Bell nodded her head in agreement and then the three of them looked at Yaone with a questioning look in their eyes. Well actually, not only them but the others looked at him in the same way.
"It's telepathy between a master and their contracted ones. Even I can't communicate with a beast that is contracted and doesn't want to let others know. I know it can feel a little weird to hear a voice in your head but you can do the same thing. You can send orders or messages to your tiger with your thoughts only."
"You said it in plural form. Does that mean one can have more than one beast? and communicating only with thoughts is possible too?" Lou asked as she shuddered at the thought of one using the powers to do terror.
"Yes, and that is why only beasts can make the contract, and that is usually truly rare" Yaone answered the question with an odd expression like there is something more to it, but they will know later what it was as it is a surprise.
Growl! and everyone went silent.
A mere second later another 'growl' but from different directions. Then everyone stared at each other, looked at the ingredients and gulped.
"Okay, that is it! The rest of the questions is after dinner!" Lou clapped her hands, rolled up her sleeves and started cooking. She prepared the rabbits first, then the birds and lastly the herbs.
She made the animal's meat shine golden and the aroma was just delish. When eating the upper layer was crispy while the inside was saucy. That was the best dinner they had while being away and in the middle of nowhere.
Just like that the food was inhaled faster than it was prepared and when everyone was done the questions come.
"What does it take to make a contract?" the old man Owen asked.
"Can anyone make a contract?" with excitement asked Lilian.
"Can I have my own beast too?" Xinge asked with a childish voice, imitating a baby that wanted a lollipop.
"If you all ask at the same time it will be hard to answer, thought your questions were not that different from each other." Lou giggled and looked at Yaone who was just looking at the situation that was happening before him.
"Um, if it's about that, then yes... anyone can make a contract as long as the beast acknowledges them as their master. But that itself is truly hard." Yaone's words made their eyes sparkle when they got to know anyone can make a contract and diminish when he told it was hard.
"What can be the use of a beast?" This time it was Xin Huo who asked. To now almost no one had a contracted beast and actually, there are only rumors saying that one can have a beast. So what use could they have when they already have one that is contracted to one of his people.
"T-That I don't know, I only know what my parents told me before they passed away" His eyes saddened at the mention of his parents. Lou that didn't understand the love of a parent come to him and hugged him. She doesn't understand what it is to have a family but she does understand the pain of losing someone important.
"Okay, that is it with the questions to Yaone, Bell can you ask something your beast for me? And you need to give it a name! Calling it a beast all the time is too much of a problem." Lou asked while looking at Bell. She nodded in approval.
"I actually already thought of a name and as it is white I thought about Shiro or Yukki. But after I asked which one it wants and it said anything that sounds feminine, as it is female."
"Yukki is a fine name, and it is both feminine and cute" Lill said as she sat down at Lou's side.
"Can you ask it why it followed us?" Bell nodded.
"It said that we had a pure aura or something like that, I don't quite understand what it means with pure aura. And it followed to check if it can trust us" Bell answered a little confused.
"The aura thing that you mentioned is our soul or righter the beast can see if we are criminals or not, the beast folk have something similar but it is much weaker than that." Yaone answered and the confusion disappeared.
"Can you ask Yukki to change it to a smaller version when we will be near a town?" Lou asked. then another question comes right after hers and Bell didn't have time to answer the first one.
"And can you ask if it can inform us when other beasts will be near us?" Xin Huo asked. After all, like that he can have some use of 'Yukki'.
"It said that it can change its size but not in the upcoming three days. It doesn't want to tell me the reason why. And commander it will inform us if it just that."