and strange. Her heart was excited, hesitant, and painful. More than that, it was an indescribable panic.

All these days, she clearly knew that Ah Yu was in the same small town, even the same school, as her. But she kept hiding, trying her best not to have any chance to meet Ah Yu.

She hadn't figured out how to face Ah Yu, nor did she know how to speak.

"You went to attack that Otherworld; it wasn't just you who wanted to fight; this world also gave a push behind the scenes."

As soon as Luo Yu said this, Tiamat, despite her anger, couldn't help but be stunned for a moment.

They had teamed up with the Fallen One to attack that world, indeed wanting to use this opportunity to try to break through their strength bottlenecks and charge from Dragon King to Heavenly Dragon. But in the end, this was their own selfish desire. What did it have to do with this world?

"Tiamat, you are about to be abandoned by this world. Going to that world actually offers a path to survival. I happen to be missing a guide."

Luo Yu made it clear. Tiamat was not a transmigrator; this world's repulsion toward her would only get more and more severe. In the end, it would either blast her out or kill her directly.

Tiamat didn't speak. She knew very well what the Red Dragon Emperor actually wanted by finding her. A guide? That was just an excuse.

Tiamat knew very well that the so-called crusade invasion by the Fallen One didn't count as a proper war at all. At that time, those who hung out with the Fallen One, dragon species of the Super Devil class like her, were pitifully few. Apart from the entire clan she brought, the rest were just a few old acquaintances with mediocre strength who had been stuck at a bottleneck for many years. The rest were all human followers of the Fallen One.

The Fallen One was able to make a name for themselves in the Three Realms by relying on that first Holy Sword, but the prestige accumulated was at most only about a dozen years. The strength and number of the followers below were, as one could imagine, how pathetic they were.

But the Red Dragon Emperor's plan was different. His goal was to drag all the dragon species in the Three Realms into the water. By comparison, the Fallen One's little commotion was simply child's play.

Precisely because of this, there was a huge stone weighing on Tiamat's heart. She knew very well that hiding in the Familiar Forest was just delaying time and could not cure the root cause. There weren't many days left until the day of her fall.

But as someone who had walked that path, she knew clearly that crusading against the Otherworld was not as simple as imagined. It wasn't that if you were strong enough, you could take it down. That was a complete world, not the concept of a single enemy. Otherwise, their group back then wouldn't have been completely wiped out. She really didn't want to do it again. Not to mention dragging all the dragon species of the Three Realms into it.

Tiamat fell silent. Luo Yu didn't press, directly throwing a piece of memory information over. Tiamat furrowed her brows, not understanding what the Red Dragon Emperor was planning again. But she had already made up her mind that no matter what, she would not participate in the Otherworld crusade again. However, she still received that memory information into her mind.

Below, Sona and Rias Gremory, watching the conversation above finally subside, secretly breathed a sigh of relief. If they really fought, they truly didn't know how it would end.

Tiamat browsed through the memory fragments in her mind. Her expression changed bit by bit. In the end, her entire face was so gloomy it could drip water. Fear and shock surged up wave after wave, slamming into her heart like a tide.

"How does it feel?" Luo Yu asked indifferently.