Unaware that he had ruined Nergigante's designs, Logan reined in his power, returning to his normal state as he flew back to rejoin Aki at their home.
Using his Sunlight Trait to scatter the clouds had been nothing more than a sudden idea—yet, against all odds, it had worked.
Even though he had only cleared a single stretch of the storm, for ordinary creatures, such a feat was nothing short of unbelievable.
When he landed, he was met with Aki's shining eyes, looking at him with boundless admiration. In that moment, Logan's vanity soared to its peak.
As for the stunned look in the Flame Rathalos's eyes, Logan dismissed it without a second thought.
Before he could speak, the Fire Wyverns left their nests, circling high above their territory. Roars echoed across the skies, startling every nearby creature into hiding. The Mosswines and Aptonoth raised by the cats pressed themselves flat against the ground like quails, not daring to lift their heads.
The Fire Wyverns had witnessed Logan's display with their own eyes. To have a being so powerful it could bend the heavens themselves—what a staggering revelation this was for the Ancient Tree Fire Wyvern clan.
Unable to contain their excitement, they could only vent it in this way.
This state lasted for quite some time, until Logan finally flew up to join in, letting out a few roars of his own. Only then did things gradually settle down.
The Fire Wyverns' behavior left the nearby Research Commission hunters completely baffled. During the downpour, they had hidden inside their tents, waiting out the rain. By the time it stopped and Logan had returned to his normal form, the only thing that drew their attention was the continuous chorus of Fire Wyvern roars echoing across the sky.
Curious, they emerged from their shelters to investigate.
Some of the hunters were utterly confused, unable to understand why the Fire Wyverns had suddenly become so excited.
In the end, after much discussion, their only explanation was that the Fire Wyverns had been pent up for too long under the storm, and once the skies cleared, they needed to release their emotions.
After all, even hunters, when cooped up for too long, would sometimes run wild just to shake off the restlessness. How much more so for Fire Wyverns brimming with vitality?
And so, Logan's transformed state was completely overlooked by the Research Commission.
The disaster that had lasted several days, however, left many marks upon the Wildspire Waste. Already poor at retaining water, the Wastes had their terrain reshaped by the torrential floods.
The levels of underground streams surged dramatically, and no one could say when they might return to normal.
In the swamplands, large numbers of Barroth were forced to migrate to areas with less water, while the Jyuratodus, freed from its natural rival, began to reproduce rapidly.
On the far edges of the Wastes, in the lowlands near the sea, new shallow coastal zones formed, drawing in massive schools of ocean fish.
From that day onward, the Wastes slowly began to return to their former environment.
Logan hadn't expected it, but the Research Commission really had discovered traces of Nergigante in the Wastes.
According to the Fire Wyvern Grimalkyne leader, for some unknown reason Nergigante had suddenly grown more active in the region. By coincidence, the Commission stumbled upon signs of its feeding, and the Admiral himself had already begun pursuing the tracks.
The news made Logan's heart tighten. Could it be that what happened that day had caused Nergigante to start tracking him down?
He had to admit—his sixth sense was frighteningly accurate. After losing Kushala Daora's trail, Nergigante, furious, chose to return to the Wildspire Waste.
It had burned through far too much energy in the battle, and since the Waste was the closest place, it decided to remain there for a while to replenish its strength. At the same time, it intended to search, hoping to uncover traces of that unknown Elder Dragon.
It was precisely this frequent hunting that allowed the Research Commission to discover its feeding marks and catch a glimpse of its trail.
When Logan first received the news, he remained on high alert for several days, yet nothing unusual happened. Gradually, he pushed the matter to the back of his mind.
In the meantime, he noticed something strange: a group of Fire Wyverns had begun returning from their hunts with injuries far more often—and most of those wounds bore the marks of electrical damage.
At the same time, those very Fire Wyverns seemed to have no shortage of food. Not only did they bring back prey regularly, but they even resumed supplying the cats as they had in the past.
What puzzled Logan most was that the prey they brought back were often enormous, unfamiliar fish, each nearly 6 to 7 meters long.
This astonished him.
Since when did the Wildspire Waste have fish that large? And more importantly—when had Fire Wyverns started fishing?
How were they managing it?
After all, such massive fish usually lived only in deep waters. Fire Wyverns despised water and were poor swimmers. Under normal circumstances, they would never deliberately hunt fish.
Yet judging from how frequently they brought back these catches, as if it were not even difficult, could it be that these fish had moved into the shallows?
Carrying this doubt in his mind, Logan finally understood the truth on that day—when nearly all of those Fire Wyverns returned injured, and aside from a few exceptions, most came back empty-handed.
