Beast Taming? Nah, Dragon Herding is Way Better! - Chapter 45

Chapter 45: Alea
“Just sit still over there, I can do something with it” seeing that this elven beauty doesn’t seem to believe he can free her from the mana suppressing shackles, Diluc just continues what he is doing, feeling a significant progress on whatever it is that he is doing as he forced the shackles into compromising its structural integrity, the strength of his grip alone more than enough to deform the shackles to the point that the elven beauty can just slip her hands through them.

After discovering this fact, the elven beauty couldn’t help but feel astonished while looking at this young man, trying to think of whatever it is that made him able to do it, second guessing through all sorts of possibilities in her mind.

‘Perhaps he is also a metal elemental mage? No, that doesn’t make sense, the mana suppressing shackles restricts the movement of external mana to the point that it is impossible to cast magic when in contact with it…’ she thought to herself as she tries thinking of many other reasons, eventually ending up into two conclusions both extremely absurd, the second one being even more absurd than the already terrifying first assumption of hers.

‘So that means… it’s either his mana control is so strong that he can just ignore the property of the mana suppressing shackles or he’s physical body is so strong that he can easily bend the shackles… something that only, martial artists can do…’ as she starts saying the two most likely reasons to herself, she starts to realize more and more that it is possibly really the second one given all the things that she gathered from this short meeting of theirs, how quickly he moves to and away from her when she attempted suicide, how he can easily deal with the combination of mages and martial artists outside and how he can easily bend the mana suppressing shackles bound to her.

What she didn’t know though is both her assumptions are correct, along with her assumption that this young man is a metal elemental mage as well, something that she really wouldn’t expect as this kind of genius is just something of legend, of even of a higher category than that.

“Is it better now?” after pulling her wrist from the constraint of the mana suppressing shackles, the elven beauty heard the young man’s voice appearing to have some hint of concern towards her, causing her to just nod towards his words as she is still engulfed in trying to figure out how he achieved the thing he just did.

“Let me help with the ones on your ankles as well” Diluc said before he moves towards her lower body, now that he got the hang of how he can bend this thing without hurting the lady, it goes even easier than before, freeing her from the bind of this shackles without even wasting a few seconds on it.

Feeling the mana finally surging into her own body, the elven beauty couldn’t help but feel like she is starting to recover her previous strength, not only her mana but also her body gradually recovering properly, making her previous sickly pale skin to appear a bit healthier now.

Despite her strength returning though, she still couldn’t help but wonder whether there’s still something wrong with her given that she still see his strength as someone who has a Vague Orange Core level, in disbelief that a young man just a level higher than her as a mage is capable of dealing with the group that captured her.

Meanwhile, seeing the Bright Red Core right in the solar plexus of the elven beauty in front of him, Diluc couldn’t help but wonder about her identity, given that she already has such high level of strength despite her appearing to be the same age as him, and his cultivation is already extremely fast given the resources he receives from within the Draconic Domain from the Dragon Herding System.

He doesn’t bother much with her level though as he got more focused on the elemental attributes dancing around her, his acute senses detecting two distinct elemental mana swirling around her body, as if joyfully playing around her, this kind of way the mana acts around her showing how talented she is with these two particular elements.

‘Wind and Wood huh… that’s so… elf-like’ being normalized as beings who are more capable on the backlines dealing devastating damage with their marksmanship more than anything else, Diluc thought about this of this elven beauty, thinking that this is a really good way to compliment that marksmanship given how easily they will be able to conjure bows and move around woods using the wood element, and how great of a buff it will be for their arrows when they can manipulate it with the wind element.

While what he thinks about the elves are partially correct though, there are still quite some holes and gaps to his facts that will eventually be filled up later when he encountered more of them, but for now, he will start learning about all sorts of elven things from this long-eared beauty that never seems to remove her gaze on him.

“You seem to be quite talented… you’re really strong physically despite being a mage yourself” trying to probe him into saying the truth, the elven beauty said with a hint of familiarity on her face as if she finally saw someone sharing the same situation as her, well, not too much given the absurdity of this young man’s situation but still, of the same type of situation as him.

“You’re not too shabby yourself, having two elements you can control” knowing that she is trying to probe the truth about his physical strength, Diluc then replied towards her with a smile on his face, something in him saying that he shouldn’t really back down on this lady’s probing, causing him to answer in a way that doesn’t really deny her of this fact, but doesn’t really confirm her of this as well.

While the two of them doesn’t really explicitly acknowledge the truth of each other’s words, both of them can pretty much ascertain that their probing are true to some degree, it is only a matter of how precise their probing are.

Stopping on this as they don’t want to offend a potential ally, possibly even friend, the two of them starts laughing it off, the young man’s loud, powerful and authoritative voice spreading across their surroundings with his laugher, and the elven beauty’s melodious giggling accompanies it, their voices melding like a two-man orchestra.

“You’re an interesting fellow” both of them said at the same time the moment they stopped their laughter simultaneously, the two of them starting to feel like they are getting closer to each other with just these mundane conversations, allowing the two of them to feel like the other person is somehow worth putting some of their trust on.

“The name is Diluc, Diluc Leonhart, do I have the honor of knowing yours, elven miss?” after a bit more laughter between the two of them, they fell into an odd silence causing the atmosphere to feel a bit awkward, the emperor-like young man immediately trying to fix this air as he clears his throat and starts another topic, only now realizing that they haven’t properly introduce themselves to each other yet.

“Alea, an elven miss from that you would rather not hear the surname of~” the elven beauty playfully said as she stands up from her sitting position and formally bowing towards him, something that all the noble, whether it is this kingdom or not, does whenever they are introducing themselves, making him have an idea of the identity this lady possibly has.

Not letting his view to the nobles of this kingdom to cloud his judgement of her though, he merely shoves this part of her identity to the back of his mind before he also stands up to greet her formally, while she held the hem of her already ruined, yet still beautiful dress and then bow towards him, he places one of his arms hear his chest while the other one is just on the side before he also returns the bow to her, both of them smiling after this.

“I don’t really like doing this kind of formalities but whatever, I can pretty much confirm that you have some of the blood in you as well given how practiced your bow is~” the elven beauty, Alea, said towards Diluc as they return to their seat, the two of them smiling at each other once again as they start conversing about all sorts of mundane things once again, both of them feeling quite good from this as they share the same situation, rarely having anyone to talk to like this despite a lot of people around them almost all the time.

After this though, the two of them decided to stand up as Alea announces that she pretty much recovered her strength, and she can start travelling to the capital of the kingdom now.