204 The Last Push

"You said her name back there, how did you know her?"

The tigress asked Don and looking at her face, she wanted a solid answer from him.

He sighed and told her what the dragon king and Ken had told him about the great war and Aathreya. She heard Don without even batting an eye and the more she heard, the more she felt terrified. She wouldn't have believed him if he said all this before however, after feeling the terror that Aathreya brought down on them, she had no choice but to believe him.

"Can you kill her?"

After hearing the story, she asked him but Don shook his head.

"At the moment, I cannot even compete with the elders of the sects out there, so how can I even think about killing probably the most powerful being in this world?"

"Don't forget what we saw was just a fragment of her soul, who knows how powerful she would be if she was whole"

The tigress's eyes gazed at the faraway land and her mind wandered into unknown territory.

Each of them sat there without uttering any word as Don took out the timer to see there's still a day and a half left until the portal to the outside world opens.

"Don, are you hiding something from me?"

Don heard Knight's voice in his mind.

"I noticed the energy emerged from you before we were teleported and I heard that ancient spell, it wasn't us, and I'm damn sure that it wasn't you, who or what was that?"

Arrora noticed Don and Knight looking at each other.

"I've been hearing that voice in my mind, Knight"

Knight was a little shocked to hear him

"Since when?"

"Since the arena, that voice was the reason that I survived the waves and that voice saved us again"

Knight didn't get angry at Don for not telling him about the voice because he knew that both of them didn't get time for a private talk since the arena.

"Now you said this, its kinda making sense, do you remember the time you lost consciousness during your training with Arrora?"

"Yes"

"it seems you happened to lose consciousness at the exact moment that Ken said he saw a bright light appeared in the cave and saved them"

It did make sense when he thought about it but even though Aathreay was a threat, he was unable to do anything at the moment.

"We need to figure out who or what's the origin of the voice? If you heard the voice in your mind, why don't you try to ask the voice itself?"

"I tried Knight but I'm not getting any responses from the voice"

Knight sighed hearing Don

"Then it's another problem on our list but now we have a more pressing issue in our hands, don't you think? "

It wasn't only Arrora and the tigress who lost the strength but Don and Knight too. Their current strength and power could be compared to a low-level master as they had no idea when their strength and power would return.

"What's next?"

Arrora asked them.

"We stay here so you can regain your strength"

The tigress was still thinking about something as Arrora gained a little bit of moveability of her body.

"Then what about the next level?"

Knight shook his head and surprised Arrora

"No, we damn near died back there and we are not ready to face the next level, who knows what's waiting for us in there?"

Knight and Don knew when to advance and when to back away. They knew that if they entered the next level with their current weak state, even some mediocre contestants could kill or rob them so they didn't want to risk going to the next level, and besides, they had already gotten so much loot including the golden elixir.

Even though they would miss the items within the next level, they valued their lives more and didn't expect their luck to save them.

"Get some sleep, we have a long journey ahead"

Don said looking at Arrora and the tigress.

He took out the map to the final portal and studied the path to be safe during their journey.

Slowly Arrora closed her eyes and went to sleep.

"Hey, are you alright? You seem worried"

While Don was checking the map, Knight went to the tigress and asked her.

The tigress didn't look at Knight as her gaze was still at the distant sky.

Seeing her absent face, Knight shook her

"Oh"

The tigress turned her gaze towards Knight

"You seem worried"

Knight sat before her as she sighed

"Worried? I'm terrified, if someone like her said that eventually your world will be destroyed by an evil being, wouldn't you be terrified?"

Knight understood her dilemma as she went on

"And the worst part is, no one in this realm has the power to stop her from destroying this world, how am I able to tell that three buggers that their world will be destroyed along with them in the future? And what about the others? Would they get the same chance as us to get out of here?"

Knight noticed that the tigress was seriously considering leaving with them and all she needed was a push from him to make that decision.

"Alone, we can't survive the great war but together, we will have a fighting chance, and I will take a fighting chance over certain death at any day"

"Fighting chance?"

The tigress looked at him with a tilted head as Knight glanced at Don

"You see that guy? If anyone can defeat that evil bitch, it's him, and I'm not saying this because I'm his friend and brother but I had seen him survive far worse and nothing will stop him from reaching his goal and now his goal is to create an empire where everyone can live without being hunted by someone or something "

Knight omitted the part where Don would take revenge against the ones who wronged him years ago because he knew that Don's journey won't stop there.

"Do you really think he can defeat her? Tell me the truth"

"Yes I do, if he can't then we're doomed, but we don't need to worry about that because he's the chosen one, remember"

The tigress couldn't see any signs of him lying because Knight wasn't.

"What about the others in this realm? Can he save them too?"

Even though the beasts in this realm lived usually alone or in groups, not a single one would want their world to be destroyed and so was the tigress.

"Certainly not now since we don't have any way to convince your kid to leave this realm and even if we convinced them, there's no way of transporting them to the outside world"

Knight paused for a moment and continued

"at outside, we might find a way to open the portal without waiting another seventy-five years but I'd recommend you to come with us as a fellow beast unless you want to sit here in this evil place and wait for your death"

As he said, Knight stood up and waved his hand and let out the three cubs in his ring.

"Think about them"

Knight said to the tigress looking at the sleeping cubs before and went back to Don leaving the tigress alone so she would decide before they leave.

The tigress was stuck in a dilemma as she had to think about the cubs and her bloodline. Just like Knight said, she could stay here and even live her whole life but eventually her descendants would be consumed by Aathreya along with this realm. Knowing this, she must decide what's best for her and her descendants as well as this whole realm because if she didn't leave with them, there was a chance that both of them would forget about them but if she was with them, she would at least keep them reminded of this place and the beasts living here.

Even if they or she couldn't save this realm, the cubs and her bloodline would survive. While she was thinking, the golden furred cub crawled towards her and rested its little head on her hand and slept peacefully.

And this was the last push she needed to make her decision.

"Fuck it"

The tigress sighed and made her decision to leave with Don and Knight for the sake of her little cubs.

"looks like you have gotten a friend"

DOn glanced at the tigress and said to Knight as he grinned

"Well, what do I say? I've grown tired of you"

Knight chuckled and punched him on the hand

"I didn't expect you'd lose this much strength"

Hearing Don ridicule him, Knight leaped at him as Don punched him in the face, and then, they both ended up wrestling on the ground like children.

The tigress was shocked and surprised to see them acting this way because she couldn't get herself to forget what happened back there.

However, seeing the bond between a human and a beast, she was slightly relaxed thinking that where she had decided to go wouldn't be bad after all.