Beast Gacha System: All Mine

Chapter 438: Graciously Flexible

In approximately two weeks, the judge would be done signing the divorce decree, and Arzhen would officially be free from that woman.

But Ruby was conflicted.

She believed that Arzhen loved her, and that he had only ever had eyes for her, his heart irrevocably, eternally bound to hers.

So why would she need to marry him?

Marriage should’ve been used as a strategic tool. And if Arzhen was already hers, all of his heart, his loyalty, his undying devotion, then wouldn’t it be better to marry someone else?

You know, someone equally useful? Someone who could bring additional power, resources, and value to her side?

If she bound Arzhen’s heart and another man’s ring, she could have both. The best of both worlds.

Why settle for one billionaire when she could have two?

Hmm. Let’s see. Who should be lucky enough to be granted her attention other than Arzhen...?

Rumoredly, Aro Industry’s owner had been single for his entire one hundred years of life. A century without a mate or anyone.

But Ruby didn’t know what kind of man Arkai Dawnoro was.

What if he was old and ugly? What if a hundred years of solitude had turned him into some grizzled, weathered creature who had let himself go? She couldn’t risk binding herself to an eyesore.

Ah. Those two Lion Heirs of Nevaeh Group—Eastiel and Elias. They were both very handsome.

She had seen photographs, though the pictures were old, from their teenage years. The younger brother apparently looked more like their famously handsome late father, all golden and striking and utterly magnetic. The older brother looked gorgeous in a different way, with a bright smile that was said to mirror their mother’s.

But Ruby didn’t know how they looked now. Years had passed since those photographs.

The problem was, meeting any of them was difficult. Aro Industry and Nevaeh Group were old money, the kind that didn’t attend the same parties as new money.

They wouldn’t answer cold calls or entertain social climbers. She would need an introduction. A connection, something she didn’t yet have.

There was still Magnus Karas, who was rumored to be wise and generous. But "wise and generous" sounded like code for "boring and unattractive." And there was Dietrich Hollow, who was... a bit crazy. The rumors about him were unsettling, and she didn’t need a loose cannon.

If it didn’t need to be a beast, then Damon Iondora, a human and the Hunter Association Director, was the best candidate. His political power was immense and his connections were unparalleled.

But he was scary.

That cold-blooded association director was too dangerous. She had heard the stories and seen the way his violet eyes seemed to strip people bare, assessing and discarding them in the same glance.

Better to stay far away.

So, the only one left was Nikolas Delanivis.

He was very approachable. Very eager. And Ruby had a strong hunch that he had a crush on her.

The way he looked at her, the way he always seemed to find excuses to be near her... He wasn’t as wealthy as the others, not as powerful, but he was available.

He would be the best candidate.

Right. After she got out of this certification camp, she would go and "accidentally" meet him and "accidentally" bond with him.

If Arzhen found out, she could just cry a little. Arzhen always forgave her when she cried.

In around two months, she would be out of this cursed camp. Two months of training, testing and proving herself, a grinding march toward her S-Rank Priestess certification.

Then she would be free to pursue her destiny. She would become so valuable everyone would want to be with her.

Ruby woke from her morning nap in her tent, the canvas walls filtering the pale morning light into a soft, golden glow. The camp was quiet this morning. At least quieter than usual.

Yesterday had been brutal, so the administrators had granted the candidates a rare half-day of rest.

To be an acknowledged priestess was not an easy feat. She didn’t only need to be tested on paper, she needed to prove herself in all kinds of dangerous scenarios.

The camp was designed to simulate the challenges she would face in the field. Controlled danger, they said. Monsters with blunted claws, or rifts with filtered corruption, guided by S-Ranked professionals.

She could still get injured, sometimes badly, but she wouldn’t die.

Well. Accidents did happen, but they were extremely rare. The administrators were very careful about that.

Candidates would be given their graduating ranks according to their accomplishments. Everything was measured.

The camp’s curriculum was brutal by design.

Combat support was the cornerstone. They tested how effectively a candidate could boost their party members’ Luck Stat and skill levels, how well they could repel physical corruption from wounded allies, whether they could maintain their holy presence under extreme stress without their concentration wavering. Things like those.

Ruby had shattered every record in this category. Her divine affinity was not merely strong, it was unfair. A fifty-percent boost to all party members’ skills, stacked on top of every other artifact in existence and a touch that could drive back the black filth itself.

Field medicine, survival skills, navigation, these were secondary, but still tracked, still scored. Ruby had done well enough. Not exceptional, but well enough. She had never needed to be exceptional at the mundane things. That was what other people were for.

The true bottleneck was purification. Priestesses couldn’t do the full, absolute cleansing that only a Saintess could perform, after all. They could only slow its spread, buying time for the real heroes to arrive.

Candidates were tested on how much corruption they could suppress in a set period, how long they could maintain a barrier, and how quickly they could recover after expending their reserves.

Ruby had been run through a gauntlet of drills, each one more grueling than the last, her holy energy drained to its dregs. She had done well.

But the effort had left her hollowed out, her limbs heavy, her nerves frayed.

Ruby rose from her cot and stretched, her muscles aching, her hand still itching for her phone.

Yep, this camp also forbade phones and other communication devices. It made sense, she supposed. To prevent cheating and outside assistance, to ensure that every candidate’s accomplishments were purely their own.

Ruby didn’t need to cheat, though. She had seen her listed sponsor, the Vasiliev name, and she knew the camp administrators wouldn’t dare give her a hard time.

She would even be given some small benefits, like preferential treatment or easier assignments. Nothing too obvious, but enough to smooth the path.

She already had her divine affinity, so help was not all that necessary to begin with. She was simply better than the others.

"Oh, Ruby, you are awake?" The voice came from outside her tent. One of the other candidates, a plain-faced girl whose name Ruby could never quite remember, was poking her head through the flap. "It is a rare half-day rest. Do you want to go to the canteen tent and watch whatever is on the satellite TV?"

Ruby smiled graciously. Why not? She was a very important and a very generous person who would spend time with someone so ordinary. "Sure. I am also a bit hungry."

"Great, let’s go."

The satellite TV was the only thing that would give them any news from the world. They were in the middle of the wilderness, after all, cut off from the internet and the headlines and the constant flow of information that Ruby craved like oxygen.

It was a small mercy. A thread connecting them to civilization.

But Ruby couldn’t have imagined, in her wildest, most paranoid dreams, what she would see there the moment she laid eyes upon the screen.

The footage was grainy, shot from a helicopter, the audio crackling with wind and distance. But the image was unmistakable.

Cecilia Araceli—floating between a dry basin and a wall of a hundred billion cubic meters of water.

What...?