《Trial of Monsters and Summons》 -3 Questions and World Info Monsters: Monsters are creations of the deity and exist within a mirror plane to the new Pangea-like continent. They are normal creatures, although most are predatory and act with a sense of self-preservation. They have a natural dislike of humans and will attack them if given a chance, the weaker ones that sense the presence of stronger summons will avoid attacking, although there are always stupidly brave or aggressive ones. Aside from some cooperating with their own species, all monsters prey not only on humans but on each other. This behavior has created the development of different tiered areas based on the average strength of monsters within an area. The more powerful monsters will live within the center and the weakest will be on the outskirts, the weaker ones have a much greater population to make up for their weak strength and ensures the species survival. During monster breaks, the monsters act much differently. They possess the drive to annihilate humanity when the break starts and only ends after 6 hours have passed and the bell on top of the gate rings once more. They have no sense of preservation and charge without hesitation to their death during this period. The stronger monsters stay towards the back of the pack while the weaker and more numerous ones charge first and wear down the humans. The monsters don''t lose their intelligence, they just have an overwhelming urge to kill humans. This is the only time monsters can pass through the gate, which is their ultimate goal as they want to kill the massive amount of humans within the city on the other plane. There are 5 tiers of monsters, and each tier shows a certain level of evolution. It isn''t necessarily reflective of actual strength, which I think makes it more realistic. Tier 2- advanced animals, larger animals that have evolved into a new creature still resembling the animal they used to be. Tier 3- Actual monsters, these are just the common ones though. But these creatures belong in books and stories rather than variations of existing animals. Always stronger than tier 1, many would be required to take one down. Stronger than most tier 2''s, but some can take down strong tier 3''s by themselves. The power difference between tier 2 and 3 is small enough that tier won''t really determine the outcome of a fight, rather the type of monster and the tactics used in battle will determine the victor. Tier 4- Rare monsters, these are more powerful monsters and aren''t as common. They aren''t always stronger than powerful tier 3 monsters, and can usually be taken on with two tier 3 monsters working together against one. Tier 5- Legendary/Named monsters, this is the final evolutionary stage for any monster and are the most powerful type of monsters. A single tier 4 will never beat a tier 5, there is a qualitative leap between tier 4 and 5. Variants: Variants are monsters that have a genetic mutation compared to their normal counterparts, this can give them specific attributes and features. Most, but not all mutations can make the monster stronger or have a unique skill set that allows them to survive easier. They are uncommon, but not especially hard to find, the odds of one being created are 1 in 10. Actually useful variants are much harder to find, about 1 in 100. While some mutations might be advantageous, only a few give a distinct advantage that raises them above their common species. They are sought after by summoners for their evolutionary potential along with their greater ability. These mutations give unique evolutionary routes for the summons to follow, and their mutation is often at the forefront of the reason behind their new species or variant of. Summons: Summons are just monsters that have been killed by a summoner and then bonded with that summoner through a blood contract. They are in an inert form of their core until mental energy is infused into them to create a link which summons out the summon to fight or follow the commands of their summoner. They still have their own personality and free-will, they are just more inclined to listen to their summoner. If they are mistreated then they can rebel or refuse to be summoned at all. What happens when a summon dies, and what are the repercussions of their resurrection- Summons are already dead as a result of the process to convert one from a monster into a summon, and those that die can be resurrected once more. The cost of resurrecting one is the loss of any increase towards evolution from the last evolution. This will also increase resentment towards the summoner, and if they continue to die or are used as shields for the summoner they may eventually revolt and either not listen to the summoner or refuse to even be summoned. What happens when a summoner dies- When a summoner dies his summons die with him as they already died once and are only resurrected thanks to the summoner. Any summons out with the summoner when they die, leave their body and core to be gathered. Summons still in core form will only leave their core behind. There are no stray summons, and you can''t get another''s summon as your own by killing them. Evolution: Evolution works through a mixture of battle experience, cores fed to them, and stimulating battles. Battle experience encourages growth both physically and combat wise. Cores fed to summons either shore up similar genetic data to help provide the genetic basis for evolving. A stimulating battle is needed to break the wall of evolution and transform into another type of creature. These 3 main factors are required for evolution, but many summoners focus on different ratios of the three when a balance between the 3 will serve to make evolutions occur quicker. The reason for cores of a similar type being necessary to evolve is that genes gathered from the cores are shored up in preparation for evolving. Cores from a stronger monster than the summon will not only provide more genes, but will also shift their evolutionary direction more towards that monster. This isn''t absolute, but happens more often than not. There is a wall between the third tier and the fourth, getting any summon to the third tier is usually fairly achievable, but getting to the fourth tier is much harder. Genetic limits are what determine whether they can easily cross the threshold or not, weaker monsters usually have weaker potential. Each summon has a limited amount of evolutionary potential decided by what the summon inherently possesses and is also affected by the method in which evolutions are induced. Forceful evolutions like most summoners do, will decrease their genetic potential. Forceful methods would be feeding them cores all at once or making them fight with their life on the line while they aren''t fully developed. Thomas has the ideal method for evolution, even if he doesn''t yet know it. He feeds them cores regularly without overfilling them which allows the summons to digest and incorporate the genes from the cores. He has them fight often to gain battle experience, and he also gives them a difficult opponent to overcome in order to start the evolutionary process. Summons that overcome their challenging opponent will instinctually desire the core from the monster they defeated to begin the transformation. These final cores before transformation usually will affect their evolution in some way, either with physical changes similar to the monster or with certain abilities gained during evolution that are influenced by the monster. What Summoners gain from the evolution of their summons and what factors affect it- When a summon evolves, the summoner gains a portion of their attributes and potentially a skill or ability that the summon possesses. These skills and abilities will be a weaker version of the one the summon has, just like how the attributes will only slightly increase the physical parameters of the summoner. Having multiple summons evolve won''t make your body go up in equivalent tier strength, but it is possible through multiple evolutions to go up a tier. Each tier becomes significantly harder to progress to for the summoner, and it is unlikely they will ever be able to match tier 5''s. This increase in strength is meant to allow summoners to survive while their summons fight for them. Having a better relationship with their summon and helping them grow optimally will allow for more to be transferred over to the summoner. Summoners: Summoners are people who have taken the profession of being a summoner consisting of fighting monsters and taking requests for specific materials amongst other things. To be one, they must register with the Summoner Association, once registered they can take requests and sell monster parts. Those that refuse to sign up can still go through the gate, but monster bodies won''t be bought and they won''t be able to buy anything from shops or people affiliated with the association. Everyone can technically summon something as a result of gaining a summon upon becoming an adult or receiving one during the start of the new era, but not all are useful and sometimes people don''t want to be a summoner. How does summoning work- Summoning works by infusing mental energy into a core to start the summoning process. The energy allows the summon to change into their actual body from their core form. Each summon requires a certain amount of mental energy to remain summoned and establish and maintain the link between summon and summoner to relay orders and intention. Smarter, obedient, and loyal summons require less energy to maintain their summoned state. More summons requires more energy, and the amount required is multiplied rather than added as it is harder to focus on more than one thing. Eventually, summoners can become mentally exhausted and can even faint from the exertion, but the amount of energy can be increased or used more efficiently from regular use. Economy: This is what I have written about the economic system- ? Tier 1 core is worth 1 credit, common corpse sells for 3 credits ? Tier 2 core is worth 10 credits, common corpse sells for 25 credits ? Tier 3 core is worth 25 credits, common corpse sells for 70 credits ? Tier 4 core is worth 100 credits, common corpse sells for 250 credits ? Tier 5 core is worth 1,000 credits, common corpse sells for 5,000 credits ? Variant cores can increase the worth depending on the traits of the monster, can cost up to the price of the next core tier. o 1 credit can pay for a complete meal o A complete set of new clothes cost around 5 credits Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. o Expanding the space within the storage watch costs 25 credits per cubic meter. Everyone starts off with 5 cubic meters. 1 cubic meter is usually enough to store 6 small monsters, 3 medium-sized monsters, or 1 large-sized monster o Items like weapons and armor cost around 3 times what the core cost from the monster, higher the tier of the materials the more expensive. Price is down to the cost of the core is the materials are provided by the summoner. o Rent for a normal apartment cost around 25 credits per month, the price increases dramatically the closer to the center of the city you get, with apartments closest to the gate costing around 10,000 credits a month o The corpse of monsters not including the core can cost as much if not more than the core due to its multiple uses like hide for armor and clothes, meat for food, organs and parts for medicine/potions, and bones for materials for building and armor/weapons. Usually sold wholesale to the Monster Summoner Association, with variant or strong monsters being sold at the auction. Society- Society was hectic and borderline anarchic at the beginning with no real form of government existing and no one knowing what is going on. The summoning association was formed in place of government as summoning became the most integral part of society. They monitored and regulated everything into some semblance of order after nearly a year. Each city is divided into sections corresponding with a compass, and each section has districts. The district closest to the gate is the inner district. The middle one is called the intermediary district, and the farthest one is called the outer district. The rich live in the inner district, and is made up mostly of strong summoners and wealthy merchants involved in summoning equipment. The outer district is where everything is the cheapest and is where most civilians live. Strength is what matters in this era, and as long as no serious crimes are committed within the city then there is no real problem with what one does. Only crimes within the city are policed, but usually, those too young to have a summon are not messed with as there will be a bounty put up against the person who harms a minor. Once you are no longer a minor is when you must become strong to protect yourself. There are summoner schools within each city consisting of minors learning how to survive in the wild, how to use weapons and fight bare-handed, studying monsters and their physiology, amongst other things all in preparation to use them to bolster the ranks of summoners defending the city from the monster breaks. People are doing their best to survive in this apocalyptic era and are willing to do things like eat humanoid monster meat and other things as a result of their conditioning from the war and then the chaos of the start of the summoning era. Electronics- -2 P atreon Accoun Link to the account is- https://www.*******.com/Porkiepie My Paypal if you just want to make a single donation rather than subscribe is- Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. -1 Early Chapters Being Fixed No content 1 Prologue: Nuclear War o Diary Entry #1 (May 4th, 2020) Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. Hello Diary, My name is Thomas and today is my Birthday. Only me and my sister are celebrating this year, not that there''s much to celebrate with the war still going on. It''s this stupid war that left me an orphan in the first place, luckily I still have my sister Mira to take care of me, I much prefer staying with her rather than the orphanage. It was too crowded with all the other orphans who were there for the same reason I was. It was even rarer for someone like Mira to be there considering she was old enough to be drafted like most of the adults and teenagers in their later years. She is the only one I care about now, all the others are off fighting or already dead. The war has taken everything from us, and at this point, even those who aren''t fighting are feeling the dreadful effects of the war. Everything is rationed and any scrap no matter how small it was recycled in order to further the war effort. With most of the food being sent towards those fighting not even things like sugar or salt were regularly available. No cake for me I guess, oh well. Most of the farmable land has been destroyed and rendered useless due to the nuclear fallout from bombs, now everyone forages and grows their own food in an effort to make up for the lack of rations. Luckily or unluckily there aren''t that many mouths to feed anymore with most of them dead already from this war that has ravaged the entire world in only 3 years. Less than a billion people are still alive in the world and there are only about 100 million left in the entire continent of North America. I guess they really got it right when they declared WW3 the war to end all wars. At first, it was only a few countries fighting each other over oil rights, then after a while, their allies got dragged in, and so on and so forth to the point that all of the countries were eventually dragged in and it became a fight between continents more so than countries. o Diary Entry #15 (May 18th, 2020) Well Diary, I suppose I spoke too soon. Sirens are going off warning us about our impending doom from nuclear bombs. There''s nothing left to do except accept my fate and try to enjoy the last moments I have left. I''m currently sitting on the concrete stairs outside of our small cracked stucco apartment watching the sunset with Mira beside me as we comfort each other in our final moments. My only regret is not being able to have stopped the war that has finally taken everything from me, even my life. If only there was a way to fix this mess. I give up that notion quickly knowing that if humanity were to change they would have done it long ago before most of the population was killed off. Any faith I had in humans has long been crushed under the harsh environment we now live in as a result of a ridiculous war continued only by grudges with the original reason for the war having been forsaken long ago. o Diary Entry #16 (May 19th, 2020) I''m still in disbelief that I''m even writing this rather than being nothing more than a pile of ash. As the nukes honed in and were preparing to go off, a booming and mysterious voice came from the sky and everything seemed to have paused except for us. The voice pronounced how disappointed it was in humanity, but then stated with a sigh that it expected this would eventually happen with the inherently greedy and vengeful nature of humanity. The voice picked up again and said that it would be changing the world that we know now and that almost no electricity, machines, or modern weapons would be allowed to exist in the hope that we don''t attempt to destroy ourselves again. It stated that since it seemed humanity would only unite and peacefully exist between ourselves if we had a common enemy it would provide one for us. It said that the world would be changing drastically from what we know now and that this change would be a test for us to determine whether we deserved to continue existing or should be left to get wiped out. The voice then proclaimed that the following changes would be made to the world and that if we wanted to adapt we should listen closely: 1st- Monsters from fantasy, mythology, and legends would exist in the new world, but would remain in their own separate plane which can be accessed through gates in each of the 7 continental cities. All Monster Gates connect to an alternate dimension full of monsters. All of the gates lead to the same summoning plane but are separate just like in the actual world. There are 5 tiers of summons- Tier 1: common, Tier 2: advanced, Tier 3: Rare, Tier 4: Mythical, and Tier 5: Legendary/Named. Monsters are inclined to attack humans, but have a sense of self-preservation and won''t mindlessly pursue and kill them. There are also near-infinite combinations of monsters, variants, and evolutions. 2nd¨C The remaining viable land on earth would be separated from the ruined lands and then combine into a mini Pangea, each continent would have its own giant continental city for the surviving citizens to remain in. Each city will have a gate to access the monster plane, an auction house, a colosseum, a monster core exchange building next to the gate, and lots of enormous skyscraper style apartments within the city to house all of us. In addition, all humans will know a universal language in hopes that understanding each other will allow humans to work together. 3rd¨C Each person 16 and older would receive a beginning free random monster summon core which they can bond with through a drop of blood. Each summoner can have a maximum of 10 summoning monsters bonded to them, the bond is permanent and can''t be replaced or gotten rid of. Only monsters killed by the summoner can be bonded with and summoned, all other cores are used to upgrade or feed other cores. Cores from the same family or type can be used to evolve a monster summon, other cores can be fed to the summons and grant abilities or variations but won''t evolve them. Any summon that is killed will revert back to a core that will be returned to the summoner and can be reformed at the expense of any experience and cores fed to the summon since its'' last evolution. 4th¨C Each summon or monster has the potential to evolve and the possibilities are nearly endless in regards to what they can evolve into, all of this relies on the cores they are fed and the experience they gain from fighting just like in video games. With each evolution a summon goes through, a portion of their physical statistics and/or abilities are transmitted to the summoner, but this only occurs as a bonded summon evolves. 5th- All humans will receive a watch that is connected to their credit account and a universal store. The watch also has the ability to store items and summoning crystals amongst other things, and each watch starts off with a 5 cubic meters large storage capacity. Larger storage capacity can be purchased for credits. It also has the ability to talk or text to people in their contacts as a way to make up for the removal of nearly all technology. Credits which can be obtained primarily through selling monster cores, bodies and goods, are the universal currency in this new era. The economy of the world is now completely revolving around monster cores as currency, it has inherent value as a supplement for summons. Where strength is the most important factor to continue surviving more cores means more strength. There are established auctions within each city that occur every week and there is a worldwide auction every month, these are meant to facilitate the trade of goods and allow for all to have the chance to access otherwise foreign resources. 6th- All minors will receive an allowance in order for them to live until they turn of age and can support themselves. Their allowance credits are non-transferrable and no items bought can be given or traded in order to protect them. They can be given credits by adults for services performed or any other reason. Any credits and items owned by their parents will be transferred to their other parent or to them should they both pass. 7th- Because this era is an experiment to see if humanity is worthy of continuing to exist, there is a merit system to weed out the corrupt and evil through bounties that are created when enough negative karmic actions have occurred, and the worse the person the greater the bounty. Any credits and items owned by the person with the bounty are given to the bounty hunter, along with the bounty reward. No minor should be harmed, and any who do so will be given a kill on sight bounty to those nearby. 8th ¨C Every two months there will be a monster break where monsters from the alternate plane will be allowed to pass through to the human realm. The monsters will attempt to break through the gate and enter the cities in order to slaughter humanity. During the bimonthly monster breaks, many variant and mythical monsters will appear, with great danger comes great opportunity. Each monster break brings successively stronger monsters, which will come in greater numbers. It is only through constant strengthening that humanity will survive. There is a way to end the monster breaks, but it is up to humanity to figure out how. The only hint he gave is to think about what brought about our situation and near annihilation in the first place. o Diary Entry # 23 (May 26th, 2020) Those 8 commandments as I like to refer to them, are the basis for the world we are in now and will hopefully guide us enough to survive in this strange new existence. On the upside, the watches given to us allow for the purchasing of many necessities that were scarce during the war. No one starves anymore due to the existence of credits, with orphans getting an allowance of 20 credits a week. For reference as to the value of a credit, a normal meal is set at 1 credit with a set of clothes going for around 5 credits, and the minimum rent for the common apartments is 25 credits a month. A tier 1 monster core is worth 1 credit at the core exchange, with each successive upgrade in tier the price rises exponentially, with tier 2 being worth 10 credits, tier 3 worth 25 credits, tier 4 at 100 credits, and tier 5 at 1000 credits, and the bodies of monsters are even more valuable. While there may not be a war going on anymore, there is a general sense of chaos and confusion at the state of the reality we have been placed in. Luckily the government and soldiers have maintained order and are in the process of stabilizing society as well as preparing for the upcoming monster breaks. Many adults have begun working as monster summoners that fight monsters for money, the others who chose not to follow that path have chosen to pick up trades like weapon and armor smithing, merchant, cook, jeweler, leatherworker, alchemist/potioneer, tailor, carpenter, builder, butcher, and entertainer amongst other things. The ones with trades were in the minority as many saw the need to be strong in this uncertain reality, and with many jobs in the previous world becoming unnecessary or irrelevant with the existence of the global store and the ban on electricity and modern weapons. Mira has gotten a job as an alchemists assistant to a former chemist named Eric Carter, the job has become a valuable one as a result of experiments with monster parts creating potions with various effects. With as smart and hardworking as Mira is, I''m not surprised at her being chosen over others to assist Mr. Carter. As an added benefit it is a decent job that has allowed us to live without worry about affording necessities. The only drawback to the trade is the expense of any failed potions, this tends to get rather high when experimenting with valuable ingredients. To counter this cost is the amount that can be earned from sharing the recipe and receiving a tithe from each vial sold of your discovered potion. This is a recent development brought about by the creation of an Alchemist guild to unionize Alchemists and allow for the sharing of recipes and information with a certain percentage of credits being paid to those who utilize the discoveries of others in manufacturing potions to sell. While it is a very recent profession that has popped up, it has become very popular due to the advantage potions provide with many recipes already having been discovered as a result of the influx of monster parts and bodies brought in by the many summoners hunting them. 2 Ch. 1 Era of Summoning Two years have passed since the Summoning Era began and the changes have been rather drastic compared to our life before. All I can say is that even this dangerous new existence is far better than what life was like during the war. We began the New Era with a world population of around a Billion people, made up of all of those who had managed to survive the war so far, with 150 million of those being from North America where Mira and I are from. 12 Monster breaks have occurred since the beginning of the Era, and due to our lack of knowledge and cohesiveness, many were killed in the first few breaks. The first one was the worst by far, 175 million people wiped out in one day, and the worst part was that many of those casualties were civilians and children killed by monsters who had managed to break through the gates. Mira and I holed up in our house with all lights off and windows curtained to draw as little attention to us as possible, we remained in the dark huddled together hearing the roars of bloodthirsty monsters and the cries of innocent civilians crying out in their final moments before being ripped apart. By the end, after all the remaining monsters had been eliminated, all that was left were; crumbled buildings, bodies of monsters and people alike strewn everywhere, and a river of blood and viscera flowing through the streets. After the horrendous wake-up call of our new reality, many things changed and we adapted as well as we could. People began to value strength over everything else, organizations and ruling bodies emerged to gather and unify us which served to stabilize society, and to ensure no tragedy occurred like that again monster shelters were built far away from the gate to house the civilians so that they could safely ride out the monster breaks. As a result of the monster breaks and some infighting, the population is down to around 650 million people worldwide as of now in 2022, with North America only having 100 million people left. Complete order was established halfway through the first year after the finalization and establishment of the Monster Summoner Association across each of the continental cities. In each continental city was a large guild-like building near the gate which served as the headquarters of the local Monster Summoner Association. The Association was ruled by a council made up of representatives from each of the continental cities, and together they worked to create rules, regulations, and establish commerce and trade between the cities. The Association mainly served to hand out jobs and bounties, while also buying monster bodies to then sell to any who had use of them, which was mainly the branch organizations of the Association loosely known as craftsmen guilds. The craftsmen''s guilds are branches of the Association and focus on money, ingredients or monster parts, and information, at the price of a small membership fee they regulate and distribute commerce and instructions/recipes to help benefit society and as a result the Association itself. The members of these craftsmen guilds can buy ingredients/parts from the guild or post ingredient/part requests for summoners at the Association to fulfill. Many people today are independent summoners who hunt and sell monster cores and bodies for a living, but there are also many who act as soldiers and enforcers for the association during the monster breaks and to keep order within the cities. Many other changes have occurred as well, but those will be mentioned in time as the major changes have already been covered. On a personal note, all minors, myself included, are required to attend summoner school while also getting an education on core subjects like basic math, reading, and science. The core subjects are similar to the classes before the new era, but with a focus on skills that will be practical for us in this new world. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. The summoner portion covers basic skills and information about monsters and summoning, the classes involve; defense lessons, monster and human anatomy, basic monster part harvesting, summon fighting strategies, and a theory class about the many things discovered or declared in these two years about the new world like monster identification, evolution, monster type counters, and developing a diverse summon team. I pay special attention to the theory class and practical lessons all in preparation for when I turn 16 and can become a summoner. Mira has been working as an alchemist alongside her teacher and has contributed quite a bit too many of his findings. She makes decent money for an apprentice alchemist and collects a portion of the tithes from the recipes she helped discover. Most of the money goes back into her research, you have to spend money to make money I guess, plus we have more than enough to live off of as long as we are relatively frugal and hopefully the situation will be even better when I come of age in a week. I want an even better life for Mira who has been both my sister and mother figure and hope to repay her by giving her the life she deserves, which she likely would have had if she didn''t have to drop out of school to take care of me as soon as she turned 18. 3 Ch. 2- Coming of Age I open my eyes slowly as I emerge from the land of sleep. it takes a while for my mind to catch up as I shake the last remaining bit of sleep out of my eyes. They quickly shoot open as I fully wake and realize what today is. Today is the start of my new life, I''ve been eagerly awaiting ever since the start of this new era. That''s right, today is the day I turn 16 and I couldn''t be more excited as my dream of becoming a summoner starts now. Thinking for a second, I realize becoming a summoner also means I have a summon and it is waiting in my storage watch. With a reaction speed that would make pesky house flies jealous, I dig into the storage space within my watch and quickly find my summon''s core. It''s nestled in with the few pairs of clothes I possess, a random half-broken pencil, half a pack of gum from a year ago, and few other pieces of junk that I should really clear out. (I don''t own much due to me and Mira being relatively poor). With a bit of thought after receiving the mental image of objects in storage, I summon the core into my hand. I take a long look at what will hopefully become the first of many companions on my journey of becoming a strong and hopefully wealthy monster summoner. The crystal fits in the palm of my hand and is a greyish green color with an engraving of a small humanoid creature with a club on one of the faces that I presume to be the front. It doesn''t look like much at first, but looks can be deceiving because when I take a closer look I recognize it to be a goblin. Humanoid monsters are coveted amongst summoners for their intelligence and transferrable combat skills, the more intelligent they are the more valuable they are. Studying the oddly colored crystal for a few seconds, I come to the realization that the greyish color of the crystal rather than the regular goblin green means that it is some sort of variant. "Hell yeah!!!" I can''t help but scream out in joy. I can''t believe my luck that I would start out with a variant humanoid summon. The chances of such a thing happening for a starting summon is about 1 in 500, with variants appearing in the wild around 1 in every 25 monsters. Variants have the potential to be strong, but as we already knew about mutations holds true that they can be as detrimental as they are helpful, so having a variant doesn''t mean instant strength. *Ughhh* (I can feel my head starting to hurt at just the thought of the droning and monotone lectures my introductory teacher at the academy would give on subjects like these). After calming down a bit I realize that I haven''t bonded yet to my soon-to-be summon. Without hesitation, I grab a penknife from my tiny wooden study desk in the far corner of my rather spartan room and prick my finger. After a moment of berating myself for mistakes being made I focus back on the bonding ritual that''s about to be occurring with the crystal in front of me. Holding my dripping finger over the core, I let a few drops of blood splatter over it before sucking on my still bleeding finger to prevent any blood from spilling on the stone floors. Blood is nearly impossible to scrub out blood from the floors, it manages to sneak into all sorts of pockets and crevices and is eye-catchingly obvious for anyone looking at the floor. Looking back at it now, I really should have done this in the bathroom, I guess I was just caught up in the excitement of getting a summon. To avoid having to deal with the hassle of hand scrubbing the floor, which would''ve put a serious damper on my day, I keep my finger in my mouth until I manage to find a tissue to staunch the bleeding with. The core greedily sucked up all of the blood that had landed on it, and when the vampiric chunk of rock had finished absorbing the blood, it began to glow slightly. That light began growing and eventually started spreading over to me, with each mote of light I could feel a mental connection establish itself between myself and the goblin core. All of a sudden I instinctively knew that the summon inside was a tier 2 iron-skinned goblin, the information rushed into my head at the same moment the bond was established. Impatient to see if my newfound knowledge was correct, I summoned out the goblin inside the core by infusing mental energy into it and tossing it on the ground just like I was taught in school and had seen many summoners do before. As the core made contact with the ground, it instantaneously morphed into a childlike monster with thick-looking greyish skin that also happened to be holding a mottled and brown wooden club. Its face was rather ugly with a large hooked nose, sharp and spaced out teeth, cauliflower-like ears, and beady black eyes reminiscent of a predator. His only clothing was a tattered burlap piece of cloth tied around its waist, which did little to hide its'' disproportionately large genitals that were very obviously male. Despite the unappealing appearance of the summon, I felt a distinct fondness for him, and any inhibitions that I may have had about him crumbled when he gave a crooked smile and quickly hurried up to me and gave my legs a deceivingly strong hug. I pat him on the head a few times consolingly as if he were a dog, and realize that he needs a name since calling him goblin just seems callous and lazy. "Hey little guy, I''m Thomas nice to meet you" He just looked up at me with an expression that indicated that he had no idea what was going on and that he was just happy to be here, I guess that''s understandable considering he is only a few seconds old as far as I now. I mean we don''t really know if our starter summons existed before they came to us or were made specifically for humanity to gain upon becoming an adult. I''m not much of a scientist so I didn''t really bother to think further on it and began to pay attention to my new little companion. Continuing to pat his head as if he was a pet to pamper I coo at him "What should your name be little guy? Hmm, maybe Herald, no definitely not, that makes him sound like he''s an accountant. I need a strong name, maybe something to do with goblins from books or movies." Thinking hard about what name would suit him, I eventually decided on the name Jareth, which was the name of a goblin king in one of my favorite movies. "I''ve decided, your new name from now on will be Jareth." I inform the newly dubbed Jareth in an attempt at an authoritative tone, which is met by ecstatic jumping and running around with him saying his own name repeatedly as if to ingrain it in his mind. It''s entirely possible, despite him having some obvious intelligence it was more on the level of a human infant than someone my age. This wasn''t meant to be derogatory, but considering he is just a few minutes old it is perfectly natural for him to be childlike, not to mention that since he was a lower-tier summon it was perfectly natural for things like intelligence to be fairly low but present. It was only the really strong or special summons that were able to talk or think for themselves rather than only taking orders or simply acting on instinct like monsters. Teaching him things like language and manners amongst other necessary things would be interesting to say the least. After a few minutes of playing with Jareth and further bonding with him, I feel the drain to my energy and decide that I should wrap it up before I run out of the strength to keep him summoned. I bring Jareth over and inform him, "It''s time to go back to the crystal Jareth, but I''ll bring you out soon and I''ll have a core ready for you to eat". He seemed disappointed but eventually came to accept my decision after the promise of food, which I managed to get him to understand through gestures. Smiling at the curious creature, I withdraw my energy from the bond and once more he is transformed back into a crystal. I can instantly feel the draw on my mental concentration and energy stop as soon as Jareth reverted into a core. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. He was instantly transported into my storage through some type of mystic mechanism that is too foreign and unfamiliar for me to even attempt to explain. It is commonly thought that this function was created by the deity that has so far saved and tested humanity, and that it was made so that no summons would get lost never to be found again, which is a depressing thing to even think about. The thought of Jareth resting in some bush in his crystal form waiting an eternity for me brings a distinct feeling of sorrow to my chest, this surprises me as it seems that I already consider the little bugger family alongside my only sister Mira. Mira would always be first in my heart, after all, I needed to be the one to protect and keep her happy, I wouldn''t let myself fail this time. Finished with my musings, I realize that I have no food to feed Jareth and so I head off to the core exchange center to purchase some cores to feed him as I had promised. Most summoners only give their summons cores when they are trying to make them evolve, but I figure it''s only fair that I feed him since I had already made him a promise. It wouldn''t hurt to pick up a few more while I''m at it so that I don''t have to constantly waste my time going and buying cores every day, hopefully, I have enough credits for them all. I don''t have all that much saved up since I only receive enough money to buy bare necessities and a little extra for some minor luxury items. I''ve always been pretty practical with my purchases and consider myself a frugal person, so I had managed to save up a decent amount over time with what I had leftover from buying necessities. It wouldn''t come remotely close to matching up with a summoner''s salary, but that wouldn''t be a problem for long hopefully. ........ Exiting Mira and I''s cramped adobe-style apartment building, I begin heading to the center of the city to buy some food. It''s a long walk to get there, and most people use summons as their transport. That is of course if they have one that can be used as such, after all, it makes much more sense that someone would have a summon like a dog or a horse to ride into town rather than something ridiculous like a spiny urchin. Unfortunately for me, I fall into the mountless category currently since Jareth is far too small to ride. He wouldn''t have made much of a mount either considering that he''s bipedal, at that point I would be traveling at the same speed and doing none of the work, that doesn''t really sit right with me. Not many other summoners seem to care too much about stuff like taking advantage of their summons like that, although I might be a bit of a hypocrite since I plan on making him fight monsters for me, which is way more unsafe and painful than acting as a ride. To house the enormous population in one large city, the only direction to build is up, and so the city is crammed with giant skyscrapers that act as large-scale apartments. The further from the center of the city the cheaper the rent is, but along with that is less space and lower class building materials. This can be seen from my adobe-style apartment, which is the most basic and cheapest apartment available, and as such is on the outermost edge of the city. After an hour of intermittent jogging and running, I finally make it to the core exchange right next to the monster gate and head inside after catching my breath from the continuous exercise. I would be a lot more winded if not for the physical conditioning everyone is put through at the academy. The core exchange is a futuristic building with all sorts of screens within the building, spaced out are counters where one can deposit cores or buy them. The only reason the tech in this building is allowed is that it was created by God himself or whoever the creator of this new era is because they likely figured it would make things far more efficient to use something that most are familiar with to process transactions. I can''t imagine the deity would find tons of paperwork amusing when they could have had it all automated for him. As a benefit, the devices would be familiar to most humans, so it would be even easier to implement in the new world. I suppose it doesn''t really matter how powerful you are, paperwork is something we all want to avoid. I line up to a kiosk and begin searching through the selection of cores. There are 5 tiers to choose from, with each tier costing more than the last. I select the tier 1 core section and find some low-class goblin cores to buy, I select 6 for purchase and then move on to the tier 2 section where I find an advanced stage normal goblin core which hopefully might help evolve Jareth. Evolution requires genes similar to the monster in order to evolve, and having a stronger core to pass on more and stronger genes is the key to quickly evolving summons. I figure going for goblins would suit my purposes just fine since they are closely related, not to mention that the cores I chose are about all I can afford right now. After selecting it, I find and purchase two other cores that I came across for bolstering some specific characteristics taken on during evolution. The cores I find are a stone crab core as well as an iron-winged hawk core, both of which are perfect for guiding Jareth''s towards a defensive type evolutionary form. I select the checkout option with my 9 cores listed, along each of their prices and the total cost all being displayed. Each tier 1 core is a credit each, the tier 2 cores are 10 credits each, and so my total ends up being 36 credits which I begrudgingly pay with my storage watch that also acts as a mobile wallet/bank. *sigh* I look at my account balance which tells me that I have 3 credits left to my name, and grumble at how quickly my life savings have diminished. I manage to cheer myself up after a little while with the thought that you have to spend money to make money, and that I would easily gain that amount back with a bit of monster hunting. Seeing that I still have to register at the Monster Summoner Association I head next door to the Association building. It is a large building made of large wood trunks stacked together like a giant Lincoln logs house. The d¨¦cor is on the fantasy side, while the receptionists and their desks look like something seen in a fortune 500 company. There are people of all types milling about, with many summoners wearing some sort of armor, while in contrast, the guild workers all wear smart looking suits to distinguish themselves as guild workers. The noise level was quite loud with everyone on the main floor speaking to attendants at the counters or with other summoners at the tables lining the back area. I approach one of the open desks and try to gain the attention of the attendant there. *Ahem* The attendant is a tall man in a business suit with a serious face and short dark hair. He asks in a coldly formal tone, "What can I help you with today?". "Well, I just became a summoner today and would like to register at the association and register my summon"(Thomas) "Ok, just fill out this form here and bring out your summon so I can register it in the system." I do as the man said and bring out Jareth and then get around to filling out the basic summoner application form. Jareth''s appearance apparently causes a minor shock to the man judging by his gasp. I look over to see him showing a look of surprise at my apparent luck by managing to get a variant monster to start out with, but quickly adopts a clearly practiced and professional poker face. I go through the form fairly fast and fill all of the pertinent parts like name, address, birthdate, relatives, along with my summon''s name and type. About two minutes later, I finish filling out the form and hand it back to the attendant whose name I now know is Max, because that''s what was written on the form I filled out. He looks it over briefly, sees everything is filled out properly and motions for me to hold out my wrist, I do as he indicates and raise my left arm that has my storage watch attached to it. He takes my arm and brings it towards a scanner and after running my watch under it, he says, "With that done, you are now a registered summoner at the association, with your registration you can now sell monster corpses here, which would be bought for a fair price." Seeing as the registering process has been completed, I ask Max, "Do you have a map of the continent, and where do you recommend summoners start hunting, they never really covered that at the academy." He brings out a simple map from underneath his desk that outlines the continents, the continental cities, and the locations of various environments, and handed it over to me. Apparently that version was complementary if someone asked for one since he didn''t charge me for it. He seemed pretty nice for someone who looked and sounded so cold and didn''t seem to be one to talk all that much. He also is kind enough to inform me, "You should go North from the monster gate, there''s a forest with lower-tier monsters there. The further you go into the forest, the stronger the monsters, so you should stay at the edge of the forest until you''re stronger." "Thanks for the help and advice Max," I tell him before I walk out of the association building and head towards the nearby monster gate next door. There is a quickly moving line full of summoners waiting to register at the entrance of the gate and get into the monster plane. I quickly move to the line and not 2 minutes later it is my turn to scan through, and just like at the guild I place my watch under the scanner and it quickly registers me and I am waved through by the guard in front of my gate. Stepping through the gate, I''m left in a grassy field with other summoners milling about in various states of dress. Some are in full plate armor of some sort, and others in a simple shirt and pair of pants with no apparent armor on them. I look around briefly to get my bearings and check the map while using my watch to find which way is North. Once I find North and match it up to the map legend to make sure I''m going to the right area, I begin to head in that direction. As I''m walking, I decide to bring Jareth out and toss his core in front of me. He emerges in a quick shift of light and gets into step with me as if understanding my intentions. With that little thing done, we continue walking and quickly enter a copse of trees which I assume to be the beginner forest. We walk around the forest looking for monsters to fight while staying to the outer edges, and eventually after about 5 minutes of walking we come across a tier 1 wolf. It has grey shaggy fur and begins to snarl at us as it senses our presence. "Go attack him Jareth, but watch out for its'' claws and teeth!" I shout like a concerned mom watching their kid go off to school, just with a bit more bloodshed *chuckle*. Jareth walks excitedly towards the wolf with his wooden club clutched in his hand, which is being waved around as if he was at a concert. The wolf charges and Jareth sets himself into a solid crouched stance with his club raised in wait for the wolf. As the wolf pounces, I inform Jareth through our bond, "Dodge the wolf first, and then follow up with an attack". He receives my message and quickly puts it into action as he moves to the left while swinging the club and bashing the wolf hard on the snout. This dazes the wolf and shakes its brain around a bit, taking advantage of the opening provided by its'' stunned state, Jareth continues to bash the immobilized wolf on the head until it dies. I am shocked at how well the fight went, and come to realize just how much of a boon it is to be able to coordinate with Jareth while he fights. I quickly store the corpse in my storage and we continue searching around for monsters to fight. By the end of the day, we managed to defeat 10 more Tier 1 monsters before running out of space in my watch to store the valuable monster corpses. As a reward for his efforts, I take out one of the tier 1 goblin cores as well as a stone crab core to help influence the growth of his evolution towards defense. Jareth managed to come out of all his battles today with only a few faint scratches on his arms and chest due to his thick defensive skin that was effective against the weak tier 1 monsters that we fought today. Before returning to the city I remember to remove the cores from each of the monsters while still preserving the corpse, just like I was taught in summoner school. While I am partially dismantling the monsters I go ahead and remove the hide from the first wolf that we killed to make a jacket out of its hide in commemoration of our first kill. I unsummon Jareth near the edge of the forest before all of my energy runs out, and begin walking towards the gate to enter the city. I immediately head towards the core exchange building next to the gate. Once I enter the building I head towards one of the empty booths closest to the door. When I am in front of the screen it comes on and informs me that to deposit cores I need to just place them on the counter. It also says that all cores will be bought at a fixed price of credits with tier 1 cores selling for a credit each, so any valuable cores should be sold elsewhere. With that in mind, I decide to deposit 10 of the 11 cores that I managed to get today as none of them were especially valuable, keeping only the wolf core as a memento of my first hunt as a summoner. As soon as I placed the cores on the counter they disappeared in a flash of light particles as if dissolving into thin air, and once all 10 cores were sold I placed my watch under the scanner which added 10 credits to my credit account on my watch. With the cores deposited I decide to head over to the Summoner Association building to exchange the corpses of the monsters. I head over to the counter that Max is working at and greet him with a drawn-out, "I''m baaack". He doesn''t really bother to respond to my words, but starts marking down the first 10 of my 11 monster corpses. Due to their relatively preserved quality, I receive 3 credits for each corpse. In addition to those, I also turn in the wolf corpse minus the hide and receive 2 credits for that one and run out of corpses to sell, all 11 have been taken care of now. With a total of 42 credits earned today, I leave the building in high spirits and head towards the commercial district to talk to a leatherworker to turn the wolf hide into a jacket for some basic defense and as a commemoration of my first-day hunting. After finding a relatively decent quality store in the middle of the district I go in and talk to the leatherworker who is manning the desk. After informing him of my request I provide the hide and pay 3 credits for a jacket to be made out of the pelt. I leave after being informed that it will be ready for pick up in 2 days. *Rumble* Hearing my stomach groan in complaint at being hungry, I decide to treat myself to a hearty meal and head towards the restaurant district nearby. I enter a small building with a sign of a roasted boar out front and decide to splurge on a 3 credit meal of roasted giant boar with a creamy mushroom soup and a glass of mead made from the honey of bee monsters. I can afford meals like this thanks to my new source of income and am once again glad that I no longer have to ration my meals just to ensure I have enough to eat for the week not to mention not being able to afford much else aside from food. With 36 credits left in my account, I decide to pay the 25 credits to expand my storage space by a cubic meter in order to store even more monster bodies and then set aside the remaining 11 credits for rent and food at least until I earn more. With my belly full and my legs tired I decide to head home to show Mira my new summon before falling asleep to recover fully from the grueling day only to hunt once again tomorrow. Finding my way back on the dark streets, I eventually make it to our apartment door and enter while calling for Mira, "Mira, are you home?". "I''m over in the living room", I hear in her soft voice, and head there after leaving my shoes at the door so I don''t track mud and dirt in. I see Mira with her long silky brown hair tied up in a lazy ponytail on our only couch watching tv after an apparently long day at work and drop down to hug her before recounting my eventful day. I catch her attention away from the tv before pulling out Jareth''s core and tossing it to the ground only for him to pop up with his club in hand but no apparent intention to use it. She looks him over before realizing that he is different from normal goblins due to his grey skin, she looks questioningly at me and I tell her about Jareth being an iron-skinned goblin variant at the behest of her curious gaze. She instantly breaks out into a smile and begins vigorously congratulating me, "I''m so glad you managed to get such a special summon starting out, now you can be a summoner like you''ve been dreaming about. Just stay safe, I don''t want you to get hurt out there, you''re much more important than some stupid credits" Jareth seems to recognize that we are talking about him since he gets a wide grin on his face and starts doing a funny little jig in front of Mira, he''s not especially good at it, but it''s certainly entertaining. After we stop laughing at Jareth, I start telling her about the rest of my day in the beginner forest and my many fights in there, all the while censoring any close calls. (What Mira doesn''t know won''t hurt her.) At the end of my story, she seems rather shocked at all of the monsters I fought and the money I got for them, but is also happy for me and congratulates me by saying as much. *Gasp* "I almost forgot it was your birthday since we got so focused on you becoming a summoner. Wait just a second I have your present in here somewhere.", she begins to frantically search through her watch before bringing out a small box with a small red ribbon wrapped around it. She quickly hands it to me and motions for me to unwrap it, needing no further prompting I tear into my gift to find a silver-colored necklace and on the chain is a pendant shaped in the outline of a snake in reference to Mira''s snake summon Lyra with my Initials TV for Thomas Vaughn on the back. 4 Ch. 3- Day 2 of Hunting I set out early in the morning to give myself plenty of time to hunt while in the forest with Jareth, it still took nearly an hour to get to the center of the city. Before I enter the gate, I go to a quick breakfast stand and purchase a 1 credit meal of sausage and eggs with a biscuit. Before I chow down I bring out Jareth to give him a goblin core for his morning meal. After finishing our respective meals we set out through the gate and into the forest and begin looking for monsters to fight. It''s funny how monsters that used to haunt my nightmares are beginning to look more and more like moving bags of money that have yet to be cashed in. The first thing we come across is a horned rabbit that Jareth quickly disposes of when it jumps to impale him on its horn, but Jareth simply moves to the side and proceeds to bash in its head with 2 hits of his club. He really seems to have a thing about crushing monsters'' heads, must be his version popping bubble wrap albeit much gorier. I guess it''s better than having him wound up and getting violent at some inopportune time, plus it''s way cheaper than therapy. We continue wandering around and after 2 hours and having slain 8 more monsters we finally decide to come to a rest. I bring out another meal I had previously purchased, this time it was a roasted meat sandwich with lettuce and tomato, but before I dig in I make sure to give Jareth his meal after working so hard. He smiles gleefully at the sight of the goblin core I hand him and quickly goes to sit next to me with his back to the tree I decided to rest against and seems to mimic my eating by nibbling at the core with his sharp teeth. I laugh at the similarities between Jareth eating and a squirrel nibbling at some acorns, and when Jareth looks questioningly at me I just wave him off figuring it''s better he doesn''t know I was comparing him to a rodent. After the break, we continue moving and head a bit deeper into the forest where tier 2 monsters will begin to appear. Not long after entering the noticeably denser forest we come across a tier 2 iron-hide boar, it had bristly gray fur covering its entire body and its'' tusks were jutting out sharply as if they were miniature scythes sprouting from its mouth. Jareth launched himself into battle without me even needing to prompt him, but due to their similar strengths, it became a battle of attrition with each monster continued circling each other looking for any opening to exploit. The boar seemed to fight by relying on its sharp tusks to eviscerate anything that it charges towards. It seems to lack intelligence as this was pretty much all it did. With impressive reflexes Jareth brings his club down from overhead in a side sweeping motion and bashes the boars'' left hind leg, breaking it. Jareth then quickly moves away from the boar''s sharp tusks which sweep towards Jareth in an attempt to gouge him while he is still within range of it in retaliation for injuring the boar quite badly. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. The boar is left exposed and immobile, and Jareth approaches the boar from the side with determined movements and fakes it out at the last second by pretending to swing towards its'' head which resulted in the boar committing to try and fend Jareth off from its front, this quickly results in the other hind leg being taken out leaving the boar effectively immobile. With half of its'' limbs not working the boar can no longer move to defend itself and Jareth quickly ends its life with a few quick bashes to the back of the boars'' neck which eventually breaks its'' spine killing it soon after. Seeing Jareth with a few deep scratches from his battle of attrition with the boar, I dress him in some bandages I had tucked away in my storage space to keep his wounds from getting any worse and feed him the core from the boar as a reward for his hard-fought battle. He seemed to not care about his wound which continued to drip blood and was instead engrossed in eating the core which he seemed to especially savor as if his personal conquest of the boar made it taste all the sweeter. I decided to end our hunt here rather than risk additional injuries to Jareth because if he goes down then I have nothing left to protect me from any monsters I might run into, not even a knife and I''m beginning to understand just how much of a mistake that is. With the corpse packed away along with the other 9 bodies after retrieving the rest of their cores, I begin to head back towards the gate to get back to civilization. I still find it strange how one step takes me into a completely different realm, going from a grassy meadow to the cobblestone streets of the North American Continental City that I now call home. The first thing I do after passing through the gate is to go submit the cores I had earned today at the core exchange, which earned me 9 credits in total since I let Jareth eat the iron-hide boar core. With that taken care of, I decide to receive the rest of my money by selling the corpses to the Summoner Association. Each of the tier 1 monsters we killed today sold for 3 credits per, and the boar corpse sold for 25 credits due to the value of its'' hide and the tusks that can be made into daggers. It would have been 28 credits but I took one of the larger tusks to bring to a weapon-smith to be made into a dagger. My total amount of money comes to 51 credits, and once again I upgrade my storage space to a total of 7 cubed meters and leaving me with 27 credits which quickly becomes 26 after purchasing myself dinner on the way back home. I walk home with a tired gait despite having cut my hunting trip short, as the constant movement in the forest and the long trek to and back from the gate have worn me down. I decided that I should bring up moving closer within the city when I make more money so that I don''t have to waste so much time walking to the center of the city, not to mention that Mira would be closer to work as well. I get to the apartment and walk up to our floor where I immediately take a shower to wash all the dirt, blood, and grime off of my body and change into a clean pair of clothes I retrieve from my storage. With the remaining time I have left today, I summon Jareth to once again take a look at his injury and see that it has healed already with barely a scar to prove that there was even damage to that area before. With Jareth healthy I plop down on the couch and have him sit beside me while we watch television in the living room, television is one of the few things still existing from the previous age as even God recognized not much good would come from humans being bored. Jareth seems to really enjoy the television, especially anything with fighting or action, it seems like he''s quite the war-monger. 5 Ch. 4- Hunting for a New Summon After the battle with the boar, I realized how bad it would have been for me if Jareth had been severely injured or killed, leaving me with no other summons or weapons to protect myself. Thinking about how I could remedy the problem facing me I eventually decided to find a second summon to add to my summoning roster, not only can I hunt more monsters with two summons, but I''ll also have backup protection in case of an emergency or if there are multiple monsters. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. In addition to adding a second summon, having something to protect myself with is also necessary on the off chance that I need to fend something off or do damage, so I''ll bring the tusk from the boar Jareth killed yesterday to a weapon-smith and get it made into a dagger for myself. I start off the day by eating a quick meal of scrambled eggs and bacon and then head out to find a weapon-smith to make me a dagger. Eventually, I find a small but nice smithy and enter the workshop to find an older man with greying hair and a bushy beard whose body is covered in muscles that I assume developed as a result of years of hard work. I greet the man and introduce myself to him, which he responds to by telling me that his name is Garth and that he owns the smithy. After the brief introduction, he asks what I came here for, to which I bring out the tusk and tell him that I''d like to commission for a dagger to be made out of the tusk. Garth takes the tusk from me and inspects it with a discerning eye and informs me that he can make a dagger from it, and since I provided the material for it he will only charge me 5 credits for the labor involved. He also tells me that he will make a sheath for the dagger since I can''t just keep it out in the open all the time. I mentally mull over the price and decide that it''s probably as fair a deal as I''ll get, and so I agree to his price and go ahead and hand him 3 credits ahead of time as an installment. Before I leave the smithy Garth tells me that the dagger will be ready tomorrow, and I can come to pick it up in the morning. Deciding that I''ve wasted enough time in the city, I head out to the gate and head towards the forest once more. Once we reach a bit deeper into the forest where Tier 2''s usually reside we come across a Shadow wolf, which is a wolf variant that is darker and larger than its'' normal wolf counterpart. As soon as I recognize the shadow wolf as a variant monster I become giddy at my luck on finding my next potential summon on the first day. Most of the time, it can take weeks or months for someone to find their ideal summon, it''s not a position to hand out lightly since there is a limit to how many summons we can have. Deciding that this wolf will work just fine as a battle/mount class monster, rounding out my current team that so far is focused on defense with a relatively strong offense based monster. Seeing that the dark wolf is hesitant to charge blindly into battle, I will Jareth to take the initiative. He slowly advances towards the wolf, all the while maintaining proper caution due to the unknown nature of the wolfs'' abilities. After closing in on the wolf, which is now about a club''s length away, Jareth assumes a low and defensive stance while tracking the wolf with his club to meet any potential attack. The wolf remains in the shade of the trees in the forest and watches the incoming goblin with weariness and the patience of a true predator. Jareth eventually loses the waiting game and closes in while swinging his club towards the side of the wolf''s head. The club hits its mark but goes straight through as if he was hitting an illusion. After Jareth makes contact with the illusion, the real wolf comes out and takes advantage of the opening and swipes at both Jareth''s side and back before darting away from the club being swung at it in retaliation. Jareth becomes much more cautious of the wolf, and after my prompting, he attempts to corral the wolf to a lit-up area. All the while ignoring the awkwardly positioned wound that luckily didn''t go too far in as a result of the goblin''s tough hide. After feinting and corralling the wolf slowly into the light, the strategy finally works. Just as the wolf realizes where it is and that it has no shadows to control, Jareth''s club comes down hard in an overhead swing towards the now powerless wolf and hits it on the neck, damaging the spine and concussing the wolf. Jareth wastes no time and hits the wolf repeatedly on the head as its'' defense is lowered due to being stunned. With no time to recover, the wolf is quickly ended with a crushed skull as a result of the powerful blows from Jareth''s club. Seeing that the battle is over I go to the wolf corpse and retrieve the core before placing it on top of the body and letting a drop of blood from my freshly pricked finger fall on the core to bond it to me. The core activates and absorbs the wolf''s corpse and changes color and has an outline of a dark wolf on the crystal. After retrieving the core and putting it in my storage to use later. I went over to Jareth to check on his condition, and to feed him a goblin core and the Tier 2 core. It was from an iron winged hawk as a reward for winning against his most difficult opponent to date. After checking to make sure that the wound was stable and already healing. I unsummon Jareth to let him rest and summon out the wolf that I had just bonded with. Looking closely at my newest summon I notice his size immediately, noting that he is about 1.5 times the size of a normal wolf. Not only that, but his fur is a deep dark that seems to blend into any shadows near it. Noticing my discerning eye, the wolf cocks his head to the side in question and my heart melts just a little at this adorable act that has no place on such a menacing-looking predator turned ally. I pet his head to assuage him which he leans into with contented looking eyes and I spend a few moments just getting used to him and petting his deceivingly soft fur. Knowing that he would be a long-time companion of mine I decided that he deserves a name and set my mind towards thinking hard about what name might suit him. Eventually, I come up with the generic but suitable name of Brutus and when I inform the newly christened wolf of his name he seems rather ecstatic at this new revelation with him pouncing on and licking me. With the recently named wolf walking beside me, we head back towards the weaker outer area of the forest to hunt for some additional monsters to sell and to test out the strength and capabilities of my new summon. Surprisingly enough, I discover as soon as we encounter a monster Brutus responds to my mental commands and we manage to sync in battle like I did with Jareth in the past. With my direction, Brutus manages to kill 6 more tier 1 monsters for a total of 14 tier 1 corpses in my storage. Deciding that I had done enough hunting for the day I bring out the bodies from my storage to remove all of the cores from the bodies before storing them all away and then head through the gate and back into civilization. Following my usual routine, I go to the core exchange center and once again place all of the cores I collected onto the counter as prompted for a total of 14 credits from cores alone. Once the cores had been sold off I head towards the Summoner Association to sell off the bodies remaining in storage. Seeing Max at one of the reception stations when I enter, I immediately head towards the familiar stern-faced clerk. Most of the bodies sell for the normal rate of 3 credits per tier 1 corpse, but the giant centipedes'' carapace is used in common armor and so sells for 5 credits and the 3 spiderlings that I killed have many organs and venom used in potions so they each sell for 6 credits each. My earnings today come out to with 90 credits and I even register my newest summon Brutus while I''m at the station. Once Max reads the form info he gains a surprised look on his face before congratulating me on managing to gain another variant summon so soon after gaining Jareth only 3 days ago. Purchasing another quick meal for a credit I decide to head back over to the core exchange now that I have an appropriate amount of funds to pick up some cores for my newest summon. I end up buying 5 common goblin cores, 8 common wolf cores, an iron-scaled newt core, and the core of a dark hound, coming to a total of 23 credits. Left with 66 credits in my account I spend another 25 credits for a storage upgrade, leaving me with 41 credits. When I get back to my apartment I see Mira once again sitting on the couch and quickly bring out Brutus to show her the new summon I obtained today. She cooed at the sight of the dark wolf which she apparently found extremely cute, and after letting her pet and harass Brutus I take pity on him by unsummoning him and relieving him from her grasp. 