"Greetings, Lord Karl. Are the pets misbehaving?" One of the identical group of horrors asked.

"No, these assholes attacked them. They even went after a hatchling"

Immediately, the eyes of the Lesser Watchers narrowed, the void black orbs turning into barely visible slits.

And then, they attacked.

Blasts of Arcane energies, the Fundamental Rule of Mana Manipulation made manifest, tore through the closest ranks of Templars. Then, one of them got the idea to use [Randomize] on his attacks, and what had simply been direct attacks turned into something so much worse.

Vines came out of the ground to entangle and tear apart enemies, the ground exploded, sending Immortal Rank shards of earth magic out like land mines, and tearing winds battered barriers, while the five gigantic horrors stormed through the battlefield.

Before stopping to wave to Merrick.

"And there it is, the reason that our God said that Karl could not have a baby dragon." The Legend sighed.

"{Why? Are they mean? Do they taste bad? Can they bring us to the Karl spaces to nap after meals?}"

"Possibly, all three. But mostly it is a personal issue between their species and the black dragon. You see, they are of the opinion that all things are valid pets. And the Black Dragon does not condone his people becoming pets to an inferior species."

"{But the skill to make the Karl space is called [All Things Are Pets]. Doesn't that imply that it's true?}"

"In the opinion of the World Dragon? Yes. But that opinion is contested."

Yewan didn't fully understand, but he nodded anyhow.

He would find out the details later.

Remi had joined with Elder Socrate in the defensive formation that the Elders had taken against the remnants of the Gralpedrin Templars, while the Clan Leader battled a half dozen surviving Elders overhead.

Remi's totems were hurling fireballs into the crowd, while providing a steady healing stream to the Elders. That left the Naga free to focus on keeping large area attacks up. These jerks hadn't been concerned about the condition of their compound when they attacked, so she would not hesitate to use [Apocalypse] against their buildings to clear room to fight.

The difference was that Remi didn't attack anyone who was running away.

Not that the Templars appreciated the distinction when there were Immortal Rank tornados tearing apart buildings, and a storm so severe that their weaker members didn't dare to leave their shelters to try to escape in the first place. Through the chaos of Remi and Hawk's combined efforts to minimize visibility, Rae stalked the battlefield, letting her golems fight an entirely separate battle. The Templars were completely unaware that she had left, and thought that they just needed to break through the line of constructs to kill the one summoning them. Only, they were just going to reach the back line of the constructs to find one of Karl's new Pet Sitters waiting there for them.

She liked those things.

They were somehow both gently caring and incredibly violent at the same time. But more than that, they were happy to watch the golems for her while she went hunting. What level of helpful were those things even operating on? Even Thor wasn't able to effectively direct her army of constructs, but the Pet Sitter had done it without question, and without any loss of effectiveness in combat.

It could even use [Blood Destruction] to keep up the number of Golems, though she could sense that it wasn't doing it.

Instead, the Pet Sitter was making the enemy think that the golems that had been summoned were all that were available, giving them hope for victory with every one that was killed.

Then, when the enemy got close enough, it fully intended to use [Army Of The Dead] and [Undead Minions] to create an army behind them and entrap the survivors.

It was diabolical.

Rae crept through the shadows of a building, stalking one of the Ascended Immortals who thought that he was sneaky.

He was headed for Yewan and Merrick, aiming to inflict emotional damage on the team. She didn't disapprove of the technique. Emotional suffering lasted much longer than physical.

But he had miscalculated.

For one, he hadn't realized that the older of the two dragons was a Legend.

For two, he didn't know that Rae had already found his family.

As the man moved through the ruined house, Rae slipped in right behind him, as close as possible without triggering his danger sense in a more direct way than the battle already had.

Then, right as he was about to make his move, Rae whispered, just loud enough for him to hear her over the distant battle.

"{How many pieces do you think that I left little Stephanie in while you were out here ignoring her cries?}"

Rae silently laughed when the man turned and ran, headed straight for the safe room where she had found the people who smelled like him.

This was going to be so much fun.

A few minutes away from the fighting wouldn't hurt anything, and she didn't want to miss the moment that this silly Rogue realized their wards didn't stop a beast using [Night Haunter] from simply stepping through the wall into the safe

room.

Through the city, the Immortal ran, darting between hiding spots with [Shadow Step], trying to prevent anyone from following him to the safe house.

A relieved sigh escaped his lips as he saw that the door to the basement safe room was still closed and locked.

Then, he smelled it. The unmistakable scent of blood.

Cautiously, he entered the lock's code and swung the door open. The horrors of what he saw inside caused his mind to shut down. Row on row of corpses were kneeling in perfectly ordered symmetry, held in place with vines, as if they were praying for the safety of the Clan, facing a makeshift altar of bones near the far wall.

Then, at the front of the room, the Elder who had been protecting the group was crucified to the wall, not yet dead, but too drained of energy to be able to

free himself from the spikes that had impaled him to solid stone.

Staggering forward toward the sound of whimpering, the Rogue noticed hundreds of small cocoons hung along the walls like decorations.

"{See how we are not the same? I didn't hurt the little ones, I just tucked them

in for the evening.}" Rae announced, appearing behind him in spider form.

The Rogue's knees went weak as he turned to face the horror that had somehow followed him here.

There was no mercy in those blood-red orbs.

Only pride her handiwork.