A chorus of roars spread across their nesting grounds. Once again, the Fire Wyverns were being summoned to a gathering.
...
This was the first time the Fire Wyverns had held a meeting since arriving in the Wildspire Waste. With no proper place to gather, each Rathalos could only circle around the edges of the clearing. Meanwhile, the group of battered Fire Wyverns that had returned looked like scorned brides, folding their wings, drooping their heads, and huddling together in the middle of the open space, forced to endure the faint, sidelong glances cast their way by the other Rathalos.
After all, for every Fire Wyvern present, this was the first time they had ever seen their kind get beaten in a group fight badly enough to come back and ask for help.
If not for the fact that the Ancient Tree Fire Wyvern group had, without anyone realizing, already developed a certain degree of social cohesion, none of them would have bothered with such a ridiculous matter.
With that kind of time, it would be better spent visiting more hunting grounds to see if they could bring down extra prey.
Thanks to the account given by those few Rathalos, the rest of the Fire Wyverns finally understood what had happened.
The truth was actually simple. After several consecutive days of heavy rain and a slight rise in sea level, the coastal edge of the Wastes had, by some strange twist, formed a unique bay.
Above it loomed sheer cliffs, and below stretched a wide, shallow shoal.
That day, when this group of Fire Wyverns returned from a failed hunt, they happened to spot, by sheer chance, a massive school of sea fish that had swum into the shallow waters to absorb warmth. Starving, the Rathalos threw themselves down without hesitation and easily caught more than enough prey. For wyverns who hadn't eaten their fill in far too long, the place was immediately set as their new hunting ground.
But where food gathers, how could predators not follow?
Within just a few days, other predators besides Rathalos began to appear in the bay.
At first, it was only aquatic beasts and a few amphibious creatures.
Though these monsters sat lower in the food chain, their pack tactics let them contend with higher-ranked predators for food. Yet in the face of Rathalos hunting in small groups, they were eventually driven off.
Later, however, Piscine Wyverns began showing up. These high-tier monsters brought genuine trouble, and it was from that point onward that injuries started appearing on the Fire Wyverns.
And since Piscine Wyverns also favored group hunting, it wasn't long before the initial band of Rathalos found themselves outnumbered. Clever as they were, they soon adjusted their strategy.
Making full use of their advantage in flight, they avoided direct clashes with the Piscine Wyverns whenever possible. More often than not, they would spit a few weak fireballs to force the water-dwellers aside, then dive in to snatch their prey before fleeing—leaving only the Piscine Wyverns behind, thrashing in impotent rage, spraying jets of water into the air.
They had thought life would continue that way. But just a few days ago, a pod of Lagiacrus appeared in that bay.
As leviathans that rivaled Rathalos in the food chain, their average body length was over 25 meters. Not only could they fight in water, but their performance on land also matched their high place in the ecosystem.
And more importantly, Lagiacrus were masters of electricity. Their ability to generate powerful currents was astonishing, and they, too, moved in groups.
Thus, that bay turned into a contested hunting ground dominated by Rathalos, Lagiacrus, and Piscine Wyverns, with other lower-tier monsters lurking around the edges.
At first, the three sides fought in constant skirmishes, no one gaining the upper hand. The sea fish there were abundant enough that, despite the clashes, all sides managed to eat their fill.
The past two days, however, had brought trouble. For reasons unknown, the number of Lagiacrus suddenly increased by several, forcing the Piscina Wyverns to retreat again and again in the water, while on land their sheer numbers suppressed the Rathalos' hunting efficiency.
In the end, with their food supply cut off, the Rathalos band had no choice but to clash head-on with the Lagiacrus. The result was what everyone now saw—they had lost.
This meant that unless there was some new interference, that bay would soon become a hunting ground dominated by Lagiacrus, and it was very possible they might even mark it as their own territory.
Losing such a hunting ground wouldn't just mean this group of Rathalos lacked a source of food—it would also force them back into competing at existing hunting grounds, where the already strained hunting pressure would tighten even further.
One hunting ground alone might not have mattered in the past, when food was abundant. But now, they couldn't afford to let it go.
Of course, since the bay was too far away and was primarily the domain of aquatic monsters, it was unrealistic to claim it entirely as Fire Wyvern territory. Still, leaving a foothold there for Rathalos was achievable.
So, after Logan gave his nod, a new group of Rathalos was dispatched as reinforcements, joining the injured ones in reclaiming the hunting ground, while the rest scattered off to their own tasks.
It was only one hunting ground, and one they couldn't fully claim. It couldn't support that many Rathalos anyway, so there was no need for all of them to move. Sending enough wyverns to secure dominance would suffice.
Then, if other Rathalos couldn't find prey elsewhere, they could try their luck there.
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