6 Ch. 5 New Equipment and Double Teaming At the crack of dawn, I wake up and begin doing my morning routine of eating breakfast while my summons both eat their respective cores. Instead of heading straight to the gate like I normally do, I veer on the cobbled street towards the commercial district to pick up my wolf-hide jacket and tusk dagger that I had commissioned earlier in the week. I enter the smithy soon after walking into the burgeoning district and once again see Garth behind the counter. The moment he sees me he instantly reaches under the counter and pulls out a curved ivory-colored dagger from what used to be a boars'' tusk along with the sheathe it goes in. After admiring the craftmanship for a while and testing the sharpness, I pay Garth the remaining 2 credits I owe him and secure the dagger and its'' holster to my waist before going a few shops down to the leather workers shop. I greet the worker after entering the pungent shop to which he just motions for me to follow him to the back. We enter into a larger back room with a plethora of leather in various stages of being stretched, cured, dyed, and then made into clothes. Hanging up with the rest of the finished pieces is a sleek black wolf hide jacket that the leatherworker hands to me. I put on the jacket and feel it''s cool but smooth interior coupled with the warm and soft fur coating on the outside. I give my thanks to the leatherworker before heading out the door having already paid for it when I commissioned it. After having gotten both of my previously ordered items from the respective stores, I head towards the gate giddy with anticipation at the thought of all of the monsters my summons will be able to defeat with their combined might. With those idle thoughts running through my head, I managed to entertain myself till I pass through the gate and am able to bring out both of my summons who both seem ecstatic to be out of their crystals. They seem almost as if not more so happy at seeing me, judging by the way they happily pounce on me the moment I bring them out. After giving them enough attention and head pats which Brutus seems to greatly enjoy, I indicate to them that we should head north, and I lead my party once more into the forest with the aim of making money and growing stronger. Money is my most important focus currently because there are many things that money will allow me access to or at least make things easier for Mira and I. When I eventually have enough after all of the costs deducted from summoner expenses, I''ll focus on making my summons stronger or better. Summoning seems to eat up most of my money currently, but money isn''t my priority because, with power, money can be easily gotten at any point in time. Eventually, we come to the border of the outer area of the forest where the tier 1''s reside and I adopt a serious expression on my face, any lax in concentration could result in my untimely demise to even tier 1''s if they were smart about it or just plain lucky. With the combined assault of Jareth and Brutus, we managed to tear through 12 tier 1 monsters, some of which were in groups that were taken care of almost as easily as the individual monsters, the only ones of note were 4 spiderlings that must have traveled from a nest in search of food in two separate pairs. Before we enter the territory of tier 2 monsters I decide to take a break and feed my summons a core each before bringing out my own cheap but satisfying meal of meat stew with hard bread that Mira had set out for me this morning. After resting long enough to recover some energy and finish our respective meals, we enter the tier 2 area deeper in the forest. Soon enough we come across another iron-hide boar which Jareth and Brutus quickly take care of, they manage it with no injuries as a result of their team work and having the numbers advantage. With quite a bit more space remaining in my storage and a decent amount of daylight left, we continue our trek before coming across a pair of spike tailed squirrels, each summon takes on one of the squirrels by themselves. Jareth has an easy time with his squirrel due to his reach with his club, but Brutus was at a standstill with his squirrel due to the danger presented by its tail and his lack of any ranged attacks that would let him escape said tail. He manages to trick the squirrel once with his illusion ability and takes a swipe at its face. He manages to gouge an eye before retreating. Jareth quickly beats in the skull of his squirrel around the same time that Brutus swipes his squirrel''s face, and so with his opponent already taken care of, he follows my directions and double teams the remaining squirrel that quickly falls due to being overwhelmed by two opponents while partially blinded. After inspecting my summons and seeing no serious damage to them, I decided we should have one or two more fights before turning in for the day. We walk some more, all the while remaining firmly in the tier 2 area and manage to see a screaming coyote in the distance that hasn''t yet noticed us. I have my two summons begin to sneak towards it slowly while I begin to plan an ambush for the monster. The primary reason for which is to prevent it from attacking with its sonic scream which can temporarily disable its'' victim. I begin by having Jareth sneak closer in order to throw his club at the coyote and stun it. Brutus, on the other hand, will be using his illusion to get the coyote to direct its scream away from us, to which Brutus will then rush in and rip out the throat of the coyote with its teeth. Jareth eventually gets into range of the coyote while still remaining hidden due to the dense trees obstructing its'' view along with being downwind of the monster. He waits for the coyote to get into his line of sight and clear of any trees, and when it eventually does, he throws the club as hard as he can in the general area of its head. Either due to skill or luck, the club manages to stun the coyote with a head blow, with the heavy end of the solid wooden club. While the coyote is stunned and planning on retaliating with its sonic attack, Brutus comes in with his illusion emerging from the shadow of a tree in front of the monster and as the coyote prepares to attack the illusion. Brutus rushes in and manages to catch the coyote unaware of its'' impending doom until it feels the clamping of jaws on its'' vulnerable yet muscle-clad throat. With a jerk of Brutus'' head, the monsters'' throat is ripped out and it quickly dies without even having had a chance to retaliate. With the success of this latest hunt, I feel even more confident of our strength and capabilities, and after a small break, we continue along and finally end hunting for the day with a Drill rabbit that quickly dies in a direct confrontation between the two summons. Once more, I begin the laborious task of removing the cores from all of the bodies, and after that is finally taken care of, we head back to the city and only once are we intercepted by a monster. It was a normal wolf that had likely been tracking the scent of blood clinging to us for some time, I let Brutus take care of it and even fed him the core for dinner. To make things fair, I ended up giving Jareth the iron-hide boar core from the boar that they had previously killed today as a reward for his hard work and to hopefully speed up his evolution. Once their meal was finished and we made it out of the forest, I reluctantly unsummon them and pass through the gate. I sold the remaining cores that we had earned that day to the core exchange and managed to earn myself 32 credits. After that, I went to the Summoner association to sell the bodies in my storage, with 8 normal tier 1 monsters selling each for 3 credits, the 4 spiderlings selling for 6 credits. The iron-hide boar selling for 28 credits since all parts remained intact, the screaming coyote selling for only 12 credits since the only remaining valuable part is the hide since the throat was destroyed. The drill rabbit selling for 16 credits, the two spike tailed squirrels selling for 18 each due to their hide being used in armor, and lastly the intact wolf selling for 6 credits. Making for an additional earning of 178 credits today, which is quite an impressive haul considering I''m still fairly new to summoning. I decided to treat myself to a nice dinner and started to head towards a nice restaurant and ended up eating a pricey 3 credit meal that left my total credit amount at 211 credits. While enjoying my meal of rabbit stew and thorny deer steak, I begin to ponder how I should spend my credits. Eventually, I decide to upgrade my storage 4 times, which leaves me with 111 credits after spending 100 credits on the four upgrades. Heading home after my dinner, I quickly take care of rent for the month which is 25 credits by sending the funds to Mira, further draining my money and leaving 86 credits. I sigh in exasperation that despite all of the money I''ve made, it always seems to disappear right after it goes into my account. 7 Ch. 6- Shopping and Colosseum After my long day yesterday, I decided to sleep in a bit and recover from the exhaustion that had been piling up after a few days of continuous work and exercise. Waking up later in the day, I shower and feed my summons a core each. Jareth seems to have taken to copying me and what I do, and so he nibbles at his core as if it was a sandwich. Brutus, on the other hand, gobbles his down as soon as I hand it to him. I have to be careful when handing it to him, as I''ve had a few close calls with him nearly chomping off my hand out of eagerness for his meal. I seem to be unique in the summoning profession as many summoners have taken to treating their summons as tools or weapons to slay monsters rather than companions to be treated equally. One of these oddities of mine is that I seem to have picked up the habit of feeding my summons with every meal that I have and usually have them eat alongside me, especially while out hunting where they can be out freely. Perhaps this regular feeding has helped contribute to their rapid growth, because in the few short days that I''ve had them they''ve not only gotten stronger and more capable, but they''ve grown noticeably larger as well. I''ve just kept up this trend as a habit and it seems to have a great effect on their growth, which would have remained stagnated for a while had I followed the traditionally accepted method of feeding the summon a bunch of cores at once in hopes of prompting an evolution. This method was finicky at best and had about a 50% chance of actually working, it also seemed to slightly injure the summons as a result of spontaneous growth all at once and as a result, it could only be done again after a long period of time had passed and the summon had recovered. I hurriedly eat a single credit breakfast and then head to the market to look around for some equipment or consumables that may be useful while hunting. There is an informal market that was set up near the center of the city during the beginning of the New Era and it has continued to exist since then, the only rules of the market are no fighting and whoever gets there first has the rights to set up shop for that day. As a result, the market begins early in the morning and is when most of the goods are sold, by the time I got there most of the inventory had been sold and the only things remaining were things of lesser value. After looking through the stalls selling various wares I manage to find some common wolf and goblin cores and buy 4 of each. In addition, I purchase an illusion crow core to strengthen Brutus'' illusion shadow clone ability for 6 credits, and for Jareth the core of a shield bear for 7 credits. Spending a total of 21 credits at the core market, I was left with 66 credits in my account. It was well made and functional, but clearly used which I didn''t mind much as long as it provided protection. The pants themselves were nothing special, they had bristly grey fur on the outside and the inside of the pants was a soft brown leather that had obviously been treated well for it to feel so comfortable. After my wild spending spree and putting on the pants I had just bought in their changing room in the back of the store, I head to a restaurant for lunch and pay 2 credits for a large sandwich full of meat and vegetables along with a tall glass of ale. I tore through the sandwich and filled my empty and complaining stomach which was protesting more than usual as a result of all the walking I did that morning. I quickly finish off the ale by taking large gulps of it in between bites to wash down the dry but flavorful bread. As I eat I decide that since I have paid off our rent for the month this early on and have the means to make plenty more money, I can go to the colosseum to bet on some of the summoners fighting each other. I haven''t ever been because I never had the money to, but now that I can make plenty of money just by going out for a day and killing a few monsters I don''t have that problem anymore. Having made my mind up on what to do today, I walk towards the giant stone colosseum and get in line at the front entrance. I take a few moments to admire the giant oval-shaped building made completely from granite with almost no breaks in between the stones to the point it looks as if it was carved from one colossal stone. I suppose it makes sense that it looks so perfect considering the deity who created it also built the entire city and had the power to combine the seven original continents into one giant continent. I pay the entrance fee of 2 credits by sliding my watch under a scanner near the entrance and enter the imposing building that just seemed to scream strength and violence. After adjusting to the light inside the building I take a look at the lineup of fighters posted on the wall, it shows the known information on the competitors and their summons, which I suppose is to draw more interest and help the spectators make informed bets off of the little bits of information provided. After judging which summoner has an advantage over their opponent I select 2 summoners to bet on out of the 10 matches going on today. One of the summoners named Damon was a newcomer to the arena, but he seemed to have a strong variant summon that he was using in his fights, it was a Plague Harpy that was able to spread sickness and poison its prey with its sharp poisoned talons. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. Although he lacked experience, he hadn''t lost the two previous matches he fought and has a type advantage over his opponent who had a common imp as a summon. Betting credits on him would earn me triple the amount I bet due to the summoners'' inexperience in the Colosseum battles and his opponent''s relatively strong consecutive winning record. It would come down to whether the imp could manage to capture and mangle the harpy with its'' sharp claws or if the harpy could poison the imp and keep its distance while the poison worked through the imp. With its'' aerial advantage, the harpy was more likely to win as it could escape the imp at any time while the imp had no ranged ability and would have to get the harpy while it was attacking. After my analysis of the likely battle strategy, I decided to place a bet of 10 credits on Damon and his plague harpy. The other summoner was heavily favored to win as he was a veteran competitor with a high tier centaur as his summon, and as such, I would only earn 1.5 times the credits I would bet on that match. It was almost a guaranteed win, and so the winnings would be much smaller than on the other fights. I decided to put another 10 credits on this fight to earn some easy pocket money and pad my pockets just a little more, only if everything went right through, sometimes upsets happen and the underdog could win if they were an unknown competitor or were hiding their strength. Having resolved who I was going to bet on, I head over to the plain-looking betting booth and made my bets with one of the tellers working the booth. I scanned my watch under the reader to put my money down and received my betting receipts in return. After taking the paper receipts and stuffing them in my storage so that I wouldn''t accidentally lose them, I went over to the stadium seating and chose an empty seat up close to get a good view of the matches. After the first two matches, the favored summoner to win that I bet on was up. Due to the similar strength of the summons, but the type advantage of the favored summoner, he quickly won his match. The summoner had a tier 3 fire spirit and faced off against an unfortunate dryad that was easily suppressed by the fire being spewed at the dryad. The dryad did its'' best to avoid the fire and even summoned roots and vines to ward off the flames for a short time, but it was inevitable that the dryad would be burned to ash, it was simply a matter of time till it happened. By the time the fire reached the dryad and was almost engulfed in flames the opposing summoner wisely forfeited in order to prevent his dryad from being killed, the moment he spoke the flames halted and the dryad was left unharmed aside from a few minor burns. I was excited at the prospect of gaining even more money from my bets and eagerly awaited the summoner match with Damon and his plague harpy. After 4 more matches, the battle I had been waiting for finally came. On the right side was Damon and His plague harpy which was currently on the ground next to him so it could conserve energy, and on the left was his opponent with their common imp. The imp seemed hyped up in anticipation of the coming battle and was jumping up and down to burn off some excess energy. The imp was the size of a child with bright red skin and fingers that acted as sharp knives that seemed like they could cut through just about everything. When the match began, the imp rushed the harpy which had started on the ground and hadn''t yet taken to the air. The harpy seemed to be preparing to take to the air with its'' mottled brown and puke green feathers on display due to its'' wings being splayed out in preparation for pushing off into the air. As the imp closed in the harpy had oddly enough yet to take to the air where it could avoid the imp. When it got into range it lunged towards the humanoid bird with its claws in front of it in preparation for tearing into the summon. At the last moment the harpy finally moved managed to not only successfully dodge the incoming attack, but it managed to scratch a deep wound into the right shoulder of the imp as it took to the air. The wound was quite deep and seemed to be progressing quickly towards infection as dark black and green vein patterns began to show up near the shoulder wound, it was so deep that even the shoulder bone could be seen within the large gash. The battle ended shortly after that ass the harpy simply remained in the air and allowed the imp to be further weakened from its plague wound that continued to spread. When the wound had reached the point of encapsulating the entire right arm in lines of infection that seemed to completely cover the limb, the harpy finally swooped down to take out its'' weakened prey and unsurprisingly succeeded in its'' attempt to take out the imp. Unlike the previous match I had bet on where the summoner forfeited to avoid having his dryad die, this summoner allowed the battle to continue despite the unfortunate position the imp was in. He seemed to be holding on to the hope that the imp would manage to get lucky and trap the harpy when it comes down from above to attack, unfortunately, no such thing happened as the imp''s reflexes were hampered from the infection flowing through its'' body. The harpy, in a brutal display of dominance first clawed out the imp''s eyes, and then as the monster flailed about in blind panic the harpy swooped down once more to pick up the imp by its forearms. The flying summon took to the air with its'' prey in its arms unable to fight back and when it had reached a great height dropped the imp. Gravity quickly took hold and the monster splattered into a great pile with blood and viscera going everywhere which transformed into a dim crystal that went back into the callous summoners'' storage. Damon was declared the winner and after a short celebration yell along with his harpy summon he left the arena so that the next match could occur. In total, the match only lasted about 3 minutes, but it felt much longer with as enthralling as the match was to watch. With both of the matches that I had bet on winning I go to turn in my tickets to the betting booth, and receive 15 credits from the first match and 30 credits for Damon''s match. The gross earnings ended up being 25 credits and left me with a total of 71 credits. Feeling satisfied with my earnings at the Colosseum I decide to head back to the market for some additional supplies for when I go hunting in the monster plane for extended periods of time. This of course only occurring when my storage space gets large enough to hold enough corpses that would warrant an extended trip. I manage to make it to a rustic looking adventuring supplies store to purchase some hunting and camping necessities. I prowl through the store looking for anything that might be of use to me and eventually settle on a few items that I think might be of use. I pick out a cast iron pan for cooking which will allow me to preserve my credits while in the wild by eating meat that I obtain from my kills, it cost a measly 2 credits so I immediately snatch it up. Then I pick out an insulated sleeping bag with a detachable liner for warmer climates for 2 credits. I toss in a lighter and some waterproof matches for 1 credit, as well as a set of skinning/bone cutting tools made out of a tier two monsters bones for 6 credits. A large canteen and a set of metal utensils and a plate that was hiding under a tarp in the corner are immediately snatched up for 1 credit, otherwise, I would have to eat all of my meals with my hands or on a stick. I smell them before I see the large batch of Monster repellant scent sacks that are selling for 3 credits and add them as they are a necessity for being safe while sleeping. As I near the counter I see a set of Emergency light sticks made from the compounds found in giant lightning bugs for 2 credits and decide to get them as well, I mean I''ve already spent this much and they may be useful in the future. Having Finished my spending spree, I''m left with 54 credits and decide to call it a day before I end up spending anymore. When I get back to the apartment I don''t see or hear Mira and assume she is either sleeping already or still at work, but I decide the latter option is much more likely. 8 Ch. 7- Grinding and Goblin Evolution Following my usual routine, I wake up and eat a breakfast meal of pancakes and sausage while also having my summons eat their usual core meals alongside me. In addition to their standard meal, I threw in an extra augmenting core for each of them in preparation for their upcoming evolutions. There''s a shield bear core for Jareth and an illusion crow core for Brutus, hopefully, these cores would strengthen their evolutionary direction and improve their traits when they evolve. I''ve noticed as of late that Jareth seems to be reaching the limit of strength that he can have in his current form and has stopped growing altogether. With that hardy breakfast out of the way, I head towards the gate with a full belly and plenty of energy to start out the busy day I have planned. I''m in my hunting clothes with the new dagger I had made on my hip and all of my new emergency supplies in storage ready to take out as needed. After summoning Brutus and Jareth in preparation for our hunting, we head out into the dense evergreen forest determined to kill as many monsters as possible to raise money for better equipment and more cores, as well as to jumpstart Jareth''s evolution. Jareth looked different from what he originally looked like when I first got him only a few days ago. No longer was he a short and lanky little grey child-like goblin, instead he was taller with more muscle and had an even darker metallic looking skin closer to black than the original grey. Before we begin hunting I told each summon what their role today would be in order to work more smoothly together. Jareth was to be the one fighting and Brutus would act as support and pick off any additional mobs that might show up. I had Brutus taking a backseat in these fights in order to jumpstart Jareth''s evolution through stimulating battles with minimal support. My hope was that these conditions against difficult monsters would drive him to the edge and push through the evolutionary wall to start off what would hopefully be an evolution that would grant him far greater abilities than he currently possessed. I could already see the credits we would be raking in with the stronger monsters we would be able to fight after Jareth''s evolution. They quickly tore through the outer forest full of tier 1''s, they hardly put up any resistance at this point. The weak monsters would be wiped out after a single swing of a club or bite from the jagged maws of Brutus. By the time we reached the edge of the tier two middle area of the forest, they had killed 14 tier 1''s by not avoiding any potential battles, despite not really slowing down and stopping to fight the monsters. Brutus took on one and allowed Jareth to fight off the other two, by sacrificing his body, Jareth was able to deal a crushing blow to one and then took on and killed the other shortly after. Thankfully due to the centipedes'' low tier and limited capabilities, as well as Jareth''s tough hide, there were only a few shallow cuts on his left arm. After taking a short break for lunch and feeding my summons another goblin and wolf core respectively, we finally entered the tier 2 area of the forest with plenty of time left for additional hunting. The first monsters we encountered were a pair of cement frogs when we had neared a small pond. They managed to avoid the sticky projectiles shot out by the frogs and ended them quickly when they got within range. Luckily their speed was greater than the cement balls shot out from the frog''s mouths, I saw what happened to anything hit by them and it''s safe to say nothing would be moving anytime soon when hit. The balls themselves were fairly small but exploded in a wave of a quick-drying cement-like substance that completely covered anything remotely near it. Continuing our crusade in the increasingly dense forest of giant green trees, our party was surprise attacked by a spade beaked sparrow. It had targeted Jareth after recognizing who seemed to pose the most danger, it dove down from it''s heightened position while aiming its sharp beak towards Jareth''s neck seemingly to cut him down in one swoop. Unfortunately for the sparrow, the surprise attack only managed to create a medium-sized cut on the thick-skinned goblin''s shoulder. The next time the bird monster came around, Jareth was ready and smacked it down with extreme prejudice, killing it instantly with a great swing to it''s reinforced head that snapped its'' neck rather than crushing the skull, likely due to the mutation of its'' beak and head into essentially a moving arrow. Since Jareth had yet to evolve despite the battles he had faced so far, I gave him a hobgoblin core in hopes that this would push the matured goblin over the edge. After resting and assimilating the tier 2 core, Jareth was ready for a fight and felt that the next monster he fought would allow him to evolve, which he conveyed more through the bond than through any actions on his part, although he did seem to have an unusual bounce in his step likely in anticipation of the fight to come. Luckily for Jareth, the next monster we came across after having rested enough for the wound on his shoulder to heal, was a steel-shelled turtle which had outstanding defensive capabilities but little offense whatsoever and relied on predators not being able to break its'' shell and eventually giving up. Jareth was up to the challenge presented by the overgrown turtle with its'' cauldron-like shell and quickly began to slam his club onto the shell while avoiding the head that would shoot out from the front and snap at anything that came close enough to it. Jareth realized the futility of hitting the shell with his club and instead baited the turtle after a little prompting from me. The turtle eventually fell for the trap and when Jareth got close enough and acted like he was about to slam at the shell with his club again, the turtle shot out its head to snap at Jareth with it sharp and powerful jaws. As soon as Jareth saw something begin to shoot out from the shell he redirected his swing to intercept the head of the troublesome turtle and managed to get lucky and directly hit the turtles'' head smashing its skull in. Jareth let out a yell of victory and feeling that he was close to evolving cut out and ate the core from the turtle after receiving my permission to do so. He seemed to feel that the core was vital to him advancing, so I saw no reason to deny his request. Not 5 minutes later after the steel shelled turtle core had been assimilated, Jareth began to glow with a strong light and the physical changes to the summon could briefly be seen as it got larger and its limbs extended and bulked up making the former goblin look even ganglier. The changes eventually came to an end and what remained was a Steel Hobgoblin with an iron mace in its hand rather than the wooden club it had possessed earlier. One of the most noticeable changes aside from the sudden growth was the color and pattern of Jareth''s skin, his skin now resembled wrought iron and had overlapping scale patterns on his skin as a result of feeding him cores from multiple metal reptiles. Another change was the bone like armor covering Jareth''s shoulders, elbows, and knees, very likely due to the influence of the iron shelled turtle core that he ate right before he evolved. As Jareth was changing, I noticed small motes of light drift off from him and flow towards me and oddly enough disappeared into my chest. With each mote, I felt small changes in my body and realized that this was the feedback enhancement from having a summon evolve after having bonded with them. By the end I felt boundless strength in my body, I surmised it was close to the strength of a tier 1 monster. My skin also changed slightly, with it becoming tougher and darker as the evolution process continued, I supposed Jareth''s notable trait of a tough defense had passed on to me a bit and would be a great tool for survival in the coming monster break. The last thing I noticed was a feeling of boundless energy infusing into me, and guessed that greater stamina had been transferred over to me as well, with all of the lethargy leaving my sore muscles after traveling through the woods all day. These feelings became understated after the process ended, but I could still feel the noticeable effects within my body, which I surmised to be permanent. To say that I was ecstatic would be an understatement, and I wanted to immediately test out how strong Jareth was now. Figuring it wasn''t necessary for Brutus to remain for the coming test, I unsummoned him and allowed him to rest after working so hard today, I would need him fresh and ready to fight should anything dangerous occur. Jareth and I then went off further into the tier 2 forest looking for enemies to test out the power of Jareth as he was now. First, we stumbled upon a large and grizzled looking Shield bear and figuring that it would be the perfect enemy to pit himself against, Jareth went off to face the bear. It soon became apparent that although the bear was strong and had a powerful defense, it was no match for Jareth who quickly dominated the bear with crushing blows from his iron mace and receiving only a few shallow scratches in return due to Jareth''s newly upgraded defensive hide. With a blow to the skull after having both shoulders of the bear fractured, it quickly died with almost nothing to show for its'' struggle. Figuring we still hadn''t reached the limit of Jareth''s abilities, we continued our happy little carnage spree and quickly killed 4 more tier two monsters before deciding to call it a day as daylight we beginning to wane. We went through the outer edge of the forest, escaping into the relative safety of the open plains and settled down to retrieve all of the cores remaining in the bodies of the dead monsters we had killed. After finishing the messy dismantling, we headed towards the gate to make it back to civilization. After making it back to the city, I went to the core exchange and turned in all of the remaining cores we had harvested today, except for the bear''s core which I would feed to Jareth in the future. I received a total of 84 credits due to hunting many more tier 2 monsters than usual. After that, I went towards the Summoner Association, as usual, to sell off the bodies in my storage. After getting in line for the familiar association attendant Max, when it finally became my turn, I sold off the 3 centipedes for 5 credits each, the rest of the tier 1 bodies for 33 credits in total. I also sold all of the shield bear''s body except for the hide and claws, which sold for 20 credits, but would have been 50 credits if I had sold it in its'' entirety. The 4 tier 2 corpses were sold for 25 credits each, and the steel shell turtle was sold minus the shell for a total of 20 credits, I planned for the shell to be commissioned into a shield and would have been 55 credits had I sold the shell as well. This made a total profit today of 272 credits, and my total amount of credits became 320 credits after a 4 credit dinner at a nice restaurant which I treated myself to after the success of evolving Jareth into a variant hobgoblin. Once my dinner was finished, I went to find the same leather-smith who had made my wolf hide jacket which I wore currently, and commissioned him to make another jacket with a hood this time out of the bear hide, along with a pair of boots and knuckle gloves. Any extra hide after the clothing was made, the leather-smith would be able to keep and as such he only charged 25 credits for the 3 articles of clothing. He told me that the order would be available in 3 days'' time as it was a large order. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. With that out of the way, I then went to the weapon-smith who had made the dagger and commissioned him to make a shield out of the steel turtles'' shell. I requested for the handle to be made out of a shield bear claw, with the remaining 19 claws to be turned into throwing knives. I also commissioned for a bandolier to be made to house them so that I could easily access them while fighting. The shield would be 30 credits due to providing the material for it, and the throwing knives would cost 20 credits due to the amount of throwing knives being made and having to use his own leather to craft the bandolier. 9 Ch. 8- Earth Slime Capturing 3 days later, the time finally comes for me to go and retrieve all of the equipment I had commissioned in preparation for me hunting stronger monsters as well as actually fighting myself rather than just my summons. I decided that with the upgrade in strength from Jareth''s evolution that changed my body I would learn to fight off monsters enough to at least protect myself in dangerous situations which will inevitably occur at some point in my summoning career. The first thing that I do today is go and restock my core food supply at the core exchange as well as pick up my commissions in the trade district near the gate. I enter the large futuristic building and buy 10 tier 1 goblin cores for 10 credits as well as 8 tier 1 wolf cores for 8 credits. I also managed to find and buy 2 tier 2 shield bear cores for 20 credits, and a tier 2 steel shell turtle core like the one that caused Jareth to evolve. For Brutus, I got him a tier 2 shadow panther core for 10 credits to augment his shadow abilities, hopefully, it will increase his control of shadows and develop into a new skill. In total, I managed to spend 68 credits on my summons food, which left me with 332 credits that I decided to save up for the coming auction so I can buy something worthwhile. After the core exchange, I go to visit the leather-smith for my tier 2 shield bear hide jacket, boots, and gloves. In preparation for my new equipment, I place my commemorative wolf hide jacket in storage as a memento of my first monster kill and leave it there should I ever need it. After receiving my sleek new leather clothes, I put on the new clothes that now completely cover me in tier 2 hide except for my head. I decided to not get a helmet of some sort made as they are heavy and restrict my vision which is more necessary for fighting than a bit of extra protection. I then move on to the weapon-smith and store the steel shell turtle shield into my storage for when I''ll actually need it. The shield is too heavy to carry around constantly, especially when moving constantly through rugged forest terrain where it could potentially get stuck on vines or between trees. After securing the shield, I equip the leather bandolier containing 10 out of the 19 bear claw throwing knives I had made, I place the remaining 9 in storage for whenever I need to replace the knives already within the bandolier. With all of this taken care of my team and I head over to the forest and plan on going even further into the forest towards the inner area of it, where tier 3 monsters live. Eventually, we get to the forest edge and I feed each of my summons a core for breakfast in preparation for the long day. They quickly mow through the monsters within the outer forest, killing 15 tier 1 monsters with 6 of those being spiderlings that lived in a large nest together at the top of one of the trees we happened to walk by. Luckily, Brutus'' sense of smell alerted us to them before they could drop on top of us unaware. When we get to the tier 2 area, I decide that it''s time to warm up and practice assisting my summons in battle with my new throwing knives. I learned how to throw knives back in summoning school, I did not have an easy time of it at first, but they''ve grown on me since. (Flashback to Summoning School) *Thunk*, I hear the solid sound of a knife finally sliding in and sticking to a wooden target. I cheer for a second before coming back to reality at the sight of all of the knives laying on the dirt in front of the target. I sigh and go to pick them up so that I can practice with them once more. Luckily for me they are all in front of the target so they are picked up quickly, I don''t move too fast as I don''t want to accidentally cut myself and add onto my embarrassment. My problem is that I don''t know how to put the proper spin on the knives, and while they hit the target every time, they never manage to sink into it. Setting Up once more at around 20 yards from the large wooden target, I attempt to remember the feeling of the last knife that I threw. Rearing back, I launch my arm forward and snap my hand, this sends the knife spinning furiously, only for it to land with the butt of the knife hitting the target and once more bouncing off. "You have to relax your hand and let the knife slide out of it rather than flicking it and making it spin as much as possible." Hearing this, I turn around to see one of the instructors at the academy, he is a rather tall and compactly muscled man with short dark hair. If I recall correctly, he teaches advanced weapons to the seniors in the academy, and he looks the part too with him exuding a deadly strength despite not being overburdened with muscles. Realizing that he was the one offering advice, I nod my head in acknowledgment and go to try and throw another knife, this time doing as he suggested. I line up the target and loosely grip the knife, and as I go to throw it, I allow the knife to flow out of my hand as if I had dropped it with forward momentum. Expecting to hear the tinny sound of a metal knife reverberating after being deflected by the target, I am instead surprised when I hear a thunk and see that it not only sunk into the target but was nearly dead center in it as well. I turn around to give my thanks to the instructor for the advice, only to find no one there. He must have snuck away as soon as I turned my back. Vowing in my head to repay him or thank the instructor when I see him next, I go back to my practice and continue to sink the knives into the target, with each throw getting successively closer to the bullseye. (End of Flashback) We first run into a group of 3 plague rats, Jareth takes 2 on and Brutus gets the straggler of the group. I inform them to remain wary of the rats'' teeth as they carry infection over to anyone they bite but are relatively harmless otherwise. While Jareth catches the attention of the two rats I decide to help even out the odds and throw one of the knives in my hand. The first throwing knife lands on the hind leg of one rat, to which Jareth quickly capitalizes on the provided opening and smashes its head in. I follow up the first knife with two more shortly after, both of which hit center mass and stall the two remaining rats long enough for my summons to finish off easily. We continued to do this and killed 10 more monsters in short order due to them being grouped up at least in pairs. After the 13th kill of the day, I decided that I had a good enough grasp of how effective the knives were and that I could confidently use them to fight or at least assist from a distance in the case of multiple monsters. After that, we moved on to the inner forest with tier 3 monsters inside. We got unlucky and were beset upon soon after by a hobgoblin that was luckily alone, and only after coordinating together were my two summons able to put it down without any major damage. They took it down together thanks to the opening that I gave them with one of my throwing knives going into one of its'' eyes. After killing 4 more lone monsters, we came across an interesting sight. We spotted a moving boulder that upon closer inspection turned out to be an earth slime variant that had the appearance and toughness of rock. I took the time to study and observe the slime for a while before deciding to bond with the monster due to its unique variant that seemed to have a lot of potential as far as evolutional choices were concerned. While it may not be powerful or dangerous now, that doesn''t mean that it couldn''t be in the future. I send Jareth to quickly kill off the unique monster by using his large iron mace to bash in the slime until it died after having its'' core struck. This took longer than expected due to its hard outer shell of rock, despite it being classified as a slime, it was more like a moving tank of rock. Extracting the core from the slime and placing it on the body, I prick my index finger with one of my unused throwing knives and drop blood on top of the core to bond with the slime. After bonding with the earth slime and storing its'' core in my storage, I decided to call it a day and head back towards the city, despite my increased stamina and strength, I was still tired after having walked and fought since the morning. I return to the core exchange and sell the 15 tier 1 cores, 13 tier 2, and 5 tier 3 cores, earning me a grand total of 270 credits from cores alone. Then I go next door to sell the monster bodies at the summoner association, of course, I go to max to cash in on my stored trove of valuable corpses. I start with the 9 regular tier 1''s for 27 credits, then the 6 spiderlings for 6 credits each, the 3 plague rats for 17 credits each, hobgoblin body for 85 credits, and the other 4 corpses for 70 each, adding up to a grand total of 749 credits made in one day. I also go ahead and register my new slime summon Emett at the desk after all of the bodies have been taken care of. Max once again stares at me with an incredulous look on his face at me once again bonding with another unique summon. I just awkwardly chuckle and say that I got lucky while hunting, likely because I push so far and hard into the forest to make as much money as possible. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. I kept the hobgoblin core to feed Jareth later for his dinner, and also decrease my funds further by increasing my storage by 5 cubic meters for 125 credits, totaling up to 32 now, it''s probably large enough that I don''t need to upgrade it for some time and so I can just save up money for stronger equipment and summon food. After seeing how many credits I''ve managed to earn in one day I decide that sometime soon I should talk to Mira about moving closer to the center of the city since I can now afford to pay rent in that area and it will be much nicer and closer to both of our work. The amount of credits I''m earning currently is far outside the norm for what a beginner summoner makes, usually, they are cautious about fighting any monsters and stick to the outer edges of the forest where the weakest monsters reside. They also usually hunt in groups, and as a result, the price of any monsters they hunt must be split equally among them. 10 Ch. 9- Weekly Continental Auction My plan for the day, having already woken up early today despite all of the events that occurred yesterday is to go out to the core exchange to get some cores for my new earth slime named Emett. When I get to one of the empty terminals near the entrance I go ahead and buy a stockpile of 10 slime cores, a tier 2 boulder ant core, and a tier 2 goblin miner core (rare but not valuable due to the weakness of the variant of a normally tier 3 monster). I bought all of these for Emet to guide its'' evolution towards a humanoid and defensive earth-based summon. My hope for him was to evolve him into a golem or golem type monster considering the similarity in their constitution. If he had a more humanoid shape, he would be much more versatile in combat compared to his current lumpy and amorphous form. I don''t know yet what abilities he has, but I''m hoping it''s something more than just slinking around looking like a rock. If that was the case, then I''m afraid his only use would be as a decoration in a garden or as an oversized paperweight. I''m taking a big risk bonding to a slime which is typically regarded as a low-class monster, but I have hope that his rare variation will give him an advantage compared to what slimes usually end up as, which is often just a bigger slime. The total came to 30 credits after not finding anything else worth buying, which I was happy to pay after spending nearly thrice that for my other two summons. I then went on to have brunch after feeding each of my summons a basic core to tide them over. As usual, Jareth nibbled on his core as if to savor it, he even wiped his mouth with a handkerchief that he seemed to have pulled out of nowhere, he was becoming quite the gentleman despite his savage appearance. Brutus wolfed his down, (forgive the wolf pun), while Emett seemed to assimilate with his core as slimes typically do. A section of his rock carapace moved as if he was revealing his mouth, he then just sat on the core and dissolved it within his body. Despite his lack of human characteristics and higher brain function, the jiggle in his movements seemed to convey contentment or happiness at having been fed. While paying for my lunch, I checked my credit total and found that I still have 1,051 credits remaining in my account. Never did I imagine in my wildest dreams that within the first two weeks as a summoner I would earn more money than I had received through my two years as a minor getting pension from the diety that threw us into this mess of a world. Seeing the number of credits in my account reminds me of the weekly auction going on at noon at the auction house on Saturdays. I never even thought of it till now, because I never had the money to even consider going to it. But now that I do, and seeing as I don''t really need to go out hunting today, I decided to go and see if I can find anything worthwhile to buy. Entry into the auction house requires a down-payment of 100 credits as collateral for buying goods and serves to limit entrance to those with money. This policy is meant to keep civilians who want to enter out of curiosity and have no intention of buying from taking up space within the auction house. The credits will be returned at the end of the auction automatically if not spent, so auction goers have no worries about having their money stolen. After paying the steep entrance fee, I enter the ostentatious looking building with its marble walls and columns and red velvet carpets and find a seat near the back with no other people around me. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. I''m not much for people in general, but I especially don''t care for strangers as I have no idea what their intentions are. Living as an orphan has disillusioned me to the world, I''ve seen the best and worst of people, and at least in the old world people were more often ill-intentioned. Now I avoid all of that conflict and avoid others, for the most part, the only person I really have any meaningful contact with regularly is my big sister Mira. I love her to death as she is the only family I have left, I also recognize all of the sacrifices she has made for me, which is why I''m working so hard to make money now. My current goal is to give Mira the life she deserves and keep her safe, and the only way to do either of those things for a regular person like me is to get stronger. After getting settled in and more people sitting down as noon approaches, the auction finally begins. As the bell toll for noontime, the white and gold curtains part to reveal a short plump man with an odd haircut almost a mix between a mullet and a pompadour. He smiles a wide smile bright enough for me to see even from where I am at the back. He begins to introduce the start of the auction with, "Welcome ladies, gentlemen, and summons, today is as you know the day of the weekly continental auction. We have all sorts of rare goods, materials, and cores gathered within the North American Continental city and today we will be giving you the opportunity to be the new owner of one of these treasures." With that introduction, he gestures to the side and in comes a pretty woman in a sheer black dress with a cart full of cores of all colors and sizes, each has its own socket on the cart and by each is a small placard for the auctioneer to read off of. "We will be beginning the auction off with some of the lower-tier cores, but don''t be turned away by word low-tier, these cores are all from valuable variants or rare monsters that may be exactly what you need to raise or strengthen your summon to their next evolution." He began selling off each core, with most being tier 2 and going for around 50 credits, that''s 5 times the normal price of a core. I tuned most of this out until I heard something that immediately caught my attention and seemed to be almost too perfect for me, "Next up is a rare core from a rather strong tier 3 rock golem, the starting price is 50 credits..." I knew I needed this core despite its'' steep price, and without any hesitation raised my betting number for the initial price. A few others tossed in their bid, each going up by 5 incrementally towards an increasingly higher price. Thinking quick I decided to cut off any competition with a large sum and called out, "125 credits". The auctioneer seemed giddy and any competitors decided to give up after seeing how intent I was to get this core, he did a last call for any buyers before declaring that I was no the owner of the rock golem core. The auction continued on until once again I heard an extremely rare tier 3 core being auctioned off once more, this time it was a multi-armed hobgoblin core, which to me seemed perfect for Jareth and his close-quarters combat style. He began the bidding and espoused its unique and advantageous qualities to any interested in a humanoid core for their summon. The competition was fierce and the bidding soon eclipsed what I had to pay for Emett''s core. When it reached 180 credits I knew that I would once again have to raise the price by a large margin to cut off any potential competition. I drew in a deep breath and stifled any apprehension at how much I would have to pay for this core and shouted loudly, "220 credits". Once more the auctioneer gave me a look as if seeing a walking bag of money and tried to drum up any competition to raise the price further, after a few seconds with no takers he gave up and announced that the core was mine as well. At this point, I was now down to 706 credits in my account after starting off the auction with 1,051 credits. For Brutus, I purchased a precious tier 2 blinking wolf variant for 105 credits, it likely would have gone for much more had it been a tier 3 core, but I was happy regardless as the ability of the blinking wolf is what I was after. It was a wolf variant known to be extremely hard to kill as it had the ability to teleport within a limited range, so it could avoid just about any attack sent at it. With only 601 credits I''m more hesitant to buy anything else unless I really need it or likely wouldn''t come across something like it any time soon if I didn''t buy it now. So I just sat back and watched the auction continue until they begin to start selling some lower tier but still relatively valuable weapons as the way to end the first quarter of the auction. This first quarter of the auction was to sell to all of the lower-tier summoners so that they could leave and make room for the richer clientele to bid. They brought out a curved sword made from the bladed forearm of a tier 3 bladed mantis, its'' appearance was similar to a curved scimitar. The auctioneer started the bidding at 250 credits, which is the base price of normal bladed mantis swords, and continued to ramble on while upselling the sword driving the price higher and higher. Eventually, I decided to bid for the unique sword and managed to win it from another summoner who was extremely upset at being outbid for the price of 500 credits. This boy I was competing against looked extremely arrogant with a better than you attitude that could be gleaned from the way he held himself, he was lanky with sandy blond hair and was dressed in nicer dress clothes, making it apparent he came from some money but apparently didn''t have enough to outbid me. The sword was more expensive than I was originally willing to pay, but I figured good weapons at this level are hard to come by and I wouldn''t get another chance at something like this for quite some time. Despite hearing the cursing and seeing the dirty looks the summoner I outbid was giving me, I pay him no mind and go to collect my prizes of the day. I went to the auction checkout to pay and receive my new items, and after receiving the items, I placed all of them safely in my storage for later appreciation and use, I figured it was better not to flaunt my new treasures lest someone attempts to rob me. Left with only 101 credits, I decided to relax for the rest of the day and spend my time with Mira who had a rare break from work today, we spent most of it playing monopoly until I grew angry at always being thrown in jail by unlucky rolls and flipped the board. It''s true what they say, monopoly really can tear a family apart. We spent the rest of the day once I had calmed down talking about her research and apprenticeship at the potion shop with Mr. Eric. I then updated Mira on my newly acquired items and my future plans for my summons, she was gobsmacked when she heard how much I had spent on the items but could see the logic in having bought the items that I did. We ended the night by going out to a nice restaurant selling orc steaks for 10 credits per plate and then ice cream for dessert for 2 credits each, the icecream was delicious and extra-creamy due to it being made from monster cow milk. 11 Ch. 10- Auction Revenge Today I plan on testing my new augmented abilities from Jareth''s evolution now that I have a proper weapon to fight monsters with. I have a quick breakfast of cereal with my summons eating with me at the table. Jareth is sitting up properly in his chair across from me and continues to eat daintily which makes for a hilarious sight considering his type of monster is known for being brutes. Brutus sits on his hind legs in the chair diagonal from me and quickly demolishes his core. Emett took more coaxing to get onto the chair next to me due to his weight and low intelligence, but once I got him up on there, he seemed content to remain and just sat quietly while dissolving the core I placed next to him. What an odd sight we must have made, and I''m sure Mira would have teased me incessantly about it, but it felt nice to eat like a family once more. I''d almost forgot what it was like, with no one but Mira to eat wit. Even then, she was gone frequently due to being busy with her work and experiments. After we had all finished our impromptu meal I sent a quick text to Mira letting her know I would be gone hunting for most of the day and then set off to the gate. Brutus continued to get bigger, to the point he was nearly as large as me and likely much stronger as well. Seeing as he was large enough to ride by now I decided to try and ride him as a mount into the center of the city. He seemed to have no problem with the arrangement and after I unsummoned Emett and Jareth we took off down the street heading for the town square. Buildings rushed by in a blur of tan and brown bricks as Brutus raced down the path until a short 20 minutes later we made it to the open area in the middle of town. I brought Brutus back to my storage and silently slid into line amongst all the other summoners going through the gate. No one seemed shocked at having a large wolf in town as it was a common sight, especially amongst the stronger summoners. There seemed to be someone gazing at me as I felt a tingling on the back of my neck, but I couldn''t pinpoint any one person so I shrugged it off and continued on through the gate after scanning in. I began my endeavor out in the outer edge of the forest to start off fighting some weaker monsters for a warmup. I had Brutus summoned out on standby in case he needed to intervene and save me. I was kitted out in full tier 2 armor minus headgear, I had my bandolier strapped on my chest and my sword at my hip ready to draw at any moment. I loved my new sword, it was shaped to cleave just about anything and had a bright green sheen to it that seemed especially sturdy. Despite the price I had to pay for it, it should last me for quite some time as it was a tier 3 weapon which I''ve only just started to have Jareth hunt. It seemed that not only did I receive a stat boost, but I also gained a basic understanding of one-handed weapons as a result of Jareth''s experience and him being a humanoid monster allowed this ability to pass on to me. I started with a tier 1 armored ant, it had red plate-like chitin armor surrounding its'' entire body and had large piercing mandible, it honestly looked like a miniature tank than an insect. It started off by lunging towards me with its'' pincers set to crush my midsection, but I sidestepped the ant and its mandibles and swept downward with my sword from above and sliced right through its neck, decapitating it with the ease of passing a hot knife through butter. My increased strength, the low ability level of the ant, and the great advantage of a tier 3 sword on a tier 1 monster allowed me to easily decapitate it as if it was a chicken with its'' neck outstretched for me to cut off. The sword felt natural to me, not only from the inherent skill passed on from Jareth to me but from my weapon classes at the academy where we learned basic sword movements and lightly sparred against each other. The difference in ability with the sword before and after Jareth''s evolution was quite clear. I never would have been able to accurately aim and maneuver the sword in such a way to pass through a gap in the ant''s armor and chop off its'' head with my previous beginner ability with the sword. Brutus had nothing to do and sat to the side of the clearing waiting for me to finish up collecting the ant body before moving onto our next target. After walking further into the woods Brutus detects the tusk markings and smell of a boar, so we track it a little ways from where we initially saw signs of its'' presence. We came across it a short while later and like last time, I had Brutus take a seat to the side as I face off against a tier 1 giant boar. This was a harder fight, as the boar was much larger than the ant and faster as well, this speed forced me to avoid and dodge its'' charges every time it would come near. If the ant was an armored tank, then the boar was a fighter jet prepared to gore anything unlucky enough to cross its'' path. Eventually, I got a lucky break and managed to nick an artery in the boar''s neck after a particularly reckless charge, it seems to have underestimated me to its'' detriment. My strategy after having made a deep wound on its'' neck was to keep my distance and let the boar bleed out. I knew cornered monsters and animals are the most dangerous, so I gave myself plenty of room to avoid an attack while also keeping it engaged to prevent it from running off and healing itself. After about 2 minutes of blood pouring from the wound, the boar began to stumble as a result of blood loss. I knew the time was right for me to finish it off. Its'' knees buckled and I darted in to swipe my blade the rest of the way across its'' neck while avoiding its'' sharp tusks. Despite the energy exerted fighting both monsters I felt surprising spry and decided that I at least had a decent grasp of my sword now and could move on to actual hunting with my summons. I flicked the blood off of my blade and resheathed it at my side and then summoned out Emett to join Brutus in today''s hunting. I would bring out Jareth as well, but I still have trouble with summoning 3 summons for any long period of time, plus it would be overkill to have him fight weaker monsters when I was trying to gauge Emett''s ability level. From what I could see, Emett has low capabilities right now and can only physically attack or shoot out rocks at enemies, so I have him acting as a ranged attacker while Brutus keeps the monsters'' attention and does damage to it. They managed to bring down 5 monsters in an hour with Emett dealing the final blows to them to allow for him to evolve sooner and get a better grasp of his attacks. After doing this for a while and slaying a few monsters with little difficulty I decide not to waste any more time in the weaker area, and so our group moved over to the tier 2 area and began to hunt after Emett is switched out for Jareth. We go through 3 pairs of monsters with minimal intervention from me before taking a quick break with Brutus getting a dark hound core and Jareth the core of a hobgoblin I had previously bought. As we get up after finishing our meal and plan to hunt once again we are attacked without warning by two summons that seems to have come out of nowhere. I would have been dead if it wasn''t for the warning provided by Brutus due to him smelling the scent of a dark hound like of the core he had just eaten when a gust of wind blew by alerting him to their presence. Luckily his warning came through in time and I was already prepared to launch into action and dodge their initial charge. As I sense the summons beginning their attack I immediately bring out the steel turtle shield from my storage and equip it to my left arm just in time to fend off an attack from a tier 2 dark hound while Jareth faces off against a tier 3 fire salamander. Brutus who was left free of attackers quickly attacks the dark hound trying to frantically bite me from behind and catches it off guard. The hounds'' entire focus was on the shield I was using to block its'' bite, so Jareth struck swiftly and manage to crush its left hind leg. Immediately after, Brutus leaped to the side to avoid the responding bite from the hound. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. I store the shield once more after the hound is distracted and bring out my scimitar that was still in its sheath at my waist. The hound continues to be focused on the threat Brutus presents and has dropped its guard towards me, writing me off as a non-threat I was just an "unthreatening" weak human. It only begins to respond to my advance after its summoner warns it about me, but by then it was too late and the hound got caught in the front shoulder by my blade. I felt muscle and tendon tear due to the sharp edge of the sword and strength of my charge blow, eventually, it came to a stop after the scimitar met what seemed to be the shoulder blade. After having the hound be rendered effectively paralyzed, Brutus darted around to the hound''s side and quickly crushes its throat in between his wicked jaws. While this was taking place, Jareth was over on his side of the forest in between a row of trees and darted out from one tree to the next to avoid the fire-spewing reptile. Jareth was wearing the salamander out by having it expend all of its'' fire, and was moving gradually closer to the summon. Once the salamander finally ran out of fire to spew, Jareth took advantage of that by rushing in quickly and smashing its head to stun it with his heavy iron mace. The salamander was dazed by the blow and only its thick skull saved it from dying immediately, unfortunately for it, Jareth is an expert combatant and never gives up an advantage when one is presented. He continued to swing his weapon all the while aiming for the head as the monster blindly waved its claws around hoping to strike at something to stop the barrage. After a couple of swings more, the salamander''s head finally gives way and its brain is pierced by the bone shards from the skull being forced into the fragile organ by the iron mace. The unknown summoner turned around to try and escape once they felt both of their summons die in short order to the ferocious might of Jareth and Brutus. The assailant never even made it past the edge of the opening before Brutus caught up to him and clamped down on his leg and broke it to prevent him from escaping. I heard the distinctly pathetic cry of a young male in pain when Brutus tore into him to prevent his escape, this is when I began to have an inkling of an idea about who it could have been that would attack me. After Brutus broke his leg I had him back off in case the summoner had a weapon and decided to use it on my wolf summon. I began to walk towards the downed assailant with Jareth beside me cradling his mace menacingly, he made for quite the sight, a large grey lumbering figure with a bloody mace gripped in one hand as if he was still ready to fight. The first thing I do as I near the summoner is to ask him, "Why did you target me of all people?". After not getting a response I proceeded to use my sword to rip away the assailant''s hood and saw the face of the summoner who I had outbid the day before. After seeing the distinctly familiar face, I realize the exact reason behind the sneak attack. I shake my head at the ridiculousness of his reasoning, it was either so that he could get back at me for beating him in bidding or to get the weapon from me for himself. With that settled, I near the other summoner keeping myself as composed as possible despite the burning hot rage simmering within me at the gall of the pathetic boy to try and attack me and my summons over something so petty. I raise my sword and tell him, "Since you seem to want my sword so bad, why don''t I let you borrow it for a while". Ignoring his pathetic pleas and furiously shaking head, I run him through the heart with my menacing sword in a swift and decisive motion and soon the light leaves his eyes. I had long ago made up my mind to return any harm that someone would wish upon me. I felt no regret at my actions except my regret that it had to happen at all, growing up as an orphan I had long ago discarded any hesitance about taking a life especially considering I grew up during wartime where the death count rose practically every second during the brutal and bloody world war. I remove my sword from his body, which thumps to the ground in a lifeless heap and clean off my blade of any blood that remained on it with the deceased summoner''s cloak. My next action was to take his watch and search the body for anything else valuable on him, it''s not like he had any use for it and I figure I might as well benefit in some way from this event. I then head back to the two dead summons and store their bodies to sell later. Having lost the desire to battle anymore for the day, I go back to the city and sell the 7 tier 1 cores, and 6 tier two cores for 67 credits in all. After having sold off the remaining cores I head over to the monster summoner association building to report the attack and sell the monster bodies. Once more I line up at Max''s familiar desk and he greets with a head nod before motioning for me to start unloading the bodies in my storage like I usually do. I shake my head and instead inform him that I was attacked by another summoner and that they are now dead. As proof, I bring out the watch of the summoner and hand it over to be scanned so that the incident can be fully filled out with information like the name of the summoner which of course will be registered at the association. Events like this weren''t uncommon in today''s world and usually the association didn''t intervene unless someone was known to be a repeat offender with evidence against them, it was bad for business if summoners were killing each other off, but usually what happened in the wild stays in the wild. Max takes down the name which happened to be Terrence Fitzgerald and hands back the watch as spoils of battle. Once that was taken care of I then proceeded to sell the armored ant for 5 credits, giant boar for 4 credits, the 5 common tier 1 bodies for 15 total, the dark hound body for 30 credits, and the 6 common tier 2''s for 150 total. Earning me an additional 204 credits. I kept the core of the dark hound for Brutus and then went over to the auction house to place the salamander core and corpse up for auction separately in hopes of earning even more money. Once I mentioned to the receptionist that I had some items to put up for auction I was shown a side room and once an appraiser entered we began negotiations. I brought out the core and corpse of the fire-salamander to be looked over and appraised, the balding elderly man informed me that the core will be valuable due to the demand for elemental cores like it to guide evolutionary paths, and since the corpse is in good condition aside from the head it would also be worth a nice sum. The hide will be used for fire-resistant armor and the organs would be useful in rare potions. After agreeing to auction off the body and corpse with a 10% commission of the final sale going to the auction house, and receiving a numbered chip to exchange after the next auction for my money, I head out the door to go to the market to unload any unwanted items from the summoners watch. As I walk I look through the watch and end up finding 450 credits, which I transfer over to my account, it seems my assailant was quite rich, just not enough to have been able to afford my sword at the auction. Along with the money were some clothes, a cheap dagger, 5 tier 1 wolf cores, a tier 2 shadow wolf core, and 4 ember lizard cores. Seeing as basically everything but the wolf cores could be sold, I unloaded them on the nearest merchant I could find for 45 measly credits, which was small compared to the amount he had in his account. On the way back home after this long and stressful day, I go and pick up 2 dinner meals from a fast-food restaurant for me and Mira. 12 Ch. 11- Forest Sleepover and Brutus Evolves My scare from yesterday has brought about an extra sense of urgency to me, I only have a few weeks before the next monster break and I doubt I''m strong enough yet to ensure my survival. The things I need most now are for my summons to evolve further making both them and myself stronger in the process, the other thing I will need is money and lots of it. Being a summoner is a great way to earn money, but you spend it just ass easily, often leaving you with little in your account after buying upgrades, necessities, or food. This is in the back of my head the entire time as I shower and dress up for the coming day. I shrug these thoughts off and go to the kitchen after catching a whiff of strong coffee which is how Mira likes to make hers. Entering our rather bare but homey kitchen I see Mira at the counter with a mug of coffee next to her cooking up a breakfast of sausage and eggs. It smells delicious and I can''t wait to eat as the popping of grease and sizzling sound of meat frying catches my attention. I go up to hug my favorite and only sibling and ask, "What''s the special occasion, Mira? Usually, you''re gone to your lab by now." She turns around with a smile and tells me, "You seemed worried yesterday during our dinner, so I thought I would go to work a bit later so that I could spend some more time with you and cook you some breakfast." I feel my heart melt a little at the thought of her going through all of that trouble despite already being so busy with her demanding job. She''s rarely around as often as I like because she is off at her job doing everything she can to earn some credits to keep us clothed and fed. She is long past the age of receiving any allowance and so has had to work hard to earn enough credits to keep us housed amongst other expenses. In this era, any non-summoner job requires a lot of work to be put in to maintain any quality of life, those who don''t work are soon on the streets left to fend for themselves. Orphans are exempt from this at least until they turn 16 and are old enough to be a summoner, that''s not to say that minors can''t work before that, but usually, all they can earn is some spare change for some odd jobs. There is an excess of people and a shortage of jobs other than summoning, so the market is extremely competitive if she didn''t work as hard as she does she may very well be replaced. I don''t blame her for things out of her control, I''m just touched at all of the little things she tries to do for me to show that she loves me. Seeing that she is done frying up the last of the sizzling meat, I set out our plates on or cozy little wooden dining table and place the silverware by them. Having finished my plate, I look up and address Mira, "So today I''ll be going back into the forest up north of the gate, I''ll probably end up staying the night there, but don''t worry I''ve got strong summons and plenty of equipment to keep me safe and cozy." She looks a bit disturbed by this news and it shows with the frown on her face, but after mulling over the info she eventually concedes to my silent request for her permission. "I suppose at this point you''re an adult and can make your own decisions, I just want you to be careful and stay safe. Remember, you''ll always be my little brother, even if you are grown now." Seeing how torn up about it she is, I rush over and give her a big hug to reassure her that everything will be fine. "I''ll be back sometime tomorrow and I''ll make sure to message you as soon as I''m back in the city so you can stop worrying, ''cause I know you will." With that said I put my dishes in the sink and head off to earn some credits. Getting near the forest, I summon all three of my summons and feed them their late breakfast, with Brutus getting the special blink wolf core that I bought at the auction. He seems to have stopped growing today, which I take as a sign of him getting close to evolving, and my hope is that during this planned camping trip he''ll be able to evolve. After unsummoning Emett, we begin making our way into the forest and don''t even bother killing all the weaker monsters we see in the outer area. Only 2 really persistent tier 1 monsters were killed by Brutus before they even had the time for regrets. Having made good progress so far, we continue on towards the center of the forest to kill some stronger and more lucrative monsters. We make it to the border between the two areas, which is easy to distinguish as not only do the trees become larger, but the leaves get darker as well, almost ominously so. Stopping to take a break after our long haul and having to once again kill about 5 more persistent tier 2 monsters, it seems the stronger a monster the more aggressive and arrogant they are. I allow them to rest near me and eat their snacks with our backs to the weaker tier 2 area, on the lookout for any danger in the tier 3 area. Eventually, we recover our stamina and continue on into the primal-looking area of the forest in search of fights. I instruct Jareth to take a backseat in the battles so that Brutus can be further stimulated to evolve, I tell him, "Your role is to attract the monster''s attention or fight off any additional monsters, only intervene if he is in imminent danger." He nods in understanding and allows Brutus to take the front of our little group. It seems that rather than growing larger as Jareth did before, he is becoming smarter and smarter and has even recently begun to speak in broken words. We still mostly communicate through intent with our bond, but I teach him a new word or phrase every now and then to help him learn our language. The first monster in the tier 3 area we come across is a death worm that we feel traveling through the ground before we see it. The vibrations already alerted us to its'' presence, but we still weren''t prepared for such a large and deadly looking insect to pop up from the ground. This insect had a gaping maw of jagged obsidian teeth that looked like it could rend steel into tiny pieces, it was made up of purple-colored chitinous sections, and smelled terribly of carrion. I remembered reading about these worms in the library at the academy, they are known as rookie-killers and were some of the most difficult tier 3 insect type monsters to fight. They either escaped into the ground when outmatched or would blindly charge at its'' prey and either crush, poison, or tear them to death. Deciding that I would be better suited out of the way, as I was still too weak to try and fight something like this, it was the size of a school bus and moved much faster than its'' size would suggest. I tell both my summons to be wary of its'' mouth and that they should attack the underside which is the weakest part of its carapace. The worm slid closer to Jareth as it sensed his larger size and that he posed a larger threat, Jareth performed what looked like a pirouette to narrowly avoid the falling body of the worm. The sound of it crashing to the ground was horrifying, but Jareth didn''t even flinch and began to pound away at the outer shell while avoiding the mouth that seemed to hone in on him. Brutus tried to relieve Jareth from some of the pressure of the worm''s assault by creating a shadow clone of Jareth, but the worm completely ignored the creation. I realized that it didn''t have any eyes to be fooled with, and so I told Brutus to wait for an opening in its'' armor. I would have told Jareth to continue striking the same spot on the armor to gradually chip away at it, but he already seemed to be doing so. Luckily with his heavier and harder mace, the carapace around waist height was dented and even had blue blood seeping from some cracks. Another 2 minutes passed by and there was an area around the size of a watermelon on the left side of the worm that was devoid of any armor and all that was left was soft flesh. The worm wasn''t the only one to receive some wounds, as Jareth had received a few glancing blows from the worm trying to crush him. There was also a nasty ruler sized rip in his forearm after being caught by the outer edges of the worm''s teeth. It would have been worse and may even have ripped off his arm completely if Jareth''s skin wasn''t so tough. Brutus had yet to strike, but was waiting around for the perfect opportunity to present itself. He knew he would only have one chance to mortally wound this oversized worm that truly lived up to its'' reputation. