A brief, vivid memory of the heated times he had spent with Lotus flashed through Benjamin’s mind.

His face softened into a gentle shade of pink as he recalled those intimate moments.

"Lotus... I miss her too, more than I can really put into words right now," Benjamin sighed deeply, his shoulders slumping slightly as the name left his lips, carrying a weight of genuine longing and affection in his tired voice.

He continued; "Did you experience any trouble or any major changes while I was gone for all those days? Did a new monster appear somewhere in the area? Was a new location discovered?"

"Ah, yes! Now that you mention it, there is something I forgot to tell you about!" Martha sat up straight from her previous position of squeezing and hugging Benjamin’s torso tightly against her own body, her face lighting up with sudden remembrance and her eyes widening with excitement.

She started; "There IS a new monster living somewhere in the Whispering Wilds. Well, it is not exactly new in the sense of being born recently or arriving from somewhere else. It has been inactive and hidden away for a very long time, and has just woken up and started moving around again."

"Oh? What kind of monster are we talking about here? Is it dangerous? Should I be worried about it?" Benjamin asked, his voice carrying genuine curiosity and a hint of eager anticipation, leaning forward slightly as he waited for her answer.

The majority of the animals and monsters living in this savannah-like region known as the Whispering Wilds were all already known to Benjamin by name and by nature.

In the short while he had been there, Benjamin had encountered many of them before, fought against some, run from others, and learned their habits and territories through personal experience.

So the mention of something new and unfamiliar, something that had been inactive for a long time and was now awake — this naturally sparked his interest in a serious way.

Especially if it turned out to be some kind of new apex predator.

Heka began explaining, her voice calm and measured as she chose her words carefully.

"Well, I personally do not think that this particular monster will be any problem for the current you, Benjamin... after your evolution and your growth. You have grown strong far too quickly, much faster than anyone anticipated. But it might take more than five elite Amazons, working together as a coordinated team, to successfully take this creature down in a fight. And I might be wrong even."

"F-Five?! More than five elite Amazons would be needed to defeat this single monster?!" Benjamin’s eyes widened dramatically in his face, his pupils dilating with a mixture of genuine shock and rising excitement.

His heartbeat quickening as he imagined what kind of creature could require such overwhelming force to subdue. "Please tell me it is a dragon!"

"Hahaha! What are you even saying right now, Benjamin?" Martha slapped his shoulder in a friendly, amused manner as she laughed loudly at his excited guess, her whole body shaking with mirth at the absurdity of his suggestion.

Then, in the very next breath, her face went completely dead serious, all traces of humor vanishing from her expression like a candle being snuffed out.

Her eyes turned cold and hard as she delivered her next words with absolute certainty. "Twenty elite Amazons, working together with perfect coordination and the best equipment available, cannot defeat a single dragon in direct combat. You think far too highly of us and our abilities, Benjamin. Dragons are not ordinary monsters — they are forces of nature given flesh."

"Awww? But it depends on the specific type and age and species of the dragon we are talking about, no?" Benjamin protested immediately, "an ordinary, mature dragon of normal size strength could be taken down by five elite Amazons working together!"

Heka made a wry and crooked smile with her lips, the expression twisting her face into something between amusement and exasperation, while a single drop of cold sweat ran slowly down her cheek as she tried to find a diplomatic way to correct his misunderstanding.

"Benjamin, please," she started, "stop this misunderstanding. Let me clarify something important for you. There is Mother, Marina, Sara, and Lotus. And there are also some hidden elders scattered around the world, ancient women whose power is rarely seen.

"And then there is the rest of us, the ordinary Amazons. We are not the same category as those women."

"Oohhh..." Benjamin said slowly, nodding his head as the pieces clicked together in his mind.

Those other women — Mother, Marina, Sara, Lotus — they were not ordinary by any stretch of the imagination.

They were abnormal and exceptional, extraordinary by the standard of mortals.

It WOULD take no more than three Saras to end a mature dragon in combat, or perhaps even just one Sara acting alone, if she was fighting at her full strength.

It is worth noting that mature dragons of the type Benjamin was discussing were approximately twenty feet long from snout to tail tip, and they weighed as much as an entire train locomotive — massive, powerful, armored in scales that could deflect most weapons, and capable of breathing fire that could melt stone and steel.

These were the typical dragons of western literature and legend, the ones that appeared in stories and songs and nightmares.

But they are distinct from Supreme dragons and Primal dragons.

"But... I do genuinely think that all four of you are also very strong and very capable fighters, especially when compared to ordinary humans," Benjamin added after thinking about the matter, rubbing his chin thoughtfully as he spoke.

"H... He is calling us humans," Lulu spoke, her lips twisting in amused exasperation, as her sisters giggled in cheerful response around her, the sound light and playful in the quiet room.

"Eh?! Ah, no, I did not mean to say it that way at all — that came out completely wrong!" Benjamin tried to explain himself needlessly, his words tumbling out in a rushed and flustered stream as he waved his hands in front of him defensively. "I’m not being arrogant and saying that you are all below me, or anything like that!"