Chapter Seventy Five - I step into a world of beasts and poo

The beast taming school was one of five schools of the Ascending Mountain Institute and was one that could be considered as focusing on offensive skills, just like the martial arts school and the magic school, whereas the alchemist school and scholars school could be said as focusing more on logistics or support for the three others. Many students came to study here, so there were as many bodies scattered about as attended the martial arts school, indicating its popularity was not lesser to the martial arts school. However, the clear difference was always going to be the one thing that gave the beast taming school its name; beasts!

With a lot of students walked, or were carried, odd little and large beasts unlike anything Leon had seen before. His eyes widened as he caught sight of an oversized rat like beast with twin pointed fangs protruding from the front of its mouth and two thick, furless tails dragging along the ground following a male youth who was talking to a girl, who carried a rabbit like creature with a large powderpuff tail and multicoloured ears a top it white head. And these were not amongst the strangest creatures here.

Knowing he was staring at not sure how to stop, Leon chose to turn his attention to Tor and stare at his back, only that was a foolish thought as it meant that he ended up treading in what resulted from owning beasts. Groaning slightly as he looked at his soiled boot, he caught Cetus' attention.

"Sorry about that," he said, sheepishly. "Everyone is meant to clear the droppings of their own beasts, but there are also bond-less beasts running about and the first years are meant to deal with their messes. Unfortunately, it takes a while to get that into the head of many first years."

"Pushing all the work onto the commoners?" Tor sneered slightly. He was not a commoner, his family could be considered notable, but as it happened Caprian's family could be considered their employers. His family had served Caprian's family for generations as advisors and close allies. He, himself, had been expected to keep an eye on Caprian, however that man's family had not considered Caprian's slovenly and deceitful nature. There was much of Caprian's shit he had been forced to clear up. It was he that had bribed and convinced others to turn blind eye's or forget thefts and beatings through Caprian's seemingly unlimited purse. It was he who had convinced Caprian to purchase pills rather than steal them, though he had not realised the extent of Caprian's greed until it was too late for some, including Leo.

"Yeah," Cetus growled, he was a commoner, so he had looked forward to attending the school where he could develop his skills without the interference of nobles. He had had a rude wake up call. The teachers turned a slight blind eye to the disagreements between nobles and commoners, not because they did not wish to intervene, more as they wished to see how the commoners would handle it. Only if nobles pushed things too far, such as physical 'chastisement' would the teachers intervene. But again that was only if they witnessed it. The first year was spent breaking the arrogance of nobles and providing commoners with confidence and the ability to stand up for themselves. Neither would make it far in a world of immortals without doing so first.

However, as Cetus' himself had already stepped in three piles of various excrement this morning alone, he was not happy with this batch of first years at all! He cracked his knuckles and grinned without mirth, thinking of ways to deal with the problem.

Cetus lead them first to a metal thing holding a board covered in thick bristles, which Leon realised was to help remove the muck from his boots, before he then lead them to a two storey building that was slightly bigger than the other dwellings, but tucked into the trees, so unnoticeable at first. Inside, was a couple of large cages, in which more strange beasts were held.

In the first were creatures that were about the size of a hamster. Indeed, they had similar beady eyes and rounded ears and a stubby tail. However, they were completely hairless and had small feathered wings upon their backs. They also had tiny pointed teeth. When they saw the students walk into the room, they grabbed thumbnail sized berries and proceeded to throw them at the youths. Fortunately, the berries simply splatted against an invisible barrier, patterns of light trickled from the centre of the barrier outward in a ripple effect when hit.

Leon later found out that these hairless creatures were called Nibblets and usually formed nests in dense forests. They were extremely territorial and would attack anything that came close to their nests. Unfortunately, these Nibblets could only show off, wary of the barrier.

"Ah, how cute!" Maimai said suddenly, looking at a large cage the other side of the room. "You have cooshee pups?! I've only ever heard about them!"

Leon glanced over at where she was looking and noticed little fur balls the size of puppies scampering about. The little beasts were mostly canine in appearance, with soft looking black and white fur covering their bodies. Their ears were more like rabbits and were atop of their head rather than to the side. They also had four bright eyes, two large and two tiny, the latter looking like smooth gemstones. The tips of the pups ears and their exceedingly fluffed up tail were either blue and white or red and yellow. One pup noticed Maimai and growled at her, then barked. Its voice was quite tiny and cute.

"These guys were born wild," Cetus told her, "so I wouldn't get too close. Even though they are young, they still retain those instincts. Still Teacher is hoping that they might become tameable. They don't have a mother to teach them, so they'd be no good left in the wild in the long run. Anyway, this way. Teacher is upstairs."

As Cetus lead them towards the stairs to the second storey, Leon could not help but look back. One of the cooshee pups was staring almost longingly in their direction.