Chapter 485: Crisis Management
“Apologies, honored elders and father. But I have to recall this particular puppet to deal with the ongoing crisis in the back of the caravan,” the Razor Maiden puppet (Razorstella) informed the group in Zhen Liu’s voice.
“Crisis?”
Zhen Shi and the three Grandmaster elders looked a touch confused at the puppet’s statement, granted they were occupied with fighting a giant dragon otter that spat lightning on the regular at the moment, so it was understandable that they wouldn’t have notice anything outside of that.
In fact, the only reason why the four of them could have this brief conversation in the first place was due to Zhen Liu’s jade puppet(Nepherage) and frog woman puppet (Hurricroak) keeping the Thunderscale Dragon Otter busy for the time being.
As such, the four of them proceeded to do a quick sweep with their aether in the surrounding area and immediately understood the situation.
It wasn’t necessarily good.
Apparently the Thunderscale Dragon Otter was a sore loser and had order her pack to go and attack the non-combatants out of spite and pure disregard of their own safety.
“Are those otters fucking crazy?!,” Zhen Yan asked aloud, “they’re fighting in what’s going to be the blast zone of their own boss’s lighting blast!”
“No…take a look. Your son’s puppet is doing a good job in preventing that scenario from happening, but its too good of a job,” Zhen Lao pointed out.
The mammoth puppet (Frosttusk) was still doing its damnedest in blocking the lighting blast at this moment in time, showing a surprising amount of gumption in the face of something as domineering as dragon force, and preventing the attack from annihilating the caravaners. Unfortunately, this also meant that Ravager Otters could rampage without the threat of getting annihilated by their leader’s attack!
In fact, it wouldn’t be too much of a stretch to assume the Thunderscale Dragon Otter understood that while she was fighting most of the warriors at the Grandmaster stage and above, her pack would have free reign to overwhelm the defenders and slaughter the non-combatants with ease.
While there was still Grandmaster Zhen Wang, as well as several other Aether Master level fighters that could very well handle the task of repelling the offending otters, the sheer number of them made for a rather worrying sight.
Evidently, the sight was so worrying that Zhen Long almost broke away from the rest of the group in order to handle the onslaught of otters, however, he was stopped by both his father, Zhen Shi, and Zhen Liu’s Razor Maiden puppet.
“I know how you feel son, but we still need to take down the main threat. If we go back there and try to deal with those minions ourselves, we’ll end up exposing our backs to the dragon otter. We have to faith that the rest of the clan can handle it themselves.”
“But father-!”
“First Uncle,” the Razor Maiden puppet interjected, “it is precisely because I know that you, father and grandfather are more than capable of taking down the Thunderscale Dragon Otter together that I feel it is okay for me to withdraw this particular puppet. Out of all the puppets under my command, this one is the most…surgical. I can guarantee that once I recall this puppet that the Ravager Otters currently rampaging will be dealt with swiftly.”
“I…”
Zhen Long still found it weird that Zhen Liu could use his puppets to talk, so he was a touch stun at the confident declaration coming out of something so…pretty.
Regardless, the intervention of both his father and nephew was enough to get him to change his mind.
“Grrr, fine! Let’s take this stupid dragon otter down! I’m counting on you, Xiao Liu!”
“No worries, we got this.”
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“Okay, last I checked, otters tended to live in packs of twenty at most, right?,” Zhen Hai asked his cousin, Zhen Yue.
“Give or take about five, but yeah,” Zhen Yue answered.
“Okay…SO WHY THE FUCK ARE THERE OVER FORTY OF THESE DAMN THINGS ATTACKING US, NOW?!,” Zhen Hai roared in frustation as he grappled with yet another juvenile Ravager Otter into submission.
“BECAUSE THEY’RE SNEAKY BASTARDS!,”Zhen Yue shouted back as she slashed through an attacking otter, sending it back to the riverbed below.
