The Divine Wolf... or?

Chapter 159: Who's stronger, you... or a kid?

As soon as Thufrat entered their sights, the trio got ready to greet him, but when they saw the three people that followed him, they stopped in their tracks. The weird family that had helped them a couple of days earlier! Ark had made quite the impression when he released all of his bloodlust, especially when he healed their guard despite his obvious hostility.

The young lady immediately became suspicious, this was too much of a coincidence right?

Ark and Ephine both acted truly surprised to see this trio here, even though they knew they were going to be a part of this. Seeing their surprise, the young lady calmed down a little, maybe it really was a coincidence? She was still suspicious, but this act of theirs definitely put them off.

Ark wasn't sure how effective it was going to be, but since Thufrat wanted his company in the dungeon, he had to be in his human form, otherwise the dwarf would probably be bored to death.

Worst case scenario, the young lady finds out about their secret, but if that happens, there are several routes he can take. If she isn't hostile, then there wouldn't even need be a need to be worried. If she was hostile or had ill-intentions, he was sure that he could dispose of her, especially with Thufrat's help. Hopefully it wouldn't come to that though.

They quickly arrived in front of all these people, and fairly quickly, a lot of eyes were glued to Ephine. It wasn't anything weird, she was truly beautiful, but Ark was a little displeased. As soon as they saw his rather displeased expression, they naturally backed off, since the young lady had invited them to this excursion, they were not someone weak, and it wouldn't be wise to offend them.

The looks of scorn and displeasure directed at Thufrat naturally disappeared when Ark glared, but he didn't forget to remember their faces.

"Thank you for helping us out this time, are these your companions?"

"Yeah, though they might not look like fierce fighters, these are some of the strongest people I've ever met!" Thufrat was a little gleeful as he bragged about their strength.

"Hmm? Do you think this dungeon is some sort of picnic? Why would you bring some kid with you?" A rather large man in the group of 20 abruptly said when he spotted Atar standing behind his mother. Did these people take this trip to the dungeon as some kind of joke?

Thufrat was about to respond, when Ark took a step forward. "Whether or not I bring my kid with me has nothing to do with you, his safety is my responsibility and no one else's. Besides, I doubt you're much stronger than him either way." Ark didn't hold back, he wouldn't let someone push them around as they wanted.

"You little-"

"Now now, let's calm down a little shall we?" the young lady quickly intervened before things got out of hand, she didn't want a fight to start before they even managed to enter the dungeon. As for the young boy, she was a little perplexed as well, this man didn't seem like a good parent at all. Without him knowing, Ark's favourability in everyone's hearts quickly plummeted.

Seeing everyone's reactions, Ark was at a loss for words. He had once heard that actions speak louder than words, and maybe it was time he let Atar demonstrate exactly what that saying meant. While people were still looking, he crouched down next to Atar, and patted him on the head.

"Do you want to show them how strong you've become?" Atar quickly nodded, he didn't like the way these people looked at them, and it was uncomfortable.

"Don't let them look down on us!"

With a pat on the back, Atar quickly walked away for a bit until he was in front of a couple of trees. Everyone was watching him, and as he felt their stares burrowing into his back, he quickly took half a step forward, and sent his arm flying forward! With all the might he could muster, Atar threw a punch at the trees in front of him.

Unlike what the others had expected, Atar didn't try to punch just one tree, instead he punched the empty air in front of him.

Unlike what they expected, Atar's punch was actually very powerful, and the wind that was brought about by his punch quickly sent the nearby trees flying. In front of him, devastation was everywhere. A large area in front of him was completely obliterated, with nothing but dirt and broken branches left. After this punch, he felt a little relieved, and just skipped back to Ark and Ephine.

Seeing the child happily skip back to his family after unleashing such sudden destructive power was very unnerving for most people, but they had to admit, the child was very powerful.

The large man realised his mistake, and he was a little annoyed. Even though he was annoyed, he knew that it was for the better if he just apologised for his rude remarks, as these people could probably easily deal with him, if the child was this powerful, how powerful were the parents?

While the man was contemplating to himself, Atar was getting plenty of affection from Ark and Ephine, who both couldn't help but want to spoil him when they saw how cute he was.

This happiness was what Ark worked so hard to protect, and he would surely work even harder in the future. After the large man apologised, the group naturally split up into two groups, the original group of 20 as well as Ark's group of four.

To Ark and Thufrat, this didn't matter at all, quite the opposite, it was actually quite nice that they were left all alone, this meant that they could do whatever they wanted down in the dungeon if they split up.

The young lady didn't like that the group had split up like this, but there was nothing that she could really do about it. She couldn't just make them suddenly like each other. With that said, she still had an idea of how to keep the group together, it was actually quite simple. Since no one would willingly follow Ark and his group, she just decided to stick to them.

Naturally everyone else just followed after them, since everyone came here to curry favours after all.

With Ark and the young lady's group in the very front, they all quickly descended into the dungeon after they arrived. Since the dungeon was actually a goblins nest, it was actually just a cave system that delved deep into a nearby mountain. Naturally, the scary opponents were not the goblins, but the monsters they had evolved into.

It didn't even take long before a group of black goblins came running. When they heard the large amounts of footsteps, they all drew their small weapons and rushed at the group to attack. Before they could even come close, they all started shrieking miserably. Before anyone in the group could react, a white flame suddenly engulfed them whole, leaving not even dust behind.

Everyone looked at Ark with frightened expressions, he had clearly used his mana just then, but what the hell was up with that attack? It was way too powerful!

While everyone was astonished by his strength, he felt like something was a little amiss. Even though goblins were stupid creatures, they were also timid, they wouldn't just rush into a horde of strong opponents like this, it was simply against their nature!