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. That chance finally came when the worm which had begun to noticeably tire after moving around its'' body so much crashed down once more in an attempt to crush Jareth. It nearly succeeded in doing so as Jareth wasn''t faring much better and had lost a decent amount of blood at this point. The exposed wound was at the perfect position and the mouth of the worm was facing away from Brutus, so Brutus finally knew his chance had come and rushed in to wound the tyrannical worm. At this point, the worm had forgotten Brutus who had yet to even attack it, so it certainly came as a surprise to it when the ignored summon tore off a sizable chunk of flesh out with its'' teeth. Brutus dove into the exposed area with the fervor of a speed eater and continued to rip out chunk after chunk of the worm. He only had a few moments of this before the worm shook itself out of its'' confusion and pain and swung its'' body to dislodge the blood-soaked wolf. Had there not been a giant worm trying to kill my summons I would have found it hilarious that Brutus now looked like a dog-shaped blueberry from all of the blue insect blood that had fallen onto him. Brutus was thrown a few yards away and seemed to be in some pain after getting shaken off like that and landing poorly on the ground, when he got up he appeared to be limping on his front right leg. Luckily for all of us, this final attack seemed to have been enough as gallons of worm blood poured from the gaping mass of what used to be flesh. Bone-chilling screams were being let out by the worm as it writhed in pain and appeared to be going through death throes as it had given up trying to target Jareth. It only rolled and smashed the ground around it with no seeming pattern or reason, this only served to further bleed the worm out. I instructed my summons to return to me and give the death worm some space until it bled out. If we were unlucky and got close to it, it may very well crush one of us to a pulp. After another minute and what seemed to be a pool''s worth of blood, the worm finally lay still. I waited another few minutes to make sure the worm wasn''t faking being dead, and even then I had us approach from its'' tail which I poked with my sword a few times to see if it would react. After receiving no response I allowed Brutus to go up and claim his prize, which in this case was the core of this monstrous insect that was essentially a pseudo-tier 4. Brutus went back to the wound he had torn up and stuck his head inside to reach the core that was conveniently located. It was close enough to the wound that he was able to reach it after sticking about half his body through. He brought out the sickly purple looking core to show me before throwing it up and swallowing it in one go. After that, he laid down beside it and appeared to be growing brighter and brighter as time moved on. Just like with Jareth, Brutus began to grow slightly bigger and motes of light gathered towards me, and with each piece, I felt stronger and could sense more than I could previously. My perception of my surroundings began to change as the evolution progressed, I smelled the dirt under us as well as the terrible smelling corpse of the worm. Details were clearer from farther away and I could hear monsters moving around us in the forest. Eventually, the light faded and what appeared was a and pitch-black grim with hauntingly opaque eyes that looked as if they were dead. Brutus seemed to be enjoying his new form and even surprised me by diving into the shadow of the worm, what I especially didn''t expect was for him to jump on top of me after coming out of my shadow. It appears that Brutus has some form of shadow travel with limits that I don''t know yet. His teleporting ability must have come from the blinking wolf core I fed him earlier today, and it seems like it merged with his shadow control ability that before this was only able to form illusions. His becoming a grim was unexpected, but I suppose it makes sense considering the core that pushed him to evolve was a "death" worm. He seemed to be enjoying covering me in slobber after vigorously licking me while I remained trapped under his larger and subsequently heavier form. I pushed him off of me after his worm stench became too much, I suppose bathing in worm blood would make anyone smell regardless of whether they evolve right after or not. To take care of that issue, I found a pond nearby and brought out Emett to join us in an impromptu bath, only after making sure that there weren''t any aquatic monsters within, of course, I''m not stupid. We had some fun paddling around and splashing each other, but Emett seemed to stay at the edge and dip his bottom in occasionally for a drink, which made sense considering he would probably sink like a "stone", get it, it''s a rock pun. After a few minutes and a quick splash war that Jareth easily dominated with his large hands and long arms, we got out and made camp right by the pond, that way we would have less area available for sneaking up on us. I started a campfire with some wood lying around and the lighter that I had bought a few days ago, and then I set about skinning one of the tier 1 horned rabbits that we had killed earlier. For an originally herbivorous creature, they sure were aggressive. Once the fire had died down a bit and left red hot coals on the bottom I placed the pan I had bought on top and threw chunks of the rabbit in until all of it was added and mixed the meat around in the pan to cook the pieces evenly. Finally, after about 10 minutes of roasting the meat was ready and I brought out cores for each of my summons to enjoy for dinner alongside me. It seems that along with increased size, Brutus has an enlarged stomach as well, because apparently 1 tier 1 core wasn''t enough for him since he became tier 3. Conceding to his pleading puppy eyes, which only served to disturb me further considering how odd the action was with his deathly pale eyes, I eventually brought out another core and fed that to him as well. I tore into the piping hot pieces of meat that were surprisingly tasty considering I had no seasoning to add to it, which I vowed to fix as soon as possible. I spent my mealtime trying to figure out just what changes I had undergone and if I had any skills or abilities from Brutus''s evolution. I had already confirmed enhanced senses, greater speed, and I noticed that I could still see perfectly fine into the forest despite it being night already. It seems Brutus''s eyes did more than look creepy, they seemed to give him night vision with me receiving the trait by proxy. I couldn''t think of anything more until I realized that Brutus had been able to teleport, so maybe I could as well. I concentrated hard on willing myself to move without physically moving and to my surprise I managed to move about 2 feet in front of where I was previously in the exact spot I had been looking at. I tried again, but couldn''t seem to until 5 minutes had passed, and when I tried again I noticed that the most I could move was about 2 feet and only to an area I could see. While it wasn''t a super useful ability with its many restrictions, it could definitely save my life or give me an advantage in a fight. I wouldn''t use this ability so easily though, I planned on keeping this as a life-saving secret for as long as I could because if no one knew about it they couldn''t plan for it. With our meal finished and the sun already down I set up my sleeping bag near the fire and placed my sword out of its'' sheathe beside where I would sleep for easy access. I kept my armor on since I was still in a dangerous area and needed to be battle-ready at a moment''s notice. I only kept Brutus summoned as his senses would be my best warning for anything coming to attack us, I also placed down one of the sacks of monster repellent near my sleeping bag. I put it downwind of Brutus though, because he would find the smell horribly nauseating. Once all of that was taken care of and my other items put away safe in storage, I went to sleep with the comforting knowledge that Brutus would make sure nothing bothered me. I woke up in the morning full of energy and after a quick breakfast of leftover rabbit from last night and a tier 2 shadow panther core for Brutus. We left our camp after putting away the pan and my sleeping bag. We began heading out of the forest and I brought Jareth out to join us in killing some monsters on the way out to pad our figurative pockets. My summons rampaged in the woods and by the time we had escaped they had killed an additional 7 tier 2 monsters and 4 tier 1''s, we didn''t really bother much with the tier 1 monsters anymore because they were pretty much chump change at this point and not really worth the effort. The moment I stepped back into civilization after unsummoning Jareth and Brutus, I began to type a message to Mira letting her know I was safe and uninjured from my trip. I added that I was in the city now and would be stopping to sell off the bounty from my hunt before heading home. With that taken care of, I went to the core exchange to sell off the 6 tier 1 cores and the 12 tier 2 cores, making for a total of 126 credits. Once that was taken care of I went over to Max''s counter, I had taken a liking to the man and had already made him my unofficial go-to association attendant. I brought out the tier 1 and tier 2 monster bodies minus the meat of that 1 rabbit and made 316 credits from the haul. I was saving the death worm for the auction and planned on earning plenty of money once it was sold to the highest bidder. I met with the same man at the auction house and dropped off the body and received a reclaiming chip in return, the man was truly a professional as he didn''t even gawk at the size of this behemoth monster. Since all of my business had been taken care of and I was 441+ credits richer, I summoned Brutus and rode him through the streets all the way home. Once I got to our apartment and unsummoned Brutus after a few headpats in thanks for the ride. I was beset upon by Mira and after a vigorous bear hug that would have hurt had I not been strengthened by Brutus''s recent evolution, I was forced to tell her all about my experience. 13 Ch. 12- Entering Beginner Tournamen A few days ago I saw a flier on the side of some buildings and restaurants near the colosseum advertising for a tournament taking place at noon on Thursday, which happens to be today. The tournament was called the Rising Stars Rumble and was something that took place every six months to showcase the budding talent of some newly made summoners. The rules were simple, any summoners who turned 16 within the time period between now and the last tournament would be allowed to participate with their summons in the single-elimination style tournament, each battle would allow for only one summon to be used. Each battle would stop once a summon was knocked out of the ring, killed, or the summoner forfeited. I had heard about the tournament but had never seen it in person, but the tempting prize of the best 3 summoners receiving a tier 4 monster core and an invitation into the colosseum league was too much to resist. So here I am, in line with lots of other young summoners waiting to get into the imposing stadium to fight until only one is left. I wouldn''t have bothered to enter had Brutus and Jareth not recently evolved, having only tier 2 summons would be a practical death sentence against the summoners who have had nearly 6 months to get stronger and prepare for the tournament compared to my nearly 3 weeks of being a summoner. Eventually, the line moved up and I finally managed to make it in half an hour before the tournament officially began. The seating area for the participants was on the opposite side of the entrance and had everyone packed in like sardines to fit them all. I personally was smushed between two burly looking guys who had yet to speak a word, but they seemed to have no problem with encroaching on my legroom, but in all fairness, they probably needed the extra room to fit themselves in the crowded bleachers. Luckily it seemed that most of the participants had at least showered or put deodorant on because, despite the crowded quarters, there wasn''t an overwhelming amount of BO unique to large crowds of people. When noon came around, 4 referees came out of the employee tunnel and took their places next to the four circular stages within the colosseum grounds. With that succinct speech out of the way, beeps were heard within the crowd summoning some participants to come to the arena for their match. After each summoner had lined up, they were prompted to bring out their summon and once that was done the match would begin. Most of the summoners brought out tier 2 summons that obviously wouldn''t amount to much in this type of tournament, some of the only notable summons, and I was hesitant to even call those summons notable were; armored ants and boulder crabs. One summoner, in particular, looked extremely out of place with a basic tier 1 slime out in the arena, its'' opponent was an iron-hide boar that looked like it would tear apart the slime in one charge. Seeing nothing really of note to observe I decided to just relax and wait for my turn to come around, or at least for some unique summons to appear. Luckily I didn''t have to wait long and out of what must have been nearly five-thousand participants I was up in the 5th round to compete. The message on my watch told me to appear at arena one on the front-left side of the stadium, and so I ambled my way down amongst the throng of competitors in the stadium. Deciding to not reveal all of my cards, I summoned out Jareth to compete. His strength was greater than the other summons I had seen competing so far, so I wasn''t worried about him losing this round. The main reason I chose him is that he doesn''t have much to hide skill-wise, and so it wouldn''t make a difference if someone was aware of his strength, no amount of foreknowledge would prevent a weak tier 2 from beating my menacing dark-skinned hobgoblin. When my opponent stepped up to the arena and realized what summon he would be facing his look of apprehension was obvious, and after mulling over his choice for a few seconds he ended up bringing out a tier 2 spike tailed squirrel. Unsurprising to everyone involved, the moment the match started Jareth lumbered forward with his imposing iron mace and with one swing bashed the squirrel in the side out of the arena. It would have been nothing more than meat paste had I not told him to hold back some so that he didn''t outright kill the summon. I didn''t want to be seen as bullying those weaker than me, it''s not good for reputation and public image plus I had nothing against the summoner in particular. With that round ending almost as soon as it started, I began to walk off to take my seat in the packed bleachers before the referee even declared my victory to wait for my next match. The matches continued to progress rather quickly as the day went on, and I eventually saw a few summons of note. One was a tier 3 bladed mantis that a young and innocent girl seemed to own, another was a white-haired yeti that an older looking guy had, they looked to be strong competition and were the only eye-catching summons within my sight. By the time 2 PM arrived most of the weaklings had been eliminated, which left only around a thousand participants out of around five-thousand. My turn came once again, and this time I was pitted against a rather unique looking tarantula variant summon, it was a tier 3 shatter tarantula and looked to be made out of glass. The deceiving thing about this summon is how weak it looks, but in actuality, it had mutated to have the hair all over its'' body be made out of a glass-like substance that would break off into its'' opponent at the slightest touch, hence the shatter part of its'' name. If one was especially unlucky the glass shards would break off into a summon or monster''s eyes, blinding them and causing excruciating pain. For this round, I once again brought out Jareth, but I warned him to remain distant from the spider and to move away as soon as he attacked to not be gouged in the eye by glass shards. I wasn''t particularly worried about the glass breaking his skin as it was as tough as steel now, but his eyes remained vulnerable and could be exploited to take Jareth down. With both summons in the arena, the battle had begun and it seemed like just about everyone in the stadium was focusing on this fight between two rather unique and dangerous summons. Jareth once again closed in on the spider, but was forced to halt his movement and shield his eyes from the glass shards that had shot out from the spider''s body after it had turned around and rubbed its legs on its large abdomen. The spider did its'' best to take advantage of the situation and leapt forward intent on stabbing as much glass into Jareth as it could with its'' entire body as well as baring its'' fangs in order to poison Jareth as well. The stoic hobgoblin didn''t remain immobile for long and began moving back as much as he could in order to avoid any ambushes while his vision was blocked. His movements were partially effective and only the front of the spider managed to make it to Jareth, while the legs did their best to shank Jareth with the remaining glass shards, the fangs were not so lucky and were pushed away with the mace that Jareth had pushed out to ward off any attacks. At a stalemate, each summon vied for dominance in an odd form of wrestling, the glass did its best to stab into Jareth when they made contact, but it was slow going as only a few especially jagged pieces managed to stick in at all, and even the ones that did go in barely made it past the specially hardened skin of the defensive variant hobgoblin. The tarantula soon realized the futility of its'' attacks and leaped away to regroup and come up with a new attack strategy. Unfortunately for it, Jareth rarely let any advantage go and charged towards the spider immediately in barbarian fashion with his mace extended out in threat. The spider had little time to think, but it was presented an opening to attack after Jareth over-extended himself when swinging his mace. The spider tensed up into a ball and launched itself into the abdomen of the metallic summon, with the mass of the spider''s body behind the attack many more shards managed to stick into Jareth, making him scream out in pain all the while looking a bit like a pincushion. This seemed to have greatly angered Jareth, and his eyes got a crazed and fervent expression in them. He charged like a berserker and swung continuously at the arachnid until the spider could no longer dodge. After a few wild swings, the mace eventually made contact and the spider was hit with a devastating blow to two of its'' eight legs which were ripped off from the force of the weapon. The opposing summoner immediately declared his forfeit after seeing that his spider was crippled and would likely be smashed into a pulp in a few seconds by a currently very angry hobgoblin with a mean-looking mace. I called Jareth over to me just before he smashed in the head of the currently crippled glass spider. He seemed upset at my order, but conceded to my command and came over to me with glass sticking out all over his abdomen and arms. The crowd at this point went wild with cheers after such a dramatic and tense fight, but I ignored them in favor of taking care of my injured summon. I rushed Jareth over to the side of the stadium and began the painstaking process of removing the sharp shards from his body. 30 minutes and about a quart of blood later, Jareth was no longer a pincushion and I recalled him in order to heal after giving him a shield bear core to reward him for the hard-fought battle. Once Jareth was taken care of and returned to his core to rest, I walked up to the much emptier bleachers to watch the rest of the matches until it was my turn once again. As the battles progressed and more hopeful summoners had their dreams of winning the tournament dashed the battles became more intense and strong summons were becoming an increasingly frequent fight. As the power difference between summons became smaller, the fights began to draw out and serious injuries became more common. Some of the summons had limbs cut or torn off, and there was rarely a summon that didn''t bleed at least a little during their fight. Everyone was determined to try and win this event, me included, and the atmosphere began to change from a lax competition to a war zone with everyone playing for keeps even at the expense of their summons. I wasn''t quite willing to sacrifice my summons like that, and was prepared to withdraw should the situation become too dangerous. Ultimately, I hoped that with my summon''s plentiful hunting experience and newly upgraded forms they would be able to eke out a win even against some of the tougher competition. I had yet to bring out Brutus, he was the wild card that I would play against any opponent vulnerable to sneak attacks. It seems that fate had read my mind as I was called out an hour later to compete and my opponent was the summoner with the yeti that looked to be rather strong but slow with a weak defense. Seeing this as my opportunity to let Brutus shine and allow Jareth to recover and rest for longer I brought out my recently transformed grim. Brutus emerged from his pitch-black core as if ready to pounce on any creature showing a bit of weakness, his haunting eyes were adding to this effect and had clearly unnerved the summoner of the yeti. Having made it this far in the tournament, the summoner shrugged off the shock of seeing another tier 3 summon that had yet to fight in this tournament. The match began as soon as the summons had taken their positions and the ref announced the start of the fight. The yeti was clearly a brute type of fighter, similar to Jareth but lacked the defensive skin that allowed Jareth to sustain his purely offensive attacking style. The yeti predictably charged Brutus and reared back for a hammer fist blow, but the attack failed as Brutus easily outmaneuvered the heavy summon and sprinted to the side of the yeti. The yeti staggered from his failed attack which Brutus took advantage of by tearing at the left calf of the snow-white summon. The yeti was quick to respond to the attack and Brutus was forced to release the leg or get hit by the lumbering summon''s massive fist. If any of the attacks reached Brutus I''m afraid he would be out of the fight, but his style is suitable to quick attacks with constant movement making it hard for any attack to land. Seeing that a drawn-out battle wouldn''t be in my favor with Brutus expending lots of energy constantly dodging the blows from the yeti. I send through our bond that Brutus should shadow jump and surprise the yeti to finish off the fight before he becomes seriously injured. Brutus seems to have listened as he gears up to run into the shadow of the ref that has loomed into the arena near Brutus. The Yeti is confused as to why Brutus is running toward the ref but follows along nevertheless, and is certainly surprised when it sees Brutus disappear into the drawn-out shadow of the referee. Even more shocking not only to the Yeti but to its'' summoner and the spectators watching the match is the sight of Brutus appearing out of the Yeti''s shadow in a lunge that brings him right up to the neck of the yeti and brings the humanoid summon down to the ground while remaining latched onto its throat. I warned Brutus to not go for the kill, but to immobilize his opponent since it is only a tournament. The summoner seeing that his Yeti could have its'' throat ripped out at any moment reluctantly forfeits, to which Brutus releases the opposing summon and returns back to me with a grin on his muzzled face and a bright gleam in his eye. I praise him and give him a few pats on the head as if he was a pet dog rather than a deadly creature that managed to take down a summon twice his size. The competition continued and the only other battle of mine before the final matches to determine the ultimate winner forfeited seeing as their chances of winning were extremely low after taking into consideration my summon''s deadly and still relatively unknown abilities. I was relieved to not have to fight another battle and exhaust my summons further before the final matches. At this point, another 2 hours had passed and only 5 summoners were left, all of them had strong or unique tier 3 summons that had allowed them to bulldoze through most of the competition that had at best a tier 2 summon if they were lucky. I was anxious to begin my battles and get them over with as the long day had bored me for the most part and was filled with lots of waiting. I didn''t have to wait long as only 2 arenas were put to use to give a bigger stage for the coming fights. My first opponent was a stubbled boy who appeared to be trying to grow a mustache but it ended up looking like a fuzzy caterpillar on his lip. I remember from one of the previous battles that this guy had a wood variant golem, it looked menacing but wasn''t actually all that dangerous as it''s body was lightweight but weak, it moved faster than most golems but still had a large body vulnerable to attacks. This seemed to be one of the examples of variants not necessarily being stronger than their original monster type. I figured Jareth had rested plenty already and since the wounds weren''t severe they should have closed up my now, so I summoned him out and was amazed to see no indication that he was ever injured, it seems his healing factor had increased as well after his evolution. The wood golem was brought out as well and the match between tanks began, blows were received on either side with each summon attempting to do as much damage as possible with no regard to any injuries they may receive. This strategy had worked so far for the wood golem, but unfortunately for it Jareth not only has a strong defense, but he also has a weapon capable of greater damage than any fist could ever dole out. Jareth quickly overpowered the golem despite being the smaller of the two and the battle didn''t end until Jareth was forced to demolish the wood construct in one giant overhead blow after the opposing summoner refused to give in. This was my team''s first kill in the tournament, and while I felt sorry for the summon my victory was far more important than a temporary death and some resulting weakness as a result of dying. The crowd went nuts after seeing woodchips fly everywhere after Jareth pulped the competition, I have to admit it was a bit satisfying seeing the amount of destruction one huge blow from my summon could create. I was ushered off to the side for the next battle to take place and sweepers came out to remove what remained of the wood golem. The summoner was weeping while holding the dull summoning crystal of his golem, luckily the death wasn''t permanent and would only result in any cores that had been fed to it or experience from fighting since its'' evolution to be null and void. The red-headed girl with the bladed mantis was up next in the arena I had previously been in and she made short work of the vulture looking terror bird that her opponent summoned, it had come a bit too close to the mantis when trying to attack and was sliced in two with one sweep of its'' bladed arm. Rather than forearms shaped like scythes, this mantis had what looked like two roman gladii on its'' arms, it also seemed rather adept with them. Recognizing that this mantis posed the greatest risk to my summons I began to try and decide who I would bring out to face it, before settling on Jareth who I hoped would be able to match the dual bladed insect. 5 summoners were left after this round, and the red-haired girl with the mantis was lucky enough to be chosen as the summoner who got to sit out until the final round. I had to face off against a grindylow with a spear in its'' grasp, its sickly green skin reminded me of seaweed and the octopus-like tentacles clearly showed that this creature was meant to be aquatic, but seemed to be doing just fine on dry land. I brought out Brutus to fight the creature which would allow Jareth to rest and prepare for its'' epic battle against the bladed mantis, there was no doubt in my mind that the summon would be either 2nd or 1st in the tournament. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. Brutus took command of the battle tempo with many fake-out attempts towards the grindylow to see how it would react, it had an obvious ability with the spear as it managed to keep Brutus away with the threat of its'' spear should he get too close. I had the idea that if Brutus could move the grindylow towards the shade he would be able to trick the summon with a shadow clone and get within range of the summon, and I transmitted as much to him. Once Brutus got within range of the summon, it would no longer be able to use the spear to fend him off and the battle would be over. With the occasional test of the summon''s defenses, Brutus prowled toward the summon, causing it to slowly but surely work its way to the other side of the arena where the shadows were plentiful. Once the sea creature was in position, Brutus charge the summon for real and diverted from where the clone he had just created was, he managed to avoid detection by blending into the shadows and struck when the opposing summon thrust its'' spear into the realistic illusion. Feeling no resistance from the fake-grim, the grindylow began to turn around and search for the real one, but by then it was too late and Brutus had already grabbed the summon by the back of the neck and forced it to the ground face first. With no other option left, my opponent conceded and I moved on to the finals. With the top 3 competitors chosen, the mantis girl and a boy with what appeared to be a rather deadly bristled boa were facing off to determine who would fight in the finals. Unfortunately for the snake, its'' defense was much weaker than the carapaced insect and was quickly diced up after failing to rend apart the legs of the insect. With that short battle finished, one arena was being prepared and the girl and myself were allowed a break to get into fighting shape for the big event. I went over to her to introduce myself since out of everyone at the tournament today, she is the only one with the potential to give me a real fight. "Hi, I''m Thomas, I didn''t happen to catch your name during the tournament. I must say that I''m pretty awed by your bladed mantis, It''s giving me shivers just thinking about fighting it." She looks up at me from the bench with her bright turquoise eyes, and after a second of thought says, "Thank you, my name is Alex. I''ve got to admit that I''m pretty impressed that you already have two tier 3 summons, how long have you been a summoner for?" I stop and think for a moment before realizing that I''ve been doing this for about 3 weeks, which is a pittance compared to some of the other competitors who have had months to grow strong. I now realize just how abnormal I am compared to most summoners, but with my rising growth comes increased dangers. I''ve nearly died twice now, when most others are safe in groups and don''t need to worry about things like that. Deciding on what to tell her, I settle on, "For about a month, I''ve been hunting on my own just about every day since my birthday, I''ve got to if I ever want to be strong enough to contend with the summoners who have been hunting for years. What about you, and do you have any other summons?" She looks rather shocked at my revelation but composes herself and tells me, "I''ve been a summoner for about 3 months, and I have another summon, but I don''t want to reveal it to you yet." I take her statement with grace and realize with a bit of embarrassment that it''s not polite to ask about which summons someone has, that knowledge could be the difference between life and death and isn''t given out so easily, especially not against someone who would be fighting her soon. Deciding that I''ve talked enough to Alex for now, I go over to another bench and wait for the fight to begin. The referee that had spoken before comes to the middle of the now larger arena and bellows out, "Ladies and gentlemen, the fight you''ve been waiting all day for is about to begin. If each summoner will step into the arena we can begin our match." He then moves off to the side so as to not be caught between our summons. I bring out Jareth and at him firmly on the back in encouragement, and just to provide a little incentive I promise him the four-armed hobgoblin core I won at the auction previously if he wins. This seems to ignite his will to fight and he confidently walks into the circle prepared to take on a dangerous opponent that may just rip him to shreds if he lets his guard down for even a moment. Alex brings out her mantis to the surprise of no one and has it enter the circle as well. Jareth sets up in a sprinter stance and when the referee brings his arm down to signal the fight, both summons race off towards their opponent, neither one showing any signs of slowing down. In a dangerous form of chicken, each summon barrels towards each other, and instead of crashing, they use their momentum and throw it into their weapons to do extra damage. The moment Jareth''s mace meets the sword-like appendages of the mantis a great gust of wind is pushed out and even disturbs the dirt around the two deadly opponents locked in battle. Both are deadlocked, but the mantis has more control over how much force can be put into the stalemate with its'' two weapons. Jareth realizes this as well and quickly dives backward to avoid the incoming blades, he is quick to recover and gets back on his feet moments before the mantis once again pressures Jareth and pushes its'' advantage. There doesn''t seem to be much Jareth can do to bring down the 7ft insect, I only advise him to use his head and try to out-think the summon rather than rely on brute strength. He seems to have taken my words to heart because instead of blocking the swords, he instead redirects them to the ground, which seems to have taken the mantis by surprise. Knowing that he might not have another chance, Jareth brings down his still readied mace and smashes it down on the left shoulder of the overgrown insect. Noticeable damage appears on the shoulder socket, and even the crowd can hear the furious chittering and hissing coming from the injured bladed mantis. With Jareth tired and battered and the mantis down an arm, each summon appears to ready their final attack, they crawl increasingly closer towards each other making sure to leave no openings. Each summon rears back, ready to swing their respective weapons once more, but then I notice a twitch in the "injured" shoulder of the mantis. I realize that it was faking its'' injury and that if they attacked each other Jareth would be the one to die. Before they can fully rear back for their attack I yell out, "I forfeit, the mantis isn''t injured nearly as bad as it made it appear. It''s my loss." Alex seems a bit stunned that I saw through the deceit but nods at my timely decision even if it resulted in my loss. As if to prove my point the injured shoulder of the mantis is shaken out and it appears to have most of its'' range of motion back. The awards are handed out with me getting 500 credits and an invitation to participate in the colosseum gladiator matches. Alex is beaming and receives the copper-colored tier 4 core of a stymphalian bird along with the same prizes as I received. Despite having gotten second in the tournament I feel great about my performance and feel no shame in having lost to a clearly stronger opponent. I shake Alex''s hand after the award ceremony and even manage to score her contact info on my watch, I hope that I can fight her again sometime soon. I begin to head home and call Mira at her work to inform her of my match results, she squeals in excitement when she hears that I placed in the top 3 just like I knew she would, which is why I brought my arm away for my ear so that I wouldn''t go deaf. 14 Ch. 12.5- House Hunting, Mira POV After Tommy''s top 3 finish in the Rising Stars Tournament, he came up to me last night and told me that he had more than enough credits to afford a nicer house closer to the inner city. I was shocked at first that he even brought it up, I mean we''ve been doing fine so far in this apartment. Granted it''s the cheapest housing available at only 25 credits a month and was at the very outer edge of the city, but it suited our needs at least for now. He took a while to convince me, I was adamant at first that we didn''t need to be spending the money on what amounted to convenience and luxury. What really broke me down is that he was working so hard and doing all of this for me, even though I had only been able to provide bare necessities for him despite all of my hard work. I even to this day felt ashamed that I couldn''t provide more for him, luckily he seemed perfectly fine with what we had, but he had always been like that even as a child. I suspected he was mature even before living at the orphanage forced us to become so. So eventually after some convincing and show of proof as to how much he had saved up, I eventually gave in and said that we could go to a realtor and find a new home deeper within the city. He made some very convincing arguments about us being much closer to our work, which usually took us about an hour to walk there. The real clincher was that he could easily afford whatever housing we chose within reason with his ever-increasing income. I never realized just how much summoner''s made and didn''t even know if his income was the average, but I guess with great danger comes great wealth, not to mention their expenses were much greater as well. The look on his face as we went to the realtor soothed any misgivings that I had about this change, if it really makes him that happy then I suppose there''s nothing to do but let it happen. Eventually, we made it to the door of the South sector realtor and went inside the modest building. A bell rang as we opened the door and soon after a nice young-looking woman in a pencil skirt showed up and asked us what she could do for us. I explained that we were looking for new housing now that we could afford more, and she seemed more than happy to help us with this. If I remember correctly even in the old era, realtors made money off of commission. She asked us, "So, what is your budget range for your new home? I will warn you, the budget goes from the cheapest at 25 credits a month all the way up to 10,000 credits for the houses and buildings nearest to the center of the city. Of course, the houses and places nearest the center are for summoners or well-off businessmen dealing with summoners." She seemed to think on where we could live with this type of budget and began leafing through pages in a large bound booklet on top of her desk before informing us, "Well with that type of budget you could begin to live in the middle sector of the city and you could afford one of the larger high rise apartments within that area, usually, this area is what mid-level summoners can afford." I was ready to turn around at the thought of having to pay such a price, I mean think of all the clothes and food you could afford with all of that money. I was brought out of my reverie by a tug on my shirt by Thomas which seemed to be preventing me from running out of here as if he knew what I was thinking. Before I could interject and tell her this had all been a mistake, Thomas chimed in with a shit-eating grin towards me and told her in a smug voice as if he had just won something, "We''ll take it, and I can even put the downpayment on it now if we can go ahead and move in today." The realtor seemed to have been expecting this and told us that it would be no problem to move in if we put a 300 credit downpayment on it, and she even had the information about our new house in a folder that she handed over to us. Looking at the pictures of the new space, it was certainly bigger than our old apartment and seemed to take up half a floor rather than a small section like our current one. The area it was in was much closer to my work as well, and it looked far nicer than our cracked stone apartment, it even had pretty flowers out front by the entrance of the building. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. After seeing these pictures and knowing that Tommy would easily be able to afford it with his current income, I finally conceded to his wishes and let him finalize the deal with the realtor while I continued to look through all of the information on our new place. I was practically glowing with excitement at the thought of being able to live there, it was a far cry from the orphanage or our now previous bottom of the barrel apartment. A few hours later and a few wrong turns and we had finally made it to our new apartment, it was about 30 minutes closer to both of our work and looked much nicer and safer too. Ours was on the 20th floor out of 30 floors in this apartment building and had far fewer shady characters. Unfortunately, there was no elevator due to most technology being forbidden during the creation of the new era, and any non-technological versions were only afforded by the extremely wealthy as it required a strong person or summon to be hired to hoist them by a steel cable through a pulley system. Luckily we had few personal belongings and any that we did have were stored away in our watch before we even went to the realtor so that we could immediately relocate, which was a smart decision on my little brother''s part. After having unpacked what little we owned into our respective rooms we began to tour our new digs. There were two sofas and a loveseat in the living area with a coffee table between all of the furniture. The kitchen had a nicer stove, along with a clean steel sink, and a dining table with six chairs, as if we would need more than two seats *haha*. By the time we get acquainted with the new house, dinner has rolled around and we go out for a quick dinner in celebration of the new change in our lives. To be honest, I never would have imagined that I would ever leave that dingy apartment, but I''m sure glad I did now. The only thing eating at me is that Thomas was the one to provide for us when usually that was my role, it''s hard to imagine your younger siblings will ever grow up. I guess I need to learn to accept that he''s an adult now, but at least through all of this we are still together, he is the most precious thing in my life and I couldn''t stand to lose him. 15 Ch. 13- First Official Colosseum Figh About 6 days have passed since the tournament, and after taking a day off to find a new apartment to live in, I''ve continued to hunt monsters for more cash. At this point even taking the downpayment into consideration I have over 4,000 credits in my account. I''m saving for the coming International auction which happens at the end of every month, and just so happens to be right before the next coming monster break, which is the best time to increase my team''s strength by even a little bit. Coming back to money, I decided to accept the colosseum invitation and am lined up for the 3rd match of the day against a well-known and frequent fighter in the colosseum. My opponent''s name is Dave Crenshaw and he is known for his two tier 3 summons, a centaur wielding a sword and a kobold with a club similar to Jareth''s old one. He is an established fighter within the lower ranks of the arena, he has an even win/loss record currently. I''m expecting a challenging but winnable match, which is set to be a two summon battle. The match-makers of the colosseum decided that since I had two known summons it would be best to showcase them in today''s match, which works fine with me since Brutus and Jareth often work together in battle. This is a bit uncommon for gladiator matches, but not unheard of, most matches are fought 1 V 1. I''m currently sitting in the 1st of 2 waiting areas with the other participants of today''s matches, I notice with mild surprise that there is an equal mix of each gender in the room. It seems that just like in the actual world, the only thing that matters here is strength. Eventually, the first two matches are finished and it becomes my time to fight. I''m already dressed out in my hunting clothes and walk out of the tunnel on one side of the stadium and settle at the end of the large circular arena. While I wait for Dave to do the same, I bring out both Jareth and Brutus and have them show off a little for the crowd. The more people bet, the more money I make as I get a 2% commission of all bets placed on me during my match, and exciting the crowd will only make them bet more. 2% may not seem like much, but considering the stadium can easily contain over 750,000 people, the number of bets made on a single match is astronomical. The commission ensures that summoners do their best rather than throw their matches, and the stronger one is the more likely people are to bet on you. The centaur is a muscly half-man, half-horse. The human part has curly brown hair and a wicked three-foot sword in both hands, the horse portion has a black mane and brown hair just like on its'' head. The kobold is a mangy looking dog-like humanoid with a short wooden club held in one hand, it doesn''t warrant much attention and it''s obvious this isn''t the main summon of Dave''s. When our eyes meet we nod in respect to each other before the announcer begins to speak. Everyone in the stadium can hear a voice saying, "Welcome once again to the colosseum, we are in for the 3rd match of the day between Dave and his centaur and kobold and our recent newcomer Thomas who placed 2nd in the Rising Stars Tournament with his ferocious hobgoblin and grim. Now look towards the arena as the ref begins the battle, remember only through forfeit, unconsciousness, or death will the match end." As soon as the ref shouts for us to start the match, Brutus separates from Jareth and heads towards the kobold at a fast pace not allowing much time for the kobold to think. His ebony canine form barrels towards the pint-sized summon, while Jareth stands his ground as the centaur charges towards him with its'' arms raised to strike down with the large sword in its'' hands. Jareth meets the oncoming weapon with an upward stroke of his own heavy weapon and a large ringing noise is made at the moment of impact. Jareth is forced back a few feet from the attack full of momentum, but after that, he remains even with the centaur as they vie for supremacy with each of their weapons unleashing devastating blows should they hit. They appear to be equal in skill and strength, as no attacks have gotten through yet and neither seem to be wearing down. The centaur has a height advantage standing at 7ft, but Jareth''s long limbs and uncanny strength negate the advantage. Brutus has begun to make some headway with the kobold as he continues to fake it out and wait for a hole in its'' defense before tearing into it. All the kobold can do is ward the grim off with its'' club, but this doesn''t last for long as Brutus charges in and rips the club out of the kobold''s grip. With its'' only weapon taken away, the kobold begins to back away while facing Brutus, but its'' retreat doesn''t last for long as he is knocked to the ground with teeth around its'' neck. Dave unsummons the kobold before anything serious happens to it, and suddenly it''s only the centaur and my summons left on the field. There seems to be an equal amount of cheering and booing going on after the kobold is taken from the field, I assume the ones booing are those who bet on Dave. The match doesn''t take much longer to finish as Brutus sneaks around from behind the centaur and hobbles one of its'' hind legs. With the centaur''s attention on the sudden pain, its'' guard is lowered and Jareth is able to knock away the sword loosely gripped in its'' hands. With its'' weapon taken away, there is no way the centaur can take on both summons and I have Jareth refrain from striking a finishing blow much to his annoyance. I had already sent a message to Brutus to only take hold of the leg and bite down on it rather than ripping it apart, there''s no need for me to do any extra damage to my fellow competitor, it would reflect poorly on me and make my future opponents more likely to try and injure or kill my summons. Dave calls out his defeat and the crowd roars in approval at the exciting match. After seeing how it went, I imagine that the centaur would have at least held its'' own if not won against Jareth, but with two summons fighting against it, there was no chance for it to display its'' strength. While Jareth may have tied or lost to it, Brutus probably would have won due to being faster than the summon and having more abilities to fool it and land a serious blow. With the match being announced in my favor, I recall both my summons after letting them gloat in their victory for a short while before going to shake Dave''s hand in recognition of the great fight he put up. He seems to hold no ill will and even has a smile on his face at the blood-pumping battle that just occurred. He says to me as we shake hands, "Thanks for not killing my summons even though you easily could have and would have been allowed to." I shake my head and reply, "It''s nothing to thank I have nothing against you and I only won this easily due to it being a double summon battle, had it been a regular match it would have been much tougher and maybe even ended in my defeat." We stop shaking at this point and head back to our respective tunnels to rest and then collect our match money. When I get to the betting booth to collect my earnings I get a smile and congratulations from the bookie before he has me scan my watch under the scanner to transfer the money over to my account. I thank the man and make my way out of the colosseum while checking my account. I notice that it went from 4,107 credits that I had painstakingly earned to 6,607 credits, with a message attached to the transaction. You collected 2,000 from bets on your battle, here''s an extra 500 for winning your first colosseum match, let us know when you''re ready to fight again. 16 Ch. 14- Hunting in the Marsh After my first official colosseum match, I celebrated at home with Mira and then took the next day off to relax and enjoy our new apartment. Mira and I played cards for most of the day after having "lost" the monopoly box, such a shame it''ll never be found. How will I possibly go on without it ;) ? Anyways, we enjoyed ourselves and lazed around, only to get out of the house to go eat dinner at a nice steak restaurant. Their special was a thorny deer steak covered in au jus with a side of mashed potatoes, totally worth every credit spent, and it was nice to treat Mira after all the things she''s done for me over the years. Now, I''m heading over to the gate, but I''m deviating from my usual plan. Instead, I''m heading over to the marsh South of the gate, which has stronger monsters that get as tough as tier 4. Although they are rare to encounter, there are a few residing at the very center in close but distinct territories. I haven''t yet encountered anyone in these hunting areas, because they are usually pretty massive and I go out of my way to avoid strangers when entering a zone. I don''t plan to change this, but I need to be especially careful, as those that enter the marsh are as strong or stronger than me. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. As Jareth, Brutus, and I plod our way South we notice the ground underneath us becoming wet until mud begins to appear and squelches underneath our feet unpleasantly. The stench isn''t terribly appealing either, as the stench of stagnant water and decaying plants is overwhelming, luckily that means monsters will have a harder time tracking us. The trees appear to be mostly mangroves with roots above ground like some sort of wooden octopus, and moss hangs everywhere from the branches and on the trunks. Some of the moss even glows occasionally, which was nice to look at until I realized that bugs attracted to the light were melted by some form of acid as soon as they touched the unassuming vegetation. Clearly this was a far more dangerous area meant for experienced summoners, and I only hoped that we were prepared enough for any dangers that might cross our path. The first monsters we come across were a pack of 6 filament dragonflies, they looked like tiny shards of metal flying around in the air with light glinting off of them any time they were exposed to the sun. Their entire body was had a hard exterior of metal and their wings were razor-sharp, and when groups of them would attack something their prey would end up looking like they were caught in a giant blender. 3 of them coordinate an attack against Jareth and zoom around him as he attempts to swat at them, 2 go for Brutus but one gets bitten at the start leaving him to deal with just 1. All that was required of him to finish off his foe was just waiting around for the remaining dragonfly to approach before lazily swiping his claws and ripping the head away from the rest of the body. 1 of the dragonflies veered towards me, but I first dodged it with my minor teleporting ability and then cut it down with my sword, which I had taken out at the start of the encounter. It was split in two with a lucky strike on its second time circling around me. Eventually, the metallic pests were taken care of after a few minor cuts on Jareth''s body, one gash on Brutus''s face from biting the first dragonfly, and surprisingly no wounds on myself despite being the weakest of the group. After sweeping the mangled bodies into my storage we continue walking along our muddy path. Storing away the 6 small bodies, our party continued on with relative ease only being occasionally set upon by the odd monster, by the time we had reached the 3rd tier area my summons and I had successfully managed to kill 16 monsters of average tier 2 strength. The only remarkable monster being a vile purple-colored poison toad. It had nearly managed to successfully poison Brutus by attempting to body slam him and smear his poisonous secretions all over him to be absorbed through his body, which would eventually kill my precious canine companion if not treated. Luckily, Brutus was smart enough to shadow travel away at the last second and dodge the lethal touch of the toad, he stayed away and allowed Jareth to confront the monster as he still had no means to attack something without some part his body. After that near run-in with a poison monster, we became extra careful about not touching any unknown monster, I informed them that the general rule is bright colors on a monster indicates poison, they use the coloring to ward off predators who would mistakenly try to make a meal out of them. The 3rd tier area of this swamp was infamous for having vicious redcap gnomes living about the area typically around groves of trees, where they would hide to ambush their prey. This tactic was especially effective due to their small stature and the thick roots of the mangrove trees they would hide behind. Those gnomes are infamous for being crazed creatures that desired blood more than anything else, and more often than not would charge headfirst towards an enemy in a blitz style attack just to make them bleed. Their body had evolved in such a way to give as many weapons to draw blood as possible, they had long hypodermic claws that were surprisingly sturdy and piranha-like teeth coated with an anticoagulant for tearing into prey and making them continuously bleed until the wound was washed out or they died, whichever came first. Luckily for us, they were especially susceptible to iron as a result of their fae-like origins and Jareth was able to easily handle them with his iron mace. Whenever he would swing his weapon at one, they would burn as if acid was poured on them as they went flying from the blow, needless to say, most never managed to get up for another attack. Also present were dryads that would control trees to try and drag their prey to a watery death, these monsters were especially avoided as they were dangerous to even groups and their control of the terrain gives them a distinct advantage that allows them to wipe out entire summoner groups if they are careless. Not to be forgotten, is the top predator within the swampy environment, the bristled boa. They were giant constricting snakes that in addition to being able to crush you, they had small spines all along their body that acted similar to a cat''s tongue and could be used to grind you to pieces if you are caught by one. It was a brutal way to go from what I had heard, I made sure to warn my summons and keep a proper distance from the moving sandpaper at all costs. Eventually, I got around to replacing Brutus with Emett so that the weaker summon could use the environment to its'' advantage. I had Emett remain in the back and shoot out globs of mud to catch prey or bullets of rock from his shell to injure and distract opponents. By the end of our massacre, they had managed to slay a total of 20 monsters with 8 of those being nasty little redcaps, and a further two being bristled boas that were luckily taken on individually. Emett seemed to be growing through these battles, at least skill-wise, and in the later battles, he began taking an active role rather than remaining as support. It was so adorable to see that little rocky body of his try so hard, and even sweeter was Brutus who acted as a big brother and tried to allow Emett to get as much experience as he could within controlled conditions. Unfortunately, Emett was a tier 2 monster at best, so against these tier 3 monsters, the most he could do is hamper or distract them unless he made a lucky shot, of which he only managed twice by hitting the eyes of some redcaps. Night came soon after and I decided that we had earned enough, and so our group set out north immediately in the hopes of making it back to the gate before dark. I had decided speed was of the essence as we really had stayed out for most of the day, so I unsummoned Emett and got onto Brutus''s back. By the time I got back and had gone through the gate into civilization, I was just in time for dinner. Unfortunately for my stomach, I first needed to go sell off my haul. With 16 tier 2 cores (four filament dragonfly cores were kept for Jareth) and 18 tier 3 cores (2 bristled boa cores being kept for Emet) the total ending up being 590 credits for the cores. After selling the bodies at the summoner association I ended up making 1,950 credits there. In total my daily earnings came out to a total of 2,540 credits, making my account blow up to a staggering 9,147. When all of my finances were finally taken care of I used Brutus to quickly get to my new apartment and see Mira. After a quick hug of joy at seeing me return alive, she began to gag at the smell clinging to me from the nasty smelling marsh. It seems I had gone nose blind to the smell and had forgotten how difficult at first it was to smell. To remedy that I went to take a shower and changed into some new non-smelly clothes, I was amazed to see the amount of mud come off of my body in the shower, there was mud in places I didn''t even know mud could get to. Once clean, I went to catch up with Mira in the living room and talk about our days. She began to talk about the newest potion she was working on and that her hope was that it would act as a general detoxifier for most common poisons. What she needed the most was poisonous monsters to synthesize an antidote, and her face when I told her about the most recent area I had begun hunting that was full of poisonous monsters was priceless, it was as if she had just won the lottery. 17 Ch. 15- Mr. Money Bags Today is finally Saturday, the day of the auction, and not just any auction, but the international auction that occurs once a month. This auction is huge and has far more stringent requirements to enter, not to mention the higher price tags on items, I''m afraid that if this was my first auction I might not have been able to afford anything worth buying. I hurriedly put on my best clothes and check for any stray dirt or stains on them, luckily keeping my clothes in storage prevents anything happening to them as soon as they are stored. Putting on my best clothes is to give as good of an impression as I can, social standing may not play a super important role in today''s society, but there is no point in looking like a bum and closing off potential avenues to yourself. To finish off the outfit I take out my old wolf coat and wear it over my shirt, luckily it didn''t get damaged during the few times I used it and looks fairly respectable, plus I was looking for any excuse to wear it again. Kissing Mira on the cheek and saying goodbye to her as I rush out the door, I begin heading towards the city center in order to secure a seat before the masses begin pouring in even if it means waiting longer. The auction house can only hold so many people, and once the seats are full no others are admitted unless they have a special invitation, which only the wealthiest or strongest summoners receive. They try to combat the number of people entering the auction house by setting the admittance price at 500 credits rather than the usual 100, at this point I have no trouble paying that amount with much more leftover in my account. Crossing down the street I see a middle-aged and balding vendor selling wonderful smelling croissants and go to buy two of them for myself, both of mine are chocolate filled and I enjoy the indulgently sweet and flaky pastry as I continue on my way. By the time I get to the auction around 10 AM with two hours to go till the auction officially begins, there is already a line formed of people eagerly waiting to enter the special auction. Most people are let through, but there is the occasional unlucky person who seems to not have known about the price hike of the admission, they are left to walk away ashamed at getting turned away at such a public venue full of prominent people. I don''t really pay much mind to all of this going around me and after getting in line I begin to daydream about all of the possible things that will be for sale or I could buy. From what I''ve heard tier 3 items are the cheapest things sold and the auction focuses on selling either extremely rare, powerful, or useful items, bodies, cores, weapons, and accessories. I get to my seat and begin to wait for the auction to start rather than mingling with strangers that I don''t know nor do I care to know most of them. I''m surprised to learn that rather than having the physical items present for the auction, since it is, after all, an international auction full of rarities from across the continent, the items are shown as a hologram on stage for people from all over to bid on. They begin the auction with lower-tier cores and after finding nothing that particularly interests me or that I''m willing to spend money on, I tune out the announcer until he moves on to the armor. What really catches my attention after a seemingly endless supply of tier 3 armor that was of decent quality but nothing special, is the sale of a fire-wyrm hide set. Wyrms are around the top of the tier 3 monster food chain, so its armor would be exceptional especially with the fire-resistant effect as a result of its elemental alignment. I decide to upgrade my current tier 2 armor with a far better top of the tier 3 category set that has an elemental resistance effect as well. I begin to bid fervently as soon as the announcer starts the bidding at 500 credits, not caring for the price I continue to raise it despite the disgruntled looks from a few of my competitors. Eventually, I manage to win it after placing a bid of 1,820 credits for the extravagant armor, the only reason I was able to win this set at this type of auction was that it was of a lower-tier than most of the richer people attending would want to buy. Even then, the extravagant price in the quadruple digits was making my heart hurt despite still having more than enough to buy other items. Now really wasn''t the time to hold back on potentially life-saving items due to price, it wouldn''t matter how much money you had saved up if you weren''t alive to spend it. It seemed they were going by item type rather than tier like normal, as increasingly extravagant armors were being shown off and bought for extravagant prices, there was even at the end of the armor auction a few sets of tier 5 dragonhide armor made from the same dragon for around 100,000 credits. There seemed to be something special about the dragon they were made from, but it was so out of reach for me that I didn''t bother to pay attention to it any further than staring at the extravagant looking scaled armor and the giant price tag underneath it. After those pricy pieces were sold off through vigorous bidding wars for each one, it was time for the weapons to be rolled out. I was especially excited for this as I felt that Jareth was growing strong enough to handle more than one weapon and with the four-armed hobgoblin core I fed him, my hope was that he would be able to handle even more or at least swing each with the full force of a two-armed being. Like usual, the beginning weapons were brought out and aside from them being tier 3, there wasn''t anything terribly special about them. Only when it continued to progress further and pseudo tier 4 weapons were brought out did I being to pay attention. A few gimmicky type weapons like a taser sword made from the tail of a socket lizard, and an exploding boomerang of all things made from a charge beetle that acted like an IED and would suicide bomb anything threatening their queen. These seemed cool, but not worth spending money on as they didn''t suit me at all, one thing I''ve taken away from summoner school was our old weapons teacher telling us that the best weapon wasn''t necessarily the most powerful, but the one that suited us most. Anyways, I wasn''t buying a weapon for myself, but for Jareth and he was the type to use heavy weapons. What eventually caught my eye was a special Warhammer that had the added feature of increasing or lowering gravity for a second at a time, which was plenty enough to do some serious damage by activating right before impact. It was made from a fusion of platinum veins running through a large grey bone from a density mammoth, the platinum came to a point at the top of the hammer with little spikes studded out from the largest and heaviest part of each face of the hammer. The vision of Jareth spinning like a top with his iron mace in one hand and the Warhammer in the other crushing everything within reach was too powerful to deny and so I began to furiously bid for the weapon. It seems I wasn''t the only one to sense the potential of the weapon, as I got into a fierce bidding war with a 40-year-old man who looked like he had enough muscles in his arms to crush a steel ingot with his bare hands. Eventually, I won the bidding war by paying 3,050 credits, the older man seemed especially heartbroken at losing out on such a wonderful weapon, but it seemed like he was saving his money for something even better since he gave up despite probably having more funds judging by his apparent strength. After that intense weapons sale, things calmed down up until the potions and other alchemy related items were brought in to be auctioned off. Alchemic items were rare enough to mostly be sold in auctions, but the items being sold today were of good or amazing quality with no question as to their effectiveness. The auction would never tarnish its'' reputation just to foist off counterfeit or defective goods. Because potions and like were typically sold during these auctions nearly exclusively, there was usually a decent stock of all but the rarest of potions. Each type from lowest to highest grade was rolled out and sold until all stocks were cleared. I happened to be able to snatch a potion of rage, it would cause the consumer to enter a berserker like rage for an hour, all attacks will be 30% less effective on wearer at the cost of some stamina and they would deal 1.5 times the damage they would normally. It sold for 1000 credits even, it was one of the more rare potions and had a great effect that lasted for quite a while which is why the price was so high. I had it in mind for the coming monster break and figured it would be perfect for the lumbering hobgoblin of mine along with his new Warhammer. With this potion, I should be able to greatly increase my contribution points during the break as well as be able to select from a larger variety of monsters to potentially bond with. The next alchemical item I bought was a healing salve for moderate cuts and wounds, the jar I bought cost 2,600 credits due to its efficacy as a potentially life-saving salve that can be reused. People were chomping at the bit to get a single jar of healing salve, as a result of the high demand I was only able to afford one of the lower end salves. If you think that the price is too high, imagine that you are wounded in the middle of a fight or on a battlefield, by using a bit of this you can recover from most wounds as long as they aren''t immediately deadly and not too much damage has been done to a vital organ, that effect alone is worth it. It helps preserve strength and allows you and your summons to recover quicker so as to not be caught by an enemy while you are weakened. It''s by no means a cure-all, but the effectiveness of the jar makes it worth keeping on you for any potential emergencies. Once the potions and other medicinal items were sold off the next things to hypothetically roll out were supplemental items for evolution. This was of interest for everyone, because having a summon evolve not only increased the summons'' strength, but their own as well. The only problem is that these supplements are for very specific types of summons or for directing a summons towards a specific evolution. The thing I bought ended up in the latter category, I ended up buying a humanoid effigy that if assimilated with a summon would direct its growth towards a humanoid form on its'' next evolution. This was meant for Emit and only sold for 500 credits due to the comparatively weak effect of the item that was only useful to a select few summoners. Luckily this item was very useful for me even if others didn''t necessarily see it that way, and its'' lack of demand allowed me to save on credits. Even though I had a fair amount of money at this point in time, it didn''t mean that my habit of saving where I could, would automatically go away. I was so used to living off of next to no money that the amount I had now seemed surreal, which in some respects made it easier to spend as it never really felt like mine despite me and my summons having risked life and limb for it. The reason for these international auctions to be held is to allow summoners to receive unique or powerful items to boost their strength in order to further chances of surviving the coming monster break. Monster breaks had become a unique opportunity for wealth, power, and fame, but on the other side of the coin, they are an event full of death and peril that could claim anyone''s life at a moment''s notice if they aren''t strong enough. Summoners like me who are just starting out or are relatively weak are usually the most vulnerable, those too weak to survive would be culled, and those that remained would become strong as a result of their experience. Summoners aren''t just mercenaries hunting monsters in the wild, they are also soldiers fighting to preserve humanity from extinction, they serve as the only thing between civilians and the monsters bent on exterminating them. This is why they get preferential treatment and are revered in society, on the flip side most of them don''t act purely out of altruism, but the result is the same nonetheless. Summoners are rich because the prices they sell monsters and monster cores for is unusually high, it serves as motivation to cull monsters and so that they can afford the equipment necessary for a summoner. It is an expensive occupation and most of the money earned goes right back into their job in some form, but by risking their lives they are allowed luxuries most civilians could never dream of. After having bought the effigy, which looked like a voodoo doll made from husks of some kind of special plant, I decided that I''ve spent enough money and have likely seen everything that I''m either interested in or could afford. So, I move from my comfortable seat in the back and head over to the transaction counter in the front foyer to pay for the items I bid for and won. In total I spent 8,970 credits, leaving me completely shocked at what I had just spent, my account was now down to just 177 credits. I was glad I had been keeping track of how much I was spending throughout the auction, otherwise, I might have not been able to afford what I had just bid on and been left in a difficult situation. It was frankly amazing what I had come to be able to afford in such a small amount of time, considering just a few weeks ago I was living off of 20 credits a week, but now I could make far more than that amount in just one day of hunting. I left the auction with some rather powerful and unique items in my storage and couldn''t wait to try some of them out. I felt far better about my odds of survival during the monster break now that I was more prepared than ever with items that would increase my strength or potentially preserve my life. It was around dinner time when I left the auction house, and after picking up some stir fry for dinner I went to see Mira and eat with her. We enjoyed a nice meal while I talked about what I had seen at the auction and moaned about how much I had spent and how empty my account was compared to what it used to be. She only laughed at me whining about "only" having 177 credits when I had never even gotten close to having that amount of money before I had become a summoner. 