Chapter 51: New Residents

The old man finished his stealthy actions and rushed away from the tavern, taking advantage of the situation to flee.

The red-haired man also emerged from the large hole in the tavern's wall as he loudly commanded, "Round up all the lackeys, no need to spare them!"

By the time his words were finished, he was already chasing after the old man, with a large, fiery bird following alongside. The spirit pet's power seemed no less than the red-haired man's.

As the two main combatants moved away, the fight in the tavern continued. More members from the Order of Blood Origin appeared to join the fray.

Seeing their disadvantageous numbers, one of the enforcement officers in glasses shouted loudly, "Everyone, assist us in defeating these villains! You'll be handsomely rewarded for your contributions!"

Hearing this, some of the spirit tamers who were originally escaping suddenly stopped. They looked at the situation as well as each other. They saw the glint in each other's eyes before darting towards the nearest members of the Order of Blood Origin.

A massive battle immediately ensued. Just from a rough glance, Ain spotted over 50 spirit tamers, and even more spirit pets, embroiled in battle. Spells and skills flew all over, causing damage to the surrounding buildings.

Boom! Boom!

The ground trembled from the explosions as people continued to evacuate in a hurry. Since this was the edge of the city, there were almost no regular humans here. Moreover, this was near Forest Gate, one of the most popular locations for spirit tamers to hang around. As many continued to run, others made their way toward the commotion, either to join in or to spectate.

Ain, who was in the middle of all this, hurriedly looked around and avoided the battles, making his way toward the location where the old man had crashed.

He dodged a couple of stray spells and arrived near the debris. At this moment, another spell appeared behind him, but Ain managed to cast Shield in time, effectively mitigating the damage. But the spell was evidently strong, shattering the Shield and pushing him onto the ground in a sorry state. As he fell, Ain turned to the side, avoiding an impact on his chest.

By the time he fumbled onto his feet and ran away with an anxious expression, something new had already appeared in his waist bag.

Ain didn't stand out in his escape, as he was just one amongst many. There were alarms sounding in the vicinity, as various emergency vehicles flew over to provide support.

As the explosions grew fainter, Ain slowly came to a stop, and the anxious expression on his face disappeared.

He turned around to look in the direction of the tavern. The light show from the spells and skills was still faintly visible, as sounds of explosions and shouting could be heard intermittently.

'What bad luck.' Ain thought. During the first time he decided to relax and explore, he almost got entangled in a dangerous battle.

He looked around and saw people gathering in the vicinity, with many recording the situation from afar. Higher-rank spirit tamers could fly, and with their status, they were naturally allowed to do so in the city. But without special privileges, normal spirit tamers weren't allowed to use their spirit pets to fly within the city limits.

As such, many spirit tamers climbed atop the shorter buildings to observe and record.

With one last glance toward the tavern, Ain turned around and looked for the nearest hoverbus station.

The situation was chaotic back then, and it was impossible for others to pay attention to everything. When he saw the old man hide something, Ain looked around and realized that he was the only one who had noticed.

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While patting his waist bag to ease his nerves, he boarded the hoverbus to return home.

...

A couple of hours later, Ain stood in front of his door, opening it with relief.

Although he was confident in his stealthy actions, the journey home was still nerve-wracking. As soon as he entered through the door, the cat ran up to him and greeted, "Meow."

A smile appeared on Ain’s face after witnessing the familiar sight. He summoned Nox to let it accompany the cat as he headed inside.

After greeting Nox, the cat stared at Ain curiously and followed behind.

"Meow." This time, the cat's cry held a different intonation, as if asking a question.

"Wooo..." Nox voiced out, as if responding to the cat.

Ain placed the heavy, black spear against a corner before removing his large backpack, as well as all his waist bags.

While he did that, the cat climbed atop the table next to Ain and stared at his chest intently. Seeing its actions, Ain paused his actions.

"Whimper..." At this moment, faint whimpering sounds emerged from his chest.

Hearing this, the cat's ears perked up: "Meow!" It held up one of its paws and pointed at the only bag still on Ain's body, the one on his chest.

"Hmm, you're pretty keen." Ain observed the cat's reaction with a small laugh. He removed the bag from his chest and placed it on the table gently, next to the cat, before opening it.

The cat leaned over the bag, and Nox hurriedly joined it, mimicking its actions.

"Whimper." "Whimper."

When the bag was completely opened and the contents were revealed, the cat suddenly leaned back and stared at Ain with surprise: "Meow!"

Ain smiled and looked into the bag, where two tiny creatures were whimpering with their eyes half-open. Their fur was black and white, with a similarly peppered tail behind them. Their gem-like purple eyes struggled to stay open as they tried to look up.

These were the two Voltic Wolf pups he found during the day.

Ain wasn't entirely sure why he brought them back, even though he originally planned to sell them.

As lightning-attribute spirit beasts, Voltic Wolf pups were highly sought after by spirit tamers to form contracts. Moreover, their innate skill upon reaching Noble was Overcharge, which was extremely useful during combat and could serve as a trump card.

When he sold the miscellaneous items and spirit plants at Liberty Firm earlier, the shop assistant asked whether he planned to sell the two pups. It was at that moment Ain suddenly changed his mind and decided to bring them back, despite having no proper plan.

There were various laws and regulations in place for keeping and raising uncontracted spirit beasts. After the cat adopted Ain, he had viewed information in this regard to make sure he wasn't violating any laws.

Spirit beasts like the Jasper Cats and Lavish Hounds were the most common uncontracted spirit beasts raised as household pets and were referred to as Fair Spirit Beasts.

Fair Spirit Beasts were peculiar because they were at the bottom-most rung of spirit beasts. Their quality was forever limited to Common, and they could only reach Rank-0, with no proper precedent for evolution.

Of course, this wasn't enough to qualify them as Fair Spirit Beasts. The biggest contributing factor was their inherently tame and peaceful nature, which had to be proven extensively.

Spirit tamers, and even regular humans, could purchase and raise Fair Spirit Beasts as household pets without any licenses or certifications.

Fair Spirit Beasts not only served as household pets but also as livestock. The Green Pig meat and the Daylight Rabbit meat that Ain used to consume were both such examples, as they could be cultivated within the city.

But this wasn't the case for the two pups Ain brought home. As newborns, their quality was still Common, but they had the potential to reach Transcendent. Furthermore, they were naturally predatory, unsuitable to be categorized as Fair Spirit Beasts.

When Ain returned through the Forest Gate, the inspectors were naturally aware of the two pups in his bag. This was a relatively common sight, as this was one of the ways spirit beasts were sourced by large stores that specialized in selling spirit beasts for contracts.

But this only applied to weaker spirit beasts. Unless you could obtain special authorizations and privileges, it was impossible to bring stronger spirit beasts into the city.

At the moment, Ain couldn't keep the pups around for too long, as they definitely couldn't be hidden forever. His only option was to obtain a special license.

From what he knew, other than large businesses that specialized in trading spirit beasts, or those with high social status, only spirit masters could obtain licenses and authorization to raise uncontracted spirit beasts within the city.

Ain had begun studying the spirit master inheritance recently, but he still needed time before attempting the spirit master assessment.

He stared at the two pups that were interacting with the cat as it nudged them slightly with its paws. The cat's curiosity and playfulness rubbed off on Nox. As it flew around the pups slowly, one of the pups tried to follow Nox with its heavy head but ultimately fell sideways onto the cat's tail.

Staring at the sight, Ain sighed and decided to search Cyberspace. The information he knew currently was from over two years ago, when his Cyberspace access was only at 1-star. There might be new findings if he tried it now, with his upgraded 3-star access.