Having exposed his figure, Logan could not act as if he had not seen it; the cats' face could be disregarded, but the face of this Ahtal-Ka that had no idea what it was butting into could not go unacknowledged—this was respect for the other party's strength and ecological niche.
Above Elder Dragons, fighting and killing are not the main theme.
After all, monsters above Elder Dragon level already possess decent intelligence. When the other party releases goodwill, unless it is a case like Nergigante and other Elder Dragons, or like Primordial Malzeno being innately averse to Gaismagorm, basically they will not drive the relationship to death.
Even though Ahtal-Ka is not an Elder Dragon.
He rotated his wings and glided toward the Ahtal-Ka that kept waving, imitating the cats.
Ahtal-Ka's compound eyes, beautiful like amethyst, looked at the silver giant dragon diving from the sky, its brain spinning rapidly.
As everyone knows, Ahtal-Ka has no creativity; its walking fortress monsters are pieced together from the strongest monsters it has seen.
The more carefully it observes, the more it can imitate the original monster's appearance and action patterns.
What this Ahtal-Ka was imitating was the Nergigante that had once been active for a period in the Wildspire Waste, and among the Nergigante battles it had observed, one was a fight between Nergigante and a Silver Rathalos.
Although the battle was very short, because it did not, like Elder Dragon wars, also stir up a heap of calamities that blocked the line of sight, that battle, though brief, was the one Ahtal-Ka observed in the greatest detail.
It was also that battle that allowed Ahtal-Ka to perfect Nergigante's final action pattern, and the related construction blueprints were completed after that brief fight.
The last time it saw Logan, its mind had been filled with the matter of processing metal at the forge, and it had also been rushed by the joy of Logan having the cats deliver walking fortress components to it; therefore it had not been able to observe Logan carefully.
Now, as Logan approached, his image completely overlapped with the image in Ahtal-Ka's memory of that Silver Rathalos in the Wildspire Waste who had briefly confronted Nergigante without falling behind.
The danger perceptible to biological instinct was also telling Ahtal-Ka of Logan's power.
At least in Ahtal-Ka's heart, the feeling Logan gave it at this moment was in no way inferior to that of Nergigante back then.
Once this thought was born, the ideas in its mind about subsequent improvements and expansion for "Annihilation No. 1" began to blur, replaced by the figure of this silver-white giant dragon full of metallicity.
"Chirp, chirp~"
Ahtal-Ka's breathing began to quicken. Its walking fortress components were basically refined metals with a silver-white metallic feel, which did not match Nergigante's pitch-black appearance to begin with, and now a monster had appeared that, whether in form or in strength, fit Ahtal-Ka's aesthetics even better.
Ahtal-Ka felt it seemed to have found a new direction!!
Although speaking from combat power, this Ahtal-Ka is still in its growth period, still far from reaching the species' upper limit, and once it equips the Dragonator, its combat strength is in no way inferior to Logan's.
But the walking fortress structure still had to use Logan's image.
This could only be said to be Ahtal-Ka's genetic instinct at work. Although the New World is the best place for Elder Dragons to cross to, over all these years, while many Elder Dragons have come across the sea, most of them are just ordinary Elder Dragons.
This Ahtal-Ka itself was very young—only a few years removed from its nest—and, unlike its mother, had never observed Kulve Taroth before, so its vision was naturally somewhat limited.
Following its instinct, it could only take Nergigante as the base point to seek a more suitable observation target.
When the feeling it got from both was roughly the same, it would naturally choose according to its own preference.
As for why it did not take its own more powerful mother as the model for the walking fortress construct, that was not due to any instinct or limitation.
It was simply because Ahtal-Ka was incapable of piecing together another mechanical Ahtal-Ka while also assembling its mother's walking fortress behemoth.
Even if its walking fortress components were truly numerous enough to construct all these things at once, it would not be able to control them.
Although Ahtal-Ka's thread control was already magical, it still had to follow some basic laws of dynamics; it could not, like a puppeteer from some ninja anime, unrestrainedly perform operations like levitating in midair.
