This Beast-Tamer is a Little Strange - Chapter 612

Chapter 612: Chapter 612: The Democratic Process
The fight was moments away from breaking out.

Spiritual energy crackled through the air uncontrollably as the Eastern girl’s hand began to glow a faint metallic gold and reached toward the blade strapped to her side, her face a mask of intense hatred.

The Holy Son, still maddeningly calm, opened his arms as though to ready receive her strike—no, her faith. His golden aura shimmered, not in defense, but as if inviting judgment.

But then—

Ding.

The sound was so out of place, so simple, that for an instant it felt like a hallucination to Kain and the others.

Then came the voice.

[Second Trial Commencing. All participants prepare for transport]

A thin line of silver light lanced down from the air above them, drawing a perfect ring around every participant.

The Eastern girl’s furious scream cut off mid-breath as the floor dissolved beneath them, her outstretched hand freezing in place before her form shattered into motes of light. The Holy Son’s serene smile was the last thing Kain saw before the world dissolved into blinding radiance.

‘Wait! I never did find out about what Serena experienced in her trial!’ Kain thought, while frantically looking toward the disappearing Serena.

Hopefully, the missing information wasn’t too important.

—————-

The world came back all at once.

Cold metal. Blinding white. A weight across his limbs.

Kain’s breath caught.

He was strapped to a chair—no, a throne, tall-backed and carved with great intricacy.

It was a throne befitting a king. But Kain didn’t at all feel pleased about sitting on it.

A metal harness held him down at the chest, forearm, wrists and ankles. Thick. Unyielding. And uncomfortable.

His arms were pinned tightly to two wide rests, but his fingers could just barely move—and that was when he saw them.

Six buttons, set into two groups—three on each armrest. Each was made of a different material—bone, crystal, gold, jade, wood, and something that shimmered like quicksilver. Each bore the stylized emblem of an animal: snake, wolf, tiger, crane, boar, and owl. The arrangement was symmetrical, forming a loose semi-circle on the armrests, just within his reach.

But Kain had a feeling that they weren’t just for decoration.

In the distance, high above the endless void, he could make out other thrones, each atop narrow stone pedestals, suspended dozens of feet in the air. The pedestals looked too thin to support the weight of the chairs—mere stilts balancing thrones like skewers holding up a massive rock. They were arranged in a wide, chaotic ring. Some closer. Some distant. Each throne bore a different emblem glowing behind it in ghostly white light—a snake, wolf, tiger, crane, boar, and owl.

He glanced at his buttons again—snake, wolf, tiger, crane, boar, owl. Perfect match.

Kain reasonably concluded that the buttons on his throne corresponded to the chair of each participant.

Kain craned his neck to look up above his head.

And glowing on the high headrest of his own throne…?

A fox.

It seems like he had no button for himself—but the others armchairs likely included one of the fox instead.

Unable to do anything else until the relic decided to speak again, Kain strained his head to look at the world far beneath each of the platforms, suspending their chairs.

He almost screamed.

Far below, in an abyssal pit that seemed to stretch forever, were creatures. hundreds. Maybe thousands. Clawed and malformed, eyeless and glistening with hunger. Some slithered like serpents with a thousand legs. Others hunched like apes with antlers made of bone. They leapt and thrashed beneath the pedestals, some even scaling the base, only to be knocked off by invisible force fields. Their grotesque mouths were open, shrieking with anticipation, as if waiting for someone to fall.

Panic welled in his chest.

Kain strained against the restraints—hard.

The metal didn’t budge.

He twisted his wrists, kicked out his legs, even tried to cycle his spiritual energy—but nothing responded.

His spiritual power was also silent—completely locked away.

No spiritual power. No contracts. No weapons. No way out.

He was powerless.

But he wasn’t alone.

Seated in the other suspended chairs, he could see the others. Cassian, face pale, mouth pulled into a tight grimace as he tested his own restraints on a throne etched with a tiger.

Serena, although tense, was quite calm and on the throne with the crane.

The Easterners, equally confused and horrified, were straining against their bonds. The boy and girl were on the boar and snake thrones, respectively.

The Holy Son… was also present—but infuriatingly calm, eyes closed like he was meditating and waiting for the trial to begin. He was seated on the wolf-etched throne.

And lastly, the one who had entered the relic with Cassian, who Kain still didn’t know the name of, was seated on the one with the owl.

The world was silent save for the shifting scrape of monstrous limbs below, and faint grunts from those still trying to regain their freedom.

But the silence was soon broken.

Ding

A chime rang out.

[Trial Two will now begin.]

[You may now vote.]

‘Vote? Vote for what?! Explain clearly!’ Kain hoped that it wasn’t what he thought.

He looked down at the hungry looking creatures waiting ominously below and looked back up at those in the circle.

The creatures below screeched, their claws scraping louder against the pedestals. One of them—a hulking thing with a distended jaw—leaped unnaturally high, its teeth snapping just inches below Kain’s feet before it dropped back into the horde.

Then—

A scream.

One of the Eastern Continent delegates—the man—suddenly plummeted a few feet, the pedestal suspending him suddenly sinking into the ground. The man was still safely above the hoard below, but one could tell that wouldn’t be the case after enough rounds of voting.

The relic’s voice echoed, indifferent:

[One Vote Cast.]

“Oh my…how democratic…” A voice filled with schadenfreude rang out, but Kain didn’t have the presence of mind to figure out who spoke.

His blood felt like it had turned to ice.