Weakest Beast Tamer Gets All SSS Dragons novel Chapter 18

Chapter 18: Chapter 18 - Taming the Gray Wing

"Room 15 Gray Wing," announced the professor, a trace of pity in her voice as she handed Ren the key.

The name was a cruel euphemism.

It wasn't really gray, it was where they sent students with "limited potential," though even there, Ren was a special case.

He was truly the bearer of a failed gray egg. They hadn't had one in decades.

The dormitory was spacious but austere, designed for four students.

His roommates were already there: Min, a thin boy with a water snake; Taro, more robust, with a digger beetle; and Liu, tall and quiet, with a night bat.

All Iron-rank beasts, yes, but at least they had evolution potential up to Bronze.

Or that's what everyone believed, but Ren could see their cultivation routes up to Silver 3 like all other beasts.

"The mushroom boy," Min smiled when Ren entered. There was no malice in his voice, just a kind of resigned camaraderie. "I guess it makes sense they put us together."

Ren dropped his bag on the last available bed, aware of the curious glances toward the mushrooms in his hair and the bruise on his eye.

"Your spore... does it do anything besides glow?" asked Taro.

Ren hesitated. After the incident in the carriage, he didn't want to draw more attention to himself. "It gives a 10% increase to my strength," he said simply. "And it has something good... I don't need lamps."

More pitying looks.

An uncomfortable silence followed his words. The others exchanged glances, the kind you give someone who won't accept a painful truth.

"Hey," Min tried to sound cheerful, "it's not so bad. Liu's bat has good perception," Taro added. "Not everything is about pure power."

"You're right, it's not so bad," Liu said from his corner. "I'm a second-year student but I failed 2 units, that's why I'm still in this dormitory. My first year here taught me that initial rank isn't everything. My bat seemed useless at first, but with the right training..."

While Liu shared advice about life in the Gray Wing, Ren observed his companions.

He could clearly see how Min's snake needed freshwater instead of saltwater in its crystals to develop its true potential, how Taro's beetle needed to be fed processed crystals during a specific moon phase to advance along the correct path and not mature.

Perhaps, he thought, when they knew each other better, when they trusted each other... he could share some of his knowledge.

At least enough to help them.

While unpacking, the mushrooms in his hair pulsed with that strange rhythm again. There was something under the Gray Wing, something ancient. Maybe being in the "worst" dormitory wasn't so bad after all.