The Zhen Clan fighters and been occupied with escorting all of the non-combatants to safety when the Ravager Otters sudden doubled down on thier attack and quite literally doubled their numbers.
It also didn’t help that mixed in among the original tier one juveniles were several tier two adults.
The Ravager Otters had initially attacked with about a dozen or so otters, so the fact that it jumped up so much was harrowing to say the least, especially now that the fighters were a bit more isolated from one another.
Since the fighters and to evacuate multiple people scattered across several dozen rafts, many of them had to separate into smaller groups or individuals in order to get people to safety.
While this set-up did wonders in terms of gathering people, it also created several opportunities for individuals to get both outnumbered and outmanned.
Some people got lucky and had someone to back them up, like in the case of Zhen Yue and Zhen Hai.
Others were strong enough to handle the oncoming threat even when outnumbered, as was the case for Zhen Wang…
“Come at me you filthy animals!”
…and the other elders of the branch clan.
“When the hell did you learn to do that with your plants?!”
“Just now!”
However, some had the very unfortunate luck of being both outnumbered and outmatched…
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“How many of these bastards are going to keep coming?!”
“I don’t know, but I’m starting to run low on aether here…”
Zhen Hou and Zhen Ye were still fighting off over a dozen or so Ravager Otters as the were trying their absolute best in both getting out of the water, while protecting the latter’s snake cages.
It wasn’t too bad at first, due to most of their opponents being a dwindling number of tier one juveniles Ravager Otters, but just when they thought things were getting a little easier, the tier two adult members of the pack finally decided to get involved.
This meant that Zhen Hou and Zhen Ye had to expend even more effort, aether and energy in fighting off the otters, especially since these tier two ones were a lot faster, stronger and tougher.
However, despite all of these setbacks, Zhen Hou and Zhen Ye were just about to reach the end of their skirmish and join up with the others for safety…until the latter heard something.
“Huh?”
Something that made his hair stand on end with worry.
“Alright you waterborne furry fucks, who’s next?!”
“Xiao Tai?!”
Several dozen rafts away from them, Zhen Ye saw that his son, Zhen Tai, was in the middle of fighting off what appeared to be half a dozen or so Ravager Otters all by himself.
Zhen Ye was confused at the sight, because while he knew that his son was the violent and energetic sort, his son also knew better than to pick a fight he couldn’t win…most of the time.
“Wait…”
It wasn’t until he took a closer look at the raft that Zhen Tai was standing on that he understood why his son was fighting so hard.
“Xiao Tai, get out of here! I’m only slowing you down.”
“No way ma! I am not leaving you behind!”
Like something out of his worst nightmares, Zhen Ye saw that both his wife and child were stuck in the same raft, the former with an obvious leg injury in the form of a bloody gash while the latter was trying their damndest to prevent anymore bloodshed.
Zhen Ye turned pale as he saw this scenario play out, but he still managed to build up the energy necessary to rush towards them.
As he did though, Zhen Ye made a dark realization: he wasn’t going to make it in time.
Thanks to his senses as an Aether Master, he could sense that below the water, a tier two Ravager Otter was about to join in on the attack against his injured wife and son. His son might have been able to fight off tier one Ravager Otters with some effort, but a tier two one would annihilate him in an instant.
Zhen Ye understood at this moment he needed to somehow draw the attention away from his son and towards himself…but he had exactly zero experience in doing something like that!
‘How the fuck am I supposed to draw away all of this attention towards?! I’ve spent most of life doing the opposite!,’ Zhen Ye cursed at this inability of his.
Despair was about to overtake his heart as he saw the river’s surface starting to bubble, the telltale aura of a tier two Ravager Otter starting to prick at his senses, but then…
*BANG!*
‘Huh?!’
A strange cracking noise echoed through the air, as something energetic impacted his back.
The world began to slow and distort…as his perception of reality began to melt…
‘Why…do I…see…stars?’
