The quality of spiritual beasts can be divided into levels:
Black Iron beasts are the least talented with the lowest upper-limit in strength. They are only slightly better than ordinary beasts which have no spiritual power. No beast tamer would bind to one unless under extraordinary circumstances. Their potential, without evolving, is also very low, likely never graduating from the lowest white spiritual power, to red.
Bronze beasts have decent fighting power. However, their abilities are really only effective at the one-star level, while their potential without evolving allows them to eventually condense red-grade spiritual power, corresponding to a human’s 2-star level of power. Although they may go one level higher to orange-grade spiritual power with some luck.
Similarly, Silver quality beasts normally can reach a strength level of orange-grade spiritual power, corresponding to 3-star humans, and yellow-grade spiritual power with some luck and hard work.
For even higher quality beasts, those Gold and above, they are impossible for the academy to possess. Heck, there may not be a single Gold-quality beast in this entire city. They are exceptionally rare and usually only possessed by beast tamers above 4-stars.
As for beasts above Gold-quality, they are completely in Kain’s blind spot. He will likely need to enter one of the top 5 colleges to even have a hope of ever seeing one.
Knowing this, Kain’s goal for Bridge would be to find a suitable Bronze-quality beast with decent evolutionary potential, it is unlikely that the school would possess a single Silver quality one.
Entering the breeding grounds Kain was fascinated by the many spiritual creatures that he had only gotten to see in textbooks so far.
However, after the novelty wore off Kain got down to business and began to look for a suitable first contract for Bridge.
After looking at all of the cages, Kain was pleasantly surprised to find that the school had quite a large collection of young spiritual beasts—over 200.
However, only 5 of them were wolf-types, two of which were Black Iron quality Sand Wolves, likely littermates. Of the remaining 3, all were Bronze-quality. A water- attribute ‘River Wolf’ pup, a fire- attribute ‘Ash Wolf’ pup, and a wind-attribute ‘Huricanine’ pup.
Kain quickly went through the pros and cons of each in his head.
The River pup has the greatest evolutionary potential, immediately skipping over Silver quality in its next evolution to become a Gold quality Clear Spring Wolf, which also possesses some healing capabilities.
Additionally, because most students choose to go with the offensive fire-attribute spiritual creatures for their first contract, if their affinity does not have an attribute restriction, then the River Pup would give Bridge a huge advantage during the college admissions tests.
Unfortunately, River Pups need a constant supply of top-quality rare herbs located near rivers inhabited by spiritual creatures with at least orange-grade spiritual power. Making the cost of purchasing said herbs from mercenaries astronomically expensive. In short: it is out of the price range for the orphans Bridge and Kain.
The Ash Wolf pup is named as such because they feed on coal, and are often found covered in black soot resembling ash in coal mines. Therefore, their biggest advantage is that their preferred food source, coal, is super cheap. Although as far as fire-attributes go, they are quite weak among the rest of the fire-attribute Bronze-quality spiritual creatures.
This means that Bridge will likely be at a disadvantage when undergoing the admissions tests for college.
It has 2 known evolutionary forms: A silver-quality Mine Wolf, also not of particularly great strength. And a Gold-quality Gem Wolf. However, there are less than 40 Gem wolves in the entire empire, and the stringent evolutionary conditions would not be known by people with no background like Kain and Bridge.
Last but not least is the Huricanine pup. They don’t possess many long-range attacks and their wind-attribute is mainly demonstrated through their incredible speed.
Few contracts of bronze quality, and even silver quality with proper training, would be able to match its speed. Therefore, it would be greatly beneficial for Bridge’s admissions tests.
Unfortunately, their development path is also the one Kain is least knowledgeable about. Huricanine pups have numerous evolutionary pathways that are determined by how they are cared for and their diet.
Without being able to afford the help of an official Evolutionary Planner, Kain isn’t confident in being able to properly maximize its potential.
After expressing his thoughts to Bridge, Kain waited for his decision.