Elemental Cats

After the battle between the boars and badgers, Lucy continued stirring up trouble between different groups of beasts, but instead of inciting direct conflicts between two parties like he had done previously, he stepped it up a bit. He went around suggesting creating alliances to different groups, he whispered in the ears of others that they might be the next target and should start preparing for battle. All the things he did led to beasts making various preparations in case they were attacked or needed to attack. Although Lucy didn't get everyone to make some kind of move, there were enough groups to spread the fear of war with their battle preparations and he didn't need to do everything by himself anymore.

Different groups prepared in different ways. Although the majority of the beasts in the mountain range had the fire attribute, there were also those with wind, earth, wood, lightning and more. Since the suppression of attributes in a low level plane is moderate it is a common sight for there to be a lot of different attributes. But the ease of improvement and strength is generally greater for the fire attribute beasts in a fire plane, it's just that the difference between different elements is tiny in most low level planes.

The few beasts with the earth attribute made preparations similar to what the badgers had done, a few wind and lightning beasts cooperated to summon storm clouds, the wood attribute beasts started planting a forest after gathering together on a mountain in the outer layer.

With the division of attributes and created alliances, the safety for individual beasts rose, but so did the tension between different groups.

If they weren't planning to fight a war, why are they preparing for it? What if they attack us? We should also start preparing. Many beasts thought in a similar manner as they started their own preparations.

Despite all the beasts preparing for battle there were still many beasts that just wanted to wait for their leader and the result of the treasure hunt, but with the increasing amount of fighting intent filling the mountains it was impossible to stay still with no worries about any upcoming battles.

Things proceeded according to Lucy's plan, but he still hadn't figured out how to really ignite the powder keg. The leader beasts could be approaching the surface at this very moment. Since the beasts would leave the mountains as soon as they confirmed the results of what happened in the pit, Lucy wanted them to fight before their leaders returned, especially the third level ones.

Thankfully there was no need for Lucy to do anything special as the situation changed by itself.

About a day after the situation calmed down following the battle between the boars and badgers, heat started spreading from the pit in the center of the mountain range. The temperature rose continuously and those that remember what had happened just a few days ago got excited. The same thing had happened before, when what seemed like a treasure had appeared. It might be a new treasure or something to do with the one that had already appeared. Either way it was an opportunity for the beasts on the surface to take part in some action and hopefully gain something for themselves.

With this excitement spreading, the previous stalemate came to an end and before the treasure even appeared competition between different groups and alliances sprouted. Rivaling storm-gathering alliances interfered with each other's cloud summoning, a few earth beasts snuck over to the centermost mountain. Among them the badgers, that on Lucy's instigation decided to take revenge on the leader of the boars that had entered the pit.

They cooperated with the moles to take over the mountain and turn it into one hell of a fortress, filled with traps and defenses. But since they didn't want anyone to know they had taken over the mountain directly next to the hole because it would pit them against virtually everyone else, they made their preparations below the surface. Condensing the earth to make space for tunnels and armaments, making some parts of the mountain sturdier so it could endure being hollowed out and more. With more time and with the moles and badgers cooperating the mountains defenses and fortifications would absolutely surpass what the badgers had built the other day.

A few groups even started fighting directly, to try and eliminate any competitors and obstacles. Since the boars were weakened after their battle they were attacked by an alliance of several beasts from the same area as the boars. The boars had ruled that place for a long time and would often mistreat their neighbors, now that they had lost a great deal of strength after fighting the badgers it was an excellent opportunity to get rid of them completely. Even if their leader returned stronger than any of their own leaders what could they do alone?

However things didn't go as planned, although the boars had lost a lot of strength they weren't so weak as to get eradicated by a bunch of beasts that needed to create an alliance and ambush them and both sides ended up losing a lot of participants in the fight. The boars weren't cleared out and the alliance was on the verge of breaking up.

The boars, upset at having taken repeated beatings, went around attacking weaker groups in their anger. The groups that were by themselves couldn't do anything to fight back but those that were part of an alliance or had some wits about them joined together and retaliated against the boars with a force much more impressive than what the boars had previously been attacked by.

This coalition force was only gathered from a small part of the beasts in the mountain range but it was enough to suppress the boars. It went well until suspicious deaths appeared in the back of the attacking forces. With the huge number it wasn't noticed if a few birds or rabbits went and died but as the number rose and old grudges were revealed the sturdy army, united in their revenge against the boars was no longer stable.

Some blamed other members of the union, others blamed other alliances and groups. After the boars were routed and the alliance separated into different camps the assassinations still continued. It lead to a tense situation in a place where there would at least be some festivities after getting rid of a strong enemy. Realizing this some of the acting leaders suspected it was an outside force behind the ever continuing murders. The only reason it wasn't plausible was because it kept happening in the middle of their camp, with only supposed allies around.

If the alliances splintered due to fear it would only be lead to a quicker death. The only options left were to either flee the mountains completely and miss the chance of treasure and helping their leader, or go on the offensive. With the amount of beasts angered by the deaths of friends and brothers it was an almost unanimous decision to begin targeting other groups until they found the culprit. Their actions stirred up a lot of anger and led to even more bloodshed.

The whole situation within the mountain range continued to degrade and fights, large and small, took place everywhere.

Overwhelming chaos and discord brought surprising amounts of joy to Lucy as he continued escalating conflicts in various ways, although he hardly needed to do that anymore.

The only thing that dissatisfied Lucy was the fact that the two largest groups, the wolves and deer still stayed out of the fighting. Wouldn't things get even more exciting if they joined in? Although they seemed perfectly content to wait outside the mountain range Lucy knew that a few of the younger ones were desperately aching for a rousing, hot-blooded battle.

Lucy figured that getting the entire group to move would be difficult, until he remembered what had happened down in the pit. The leaders of the wolf pack had killed one of the third level deer. Although that wasn't what happened exactly, and he wasn't even sure the deer actually died it looked dead enough for him to proceed based on that assumption. If he could get a witness who had escaped the pit to tell the deer herd that one of their leaders had been killed by the wolves, couldn't that lead to something?

Naturally he couldn't use any old random beast as a witness, there would be no way for the deer to believe that. At least one witness from the same area as the deer should be used. Even if the herd didn't believe the witnesses it would at least sow some suspicion and Lucy could use the moment when the beasts manage to climb out of the hole, and only two deer emerge, to stir up even more chaos.