18 Ch. 16- Emett Becomes a Golem After successfully bankrupting myself at the auction yesterday, I decided that now would be a good time to try and evolve Emett with the effigy I bought. He was currently a tier 1 summon but bordering the minimum requirements of a tier 2, and has very little capability in his current blob form aside from throwing projectiles at enemies. My hope is that by becoming humanoid he would be able to use his hard earthen body to his advantage and actually fight monsters. Not to mention that with limbs he would be able to learn some basic fighting skills eventually, though I doubt that will happen anytime soon considering how low his intelligence currently is. It''ll likely take one or two more evolutions before he gets to that point, and if he continues to grow larger it likely won''t matter at that point. He''ll become an immovable wall of stone capable of grappling or stomping on anything in his path. That was my hope at least, but there was a long way till we get to that point considering he is a little round blob still. Having Emett fighting under harsh conditions in the outer area of the swamp against tier 2 monsters will hopefully allow him to advance. I chose the swamp rather than going back to the forest, because the muddy conditions of the environment gives him an advantage as he can collect mud from the ground to throw as a projectile rather than thinning out his own body to throw things. I have Jareth on standby to intervene if Emett becomes overwhelmed, it would defeat the point if Emett was to temporarily die while trying to evolve, all of that work would have gone down the drain. Before we begin battling, I set out the tier 3 golem core I bought at the previous auction as well as the effigy for Emett to assimilate with. For Jareth, I give him a filament dragonfly core to bolster his metallic defense even further. I know that Emett is ready to evolve not only because he has indicated as much through our bond, but because he has finally stopped growing and has become the size of a beach ball rather than the soccer ball he started out as. It''s a funny sight to see such a large rocky blob slink around in front of me acting all serious despite his initially harmless appearance, but looks can be deceiving. All Emett really needed at this point was difficult battles to kickstart his evolution. It seemed that no matter how many cores you fed a monster they wouldn''t evolve if they weren''t at a certain level of fighting ability. It must be a Darwinian trait, as a weak evolved monster would be in more danger from stronger enemies than if they remained as they were. We set out to find some tier 2 monsters to pit him against as they were the only type of monsters in the marsh that he stood a chance of defeating, tier 3 or even worse tier 4 monsters were still far out of his reach for now. Of course, I wouldn''t allow him to fight without some fallback plan, and so I had Jareth out to sit at the sidelines of any fight to ensure Emett''s safety in case of more than one monster or the monster he was facing became too much to handle. I had high hopes for Emett after having gained more fighting experience from his recent hunting bout with Brutus, and so I didn''t plan on needing Jareth to intervene, but better to have a bodyguard and not need them than to need one and not have one. We started off facing a few more redcaps which were only scary in swarms against a single opponent. With Jareth nearby to take care of the majority of the pack, Emett was left to battle against two of them. Luckily his rocky carapace protected him from their sharp nails and teeth. The battle was over pathetically quickly as two stones shot out from Emett and hit the bloodthirsty pests point-blank in the face. It seemed one solid hit to the brain was enough to put them out of commission if not kill them, and just to make sure I took my sword and stabbed each through the heart as they lay on the ground. I was more than happy to put the remains of 6 redcaps into my storage and continue looking for fights. Seeing how easy those particular monsters were, we decided to go looking for more hardy monsters that could take a hit or two to see how my earth slime would fare. Ironically we got exactly what we wanted, maybe more so than Emett was prepared for. The next monster we came across was an iron-scaled newt that typically frequented moist environments, so it''s no surprise that one was here. Emett seemed to do just fine against the redcaps, which were monsters focused on speed and offense, but a defensive monster was a whole ''nother beast. They couldn''t be taken out with a chunk of rock hitting them, in fact all that would do is make it mad or at the very least irritate it. I knew shooting rocks at the newt would do nothing, its'' metal hide would prevent any damage aside from some bruising, but I decided to let Emett figure that out for himself. I wanted to see just how he would react to this type of monster, and whether he could adapt to defeat it. Even I didn''t know all of Emett''s capabilities, so I was leaving it to him to try and figure out something that would be effective against the newt. Providing an answer to his problem now might help him immediately, but it could hurt him in the long run if he doesn''t develop the ability to think for himself while in battle. The only upside to this matchup was that the newt didn''t have many offensive abilities and the ones it did have were relatively basic. Its'' two main attacks were swipes from its'' sharp claws and hitting things with its'' dense metal tail. The claws would do next to nothing, but the tail would be something to watch out for as the weight behind the attack was nothing to scoff at, but as long as it didn''t break through Emett''s outer shell and damage his core everything would be fine. As the silver reptile made its'' way over to our group, Jareth and I took a step back to let Emett step up to the plate as it were. The newt wasted no time in attacking as it launched itself from the tree it was on over to Emett with its'' claws outstretched for a slashing attack. The outer layer of rocks kept the damage from the attack to a minimum with only a few scratches to be seen on some of the rocks and gouges made in the mud in between all of the rocks. Luckily with mud all around us, Emett was able to resupply himself with mud a few moments later until no damage could be seen on him. The monster wasn''t discouraged by this and continued moving around and slashing every now and then to test Emett and see his capabilities before committing further to attacking. Emett decided there was no point in remaining passive and so began to shoot out a few rocks when the newt was farther away to test it out as well. After a while of this war of ineffective attrition, both combatants came to the conclusion that maintaining the status quo wouldn''t do anything but prolong the battle. So they both moved in on each other to try and do as much damage as they could within a short amount of time. The newt seemed to be going for quantity of attacks rather than quality, as Emett would recover from any wounds if given enough time, and calling them wounds was a little much for the tiny amount of damage they actually did to him. One thing to be said about slimes is that they were especially hardy creatures that could recover from anything should their core remain intact and with enough resources to replenish themselves, and with Emett being an earth slime all the resources he could ever need were at his feet. Emett seemed to realize his attacks were just as ineffective against the metallic monster, and so he began to try and mimic the lizard by using his tendrils to lash at it up close since projectiles weren''t doing anything. The lashes were denting the hide armor of the monster, but not breaking it as he had hoped, so Emett dropped that attack and began to try and think of something that would pierce the resistant hide. After stopping completely to think while relying on his so far impervious defense, Emett gave the newt a long enough amount of time to set up and use its'' seemingly ultimate attack. The newt swung its body around and its tail followed with a hard strike that actually pierced the slime''s hide due to the appendage being straightened out like a spear at the last moment. This caused Emett to cry out in pain, but luckily it seems like his core was unharmed as he wasn''t dead yet. Unlike the other wounds he had received so far, this one wasn''t healing nearly as quickly, indicating that some real damage had been done. At this point, I was ready to step in and let Emett recover before trying to fight another monster, but as if sensing my intentions, the slime sent through our bond that he felt that he would be able to take the lizard on and to not interfere. I obliged my hard-working summon and waved Jareth off from stepping in between the two, which he obeyed despite seeming confused at the order. It seems that last major attack was the inspiration needed for Emett to come up with another attack that might just work against the newt. Because, the next time they came around and clashed, Emett stuck out a sharp and stiff tendril right in the path of the overconfident reptilian. It seems that after any attacks against it being ineffective and having that last attack breakthrough, the monster had become emboldened and recklessly charged the slime. Unfortunately for the monster, that extra inertia from the charge was exactly what was needed for Emett''s spear-like tendril to pierce through its'' hide and run it through starting at the neck. To no one''s surprise, that last attack was more than the newt could recover from and it quickly bled out from a busted artery while still being skewered on Emett. I went over and congratulated the victorious slime and even had to ask him how he managed to get through the tough hide of the monster when previous attempts were ineffective. Emett''s reply was to stick out another tendril just like the one he had made earlier, and when I touched it all I felt was hardened rock rather than the squish I associated with the jelly-like inner body of the slime. It appeared that Emett had managed to harden his pointed tendril, creating a make-shift spear. I was ecstatic that Emett had not only discovered a new ability, but he was also able to overcome his opponent by imitating their attack. This showed intelligence and a capability to learn that would be important for future battles that might not be as low stakes as this one was with backup in place to intervene if necessary. There wouldn''t always be summons in place to ensure safety while battling, so it was important to gain ass much experience as possible under supervision so no fatal mistakes would be made when it mattered. After gloating for a moment, Emett slid over to the lizard body that he had discarded in order to celebrate and began to dig through the corpse until a core was taken out. After receiving my approval to eat the core, he began to enjoy his victory treat which was made all the sweeter for him due to having earned it by himself against a tough opponent. As I had suspected, as soon as the core had finished dissolving Emett began to glow the bright golden color I had come to associate with evolution. His form began to get lost in the bright glow and all I could make out was the sounds of stones shifting against each other and a change of shape in his outline. As this was going on, a few specks of light would filter over to me and absorb into my chest, with each addition of light I felt an increased amount of stamina and also felt that I could withstand more damage or heal quicker. That wasn''t the only thing to be transmitted, I also felt that I had another skill thanks to Emett''s newly discovered ability. When I tried it out I felt my body become stiffer but also much harder as well, it seems that I had gained the skill to harden my skin and further my defense for a short period of time at the sacrifice of speed and flexibility. This could be a potentially life-saving skill against an inevitable attack aimed at me. When the evolution had finished and the light had subsided, what was standing in the place of the amorphous slime was a mini golem about 3 ft high and 1.5 ft wide. It seems like the effigy had worked and rather than grow larger, Emett had grown permanent limbs and a head that had the impression of eyes and a mouth. What surprised me even more, was when those impressions on his face moved. It seemed that my rotund little summon had grown a face along with his limbs, and hopefully in the future, he would be able to speak. His outer coating was made up of smooth sections of marble or some other type of white rock, and in between all of that was some sort of mud or dirt, there was no slime to speak of. It seemed the biggest change of Emett was his race rather than form, as he was now a completely different type of summon. This is more than I could have asked for and it meant that his evolutionary pathway was much broader now, as slimes had little potential and would usually just grow larger or take on a minor affinity while remaining a slime. The race change also appeared to be the reason for his diminutive stature, as most of the energy was spent shaping and changing Emett rather than making him grow bigger like my other summons had done when they evolved. 19 Ch. 17- Battle Practice for Eme Figuring there would be no better time to acclimate to his new form, I had Emett continue hunting with Jareth on standby, but this time we began to make our way over to the middle area where tier 3 monsters lived. I didn''t want him to gain a new form and not know how to use it, especially with the monster break coming up so soon. So to start off, I had Jareth practice with Emett and allow him to get a feel for his new body, what they did was more akin to play wrestling than a spar, but both seemed to be enjoying it. Emett''s limbs were long and mobile enough for him to grab and hold onto a limb, it wouldn''t work against something large like a torso, but it would be just fine to grapple with a monster or person. He also had 3 little fingers on each hand that seemed to work like claws and the amount of pressure he could use with them was insane for his body size. Solid rocks were being crushed when we had him squeeze them, and I imagine bones would be the same. I almost feel sorry for anything unlucky enough to get caught in his grasp. If he caught a hold of you with his arms there wasn''t much you could do to remove him, he didn''t seem to tire at all as long as he was in contact with the ground and despite his diminutive frame he was insanely heavy. By the time both my summons were done practicing, Emett had learned how to properly hold or wrestle something. This was perfect for his style of fighting seeing as he was a moving tank with unlimited stamina, his only drawback was a lack of speed but that wasn''t too much of a problem against most opponents. It seemed he also retained the ability to change his shape to some degree as a result of having a fluid inner shell of mud, not to mention that with his hardening ability he could turn himself into a weapon and so had no real need for one. Once they were done I decided to try and test my summoning limits and bring Brutus out to see how long I could maintain 3 summons. After summoning him, I realized just how much more mental energy I''ve developed from constant summoning, as it didn''t seem nearly as difficult to maintain as I remembered. After thinking about it, I realize that isn''t the only factor, as the energy strain lessened when Emett transformed and became noticeably more intelligent than in the past. It seems the skills of humanoid monsters weren''t the only reason they were so coveted. Figuring that since Brutus is out, I might as well let him and Emett spar and see how he does against a much faster and animal-like opponent. With experimenting out of the way, I was hoping to come across some moderate or weak tier 3 monsters for Emett to gain actual experience with. Not to mention I was excited to see just what my newly formed golem summon was truly capable of. It didn''t take long for my wish to come true as the next monsters we come across were as convenient as they were disturbing. 3 bloated swamp zombies emerged from a murky pond as soon as they sensed us. I had Jareth and Brutus keep 2 of them occupied for now without killing them, and allowed Emett to challenge the lone one. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. Humanoid zombies are usually created from any summoners who died while in the monster plane, but not every summoner was transformed after death, no one really knew just why some turned and others didn''t. Unfortunately, the bodies of the zombies were worthless and the usual protocol was to bury the bodies after making sure the brain was destroyed so they wouldn''t rise again, they didn''t even have cores to harvest since they weren''t born/created as monsters originally and were animated by something else. These zombies were especially slow due to all of the water bogging them down and all that was required of Emett was to position himself so that he could capture a leg before the zombie could reach him. Once the leg had been secured, in a brutal display of strength, Emett crushed the leg and bones within in a sickening bear hug. The zombie already didn''t have great balance and once its'' leg was taken out it fell to the ground and began to crawl towards me as the closest living thing in its'' vicinity. Before it could make much headway, Emett lumbered over and stomped down on the head effectively killing it, albeit in a stomach-churning way. I had Brutus and Jareth let the two contained zombies go so that Emett could try his hand against multiple opponents. He seemed to be able to shrug off the unnatural strength of the zombies and systematically mangled and crushed them until they were no longer a threat. Feeling a little bad about using former humans as combat practice, I had Brutus dig out a deep hole and placed all three zombies within, we pushed the mud/dirt back in the hole and then placed a large stone as a makeshift gravestone. I paid my respects to the fallen humans and then continued on through the marsh. It was beginning to grow dark and so we decided to find one last monster for Emett to fight before heading back for the day. Staying within the tier 3 area of the marsh, we eventually had a monster come to us rather than requiring us to find it. If not for Brutus''s excellent senses we might have been caught unaware by the expert assassin that is the bristled boa, it was slithering from tree to tree heading towards the living creatures it had sensed. Seeing this as the perfect opportunity for Emett to really challenge himself against something he couldn''t so easily capture, we allowed him to step up and face the recently discovered reptile. Like all bristled boas it seemed to have a fur coating of white barbs flowing down the majority of its body aside from the head. The snake was around 15 feet long and had the circumference of a dinner plate, it seemed to rely on keeping a slimmer body to allow it to move quickly and tear apart its'' prey. The abrasive spines weren''t too much of a worry for Emett with his stony defense, but how he would manage this monster was still unknown to me. He seems to have learned from his fight against Brutus that a speedy opponent was best fought by immobilizing or slowing it down. He threw globs of mud that hardened upon contact at the snake with most missing, but a few lucky shots hit their mark and made it much harder to move around as effectively. Seeing as there was an unlimited amount of mud at Emett''s feet within the swampy environment, there wasn''t a worry that he would run out of ammo any time soon. After a few more globs were thrown and the snake was moderately contained, Emett decided to fight up close with the bristled predator. He went towards the head, but right before he was in range, the boa wrapped around him with the sections that either weren''t hit by the mud or had broken free from their earthen prison. A horrible grating sound was heard as the reptile attempted to rend apart the golem, but not much luck was had as the hardened mud and rock proved to be a bit too tough to tear apart with friction, after realizing this the snake attempted to crush Emett with its'' powerful coils. Aside from a bit of creaking, nothing the snake could do would crush the earthen golem. Before the snake could escape to try and attack some other way, Emett took his only unbound hand and after hardening it, he jabbed it into the upper section of coils wrapped around him. He had made his hands point straight out into a knife-hand and pierced straight through the abrasive monster, it seems the spines were its'' only real defense and against something so difficult to damage like the stone coating of Emett''s there wasn''t much it could do. The snake had hissed out in pain and did its best to escape before any more damage could be done to it, unfortunately for it, Emett wasn''t very keen to let it go. He grabbed onto the snake with his other now free hand and dragged the snakes head closer and closer to him before securing the snake''s head in a vice grip and literally squeezing the life out of it. I was equal parts shocked and impressed by the usefulness of Emett''s transformation. Stowing the body and core away in my storage, I unsummoned Emett and Jareth and began to ride Brutus out of the marsh and back into civilization. My first stop, as usual, was to sell off the cores I had gained. Placing the few cores I had retrieved from today''s effort I only made 95 credits, which was a pittance of what I usually earn. I, however, wasn''t disappointed by the amount of money as Emett''s evolution was much more important than any measly sum made from one day''s effort. Him being stronger would net me far more money in the future than had I not taken the time to evolve him and just hunt like normal. When I made it to the Summoner Association I immediately head over to Max''s corner I go and greet the usually stoic man, "What''s going on Max?". He just looks over to me with weary eyes and says, "Everyone seems to be working extra hard to hunt monsters before the break, and as a result, everyone at the association is having to work overtime. I was scheduled to get off at 5, but it''s already 7 and it still doesn''t seem to be slowing down anytime soon." Looking around I take notice of all the people within the building and note that there are almost twice as many people as usual. Realizing I''m one of the people holding him up from going home I sheepishly begin to take out the few corpses of the day which were 6 redcaps, an iron-scale newt, and a bristled boa that was rather mangled. The bodies came out to a total of 135 credits, the boa mas mangled too badly to be worth much, and the redcaps had little use aside from cashing in as monster bounties, the only monster body of any actual worth was the newt and since it was a tier 2 even that amount wasn''t much. 20 New Schedule Star No content 21 Ch. 18- Monster Break Preparation (Mira''s POV) The Monster Break has finally come, at noon today the planar gate will be opened to monsters and any in the surrounding areas will be attracted to it through some sort of homing beacon or something of the like. Despite having witnessed the phenomenon multiple times, humanity still has no remote clue as to how it happens, we''ve just chalked it up to magic or the powers of the deity and left it at that. It really doesn''t matter, because from what I''ve heard is that nothing can stop it until it turns off by itself after 6 hours. I''m a civilian, so it''s not really my job to worry about this type of thing, but I can''t help but worry about it not only out of concern for my own safety but for Thomas who will be fighting with the other summoners today. I''m currently being guided along with the rest of the civilians in our middle sector in the south area of the city to the monster break shelter, it was created after the many civilian casualties that occurred during the first monster break when monsters managed to make it past the fighting summoners and through the gate. They rampaged and wiped out any human or building they came across, they were only stopped after enough summoners were able to get away from the battle in the monster plane and cross over to ours and slay them, unfortunately, this was about 2 hours later and the damage was immense. I still remember hiding in our dingy apartment located in the outer sector terrified that the monsters would sense and kill us. It seems the only good thing that came out of being poor is that we were far away from the gate and the subsequent monsters that managed to get through and go on a killing spree. The inner sectors were devastated, and as a result, the shelters were made a priority to prevent anything like that ever happening again or at least on such a scale. It seems similar things happened within the other continental cities and they had similar ideas to help preserve the safety of their many civilians. The shelter I''m in front of is similar to that of a nuclear shelter with thick steel encasing the entire outside frame and door to prevent monsters from getting through. There were many panicked women and children along with the occasional civilian man in line, the women and children were given priority as they were considered humanity''s future and would be able to bolster our population and as a result, our fighting force as well. I was no less freaked out, but I hid it well and tried to reassure some of the panicked children near me that seemed to not have any parent nearby, they were either orphans or their parents were summoners fighting off the monster hordes. The scanner was necessary not only to keep track of who was in the shelter and where they could be found but also so that no available summoner could hide as fighting during the break was mandatory for anyone signed up with the association. It was a harsh but mandatory rule that served to ensure that as many people as possible were fighting off the monsters, thus reducing the chances of monsters breaking through and causing destruction and mayhem. I eventually found a wall to sit down and lean back on and just began to pray to the deity that had changed our lives forever that Thomas would make it through this coming battle safe. I would wish for the safety of everyone fighting for those who couldn''t, but that was unrealistic and I figure it would be best to save my prayers for those I truly cared about, which at this point was only Thomas. I knew he was strong after seeing his tier 3 summons and him nearly winning that tournament, but I couldn''t help but worry. After all, there were many summoners stronger than him who had perished due to bad luck or a strong monster on the chaotic battlefield. I have even heard that there are a few tier 4 and 5 monsters that come out, their presence is always devastating and usually requires multiple strong summoners to bring down. Not to mention that Thomas is still a relatively new summoner whereas other summoners who have been summoners since the beginning have years of experience and have had a much longer period of time to grow strong. The increasing strength of each monster break doesn''t reassure me either, but I try not to dwell too much on it and just continue to hope for my brother''s safety, after all, he''s the only family I have left. (Thomas''s POV) The alarm had rung at 8 this morning alerting that all summoners registered with the association were to report to the gate in preparation for the monster break starting at noon. The extra time was needed to organize the few millions of summoners available and get them registered before going through the gate. The registration was to ensure that summoners were accounted for otherwise they would be considered as a deserter and any further business with the association would be cut off, which means no buying or selling of any summoner related goods. This was incentive enough for any summoner to participate in the monster break despite the danger, not to mention that us summoners were the only ones capable of keeping our family, friends, and neighbors from being wiped out by monsters. The other reason is that when scanned, our watch would keep track of our merits, and each monster killed during the break would be worth a certain amount of points that could be exchanged for prizes or lottery spins at the core exchange. The lottery was set in place by the deity as an incentive for participating in the monster break before the association was created, and these points could be traded in for guaranteed prizes at the association. Additionally, the merit points could be transferred and there would be plenty willing to buy those points, it was a win-win for everyone as long as they survived. I was dressed in my new fire-wyrm hide armor set and had my bandolier and sword set out on my body in preparation for the battle to come. I was lined up along with the other summoners in the city, with many in groups working alongside those they knew or were familiar with, I was alone as I had always fought alone and didn''t know many people. Looking around at how many people were in groups working together it seemed like I might need to find others to team up with in the future to either ensure survival or take down stronger monsters. I put the thought to the back of my mind for a later time and began to mentally prepare myself for this challenging trial. I had a general idea of what to expect, but I knew the real thing would be far different from the image that I had in my head. Despite the insane amount of people waiting to pass through the gate, my turn to scan in and pass through the gate came about 30 minutes after getting in line. At the direction of the association members organizing the summoners through the gate, I scanned myself in and walk through the gate. The sight that I saw after passing through the gate was incredible, there were rows and rows of people spread out in every direction from the gate. Monsters would be coming from all over, so it made sense to spread out summoners like this, not to mention that the sheer amount of people present would require an insane amount of space to fight. This isn''t even taking into consideration their summons that hadn''t been summoned yet. Everyone was saving as much energy as possible and would wait to bring out their summons until the last few minutes before the monster hordes came charging at noon. There was no real sense of organization between these summoners aside from groups of people gathering likely due to working together normally. I decided to make my way from the gate towards the northern area where most beginning summoners would be stationed. This was the direction facing the forest full of the weakest monsters, but even then the sheer amount of monsters would be a challenge, there also wasn''t any rule that a stronger monster wouldn''t emerge from this direction. I just had to hope for the best and pray that I didn''t come across any monster I couldn''t handle. I eventually settled into the middle section of the northern side of the gate, I would be sent into battle after around 2 hours to fill in for the summoners fighting at the front, but I could go in sooner if there were too many monsters for the current summoners to handle. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. This was the only type of organization that occurred between summoners during the break, no person could fight straight for 6 hours and there wouldn''t be enough room for everyone to fight at once. I was also thinking about how I would store all the monsters in my storage and settled on only storing tier 3 monsters or higher. Thinking about storage, I realized I would need as much space as possible and decided to dump all of my current credits into extra storage space. I currently had 32 cubic meters of space and with my credit count at 407 credits I could get an extra 16 cubic meters, so I dumped all of my credits in and made my storage expand to 48 cubic meters and leaving me with a measly 7 credits. All that was left was to wait until the break began, and so I sat down where I had been standing to conserve as much energy as possible for the upcoming battle. I had only just sat down and the waiting was already killing me, I didn''t know how everyone managed to tolerate the agony of doing nothing before an intense fight like the one I knew was coming. Looking around once more, it seems like people were either by their lonesome and brooding or checking their equipment for the 100th time, or they were joking with others in a concerned tone despite the light subject matter. It seems like I wasn''t the only one who couldn''t stop worrying about the battle, I just hoped that I would make it out alive and that no monsters got through to attack the defenseless civilians within the city shelters. I''ll summon out Jareth and Brutus when the time is closer, I had a few things to equip Jareth with before the battle and I needed to go over basic strategy with them before the battle began. Conserving physical and mental energy was the most important thing to focus on during the battle as it was a test of endurance as much as it was one of strength. I was planning on saving Emett for the beginning of the battle and the end of it. Having him work tirelessly throughout the long battle and helping with the clean up would be no problem since stamina wasn''t an issue for him as long as there was earth for him to stand on. 22 Ch. 19- Monster Break Pt.1First Wave As time passes and it comes closer and closer to battle time, eventually it becomes 11:30 and I decide to summon out Jareth to give him his equipment for the tough battle ahead. He seems to sense the tense atmosphere and becomes excited at the mere thought of a battle. I smile at the antics of this battle maniac before reigning in my amusement and telling Jareth, "There''s going to be a very dangerous war soon, when I summon you, later on, I want you to drink this potion. It will make you stronger for an hour and I want you to kill as many monsters as possible while remaining reasonably close to me. I also have a few pieces of equipment to give you as a preemptive gift for the coming fight." I hand him a small pouch with the potion of rage inside, which he ties to the waist of his ragged pants. Luckily, it seems with his evolution his equipment that he came with advanced with him and he was no longer in his tiny scrap of cloth trying to pass for a loincloth. Along with the 1,000 credit potion, I give him my set of tier 2 armor for additional safety, as he is the only one of my summons who could possibly wear it. His skin may protect him from most attacks from lower-tier monsters, but it won''t hurt to have extra protection when there will be an insane amount of monsters to continuously battle. I help him equip the leather armor, and aside from the sleeves being a bit short due to his lanky but impressively strong arms, the rest of it fits quite well after a few adjustments. He already was an imposing figure, but seeing him looking like a real warrior brought a shiver to my spine at the terrifying figure he made. Along with the armor, I also handed him the gravity warhammer I had won at the international auction recently. We hadn''t had a good time for him to practice with it, so I had kept it with me till now. What was originally a two-handed weapon became an oversized one-handed weapon of destruction, Jareth was barely straining to hold it up and seemed like he would have no problem continuously fighting with it. He now held his iron mace in his non-dominant left hand and held the warhammer in his right hand while resting it against his shoulder. He looked ready to deal some serious damage, his bloodthirsty smile, and eyes that gleaned with killing intent only served to increase that impression. His demeanor wasn''t far off from how he looked as he was practically vibrating with intent to test out his new toys on some unsuspecting monsters in a glorious show of blood. With that taken care of, I unsummon Jareth with all of his equipment remaining on him, ready to use at a moment''s notice when summoned to fight. 20 minutes had passed by since summoning Jareth and there was now only 10 minutes left till the break began, with that knowledge I decided to bring out Emett to serve as my bodyguard while waiting for my turn to fight once the front line was exhausted. I may even send him out to help other summoners or take out stray monsters that came near me, his unlimited stamina was a boon that I planned on taking full advantage of throughout this assuredly long and exhausting battle. The summoners around me seemed to have the same idea as me and began to bring out and ready their summons for the impending fight. Those around me usually brought out only one summon to preserve their energy, but occasionally there would be a seemingly experienced or foolish summoner starting out with two summons. With the concerns of stamina for this long battle to worry about bringing two summons while not even actively fighting yet was either extremely foolish or proved just how strong the summoners were that they could manage multiple summons for so long. I was able to dual summon for quite some time myself, but that was due to constant practice when hunting and pushing my limits every day in order to improve my summoning energy limits. Not many summoners bothered to practice like I had, they were either lazy or saw no need to improve themselves past managing one summon at a time which is what was usually used in non-lethal battles between summoners. I found it foolish to not train extensively and push our limits with our survival at stake, but many seemed complacent despite the constantly looming threat. They were the ones most likely to be wiped out, but that was their problem right now, and I had my own life and fights to worry about without adding the burden of my peers on top of that. Everyone lines up in a jumbled but organized pattern with their monsters beside them, most summoners seem to be willing to sit back while their summons fight, as there is too much danger involved in fighting monsters much stronger and dangerous than them. Summons can be revived at a cost, but once a summoner dies so do their summons. The ones that were out at the time have their bodies remaining along with their core, but the unsummoned ones in storage remain only as a core. Noon finally comes along and a loud bell rings in the distance from atop the gate and what comes over the horizon is a horde of monsters the likes of which I had never been able to conceive of till now. There seemed to be a never-ending tide of monsters large and small marching or running along towards the group of a few million summoners and their summons. I could feel the ground shaking and rumbling as giant monstrous bodies ambled along towards us. The smaller and faster monsters were in the front and were the first to make contact with us. Most were usually tier 1 and 2 monsters, which by themselves weren''t especially dangerous, but when in a horde of millions of said monsters they could easily pose a greater danger than the higher tier monsters. While the monsters began their charge almost immediately after the ringing of the noon bell, the summoners didn''t remain idle and began to move outwards to meet the enemy and give us more space to work in and guard. The more room we have in between the monsters and the gate, the better, because it would be inevitable for us to give up ground at some point. Usually, later on in the monster break when the larger and more dangerous monsters made their way into battle us summoners would be forced back to make room to fight them off. The common tactics of the monsters during these breaks from what I had been taught was for the weaker and smaller monsters to be sent out to wear down on the summoners. When those monsters were killed off, the stronger ones would step forward while the most dangerous remained behind for the end of the battle. Their ultimate goal would be to attempt to break through the lines of summoners and make it to the gate where they would wreak havoc on the city and those within it. We had summoners who worked for the association remaining behind in the city as a precaution for any monsters that did make it through. After the first 3 monster breaks, which were a disaster, summoners became organized enough and strong enough to ward off any monsters trying to make it through the gate. But as the monsters became more numerous and stronger with every successive monster break it became harder and harder for us to hold them back. After the first 3 breaks where casualties were numerous, we had managed to break about even between summoners lost and new summoners being made after turning 16. A significant portion of the population in this new era was minors who hadn''t been required to participate in the war and so the number of new summoners wasn''t insignificant, the only problem was their lack of experience and strong summons. This was a major flaw in the ranks of summoners fighting during the breaks, the new summoners were thrown into the figurative fire and only the smart or strong ones would remain to become the pillars of humanity. It was harsh but necessary to ensure that those remaining had the skills to survive in this harsh world. Experienced summoners would do their best to save or help the new summoners, but there was only so much to be done without fighting for them which no one had the luxury to do. This figurative culling also served to ensure that humanity''s resources were going to those who would survive rather than be wasted on people bound to die. Anyway, chaos ensued as soon as the monster break began with flying monsters and summons fighting in the air, with the occasional lucky monster breaking away and attacking the summons and summoners below who were often unaware of their presence until it was too late. On the ground fighting currently were lower-tier monsters native to the beginner forest, all sorts of monsters such as; wolves, horned rabbits, boars, rats, spiderlings, giant insects, boulder ants, ember lizards, cement frogs, goblins, spike-tailed squirrels, and many others were fighting as the first wave. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. Spreading out further up along with the rest of the summoners in front and beside me, I sent Emett out to back up other summons and kill off the many weaker monsters. I gave him the order to go and fight any monsters he sees and can take on while staying in my line of sight. With him going out to help take care of the weaker but numerous first wave, I paid special attention to my surroundings as I didn''t have any summons out to protect me in an emergency. My sword was out and ready to use and had already taken care of a few of the smaller monsters that had slipped through the frontlines. I was withholding summoning any other of my other summons to save as much energy as I could. There wasn''t too much danger to me currently and I could take care of myself, but any monsters that would require a summon to take care of I could bring Brutus out or have Emett come back since he wasn''t very far away from me. It was difficult to keep track of anything going on as everyone was moving frantically around to fight off monsters or get away from them for others to take care of. Emett seemed to be having a blast crushing and piercing anything within range of him. He was almost completely impervious to any attacks from these weak monsters, and any that managed to scratch him healed nearly immediately as he drew from the earth to fill in any missing parts. He was a tiny little juggernaut that mowed through anything in front of him, and any monsters that managed to resist his initial strikes were run through by one of his hands molded and hardened into a spear that pierced through the body of his foe. I seemed to be racking up quite a bit of merit point from Emett''s rampage and was amused by the new appearance of my summon, he was soaked through with blood from head to non-existent toe and had a bright smile on his face from being able to let loose on the never-ending rush of monsters. The area of space he occupied closer to the front line was littered with bodies and blood, there was an open pocket of space free from monsters that the tired summons and summoners had taken refuge in the area as no monsters had managed to make their way through him. This was due to the combination of high defense and healing ability along with endless stamina from his contact with the earth. By the time I recalled him towards me as stronger and bigger monsters with most being around tier 2 and 3 had made their way to the front line. By the looks of the bodies surrounding the area he had been posted at, there must have been nearly 200 tier 1 and 2 monsters that he had killed. I had managed to get 8 kills from the occasional stray monster that made their way through the frontline, I was still extremely energized and fully prepared to begin my portion of fighting during the monster break. It had been somewhere around 2 hours into the fight when the monster tier began to change and the frontline summoners who were mostly weak or beginners made there retreat to rest and recover while the middle row where I was stationed began to step up and fight the tougher monsters on the frontline. Seeing that everyone was beginning to move out and bring out their summons, I did the same and brought out Brutus and Jareth who was equipped with all of his new equipment. 23 Ch. 19- Monster Break Pt. 2 Jareth Smash For every summoner, there were at least 10 monsters if not more. They seemed like an endless wave of death and chaos. Bodies, blood, and limbs were flying everywhere, an endless grinding wheel of monstrous and human bodies clashing together Wass being formed during this especially difficult phase of the monster break. The tier 3 monsters and stronger/bigger tier 2''s were showing up en mass to face against the stronger and relatively fresh middle section summoners. The first group did their best and most managed to handle it with the occasional bit of help from the back, most didn''t have specialized summons like aerial or ranged summons, so those that were being used during that portion of the battle were from the stronger reserve summoners. We had managed to maintain the lines so far and were about 3 football fields away from the gate currently, this wouldn''t last forever, but we would try and hold for ass long as possible. The problem with group fights like this is that it relies far more on teamwork and stamina than individual might. The stronger summoners that would normally be able to mow through the current crowds were required to maintain the line and stick with the rest. Those that went too far ahead would be swallowed up by the horde of monsters and attacked from all sides until they died, I was not seeking death and so I decided that I would do my best to not go off seeking glory. We were staggered and spread out as much as possible to allow for as many people as possible to fight off the monsters, there wasn''t much room and what little there was, was littered with dead bodies. It had become a job for those in the back lines to prevent the bodies from piling up too much and tripping up the fighters at the front. Walls were being made from bloodied corpses both monster and human alike. Some summoners with more supportive or industrious summons were be especially ingenious and were using their summon''s abilities to bind or cement the bodies to make immovable walls of flesh. These makeshift barricades helped us to prevent monsters from leaking through in areas that couldn''t fully be covered, and even served to allow for short breaks from exhausted fighters before once again entering the fray. My team and I had just moved up to the front with the rest of the early reinforcement summoners and their summons. It was extremely difficult to move with the mass of exhausted summoners fleeing to the back lines for rest and safety, all the while the reinforcements were doing their best to push up as fast as possible in order to not lose any extra ground on the battlefield that had been so hard fought for. I had Jareth making way ahead of me pushing through the throng with barely contained fury and anticipation at the coming slaughter. We were at the right section of the northern portion of the fighting force and what we were facing were mostly tier 3 forest monsters and especially strong tier 2''s like; hobgoblins, goblin variants, imps, kobolds, terror birds, centaurs, satyrs, bladed mantis, dryads, earth and wood golems, a few wyrms towards the back end of this wave, feathered serpents, elementals, leopards, tigers, wolfs, and some undead like zombies, skeletons, and ghouls, amongst other things. Point is that was just what I saw with a peripheral glance and there seemed to be no real pattern to any of it. They charged with suicidal intensity and would do anything to take down any summons or humans that they came across until they were put down. The undead were especially hard, they were relentless and aside from destroying them completely or damaging the brain they would continue attacking. I even had a clattering skull attempt to take a bite out of my foot as I walked by, I put a quick stop to that one by crushing it underfoot with a satisfying and loud snap of cranial bones giving way. Once we finally made it out to the frontlines of battle and had enough room to properly fight, I sent Brutus and Jareth out ahead of me to take on the rushing monsters. Jareth roared out in a warlike cry promising death and rushed out with both of his weapons in hand. Every step he took was met with a swing of one of his blunt instruments of death. The weaker goblins and skeletons in front of him were crushed in a single swing, each impact led to gore exploding out in a splatter of gore and shattered bones. Soon enough, Jareth was covered in the blood of his enemies and stood around like a red-painted war god, nothing seemed to be able to stop him until he got locked in a battle with a bladed mantis. They crossed weapons a few times, and put a stop to Jareth''s momentum, which was probably for the better as he was getting a bit too far out into the crowd of monsters. His hide was the only thing saving him currently, as he was beset upon by a throng of gnomes with miniature weapons in hand, they made little scratches on his legs with their weapons but weren''t much more than an annoyance. Eventually, Jareth became fed up with their interference in his fight and spun around with his iron mace in a counter-clockwise direction and smashed all of them into bits. With the annoyances taken care of, Jareth decided to end his brief fight and activated the gravity function of the Warhammer, it blew right through the guard of the mantis and completely decapitated the giant insect, leaving only a stump spewing a blue-green blood from its'' severed arteries. I was quick to command Jareth back a bit to make a stand along the line, albeit a bit farther than those beside me. He brought the mantis back with him and I was quick to store it before focusing once more on the battle. Brutus wasn''t idle either all this time, he was running around Jareth and taking out the vulnerable monsters attempting to attack him from the sides. He was quick to dart around while hiding in the shadows and chaos of the battlefield and ripping the monsters apart with his claws and teeth before they even knew what hit them. Any stronger monsters like the pair of hobgoblins that spotted and faced Brutus were quickly dealt with after an illusion Wass created to occupy one while the grim dove into a random monster''s shadow and came out from behind the hobgoblin and tore out its'' neck before it even knew that its'' opponent was attacking it after disappearing. It was left to bleed out and die with a look on utter confusion to be seen on its'' face. This had all taken place in the matter of a seconds and by the time that the illusion Wass smashed and seen through, Brutus was right by its side after taking care of the partner and pounced and took down the green-skinned monster. Brutus savagely tore into the disoriented monster and was efficient in killing it by repeating what it had done to the previous hobgoblin and ripping out the throat. I went near the battle site about 10 feet in front of me and stored those bodies ass well. My summons were working as a perfect machine with Jareth tanking the monsters and grabbing their attention while tearing them down with vicious blows. All the while, Brutus snuck around and protected Jareth''s sides by quickly dealing with them in efficient moves aimed at their weak points with swipes of his claws or bites from his jagged maw. Together they were ripping monsters apart with bodies piling up often. Jareth was well within the throes of rage from the potion as he continued to take on any threats within reach, any time he was surrounded he would simply spin like a top with blunt weapons extended. Just like I had imagined when buying the special Warhammer, Jareth seemed to be handling it just fine and was unleashing twice the damage with it. Anything within the range of his weapons while spinning were either damaged and thrown back, or completely obliterated like something caught in a blender. The weight and inertia of the weapons was doing all of the work for him, he simply held them firmly and extended them as much as possible. He limited doing this move to whenever he was surrounded, it took quite a bit of energy to do it and he was still unused to the dizzy feeling following it. We weren''t alone on the battlefield, as our neighbor to the right had summon of a giant wolf and a socket lizard which would paralyze anything within a certain radius and made for easy pickings with the wolf dealing the final blows. To our left was a death worm interestingly enough, and it seemed to be doing even more damage than Jareth with its'' school bus sized body and the wicked circular mouth of razor blades that demolished anything under it. The only downside was the faster monsters that were getting by it, but there were summoners behind us to sweep up anything we missed, their job was just as important as mine on the frontline as they prevented monsters from attacking our exhausted or injured when they have no defense of their own. I was having a much easier time in the battle than my summons, and aside from the potential for death, screams of the injured and dying, the horrible smell and sight of bodies and entrails everywhere, it wasn''t too bad picking up said bodies while warding off monsters. Not many managed to get past my summons and the ones that did were only fast and were easily taken care of with a slice or two of my blade, only one especially fast monster made me use a skill to avoid death. I hardened myself right before the sharp claws of the panther pierced me, and instead only broke the outer-layer of skin. I cancelled the skill after the claws had passed and regained my speed just in time to block another blow and then retaliate by jamming the point into its'' chest cavity and shearing its heart to kill it near instantly. It was in all sense of the word a "paper-tiger" and could only deal damage, but not take it, which is made even more ironic because the monster was a feline. Dropping the body into my storage I went off closer to my summons as we pushed forwards a small bit, the cannon fodder had been used up at this point after about 40 minutes of fighting and now there were only monsters worth storing. We must have collectively killed at least 350 monsters during this time, and I had filled up about 10 cubic meters of space already with lower tier 3 monsters, but now I could make some real money with these stronger monsters. I regretted my eagerness when a freezing wyrm that had been hidden in the back of the second wave came forward to fight us. Jareth and Brutus grouped up more in preparation to face the wingless dragon-kin, it had icy-blue scales and white plates on the underside of its'' body. The head had little sharpness to its'' features, but still retained a fairly lizard-like overall appearance, and there was the beginning of a horn on the forehead of it. Overall it looked like a horse-sized blue lizard, but its'' breath puffed out in white snow of frozen droplets of moisture, half of the moisture in the air around it was blood that had been sprayed into the atmosphere or evaporated from the blood pools soaking into the soil. The snow-mist breath was pink from the white of snow and red of blood and looked rather ominous. I warned Jareth to be weary of its breathe that could shoot out large chunks of ice, it wasn''t up to par with the breathe of a frost drake that could send out a wave of frost that could turn opponents into icicles, but it could still do some damage. Jareth charged ahead when the wyrm stepped up to fight, the already close distance closed even more as Jareth went in with his hammer reared to attack. The wyrm met the weapon with one of its'' frost-tinted claws, but was met unexpectedly with an extremely heavy impact from the previously unassuming weapon. The gravity hammer had broken the paw and claws used to bat at the weapon, and and now it was hanging from the front left leg in a hurt stance. It was now compensating for the damaged limb that severely limited its'' mobility by driving Jareth away from it with a chunk of ice expelled with blinding speed toward the metallic hobgoblin at point-blank range. There was no time for Jareth to dodge and was forced to bear the brunt of the bowling ball-sized block of dense ice, the armor I had put on him was annihilated as a result of the ice shot from the angered overgrown lizard. Jareth was shot back from the blow and had a hard time getting up from the ground, and was now shirtless with a giant purple indentation where the projectile hit. The armor did its'' job however, and instead of deeply damaging some bones and internal organs, there was only a large bruised area around the breastbone and two cracked ribs. Each fighter was damaged and Jareth was moving noticeably slower from that attack, the potion was helping him block out the pain and had reduced the damage some to prevent the attack from becoming lethal. The wyrm still had a ranged move, but it seems that it takes a bit of time to gather enough ice to shoot out, and so Jareth was safe to approach for now. Brutus was as always waiting undetected for an opportune moment like what happened with the death worm that he defeated and then evolved into a grim which ironically happens to be associated with death. From the pattern I had noticed, my summons seem to take on some traits or skills from the monster whose core they devour to finally evolve as long as it suits them in some way. I was working with this theory and figured I probably lucked out on finding a suitable evolution monster to battle and then devour, although they each took some time to find, with many other battles having occurred before meeting them. Anyway, Brutus was in wait and sneaking up to the side of the wyrm as Jareth attempted to clash once again with it. Jareth once again threw everything into the gravity hammer and the wyrm was smart but unfortunate enough to be forced to sacrifice its'' already injured paw to deflect the blow, since using another limb would result in being immobile and easy prey. It wailed in pain from the unfortunate attack, and while distracted, Brutus rushed in under the monster and used his teeth to ravage the weak leathery underside of the land-bound dragon-kin. This further incensed the wyrm and it seemed to have the perfect counter measure to prevent anymore damage from being done to it, it simply allowed itself to fall down and let gravity and the heavy weight of the dense lizard body to immobilize Brutus under it. This move saved it from further damage to it''s'' underside, but that victory Was short-lived as Jareth rushed in once again with the hammer and bashed it on the side of the head that was brought down to shoulder height after falling down on Brutus. The dragon had a serious dent on the side of the head and even had a pulped eye from the force of the blow. This signaled the end of the dragon as it was dazed from the 1-ton blow and was open to more attacks to it. Being unable to move and already injured the head was smashed continually until it was no longer moving and remained on the ground with no further twitching. Monsters had gone to other parts of the battlefield to avoid being mixed up in the crossfire of the epic fight, so I was free to go up to the wannabe-dragon and was about to store the body before thinking for a moment. The wyrm had plenty of potential as a summon and was able to fight off my summons for about five minutes before succumbing to the the both of them, it would make an excellent companion and it was rare to come across any of these types of monsters. Since it was still in a rather basic evolutionary stage, I would be able to grow the summon and receive more benefits for evolutions, it was more work, but would result in a stronger team in the end. There were many of the experienced summoners who had been doing this since the beginning, and they all had full teams of summons, the only thing limiting them is trying to advance them all, and only being able to summon out so many at a time. By choosing summons with great potential they are paving the way for them to grow stronger when others would stagnate after using up the evolutionary potential of their summons and being stuck with mediocre advanced summons. This was a long ways away, but it wouldn''t hurt to have a dragon based monster on my team to cover up some weaknesses in my formation, now I would have a ranged attacking monster that may even be able to fly later. With that having been decided I cut into the breast area of the monster and where a heart would be is the core. Pulling it out, I see the white-blue hue of the cold to the touch crystal, I place the core on the body in order to bond with it. Before I do, I send Jareth and Brutus to ward off any monsters while I complete the bond and am vulnerable. With distractions and danger taken care of, I cut the tip of my finder and bleed a few drops onto the core, which begins to glow with a blinding light. As this change occurs, I begin to feel a foreign energy attempting to merge with me, and I do nothing to stop it. After about a minute of solidifying the summoning bond, it is finally complete and I feel a connection to my previous scaly foe. It seems proud but loyal to me after showing my might and defeating it, and I couldn''t be happier with my decision. Not only do I have an additional summon to fight with during this battle after a little bit of recovery, but I also got a rare opportunity to bond with a strong dragon-kin. The wyrm, which I decided to name Jotun due to his ice aspect, revives just like other summons do without the negative of losing any gained experience while trying to evolve, but he will need another 5 minutes to fully recover and solidify before summoning. This is perfect as it is getting close to the end of the hour that Jareth has in his rage potion before becoming fairly weakened from over-exertion. I call Jareth over and rubbed about an eighth of the healing salve over his chest and saw immediate results with the purple bruise lightening in hue and reducing at a rate visible to the eye. The remaining bits on my hand I rubbed over the faint scratch I had gotten earlier from the panther. Brutus was fine if not a little tired from all of the activity, we were all used to exercise and exerting ourselves for long periods of time, but this was near constant fighting and even we were feeling the exhaustion begin to set in. My neighbors seemed to be no better off as the death worm was just lazily rolling around to crush those near it, and was more of an obstacle than a fighter. My other neighbor''s giant wolf was covered in wounds and was heaving for breathe with its tongue out desperately panting for air. The socket lizard was out of electricity and barely had any electricity branching around it. Both of the summoners saw the state of their summons and switched them out for new summons, or ran to the back of the line to recover in relative safety. The hardest part was coming soon, and the real dangers would be coming, the third wave was when most of the casualties occurred, and even those not fighting wouldn''t be safe. There was a decent amount of time left till then, and so I paced my team by heading back a bit and letting others cover for me while having Jareth rest when he could and take care of the occasional stray monster. We only needed about 5 minutes of this before being able to head back to the frontlines. Brutus was run ragged and finally became too tired to fight anything off, I unsummoned him to allow his muscles to recover for later on in the second half of the 2nd wave. Deciding that Jotun had had enough time to solidify, I summoned him out to fight alongside Jareth for the last 5 minutes or so that he could fight before the potion wore off. We charged in almost recklessly and began to take monsters out left and right, I had Jotun hold off on using his breath due to the relatively large recovery time just in case he ran into a situation that required its'' use. Bodies began to stack up and I was filling my storage more and more with these larger tier 3 corpses. Battles began to take longer as stronger and stronger opponents appeared, fights would take 3 minutes for what used to take about 30 seconds at most. All good things must come to an end, and the time for the potion finally ran out. Jareth had noticeably weakened and was hunched over in exhaustion, his skin had also paled a few shades from the weakening after-effects of the potion. Seeing him like this, it seems I had underestimated the side-effects of the potion and should have saved it for the last half of my two hour wave at least. It''s too late for regrets, and as a plus I have another strong tier 3 summon to cover for him. I recalled Jareth as having him around now was a liability, and stayed well within the center of the frontline so that we had allies surrounding us when fighting monsters. I wouldn''t trust sending a lone summon out at the very end of the frontlines for anything to attack him, not to mention the seemingly endless tide of summons would tire him down until he was taken down. With no other summons to rely on for effective backup, I kept him close to me and allowed him to fight as many as possible within a safe margin. At this time, my storage had been filled till there was only about 15 cubic meters left with bigger monsters beginning to take up more space within. Quite a few valuable monsters had been killed and acquired, not to mention the amount of merit points given out for each monster defeated. My count was reaching close to a thousand at this point, although most were lower tier monsters. I had Emett on standby to help with any imminent dangers, but so far nothing had occurred that warranted bringing him out. He would be mostly ineffective against these stronger tier monsters fighting during the 2nd wave, at best he would be a shield against an attack, but I would prefer not to be in that position anyway. With Jotun fighting in the now middle section of the upfront fighting summoners all was going well and we were maintaining the line so far, 30 minutes passed like this and Brutus was finally rested enough to fight again, so I brought him out as well. We went up front once again and my newly acquainted summons began to team up and take down any monsters in their path until they met a tier 4 orc that had riddled its'' way up the battlefield. It had a vicious looking dirty grey metal axe and raggedy leather clothing. His most eye-catching features had to be bright green skin marred by tan scars and blood, and his prominent tusks jutting out from the lower section of his mouth. He looked like a weathered warrior and bellowed loudly before charging at Jotun. Not wanting my wyrm to get caught in a battle of strength against an opponent with a blade, I had him shift to the side and blast out an ice ball right at it to stop him from gaining any momentum. The ball hit directly and even though the opponent was a tier 4 monster, it was on the lower end and it was apparent to me that it was definitely feeling that hit, he is about at the level of Jareth while on a rage potion. As the orc remained in place, Brutus and Jotun pincer attacked the hulking green figure. Brutus jumped on top of and brought him down to the ground, while Jotun moved up and used his sharp claws resembling icicles to maul the downed humanoid until the rib cage was easily visible and the beast stopped moving. Orcs were a monster that exceeded in combat and intelligence, but when Jotun disrupted and injured him before even getting to charge at them properly, it was thrown off balance and any strength advantage was negated when he fell on the ground. With that battle taken care of and no serious injuries on my summons due to the element of surprise, we continued to battle until about 10 minutes were left in the second wave. At that point, the remaining monsters kicked it up and the weaker of the tier 4''s began to mix in regularly. This wasn''t too much of a problem as summoners began to work together to bring them down with the average strength of the summons out at this point at mid tier 3 at least. We took down a few, before I heard a scream not too far away from me. This wasn''t unusual to hear as many had already died during this venture, but what really caught my attention was how close to me it was and the bright red hair of the person yelling out, it seemed familiar for some reason. Seeing that my summons were done with their most recent opponent, I decided to rush over and help her. Running over, I saw what caused her to scream for help, it was two large grayish-green ogres that had settled on attacking her. A bladed mantis Was locked in close combat with one and seemed to be on the loosing end as the blades weren''t sharp or long enough to inflict any real damage, the blubber of the whale-on-legs was protecting it from most damage from any blades. 