The balance in Ahtal-Ka's heart quickly tipped completely. When Logan descended onto this clearing with a gust of wind, before the cats could rush over first, Ahtal-Ka, relying on its large body, took the initiative to approach.
While chirping and waving to show goodwill, it used those fervent eyes—so intense they nearly made Logan's scales explode—to constantly observe the details of his body.
"If only I could see some battle scenes or more ground activity scenes, that would be even better!!"
Ahtal-Ka thought this, and began using its low emotional-intelligence brain to ponder what method it could use to truly express its goodwill, so as to better observe Logan up close.
Unaware that it was about to be used as a reference model for a figure, Logan at this moment was still astonished as to why this Ahtal-Ka was being so enthusiastic.
He wondered whether this guy had experienced something in Astera over this past year—or whether it was plotting some kind of strange idea.
Ahtal-Ka's gaze was simply too ardent, which made Logan choose to run off not long after he landed; he kept getting the feeling that Ahtal-Ka wanted to dissect him and compare him piece by piece.
Under the shade of the trees, Ahtal-Ka watched Logan spread his wings and fly up into the sky, then, within the wind vortex he stirred up, speed away; it scratched its own head with its forelimbs.
To be honest, it felt a little disappointed.
It was not that Logan was not good enough. In terms of interest, Logan's exterior did indeed fit its aesthetic; every block of muscle and every scale combination, the arrangement of spines, and so on, were all just right.
One could say Logan had already achieved, among this kind of skeletal-frame monster, the perfect posture that most brings out one's own characteristics.
In terms of appreciating excellent things, Logan really was a very suitable object of observation.
But in terms of Walking Fortress construction, the practicality was too low. For one that cannot fly—indeed, even the Walking Fortress's aerial displacement requires pre-constructing silk-web zones, using the casting and reeling of the web to accomplish short-distance leaps.
Therefore, a mechanical beast in the four-legs-two-wings form of Nergigante, for an Ahtal-Ka that currently mainly relies on physical damage, is, in practicality, far higher than Logan's two-legs-two-wings type.
Not to mention that the current Walking Fortress parts are basically all machined using Annihilator No. 1 as the blueprint.
After a brief moment of disappointment, Ahtal-Ka perked up again.
Now it not only had such vast relic resources in the Ancient Ruins Basin, it also had two places—Ancient Tree and Astera—that could provide it with high-quality Walking Fortress components for a long time. It did not need, like other Ahtal-Ka, to carefully maintain parts and, after large amounts were damaged, go search for new ruins or human settlements.
Therefore, just like a university student who has just graduated and found a high-paying, stable job, Ahtal-Ka generously apportioned its future resources.
Walking Fortress parts of poorer appearance would be used to construct the Walking Fortress nest; those of better quality but not usable would be used to construct a model of Logan to satisfy its hobby; the rest would continue to be pieced into Annihilator No. 1, striving to reach the level of its mother as soon as possible.
As an Ahtal-Ka with ideals, it happily finished its plan for the future.
In its envisioning, a beautiful tomorrow was already beckoning to it!
On the other side, with the cat transport team arriving at Astera, the people of the Research Commission then learned of Logan's return, and the Admiral and the others further breathed a sigh of relief.
After all, Logan's existence was indeed too crucial. Although he had not overly interfered in the matters between Ancient Tree and Astera, everyone knew that his existence was the key for both sides to be able to keep the current relationship and even continue to move forward steadily.
Therefore, when Logan left it was for more than a year, with not a bit of news; not only were the cats worried, the Research Commission here was also afraid.
Ordinary Fire Wyverns always have ample wildness. Once a conflict with the Research Commission arose, then there would not even be an existence capable of effective communication; at that time, should the hunters fight or not?
Therefore, although over this year and more the relationship between the Research Commission and the Fire Wyverns also made progress, in the process of getting along they became all the more cautious.
This was not being timid; faced with this kind of new, epoch-making way for humans and monsters to interact, whatever one did had to be done prudently.
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