This Beast-Tamer is a Little Strange

Chapter 662: Chapter 662: Internet Famous

The day’s matches were over.

Serena, Kain, Bridge, Addison, Aiden, Leonara, Finn, and Elias were all gathered in the same private back room at a cafe on the north side of campus. Tucked above a student-run bookstore and blessedly free of eavesdroppers, it had become something of an unofficial base of operations. Although, due to Kain and Serena often being on missions, he hadn’t come to this café nearly as often as the others. The table creaked beneath the weight of drinks, desserts, and general chaos.

Kain picked up the café’s new drink, a disturbingly neon pink smoothie, and couldn’t resist raising a brow at the taste. It was surprisingly delicious…

Unfortunately, he couldn’t fully enjoy his drink because Addison’s sparkling eyes, red face, and jittery body were practically screaming that she was hiding something and was desperate to share.

“You,” he said, pointing at Addison with his straw, “are being suspicious.”

“Suspiciously brilliant,” Addison replied, flipping her tablet around with a dramatic flourish. The screen lit up with a simple blog interface.

A somewhat familiar blog interface. Kain couldn’t place where he’d seen it before, but knew that it had been shown to him at some point.

“…Wait,” said Leonara slowly. “Is this about what I think it is?”

“Yup. That blog,” Addison finished. “The one that’s been dragging the top students for months.”

Bridge leaned in, eyes wide. “Wait, what? Something like that existed?”

“Yup,” Addison said, scrolling through post after post. “The blog mostly rags on the top 5, but occasionally throws shade at Dwayne and Hailey too. Really goes in on Soren. Like, obsessively. Daily posts. Multiple categories.”

“Turns out Lukas was the one running it,” Aiden explained, scrolling through the posts with swift fingers. “Addy and I had our suspicions, but Soren’s little speech helped us confirm it. We pulled some strings, got access logs, matched the post times to Lukas’ schedule, and—boom.”

“But,” Addison added, holding up a finger, “credit where it’s due—Soren’s the one who put two and two together long before us. The blog got big recently, and he noticed Lukas was one of the only top-ranked names never mentioned. That, and a few linguistic quirks… the prince may act like he’s arrogant and impulhot-tempered, but he’s not dumb.”

Kain frowned. That tracked. Honestly, now that he thought about it, Soren probably had more raw intelligence than Cassian. The problem was, intelligence or charisma that might threaten the Crown Prince never got cultivated within the royal family. It wouldn’t be surprising if Soren had learned to hide just how sharp he was to avoid losing resources or getting sidelined within the royal family.

Addison tapped the screen. “With Soren leading the way, we got full confirmation by asking one of Aiden’s exes working in IT to double-check. Username: ‘DrakeSlayer95.’ IP logs match Lukas’ dorm, his comms usage times, and the location changes in the IP even match the cafe he visits every Thursday.”

“It’s him,” she said with relish. “And he’s been at it for months.”

The blog’s front page looked harmless enough—standard black and gold interface, a few clickable tabs. But the moment they scrolled to the corner—

“Four thousand viewers,” Bridge said aloud. “Right now?”

“And climbing,” Aiden added smugly. “Word’s getting out.”

“Wonderful,” Kain muttered. “That means everyone is reading this.”

He jabbed a finger at the first hate post with his name in the title: ‘Newman, More Like No-man: Why This Evolutionary Planner’s All Hype.’

“Don’t know his problem with you,” Addison said, snorting. “Look at this one—he claims your ‘mental attribute contract’ doesn’t actually exist since nobody has ever actually seen her. You must just be using a gift outside of school rules. It says it’s just an illusion you created to inflate your mystery factor.”

“Is he dumb…,” Kain said in disbelief. “How would I even get away with that in the College? There are high-level beast-tamers here.”

“Wait, wait,” Elias pointed out a post. “This one says the College only made you their public face for all of the research results other people got. They did it to have a young genius Evolutionary Planner so that the College could get more attention.. ‘A fabricated genius built for clout.’ Damn, dude.”

“I’m not even mad,” Kain said honestly, scrolling past more. “It’s all petty. You can practically smell the insecurity and jealousy. Half of his insults aren’t even grounded in reality. I mean, I only have one dragon and it’s not even my strongest contract. Yet in this post,” Kain pointed to another, more recent, post made about himself, “he called me an overhyped dragon tamer?”

Bridge was still flipping through the blog. “Okay, maybe this guy just has a vendetta against people who have contracted dragons. Look—here’s a whole breakdown of Soren’s ‘entitlement complex’ and how the royals’ dragon affinity is overrated. He even made a meme of Soren getting beaten up by his ‘much stronger’ cousins.”

“There’s a series on Dwayne,” Aiden added. “This guy thinks Dwayne’s ‘S-rated affinity’ is fake and that he must’ve bribed his high-school teachers to get that label. There’s a whole conspiracy board image with red string trying to prove that his affinity is only A-ranked, at best.”

“Here’s Kairos!” Addison exclaimed. “He called him ‘that freaky cursed puppet boy’ and said the only reason he’s ranked so high is because his opponents are probably too afraid to get cursed.”

Elias looked further down the page. “What about this one on Serena?”

Serena glanced over and her brows furrowed.

The title read: *Ice Queen or Backroom Furnace? Why Pretty Girls in Power Are a Lie.* The content was worse.

The first paragraph called her an ’emotionally constipated frost-doll with no personality except when she’s flaunting those legs in her intentionally lude skin-tight training suit.’ It accused her of using her beauty to manipulate professors, ranking evaluations, and ‘the weak-willed minds of her male classmates.’

It then launched into a spiralling rant about how she was probably only ranked first because of a disgusting insinuation resembling prostitution…

Kain didn’t finish the post. He could only read so far before his grip on the tablet tightened.

Heat crept into his expression. A slow-burning rage settled in his chest.

Crack

“Shit! My tablet”

If it was as normal Kain would immediately apologize and reflect on the fact that he hadn’t yet adjusted to his increased strength yet. But instead, he continued staring at the tablet, now cleanly broken into two pieces and screen dark, expression blank.

Everyone else at the table noticed the abnormality immediately.

“Kain?” Leonara asked slowly.

He handed the broken tablet back to Addison without a word and downed the rest of his drink in one sharp gulp.

When he looked up again, he looked a lot more calm. But something about his expression just looked like the calm before the storm. It was even more frightening than his obviously angry expression.

Bridge blinked. “You okay, bro?”

Kain smiled forcedly. It did not reach his eyes.

“Yup. Just great.”

————————

The next day dawned bright and blistering with tournament energy. The crowd was roaring before the gates had even opened fully, everyone buzzing from the overnight blog exposure.

Kain didn’t say much as he stepped into the area specifically for the competitors.

He greeted Serena, nodded at his friends, ruffled Bridge’s hair, and took his seat. He looked calm.

Too calm.

And then the day’s match schedule appeared on the central screen.

Stage One: Kain Newman vs. Lukas Reeve

Kain’s expression froze before a wide grin practically split his face in half.