24 Ch. 19- Monster Break Pt.3 Rescuing a Damsel The ogre was closing in slowly but surely towards who I now recognized as Alex from the tournament. She had backed up as much as possible, there was no room to go anywhere else, any potential avenues were blocked by piles of bodies and makeshift barricades. Anyone else who could have helped was busy with their own fight or was too tired or weak to help, for them there is no point in risking their life when there is no chance for them to survive much less help someone else. It was a selfish but realistic mindset which I could understand, but in this scenario, I had the means to help and was close enough to do something about it before it was too late. Not to mention that I actually knew the person and got along with them, which for me practically counted as a best friend considering how few people I actually bothered to know or talk to. Thinking quickly, I returned Brutus and sent out Jareth from his resting state in the core and had him go out and provide support to the bladed mantis. I then had Jotun and Myself barge towards the hulking blob of fat that was looking at Alex like a snack, with drool dribbling out of its'' mouth and all. Thinking that I would need to distract it in order to make it in time I stopped when I was within hearing range and began to taunt the monster, "Hey one-too-many-bigmacs I heard your mama was so ugly that she tried to enter an ugly contest but they said ''sorry, no professionals''". This seemed to catch the attention of the beast, and although it may have not been intelligent enough to understand what I was saying, the manner in which I was saying it made it apparent that I Wass making fun of it. It didn''t seem to care much for my taunt as it switched directions towards me and lifted a fist in preparation to punch me into next week. Deciding that this probably wasn''t a hit I wanted to take even when hardening myself, I used my teleportation skill and moved about 2 feet to the right of the incoming fist and hightailed it out of there. I began jogging over to Alex to check up on her while leaving Jotun to take care of the incensed ogre. The wyrmling seemed to be having a blast as he was much faster than the towering monster and was just taking chunks out of it with every swipe of his paws. The fat coating only prevented so much damage, but it eventually reaches a point where enough damage will wear it down until it is vulnerable. I got close enough to see her and her harpy in a defensive position in case the ogre veered towards them. I spoke to try and assuage their fears, "Those ogres won''t be a problem anymore. Are you alright, what happened?" She seemed less weary after my assurance but still remained on guard, which wasn''t a bad idea on the battlefield. She calmed down a bit more before answering, "I''m fine for now, just exhausted. We got ganged up on by those two ogres and my harpy Holly went to distract one while Musashi my bladed mantis fought the other one off. The problem is that sharp weapons didn''t seem to do much to their thick hide. Musashi''s blades bounced off for the most part or made small cuts, and Holly''s talons weren''t even long enough to get through the large fat exterior of the monster." I looked behind me to see how my summons were fairing, Jotun had torn up the ogre and was already waiting around near the battle with the mantis and Jareth in case they needed any help. Jareth had already mostly recovered from the aftereffects of the potion and was providing more than ample support to Musashi. His blunt hammers negated the thick-skin advantage of the ogre and did direct damage to flesh and organs, which was quickly wearing on it. The fight ended soon After Jareth joining and using the mantis to distract it while he did the damage. He slammed his gravity hammer right into the side of the ogre''s left knee-cap, which completely hobbled it and it fell from the lack of support and extreme bodyweight. It was easy pickings for the mantis and Jareth, it did its'' best to fend off attacks, but with nowhere to got they situated themselves to the side and behind to attack from its'' weak spots. Eventually, it succumbed to a lucky strike at the neck from the mantis where the skin wasn''t nearly as thick, and Jareth smashing in the back of the ogre''s skull after it became distracted at the pain in its'' neck. Seeing that both monsters were taken care of I said to Alex, "Well, looks like they won''t be a problem anymore. Since your mantis took care of the ogre, for the most part, why don''t you get that ogre and I''ll take the other body. It''s starting to get dangerous on this field with monsters stronger than us like what happened just now, why don''t we team up at least until the battle is over. Safety in numbers and all that." I''m not the greatest speaker or the most social of people, but I thought I was pretty convincing in my speech. She nodded at my suggestion to split the bodies, but seemed to be thinking a lot longer about teaming up with someone she barely knows. But after a few seconds of contemplation, she seems to have warmed up to it and says, "I''ll agree to work together on one condition, any money made is split and we watch out for each other. If you abandon me and I survive, I''ll hunt you down." The end of her proposal scared me a bit, but was just fine with me as I never intended to abandon her. I absolutely believed her threat though, the hard look in her eyes said that she would cut me down without a second thought if I ever betrayed her. She seemed to have a guarded worldview similar to mine, and it looked as if those with poor childhoods like ours created adults focused on safety and survival with no allusions as to how cruel the real world is. After looking in her eyes to try and glean anything from her, I went up and shook her outstretched hand. "I think since Musashi and Jareth are familiar with each other they should pair up, and we can have my frost wyrm Jotun team up with Holly. They should complement their fighting styles fairly well." She just nodded her head and focused on her summons which I could only assume she was communicating with. Once done with her mental talk, she faces me again and says, "Since we''re going to be trusting each other with our lives why don''t you call me Alexis, only strangers call me Alex. Also, there should only be about 5 minutes until the second phase is finished, we just need to hunker down and remain alive till then." I couldn''t agree more with her, and we do just that. Our summons battled together against increasingly stronger monsters until they all were eventually forced to face off against a minotaur. It was an 8-foot tall monstrosity with almost everything below the neck looking like an intimidating and tanned human with the occasional patch of hair, while the head was a brown fur-clad bovine head clad with large scythe-like horns and had a thick golden ring through its'' septum. Each snort from its nose produced noticeable gusts of wind, and it gripped its'' double-headed axe tightly within both of its hands. The weapon was a scarred and bloody hunk of sharp metal attached to what looked like a weathered bone handle of some large beast. "I don''t think this muscle-brain is looking for an invitation to a tea party, " I said nervously about the towering figure that was stomping its'' legs through the dirt in preparation for charging right at us. Its hooves made deep crevices into the blood-stained field and bellowed out a war-cry before charging at me and Alexis with axe at the ready in front of it. Our summons were too far away to intercept the minotaur that had appeared right after they had finished taking care of some hellhounds that breathed out black hell-fire every chance they got. Each team had taken on one of the fire-spewing hounds and were farther away from their summoners than was safe when the minotaur showed up. Minotaurs were in the middle of the tier 4 category, they were impressively strong monsters that wielded two-handed axes and hammers to crush any foes. They had average defense and were only capable of physical skills, but they were extremely strong and capable fighters. He rushed closer and closer, picking up speed as he went. By the time he was only a few feet in front of us, I grabbed onto Alexis and told her to hold on. She didn''t understand what I was doing and seemed only capable of watching what she thought was our impending doom. I didn''t know if my teleportation would work with an extra passenger, but figured that it wouldn''t hurt to try. I looked to the immediate left of our position just out of range of the stampeding humanoid bull and activated my skill after securing her within my arms. I felt the odd sense of displacement and slight disorientation and luckily still felt Alexis within my arms. Since we were still alive, my skill must have worked and with a passenger no less, although it seemed the range was half the normal amount on account of having an extra person traveling with me. I looked to our right and witnessed the charging minotaur rush right past where we had previously been with its'' head aimed down and jet-black horns ready to impale us. It had too much momentum to stop the charge immediately, but did its'' best to stop after realizing his targets had somehow evaded. My teleportation was on cooldown for another five minutes, but luckily I wouldn''t need it as Jotun and the rest of the summons moved in on our position to get between the monster and us. Alexis seemed stunned at the sudden teleportation and remained within my arms as our summons rushed to protect us. I let her go and readied my sword in case any other monsters showed up as I wouldn''t be able to easily escape them. I roared over to my still stunned teammate who had seen her life rush before her eyes, "Get your head back in the game! We have a monster to kill and we''re still in danger, so don''t let your guard down." This seemed to shake her out of her fugue state, she looked towards the battle that was about to start between our 4 summons and the hulking beast. We each gave orders to our respective summons and hoped for the best while attempting to remain incognito behind a barricade while the battle resumed, it would do no one any good for us to remain vulnerable. We were too weak to have an effect on the monster, and at most we could provide orders or suggestions during the fight. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. Jareth and Jotun rush in to prevent the minotaur from gaining any momentum, Holly and Musashi were sneaking in attacks from the air and the monster''s back respectively. Being attacked from all sides, the minotaur was hard-pressed to defend itself. Jotun unleashed an ice-ball attack at the minotaur''s right shoulder, which upon impact broke the shoulder bone and dislocated it so that the axe was forcefully released from its'' grip. Holly rushed in and mauled its'' eyes and face while trying to avoid the horns, the pain caused the monster to roar out in pain and shake its head to try and ward off any further attacks. Unfortunately, the horns on its'' head were rather large and managed to nick the harpy and throw her away onto the ground, nothing was broken but she was out of the fight for now after that hard jolt and fall. Musashi was still rather tired, but persevered and cut swathes through the sizable muscles on the back of the occupied and injured monster. Jareth managed to finish it off with a gravity hammer strike to the abdomen that pulverized the internal organs of the beast and brought it down with the additional cumulative strike from the other summons to ensure that it died without retaliation with its'' last bit of energy before dying. Moments after the monster was felled, the bell for the 3rd wave rang and we each recalled one of our summons to make room while retreating while remaining safe within the protection of our remaining summon. Older and stronger summoners moved past us as we retreated and what we heard behind us were deafening yells and seismic movements from monster rushing towards the newest group of summoners. There was no chance for us to take on all of those significantly stronger monsters and we hightailed it to the back of the line with the last remaining bits of energy. Those two hours truly exhausted us and not only our bodies were sore, but our mind were fatigued from keeping control of more than one summon and directing them in battle. Once we made it and found an area to rest and recover, we looked over at each other, both of us covered in dirt and blood-stained, and began laughing at the ridiculousness and horror of what we just experienced. With the feeling of safety our current position presented, we collapsed near each other and just enjoyed the feeling of survival and the endorphins leaving our body, making us a noodly mess. 25 Ch. 19- Monster Break Pt. 4 Titans Clash Alexis and I were tucked in relatively safe amongst the throng of tired and injured summoners in the backlines mostly away from danger. The ground had remained blood and gore-soaked, but rather than bodies piled up, there were injured being cared for either by potions and salves or by summons using healing abilities. Healing type summons were rather rare and were being used sparingly for the worst cases. As long as a person wasn''t dead, they could be fully healed later on. One good thing about this era is the surplus of miracle ingredients allowing a person to heal from just about anything. The strongest of the summoner population within the city was up now facing against a plethora of tier 4 monsters and the occasional tier 5, luckily there had yet to be any strong tier 5''s. However, we all knew the strongest monsters would be coming eventually, probably as soon as the tier 4''s had been wiped out and severely weakened the summoners. This is when everyone regardless of their current state would need to band together. Not only to survive the attacks, but to bring down these behemoths that would do their best to not only wipe us out, but our families and neighbors as well. We had a strong reason to fight to the last, and many of us had the mindset to do such a thing regardless of if it costs them their life or not. There were reparations for the family of any summoner who died during the monster break, and additional compensation would be given according to the merits recorded on their watch. I wasn''t looking to sacrifice myself, after all, I had Mira to think of and she would be heartbroken to discover my passing. I couldn''t be sure she would ever recover as I Wass often the one taking care of her rather than the other way around. This was especially true of when we were in the orphanage and had no one to rely on with most adults not being able to care about so many orphans and their squabbles. Those times were especially rough and I had to do things that not many my age would be willing or able to do. Most of those things involved protecting Mira and dissuading anyone from taking advantage of her, whether through the promise of threats or actual violence until they were no longer a threat. Most backed off, but some wouldn''t be turned away so quickly, after all, girls as pretty and socially vulnerable as Mira were rare and many had given up their humanity long ago to survive and were no more than beasts. These events were a major reason for me mistrusting not only my peers but authority figures as well. None of them were willing to help us when we needed them and as a result, we had to take care of our own welfare. Fighting continued as we regained our strength for the final haul before we can all rest and repair what had been destroyed this day. The smell of death and the tang of iron on our tongue remained pervasive, it was only slightly better in the back near the gate. We still had our summons ready for any stray attacks or projectiles, hopefully, nothing would attack us but I wouldn''t bet on it. Around 20 minutes of resting later and we were finally in a state to watch the battle and talk. When we had originally sat down to rest we could barely even form a coherent sentence we were so mentally tired. I turned around to get a better view of the battle in our area and asked, "So, is this your first monster break?" Her, "No, although this is only my second. The last one didn''t have as many monsters fighting, and I don''t even know what monstrosities we are going to face before the day is over." I didn''t really find this info reassuring, but it only reconfirmed that I would need to become stronger to keep up with the monster breaks or get caught in the flood of seemingly endless monsters. I decided that not only would I be focusing on the quality of my monsters, but I would also need a wide variety of different monsters to be truly effective. Jotun was a good start, but I still had glaring weak points in my lineup so far, not to mention having more monsters to evolve would increase my own personal ability to survive. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. We didn''t have a chance to converse any further as a booming stomp was heard from afar, and in a cloud of dust and dirt emerged a Manticore the size of a small house. It was obviously at the height of tier 5, and not only that, but it had a wicked-looking scorpion tail extension that was the length of a school bus and dripped with an ominous bright green looking venom. It had the head and body of a tiger with stripes and all, and had what looked to be demon-like wings on its back. The wings were bony structures with red and dark-purple hued leather connecting it all together, and at the tip of each wing was a barb that I could only assume held some of the same venom I had seen before. The weaker summons took a step back from the manticore and worked on culling the tier 4''s near them to maintain the line. What stepped forward to meet the manticore was a freshly summoned monster from a summoner with a dark soul-patch and curly black hair, he had an imposing demeanor and seemed more than confident that the summon he had brought out could take it on. The summon was a Titan with enormous muscles and an even larger hammer that it held within two hands. The titan stood above even the manticore and had stone-like grey skin that cracked and reformed with every step. It seemed like a good pairing, as the strong defense of the titan would help ward off being affected by the venom, and its'' strong constitution could fight off the ominous liquid when it inevitably was introduced into the summon. Its'' hammer was almost as long as the gigantic summon, and was made from an odd white looking stone at the hammer portion, and was held together by a black metal with red veins running through that I recognized as adamantium. The handle was made from a vibrant looking piece of wood, and all of the unique parts formed together seamlessly into a powerful and intimidating two-handed hammer that seemed like it could crush the world. Each opponent readied themselves after identifying their foe, and began to charge furiously towards each other. After a few strides from each, with any unfortunate monster between them getting crushed underfoot, they met in a loud clash of body meeting body. The manticore had jumped and positioned its'' front claws to pierce the chest of the giant humanoid, this didn''t quite work out as the titan ducked unexpectedly and me the monster with a football shoulder charge. The monster was losing in the first confrontation and lost ground all the while being disoriented from being thrown back onto the ground. The titan didn''t let up as it regained momentum and looked to be setting up for a hammer strike. The battling monster and summon were so large that no one had any trouble witnessing the fight, we could even feel the wind being blown back from the concussive force of the initial confrontation. When the hammer was brought down on the lion-like amalgamation of parts that had just regained its'' footing. There was a loud smack and cracking sounds heard from each opponent. The titan had crushed the tail that had been brought up to ward off the summon, but on the flip-side, before the appendage was destroyed the stinger had managed to surprisingly pierce through the forearm of the titan before being ripped away from the force of the blow. The chitinous stinger of death was actually directed right towards the back of the summoner line towards us. If there was nothing done to deflect or slow down the stinger, it may very well crush some of us that couldn''t move in time. Seeing the injured around me, I came up with an idea and promptly summoned Jotun. With him sensing my thoughts of intercepting something and seeing a black worm-like object heading right for us, he reared back and charged up an extra-large ice ball the size of a boulder and with all of the force he could muster he launched the ice right at the incoming appendage of doom. Luckily for us, the ice had managed to make contact and put a stop to all of the momentum of the tail, it hit right before us and luckily most had managed to move out of the way in time. When the tail made contact only one person remained underneath, they had had both legs amputated and were in no position to move, luckily his end was quick and there likely was no pain from the incident which is about as much as you can ask for in this situation. Feeling a tinge of sadness from the loss that I had inadvertently caused, I run towards the stinger in the hopes of storing it before another can get to it. Jotun was left behind recovering from the massive in comparison to size ice ball, Jareth and I made it in time before others got brave enough to try and vie for the severed tail. I had intercepted the limb and so no one disputed my claim to it when I stored it, otherwise, they would have been clambering to benefit from this unexpected prize. What was going on when I was distracted by my potentially impending doom and then securing of my prize was each monster yelling out in agony as each had taken a rather severe blow. The manticore had lost its'' greatest weapon and limb in one blow, and the titan was injected with venom that was already beginning to show signs of decay in the arm attacked. In a surprising display of willpower each took care of their own injury to prevent them from weakening them further. The manticore breathed out a blue flame at its'' tail to cauterize the wound and prevent further bleeding, and the titan had it even worse as he ripped a strip of cloth from his shirt and made a tourniquet for the left arm already injected with the highly corrosive venom. Once the forearm was secured he brought out a proportional bronze dagger secured to his back, presumably for emergencies, and sliced the forearm right off. Both of these wounds could be healed later on, but currently, each was a crippling wound that would severely lessen their fighting potential. It was likely neither would be able to fight another opponent after this fight, but they didn''t seem to care as they continued to charge at each other with malice spewing from their glaring eyes. It was personal to these two and each seemed determined to stomp their opponent. With another clash imminent, everyone watched and prepared for any unexpected projectiles or attacks like last time. The manticore spewed those deceivingly calm looking blue flames, and the titan wound up with its'' one arm to hammer the beast to death. Each bellowed out before fully unleashing their attacks. The titan used his severed arm to block the flames while swinging the hammer with all his might and bashing in the skull of the monster and subsequently stopping any further flames. The titan may have won, but his stump was now charcoal and he was barely standing at this point. The summoner ran over to check on his titan and handing it a vase-sized potion of a red liquid, the titan immediately gulped down the potion and began growing out a new limb slowly as if it was magic. The summoner unsummoned the titan to allow it to rest after ensuring there were no more life-threatening wounds and instead summoned out a glaringly-white pegasus. He hopped on the winged horse summon and went over to the chimera, he dug out the core from the chest and then unsurprisingly bonded with the monster. The summoner did what most people would do and bonded with the fully matured and monstrously strong chimera, he would gain no strengthening from the chimera since it was fully evolved, but the promise of an already strong summon was often more than worth it. The corpse disappeared into the chimera and the summoner palmed the core before heading back to the front lines to continue fighting. Luckily I had already stored the stinger into my storage space, otherwise, it would have disappeared with the rest of the body. Most of the body needs to be present for the bond to form with the dead monster, but a small piece or two being stored was fine, it would just take longer to reanimate and gain strength. The battle continued on with the occasional appearance of a tier 5 monster fighting against a summon brought out to counter the monster. So far an hour had already passed and there was only an hour left till the monster break ended, but this is the most dangerous time as this is when the strongest monsters would come out en masse to try and break through the gate. They slowly started showing up more and more, but luckily the strongest summoners at the front currently were enough to take care of the monsters, but they were beginning to lag behind and weakening. By the time another 30 minutes had gone by, more and more summoners were beginning to be dragged in to fight off these true behemoths. Alexis and I strolled up as well and directed both Jotun and Holly to shoot projectiles at weak points while remaining safe within the lines. They weren''t strong enough to face off against the terrors facing us currently, but every bit counted and even the smallest bit of damage would add up. What was in front of us was a red dragon spewing fire every which way, and facing against the beast was a perfectly suited summon, it was a fire-Ifrit that controlled all fire absolutely. Any fire spewed would be blocked or used against it, the dragon learned soon enough as a breath that it was charging up was forced back into the dragon by the Ifrit, damaging important organs and severely weakening the dragon. The only thing allowing the beast to remain standing was its'' extremely resistant hide, but even that was accumulating damage, and weaker summons were targeting the eyes and mouth to damage it. A group of harpies, Holly included, fired off their knife-like feathers at the dragon''s eyes, forcing it to keep them shut to protect them. The dragon let its'' guard drop and opened its eyelid slowly to check for enemies, but this allowed for a few feathers to sneak through and pierce the eye, blinding the dragon in that eye. It wasn''t long after that the dragon was finally brought down by the exhausted Ifrit along with the cumulative damage of weaker summon''s attacks. These mini battles continued on with everyone doing what they could to stop those elite monsters, all the while having to slowly give up ground to remain out of range. Jotun had used his ice attack as much ass he could until there was no more frost coming from his mouth, and other summons around us with ranged attacks were in similar situations. I had remained by Alexis this entire time and so far we had saved each other on a few occasions from stray attacks sent out by these beasts, one such instance alerted me to the fact that she could sprout wings and fly for a short amount of time. Obviously this ability originated from the evolution of Holly into a harpy from what she told me was originally a silent-feathered owl that could shoot her feathers like bullets while remaining completely silent. Time continued to pass with more and more falling victim to the area of effect attacks, it was horrible to see groups burst into flame or be crushed by a thrown boulder, all the while thinking about how glad you were that it wasn''t you this time. I''ll definitely never forget some of the horrible and haunting things I had witnessed during this event, but I also had a new appreciation for life and the strength of humanity when they work together against a common enemy. I think this even showed a glimpse of what the deity was saying when he gave us a common enemy in monsters for us to band together against. By the end when the final monster was slain, we crowed out in joy and anguish as our fight was finally over. I crushed Alexis in a hug before the last of my strength left me and we rested on the ground for a while before gearing up for the sobering duty of cleaning up the battlefield and scavenging. 26 Ch. 19- Monster Break Pt. 5 Cleaning up and Reuniting with Mira The gilded bell at the top of the gate had finally rung signaling the end of the monster break with no monsters breaking through the line, it was a rather close call though as some of the faster tier 5 monsters almost made it through. They would have if it wasn''t for the plethora of summoners between them and the gate, and each fought back and stalled it until it was grouped up on by stronger summons that managed to take them down after a few summoners being killed by acting as a wall to prevent the monsters from going through. The moment the break ended was visible as rows and rows of humans flopped to the ground to rest, they had long ago run out of energy and were only keeping upright through willpower. The dirt had never felt better, even if it was stained with the blood of the fallen and the beasts they fought. My clothes were matted with blood, guts, and dirt and were in all sorts of disarray, some of my throwing knives were lost during the fight and remain in some of the bodies within the giant field of corpses. I could care less about them, they were only good for distraction at this point, but I replaced the lost ones with the last of my knives in storage. After having recovered a bit, I summon out Emett and have him follow the example of other summoners. They are organizing the bodies in accordance to either monster or summoner, the valuable bodies tier 3 and up are stored or piled up for the association to collect. The human bodies were a more somber matter as most were ravaged and in pieces from all sorts of brutal attacks from vicious monsters. Alexis was still resting from the exhausting ordeal, it seemed she wasn''t as experienced with long periods of fighting. She had already returned Holly as soon as the bell had rung and any remaining monsters ran away as their desire to maul humanity was suddenly not nearly as prevalent. I worked alongside Emett and began sorting through the piles of flesh, storing some of the more valuable ones left lying around in my little remaining space. With the amount of bodies in my storage, I had about 3 cubic meters left to store any worthwhile bodies to sell later on. The prices would be much lower than normal due to the sudden influx of bodies on the market, but I would still make quite a bot of money today. I would keep the bodies until the market regulated again after a few days, but I can make more money by selling them and freeing up space for more monster bodies in the future. Even when the material for the project is provided, it is still extremely expensive, a few thousand credits at least. This could be an invaluable piece later on with the defensive properties of such a sturdy chitinous limb, or maybe a spear with the stinger being the tip combined with another sturdy material for the staff section. We cleared up our section fairly quickly and began to branch into other sections being worked by my fellow summoners. They nodded to me in appreciation for my efforts but remained silent in respect for the dead who had sacrificed themselves for our continued existence. I had long ago given up worrying about keeping clean or touching questionable bits of I don''t know, my hands were colored in all sorts of blood and bile amongst other things and I imagine they didn''t smell much better than they looked. As time passed, more and more people got up and worked together to take care of the destroyed field full of masses of dead. The groups of bodies pasted together to act as barriers were picked up whole by larger summons and placed in a separate pile to untangle the bodies and put them in their appropriate place. The weaker monsters were placed in a huge pile meant to be shipped off to be processed into food and future rations for the poor to eat a lot cheaply. It wasn''t a perfect system, but realistically it took care of two problems at once and everyone was happier for it. We couldn''t afford to not be practical in such a dangerous period of our lives, as long as it wasn''t human, most people would eat it. About two hours later most of the bodies had been sorted and taken care of, and everyone was beginning to head back to their houses to sleep or a restaurant to eat something after the exhausting day. Alexis and I stayed together enough to exchange info to meet up sometime soon to discuss our partnership, I had a feeling we would be seeing each other quite a bit. There wasn''t much discussion between us, but I feel like I already knew her better than if we had spent a year talking to each other, being in life-threatening situations will do that to somebody. After we parted ways, I was headed home immediately and didn''t forget to message Mira that I was safe and would see her soon. I tiredly walked over to our larger apartment in the middle sector, which luckily didn''t have any damage to it since no monsters escaped. People were piling in from the bunkers, and aside from being a little sweaty and tired they seemed fine for the most part. An occasional person would be weeping at the loss of a loved one fighting during the break, but it didn''t seem to last long as the risk of death came with a territory. One more name added to the list of deceased hardly made a difference to the mountain of bodies already killed during this era. We couldn''t afford to mourn for long, there was lots to do and little time to dally around with the current situation to deal with. There would be lots of production during the coming days from all of the monster bodies, and plenty of funerals would be held to commemorate the one who fell in the line of duty. I just thought to myself that I was lucky I wasn''t added to the list, I couldn''t begin to imagine Mira''s reaction to the news, but I couldn''t give up on this dangerous path I had already ventured on. To ensure our survival, one of us had to become stronger as we could only truly rely on ourselves to survive during dangerous moments where everyone is doing their best just to stay alive, they would be too occupied with their own imminent danger to be able to try and save others. The shower felt heavenly, and I stored my armor in the small portion left within my storage space. It was cake with mud and had red splattered in various places all over, and would be difficult to get out any time soon. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. The warm water felt heavenly and you could see the water flowing off of my body turn this reddish-brown color as all of the nastiness was washed from me. I scrubbed vigorously with my nails to get anything caked on free of my body. My hair was especially difficult to clean, but with about half a bottle of shampoo and three separate washes, it was free from any debris or gunk. When done cleaning myself, I set about to clean all of my gear used today. I would maintain them properly tomorrow, but for now, I would wash off the bloodstains and other things marring their surface. My armor was, of course, the first thing to be washed off, and upon inspection, I saw no major damage to it, it seems that it held up quite well under the few attacks that I endured. My sword was likewise freed from blood and aside from a few small nicks from regular use, it was completely fine. Summons were the next to be washed off, with Emett not really requiring a wash considering he was made from mud and rock, and Jotun being a bit too big to fit in my shower. His scales were fairly clean with their slippery properties making it harder to stain the surface, so it wouldn''t be a big deal. It would get addressed the next time we went into the wilderness and found a pool to swim in. Jareth was capable of cleaning himself with a bit of instruction and seemed to really enjoy the relaxing spray of warm water and scented soaps. Brutus was a different story, however, and I had to wash him myself while enduring his complaining thoughts through our bonds. A soon as I was done washing the last bit of soapy fur, Brutus immediately began shaking like a dog and threw water everywhere, including on myself who was now extremely wet. With that done and suitable tier 3 cores that were gained from today''s event being fed to my summons, my job was finally done caring for them. I threw on some clean and comfortable civilian clothes and walked into the dining room to see Mira there. She couldn''t seem to restrain herself any longer as she threw herself at me and mumbled into my chest, "I''m glad you''re safe Thomas, now you need to tell me all about the monster break, I need to know everything that you did." I had no choice but to tell her just about everything that went on while covering up some of the more dangerous moments as minor inconveniences rather than life-threatening moments. My reason for "lying" to her was two-fold, not only did I want to seem strong in Mira''s eyes, but having her worry over my safety even more, would only make her feel worse. I needed to gain more summons quickly to plug up some of my weaknesses in my line-up and would be looking out for any of my trips into the monster plane. I would also need to directly up my survival chances by choosing lower-tier monsters so that I could get them to evolve more. It would be hard to discern which monsters had potential to get all the way to tier 5, and would be even more difficult to choose monsters that wouldn''t be able to get there, but served other important purposes making them worthy of bonding with. Speaking of new summons, I brought out jotun in our living room and she couldn''t seem to help herself as my dragon-kin became the newest target of her affection and crushing hugs. It was practically tradition to let Mira fawn over my newest summon until I eventually took mercy on them and unsummoned them at their behest. They tolerated her because they knew she was important to me, but they weren''t enthusiastic at getting played around with someone other than me. I saved the best part for last and seemed to have truly shocked her as I mentioned the way I had managed to procure the manticore stinger, and then brought it out from my storage. She squealed in delight over something that most people would either be grossed out by or not care about aside from its'' obvious value. "Tommy, you''ve got to let me have some of the venom, it''s perfect for the potion I''m currently working on making." - Mira "You can have half the venom as long as I get a vial or two of whatever potion you''re making from it." - Me With our mutual ascent to the arrangements for the stinger, I had Mira bring out some strong empty glass vials, and milked the stinger until 6 small vials had been filled with the toxic green looking substance. I handed half to Mira, and we both stuck them in our storage for later use, and so the vials wouldn''t break and accidentally poison us. We spent the rest of the night indoors as Mira cooked and we just stayed together enjoying each other''s company while eating. It wasn''t till around 10 that we had to break up our lovely moment as Mira began to yawn and I felt the urge to do so as well. I wished her goodnight and went off to my own room. I stripped to my underwear and flopped into bed. I couldn''t help but feel like I needed to do something before I slept. The feeling continued for another few minutes before I realized that I had yet to solidly arranged to meet up with Alexis. I brought my arm out to use my watch and sent Alexis a message telling her to meet up with me for lunch at 11. I also informed her that we would go to the core exchange, to not only sell off the monster cores that we earned today but to redeem our merit points from today at the lotteries available within the same store. With that sent I began to drift off, I didn''t even wait for a response and set my alarm for the appropriate time. I just assumed we would go to the association to sell off bodies and then figure out what to do after when we actually met up. No point in planning too far ahead tomorrow. 27 Ch. 20- Nightmare Dark swirls of mist surrounded my vision in a dark and void space with only the faintest occasional glimmer of light visible. "Hello, is anyone there?" I don''t hear any response, but my voice seems to have caused the lights to move closer at a rapid pace. The first few I catch sight of are some of my earliest memories with my parents and Mira when we were happy, at least before the war tore it all apart. Only the most memorable ones like Birthday parties and vacations are present. My favorite is when we all went on vacation when I was 8 and went to the national forest near our house, it was too long ago to remember what it was called. All I recall are these towering pine trees the size of skyscrapers, and pinecones the size of my torso. I was so impressed by the size, that I took one home and put it on my dresser for me to wake up and lookt at every morning. The next memories weren''t as enjoyable, I see my parents both leaving to go to war after getting drafted. I remembered the night before hearing them in the kitchen discuss running away with Mira and I to avoid the stupid war, but they came to the conclusion that it wouldn''t end well for any of us if we were ever caught. I wished they had taken us and just left to live peacefully, but looking back that probably wouldn''t have been a very good option realistically and likely would have ended with us all being executed for desertion. The next thing I remember is the funeral that was held after my parents apparently got caught int the radius of a bomb blast. There wasn''t enough of them left to bury, so all that was put in their respective little gravesites was a cardboard box filled with a few of their meaningful possessions. At that time I was 12 and Mira was 16, we had no family left so we were put into foster care along with the rest of the war-orphans. That was not a pleasant time in our life, we had to struggle along with the rest of the kids to survive off of the less than sufficient food provided by an overburdened orphanage. There were so few beds that I was forced to share a bed with Mira, which I didn''t mind as I found her presence comforting. I tried to be strong and mature in order to not burden Mira further and so I could protect her. I saw the way that the director and some of the older boys were looking at her, she was one of the few older girls in the orphanage. Most of the other ones had been adopted or "ran away" according to the director. Around a year had passed and I was 13 and Mira was 17, she was almost old enough to live by herself and bring me along with her acting as my guardian. It had been rough on her this past year, but she had done her best to keep me safe and fed. This led to her being forced to do less than comfortable things with me being used as leverage against her. I did my best to stay near her and ward off any creeps, but I couldn''t always be around her, sometimes I would be sent off to do jobs with the threat of no food if it wasn''t completed. I hated complying with his commands, but it was an order from the director, and he wouldn''t hesitate to follow through on his threat, after all, there were plenty of mouths that would be happy to get more food. One day after being sent to go hang up the wash, I came back to see Mira much stiffer and out of sorts than usual. It wasn''t odd for her to get sad thinking about our deceased parents, but this was different, she seemed traumatized. No matter what questions I asked or how many times I would beg, she would never tell me what was bothering her. I wasn''t stupid, I knew what went on in this corrupt world, girls being abused or raped especially when in positions of powerlessness was not uncommon. I had been so vigilant about preventing something like that happening to her, I had even threatened a few boys who couldn''t seem to keep their eyes to themselves or made suggestive comments about her. They didn''t take me seriously until I pulled out my dad''s hunting knife and held it to their junk, they clammed up real quick and did everything they could to make sure I didn''t cut it off. I knew that my act know wouldn''t stem them from acting forever, so I made sure they understood that I knew when they slept and wouldn''t hesitate to make them a eunuch. They seemed to believe me as word seemed to get around and Mira was off-limits to them. In the past I would have never done something like that, but losing my parents had left me to desperately cling to the only family I had left, and I would do anything to make sure she remained safe and happy. Anyways, I couldn''t help but feel dread at the sight of the coming memory, it was permanently ingrained in my memory as my greatest failure. The closer the image of the event that would forever haunt my memory came, the more I wanted to look away, but I couldn''t bring myself to as it worked as a form of sick penance. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. A few days after the incident with Mira, I had been told by the director to go out and buy some more bread from the bakery, which was about a 30-minute walk from the orphanage. I had been getting more and more suspicious of the Director, whose name was Gordon Tiddle. He was a short and paunchy man with a caterpillar mustache, he was in his late 30''s and was already balding heavily. His eyes seemed lascivious any time he looked at a girl, but it had never occurred to me that he might act on his desires that were so prevalent on his face. He was the most senior member of the staff, and the workers were either too overworked or too scared for their job to say anything about the odd happenings within the orphanage. He would always be "innocently" touching girls on their shoulder or leg, and never bothered to knock when going to their rooms as if he was hoping to catch them undressed. There had been complaints about him for a while, but there was no evidence and it was only whispers and rumors about what he might have done. I didn''t take these to heart until he started to paying attention to Mira, and upon further study realized how right the rumors were about him. I was always cautious about him, or at least I thought I was. The time of the chore seemed odd to me and was extremely unusual, as it was usually the workers that would pick up any groceries. He handed me money to buy the bread, and I pretended to go out shopping, I had to even leave the actual house as he followed me to make sure I actually left. This behavior made me even more suspicious, and as soon as I left sight of the house, I entered the woods and snuck back to spy and figure out what was going on. I snuck back up to our room and put my ear against the door, I had to cover my mouth with my hand to make sure that I didn''t give myself away. What I heard confirmed my worst fears and immediately sent me into a rage. "Come on girly, be nice now and take your clothes off, you know the drill." The only response was muffled crying, and I heard the rasp of fabric fall to the ground. When that happened I heard the sound of a metal buckle clank and then heavier pants hit the ground as well. "Come over here and make me feel good with your mouth, it''ll be like sucking on candy except maybe not so tasty (chuckles)." At this point, I couldn''t help but reach for my knife and grip it tightly in my hand. I always kept my dad''s knife on me, tucked away at my back so that it wouldn''t be found and confiscated. It was for protection purposes, but I also used it to threaten bigger boys to steer clear from Mira when I by myself wasn''t intimidating enough. It was a solid four inches of Damascus steel with a deer antler handle, it was sharp as a razor and was my dad''s most prized possession. I was about to rush in and stop him from forcing Mira to do anything more when I heard him speak once more. "C''mon you can do better than that, just think about the food you and your brother will get. If you can''t then I would hate to imagine what might become of your brother as young as he is. The orphanage is always in need of funds, I imagine he might fetch a fair price as a labor slave or as a pet from some rich pedophile." This shocked and horrified me, not only that Mira had been forced to do these things, which was bad enough in my opinion, but that he was using me as leverage against her. I had never hated someone so much in my life, even when I heard that my parents had been killed I was only sad, but this was different. I could feel my face getting red and hot as blood furiously pumped through my body in response to my anger. It took a second, but all of that rage became contained and I regained my previous calm. I might have outwardly been fine, but I was so angry that I had gone cold and quiet with an inferno raging within me. It was all so clear yet fast at the same time, I lowered my knife to my side and rushed into the room after slamming the door open. The sight I came onto was Mira naked kneeling in front of the Director Gordon all the while crying as she serviced him. She looked up with tear-stained and dead eyes, while Gordon turned around with his pants still around his ankles. The surprise and anger on his face was evident, and right as he was about to reprimand me for barging in, he caught a glimpse of the knife at my side. I could see the moment he saw it, as his face became a mask of fear and he desperately backed up with little scoots of his legs as his bunched pants prevented him from moving too much. I didn''t waste any time and methodically stalked towards the dead man walking, I could feel the cold glare of my eyes already boring into him, making him all the more frantic. When I closed in, he had his hands raised out to defend himself while begging for his life. I took care of those quickly with a quick slash on his right hand that he quickly withdrew into his chest. This was my chance as I closed the gap and thrust my knife up into the stomach of the portly man, and as I did this I also checked him with my shoulder into his sternum making him lose his balance and crash to the ground. This wasn''t the end as I sawed the cut wider until his intestines began to spill out. My rage wasn''t quelled as I grabbed his intestines and pulled while taking the knife and stabbing him in the chest wherever I could land a blow from my position kneeling at his side on the floor. Blood was pooling out quickly and it wasn''t long before I was covered in it. He ended up looking like a ravaged piece of meat with red staining him and all of the cuts making him more pieces than man. I wasn''t remotely sane at this moment, I had completely snapped at the knowledge of him abusing my sister and using me to threaten her. In my mind, there was only one solution to this, and it ended with him dead. I had no thought for the consequences of my actions, I simply wanted the man dead. With the last breathes leaving his body in hoarse wheezes, I sat down on the blood-soaked ground and just sat there completely numb to what had just happened. It wasn''t until Mira came over to me that I was able to think, seeing that she was still naked I went and collected her clothes and helped her put them on. After that, I decided to call the police and report the crime. It was an odd conversation as the person on the phone didn''t quite understand what I was saying at first. "911, how may I help you?" "I''d like to first report a r*pe, and also a murder." "What do you mean?" "I found the director of the orphanage r*ping my sister and so I killed him." "Uhh okay, police will be on their way shortly to your location." With that taken care of, I went over to Mira who was still in shock and just held her close whispering that everything would be okay. I was supposed to protect her, and I had failed, but now she would be safe from him forever. Eventually, the police came, and after assessing the scene and seeing me soaked in blood with a body on the floor I was arrested. Mira was frantic when she saw I was being detained, it took me a minute or two to assure her that everything would be okay and I would see her soon. I told her to just tell the police everything and I would be fine. In this moment she was so broken that she was no longer my older sister, but my family who desperately needed my direction and comfort. I spoke to the police when they interviewed me and told them everything about the event, I may have also added that it was all in self-defense and I was insane at the moment I killed him. I was deemed innocent of any crime, considering my age and the circumstances surrounding the event. I could not have been happier to be reunited with Mira after a few days in detainment, and she seemed much more stable from when I had last seen her. With the scene ending in our hugging in the courthouse, I felt a rushing sensation and woke up from my dream with a yell on my lips. Moments later Mira came in to check on me, she knew what I was dreaming about when I woke up from a dream like that. All that was needed for us to reassure each other that we were fine, was just to hug and make sure that we were real and here together. 28 Ch. 21- Test Your Luck After my nightmare early in the morning, I had plenty of time to get ready, eat breakfast, and then message Alexis to meet up and take care of selling bodies and cores. There was also the merit lottery to think about, I had no idea how many points I would receive, but it certainly felt like a lot considering it was my first monster break. I walked into the square and immediately spotted a red-headed figure near a fountain of a cupid spouting water out of its mouth. She was dressed nicely but casually and had on some tan khaki pants and a deep purple blouse that quite suited her. I told her as much, and she blushed while thanking me and then mentioned my outfit of blue-jeans and a white hoodie looked good on me as well. "Want to head over to the association and unload our monsters before getting anything from the merit lottery" She nods her head in acceptance and immediately begins marching off to the fantasy-like building to sell off the monsters crowding all available space in our storage. Before she can go and randomly select a clerk, I grab her shoulders and veer her over to my favorite attendant. Max had dark bags under his eyes, and his hair has turned into a birds nest from constant touselling. The reason for his messy hair became apparent, because as soon as he saw us heading towards us, he began to furiously tussle his hair out of stress and frustration. "Hey Max, seems like you''ve been working hard since yesterday. Is that a coffee stain on your shirt?" "Hmmm" His tired response resembles that of a zombie, and he does no more than tilt his head to check his shirt before shrugging at the apparent stain on it. I let Alexis go first, and bodies start to form a small hill as they rush out of her storage. Max efficiently notes all of the monsters before plugging it into the tablet in front of him and showing her that she earned a total of 3,164 credits. This was about a sixth of the normal price of these monsters, but the sudden influx drove down prices greatly. She seemed a little upset at such a low price for all of her life-threatening work, but before she goes and argues, I pat her on the shoulder and just shake my head. She pouts at me since I''m stopping her from getting a better price, but I remain firm that arguing won''t change the price and only make Max even grumpier. I don''t know how to console her, after all, I''ve only known her for two days and while fighting both times. I feel like I know her better after we saved each other''s lives, but I don''t know anything about her likes, dislikes, and background. It would have been pretty weird to ask her about her favorite food while we were demolishing a crowd of monsters. Thuds are heard as ragged corpses fall to the floor in a puddle of bloody limbs, and finally, a small mountain is made from the nearly 45 cubic meters of bodies in my watch. The numbers began to add up on the tablet screen, and eventually, the prices stopped at 5,260 credits, mainly due to my multiple tier 4 monster bodies in the pile. With the 17 credits left in my account after my major storage upgrade, my total ended up at 5,277 credits. It was a fairly reasonable price considering the sever cut in price, my major increase in space paid off with me earning about 2,000 credits more than Alexis. She seems even more upset at my larger income, but she manages to calm down when I promise to take her to dinner tonight at my expense. I don''t think she''ll be able to do too much damage to my theoretical wallet. But even if she did, I was rich right now, so it wouldn''t matter too much. With Alexis consoled and me no longer the target of her ire, we went next door to the core exchange. We were here, not only to sell off the cores we weren''t planning on keeping but also to cash in our merit point from the battle and spin the lottery wheel. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. The wheel would be based on different rarities of potential prizes, and each successive wheel increases in price by x10. It would have a mixture of items useful to you based on your profile and summons, and would also have some dud or consolation prizes on the other available slots, hence the lottery part of it. "What do you think you want to try and get from the lottery Alexis?" "Mhm, I don''t know. Maybe some cool armor or a skill, I just hope I don''t get too many duds. My luck is always bad with lottery spins, I just hope my history doesn''t follow me this time." "I''ve always had pretty good luck with stuff like that, I feel like I''ll have enough chances to at least get a few items. Luckily the good stuff is all useful to you in some way usually, it wouldn''t really be much luck to win some epic armor only for it to fit a man half your size." She just seemed to look relieved at me reminding her that anything we get would be useful in some way even if she didn''t win big. The doors approached quickly as we walked, and inside was crowded with refreshed summoners who had the same idea as us to cash in their prizes the day after. After a bit of waiting for one of the terminals to open up, a few of them eventually opened up and we chose two empty terminals next to each other. I think we both felt safer with the knowledge that we would have someone there for moral support if nothing else, plus the fewer people who knew what you had or got, the better. We start piling the unwanted cores onto the counter one handful at a time, it was lucky that the cores were absorbed as they were put down or there would have been a mountainous pile on both of ours. Harvesting them while cleaning up was a pain in the ass, but seeing the total amount increase sure made it worth it. Eventually, after all but a select few were sold off, my total came to 8,660 credits. This made my total balance to 13,937 credits. My merit points would also be 8,660, since the monsters killed gave merit points based off of the core price system. The sheer amount of tier 3 monsters I had killed yesterday gave me the most significant sum of points. The amount was added after I confirmed I was finished selling, and then I selected the merit lottery system and was taken to a completely different page where I could select the rarity of each prize wheel to be spun. For the rarities available to me, there was normal for 10 merit points, uncommon for 100 points, and rare for 1,000. Seeing that it would be rather easy to decide on how many spins for each lottery, I decided to go with 8 rare spins, 6 uncommon ones, and 6 normal spins as well. I decided to go from normal to rare for prize spins and build the anticipation, it was also my hope that some practice spinning would allow me to get better prizes later on. This, of course, wouldn''t happen since it was completely up to chance and wouldn''t be affected by one iota of skill or strategy. The common wheel had a few grey and white slots within it with one yellow slot as the grand prize. The black slots were duds and the whites were slightly useful common items, the yellow was an uncommon prize typically consisting of a minor skill. My first spin had the wheel continuing with a rush of bleak colors until landing on a black space. The rush of disappointment was palpable as my first prize on the wheel is the legendary brick of destruction (jk, just a normal brick). It seems like Alexis is having the same amount of luck as me judging by her grunts of frustration and the pounding of her fist on the wall. I look back at my screen while peeking out the corner of my eye to avoid making her angrier by directly looking at her outburst. She really did her hair color justice by setting off like a firecracker at every upsetting thing, no matter how small. Her next spin seemed to be a bit luckier as she fist-pumped in the air while whooping after seeing the results of her spin. Turning back to my wheel, I continue to spin until all six spins for the common lottery wheel are used up. I got luckiest on the last spin as I managed to land the yellow spot and gained a transferrable riding skill. The other 4 items received were; a plaid schoolgirl skirt, a curly blonde wig, gem of minor healing, and a meal replacement pill. Overall not too bad, but more than half were duds, and the rest were only minorly useful. Moving on to the uncommon lottery, the wheel had a mix of white, yellow, and two greens. It seems the increase in price gives more opportunities for greater prizes, while also removing the less useful colored slots from the previous wheel. It seems that no matter what, with this roll I wouldn''t lose out on much. Like the last wheel, I had a mix of success and barely useful items. My prizes consisted of a dryad one-time summoning card, cauldron of elemental tempering, camouflage skill, drop of elixir for increased regeneration, tortoiseshell comb, and a stamina pill. I was pretty content with what I had won, and even managed to hit both green slots, gaining me the cauldron and drop of elixir. Alexis also seemed pretty happy with her haul, I didn''t know what she had gotten, but I''m sure she''d brag about it later to me. I only hoped that my lucky streak continued and that I wouldn''t get duds on the most useful spins available to me. I even had 8 of them, so my chances were better than usual. I had worked out that the continually better odds for useful items as the tiers increase is to encourage people to use the minimum amount of spins and to justify the wildly increasing point requirements for them. The 8 spins I was using on the rare lottery could be used to spin the uncommon 80 times or the common wheel 800 times, that would be just a bit ridiculous. The colors were a mix of yellows and greens, and also three blue slots added into the mix. I had high hopes for this one, and was really banking on my previous bad luck in the past to have been used up to provide me some good items. As the wheel spun, I continued to chant under my breath, "C''mon, c''mon, lucky prize please". It seemed to work as I got a fair amount of pretty directly useful prizes, and even managed to snag 2 of the 3 available of ultra-rare blue slots. My 8 prizes ended up being; flask from the river Cocytus, the collar of hell''s guardian, a core from a magma elemental tiger, berserker skill, a supplement of undead souls, tier 3 fuzzy seal mittens, a body tempering pill, and an energy shield skill. These all had the potential to be useful to me and my summons now, or at least in the future. The collar and the mittens were more for aesthetics than immediately useful clothing. I mean the mittens would only be useful in the cold, but we aren''t really near snow for quite some miles. Alexis had finished around the same time as me, but it seems she had more lottery spins with the uncommon wheel due to lacking the necessary amount of points to spin the rare wheel as often as I had. Her expression was luckily pretty satisfied so I wouldn''t have to deal with a moody date at dinner tonight. I could also gift her with the skirt since I didn''t really have any use for it, I''m keeping the wig in case I need a disguise for some reason. I mean, you never know when you''ll need one, that''s probably my inner packrat talking. "I think I''m going to go back and use some of the items I got, we can discuss all about what we got during our dinner date." "That''s fine, I also want to try out some of the stuff I got, I''m looking forward to seeing how effective they are." With that out of the way, we head separate ways to our apartments to try out our new toys and to get ready for our date. Come to think of it, I never did tell her when or where to meet for our dinner, or even where we were going. Guess I''ll have to message her and let her know once I''ve decided, maybe I''ll drop by that all you can eat bbq restaurant on the way home. Not only is it delicious, but I don''t have to worry about her eating me out of all my money, she seemed pretty excited at the prospect of free food. She''s worth it in my mind, so I don''t mind spending a lot on her, it''s not like I couldn''t make it all back later. 29 Ch. 22- Prize Allotment and Date with Alexis I had been thinking about what of the new items I had won that could be used now or in the future, and who I should give some of the prizes to. It took an hour of serious consideration for me to decide on the right allotment. Most of the items were very obvious in use and who they were meant for, but some could go to any of them. I was trying to make the right decision and give them to who would benefit the most from them. For example, It wouldn''t hurt any of my summons or myself to get some extra regeneration, but Jareth would be able to make the most use of it in combination with his solid defence and berserker fighting style. Speaking of Jareth, he would also be getting the tier 4 ogre core from the monster break soon to help him evolve, but I would only give it to him the day he feels ready to evolve. For the riding skill, I was still undecided whether I should use it for myself or give it to Jareth. My plan was to use Brutus as a mount, but his size still wasn''t quite up to par for that right now, plus his build is meant more for speed and stealth than strength. Maybe I''d use Jotun as a mount instead depending on his evolutionary direction. The dryad card and the healing gem would come in handy in a fight, but were one-time use items that I didn''t plan on relying on. The stamina pill and meal replacement would just be stored for later use if I ever remembered that I had them. I don''t know what the cauldron of elemental tempering could be used for, but I guess I''ll keep my eye out for potential elemental summons to use it on. The camouflage skill was remaining unused as none of my summons were the scout or assassin type, which is where the skill would be most useful. The flask of icy water from the underworld would go to Jotun obviously, I would give him a drop every morning until it''s used up in order for him to not be overwhelmed by it. It was extremely powerful water, too much would be harmful and potentially deadly. It would be best to gradually let him absorb the water completely, and he can harness the water as he fights when we go out into the wild. The collar would obviously go to Brutus. It looked rather stylish yet intimidating, it was black leather with red streaks on it from some unknown source, and reddish tinged metal spikes that denoted some adamantium alloy within the collar. It even had a little bone-shaped bronze ID that hadn''t been written on yet that was obviously where Brutus''s name would go. I have no clue what undead souls could be used for, they were swirling around as a grey mist within a glass bead type object. It gave off an eerie feeling and was cold to the touch. It wouldn''t hurt to keep with me for now, if I didn''t need it then I could just sell it. When I asked Mira about why the potion didn''t seem very berserker-like, she explained that the potion was an extended-release version that lessened the effects as well as side effects to make it last longer. It was based on the berserker skill, but because of how powerful the skill was, the drawbacks were equally as powerful, which is why the effects were diluted. It was a double-edged sword, but a good wild card to have when in a pinch. The clothing was of no immediate use and the wig would probably rest in my storage for quite some time. The body tempering pill would go to me and hopefully can help upgrade my body in an all-around way, this was the equivalent of having a summon evolve from tier 2 to tier 3. I wouldn''t want to take it if all it did was increase my muscles but neglect my reflexes and speed. It was important to be versatile in all situations, not only in strategy but also in ability as well so you are that much harder to counter. A bad matchup can easily decide a fight even if the losing monster was stronger. Pairing an ent against a fire-wielding imp would probably result in the ent losing even if it is stronger due to the elemental advantage of the imp which can transcend tiers. Last but not least is the energy shield skill. It took me a while to properly decide what should be done with it, but I decided that I should obtain it to have an additional life-saving measure. It never hurt to have more of them, plus none of my summons really needed it. ... After making the reservations at the Korean bbq restaurant, I mailed Alexis the info and told her that I would come and pick her up by the summoner association building where a large fountain nearby was. The fountain was not only easy to find, but it really was a piece of work with a spearman and dragon fighting each other, each detail was exquisitely crafted to the point you thought it was real. I had Mira help find me clothes at a nearby store, and we eventually decided on a casual blue and white button-up shirt with black jeans. I thought I looked pretty good, but I was still nervous to see whether she like it or not. I didn''t have the faintest clue as to what she would be wearing, but it was hard to imagine her not looking good in anything. After all, she looked enchanting covered in blood during the monster break, so with time to clean up I could only imagine how good she would look. It hadn''t even really struck me that I had actually asked her on a date at the time, until I realized I needed to figure out a restaurant to eat at and what I should wear. By then I was freaking out a bit while also smiling at the thought that she agreed to go on a date with me, even if it was only because I promised her food. I hadn''t ever really focused on anyone like this ever, aside from Mira, but she doesn''t count. I was new to any romantic feelings and didn''t even know if she felt the same way. In some ways being a teenager doesn''t change, apocalypse or not. It seemed being awkward and clueless was universal. The first time I had seen her I was impressed more by her strength than her beauty, mostly due to her being a potential competitor in the tournament. After we had fought and she beat me, I saw her in a new light and she left an even greater impression on me. Seeing her now gave me butterflies in my stomach and the odd compulsion to protect her, even though she can very clearly take care of herself. I was glad that we had decided to stick together even after the monster break had ended. We had been forced to trust and rely on each other and it seems as if we both felt a connection to each other. I don''t know where this will lead, or if she even likes me back, but at this point, I''m happy just being around her, I imagine I''ll probably get to know her better before officially asking her to date me. I''ll probably ask Mira later for some advice when dealing with her in the future. Well, at least dealing with something other than her temper and hastiness, which made up a big part of her personality. I guess red-heads having a personality to match their fiery hair was true, at least in her case, but I loved that about her. She was especially in tune with herself and knew what she wanted and liked, it was because he knew this that she acted in the way she did, at least as far as I knew. ...... I finally made it to the fountain I had told Alexis to meet me at, and just on time as I see her make her way over to the fountain as well. My mind goes blank for a moment looking at her in a gold and white skirt and a dark blue blouse that brought out her crimson hair and turquoise eyes. I honestly couldn''t recall her ever wearing a skirt, and it looked better on her than I thought it would, I had to struggle to maintain eye-contact with her rather than ogling at her now exposed legs. With a herculean effort, I tore my eyes away and looked her in the eyes, I could feel a bit of a blush coming on, but I resisted looking away and losing our impromptu staring contest. She also seemed to be blushing a bit from the uncomfortably intense staring, but she seemed determined not to lose and continued looking on at me without blinking. I realized she would continue this until I gave up, I cared far less about winning than she did, so it was usually me who ended up losing any contests. I broke up the atmosphere by clearing my throat and saying, "Hey Alexis, you look great. Are you ready to go and get some dinner? I already made reservations, so we should be able to eat immediately." She broke eye contact at this and was instead staring at my shoulder when she said, "Thank you, you don''t look so bad yourself mister. I''m starving, bbq is my favorite so I can''t wait." She seemed to be speaking the truth because, when she mentioned bbq she began to salivate and even had an odd sparkle in her eye. I dismissed this as her just being her, I should have known there was something more to her words as I would soon come to find out. I began to lead her, and we walked shoulder to shoulder while making small talk. "So, what is it about Korean bbq that you like so much? I mean I love it too, but your eyes seemed to light up when I mentioned it" "Well, I love the freshness and quality of the meat and the rich flavor when they are seared on a charcoal grill. There''s nothing like it, the side dishes don''t hurt either, my favorite is the spicy kimchi and pickled radish that goes great with the meat and rice." I wasn''t expecting a food review from her, but it was slightly entrancing the way she talked so fervently about something she liked so much, I hope I get to hear more about things she likes or just about her in general. I was more than happy to listen to her talk, and I continued to ask questions about her in order to learn even more about my potential partner. She usually didn''t stray into the too personal, but I learned a few things. For one, she was an orphan like me, but she didn''t have any siblings, and she had been adopted by an elderly gentleman who had lost his own son in the war a while ago. She adored him and was extremely grateful for him taking her in, she viewed him as more than just family and worked so hard to get strong and make money to pay him back for his kindness. Her motivation was very similar to mine in this new world, and it seems that our similar motivations are just one more reason we should work together, and I say as much. "I was an orphan before this new era, and the only family that I have now is my sister Mira, she is to me what the old man is to you. I also want to get stronger so I can protect and provide for her to repay all that she had done and sacrificed for me." She just smiled at that shared connection and we walked on in comfortable silence after having revealed a small but significant part of ourselves. It wasn''t long after that we made it to the door of the Korean bbq restaurant, which was called Merlin''s Grill. It was an odd enough name, but the food was great and the decor was simple but pleasing to the eye. The booths were set up with comfy cushions and had scenes of epic battles between a wizard and monsters on the walls, the detail was impressive enough to give you the impression that it was a photo rather than a painting. One of the few things I miss about the old days was the ease of saving moments with pictures, but having no cameras in the summoning era makes that a bit hard. At least art as a profession has come back into fashion, it''s the only way to have pictures of your loved ones nowadays. Some of the better artists are commissioned to draw references for monsters, geography, plants, and the like for textbooks for students to learn about them. It''s hard to learn to identify things without a reference to know what they actually look like rather than rely on the description. Alexis and I sat across from each other and were staring intently on the menu to decide on what we wanted to order first. By the time the waiter came around in a form-fitting black chef uniform, we were ready to order both our food and drinks. I got a spiced mead along with a double order of orc bulgogi, which was a marinated and thinly sliced sirloin. It was my favorite dish and orc meat was even richer than regular meat, so it would be especially tasty. I had only eaten at Korean bbq once before in my life, it was a special treat from Mira for my birthday. She had been saving up and had gotten lucky with making some profits over a minor potion recipe she had helped develop. It was one of my favorite memories, and now I got to have another special meal with someone I had quickly grown close to. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. Alexis ordered green tea and short ribs and brisket to start, and with our starting orders for our all-you-can-eat meal out we could focus on each other. We couldn''t lean as close as we wanted in order to talk, due to the heat from the charcoal grill in the center of the table to cook our meat but we still managed. "What are some of your favorite things Alexis?" "I like candy, cute summons, and fighting" "I shouldn''t be surprised that you''re a battle maniac see that you can more than keep up with me in a fight, and you didn''t seem to shy away from any battles during the monster break either." She just shrugged while seeming a bit embarrassed with what I had pointed out. Snapping out of her embarrassment, she asked me, "What about you, what is it that you like?" "Hmm, I like learning, fighting, eating, my summons, and my sister Mira." Our line of questioning was cut off by the arrival of our drinks and platters of meat to begin grilling. We set our meat on the fired-up grill and the sizzle of the pieces along the metal grid was immediate. The smell was mouth-watering, and it only made us that much more excited to begin eating. We decided to split the available grill space in half for each of us, and while it was a bit crowded, we managed to evenly cook all of the pieces by constant attention and moving the meat around. As soon as ours was cooked through, we began to devour our meal with gusto. The taste was indescribably rich and savory with a faint bit of sweetness from the marinade. It wasn''t long before we ordered more of the same while including the sides like kimchi and rice with the occasional bite of meat to mix things up. I was beginning to be happier about my decision to go to all-you-can-eat after seeing the impressive number of empty plates pile up. By the time we were full, we had managed to eat a total of 20 plates of food and neither of us felt like moving any time soon. We settled down with our drinks and ate a slice of chocolate cake split between the two of us. We continued to idly chat and were having lots of fun with just the two of us. Eventually, I manage to propose something I had been mulling over since this morning, "Alexis, we seem to get along pretty well, and have even saved each other''s lives a few times. Would you like to continue partnering up and working together when hunting amongst other things? I''ve been working by myself and I''ve started to finally feel the drawbacks of working with no one else. Things like being constantly vigilant and having fewer summons able to fight at once if there was a large amount of monsters, which could turn potentially deadly. It would make me feel a lot safer not to mention richer with having us work together to fight bigger and more monsters with someone I can trust." She seemed a bit shocked at the proposal but looked to be seriously considering what I had offered. After a minute of contemplation, she looked up at me and casually said, "Sure I''ll work with you, I had been thinking the same thing, I just didn''t know how to bring it up. It''s rare for me to trust someone, but you''ve more than proved yourself during the monster break, so I would love to work together for now." I couldn''t keep the goofy smile off my face as we worked out the terms of us working together to prevent any issues down the line, it was important to lay down ground rules so that there aren''t any fights over money and stuff like that. We agreed upon splitting any and all profits, and any valuable cores and materials would go to whoever needed them. The only requirement would be to reciprocate the favor with the other partner by helping them as well, or at least paying them the number of credits they would have earned from selling it. Obviously neither of us would allow any betrayal, but we didn''t have to worry about that seeing as we had already proved we wouldn''t abandon each other when things got dangerous. With the terms agreed upon, we shook and enjoyed the rest of the dessert. We finished the cake not long after, and I covered the check which came out to a total of 205 credits, 100 credits for each of us to have an unlimited amount of meat and 5 for the cake. 30 Ch. 23- First Journey as Companions Today was a day of firsts, first time hunting after the monster break, first time hunting with a partner, and hopefully, I would also be able to gain my first tier 4 summon. Jareth had finally accumulated enough experience and had achieved maximum growth in his body, so all that was required was a dangerous fight for him to evolve. When he expressed this development, I immediately knew it was time to feed him the ogre core to start off and potentially affect his evolutionary path. Becoming an ogre was more in line with Jareth''s personality with brute strength and strong defense being his apparent qualities. Orcs were weaker and more skill-based, and trolls were dumb as rocks, so I wouldn''t want him to become one of those. The drop of regeneration serum would make Jareth a pseudo-troll in a way, since trolls were known for their impressive life force and regeneration. Thinking about that made me realize I still needed to give it to him. I took out the vial with the drop inside and handed it to Jareth, "Here, drink this, It''ll make you heal much faster and be that much harder to kill." He seemed to take my words at face value as he uncorked the vial and downed the red-tinged drop of liquid. His next action was to crouch down on the floor in pain as his body began to change and accommodate more cells and blood vessels for increased healing. He had begun to turn red despite the grey shade of his skin, and by the end, the hobgoblin had gained an extra 10 pounds of stem-cells and blood. It was spread evenly around his body, so the change was subtle and only noticeable because I watched the changes occur. I brought out my tier 3 sword and told him, "Cut your arm and see how fast you heal now with your increased regeneration factor." He did as he was told and drug the sword in a neat line across his bicep with the help of a little elbow grease to get past his naturally defensive skin. Red rivulets of blood welled out of the cut, and at a visible rate, the skin slowly stitched itself together until after a minute there was nothing but a faint scar, and even that was fading. Jareth had become that much more deadly, and now he could rush in and commit to dangerous attacks since he would heal soon after. It suited his fighting style perfectly, but it wasn''t without flaws as there was only so much damage that could be healed at once, and eventually, his healing would slow down after repeated use. I sent him back and decided to distribute a few other gifts to my summons. Jotun had to be summoned into the living room and I made sure to carefully give him just a drop from the river Cocytus, the effect was immediately apparent as ice seemed to form and crack all over Jotun''s skin, and his breath became an icy fog every time he breathed. Brutus got the collar, which he seemed to really enjoy and was showing it off at every opportunity when I was paying attention to him. I had to console him with praises and head pats as if he was still a puppy despite coming up to mid-chest on me. Getting this close, I was able to see that his evolution to a grim had actually changed his fur to malleable wisps of shadow, they even felt cool to the touch from the heat of light being absorbed by the shadows. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. My immediate gifts had been given to the necessary recipients, and now it was my turn. The first thing I got out of the way was the energy shield skill that I immediately used on myself. I crushed the card that the skill came in that had the name and description of the skill on it. I saw a burst of golden light rush towards my eyes, and then all I felt was information rush into my brain in a tide. For a short moment, it threatened to burst the vessels in my brain from the sudden rush of blood required to distribute oxygen for the brain to work at max capacity. My brain was working on overdrive for about 10 seconds before the information settled and was properly stored within myself. With the consolidation of information, the headache that had been plaguing me since the start had abated as well. The sensation of suddenly knowing about and being able to do something that was impossible a few seconds ago was startling, and it made me appreciate how convenient it was even if it came at the cost of a headache. I decided to try out the skill and see the limits of the skill. I closed my eyes and focused on the intent of creating a barrier in front of me, with that intent came a rush of energy, and when I opened my eyes a faint green shield-like barrier was formed in front of me. In total, the barrier was about 2 inches thick and looked like it could handle a strong attack, and would probably save my life in the future. The only drawback of the skill from the info that was available about it was that it would only last for 20 seconds, it was stationary, and each attack against it would make the barrier disappear faster. It was still a strong skill and would definitely be of use in the future. In addition to the skill, I also had a body tempering pill to use. I had woken up early today before when I had planned to meet Alexis so that I could use the pill, my only hope was that it wouldn''t take too long. The pill itself was about the size of a thumb and was a brown oval with an engraving of the letters BT, if I didn''t know better I would think it was just a normal supplement. Deciding I had done enough inspection, I tossed the pill back and downed it with some water I had on hand. The size of the pill made it difficult to swallow, but with monumental effort and three tries, I managed to get it down. I felt it already beginning to take effect, and headed to the bathtub and took off my clothes so I didn''t get the rest of the house dirty and ruin a pair of clothing. The pill was supposed to enhance the body by removing impurities that blocked us from using our full physical capabilities. I''m looking forward to seeing just how much this would change me. The pill seemed to be working just fine as I felt pain begin to build as gunk and impurities were pushed out of my body. I even puked up a nasty black blob from my lungs and immediately felt like I could breathe easier. In total the entire process took about 10 minutes, and was rather painful, but still within manageable levels. No pain no gain I guess, the other downside was the horrible smell emanating from the black sludge covering me. Focusing on the smell made me immediately gag as the unpleasant aroma of rotten garbage wafted from it. I couldn''t stand the smell anymore and turned the shower on and made it as hot as it could. I furiously scrubbed the gunk from my skin with soap and hot water and after about 5 minutes of scrubbing myself raw, I had finally managed to rid myself of the tar-like substance and the smell that seemed to want to cling to my skin. When I could stand being around myself I turned off the shower and threw on some clothes before rushing out to go meet Alexis. I was still a few minutes early from when I had planned to leave, but I wanted to take my new body for a ride to see the efficacy of the pill. What I noticed was that I was able to breathe easier while running, and the familiar ache in my muscles after running for a while was absent. When I got to the fountain we had met at the night before I was able to study myself closely. My skin had turned lighter, and no longer was it an olive-brown tone from many hours spent in the sun training, but instead, it was a creamy medium skin tone that looked rather nice on me. That wasn''t all of the changes, but it was all I was able to discern at this moment. The body tempering was about the equivalent of having one of my summons evolve from tier 2 to tier 3, but it came completely from my own body''s ability which had been unlocked at this point. It wasn''t a massive change in strength, but it was noticeable, and overall it seemed to make my body more efficient with no impurities left to obstruct it in any way. .... I was excited for this coming hunt with Alexis, I was sure that it would take a bit of getting used to, but I had no doubt we would be able to be more efficient and safer than if we were on our own. Speak of the devil, as soon as I begin to think about her she shows up. I continue to watch her and see that she is dressed up in a carapaced hunting armor with a short-sword strapped to her hip. I wave her over and greet her, "Hey Alexis, it looks like you''re all set up for hunting today." She gives me a duh expression and says, "Of course I am, death isn''t exactly something I want to invite today so full protection is warranted, especially considering we''re going into a relatively dangerous area for beginners like us." "It''ll be fine, we both have our summons and skills, not to mention that if we can survive a monster break then we can survive anything." She just shrugs and we head off to the gate, and after registering with a quick scan of our watches we head south to the glorified swamp. .... Getting there after a bit of a run, we each bring out one summon to preserve our strength for now while in the easier outer area of the biome. I bring out Brutus, and Alexis brings out Musashi which was her bladed mantis. They look at each other and then to us to see who all would be in our group, and upon finding no one else they begin to head into the dark marsh. We come across a few poisonous insects that are quickly stomped, along with some filament dragonflies that try to swarm us with a group of 9. They all rushed towards Alexis and I, and to block their charge which could potentially hurt us despite the armor we wore, I used my energy shield skill. Their bodies acted as if they had run into glass and were smushed against it before flying off to try and attack again. My shield was still up, but after 10 seconds it disappeared early due to preventing the mass of dragonflies charging with their ridiculously sharp wings. Seeing that their charge hadn''t worked, they split up and gave 2 monsters to each person and summon, with an additional one attacking Musashi. Brutus uses an illusion to fool them into missing him, and uses their confused state to snap them out of the air with his teeth and grinds them up before spitting them out to make sure they are dead. The only wound on him is a few cuts on his tongue, which heal not long after. Alexis and I were swiping at them with our swords and managed to avoid their charges while swinging our swords along the trajectory of their flight. It took about 3 swings for each dragonfly before they were brought down. It didn''t require much from us as the bugs were only tier 2 and had a fairly weak body. Despite their wings being so sharp as if made out of metal, they were only made from a hardened and thinned chitinous shell. Musashi required no help as the dragonflies had trouble even getting close before he swiped them out of the air in half. If it was the entire swarm, they may have been able to actually damage him some, but 3 posed no challenge for the skilled mantis summon. A few more monsters crossed our path and were immediately disposed of with minimal effort before we made it to the middle area where tier 3''s resided. We broke for lunch at this point before venturing further and each summon got a core to eat, while Alexis and I each brought sandwiches out from storage to quickly eat before continuing on. We ate in comfortable silence and focused on resting for the little time we had allotted while eating our food. Our meals were quickly finished off before we allowed for an additional 5 minutes to collect ourselves before venturing on. Preparation was important, and even though we hadn''t gotten into a truly dangerous area yet, it didn''t mean we could allow ourselves to relax. A weak monster could still get lucky and take us out if we were unprepared, especially if it was tier 3 and managed to slip by our summons. We were no means invincible, but it was understood that being cautious would go a long way to saving ourselves from threats. We kept Musashi and Brutus out while also summoning Holly and Emmett for added insurance against these potentially equal opponents. It wouldn''t do to have a swarm of tier 3''s restrain our summons and attack us, having more summons out would hopefully prevent this problem from arising. 31 Ch. 24- Jareth vs. Juggernaut Centipede Entering the tier 3 area wasn''t much different from the outer area, only slightly denser shrubbery and some larger and more dangerous monsters. They didn''t really pose a threat to us with two summons each summoned out, each was at least able to contend with tier 3''s if not completely dominate most of them. I let Emett take a front seat to get some more battles in and Alexis did the same with Holly saying that she would need the practice fighting in closer quarters where air space is mostly blocked off. Musashi and Brutus were sitting back like doting parents watching their kid play on the playground all the while ready to swoop in and save them if need be. It was an odd image to come to mind, but I couldn''t say it was inaccurate. Holly taking the air and supporting Emett on the ground seemed to be a pretty good pair as could be seen in their first fight where a feathered serpent and a bristled boa pair worked to take down the unassuming-looking duo. Obviously the feathered serpent went after Holly with its'' poisonous fangs bared to plunge into the harpy if given the chance. The boa slunk its way towards Emett who remained stationary the entire time as if letting the serpent attack first to at least give it a fighting chance. Neither monster had much luck as the feathered serpent was unable to come close due to repeatedly dodging feather projectiles shot from Holly''s wings. The boa managed to wrap around Emett, but not much else happened as it was unable to even shave away the rocks on the golem''s surface. It didn''t last much longer than getting an initial attempt at shaving away the skin. Emett seemed to want to finish the fight sooner rather than later and went for the vicious move of prying apart the razor-like jaws of the constrictor and tearing them apart from each other. The ability to unhinge its'' jaws helped the snake at first, until even that limit was being broken with a sharp snap as the bottom jaw was completely removed from the head. The boa attempted to hiss in pain, but it had no tongue to do so, and instead just writhed around in pain until it died shortly after from blood loss. Holly''s fight wasn''t over any later than Emett''s as the flying snake dove in with a last-ditch attempt at poisoning the humanoid bird. Unfortunately for it, Harpies are experts at fighting and eating snakes, and just as easily caught it within her claws before ripping it in half with heavy tugs from each leg''s talon to kill it. By the time we made it to the edge of the area which was clearly marked with a barrier of low fog that made it difficult to see far away. We would have to be extra vigilant within this area and so prepared our summon lineup accordingly before entering the ominous area. I called back Emett and brought out Jareth who seemed to be eager to battle with some strong monsters. I was just hoping he would be able to defeat his unknown foe and evolve, going in this area was risky but necessary for his evolution, I doubt I would have attempted it had I not partnered up with Alexis. Alexis just had the two summons currently, but just had Musashi at the front now and Holly hanging at the back as support. "Jareth tells me he''s about ready to evolve, so I''d like for him to take point and fight against any monsters we find if he is able to handle them, otherwise please step in and help him fight it off." "Ok, you hear that Musashi?" The large insectoid nodded his green triangle-esque head and clattered the pair of mandibles around his mouth in some attempt at communication. "Musashi says that he''ll step back, but only if he gets to fight some monsters later too." "Fine by me, I just want Jareth to finally evolve, and a dangerous solo battle should do just the trick." With that agreed on, we walked into the misty bayou with our heads on a swivel, weary of any unknowns. Brutus and his keen sense of smell would be our first line of defense, and Holly with her aerial view would serve as a back up to find any monsters hiding. Fortunately, most tier 4 monsters within the area were sparse and had little concern with hiding themselves as their power was usually enough to fight any opponent they came across. The first one we came across was after 30 minutes of wandering around we found a spriggan that Jareth immediately fought against. It was a tough battle with the living wood monster controlling plants within the vicinity to attack Jareth ceaselessly. He was strong and fast enough to run through them while smacking away the stronger vines and branches with his mace, his gravity hammer remained at rest on his shoulder. Without the foreknowledge of knowing what monster he was fighting and that there was a monster near, Jareth likely would have been taken by surprise and drowned before he even knew what hit him. Luckily this wasn''t the case and he was prepared to take down the ambush specializing monster. When he got within distance Jareth sprinted just out of reach of some vines trying to tangle his feet and swung around in a tight circle with the gravity hammer outstretched. At the peak of momentum and right before impact on the spriggan''s chest, the gravity ability was activated and what resulted was a giant crash and a gaping hole where the chest of the monster used to be. I quickly stored the body and after a little searching, the core as well, which had been lost in the final attack. We moved on to avoid being ambushed ourselves and came across 2 more monsters before finally coming across the most dangerous monster I''ve ever faced to date. I quickly identified the monster as a juggernaut centipede, which was the length of a bus and about as wide as a tire. It had a red and black-streaked carapace that just screamed violence, and also had about one-hundred legs that were each the size of my arm and pointed at the end for digging into ground or stabbing. It had a large pair of pincers around the mouth and a multitude of eyes on its head. The most eye-catching and remarkable part of the body was the thick plates that shifted around the outside of its body like living chainmail. This centipede was defensively focused, and it was difficult for any attacks to even mar the surface, let alone do some real damage. The giant insect was known for crushing or plowing over its prey with no concern about damage to itself as if it perfectly embodied the concept of being a juggernaut. It was essentially a large and dangerous moving tank and was one of the especially dangerous monsters within the marsh. I knew this was serious and sent Jareth out to distract the bug for a second while I summoned out Jotun and unsummoned Brutus. This monster would require a team effort to take down, which would be especially hard considering how one hit could spell the end for any of the summons. "Alexis, have Holly help distract the centipede and have Musashi stay behind, his blade-arms won''t be able to get past the bugs'' defense." I had Jotun go out and support Jareth as well with an occasional Ice breath attack. Jareth was holding his own against the centipede by pure merit of being faster than the bug. It was raised off the ground and doing its best to squash Jareth with its body weight or tear into him with sharpened legs pointed down to attack. It didn''t seem to be too concerned about Jareth and was currently toying around with him, this only lasted till Jareth managed to strike the exposed underside of the colossal insect with his gravity hammer attack. It seemed like it managed to go through the tough armor and inflict some internal damage. The resulting shriek from the monster was like nails on a chalkboard and resulted in almost all of the summons flinching slightly at the sound, luckily the monster was too occupied with the damage it received to take advantage of that moment of vulnerability. It was now warier and avoided exposing itself unnecessarily while fighting to avoid another incident like before. It didn''t seem to be terribly bright either as it was able to be distracted from the feather shards and ice balls being launched at it. This gave Jareth a necessary reprieve to recover a little from constantly dodging attacks that not even he would be willing to take on despite his high defense. That''s not to say that he wasn''t hurt in the fight at all, as there were a multitude of deep cuts along his body from the legs of the monster, but his increased healing factor was taking care of them for now at least. It seemed like at this point that for every wound healed there were two more that would take its place. He was covered in blood, but didn''t seem to be out of the fight yet. I knew he wouldn''t be able to take too much more of this and decided to gamble in order to win. "Jareth, use your berserker skill! You need to take it down as soon as possible so only bother using the gravity hammer to deal internal damage." I got a head nod in response as he was too preoccupied to do anything else. He dropped his iron mace which was just taking up space in his hand at this point and his skin began to have veins of red surging through it. His face took on a feral expression and he roared out in rage, he turned his head towards the closest moving thing which was luckily the monster and began to viciously attack with no regard to any damage taken. Swing after swing was given to the bug which was doing its best to avoid the raging summon to no avail, Jareth was too fast and it was too large to effectively avoid his attacks. Seconds passed by as heavy damage was given on both sides, each vying to take out the other before they themselves were killed. Both opponents had given up any attempt at avoiding attacks and were now doing their best to squash the other. Jareth was like a surging tide with the hammer whipping in and out in some sort of ethereal dance of aggression. He moved like a never-stopping spinning top and continued to layer on attack after attack on the now crushed carapace of the insect. However, it wasn''t going down without a fight and had been able to use its'' claws to great effect, anytime Jareth got close enough to attack he was pierced or slashed with at least a few. Unfortunately for it, Jareth was unable to feel any pain in this state and only focused on doing as much damage as possible. It was nearly the time limit for the berserker skill and as soon as that ran out, Jareth wouldn''t be able to survive for even a few seconds longer. Luckily the damage accumulated over the battle from repeated attacks from an enraged hobgoblin was enough to take down the juggernaut centipede before it could take out Jareth. It fell over after a sharp wail of defeat and remained motionless after that. Jareth, seeing that his opponent was no longer moving looked around for another target to attack in his bloodlust and began to charge towards Jotun who was closest to him. Luckily Jareth only made it about halfway before the skill ran out and he fell to the ground in extreme exhaustion. Alexis and I began to head towards Jareth to check up on him and to secure the monster core for Jareth''s evolution. I brought out my healing salve and used a fair amount covering the multitude of wounds crossing across the hobgoblin''s flesh. Alexis went to retrieve the core for me as I was taking care of my injured summon. As soon as she retrieved it and handed it to me, I fed the core to Jareth in hopes that the core and the tough battle would be enough to launch him over the evolutionary wall. Luckily it seems to have worked as light began to emanate from Jareth who still remained on the ground. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. Alexis and I backed up and watched the evolution begin. Jareth''s form seemed to be growing larger and more rotund, and is even seemed like there was an additional pair of muscular arms growing from his extended torso. Lights were also flowing into me as the change continued and I felt my strength soar and my skin get thicker. I got the odd impression that I was now fully capable of using either hand like it was my dominant one, this also seemed to extend to my legs as well. By the end, Jareth was recovered and standing in his new hulking form. He was now an ogre larger than any human with a thick platinum-colored skin that seemed impenetrable, along with that large change was the additional pair of limbs right under his original ones. The official name for Jareth''s new form was the 4-armed titanium ogre, and he was as impressive as the name made him sound if not more so. It seems the trait of many arms from the centipede passed down onto Jareth as he evolved, and the ogre core seems to have done its'' job of guiding Jareth to become an ogre. He looked domineering just standing in his new form and exuded a dangerous aura. His mace seems to have evolve with him and now had jagged and curved tips reminiscent of the centipede''s legs all over the head of the weapon, it was definitely built more for tearing and ripping at this point. He picked it up and held the changed weapon comfortably with one hand. I had gained increased stats to the point of being able to contend with a strong tier 2 monster by myself, and I seemed to have gained a thicker skin and the ability to be ambidextrous from Jareth, probably as a result of him gaining extra limbs to use. "Congrats Thomas, it seems like you have your first tier 4 summon. That''s quite the accomplishment for someone as new as you to summoning. I suppose that monster break must have really pushed Jareth to his limit." "Thanks, it''s still hard to believe that he used to be just a little goblin around knee-height and is now a towering ogre that I have to look up at to see his face. I suppose I owe Musashi a battle or two, so why don''t we keep looking for more monsters to fight." 32 Ch. 25- Fighting a "Lesser" Poison Drake Alexis POV Thomas and I had been fighting for most of the day in this smelly and dirty swamp, and he had finally just managed to evolve his hobgoblin Jareth into a four-armed titanium ogre. It was a variant I had never even heard of before, and he seemed to be especially powerful in combat with his additional limbs and damage resistant skin. I was really happy for my new partner, I''ve only known him for a few days at this point, but he has quickly grown on me. My first impression of him during the tournament, which he had wisely forfeited, was of a determined but inexperienced summoner who was especially lucky in getting decent summons early on. Many were unable to become summoners due to their weak initial summon, and unless they had the money or connections to get help with contracting better summons or strengthening their initial ones, they would be SOL (sh*t out of luck). We had talked briefly after the battle, only enough to introduce ourselves and make a little bit of small talk. I had given him my designated acquaintance name with no intention of getting any closer after that. He seemed nice enough, but I was busy trying to be a strong summoner and didn''t have time to try and make new friends. Obviously my mindset has since changed since I''m hunting with said person currently. It was a new experience for me, but I couldn''t say I didn''t like it. The next time I met him was when he saved my life during the recent monster break. I was about to be crushed by an ogre as my other summons were preoccupied when Thomas charged in and saved me after hearing my shout. All of the other summoners either ignored me or were too far to help, but not him. He and his summons charged in to take down the tier 4 monster duo and then stayed by me as we worked together to survive the mad onslaught. That incident greatly changed my perception of Thomas, and now it was hard to imagine not being by him for the foreseeable future. I didn''t know if it was love or not that was making me want to be by him, but all I knew right now was that I was happier working together than being alone again. ... I was an orphan just like him, although unlike him, I had no other family or siblings to rely on. That was true until right after the monster break where I was taken in by an older summoner who had lost his granddaughter during the first monster break. We became each other''s family when we needed it most, he treated me as his own family and doted on me whenever he could. Unfortunately, even in this era, old age gets to us all and he had to retire as an active summoner about 3 months ago. Now that I was of age to become a summoner, I had taken it on myself to take care of and support him by any means necessary. Thomas had immediately taken to trusting me and sharing personal information as soon as we began to fight together and save each other''s lives. I didn''t want to betray his trust and even tried to reciprocate, but I wasn''t very used to sharing anything personal so I was still working up to that. I''ll probably need to sit down with him in the near future and really talk and share myself with him. If I can trust him with my life and work with him, then there''s no reason I can''t share other things with him. The more I get to know the boy, the more endearing I find him. He has such a strong drive to care for his sister and become strong to protect what he cares about in this unforgiving world that it would be weird if I didn''t fall for him a bit. I''m still not sure how I could even admit that to him, or if he even feels the same way. If Thomas rejected me and said that he thought of me more like a sister, I would be devastated. Last night might have helped confirm some interest from him, but I''m still not sure just how strongly he feels. It may just be passing interest as a result of being around each other so much, but I''m really hoping that isn''t the case. Maybe talking will help me get closer to him and if I''m lucky I''ll find out if he feels the same way about me as I do him. I''m not used to expressing feelings or sharing anything about myself so I don''t know when would be appropriate to confess or even hint that I like him, the thought of being rejected makes me depressed just thinking about it. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. I guess, for now, I''ll just enjoy being around him while I can, and as I get to know him better maybe things will progress the way I want them to. One thing I''ve learned through my many hardships is that it is important to enjoy and appreciate the things you have now, because nothing ever stays the same in such a wild world. Working up my courage, I eventually manage to talk with him, "Hey Thomas... is there another name that Mira calls you, or do you only go by your given name?" I figure that if anyone would give him a nickname it would be Mira, after all, she is his only family and he mentions her often whenever he talks to me. She seems to have a special place in his heart, maybe one day I can share that same position with her and become a precious person to him. He thinks for a moment as we walk side by side through the squelching mud before finally replying, "Mira calls me Tommy sometimes to embarrass me." Deciding to assuage his fears I chimed in, "I like the name, it suits you." This seems to shock him slightly since he was usually teased with that name since it sounded a bit childish. He regains his composure a bit after a second before looking at me and saying, "If you really like it that much, I guess I''ll make an exception and let you call me that. Since I answered your question, I have one of my own for you. Why do close friends call you Alexis and strangers Alex?" I didn''t really expect this question but I guess it''s only fair since I asked him a pretty personal question as well. "I let strangers and acquaintances call me Alex since I don''t care for that name as much. However, I saved my real name for close friends or family. I really like my first name since it''s the only thing I have of my parents, and so Alex was the default name to give. I feel like my name is something special that I reserve for people who deserve to say it." "Hmmm, that''s not what I thought the reason would be, but it''s as good as any reason if not a bit weird. Usually, it''s friends who call you a nickname and strangers your given one, but I guess I can see why you chose to do it that way." I was glad to see that he had accepted my explanation and that I got to learn something about him and also managed to share a bit of myself with him as well. "We''ve been wasting a bit too much time, why don''t we pick up the pace and find some more monsters for Musashi to fight. If I''m really lucky I might just find a monster to become a new summon for me since I only have two right now. Let''s pick up the pace... Tommy" ....... I managed to get my wish, as we found a few weaker tier 4 monsters for my harpy and bladed mantis to fight. Holly would fly around and shoot out feathers at their faces to distract them as Musashi got up close and dealt damage to them with his bladed arms. They really got in some valuable fighting experience while facing these stronger monsters, even if it took them a while. I wasn''t really concerned about safety since Tommy had Jareth on standby to intervene if it was necessary. We walked from the latest battle site only to come across an odd clearing of mud with few trees to get in the way of fighting. There was a deep but small pond to the left of us with all sorts of vegetation around it, and oddly enough the plants gave off vibrantly hued colors, with the main color being some shade of purple. I got an ominous feeling from those plants and knew better to eat them since they seemed odd and bright colors on something was usually a bad sign. They could even be poisonous for all I know. Little did I know just how right I was about them being poisonous, but there was an even greater danger lurking around somewhere near. I could feel the ominous presence of something predatory near, but no matter where I looked, I couldn''t seem to find it. Thom... I mean Tommy must have felt the same way since he appeared to be alert and looking around like I was. I warned Musashi and Holly to be ready for something dangerous, but it was unnecessary since they were already tense in preparation for the unknown. After a few moments of this serious silence and controlled movement, the danger made itself know by rising up from the mud that had covered its'' body completely. It even had plants that had grown in the mud that was caking its back. Taking a closer look, I could make out the deep purple coloring on the scales covering the monster that had emerged from the marsh. Its'' appearance became even more clear as it shook off the mud clinging to it and emerged as a proud poisonous drake. It was another Dragonoid variant that was a level above wyrms like Jotun which had a serpentine body and small legs to help maneuver on tricky terrain where slithering wouldn''t work. This one was clearly quadrupedal with a long and nearly prehensile tail that ended in viciously curved spikes that resembled daggers. It had spikes dotting along the spine and limb areas, and its head had become more snout-like and refined with small horns sprouting from the ridge of its'' head which resembled a goat. Deadly looking fumes spouted from the nostrils of the monster and each of the spikes on its body glowed bright purple from being adorned with poison. It would be best to avoid being damaged at all by the monster, because one scratch would be enough to potentially kill the unlucky victim. To go along with the poison theme of the drake were longer and sharper fangs protruding from the mouth of the monster that promised a painful demise to any unlucky enough to be struck by them. It was slimmer and lankier than other drakes that I had seen, not to mention that the horns are still rather small. This all indicated that it was a rather new drake and that it was a female judging by its'' body shape. The poison was dangerous enough as is, and anything affected would be greatly hampered if not killed by it, but it would be downright menacing if it was matured and experienced. This was the equivalent of giving a toddler a gun, it doesn''t matter how powerful the weapon is if the user doesn''t know how to effectively use it. I shared my observation with Tommy and he seems to have come to the same conclusion as he didn''t seem surprised by what I had shared. Dragonoid''s are strong enough even in lesser forms that it would be best to avoid fighting them if possible. They were usually one of the more powerful monsters within whatever tier they were classed as, except for drakes which were on the lower end of the spectrum of tier 4 monsters. Wyverns were also in tier 4 and were the real dangers since they were just a step away from a real tier 5 dragon or some version of. Luckily we weren''t facing one of those, and the Dragonoid that we were facing was fairly new and weak. This weakness is only relative to tier 4 monsters, they would still crush anything below their tier, and the adult drakes could even contend with some of the stronger monsters. Taking all of this time to think about the enemy in front of us was a mistake as the poisonous drake didn''t hesitate to roar and charge us. The roar shook me out of my thoughts in time to witness the deceivingly speedy monster run right at us. Holly already took to the air and Musashi jumped to the side since he knew I could take care of myself. Sure enough, as the beast closed in with a swipe being directed towards me, I activated my flying wings skill and took to the air with a few beats of my newly sprouted wings. Tommy seemed to be fine as well since his ogre summon was handling the drake. Deciding I would be safest near him, I direct my wings and land next to him right as my wings disappear. They are very useful when escaping, but their only downsides were the time in between uses and the short activation time. Deciding that some coordination is in order to take down this lethal monster I looked over to Thomas and said, "Why don''t you have Jareth manage the drake while the rest will attack during openings and distract it. If possible, please leave it alive enough for Musashi to kill it, I need another summon and this one would be really helpful." I was relieved to hear, "I''ll do my best to let you get the final strike, but no promises." And so our struggle began with us fighting a monster that we couldn''t risk getting near, well all except for Jareth whose skin was now strong enough to not be pierced by any of the stray spikes. It would take a powerful attack for any of the spikes to break through, but the intimidating ogre wasn''t allowing it any time to work up a move like that. They two monsters were deadlocked with neither being able to damage the other. Jareth was too defensively strong to be hurt by casual attacks, and the drake was too fast to be hit by the ogre''s hammers which he wielded with two hands on each. The newly enlarged form of Jareth seems to have traded speed for damage nullification when moving into the 4th tier, and was, unfortunately, being countered by a speedy opponent taking advantage of his slow form. This stalling state didn''t last long as multiple attacks were launched at once on each side of the fight. The drake released a poisonous purple mist that seemed to wilt vegetation as it passed by, and it immediately curled up a defensive position to try and mitigate some of the damage. Its'' tail was curled around and protecting the face while the underside dropped to the ground to hide weak spots. This proved to be the best move as feathers bounced off the tail protecting the Dragonoid''s face. A large chunk of ice, courtesy of Jotun, who had just been summoned to join the fight, rammed into the side of the monster with a loud crash and resulted in quite a few cracked or removed scales. Musashi and Brutus weren''t idle either as they ran in from the sideline and cut and slashed at the exposed and vulnerable flank of the defensively positioned monster. Only a few attacks were able to be made before the drake got up and lashed out at the two summons within range. Brutus got lucky and shadow traveled through the shadow of the incoming barbed tail to escape. Musashi was not as lucky, and while he may have managed to fly above most of the tail that was acting as an extended mace, he still got nicked by one of the poisoned spikes on his back left leg. I was worried after seeing him get hurt and knowing that it was only a matter of time before he got too weak to finish off the monster. Holly was still a tier 2 monster so she wouldn''t be able to damage it, not to mention that I definitely could not finish off an incapacitated tier 4 monster even if I wanted to since my strength was even less than Holly''s. "Tommy, we need to finish this quickly before Musashi falls to the poison." "Gotcha. Jareth, go and finish the drake off quickly, but make sure not to instantly kill it." The ogre did as expected of him and charged in through the dissipating poison mist to attack the now wounded monster. Jareth''s increased regeneration was taking care of the poison being inhaled and he paid no mind to anything other than striking down the pesky lizard that kept avoiding him. With a hind leg mauled and a few broken ribs from Jotun''s ice cannon, the drake was in no position to move quickly and avoid Jareth like it did before. Instead, it readied itself for one great attack to hopefully fend the ogre off. The poisonous monster coiled up with the end of its tail winding past its face and spun quickly while extending its tail out as far as possible. The tail swung around completely like a deadly mace packed with inertia from the rotation. Jareth didn''t slow down as he saw the move, but instead mimicked the drake as he moved and with his gravity hammer extended spun the opposite way to meet and counter the rushing tail. A great ringing and shattering was heard as bone met metal in an explosive final move. The hammer was ringing from the excessive force crashing against it not long ago, while the breaking sound was the spikes on the tail end being crushed and broken off. The force of the rejected tail spun the drake around wildly and left it in an unstable position, while the only backlash for the silver-colored ogre was a ringing hammer. He wasn''t moved back at all, and he continued to charge forward and take advantage of his opponents'' unfortunate position. He swung with his recently evolved titanium mace spiked similarly to how the drake''s tail used to be and crashed it into the front shoulder of the downed drake. The impact left the limb crippled, and a second smash to the head with the same mace left the proud juvenile drake clinging to life. "Hurry Musashi, strike it down before it dies" My faithful mantis summon took heed to my words and charged the immobile monster and drove both sword limbs into the vulnerable eyes of the monster before ending its'' life with significant damage to the brain behind the eye sockets. "Tommy do you have any antidote on you, Musashi is still poisoned and I didn''t think to buy any." "Luckily Mira gave me a few bottles of a new anti-venom she is working on, here''s one for him and another in case of emergency." I gratefully received the bottles and stored one away while running towards Musashi to give him the antidote. I luckily got to him in time, and the bulging purple veins that had spread across his body began to recede at a noticeable pace. With my summon''s safety taken care of, I ran over to my soon-to-be summon and dug around in her chest for the core. I managed to retrieve it despite how nasty it was to dig around in its'' chest, all the while remaining aware of any spikes near me and remaining careful not to accidentally scratch myself on one, which would undoubtedly kill me. I placed the core on the mangled body of the lesser poison drake and began the summoning contract after slicing my index finger with the dagger Tommy handed to me. A few drops of blood landed on the core and a few moments later it was all absorbed along with the body going into the core as well. I now had a new and powerful summon with plenty of future evolutionary potential, not to mention she possesses a powerful bloodline. I couldn''t keep the ecstatic grin off my face or manage to be embarrassed by how I was acting in front of Tommy, I was just so happy nothing else mattered. Knowing that I couldn''t continue calling my new summon by her species, I tried to think up a name and eventually came up with, "I think I''ll call her Hemlock, naming her after a beautiful but poisonous plant suits her perfectly". I jumped onto the nearby figure of my summoning companion and gave him a big hug for helping me get a new summon. I knew I would not have managed to survive, much less gain a new summon had I been by myself facing off against the drake. "Thank you, thank you, thank you" I just kept repeating the words with no other way to express my gratefulness, eventually, I worked up the courage to peck him on the cheek before turning away and heading over to my summons nearby. I turned around so he wouldn''t see my beet-red face, it would be too embarrassing to let him see me like this. I counted this as progress towards my goal of confessing to Tommy, despite how slow it may seem. To be fair I''ve only known him for a few days, so this amount of time isn''t enough to warrant worrying about confessing just yet. I planned to get to know him better before committing to anything, but what I had seen so far was exactly what I would want in a partner. In this era, many relationships bloomed quickly due to the volatile and unknown nature of the current world, so it wasn''t out of line for me to feel so strongly about him. His having saved or helped me at least a few times doesn''t hurt either, but I wouldn''t rush into a relationship yet. I needed to know that we were strong enough not to worry about losing each other to have a stable relationship, I also needed more time to work out my feelings and make sure they were genuine and not just infatuation from him saving me. I had to be practical, even with love, the dangerous new world would allow for nothing less. I couldn''t afford to give away my heart before I was completely sure about him. For now, I would enjoy his company and spend as much time as I could with him. I decided to suggest something to get him to stay with me for at least a bit longer, "Now that the battle is over, why don''t we head back and get some ice cream after all the hard work and danger we faced today." "Sure, why not. After being able to get Jareth to evolve into a tier 4 summon, I''m in a good enough mood to pay for it too. But first I need to collect some of these poisonous plants for Mira''s research, and then we can go." We spent a few minutes gathering and storing a plethora of multi-colored plants before heading back as quickly as we could while there was still light. We didn''t even head over to the core exchange or summoner associating when we made it through the gate, instead, we went right for an ice cream parlor with a large ice cream cone sign with the words Gilbert''s Icecream Parlor written on it in a variety of colors. I got a hot fudge sundae while Tommy got a chocolate milkshake. We ate in comfortable silence and just enjoyed being around each other. Despite being in our dirty hunting armor, this felt like a date to me, which improved my mood even more. Even if it isn''t a real date, I''ll take what I can get for now and enjoy it as much as possible. 33 Ch. 26- Cashing in Corpses Today was a break day for Alexis and me, but we needed to meet up and sell our haul from last night. We were just too wiped after all that had happened to bother with trying to do anything else except eating and sleeping. Speaking of which, I didn''t even bother with a proper meal after the ice cream we had. I was just so focused on showering and sleeping that nothing else crossed my mind. I can still feel the phantom sensation of mud and grime sticking to places I didn''t even know they could reach through clothes, ugh *shudder*. When my personal hygiene had been taken care of and I once again felt like a human being I fell into my comfy bed and didn''t even bother to pull the covers over me before succumbing to my heavy eyelids. Now that I was rested, I could distinctly feel the absence of any food in my body which growled at me in what I assume to be anger or frustration. I didn''t even know it could make sounds like that. Breakfast should help remedy that anyways, so I guess I''ll just grab something on the way to meeting up with Alexis. There''s no time to cook for myself, so I''ll pick up a bagel or something to eat on the way. The thought of getting food motivated me enough to hop out of bed and throw some casual clothes on before jogging down the main street into the center of the city. About 5 minutes in, I come across an interesting smelling stall. There''s an elderly woman in front of some waffle makers and some oil fryers, the smell wafting through is a strong sweetness from warm maple syrup and the doughy smell of freshly made waffles. Even more noticeable was the alluring scent of fried chicken mixed with various spices, with it coming fresh out of the fryer there was the popping and sizzling of hot oil coming from the breaded pieces of deliciousness. The waffle maker was a bit odd shaped and looked to be more like a wide football, which made sense when I saw the greying vendor place chicken in the middle of the waffle and fold it up like a taco before putting a healthy dose of thick amber syrup. She had made chicken and waffle tacos perfect for eating on the go, and I had to concede to my growling stomach and buy three. I figured I would fill my belly with two of them while saving the other for Alexis when I saw her. Not wanting the food to go to waste or get dropped, I stored all but one in my storage to maintain their heat and to prevent the waffle from getting soggy from all of the syrup. After that was taken care of, I realized I was in a bit of a conundrum as it would be hard to walk and enjoy my food without taking forever to get to the fountain and meet with Alexis. It occurred to me a few seconds later that I was a summoner and had a summon I could ride to enjoy my food in peace while getting there quicker. Rather than continuing to kick myself for stupidity, I brought out Brutus''s core and summoned him to be my ride. He was about at my height, so I had him lay down so I could hop on his back. Hanging onto his spiked collar with one hand and eating my chicken and waffle taco with the other, we began my rather quick journey to the central plaza. With Brutus cutting my travel time down significantly, I made it to the fountain before Alexis and began working on my second breakfast taco, which was practically the food of the gods. About halfway through my second taco, I saw a familiar figure come into view in casual clothes similar to mine. Waving over to catch her attention, I have her come and sit beside me on the edge of the fountain and hand her the last remaining taco. Her eyebrows raised at being handed a food surprise, but she didn''t comment aside from murmuring thanks and digging into the food. Right now, I was wishing I had bought the entire available stock to store in my inventory, I guess I''ll just have to do it when I see the stall open next. I finally understand how addicts feel, I was even discreetly eyeing the nearly finished taco in her hands, barely managing to restrain myself from taking it away. As she enjoyed her breakfast in between small moans reveling in the syrupy goodness that is breakfast tacos, I was instead looking at her and thinking. The way she was acting confused me a bit, we seem to have gotten closer, but I''m still not sure how she feels about me. Maybe she''s just teasing me, or just being nice, I really don''t want to screw up and make things weird between us. We''ve still only known each other for a few days, so this isn''t that big a deal since it''ll all be revealed in time, but I can''t help but stress about it with my hormone-addled body screaming at me to ask her on a real date. I guess there''s no reason not to, but I''ll have to wait for the right moment since right now we have things to do. We got quite the haul yesterday, the only downside is that the reduction in price is still in place, but at this point, they are worth about 60% of what they usually are, not to mention that I split profits with Alexis as well. I don''t mind splitting the money with her too much, but it''ll be nice when the prices go back to normal and we can make some serious money. "Morning sleepyhead, are you ready to head over to the core exchange and summoner building to cash in our prizes?" (Thomas) Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. "Sure, let me just find a trashcan and we can head over" (Alexis) ........... The core exchange was only moderately busy this morning, which meant we didn''t have to wait in line for a station to open up. There was an empty one on the far wall to the left of the door, it didn''t have others using the ones beside it, so it was perfect for us. This was my first time splitting the profit with someone, so I was unsure how this would work. Figuring something was better than nothing, I suggested, "Why don''t we put all of the cores we want to sell in this station and then we can either split the credits if there is a function like that, or I can send you the credits after we sell them all." (Thomas) "Why not, let me start taking some cores out of my storage so we can get this over with quick." (Alexis) We got to work pulling out the plethora of cores, most of which were different sizes and colors. By the end, we had made a veritable mountain, which was absorbed by the station as soon as we told it we were finished. The total came out to be an even 1,000 credits, but even better was the option to divide payment to multiple people. There were even different ratios for groups that handled salaries like that. I didn''t need to mess with all of that, so I set it to transfer the money equally between Alexis and I. With each of us earning a cool 500 credits form cores alone. This left my account to be at 14,200 credits, I was wealthy, but needed even more money in preparation for the coming auction that would be selling off a lot of the goods harvested during the monster break. We did the same over at the summoner association, and of course, Max was our attendant for the transaction. He had a larger scowl than usual on his face so I didn''t want to bother him with small talk. He rang us up quickly by efficiently browsing and scanning each body that we pulled out. By the end, he had managed to tally them all up then mark for the reduction in price due to excess monsters. Both of us earned 828 credits, which would have been quite a bit more if it wasn''t so close to the monster break. My account stacked up even more with 15,028 credits to my name, it''s getting there, but it still isn''t enough for me. We still had a few especially valuable bodies to sell off, but we wouldn''t do it at the association due to their low prices. The auction house would let us earn a lot more, and I suggested as much to Alexis. She had no problem with it, so we went over the greek theatre styled building and met with an appraised who looked over the few rare tier 4 corpses that we had. The bodies were only the spriggan and juggernaut centipede, and despite the rough shape they were in from the battles to take them down, the valuable parts were still mostly intact. I decided to keep the spriggan core in case I came across some summon that it would be useful for, it would be a boon for any plant-based monster since it would likely give the ability to control all plants to an extent. We received two tickets to reclaim the money we earned when the bodies were sold off, and we went on our way to relax and enjoy walking around the city just enjoying being in each other''s company. The auction was two days away and then not only could we buy some potentially powerful or useful equipment, but we would get a big payout from our monster''s being auctioned off. I still had some tickets for some monsters I had put to auction that would only now be sold off, I wouldn''t mind the extra pocket change. This was in the back of my head as I focused on Alexis as we just wandered around the streets and occasionally going into shops that looked interesting. I still didn''t know what to make of her, but she seemed special to me, I hope the situation that I am unable to save her never occurs. That would probably destroy me for quite some time. I guess my reaction to that little hypothetical situation is revealing just how strongly I feel about her even if I didn''t want to admit it. Maybe it would be the knowledge that I failed her that would be the most devastating, I can''t quite tell if her being gone or me being the cause of it would be the worst feeling. Emotions are difficult and confusing, especially since my hormones are making me constantly be aware of her whenever she is around. One thing I can admit to though is that Alexis is definitely gorgeous with her bright red hair and icy blue eyes that contrast so well with each other. I''m not too bad looking myself, but I hardly think I match up to her beauty. Luckily looks aren''t everything in this world, being strong is even more important. I only felt the urge to be stronger deepen since I would try my hardest to never fail my hunting companion who had quickly wormed her way into being more than just that. 34 Declining WebNovel Contrac No content 35 Ch. 26.5- Alchemists Apprentice There are so many things that we don''t know still, and any discovery or invention receives a huge reward for their contribution to worldwide knowledge. Scientists seem to be the rare exception to the remaining enmity between all of the continental cities for many of the resident''s role in participating in world war and as a result, killing their friends and family members. I''m in the neutral zone as far as foreigners are concerned, it''s hard to continue to hate a group of people for something they didn''t do themselves. Eric also shares my sentiments and so we contribute to society rather than focusing on our own self-interests by hoarding the knowledge and making money off of it. The amount we gain is pretty sizeable, but having a monopoly on a product would make us even more money. That isn''t really a concern of ours for now, especially since Thomas is a summoner now and can make more than enough for both of us. He was even kind enough to cut down on material costs by providing a bunch of poisonous samples and bodies for me to experiment with. My prized sample is currently the manticore venom that I managed to get a few vials of. I have to use strong monster hide gloves just to protect myself from an accidental splash on me. One drop on my skin would be more than enough to kill me. It''s so potent that just absorbing it through my skin is effective, especially considering that I''m not a summoner with a stronger constitution that would afford me with enough resistance to not instantly die from it. This was an unexpected boon, and honestly, I would never have been able to get my hands on something so rare and precious. One vial was enough to even make top tier summoners interested, and their concept of money was blown way out of proportion compared to mine. I would be able to live a modest life with no concerns for money, unfortunately, I''m more interested in the potential discoveries I could make with it. What I''m currently working on is a way to counteract any poison, and all of these poisonous materials are used to test if my antidote will work against them. Most of my poison and venom come from monsters, but there are plants that take on poisonous characteristics after being exposed to a venomous or poisonous monster. The antidote I had been working on was getting closer to what I had imagined for it, most common poisons would be counteracted by the serum, but the stronger and rarer ones were harder to account for. Not only are the materials hard to find, but they are exceptionally lethal and as a result much harder to counteract while still having the antidote affect other poisons as well. I wanted it to be able to create a potion that would counteract any poison no matter how strong. The hardest part wasn''t counteracting a strong poison, instead, it was far more difficult to make it a general use serum for any poison or venom. There are already all sorts of antidotes for one specific poison, but it''s hard to know what you''ll encounter in the monster plane. Adaptability is what would set my serum apart from the others, it would be a huge achievement not only for me, but for Eric as well. He had helped give advice and even helped with implementing my experiments. I only had so many hands, so his help and expertise in chemistry were greatly appreciated. *Crash*, Speaking of, it seems that Eric has once again done something to break our equipment. I swear, we spend more on replacing glasses and tools than on our materials, granted I got most of my recent supplies courtesy of Tommy. "Eric, are you alright over there?" I ask him as I turn around from my desk that I had been staring at in thought for the past hour. The wild-haired man was on the ground with shattered glass all around him, and some mysterious pink liquid on the ground. He slowly pushes himself off of the ground with his spindly arms, and looks up at me with his sleep-deprived eyes. His face was gaunt as usual, each eye seemed to be sandbagged with dark and heavy eyelids from too many all-nighters. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. "Here, let me help you up. It seems like I''m always doing this with you, what would you do without me?" (Mira) "I honestly don''t know, time just passes by while I''m working and when I get up to do something my legs go numb and I fall. Gravity doesn''t seem to like me much." (Eric) *Chuckles* "I guess not. I''m going to head back to my work, are you alright for now?" (Mira) He waves his hands lazily at me as if shooing a dog and says in a weary voice, "I''m fine, you can go back to your experiments." I took him at his word and went back to combining a serious of plants, half of which were poisonous, and the others were cures for said poison. I was banking on being able to neutralize a set of poisons and then using the combined matter to neutralize other deadly substances. Medicine was low-grade poison anyway, so why wouldn''t this work. In a way, the serum I was trying to create was like an antivenom that uses the venom as a base to cure the poison. *Crash* "Ooops" I mutter as I look towards the mess I accidentally created right after berating Eric for doing the same thing. I knocked over a few restorative plants and a few vials of poison which included some of the manticore venom. Luckily most of the valuable liquid was still locked safely away in a thick and shatterproof container. I didn''t think much of it as I got the broom and materials to handle the potentially deadly spill, at least until I saw a blue lotus-like plant in the middle wither and become darker at the same rate that the dark poison turned a bright blue color. The change surprised me and since this could be a potential discovery, I wanted to record what exactly had happened and what materials were involve in what ratios. "It looks like the main catalyst was the ice lotus dunked directly in the puddle, and a few pods from a fragrant wasp flower were on the edges of the puddle. The venom was a mix of 2 drops of manticore venom, Naga venom, and the concentrate from a mixture of hemlock and nightshade." (Mira) After categorizing the contents and discerning a relatively close ratio of ingredients I got to work attempting to recreate the mixture to see what it would do. The puddle on the floor was contaminated, so it wouldn''t be effective to test it, luckily I was pretty good at my job which I had been working for over 2 years. In a mortar and pestle, I ground up the nightshade and hemlock and strained it into a vial to add to the mixture later. After that was completed, I gathered the required venoms, which were two of the strongest and deadliest known to man currently. 2 drops of the manticore venom were added first before pouring the Naga venom till the combined liquid met the line near the top of the vial like what how the vials had been before falling to the floor. I recall 4 pods from a fragrant wasp flower being in the mix, so I ground them up for easier dispersal when drank or injected. Last was the ice lotus, I don''t know how much is required since the whole thing was added last time. I don''t want to waste materials, so I''ll just add the lotus petal by petal until the reaction occurs. Now that all of the ingredients are prepped and ready to be mixed, I start with putting a low temperature under the vial of poison. Too much heat and the venom will be relatively neutralized and as a result ineffective, but not enough and the ingredients wouldn''t mix properly. The candle I was using as a heat source was actually made from the fat of an ice troll, which causes the flame to only be a few degrees above room temperature. It is perfect for the job, but in reality, it is much more inconvenient to use tools like these compared to the equipment and tools from the old era that were banned from this new world. I hadn''t worked with anything related to chemistry or alchemy until the change, but from what I had heard from Eric, our job would have been far easier to do with the equipment and tools that used to exist like centrifuges or even gas burners. Oh well, no point in crying over the stuff you can''t have. We make do with handmade equipment and muscle power, we''re fairly similar to apothecaries of old, except our potions or other forms of medicine can actually heal somebody on the brink of death. *Clink* "Whew, that was close" I mutter after almost knocking the vial over when I was not paying attention to my work. I get distracted from time to time, but usually, it''s not too bad unlike what almost happened, which could have actually killed me. Trying to get back in the zone and focus for the sake of my experiment and safety, I whisper, "Get it together Mira, focus on the glass full of death and don''t knock it over." It wouldn''t matter how thick my gloves are if the vial spilled on another part of me like my legs. Luckily, due to Eric''s chemistry background, we maintain the same safety rules that would exist in an actual lab back then. Although with a bit of the manticore venom in there, I''m not so sure how safe I would be even if I managed to follow procedure and wash the splatter off of me. No risk, no reward though, so I''ll venture on in the name of science. I''ll make sure to keep as safe as possible though, wouldn''t want to leave Tommy alone in this world when he''s had it hard enough as is. Deciding to bite the bullet, I began the careful process of mixing each bit of ingredient and recording exactly what I had done so that I could recreate it if it succeded. The venom was already heated to the right temperature, so I delicately poured the vial into a beaker. Once that was done, I added the essence of nightshade and hemlock. I added the entire vial, which was the sum of all the liquid within a single plant of each, which honestly wasn''t all that much compared to the volume of venom. The mixture got darker when the plant essence was added, but nothing else had happened so far. As far as I could observe, it was a redox reaction that had occurred between the two, but it may have also been a mixing of colors between the two liquids, it''s hard to tell without advanced tools like microscopes. A redox reaction in simple terms is one of the types of chemical reactions known for having color changes, which I had vaguely heard in high school chemistry class, but was later told in detail about it by Eric during one of his chemistry rants. I swear the man lives, eats, and breathes chemistry, I left the sleep part of that saying out since he never gets enough. The stubborn man always insists on working until he collapses, there was more than one instance of me having to drag his spindly body onto the couch upstairs where he lives. I had been recording the steps I had taken as I did them, and continued on by adding the crushed pods from a fragrant wasp flower, which had a distinctly stinging yet alluring scent to it. The herb was known to heat up the body and help it rid itself of bacteria and lower grade poisons all by itself. I made sure not to accidentally get a noseful of the stuff as I poured the substance into the extremely dark purple solution. The reaction was immediate with the color-changing once again into a now burgundy shade of color, and the heat of the vial rising sharply. I nearly panicked at the extreme reaction given by introducing the fire-based herb, but I managed to calm myself down before counteracting the heat change. The ice lotus was the only thing left and I quickly added half the leaves from an entire flower before the mixture got too hot and rendered the venom ineffective. A sizzling was heard as the reaction cooled down to normal and turned an electric blue color and seemed to settle for the moment. *Chink* the sound of glass continuing to fracture bit by bit broke my heart. I was alert enough to immediately back up upon hearing that sound. It turned out to be a wise decision as the glass beaker completely broke apart from the short interval heat changes that had occurred within it. "Dammit all to hell!" I yell at no one in particular and then set about cleaning up both messes that had been made by me today. My immediate anger subsided as I realized I was now much closer to achieving my ultimate goal, all I needed was time and the perseverance to continue experimenting until the perfect amount of each ingredient was found. I still didn''t know what the mixture did, but I had a feeling it was exactly what I was looking for. I would test out the effects it tomorrow when I come back to the lab and recreate a successful mixture. My poor lab rats would be subjected to a few necessary evils for the advancement of science. I didn''t like to put them through any harm, but it was the only way to discover the effects of our creations without testing them on a human. Testing on people is generally frowned upon, so I''d like to avoid that if at all possible. I couldn''t wait to tell Tommy about my successful lead on my multipurpose anti-venom/poison as a result of an accident. He''d probably be ecstatic knowing that he had helped contribute to my success. I wasn''t a foregone conclusion, for now, so I wouldn''t get my hopes up too much. I still couldn''t help but feel a little happy at this fortunate occurrence, I wasn''t the only one for this to happen to since a lot of discoveries that had been made were a result of accidental mixing. These are thoughts for another time since it was now about dinner time, and I needed to leave and get dinner since I hadn''t eaten since breakfast. I guess I was picking up some of Eric''s bad habits after spending so much time around him *shudders*. "Bye Eric, I''m heading out. Be careful and don''t do something potentially dangerous without me here to help you please, we don''t want a repeat of the fire-salamander explosion incident now do we?" (Mira) He didn''t bother to respond to me, all I saw was a hand raised lazily in acknowledgment of my words. With nothing left to do for me here, for the time being, I went out to find a nice restaurant to tuck into, I was getting a craving for some lobster rolls. I''d still have plenty of time before Tommy gets home since he was spending time with his new "not girlfriend" as he liked to claim, so I didn''t have to worry about rushing while eating. I loved to tease him at every opportunity about his new friend since he was obviously head over heels for the girl. I just hope she wouldn''t get him killed or hurt his feelings. I hadn''t met the girl yet, so I was still reserving judgment about her, but I felt like I already knew her since he had been mentioning someone named Alexis constantly. 36 Ch. 27, Pt. 1- Second Colosseum Fight Bronze League I thought that I would continue to be a loner who went into dangerous places with only myself to rely on. Alexis has changed all of that on its'' head. I still don''t trust or like most others, but she has proven to be a valuable and loyal partner to have. We can cover each other''s weak spots and have the other''s back, which has already been proven during the monster break and our first hunting trip together two days ago. It seems we weren''t the only ones to have an exciting few days since Mira wouldn''t stop talking about her potential success at work as soon as she got home last night. I was proud to help contribute to her success, but I was even more proud of my big sister getting close to accomplishing her dream. She''s been working so hard and learning as much as possible about alchemy that it was almost inevitable for her to have a breakthrough in her research. When she managed to perfect the recipe and prove its'' effectiveness she would be not only famous but quite rich as well. We didn''t really have to worry about finances now, but extra money never hurt to have. This way she could afford all of the luxuries and things that she had to sacrifice when raising and taking care of me. If anyone deserved to be pampered, it would be Mira. She gave up so much when taking care of me and never once complained about it, that''s saint material right there. I got to the apartment before her yesterday, since my "date" with Alexis ended after a few hours of going around in shops and getting some food. Neither of us really bought anything, since still we''re far too practical and miserly to buy some useless trinkets or clothing that would just get ruined or destroyed if we wore it hunting. That''s not to say that we don''t have some nice clothes, but as far as I can tell we only have a pair or two for special occasions. That''s not to say that I wasn''t tempted to buy something for her like a necklace or an especially nice looking blouse that she looked at for a while, but I resisted getting her something so mundane. I wanted to get her a gift, but I didn''t really know what would be appropriate for her. Then I realized that since she''s a summoner, she would need jewelry or the like that would help her in some way. This genius thought popped into my mind when we were browsing bracelets and I thought that it would have been nice if they actually did anything. I wracked my brain to try and figure out just how I would get something like that, which was a fairly rare thing to possess. Only strong summoners or extremely rich civilians would be able to afford them. The effects of a monster core would be most effective when the jewelry conduit was made from monster parts that used the skill or had the elemental affinity when it was alive since their body has been adjusted into being a proper conduit for it. This process was known as artificing and there was a far higher demand than supply of these things. This means that the only way I would be able to reliably find one would be at the auction, and they would be expensive too, which meant I needed even more money to buy one for her. She had already become a special person to me, and I wanted to show that by getting something that is either extremely useful or could save her life potentially. I should really get something similar for Mira, except only the protective features would be useful to her since she wasn''t a summoner. I always worry about Mira since she doesn''t have the ability or skill to defend herself against people who could literally summon terrifying and dangerous summons on a whim. She was the most important person in the world to me, and I never want anything to happen to her. An artificed protective accessory would be perfect for her and give me some peace of mind when I wasn''t able to be around her. I would really need some money if I planned to purchase these things, and one of the quickest ways was to fight in the colosseum. The one thing I was certain of was my strength, so this would practically be giving me free money. Before Alexis and I split from our date to go home, I suggested that we should meet up and participate in the colosseum with our new tier 4 summons. Having a tier 4 summon was enough to qualify for the official ranking colosseum battle, each new summoner to the league would start out in the bronze league and face opponents of a similar level. If the new challenger was defeated by one of the lower-ranked summoners, they would be kicked out. Summoners who failed at the initial ranking trial would only able to try again in a month''s time. If they failed this attempt they would only be able to try again if their summon used for fighting evolved, or a different summon managed to break into the 4th tier. Failing this attempt would result in permanent expulsion from participating in the colosseum. It was rare that someone got to this stage, but it did happen, and usually only occurred to an especially weak and impatient summoner. Most usually took the first failed attempt in stride and greatly improved their strength in order to ensure a win during their next fight. The impatient or delusional summoners who failed thought that it was a fluke or unfortunate match up that caused their loss and another fight would prove that they deserved to be there. Unsurprisingly, most of these immediately challenged when the month''s time limit was up and lost once again. These types didn''t really bother to gain more experience fighting, and only relied on their summon''s evolutionary tier to suppress weaker monsters. Doing this resulted in no practical experience gained, and only taught how to fight against those weaker than yourselves. These summoners were rightly thrown out and banned from wasting people''s time in the colosseum. People want entertainment, not someone who never bothered to teach their summons how to fight. I highly doubted I would fail the initial test with all of the fighting my summons and I had done, not to mention that Jareth was special even amongst lower stage tier 4''s due to his variance. Alexis also should be fine with her new poison drake Hemlock. She may not have much experience fighting with her new summon, but it took a concerted effort for our summons at the time to take her down, so she should probably be fine. Speak of the devil, "Hey Alexis, over here". I wave my hand to stand out from the few people milling around me and catch her attention. I''m currently leaning against one of the pillars near the entrance of the outside of the colosseum where we said we would meet. She seemed interested in fighting with Hemlock, especially since money could be easily made. We got here early before the fights began so that we could register to fight today. Normally these arrangments would be done ahead of time, but with the promise of a high stake summoning battle, I''m sure they wouldn''t mind adding us to the lineup. The colosseum usually had a few summoners on retainer to fill in any gaps in the fighting schedule or to fight people like me and Alexis who show up in the morning to register. "Hey Thomas, are you ready to fight in the big leagues now?" (Alexis) I could hear the faint teasing in her voice as she asked, and so I gave her an equally teasing answer, "Only if you''re ready to lose to me when we fight each other again." I knew that we probably wouldn''t fight each other any time soon, nor did we really want to, but it was fun to think about. Neither of us likes to lose, and the thought of being able to really fight against her in an epic no holds barred match was really tempting. Unfortunately, the reality would just be that one of us would be resentful of the other since there could only be one winner. It was realistically a lose-lose situation, and I didn''t want to damage the relationship that we had right now. I was fine accepting my loss during the tournament, but I don''t think either of us would be able to gracefully accept a loss. We both just chuckle at the light ribbing we gave each other and begin heading towards the entrance with a guard on either side. We flash them the colosseum invitations we received and head on through towards the betting booth. I nod to the lady at the desk sorting through some paperwork and go to the manager''s office door behind the large booth. Alexis is right beside me showing unwavering confidence on her face, and I try and do the same to show the manager that we are strong enough to warrant putting us on today''s roster. He is a businessman at heart from what I can tell, and as long as adding us to the lineup would be beneficial to him, there is no reason he wouldn''t put us on it. That heavily relies on whether we would put up a decent fight or not, and acting confident in my strength would go a long way towards reassuring him. *Knock Knock* I rap twice on the door to get permission to enter his office, it would be outright rude to just barge in and demand a spot for today. I hear a muffled voice saying, "Come in", from inside the office. The door opens with a faint creak and I see a surprisingly fit looking individual in their late 40''s behind the desk. He has a serious but not unpleasant expression on his face and still has a full head of hair. He completely goes against the stereotype of the overweight and balding manager that I had built up in my head. Alexis chimes in before I get the chance to, as a result of being distracted by the surprising appearance of the manager. "Hello, Mr. .....?" "Castle, but you can call me Bert. What can I help you with this morning?" (Bert) "My name''s Alex, we came to see if you would be willing to add us to the fighting roster today for the entrance to the bronze league." (Alexis) "Oh? So both of you have a tier 4 summon, that''s pretty rare for someone so young. I don''t see why not, but first let me see your summons for myself to verify and decide who should fight you." (Bert) I look around the surprisingly spacious office and see that there''s enough room for both of our summons if we take turns. I turn to Alexis and say, "I''ll go first.", and then turn to Bert the manager and inform him, "My name''s Thomas, and my summon is a four-armed titanium Ogre named Jareth." With that, I bring out the correct summoning core and bring out Jareth. He nearly touches the ceiling with his head, and with his large size, I''m worried about him knocking things over, so I tell him to be careful and try not to move. I can see the glimmer in the manager''s eyes as he looks at Jareth. The hammer and mace in two hands each makes for an intimidating sight, but Bert doesn''t seem to be fazed at all, as if Jareth doesn''t really pose a threat to him. More and more Bert seems to be defying any expectations I have of him, it makes me wonder what other secrets he has. "I''ll be honest, I didn''t expect you to have such an impressive summon to fight with. Usually, I get new summoners with fairly normal summons that turn out to be average at best. I''ll have to bring out someone a bit stronger than usual to fight Jareth over here. However, being at the 4th tier doesn''t mean much if he can''t fight well, I hope you don''t disappoint me." (Bert) He shuffles through a few folders before finding the right one on top of his desk, "Here''s the person I''m looking for. You''ll be fighting Wallace Benson as the 5th fight of the day, and he has a dullahan summon named Mort. The name is a little on the nose for my tastes, but for any more information you''ll have to find out for yourself, good luck." With the end of my showing, I unsummon Jareth to make room for when Alexis brings out Hemlock. "Now what about you Alex?" (Bert) "This is my poison drake, and her name is Hemlock." She says with confidence, almost like she is guaranteed a spot already. I mean she probably isn''t wrong, but I find it hard to have the same level of confidence when dealing with people. She brings out Hemlock, who stands up proudly in the suddenly cramped office. Her scales are a bright purple just like I remember from the last time we fought against the drake, and she looks just as deadly as the plant she was named after. I make sure to give a wide berth to the spikes poking out along her body, wouldn''t want to get accidentally poisoned before I even got to fight. "It''s pretty impressive to get a dragonkin summon, I''m certain she''ll put up a good fight today. Now let me see who I should get to fight her. I wouldn''t want the main attraction of today to sweep the competition against a weak summoner, or vice versa." (Bert) "Here is a worthy opponent, they are in the middle ranks of the bronze league. Her name is Charlotte Gains, she should be able to put up a pretty good fight against your drake. Her summon is a Rougarou or swamp werewolf named Gromit, and you''ll be fighting in the 10th and final match of the evening." (Bert) "I''ll put you both on the roster for today, now if you don''t mind, I''ve got more paperwork to take care of." (Bert) With that dismissal, we got the hint and exited the office. "Whew, looks like we managed to get on the roster, and you even got to be the main attraction. Congrats." (Thomas) "Thanks, it sounds like both of our fights should prove interesting. I don''t think the fights will be as simple as Bert made them sound to be, our opponents are ranked summoners who have been fighting in the bronze league for a lot longer than us. We''ll have to give it our all to win." (Alexis) "I was thinking the same thing, why don''t we go to the fighter''s waiting room to get changed and then head to the stands to watch the other matches. We got lucky enough that our fights are far enough apart to watch the other''s fight." (Thomas) Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. With that decided on, we go down to the competitor''s hall and enter the waiting room to change. There is a tv to watch the matches from and a couple of benches for the competitors to sit on while waiting. In the old era, there would have been lockers as well to store our stuff, but now that everyone has storage watches, lockers are pretty much obsolete. We quickly throw on our hunting gear and head towards the spectator stands to get a better view of the fights. This is only my fourth time in the colosseum, so I can''t help but fidget in anticipation of the coming fights. "Wait, we need to place bets on our fights before we sit down to watch the fights. I''m certain we''ll both manage to win, so there''s no point in not betting." I wanted to palm my forehead for almost forgetting the entire reason we had come to the arena. With my intervention, we turn around and head towards the nearest betting both to place our bets. Looking at the info chart on the wall, I see the fights and odds for each one. Going down a few, I manage to find my fight, which has my name and summon type against my opponent with 50/50 odds since not much is known about my fighting ability. Being able to double my money isn''t so bad, so I go up to the betting booth and place 10,000 credits on myself. I left 5,000 in my account on the off-chance that I don''t win the fight. Fortunately, fighters aren''t forbidden from betting, but any bets can only be for your own victory. There isn''t much worry about fighters intentionally losing since winning is expected of regular fighters. Summoners who lose get fewer and fewer opportunities to fight in the colosseum, so most do their best to win. There is the occasional case where a fighter desperately needs immediate money and intentionally loses while having someone place a bet on their opponent, but any fighters found forfeiting intentionally are banned for life. I don''t need to do something so degrading since I''m confident in my strength against others at the same level. That doesn''t mean that others haven''t tried it though. Alexis bets on her fight for a few thousand credits and then we head off to the stands to spectate while waiting for our fights. 37 Ch. 27, Pt. 2- Jareth vs. Mor After all that I had already done and seen, tier 3''s just didn''t do much for me. That''s not to say that tier 3''s couldn''t be dangerous or powerful, but the majority just weren''t a challenge with my lineup, even if I didn''t use the especially strong ones. It was hard not to be overconfident against foes like that. I still had a healthy amount of respect for them and tried to be as cautious as possible so I don''t lose as a result of something that should have been completely preventable. I wouldn''t ever be able to forgive myself for making a mistake like that during such an important and public event, I would take this battle completely seriously. It was quite in the hallways along the way to the locker room, with the dull roar of yelling people from the stands in the background. Only a few people were milling around to buy greasy food from vendors or to use the toilet before getting back to the fights. I was using this chance to psyche myself up and get in the zone as it were. I usually did this before going into a monster biome, it helped me stay sharp and focused on any potential fights. It helped to keep the adrenaline from clouding my mind and making me panic, it also gave me an advantage in reaction time compared to someone treating the fight normally. Hyperfocus like this was hard to maintain, but all of my constant fighting in unknown and potentially dangerous environments had tempered me. Facing against monsters much stronger than myself had allowed my mind to turn this skill into something I could call up at nearly a moment''s notice. I was struggling to get into this mindset at the moment because it wasn''t a life or death battle and that was throwing me off a bit. My normal combat mindset is to kill any enemies as fast and efficiently as possible, but this wasn''t really necessary in this staged battle setting. Finding a balance between casual and deadly serious was a lot like mental juggling with one arm, it was possible but much harder than it initially seems. But enough about my emo thought process, I had finally made it to the room with only a few others still present in it. They were watching the screen intently to study or be entertained until it was their time to fight. Everyone seemed to be in their battle clothes, and were all the more intimidating for it. Had I not already fought in a bloody and deadly war, I might have been a bit intimidated by them. It seems like luck wasn''t on my side, because right as my but touched the wooden bench, the fight ended and one of the colosseum attendants was calling for me to come out for my fight. It could have been worse though, I could have entirely missed the call for me to fight and lost by forfeit. With a sigh, I get up off the hard seat and walk over to the woman in a business suit with a clipboard who had called my name. She waved her arm in a move it gesture and I followed without bothering to say a word. I was too focused and tense to bother responding or even being polite, all I had on my mind was the fight and potential strategies I could use against my opponent. What I knew was that Wallace Benson was my opponent, and his tier 4 summon was a dullahan. What I knew about them is that they are armored undead who carried their severed head in one of their arms. They were masters of one-handed swords and were deceivingly strong, the undead part also made them rather hard to kill or even defeat for that matter. I''ll probably have Jareth test out their strengths and to see if it had any other abilities that might be dangerous to my 4-armed ogre. It would be interesting to see if skill would be able to overcome overwhelming force from two weapons that held the force of two hands each. I had no doubt that it would end up a close-quarters match, which didn''t leave much room for strategy. If worst came to worse and Jareth was being oppressed, I''d have him use the berserker skill and step back a bit to let him duel it out. The skill was overwhelmingly useful against a single opponent with little room to escape. I didn''t make the rules, but all is fair in love and war I guess. The dirt floor of the arena was similar to what I remembered last time, except for a few recent holes made from the earlier fights. The sun was still bright overhead, and the roaring of the crowd was deafening as a result of a bronze league match being promised to them. With more than enough room for me to summon Jareth, I did just that and reveled in the yells of appreciation that came from most of the audience, except for a few critics who shut up after a glare from me. There''s always going to be critics wherever you go, so I didn''t worry too much about what they thought. Jareth seemed to be enjoying the crowd''s reaction, and even gave a war cry to rile them up some more. The hulking silver humanoid carrying two weapons almost as large as me made for quite a sight, and I couldn''t help but smile remembering when he had been so little and undeveloped compared to the summon standing in front of me. As this was going one, my opponent came from his end of the arena as well. Cheers instantly began as soon as he was spotted, and all attention went from me to him in a heartbeat. If I were a more vain person, I would be a bit miffed about being forgotten like a moldy piece of cheese in the back of the fridge. Who was I kidding, I was a bit mad at first but looking at my opponent, I couldn''t stay angry at such a nice looking person. He had a humble smile on his face and waved to all of his fans in the crowd, his outfit choice was rather interesting as well. He wore khaki pants, a white long-sleeved shirt, and a green woolen sweater-vest. His physical features were no less eye-catching, he had a rather long nose and ears, and his teeth were large but pearly white. He didn''t exactly look like he was participating in what amounted to a gladiator match, but who was I to judge, if the man wanted to wear odd clothes then all the more power to him. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. At least that was my thought before he brought out a slice of swiss cheese from one of his pockets and began nibbling on it like he was a mouse. I was rather off-put by the eccentric figure, but compared to the man, his summon was rather normal. That''s not to say that the undead warrior wasn''t special or intimidating, but it was hard to be super impressed by its'' looks when his summoner is acting like a mouse who learned to put on clothes. The dullahan had a dark blue almost black armor and a pale cadaver blue skin shade to match the outfit. Its'' head was tucked under one arm with no helmet on, and in the other was a dull silver longsword that would have been a two-handed weapon on a normal person. The armor was dented and cracked along some places, but for some reason, it didn''t seem weak or unstable in the least. "Good day mister summoner." (Wallace) "Ummm, Hello to you too?" (Thomas) "Would you care for some cheese? I''ve got some swiss in me pocket, and a wheel of cheddar in my storage if you would care for that more." (Wallace) I couldn''t help but respond politely to his question despite being extremely confused, "I''m alright, thank you for the offer though." "Suit yourself I guess, more cheese for me then. Mort, would you be so kind as to cut me a slice of cheddar from this wheel. I can''t eat swiss when fighting, it gives me a terrible stomach ache." (Wallace) I was extremely baffled by this person, but I guess I seemed nice despite the oddities surrounding his entire existence. I warned Jareth through our link to do his best not to kill the dullahan, I wouldn''t want to be rude to someone who had been friendly so far to me despite his eccentricities. Wallace and his bluntly named dullahan Mort, whose name meant death, if what little I could recall from French class was correct, stepped up to their line to get ready for the start of the fight. I wasn''t going to judge the guy, but it was almost like calling a slime ''gooey'', not terribly imaginative. Not all names can be winners I guess, I just hope my summons would come to appreciate the thought I had put into theirs. I decided it would probably be wise for Jareth and I to do the same, and so we also stepped up. There was a referee to the far side of the arena preparing to begin the match, he was quite far away in what I assumed to be well-warranted caution. After all, it wasn''t just a simple fight, it was potentially mortal combat between two tier 4 summons who could easily kill him with a stray attack. "Both Summoners, are you Ready?" Boomed the referee with a surprisingly loud announcing voice. Both of us just nodded without taking our eyes off of each other, and as soon as the ref saw our confirmation, he blew the whistle to begin the highly anticipated fight. I was not only hyped to fight against a well-established summoner with a fairly strong tier 4 monster, but I was also looking forward to the money I would get if I won. I didn''t plan on losing, so the money was as good as mine, and Jareth seemed to agree as he charged the undead warrior with surprising speed for someone his size. The dullahan proved to be much faster than Jareth, and dodged his charge with little effort while also leaving a decent cut along my humanoid tank''s abdomen. A little wound like that wasn''t too problematic, what was concerning was the skill and speed of the headless undead. Mort was obviously much more experienced fighting one on one, and it wouldn''t matter how hard Jareth could hit if he couldn''t land a single attack on his foe. "Jareth, don''t charge in like a barbarian, you''re better than that. Fight him properly, and use your reach to your advantage, no point in having extra arms if you don''t use them." Luckily he was willing to listen, and the titanium ogre got into a proper stance and walked forward without leaving any apparent openings. Both weapons were raised and prepared to swing, the dullahan did the same as Jareth, and had his single dulled metallic longsword at the ready in front of it. The head of Mort remained in the crook of his left arm and had the same static expression on his face that he had before the fight, it was almost infuriating to look at even for me. Jareth had a much quicker temper and roared out before swinging his weapons continuously, all the while, Mort remained expressionless and almost effortlessly parried the heavy hammers. The dullahan was smart enough to not try and get in a contest of strength, instead, it was using a soft method of fighting where Jareth''s wild strength was used against him. Each parry was followed up with a quick swipe of the sword, and Jareth was left bloodier and bloodier as time continued. His regeneration was doing its'' job, but there was too many wounds for it to address and was quickly running out of reserves to heal him with. It wasn''t looking good for my summon, and it was quickly becoming apparent just how different the bronze league was to normal colosseum fights. Not only were the summons at the 4th tier at least, but their skill was far higher than most. When it came to the higher tiers, fighting skill became as important if not more so than abilities and physical attributes. There was only so much room to go, so having a fighter that could continue to advance in other aspects than tier was extremely important. I now saw the significance of this test and the bronze league, I had taken it lightly since I now had a tier 4 summon, but amongst those on or above my level, I was still too inexperienced to fight them. Despite this realization, I had no intention of losing and decided to risk it all on my next move. Jareth was on the losing side of this battle so far and wouldn''t last much longer. None of the wounds he received were especially deep due to his naturally bolstered defense, but the sheer amount of wounds was making up for their lack of power. My ogre was trying as hard as possible, but he was simply out skilled in combat and too slow to fight his opponent effectively. Deciding to bet it all, I inhaled deeply before shouting, "Jareth go berserk mode!". He looked back with a manic grin towards me while ignoring the damage occurring due to his current lapse in attention. I could only smile back myself as I saw his skin begin to redden in a weblike pattern until he was the color of a red chili. His smile and eyes changed as well, no longer was there a smiling and excited ogre, in his place was a manic and angry brute with his sizable teeth bared in aggression. His muscles bulged slightly, and the cuts from the dullahans sword were becoming shallower as time went on. A frightening scream of madness and rage came from berserker Jareth, and he charged forward with an even more impressive set of physical abilities than before due to his new state. No longer was Mort able to keep up with Jareth, and he was quickly forced to retreat to avoid being crushed. Luck wasn''t on the undead''s side apparently as the enraged ogre''s mace managed to nick the severed head that was being held in the left arm of the dullahan. Said head went flying back against the wall of the arena, and even more surprising was the reaction of the headless undead. The body acted for lack of a better expression like a chicken with its'' head cut off, which seemed to be the actual case here. Apparently the head of the dullahan was used to see, and by knocking the head loose, Jareth had managed to blind the undead. This obviously wasn''t intentional on Jareth''s part, since it would be a miracle if he was able to have a coherent thought in the state he currently was in. He also didn''t let up on the disadvantaged undead and began to wale on the armored form of the dullahan. The crazed ogre had even forgotten the gravity function of his hammer and was simply swinging at the other summon. Great clangs were heard as metal impacted on metal, and the armor quickly began to creak and chip from the frequency and strength of the blows. Apparently, the head was situated well enough on accident that there was some vision available for the summon to direct the main body. It used the force of a blow from the unactivated gravity hammer to scramble for its'' head before Jareth could intercept it. It would practically be a sitting duck without its head to guide it. Miracles never cease, as Mort was finally collect all of himself and fight effectively once again. Jareth continued to hammer down blows that were either dodged or redirected, the strain on the comparatively diminutive summon was apparent as each blow knocked his sword a bit farther and he began to be slower to dodge. Jareth was still full steam ahead and continued his barrage of blows, and just when it seemed that the fight was over, something rather unexpected happened. Mort raised his head from under his arm towards Jareth and let loose a burst of black fire on him. Screams were immediate as Jareth screamed out in pain and misery as the flames ate away at him. He had managed to raise an arm to defend part of his face, but the flames still managed to eat away at the forearm and right side of Jareth''s face. I thought that I had witnessed rage from Jareth, especially when he activated his berserker skill, but this was something else entirely. All screams ceased from Jareth''s partly damaged mouth, at first I thought that he was unconscious or his tongue or throat was damaged as well, but I was extremely wrong. Jareth had literally entered a new state of rage, this was the cold and calculated sort of anger that masked a raging inferno underneath. It seemed that Jareth was in complete control despite the berserker skill, but instead, all of his anger was directed solely at the dullahan that had burned and half-blinded him. A new stage of the berserker skill seemed to have emerged when Jareth was especially pissed at a particular enemy, he had returned to a semblance of his normal self, enough to think logically while retaining the extra-strength that his anger afforded him. It was the best of both worlds, and I felt especially bad for Mort since he was the current target of Jareth. The dullahan seemed to of realized he had screwed up judging by the startled expression on his previously expressionless face. It backed up quickly while Jareth slowly stalked towards it, and eventually a wall met the back of the slightly scared undead. I never thought I would see the day that the mostly unfeeling undead would express fear, but sure enough, it was written plainly on Mort''s face. The cat and mouse game ended quickly, and Jareth finally closed in while leaving little room for Mort to escape. The first swing of his mace left a whistling sound as it disturbed the air from the force and speed it was swung. There was almost no time for the dullahan to react, and what did end up happening was him raising his sword in an attempt to block or stall the incoming weapon. What happened, in reality, is the mace barreled through the dullahan''s paltry defenses and smashed the left arm holding its'' head. The arm was pulped within the armor, and the head was knocked far away to places unknown. The next blow was the gravity hammer, and Jareth had enough mental faculties to turn on the gravity function, and the resulting impact created a giant gong-like sound as the chest plate completely cracked and sent the undead warrior flying. Jareth rushed up to the downed opponent, when I heard Wallace to declare, "I forfeit the match!". It was quite clear who the winner was in the end even if the start wasn''t so great, and now I had the problem of reining in a rogue summon intent on demolishing the opponent who burned him. "Jareth, calm down! You won, the match is over!" I did my best to get to him, and aside from him glancing at me for a moment, he didn''t stop his march to the downed undead. Seeing that nothing was working yet, I ran towards the marching ogre and got within unsummoning range and immediately did so. I didn''t think I''d make it in time to stop him, but luckily the fight had taken a lot out of him, and the final blows did, even more, to tax the already down beaten ogre. I didn''t want to turn a friendly if competitive match into a feud or bloodbath, and I couldn''t be happier that I had wone while also managing not to kill the opponent''s summon. It was a possibility we were all aware of, but none of us wished for it to happen to us. Having a summon die would waste any effort they had put in with the summon since the last time it had evolved. The aftermath was a blur with me being declared the victor to the cheers of the crowd after seeing such an intense performance. All the while in my head, I was thinking about Jareth''s newest berserker skill development and the possibilities that came with it. I continued to think about this until I reached the stands near Alexis and she wrapped me in a large hug. It appears that the fight was just as nerve-wracking for her as it was for me, but we could both be happy for now that I had won. I also looked forward to the money I would be making off of my bet and the fight itself. 38 New Schedule and Announcements For Announcements, I have three things I''d like to announce/ask. The first is that I will be doing a general audience Q/A in discord sometime in the near future. Let me know what time most of you all would be interesting in tuning in, or if there are other community activities you would be interested in. The link for my discord to participate is- https://discord.gg/Y8X2ZCA I''m aware that we live all over, so I''ll try to be as accommodating as possible about the time to ensure as many of you can join as possible, Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. Lastly, I just want to express how much I have grown to love and care about our little community and seeing all of your support always makes my day. The story is what it is because of you, so feel free to always add suggestions or comments about the story. 39 Ch. 27, Pt. 3- Hemlock vs. Gromi Tommy''s fight was definitely something I didn''t expect, I thought for sure that Jareth would have swept right through the dullahan. After the first few moments of the large ogre getting toyed with by a faster opponent, I thought the fight would be over. I definitely didn''t expect for the tides to turn with a new skill that I hadn''t seen him use before. It reminds me of the berserker potion that I remember seeing him under the effect of during the monster break, except this time there was no intelligence behind his movements. All that existed was pure overwhelming force matched by an impressive enough speed to outpace the originally speedy headless knight. What really shocked me was the evolving effects of the skill that happened when fire was sprayed at Jareth''s face. The switch was almost instant, he went from raging beast to cold predator in about two seconds after getting burnt. He even regained some intelligence back, but it was almost like he was consumed by his need to kill the undead for burning him. I''m just glad that Tommy managed to unsummon Jareth before he actually killed the summon after the summoner had already surrendered, that would not have done him any favors with the other competitors. Now I just had to wait for him to come back from the arena and sit with me until it''s my turn to fight, speak of the devil. "Congrats Tommy, I didn''t think you were going to manage to pull out a victory, I guess miracles really do happen." (Alexis) "Haha, and thanks. That was a lot closer than I''m comfortable with, it seems like having a tier 4 summon isn''t everything" (Thomas) "I could have told you that much, but a win is a win I guess, and as long as you learn from it, then no harm done." (Alexis) "I think I got a little slice of humble pie, and right now I''m a bit full *laughs*, so I don''t plan on getting overconfident any time soon." (Thomas) "If you say so. Don''t just stand there, come and sit back down by me, we still have some matches to watch before it''s my turn." (Alexis) "Whatever you say, princess." (Thomas) "Bitch please, if anything I''m a Queen." (Alexis) ........ The rest of the matches were between some tier 3 summoners with one other match being in the bronze league. That fight was the only really interesting one, it was between a minotaur and a treant with the minotaur losing in the end. The treant had some control skills with vines and roots that stalled or tripped the minotaur so that it couldn''t charge the treant and overpower it, with no ranged skills, the minotaur was pretty much a sitting duck. It wasn''t a ton of credits or anything, but it helped make ends meet and afford a few nicer things. He was a summoner himself, but he only did a few easy jobs since his body isn''t up for much more than some light exercise. Before being a summoner he could barely do anything, but the attribute transfer after a summon evolution gave him some of his youth back. He still likes to pretend he''s retired while doing a few odd jobs or hunting every now and then when needed, but I like to help him out a bit so he can relax a bit more. He was the man I looked up to the most, and I basically considered him my grandfather in all but blood, which is why I wanted to help him in any way I can. I know he wouldn''t accept me giving away most of my money to him since I need it for my own summoning equipment, but he doesn''t turn away me giving a few credits here and there to him. *CHEERS* The sound of the crowd as I step into the arena is almost deafening, and even more so when I bring out Hemlock. My gorgeous purple drake certainly seems to be a crowd-pleaser and she soaks up the attention like the diva she is. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. Every dragon-kin is a bit vain or prideful, but Hemlock seems to take the cake as far as that is concerned. She loves to show herself off and keeps meticulously clean at every opportunity, which doesn''t make sense considering that the first time we saw her she was covered in mud. I guess she thought of it as a beauty spa treatment rather than camouflage, I''ve given up trying to figure out the lengths she''ll go to appear pretty. If she wasn''t so strong already, I would be concerned that she was a beauty obsessed summon more worried about her appearance than fighting. I knew better than that though, because as soon as she got the chance to fight she would viciously tear through her opponent. If her poison didn''t take the opponent down, then ripping them apart with her teeth, claws, and spikes would do the trick. It was almost horrifying just how insanely deadly she could be, it was a miracle that we even managed to take her down in the first place. Without my and Tommy''s summons working together, it would have been nearly impossible to take her down. Dragon-kin aren''t known for being some of the strongest summons without reason. *ROAR* I was drawn out of my thoughts at the sound of a loud and bloodthirsty yell from the Rougarou on the opposite side of the arena. It was the summon of my current opponent Charlotte Benson, and all that I knew about it aside from the race was that its'' name was Gromit, which was a pretty odd name if you ask me. Charlotte looked like a southern belle with blond hair and summer dress to complete the look, but all that the look managed to achieve was give the impression that she was a haughty person. I mean I was dressed in my hunting armor and here she is looking like she''s out for a stroll, she is either really underestimating me, or she was just that arrogant. I wasn''t risking being hit and killed by a stray attack, but it''s not my problem if she is. I guess some people are more concerned with appearance than safety. "See that person Hemlock? That''s what happens if you keep worrying about your looks, you''ll end up useless and taking stupid risks." She looked a bit horrified and affronted at the thought of ending up like Charlotte, which I thought was hilarious. I guess just the reminder of this moment would get her to stop being so vain. It would probably require more work to get her to stop worrying about all of that stuff. Maybe I''ll buy a psychology or summon training book to get her to give up her obsessive and unnecessary grooming habits. "It looks like we''ll have another easy win Gromit, such a shame, I was hoping to at least have some competition." (Charlotte) "Excuse me, what did you just say?" (Alexis) I couldn''t stand the gall of this girl, she takes a look at me and just writes me off like I''m not worth her time. "You heard me, or are you not only weak but deaf as well?" (Charlotte) "You''re sure confident for someone who''s going to have the floor wiped with them." (Alexis) "I doubt that''s going to happen, there''s a reason I''m in the bronze league and you''re not." (Charlotte) "Yeah, it''s called being younger. I want to thank you ahead of time for being my first stepping stone in the bronze league, although I don''t plan on being here long. You must not be all that special to still be in the bronze league after all this time." (Alexis) "We''ll see who''s going to win soon enough. Gromit dear, you don''t have to hold back during this fight, have as much fun as you want." (Charlotte) "You heard the Bitch, go ahead and rip the mangy mutt to shreds. Don''t blame me for your summon''s death, you brought this on your self." (Alexis) ...... "Both contestants are fighting in the final match of the day, and it appears that the stakes are higher than usual today. The fight will be decided by a deathmatch, where the victory condition is the death of the opponent." (Referee) "Now that both of you are ready, let the fight begin... NOW!" (Referee) The swamp werewolf began charging on all four limbs at a rapid pace, but its'' charge was brought to a premature halt as Hemlock spit out a cloud of paralytic poison. Most of the cloud was dodged, but the very edge managed to catch the rougarou before it could completely stop. A few breaths were inhaled accidentally with some of the poison mist contained within. This wouldn''t be enough to paralyze the summon, but it would be enough to inhibit its'' reflexes and strength slightly. Hemlock gave no time for a second charge by Gromit and instead went on the offensive herself. She was a swirling quadrupedal storm of claws, spikes, and tail. She managed to utilize her assets to the greatest effect considering the situation. She would swipe with her claws before making a quick spin and whipping her tail with all of the spikes on the end at her opponent. Wounds were quickly accumulating on the rougarou with only a few cursory swipes in return that slightly bled at best. It was on defense at this moment and was holding on quite well against the onslaught. I honestly expected it to have fallen to the poison already, but despite the quantity already put into the bloodstream, only a few effects could be seen. Apparently, the rougarou had some type of poison resistance, luckily it wasn''t immunity, and the quantity and quality of the poison already put into the summon would begin to affect it soon. After a few more slashes at Gromit, Hemlock backed off to let the poison go to work. The wounds were already starting to close, but the edges of them were still purple-colored, and the poison was beginning to work its way through the body. It seemed the moss and grime-covered beast was aware of its'' sudden time limit until it was taken out of the fight completely, and began to frantically try to end the fight. What was surprising was the lengthening of and silver-color coating the nails of the bipedal wolf. I learned the use of them soon enough as they tore through the tough purple scales of Hemlock. She screamed out in pain and frustration and switched to offense by throwing herself at the other summon and impaling it on some of her spikes. This was a bit of a sacrificial move since the rougarou had an equal chance to damage her, luckily Hemlock was larger and on top of her opponent. Her position and advantage helped to prevent any potentially lethal moves while further damaging the ragged Gromit. The summon at this point was more scarlet than the dark brown and grey it had been before, blood was now pooling out of the newest wounds made since Hemlock switched poisons to an anticoagulant one. Not only poisoning but bleeding out her opponent would end the fight that much quicker. Gromit began to become noticeably weaker and slower as time moved on and the pair frantically clawed and bit each other. Gouges had been made along Hemlock''s flank, and chunks of meat had been torn off by the frantic rougarou. Hemlock gave just as good as she got, and she had managed to half-blind the summon by clawing its'' right eye out and ripping out a section from its'' side by her spiked tail being used as a mace. It seems that Charlotte had forgotten about the initial poison breath or had assumed it would take too long to recharge for Hemlock to use it again. Unfortunately for her, Hemlock had recovered enough for an additional breath and used it to devastating effect. While in close quarters and no room for escape, Hemlock grappled the wolf and sprayed a neurotoxin right into its face. It was extremely effective, because the exhausted summon found enough energy to wail in pain and began tearing into itself to make the pain stop. This was an especially vicious attack reserved for killing strong summons, their nerves would begin firing rapidly with the signal for extreme pain being activated all over despite there being no injuries. The only downside was that it didn''t last long and needed a direct hit to be effective, but it was almost guaranteed to drop an opponent long enough to finish them off. Luckily my beautiful drake shared my sense of urgency and charge the distracted rougarou and tore into its'' open throat, killing it within moments. I almost felt bad for the summon, but its'' summoner was the one who forced it into the mess in the first place. Poison and venom were Hemlocks greatest attacks and advantages, and she used them to devastating effect today. By weakening the wolf with her poison at the start with an anticoagulant and paralytic the summon was brought down to a manageable level with no real advantages. She stalled for time while Gromit continued to bleed out and have the poison advance, and when he was finally weak enough she distracted him in order to deal a final blow. I couldn''t be prouder considering I really didn''t have to direct her at all, she had managed to develop to the 4th tier on her own, so her battle ability was far greater than most and I trusted her to make the right decisions. If she was in a bind I might have helped her out, but so far it had been unnecessary. "There you have it ladies and gentlemen, the poison drake managed to slay the rougarou after a fierce battle of attrition. The winner of this deathmatch is Alexis and her drake Hemlock." (Referee) *Roar* The crowd went wild at the spectacle of the rougarou finally being slain after being toyed around with for so long. "I warned you this would happen. Maybe next time, you won''t be such an ass and end up with your summon dead." (Alexis) With my victory already announced and my parting shot towards the crying Charlotte given, I began to head back to Thomas after changing out of my hunting clothes. "Congrats on the win Alexis, the fight was so one-sided that I almost felt bad for your opponent. You were unexpectedly vicious to your opponent, what did she say to rile you up like that?" (Thomas) "The bitch was acting like she already won and called me weak, I figured I would give her a manners lesson. Although the only reason the match was so easy was the summon''s lack of ranged attacks. Hemlock requires close quarters for her poison to be effective, if it had dodged her and stayed back while pelting her it might have been a different story." (Alexis) "All that matters is that you won, so let me go get changed since I didn''t think about it till I saw your outfit. Once that is taken care of, we can go collect our earnings and then get some icecream." (Thomas) "Sounds good to me, I''ll pay this time though, and no arguing with me about it. It''s only fair after you treated me last time. It doesn''t hurt that my earnings will more than make up for the few credits icecream costs." (Alexis) "What are you doing still standing there, I have money to collect and icecream to eat, don''t make me wait forever. I already showed off what happens to people who make me angry, now get to it." (Alexis) That last bit seemed to put a bit of pep in his step as he broke into a run to get changed in the competitor locker room. I couldn''t help but chuckle a bit at his reaction to my threat, which I would never actually follow through with, although he didn''t need to know that. 40 Ch. 28- Fresh Auction and Gifts The funds I had managed to save up so far, before yesterday, was 15,028 credits, luckily I had more than doubled that with the help of the colosseum. I bet 10,000 on myself to win with me having 50/50 odds, and the additional 6,048 credits came from a percentage of the bets placed on my match itself. It was a slow day since people were still getting over the monster break, still, a couple thousand credits was nothing to sneeze at despite my sense of money at times. The plan was to meet up with Alexis outside the auction house and sit together for the bidding. This time I would finally be able to make some bids on the lower side of the middle-class items, middle class for typically wealthy summoners, not civilians. Which was just what I needed since enchanted jewelry or items were stuck in that class due to their scarcity and difficulty in making. I didn''t know what exact form they would take, but I would select what was most functional not what looked the best. I cared much more for their safety than how it looked on them, granted I probably wouldn''t force them to wear something unsightly. In addition to that, for Mira and her summon, I would be buying some expensive cores and supplements to help it evolve. She really cared for her summon, but unfortunately, she had little combat ability so there wasn''t much of a chance on her being able to evolve on her own. Once Lyra was close to evolving, I would take Mira out to the forest and help her evolve and potentially find another summon for her as well. Getting a summon would be harder since she would have to come through the monster gate to fight and contract a summon since monsters couldn''t pass through the gate until a monster break. I wouldn''t know what was available for her until the auction started, so I would just try to pay attention when they brought out cores. After all, what kind of brother would I be to not take care of my sister after all she''s done for me. If I can help to protect her in any way, I''d be willing to do just about anything to get it for her, she was the absolute most important person in my life currently. Alexis is important to me as well, but I don''t have to worry as much about her since she is strong enough and I''ll be right next to her to help keep her safe. Speaking of... "Hey Alexis, glad to see you could make it," I said with a grin. "Can it Tommy, I''m a late riser so sue me." (Alexis) "Alright princess sleepyhead, lets head in and get some decent seats for the auction." (Thomas) Alexis and I traded some barbs with each other to pass the time and tease each other. It was a far more interesting way to pass the time than sitting quietly by myself while waiting for the auction to start like the last time I was here. I asked Alexis what she planned on buying, but she was being tight-lipped about it and I didn''t want to pry too much. She was entitled to her secrets, and we weren''t nearly good enough friends to be able to demand answers from each other. We trust each other with our lives, but that doesn''t mean we don''t have our own circumstances and secrets to keep from each other. Hopefully, in time, we would get closer and be able to share these things, but it would happen all in good time. "Welcome all of you to the weekly city auction, we have plenty of lovely and rare items for your viewing and hopefully buying pleasure. Without further ado, let''s bring out the first items of the night with some lower-class tier 3 cores." (Auctioneer) They paraded around some cores that might have caught my attention a week or two ago, but now I had set my sights higher and was looking for something unique that would suit lyra the smokescreen python. I was thinking something along the lines of a more offensive ability for the snake, but it was really up to luck depending on what was available today. I feel a nudge to my side from Alexis''s elbow and tune back into what is being said by the auctioneer. "Up next is a socket lizard core, this monster is known for its powerful electrical abilities and paralyzing properties, great for any offensive ability needs for your summons." (Auctioneer) I wasn''t one to doubt the man''s words and he practically described what I needed. I was hoping for something with fire or poison since smoke came from fire and snakes usually had poison, but electricity would work just fine I guess. I might be even better in some ways, because stunning would likely work even against monsters with strong defensive skin that normal attacks wouldn''t scratch. I wasn''t worried about Mira being able to kill her opponents, just be able to escape them and survive. "We''ll start with the price of 50 credits for the core." (Auctioneer) "60 credits." (Rando 1) "No, 75." (Rando 2) I decided to bust in and take the core before the price continued to hike with this fairly desired core. "100 credits for the socket lizard core." No one seemed to want to pay above that, but no price was too much for Mira and luckily I managed to curb any competition with my inflated price. "It seems like Mira is going to be happy with the core, what else do you need for her?" (Alexis) "Now I need a higher tier snake core and something to help protect her when I''m not around." (Thomas) ... The auction continued and nothing particularly caught my interest until we got to the 4th tier cores, where I managed to nab a 4th tier rainbow serpent core. The bidding ended at 260 credits, where I managed to beat a man with a greyed-out mustache. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. Finally, the middle-class Items came out after the first intermission, this was the point where many in attendance left. The seats around us were now vacant, and you could see who was wealthy or influential just by looking around at who was here. Of course, this didn''t apply to everybody, and some people were even wealthier than the mid-class part of the auction and were just waiting until the objects became rare or expensive enough to catch their attention. Another elbow to my side brought me back to the present where the accessories I had been hoping for were being brought out. The price range for this class of items is in the 1000''s easy, if not more. "What we have here is a treant heart necklace accessory, its'' strong life and vitality properties can allow for quick healing in dangerous moments up to 5 times depending on the severity of the wound. A life-threatening wound will use up all 5 uses, and the wounds that scale down from that have their respective amount of uses, so use it wisely." (Auctioneer) The actual necklace itself looked to be a vine string attached to a dark red wooden pendant with the caduceus symbol amongst other runes and symbols were on the face of the pendant. It was about the size of an egg and looked rather nice. "We''ll start the bidding at 5,000 credits." (Auctioneer) "6,000 credits" (Rando 3) "7,000" (Rando 4) The bidding continued fiercely, and I finally managed to butt in and win the amulet for 8,500 credits. It was well worth the price and would do just fine for Mira. A few other items were brought out that while expensive, they weren''t what I was looking for. That was until a metallic looking bracelet was brought out. On the front face was a small shield attached to the bracelet. The auctioneer explained that this was made from an automaton and had an expandable shield. The shield itself was reusable, but would eventually wear down despite being in the 4th tier material wise. I knew this would be a great life-saving tool and figured it would be just as desired by others as well. The bidding got fierce and it was a battle between me, the mustached gentleman again and a blonde woman in a long turquoise dress. The man gave up first, and I managed to edge out the woman by bidding 9,600 credits for it. I had plenty of money to spend and required little else, so I was free to spend as much as needed on these items. "Alexis, let''s stay for a little while longer, and if I don''t find anything then we can leave." She had already purchased the items she was looking for, which included some cores and a new one-handed short sword with a thin piercing tip. It was a pretty weapon and resembled a wider edged rapier more than anything. Items went by and nothing interesting passed by, not that I didn''t want them, but I could only afford so much and I was waiting for the right thing to pop up. We had just got up to leave after a few minutes when the auctioneer announced the showing of a unique accessory item. "What we have here now is a new rechargeable shield spell necklace, it was made with the latest advancements in the field and has quite the potential for long term use. It can cast 3 shield spells of the 4th tier with a 4th tier core, or 1 spell at the 4th tier with a tier 3 core. This is a hot item and is the only one being sold today at this auction." (Auctioneer) Murmurs resounded within the large cavernous room, and I couldn''t help but agree that the item was worth talking about. It was a rare item, but only to a certain extent which is why I had a chance of snatching it up. It would probably take the rest of the money that I have, which at this point is about 12,616 credits. "Let''s start the bidding at 5,000 credits, do I have a taker?" (Auctioneer) The price was initially rising by 100 credits each time, but some people got tired of this and raised the price by a 1,000. This discouraged most of the current bidders and soon it was down to a few bidders going back and forth. An aged woman with greying hair that had a severe expression on her face the entire time was the main competitor for this item. Most had dropped out since it was only the first of such items, and that they would be able to get one of their own later at a cheaper price. I would normally agree with the strategy, but I needed it now so that it could do its'' job of protecting Alexis. Mira had the wooden healing amulet, and I had the transformative shield bracelet, all that was needed now was the current item being bid for so that Alexis has a gift as well. It got up to 9,000 credits and then devolved into going up by 100 each time once again. By the time it got to 9,300 I realized something should be done to dissuade them from bidding so they don''t outbid me slightly. I got up as calmly as I could and spoke with a clear and controlled voice, "12,500 credits for the necklace". The jump in price had many looking back at me wondering what I was playing at, I just remained calm and prayed that they didn''t call my bluff and go above my price. I was already over what the actual necklace was worth, but exclusivity always manages to drive up prices. I would be practically poor once again after this auction if I won the item. Tense seconds ticked by, and my back was coated in sweat, but it seemed to be my lucky day as no one else decided to bid for it in fear of driving the price up even more. "12,500 credits going once, going twice, .... and sold to the gentlemen in the back middle row." (Auctioneer) "Alright, that was all of my money, let''s head over to the checkout to get our items." (Thomas) "Finally, hurry up already." (Alexis) I couldn''t help but shake my head at her impatience, but quickened my pace anyway. The counter was relatively empty from people, and so we were seen shortly after arriving. We both handed in our auction number and the items were transferred over to us after payment. Now my wrist was equipped by a deployable shield, and my bank account was down to 116 credits. At least it was until I remembered that the monster bodies I had sold to the auction had been sold off today. I quickly handed the lady at the desk both numbered chips, and in my account was an additional 1,200 credits. Part of which I had to share with Alexis since we killed it together. Which ended up with my account balancing out at 818 credits total. Seeing that now was as good as ever, I brought out the necklace and said to Alexis, "I bought this necklace for you as a gift for officially becoming my hunting partner and so that this can protect you in case I can''t". "Tommy this is too expensive, I can''t possibly take it." (Alexis) "It''s a gift, and I didn''t have any use for the money at this point in time anyways. I already got Mira and myself something similar, so it''s only fair that you get one as well." (Thomas) "Fine, I''ll take it. But, you have to let me help pay part of this off at least." (Alexis) "I can tell that is the minimum you will allow, so I accept. You can help pay for half, that way it is still a gift. I don''t need the money right now, so when you get the chance you can pay me back." (Thomas) With that said, she took the necklace from my hands and placed it around her neck. It was quite a beautiful thing with a core tucked into the top of the amulet. Depicted on it was a lotus flower with small exposed areas that let the core tucked into the amulet shine through to give the impression of color in the mostly silver flower. "It looks great on you, clearly it was meant to be yours." (Thomas) 41 Ch. 29- Putting the Auction Haul to Use "I''d like that. I can''t help but wonder what type of person your sister is, since she pretty much raised you." (Alexis) ..... "Mira, I''m home and I brought company." (Thomas) "Which I really hope I don''t regret." I mutter to myself quietly, only now realizing I''m introducing two women who give me problems on their own, and now they would be able to collaborate with each other. I just hope they wouldn''t come to realize this on their own, not that I was holding out much hope for that to occur, after all, they weren''t stupid. Mira walks out from the living room where she was lounging out in her pajamas assumedly watching tv since it was her day off. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. "Hello there, I''m Mira Tommy''s big sister, nice to finally meet the Alexis I''ve been hearing him talk all about." (Mira) "Likewise" Alexis says politely with some enthusiasm that can be seen in her smile, which only serves to send shivers down my spine. "Well let''s get settled in the living room instead of standing in the hallway. I also have some gifts for you Mira, Alexis already got hers." I usher them urgently before they can begin plotting, baiting Mira doesn''t hurt my efforts either. We get situated on our dark pleather couches and I start bringing out the cores and wooden amulet for my sister. "The cores are to help Lyra evolve and to gain some offensive abilities to help protect you. The necklace is a potential lifesaver and will act to heal any major wounds on the wearer, it only has up to 5 uses to heal your injuries, so let me know when it runs out." "I love it, and I guess this will make you feel better about me being safe when you''re not around. I know how paranoid and concerned you get over me, so I''ll keep it on me at all times for both of us." (Mira) "I think it looks pretty good on you, like some sort of new-age jewelry worn by a crystal and zodiac sign obsessed lady. You make it look better than most though." (Alexis) Having said that, Mira was more than happy to bring her little grey snake out for us to look at as she feeds her the two cores I got her. The adorable little snake gobbled up the cores like she was starving and about 10 minutes later it seemed like she had fully assimilated and digested them. Unfortunately, that wasn''t enough to get her to evolve, but she seemed to be close to evolving, not to mention that she had grown in size compared to when she was initially brought out. I imagine that she would evolve to gain some offensive electrical type skills with her evolution, that was the hope at least, but evolution is still something we don''t understand, and nothing is absolute when it comes to evolutions. "I guess we''ll have to take you out tomorrow or when your next day off is to get Lyra to evolve. At least we know she is close to evolving, so we should only need part of one day at most. I don''t mind taking you out with us, so don''t try and protest out of concern for us. You''re important to Tommy, so it''s the least we could do to help ensure your safety." (Alexis) "You''re calling him Tommy now are you?" Mira couldn''t help but say with a smug tone and a giant smile on her face. I could feel the blood rush to my face in a fierce blush, and face-palmed about the fact that she focused on how Alexis called me rather than anything else she had said. I palm my face and suppress a groan that tries to escape my lips at the impending girl talk. "We decided that we were close enough to be calling each other by our nicknames, and since you call him Tommy, I thought I would as well. You can call me Alexis by the way, Alex is usually for people I don''t know or don''t care to know very well." (Alexis) "I appreciate that Alexis, I don''t really have a nickname, so I guess you can keep calling me Mira. So how has Tommy been lately? I hear little bits of his life and job as a summoner, but I''m pretty sure he sugar coats or brushes off a lot of it. In exchange, I can tell you some stories about Tommy as a kid." (Mira) I couldn''t keep my look of horror off my face as my worst fear came true, I could already see the plans being cooked up in their heads as they began to plot together. It wouldn''t be long before I was being pranked or teamed up on by them. Luckily it only progressed to sharing stories and Mira getting mad at me for leaving out a few important life-risking things from my recent activities. I''m just glad Alexis doesn''t know about some of my closer calls when I was by myself, she would be furious, and I was in enough trouble as is. They continued to swap stories as we ate dinner, and I stayed off to the side trying to move and speak as little ass possible so I didn''t grab their attention. I was treating them like dinosaurs that could only see movement, and for good reason too, it was better for them to distract each other rather than they focus on me and what I may or may not have done wrong. It doesn''t even matter if I''ve done something wrong or not, living with Mira for so long has given me plenty of experience about the rationale and logic of girls. Needless to say, I didn''t particularly want to mess with them and would endeavor to keep them far away from each other as much as possible. "Well ladies, it''s been fun, but I need to get Alexis back and we have an early day tomorrow so we all need our rest. Plus you can continue swapping embarrassing stories about me later while we''re out tomorrow." (Thomas) With that, I managed to separate the two girls and brought Alexis back to her place as the polite thing to do. We agreed on meeting up at sunrise to take Mira out to evolve Lyra, then we would bring her back safely before returning to the swamp to hunt deeper in the center of the dangerous biome. We both felt strong enough to venture that far after being able to wipe the floor with our opponents in the arena. Okay, so maybe Alexis wiped the floor, I just managed to get a lucky win. I won in the end though, and that''s what matters. At least that''s what I keep telling myself. 42 Ch. 29.5- Lyra Finally Evolves I had no idea what she would turn into, but I had high hopes for her to transform into something strong and capable of protecting and guarding Mira. She was one of the few people I cared for in this world, and I would do anything to keep her as safe as possible, I would die before letting her be harmed again. I couldn''t be upset that Mira hadn''t evolved Lyra after all of this time, Lyra was great for helping escape a dangerous situation, but she had almost no offensive abilities. I was hoping to shore up her abilities to give her something to attack with. Running was great and all, but you couldn''t always outrun an enemy, so being able to kill them is a must when in a dangerous area. I will probably have to baby her for quite some time, like helping her summons evolve or to bond with more summons, I had hopes that she would at least have the capabilities of a summoner even if that wasn''t her main occupation. This was a dangerous world, and I wanted her to be strong enough to at least not be oppressed or harmed by most people. I was more concerned about her being hurt by people than monsters, monsters at least stayed in a separate plane most of the time, and we know they will try to harm us. Humans will pretend to be friendly and then stab you in the back when you''re most vulnerable, and those in positions of authority are the worst of all. If any more people tried to harm us, I could always just dig a second grave for my next deserving victim. It was much easier to hide a body or make a person disappear in today''s era with no technology and monsters that would kill us without a second thought. I didn''t want to go killing people, but I wouldn''t hesitate to if they attempted to harm me or anyone I cared about. I''m done being victimized and stepped on by others, I now had the power to back up my conviction, but I was smart enough to realize violence wasn''t always the right or best answer to things. .... "Tommy, are you even listening?" (Mira) I finally began tuning back into whatever Mira was talking about, and now I would have to admit my wrongdoing at least in her mind it would be. "Sorry Mira, I was thinking about something. What were you talking about again?" (Mira) "Ugh, you always tune out when I start talking. Am I really that boring?" (Mira) "Well, I was telling you about my newest discoveries for the universal antidote I''ve been working on. I''m getting so close, I just need to fix the ingredient ratios and then I''ll have a working product. I can''t thank you enough for the manticore venom, I don''t know what I would have done without it." (Mira) "That''s great Mir, I''m so proud of you. I''m just glad I managed to actually help you, just let me know if you need anything else and I''ll try to get it for you. I also want a few vials of your finished potion when you complete it, never know when that might come in handy." (Thomas) We continued on talking about her work until we made it to the gate right as Alexis did. "Hey Alexis, over here!" (Mira) "Hey guys, are you ready for this early hunt?" (Alexis) "I''m still trying to get my eyes to stop drooping, luckily we can ride our summons to get to the forest quicker." (Thomas) We scanned through and as soon as we passed through the gate we summoned our respective summons. Alexis was riding Hemlock, I was riding Jotun, and Mira was riding Brutus while Lyra remained draped around her. I would have let Mira ride Jotun, but his skin is ice-cold and I can only stand it due to the minor resistance I have to the cold from being bonded with him. The resistance is enough for me to not develop frostbite, I was just thankful that my armor was enough to keep me warm while riding my frost wyrm. Our mounts ran quickly, and we arrived at the edge of the woods within 20 minutes of riding. At this point, I unsummoned Jotun and instead brought out Emett. The little humanoid rock golem was still a tier 2, but he was now at a level where he could fight off most tier 3 monsters thanks to his defensive outer-layer of rock. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. He would be able to help Lyra hunt while not doing all of the work for her, this was necessary to jumpstart Lyra''s evolution. She had more than enough DNA absorbed from the tier 4 snake core, all she needed now was a difficult battle to start the process. It seemed like it was true that battle was necessary to evolve despite any cores that may have been fed to a summon, the excess amount of cores would simply make it easier to evolve. "Alright, let''s head into the woods and find some monsters to fight for Lyra. Alexis, you''ll stay back with Hemlock in case any dangers come close while Lyra is pre-occupied. We want her to get some real experience and any real danger to her will be taken care of by Emett." (Thomas) We continued on with Brutus in front of us to search for any monsters and to warn us about any attempted ambushes by monsters. Just because the monsters here are weak compared to the ones in the marsh, doesn''t mean they can''t be lethal in a moment of luck or a lull in alertness for danger. ...... We had made a decent ways through the forest and Lyra was able to handle the tier 1 monsters that tried to attack us occasionally. Although it was fairly rare due to the imposing presence of Brutus and Hemlock nearby, it was the most aggressive of monsters that attacked us. Unsurprisingly the horned rabbits seemed to have a vendetta against us as they continually charged towards us either by themselves or in a pair. Any extra monsters were taken care of quickly by Emett who was impervious to their attacks and simply rushed up and snapped their necks. About an hour later of fairly continual movement, we made it to the barrier between the first and second-tier areas of the forest. We took a moment to rest and have a quick snack before continuing on, by this point, the sun had already risen and the bright orange glow from the rising sun made for a picturesque moment in our journey. After we and our summons ate, we made our way within the second area and searched for a worthy opponent that Lyra would be capable of fighting. She really only had the ability to constrain with her body and attack with her sharp fangs that would inject a fiery concentration of ash into the body of her opponent. Her fangs could be quite lethal, but it was difficult to use them against an even-strength opponent since to bite them she would need for them to be relatively still. She easily proved that when some drill rabbits charged at us. Rabbits seemed to be making up for all their years as prey, they were by far the most aggressive monsters I''ve encountered so far. Just imagining a group of them charge at me alone is enough to induce nightmares, luckily I''m usually cognizant enough to know that I have my summons to count on. The python quickly slithered over to the first of the drill rabbits and quickly constricted the monster all over with her body. Her next move was to use her concentrated ash to begin internally damaging the monster. By the end, the rabbit had turned crispy and smoke was pouring out of all orifices, many blood vessels had burst from the heat and blood was leaking everywhere. The worst parts were where the initial injections occurred, and by the time the monster was dead, there were at least 6 bites on its'' body. There were 3 more rabbits to take care of, and Emett plowed through 2 of them while leaving the other one for the strained snake. Lyra wasn''t used to regular exercise or expending so much liquid ash, and it showed in how much stamina she had after facing just one low-class tier 2 monster. The small scale skirmish ended quickly, and what was left at the end were 4 wild monster bodies, a stone golem, and a tired smokescreen python. Lyra was tired but still capable of moving on and continuing to fight. I would need to take her abilities into account and finish up the hunt before Lyra became too tired to even fight a decent opponent. "Brutus, go and search for a decently strong monster for Lyra to fight in this section of the forest." (Thomas) My Grim hound went off while sniffing at the ground and not 10 minutes later he came back excited indicating that he had found something. I just hoped that it was strong enough to be a challenge while still remaining beatable. "Lets go see what Brutus found. Lyra you get ready to fight your last battle, only rush in if I tell you, I wouldn''t want you to waste your energy or get injured by a stronger enemy." (Thomas) We came to a copse of trees fairly far apart and in a den was an Ironhide boar. This wasn''t the most ideal opponent for Lyra since its defense would pose a significant challenge to her fangs. It didn''t really have any capabilities to fight back effectively, it probably won''t be any easier to find a better opponent so we might as well use this monster to fight. "Alright Lyra, go and fight that Ironhide boar. You''ll have to be careful though, aim for getting up close to it and finding a way to get past its defense in order to kill it. Fight smart, not hard." (Thomas) The little python nodded to me before sneaking off over to the sitting boar. After about a minute of waiting, Lyra came into view and had silently snuck up on the tusked pig. She used her long body to wrap around the tree trunk and slither up onto an overhanging branch. She was in the perfect position to ambush and used gravity to help give her fangs an extra piercing boost. Her body flew like a little grey missile, and when she reached the boar managed to barely puncture the neck of the boar. Unfortunately, she didn''t get very far into the hide, however, some of the ash concentrate had made its'' way through the boar''s body. It was squealing in agony and Lyra used her advantage to wrap around and constrict the frantic monster. She made sure to remain clear of its head and sharp tusks while constraining the movements of the pig. It took a while, but she managed to slide into the correct positioning on the body while the monster was bucking around trying to get her off. With a sudden and sharp contraction, multiple bones were heard snapping or dislocating and the monster ceased most movement. Lyra remained cautious of the suspiciously still boar and carefully made her way up the side to where she had already punctured the tusked monster''s neck. She carefully positioned herself and struck the boar again in the same area so there was no resistance from the hide. Soon liquid ash was injected into the once more squealing pig and it quickly became cooked from within. It threw its'' head back despite the many broken bones in an attempt to gore Mira''s python, unfortunately for it, Lyra was ready for such a desperate move and darted to the side as soon as movement was detected. Lyra had managed to finish the fight fairly easily and quickly, however, I suspect that the element of surprise had a large part in such a successful hunt. It didn''t really matter anyway as the cloudy featured reptile began to glow and evolve after such a battle. Light suffused the area, and motes even began to travel towards Mira as well. She seemed ecstatic and shocked as she continued to gain strength and a new ability from Lyra. Not long after, Lyra turned from a grey 5-foot python with cloud patterns overlayed on her into a storm-toothed python, and bright yellow zig-zags began running about all over her. Her fangs released a combination of smoke and lighting and together looked like a miniature lightning storm. She had the same dark color interwoven with small lighting bolts branching all over, and had gained an additional 2 feet onto her already impressive length. She looked positively lethal, and I now felt much better about Mira''s safety. All she would need now is a few additional summons for her, but we would cross that bridge later. For now, we could revel in Mira''s success and head back to drop Mira off before Alexis and I went to the far more dangerous marsh. 43 Ch. 30, Pt. 1- Pride Comes Before the Fall It was similar to how summoner parents would help capture summons for their children when they were still too weak for strong summons. Most people disregarded having low-level tiers for additional strength and ability bonuses. After all, nobody is going to turn down a tier 5 dragon summon regardless of their comparative strength. I highly doubt I would be able to catch any useful ones, but I would be on the lookout for any. If I was really lucky, I would come across monster eggs which could pass through the gate barrier. They were exceedingly rare and hard to find, the mother monsters would fiercely protect their babies and even give their lives for them. Usually strong monsters were the ones capable of protecting their eggs and raising them to hatch, the weaker monsters would have their eggs turned into a meal for another monster. Not only would eggs have the advantage of being static and able to breach the gate barrier, but they were more prone to mutations as a result of multiple genes being transferred to an offspring, and so variants were much more likely. That''s not to say that all born monsters had an advantage due to mutation, they followed the laws of genetic variation like us humans. The mutations could turn from an extra finger to even multiple heads. Not all were useful, but they have the opportunity to gain something beneficial at an early stage of their development. One of the downsides aside from negative mutations was that the summoner would have no idea how the summon would turn out until it hatched. They were also much slower to develop since they grew at a natural rate rather than the quick rate of created monsters turned summons. This would normally be a downside for most summoners who desired quick power, but the potential of born monsters were often great than the fast-growing created summons. This only applied to the later stages of summoners where the potential of a monster mattered more than their inherent current strength. Most people didn''t have the foresight to bother about a level of strength they might not ever reach. They only desired to survive at the current moment and gave up long-term benefits for short term gain. This wasn''t necessarily a bad choice as many had survived only because they added more summons to their team to shore up some immediate weaknesses. It''s hard to worry about the future if you can''t even survive the present. I was planning on searching for valuable items or plants or fighting off strong but valuable monsters. I feel like we have enough strength to warrant going deeper, and since we had managed to fight off various tier 4 monsters and summons already we would be perfectly alright unless something freakish occurred. .... The marsh was as humid and muddy as normal, and the trek was only made bearable by the fact we were using Hemlock and Jotun to traverse the biome quickly. We didn''t bother stopping to fight, and quickly breached through to the center of the Marsh. It was darker and vibrant with all sorts of moss, bushes, and cypress trees dotted throughout. Were it not such a dangerous area, I would have loved to stop and admire the scenery for a bit. Unfortunately, it was rather dangerous, and both Alexis and I brought out an additional summon to help fight. Obviously I brought out Jareth and had him on standby to intercept any monsters. Musashi was Alexis''s bladed mantis summon, and was rather strong for a tier 3 summon, he would act as back up in case of multiple monsters. I wouldn''t be relying on his strength, instead, Hemlock would serve as a great protector and deterrent for any dangerous monsters that arrived. With the poison drake alongside a nearly impervious Ogre, we would be perfectly safe within this area. Getting closer to the center allowed us to come across increasingly dangerous monsters like dryads, spriggans, and treants, or nagas and hellhounds. These were the most notable or dangerous of monsters, that we came across, but by no means represented all of the dangers present in the marsh. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. Some were in different areas more suited to their development, others were more sparse or decided to attack a smaller group of humans and summons. Those that attacked us were dumb enough to attack a group like ours in fewer numbers, and others were overconfident in their strength. None of our mini-battles were enough to warrant further caution and only served to bolster my confidence in the group. It seemed like nothing that got close to us managed to get even close to doing some real damage, and so I decided to continue on and get further into the more inaccessible areas. I was hungry for more monsters to sell and treasures to find. The deity didn''t leave us humans without any means to get stronger, and in some cases, natural treasures or hidden items could be found in more dangerous parts of the biomes. These items attracted stronger monsters to protect the item in a usually mutually beneficial relationship, and as a result, the more dangerous areas were exactly where the treasures were. I was determined to at least find one by the end of the day. I didn''t want to say I was getting greedy, but getting so close to emptying my accounts had set me off on a frantic hunt to earn some more. I felt like I was suffocating when the thought that I might become poor again resurfaces in my brain. .... "Tommy, do you really think we need to go any further in? It just takes one strong monster to wipe us out, and we''re a lot more fragile than our summons." (Alexis) "We''ll be fine Alexis, we already have our strongest summons out and with Brutus''s sharp nose, he can detect any monsters near us in case of ambush. It''s only a tier 4 area, so why worry too much when we have two of our own. The only thing I''d be worried about is a group of tier 4 monsters, but they rarely ever do that." (Thomas) "Ok, but I have a bad feeling about this. Everything''s started to get quiet and it''s making me unnerved." (Alexis) "Shh. I think I found something." I said as quietly as I could to Alexis who was right next to me. The clearing we had just passed contained a small spring and a cave in the back that looked like it was made by some monster. The size of the claw marks and how large the cave was made me a bit weary. However, I didn''t see or sense any monster and neither did Brutus, so I figured it would be fine to enter and take a little look around. By the time we finished scoping out the place, we would still have plenty of time to leave before the monster came back if it was still alive. "C''mon let''s go look and see if we can find anything valuable in the cave, Brutus hasn''t sensed a monster around and I doubt it''s going to come any time soon." (Thomas) Alexis reluctantly agreed to go with me, and since she seemed so hesitant to enter I had Brutus shadow travel and sneak around ahead of time for any hidden dangers. She seemed a bit more relaxed after taking so many precautions and Brutus reporting back that there were no traps or monsters around right now. What was interesting was that he smelled something further down in the cave that was heavily marked with the scent of a monster similar to Jotun but at a higher evolutionary stage. I was ecstatic because dragons were notorious hoarders of wealth and it was likely that something really valuable was further inside. The cave was lit up slightly from the sun overhead, but only at the entrance. The rest of the cave was extremely dark which made it difficult for our eyes to adjust. Luckily, Brutus and I had night vision and could see completely fine after a few moments of adjustment. Alexis couldn''t say the same, and neither could her summons, so I went back out to grab a stick large and dry enough to be a torch. I grabbed an extra t-shirt I had in storage and wrapped it around the stick to act as an accelerant, which lit up quickly after setting it on fire with a lighter. "Here''s a torch so you can see, I''ll go ahead of you so the light doesn''t affect my vision." I handed off the makeshift torch to Alexis and wandered on ahead. It seemed like part of the cave was naturally made as a few stalagmites and stalactites existed peppered around the area. These weren''t a problem as many had been broken presumably by the monster and none were big enough to block our path. Contrary to the outside where the marsh was quite damp and humid, the cave itself was rather dry and warm. Thinking about why that would be so, I take a quick whiff and detect a rotten egg stench indicative of sulfur. It would be fair to say that maybe there are some hot springs or volcanic activity beneath the cave. I wonder what a monster would want with a cave that was naturally warm and dry despite living in a swamp? My question was quickly answered when we got to the end of the large tunnel and found a rounded out circular room with a series of rocks spewing steam out from cracks within them. In the center of that formation was something I absolutely did not expect to see. In the center was a blue-violet egg the size of a microwave if they still existed in this era. There were scale-like patterns around the shell, and even odder was the shifting of color on the egg. It was like it couldn''t decide what color it wanted to be and soon enough shifted into a red-violet color intermixed and taking over the previous cool coloring. It was different from most eggs I had heard of, where most would maybe have a special color or pattern on them, never before have I heard of an egg changing color. "It looks like we have something special here with this strange egg, I don''t imagine it would be a weak monster either. Let''s quickly take it and get out of here before its'' mom comes back. I really don''t want to be on the bad side of a monster that can produce an egg like this." (Alexis) I couldn''t help but agree and let Alexis store the egg for now. She needs a new summon more than me right now, but Mira could also use a new summon. For now, I would just let her store it and we could figure out who should get it later. I started to get a bad feeling about all of this and started waving my hand to tell Alexis to hurry up and store the egg so we can leave. I let out a breathe ass soon as it was safely tucked away and we started moving out with some serious speed like the devil himself was behind us. I just now started to realize the potential danger of what we just did, I''m just really hoping it doesn''t come to bite us in the ass. As soon as I finished that thought I came to regret it as I started to feel the vibration of heavy footsteps proceeding closer to the cave while we were still in it. Alexis seems to have felt the same thing judging by the frantic expression on her face. We booked it for the opening only to see in the clearing by the spring outside was a large draconic monster with two heads. I would call it a hydra except for the fact that it only had two heads on its'' body. It was a rather slender yet tall and long monster with each head being a different color. The right head was red as a ruby, and the left was the opposite being a cool ice-blue. It didn''t take a genius to figure out what the heads could do, and suddenly the coloring on the egg made sense. I guess the most accurate name for this unique monster was a bydra, and while it was still in a usually tier 4 area, this monster seemed stronger than most. It wasn''t quite at the 5th tier, because that would require it to have nine heads like a true hydra, but that didn''t make it any less imposing or lethal. I would have to classify it as a pseudo-5th tier monster, and it would be fair to say that it was the king of this section of swamp. I didn''t really like how outclassed we were right now despite our numbers, and began to feel fear as its'' draconic aura began to affect summons and summoners alike. It felt like we were looking at a king and had weights on our shoulders while facing it. It took effort but we all managed to shake off most of the effects after a few moments. Had we encountered the monster before the monster break we would be terrified sitting ducks, but now I only tried to figure out how best we could fight or escape the monster. It wasn''t even the strongest monster I had ever faced or seen, but it was definitely the strongest I had encountered while with just one other person as back up. We remained in a tense silent standoff with the monster for nearly a minute as we assessed each other. I was using this time working on how I would get us to escape this area alive, we wouldn''t be able to defeat it, and it wouldn''t just let us leave after having taken its'' baby. We would have to survive against an angry mother far stronger than our summons, things were not looking up for us. I couldn''t help but look over at Alexis with her wide eyes and whisper, "I''m sorry I got you in this mess, I''m going to try and keep it occupied while you escape when you can. I might need Hemlock, so leave her here to help me fight it off while you ride Musashi. Unsummon her about 30 seconds after you start leaving, that should give me plenty of time to keep it occupied." "I''m not leaving you to die while I escape, we''re in this together. I''m going to fight with you just like we''ve done before, but I''m going to make you pay for it when we get back for being so greedy. I''m also telling Mira on you." (Alexis) I couldn''t help the miserable expression on my face when she mentioned siccing Mira on me, but I knew I deserved it and just nodded in acceptance. Our little strategy meeting was cut short by an angry roar that preceded an angry mother bydra charging right at us while charging up both breath attacks at once. "Oh Shit!!!" (Thomas and Alexis) 44 Ch. 30, Pt. 2- Running Away with a Prize ...¡­ The dual colored 15ft monster was charging right for us, and my battle-plan was at best stall and try not to die while running away somehow. I''m aware it wasn''t the best of plans, but to be fair I spent most of my original planning time throwing myself on a cross for Alexis who decided to stay around. I can''t be upset about it though, she decided to stay around even knowing she might die. But now we''re stuck with a charging monster angry about someone daring to take her egg, and she was rapidly approaching. "Alright, you go left and I go right. We''ll have to send out Jareth and Hemlock if we want to stall it for any amount of time to come up with a plan. Tell Hemlock to focus on ranged attacks, and use Musashi to move away from any of its'' attacks. Save your dodging skills for when you really need them." (Thomas) As I was telling her this, I was also informing Jareth through our bond to go up and protect Hemlock from being focused on. I also had him leave his normal weapon since it would scratch the thick hide of the dragon-kin at best. I was banking on the gravity hammer being able to do some actual damage, speaking of, the only areas really vulnerable to attack were its'' legs since the rest of the body was tall enough to make attacks awkward at best. We split up after I finished, with Alexis riding Musashi and myself on the back of Jotun. I veered right where the fire element head was at and had my frost wyrm take some distance so we could hopefully dodge any projectiles. Alexis was on the left where the ice elemental head was at, and she decided to reach even further since Musashi had no ranged attacks at this moment. I hoped by splitting the monster''s attention in two directions we would be able to handle it better. "Jareth and Hemlock, focus on the knees of the legs. If we take at least one out we can outrun the monster." (Thomas) It seems like my comment was unnecessary since Alexis had the same thought as myself judging by how Hemlock was already darting in towards the bydra to take some quick swipes while doing her best to dodge the long whip-like tail that the monster was using to attack within close range. The tail was too fast for the poison drake to dodge, and instead, Jareth was able to ward off the attack by hitting the near end of the tail with his extended hammer. It was a close call, and only his longer limbs and even longer reach of the hammer let Jareth get in front of the speedy limb. I didn''t see the bydra using its'' claws or legs to attack aside from moving around slightly while facing the two tier 4 summons. It seems like the bulkier body of the monster was preventing it from using any claws to attack since it would destabilize the bulky body. We managed to get out of the way in time, but we could definitely feel the sharp temperature drop from the breath attacks. I was even more terrified after seeing the trail of flame remaining on the ground as if someone had sprayed the ground with a flamethrower in a straight line. Any vegetation was now ash, and the even scarier part was how the flames remained for a while after. Getting hit by this attack would leave you drenched in flames that would continue to burn and cause damage until it was put out or wiped off. That of course relied on you still being able to think properly while burning alive. The two close-ranged summons working on the legs of the monster were doing their best to at least inflict some damage. Unfortunately for us, Hemlock''s main attack being poison was unable to really affect the bydra as her attacks wouldn''t make it through the skin. It seemed like the surface exposure to the poison wasn''t doing much either. Usually, at least some poison would be absorbed through the skin, but the hide was so thick and dense that barely any was able to pass through. Seeing that if nothing changed soon we would get wiped out, I decided to redirect the tier 4 summons'' focus by shouting out, "Jareth try and make a wound for Hemlock to shoot poison into, quick!" He seemed to have heard me as he was focused on making cuts on the surface of the skin than doing some deep damage to the muscles and bone. After a few quick swipes, a forearm sized diagonally downward gash was made in the front left leg of the monster right above the knee. This effort was made at the cost of Jareth being brutally smashed with the whipping tail and sent shooting back into a large tree, which now had a Jareth sized indentation into one of the larger trees to the side of the clearing. Even I was shocked at just how much power was packed into the attack, it seemed like the bydra mother was extremely pissed off. Luckily, Hemlock managed to take advantage of the opportunity given to launch a large lance-like stream of poison into the wound with unnerving accuracy. It seemed like the pseudo-tier 5 felt the burning of the poison in its'' body as it ceased the breath attacks towards Alexis and myself, and aimed both right towards Hemlock. She didn''t even have a chance to run or dodge before the beams of fire and ice blared right towards the purple drake. None of us had any time to react before a giant explosion went off and left in the spot where Hemlock had stood was a crater of molten and frozen mud and rocks. I was left in shock that in one moment one of our strongest summons was vanquished in the blink of an eye. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. "Oh come on, it''s not enough that the giant two-headed dragon can breathe fire and ice, but the attacks together create giant explosions that can kill a drake in one hit." (Thomas) "Hemlock!! Dammit, if I could kill this bydra I would." (Alexis) "That''s kinda the problem Alexis." (Thomas) "Not the time Tommy. Oh, and I''m so kicking your ass for this later." (Alexis) I decided the best course of action would be to shut my mouth and focus on the giant killer monster. Jareth had recovered from the blow into the tree, but was knocked right back down again from the aftershock of the blast. Deciding to go for broke while we were behind I shouted over to Jareth who was charging forward again towards the slightly injured and now poisoned left front leg, "Jareth, use your rage skill and try to stay focused on injuring that leg if you can. Remember, we''re relying on you to keep the hydra from killing us all." His skin quickly began to flush red and veins and muscles began to bulge out visibly from his skin. With a giant roar, the multi-armed platinum ogre rushed towards the destructive beast currently endangering our lives. He sprinted with gravity hammer in hand and used all of his forward momentum combined with a spin to further build up force and activated the hammer at just the right moment for maximum damage right where he had previously damaged the bydra. The wound had turned a sickly purple/black hue and seemed to be spreading in thick black web-like veins up the leg. Hemlock''s sacrifice wasn''t in vain as the condition of the beast seemed to deteriorate from the poison. It was noticeably more still and the wound itself seemed to be growing larger with pus forming in pustule clusters along the vein lines and blood flowed freely. It seems like the poison Hemlock had used was a combination of anticoagulant and plague characteristics, which for a beast of this size was the best tool for the job. It was too large for a paralytic to be effective, and anything attacking nerves would be next to useless as the monster didn''t move much, to begin with. The bydra was practically a living tank with a deadly set of projectile weapons, but with the foothold of damage we had carved out through sacrifice we now had a better chance at surviving this encounter. The anticoagulant would help remove some of its'' health and stamina, although it would take far too long and much more poison in order to bring down the monster. The plague element would allow for more damage to be added to the wound by weakening its'' defense and rendering it less mobile by inadvertently disrupting the nerve signals and weakening the muscles in the leg. Neither Alexis or myself remained idle while Jareth charged almost suicidally at the monster, I had Jotun fire a large ice-ball to fire at the fire breathing head. Alexis was proactive as well and brought out Holly her harpy to shoot feather projectiles at the ice breathing head in order to distract it, she was too weak to actually do any damage, but she would work just fine as a distraction. With both heads occupied and fortified by his rage skill, Jareth brought the hammer down on the knee of the draconic enemy and at the moment of contact the bone broke and the skin was ruptured after being violently struck after being weakened by the poison. The furious mother became even more enraged after having been played and damaged so badly, she completely disregarded the nearly powerless summons distracting it, and brought her heads around for another devastating explosion beam. I was powerless to stop the attack, and Jareth at this point had lost what little rationality he had ass the rage consumed his mind. He continued attacking and threw in two more blows before the beams were shot out directly at him. Apparently the bydra was unconcerned with Jareth being so close to her at this point and let loose with dual beams that at the point of contact with each other exploded right in front of my first and strongest summon. I knew that this would be our only chance to escape the wrath of the wronged mother and yelled at Alexis on the other side of the clearing, "Run away now and don''t look back, I''ll be right behind you and meet up with you at the gate". She looked conflicted at my words, but after a second of internal debate decided to heed my words and rode off as fast as Musashi could take her from the battle zone while unsummoning Holly so she didn''t unnecessarily lose any more summons. I wanted to do the same, but needed to know whether Jareth had survived the blast. I wouldn''t abandon him to face certain death if I could help it, especially since my objective of limiting the monster''s mobility was completed with that initial strike of Jareth''s on the knee. Luckily even the bydra couldn''t unleash these dangerous attacks on a whim and some time was required in between blasts, this allowed me to wait around on the edge of the marsh by the pond in the clearing with Jotun ready to run away. After the dust cleared, I was shocked to see that my faithful summon had managed to survive the blast, although his body was riddled with horrible wounds and looked like he would die from a minor strike. He was covered in blood and dirt, and had a multitude of burns, frostbitten skin, and ruptures from the violent explosion. Despite my gratefulness for Jareth not having perished as a result of the defense buff from his rage skill and naturally tough skin, I was a bit saddened by the loss of the gravity hammer Jareth had on him. It was an incredible weapon, but was now laying on the ground smashed into pieces from the explosion. Judging by the state of the weapon, I would say that the reason Jareth survived was that he used the hammer to intercept the explosive attack and allow for more room between him and the blast. The dual-headed dragon-kin was just as shocked and likely the opposite of relieved at seeing Jareth remaining, albeit on the ground and riddled with a myriad of injuries all over his body. Intent on finishing the incapacitated ogre off, the bydra brought back its'' tail and swiftly brought it down to smash into the immobile summon. Knowing that if I didn''t act Jareth would certainly die from this next blow, I remotely unsummoned him just in time for the tail to pass and smash through where he had previously lain. With my brave summon safe within my storage, I had Jotun hightail it out of the clearing as fast as possible with directions to head to the gate to meet up with Alexis. I felt elated to know that we hadn''t been dealt any irreversible damage from this dangerous encounter, although Hemlock did die during the fight. Luckily, she was a summon and could be brought back at the expense of any experience gathered since she had last evolved or in this case since she had become a summon. I would really have to make it up to Alexis for not only bringing her into such a dangerous situation due to my greed, but for allowing one of her summons to sacrifice herself in order to allow us to escape. I would get a nice little gift for Hemlock as well, since it was my mistake that let her die, this would also serve to lessen Alexis'' ire at me. I didn''t really have any money on me at this point since the last auction had left me nearly penniless, so I guess gifting the egg we had gained from this dangerous venture to Alexis would smooth things over between us. Not to mention that I probably would have given it to her anyway since she needed more summons and especially ones that would be effective at a range. I heavily considered just giving the egg to Mira to keep her safe, but after seeing what the egg actually contained it would be a waste to give it to her. Don''t get me wrong, I want her to have the strongest summons possible to keep her safe, but such a potentially powerful summon would be underused if she was given it. Whereas Alexis would add another powerful fighter to her roster, which would, in turn, benefit me since we fought together and were partners. Her strength was mine, and mine was hers so long as we remained partners. There wasn''t really a way to justify not giving the egg to her as much as it saddened me to give it to someone else, but I had learned my lesson for now and wouldn''t let my greed control me. These idle thoughts were cut off as I heard a rushing sound coming rapidly nearer and nearer to my location. I turned around to see what could be making that noise and saw a blur of blue and red blaring directly towards us. It seems like the mother bydra didn''t give up just yet on killing the thieves of her sole egg and blew another combined explosive beam towards me in retaliation. She couldn''t chase us after were rendered her nearly immobile, but it seemed that she wasn''t out of the fight yet. I noticed that the beam was shot quite a bit sooner than the usual time in between explosive blasts, and the color and size of the projectile was smaller than the previous ones. This was all the time allotted for me to think as the beam of doom rushed imminently closer. With all synapses firing in my head I simultaneously activated the energy shield within my newly acquired necklace while also short-range teleporting myself and Jotun a few feet to the left of the blast. I could only pray that this would be enough to at least save our lives if not protect us completely, although I wasn''t really holding out too much hope on coming out of this with no damage. Milliseconds pass and finally the beam sets off an explosion of bright light and a large concussive blast. I register the feeling of pain all over my body and shortly after darkness creeps into my vision as I fall unconscious. My last thought is that I hope Jotun is at least conscious enough to get us out of here rather than fall prey to any predators nearby that might be drawn to the sound of the blast. Finally, my thoughts cease as I lay on the ground while still remaining in contact with Jotun whose scales I feel underneath my right hand. 45 Ch. 30, Pt. 3- Recovering and Hatching I felt oddly comfortable yet sore, and I still had no idea where I was until I began to recognize the furniture and items around me. It seems that somehow I''m back in my room in the new apartment we had recently bought. All I could remember was trying to dodge the explosive blast and then the feeling of pain and then nothing. I don''t even know how I managed to make it back here in one piece. The stabbing sensation over my side and back was letting me know that not all of me managed to make it out unscathed, although I was lucky to even be alive with all my limbs intact. I didn''t feel up to much more than turning my head and looking around while staying laid down. It seems like it''s light again, so I assume this means that I probably slept for nearly a day at least. "Mira, are you here?" I do my best to yell out with a hoarse voice from dehydration. I figure that since I''m at home, Mira likely is too, and I am not looking forward to facing her wrath. Not long after my beige bedroom door opened and in entered an obviously stressed and angry Mira. She had tear tracks in her makeup from crying, but all I could focus on was the pure rage on her face directed at me. "Hey Mir, it''s nice to see you again instead of being put in the dirt. What happened exactly? How did I make it back here, because all I remember is blacking out after nearly escaping the bydra." (Thomas) "Don''t you ''Hi Mira'' me Mr. I can''t believe you did something so risky, you''re lucky to even be alive. I can''t decide whether I''m relieved that you''re here and safe or pissed off at your reckless and dangerous behavior, not to mention you put Alexis in danger as well." (Mira) "In my defense, I thought we would be able to escape before the mom came back to the cave, we just got unlucky with timing. Although I realize now how reckless and stupid it was to go so deep into an area where I''m not completely safe from harm, and it was even worse for me to drag Alexis along even though she tried to warn me. I just wanted to make some more money or find something valuable and hopefully useful for us, I didn''t think it would lead to such a disaster." (Thomas) "Well at least you seem to have learned your lesson, I won''t bother nagging you over something you clearly regret and have looked back on. But don''t you dare ever do something like this again you hear me, if I have to worry about you dying off every time you go to the monster plane I''ll just kill you myself." (Mira) I couldn''t help but bow my head in shame after being so verbally berated for something I know was completely my fault. I gulped at the thought of having to face Alexis again, I didn''t know how I would thank her for saving me or apologizing for getting her into that situation. *Creak!!* Snapping me out of my thoughts was my door once again opening and entering was Alexis. She had bags under her eyes from lack of sleep and it seemed like she hadn''t even had the chance to shower since I last saw her. Deciding that getting this over with as soon as possible was the best way to go about it, I began speaking to her, "Hey Alexis, you look like hell." "I wonder why?" She couldn''t help but snarkily reply to me. "Fair enough, I deserved that." (Thomas) "No shit you did. I''m just glad that we made it out of that fight in mostly one piece. Although I''m a bit upset at Hemlock dying so soon after getting her, luckily not much experience was wasted since she is relatively new to my lineup." (Alexis) *Gulp* I couldn''t help the nervous swallow at being reminded of the serious and potentially lethal consequences of my mistake. I''m just glad she''s more upset about it and that no more summons were killed, I think. "Look, Alexis, I''m really sorry for ever putting you in that situation when you even tried to warn me about it. I promise that in the future if you still want to work with me, that I will listen to you and exercise more caution. Also, I decided that the egg should belong to you since our little excursion cost you so much, so go ahead and bond with it, I''m curious what it will turn out to look like." (Thomas) "Don''t sweat it, shit happens and you even tried to sacrifice yourself to save me when we were faced off against a far stronger opponent. Of course, I''m still going to be working with you, this just further proved how dependable if a bit hasty you are." (Alexis) "Before you bond with the egg, why don''t you tell me what happened after I was knocked unconscious from a blast, and how I even made it here." (Thomas) "Well, I don''t know the entire story, but from what I can gather is that you managed to survive the explosion from the bydra somehow and Jotun carried you the rest of the way to the gate. Luckily I stayed waiting for you and was able to start some first aid as soon as I got to you. You had bled a fair amount and there was a ton of splinter stuck in you." (Alexis) "Once I got you stable and stemmed most of the bleeding, I brought you back to the apartment where Mira and I began to take care of you. We managed to disinfect your wounds and remove all the splinters, but there''s still a bunch of holes in your back. If I remember right you still have some healing salve, so you might want to use that, otherwise, you''re going to be stuck in bed for a while." (Alexis) "I can''t believe I forgot about that," I say in a tone that expresses my frustration at forgetting about something so important that could easily take care of the remaining injuries. I took out the mostly full jar and had Alexis help me put it on myself until we had emptied the jar out covering all my wounds. My healing factor which was boosted thanks to Jareth took care of most of the smaller cuts and scrapes already, but there were plenty of larger wounds to take care of. Pretty soon my body was mostly back to normal if not a bit tired, and we decided to get the egg bonding out of the way After having helped me, she fiddled with her watch until she brought out the large multicolored egg we had gone to all of the trouble to acquire. Seeing how rare the monster egg looked and knowing how powerful the mother was made me just a bit tempted to take it for myself. I quickly shut that line of thought down, not only because she truly deserved and needed the egg, but because I had already given my word. I would be able to make use of the monster since Alexis was my ally and partner and her summons would fight alongside mine. Without worrying much else, Alexis single-mindedly brought out a short knife and pricked her finger to bond with the egg. Ruby-red blood dribbled down the egg, and as if the egg itself was starving for blood, it gobbled it all up and began turning black all of a sudden. With the color change started a series of cracks to form alongside the egg, and a few moments the egg had completely collapsed. Inside was a tiny two-headed lizard colored mostly purple with one head having blue horns and the other red ones. It was about the size of a puppy and looked like a miniaturized copy of its'' mother, although many defining features were either absent or much less pronounced. If I had to take a guess, as the summon advanced in stage and age these features would present themselves more pronouncedly until it surpassed its'' evolutionary starting point. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. It was a creature that was currently weaker than most tier 1 monsters as a result of being a weak newborn, but it had the absolute potential of reaching the pseudo-tier 5 rank or even surpassing that and becoming a real hydra. Both heads seemed to be independent of each other and were looking around at everything near them, at least until it spotted Alexis. As soon as eye contact was made, the little critter began ambling its'' way over to her, tail wagging in its'' wake and apparent excitement. Alexis squeed and began coddling the little lizard. Mira must have heard Alexis making noise since she popped in to check what was going on. Just like Alexis, she started to play with the infant summon as well, and I was completely forgotten, which I was appreciating considering they would probably still be a bit mad at me. I would take what I could get, and after the girls had settled down with the little bydra in between them, I brought up the topic of what it should be named. "Considering the little baby is a she, we should give her a feminine name that suits her." (Alexis) "What about Suzy?" (Mira) "Or maybe Therma, since she controls hot and cold." (Thomas) "No, too on the nose. Ooh... I know what to call her, from now on her name will be Violet. It describes not only her color scheme, but it is a flower as well, which fits in with Hemlock." (Alexis) Since it wasn''t my or Mira''s summon we didn''t have any grounds to object, not to mention that it was a pretty suitable name for the little one. .... "Now that her name is decided, I wanted to bring up something I''ve been thinking about for a while now since we started partnering." (Alexis) "Alright, let''s hear it." (Thomas) "I know you just bought this apartment, but I was thinking that we should save up our money and try to buy a guild house of sorts for us to live together in. It would obviously be a smaller one since it''s only you and me right now, but it would make working together much easier." (Alexis) "I hadn''t even thought about that honestly, but it definitely seems like something we will need at least in the future. Guild houses aren''t cheap, but since we only need a small one the expenses shouldn''t be too bad. We should probably start taking some bigger official jobs rather than hunting to earn income." (Thomas) "We can also explore the world and meet new people from all over to recruit while we''re at it. I don''t really want a big group, but I definitely think we need to expand our group at least a little in the future. We''d be a lot safer if something like the bydra incident happened again, and we could take on more jobs requiring a larger amount of people. I don''t know about you, but just hunting gets boring after a while." (Alexis) "Then it''s decided, we''ll work extra hard to save up some income, and we''ll be a lot more cautious of what we do or where we go." (Thomas) I couldn''t take much more of interacting due to the exhaustion from being rapidly healed. I would need to buy another jar of that, or even better, I can get Mira to make me some for a lot cheaper. I left Alexis to play with her new summon that was acting like a new puppy dog, which was cute until you realized how much lethal potential was packed into that tiny body. I flopped back down onto my bed and went right back to sleep knowing that I would probably be extremely busy trying to gain additional funds. 46 Ch. 31- First Mission Leaving the City Having decided on the next direction Alexis and I would take our little group, we set out in the morning towards the Summoner''s Guild. My back was still a bit sore, but luckily the healing cream took care of most of the injuries riddling my body. One thing was for sure, and that was that I wouldn''t be trying to throw us into some dangerous area just in the hopes of earning a bit more or finding something rare. Last time that happened we found a lot more than we wanted too, but it''s not all bad since Alexis has a new summon now. The little thing is the size of a puppy and is constantly wrapped around Alexis like a scarf, she would take a while to grow up properly, but when Violet did, she would be a force to be reckoned with. Seeing the antics of the twin-headed lizard couldn''t help but make me think that it would be a while until that happened. The little sucker was also a black-hole on four legs since she would eat anything and everything that we had with us. She didn''t care for what type of core it was, and nearly ate me out of nearly all my and Alexis''s cores this morning, due to that we will have to be making a stop at the core exchange after we decide what job to pick up at the Guild. "What type of job do you think we should be taking?" (Thomas) "I was thinking something easy like caravan guarding, low risk typically easy job that will let us get a taste for how these jobs are. I''d rather dip my toes in the pool so to speak than accidentally throw myself off a cliff into lava, if you know what I mean." (Alexis) "Ughh... Yes, I know what you mean, especially since you keep reminding me of it every few minutes." (Thomas) "I just don''t want you to forget your lesson, if you didn''t screw up I wouldn''t have anything to remind you about." (Alexis) "Guard duty sounds fine considering how crazy the past few days have been, a few days of rest and easy money sounds nice right about now, even though the pay likely won''t be much." (Thomas) "I''m glad to hear that you see things my way, low and slow will work just fine for me thank you very much." (Alexis) "I''m sure she''s just hungry again or sucking up to you." (Thomas) Even more shocking was the hisses and the tiny spouts of frost and sparks coming from the two mouths of Violet as she looked menacingly my way. I didn''t know if her ability to at least partially understand what I was saying was as impressive as the hot and cold attitude she was giving to me at that moment after me feeding and playing with her earlier. To console the little creature I tried placating her with some complements and a snack. "Sorry Violet, that was my bad, of course, a summon as pretty and intelligent as you wouldn''t stoop to holding a grudge with little old me. Here, as my apology, why don''t you have another core to eat for a snack." It seemed to have worked as the tiny bydra snapped up the core from my fingers and then rubbed her neck on my fingers in thanks. "Traitor" Alexis couldn''t help but matter at seeing her own summon side with me after a few nice words and a snack. I did my best to hold my snickers in as we continued walking towards the Guild, it wouldn''t do to have her any more angry at me than she already is. I guess I still have a bit of making up to do before she forgives me, but at least she''s still talking with me. The only thing worse than Alexis or Mira yelling at me is when they give me the silent treatment, once is enough of that. *shudders* Luckily I didn''t have to worry about the tense atmosphere between us as we came up to the large wooden doors of the guild. I''d try and be chivalrous to Alexis by holding the door, but I''m pretty sure she''d kick my ass for treating her like a helpless girl. It wouldn''t be my intention to do so, but that won''t matter to her, so I decide the best course is to walk through and leave it open for her. She huffs at me but doesn''t say anything, I guess she''s just extra fussy today, maybe she''s nervous about leaving the city for our first job even if it''s not on the monster plane. We walked straight past summoners queuing up for the booths near the front entrance to sell their gains from hunting trips. Instead what we approached was a job listing board with papers plastered all over the cork board. Most of the job listings had a drawing of the task or a monster to be fought along with a credit amount. This was so that it would not only be easier to find a job, but any illiterate people could find jobs as well. Not that there were many, but they did exist and were on the rise with the voluntary status of the informal education offered today for rising summoners. We searched around for any that had something along the lines of what we were looking for, and eventually, in the bottom right corner of the board, I saw a post with a wagon on the front describing a caravan guard job for a smaller caravan requiring around 2-3 people. I pointed the sheet out to Alexis and we carefully read over the exact description and what would be required of us on the journey, not to mention the amount of money for a job like this. The payment was 4,000 credits per guard, and would likely take a week to complete. There weren''t any expectations of danger, and at most, some low-level thugs may try to rob the caravan. We didn''t see anything that seemed inherently dangerous about the request, and everything seemed to be in order, so it was unlikely that it was a scam of some sort. I was always watching out for those, Mira is too trusting most of the time despite what she''s gone through, and usually, I have to help her avoid or deal with any scammers. We took the job off of the board and brought it to one of the open counters to submit acceptance of the job. We had to register as having taken the job, in order to ensure people didn''t try to take the job and then not do it, if that happened there would be hefty fines, an investigation, and potential banishment. For those reasons, most people did their best to finish whatever job they accepted, or they would recruit others to help them finish the task. The tall lady at the end of the desk didn''t even bother talking to us, she just scanned the job and then our storage watches to confirm our acceptance of the task. With that, we were handed the paper as a physical copy of the contract and were shooed away somewhere else. The treatment made me miss my go-to surly attendant Max, unfortunately, I didn''t see him working today. ... Once the job was accepted, we went next door to the core exchange to stock up on cores while traveling, and to feed the bottomless pit that was Violet the infant bydra. The exchange wasn''t especially busy today, so all we had to do was walk to one of the empty computers mounted on the wall. Both of us got our own terminals and were purchasing a plethora of cores for our summons when I remembered that we still had some cores and bodies to sell from the day we stole the egg in the marsh. Normally this wouldn''t be an issue, but I needed as much space in my storage as I could get, and they would help cover the costs of all the rest of the cores we would have to buy. I let Alexis know about the cores and we quickly selected the ones we would keep and then sold the rest. We would have to wait until we were done shopping to go back to the Guild and sell the corpses, preferably not to the woman whose desk we were at earlier. Buying a few wyrm cores for my frost wyrm Jotun was expensive, but necessary to get him to grow more and evolve. I made the same sacrifice for my other summons, but most of the month''s worth of cores I got for each of them were lower-tier ones with a few higher tier to help them evolve sooner. I threw in a few first-tier cores as snacks for Violet in case I ever needed to get on her good side. It took a while to choose the right cores, but soon enough we were all stocked up on summon food, and ready to purchase a few traveling essentials. We would be living in the wild for a week and likely through some rough terrain, so a few gadgets or special clothing would be necessary. Food wasn''t as much of a concern now that my summons had something to eat, especially since we could hunt some animals for food any time we were hungry. I was mostly already prepared, but I decided to help Alexis purchase a few essentials since she seemed more like a city-girl at heart to me. There was a difference between being able to survive for a day while fighting monsters and traveling through the wilderness for a weak with no one to rely on but the people around you. Not to mention that I would need some spices and vegetables if I wanted to eat anything palatable, juniper berries would be the first thing to buy in order to get rid of the gamy taste in most wild meat. ... After visiting a survival and hunting store and purchasing some outdoor essentials like cookware, flasks of water, a camping knife, and a various assortment of clothes for different biomes. We would only be passing through marshes and a desert, so rubber boots for the marsh and a cloak of sorts to keep the heat off of us would suffice for our travels. Going back once more to the Guild to sell our remaining monster bodies only served to recoup some of our expenses today, luckily we managed to avoid being served by that silent lady from earlier in the day. There wasn''t much left to take care of since our quest would only start in two days and there was no real need to hunt any time before then. With nothing left, we decided to get an early dinner at a taco restaurant of all places. They were pretty popular in the main city square and served an assortment of odd and unique tacos to choose from. I got seared cactus and wolf steak tacos with a nice mix of pickled red onion and cilantro as a garnish, and the sauce to top off the meal was a spicy pineapple chutney. Alexis got something a little more common and ordered marinated and cubed drill-rabbit along with sweetcorn and a roasted chili sauce that looked hot at a glance. I was just fine eating something that wouldn''t scorch my tongue, to each their own I guess. We idly chatted and argued about what the job would actually be like and whether the merchant we were working for was nice or at least agreeable. Either way, we were stuck with the request and would have to get along at least for a week at a minimum. All that was left was to wait another two days and meet with the merchant in the morning at the south gate of the city to head to the South American continental city Southwest of us. ... Alexis stayed over with Mira and me for the time being as we waited for the two days to pass until it was time for our job. She got closer to Mira, and I regretted ever introducing the two after they decided to gang up on me in a prank war. I have had my underwear frozen, my room covered in sticky notes, saran wrap over the toilet, amongst other things and I was this close to strangling the two. Of course, I had to get my revenge and ended up covering most of their stuff with vaseline including doorknobs and toilet seats. I was paranoid about them getting back at me in my sleep, but they either took the prank well, or they didn''t have enough time to do anything to me yet, I really was banking on the former no matter how unlikely it was. All we needed to do now was make our way to the Southern gate and meet up with the person who hired us and his crew of people. From what was on the poster, I knew that there would be 3 wagons and 5 merchants in the caravan crew. They had a policy explicitly stated that the lives of the merchants were more important than the merchandise. It was a good sign that they had a policy like that in place during a time where people might sell their mother for a bit of strength or profit. Speaking of, I couldn''t help but be brought out of my musing by a gruff voice calling out to us. "You two must be the summoners I hired guessing by your apparel, not to mention that no one gets up this early if they don''t have to. Name''s Jerimiah Cross nice to meet ya." The man talking was a man in his late 50''s with a weathered face from a hard life in the wilds, he seemed rather jovial and kind. It was a bit out of my expectations to meet such a hospitable merchant when I was imagining that a miserly and suspicious merchant was the one who hired us. "Best be getting on our way now, y''all can ride up with me upfront. The wagons are there as much for our comfort as they are for transporting goods, it''s a mite cheaper than buying enough storage space to store it all. Although maybe I can eventually make enough to sink my money in now and make a killer profit later on." (Jerimiah) Leaving the old man to his musings, we introduced ourselves to the crew and hopped on the front of the lead wagon. Once everyone was settled, they got the horses on their way and we were off towards South America. 47 Ch. 32- Bandits at the Border Not all was lost though, as Brutus had been able to sense and then shadow travel quick enough to snatch up some wild animals for dinner. We had a variety now in my storage of foxes, squirrels, and a family of brown rabbits speckled with little dots of white throughout their bodies. We''d have to set up a roasting spit around the campfire to take care of all of this meat, but I was looking forward to it already, especially since I got a variety of herbs to add to the taste. Nothing was worse than food cooked plainly, and if I could avoid it, I would. The scenery was nice enough even though it got gradually more marshlike as we continued on. The going was slow due to the carriages being pulled by normal horses, rich merchants were usually able to acquire summons perfect for carrying heavy loads across long distances. Any summon remotely suitable for pulling a carriage would be better than a regular animal, after all any summon has at least above average attributes compared to their normal counterparts. It seemed like Jerimiah wasn''t lucky enough to start out with a summon suitable for his trade, nor was he rich enough to get someone to help him acquire one. He didn''t seem like a fighter, which is likely why he hired us. It''s interesting that despite every person of age having a summon, most who weren''t a summoner as a profession either didn''t use their summon at all or had such a weak summon that they wouldn''t be able to advance in life by fighting. These are the type of people who take the mundane jobs, it was mostly a matter of chance or luck that determined which type a person would become. It was a lot easier to become a summoner by starting out with a stronger summon, and even then, those with money or connections can have others help them hunt for more summons. This was an uncommon thing to happen, but enough that it was worth mentioning. I had nothing against those who weren''t summoners, after all, they are the ones that work hard to provide for us all the amenities and supplies that kept us alive and safe. It was a co-dependent relationship and while those not fighting earned less usually, the fighters were being compensated for risking their life, all in all, it was a system that worked fairly well so far. "Hey Thomas, what are you staring out at the woods about?" (Alexis) "What, you mean you have the capability of actually thinking. Say it isn''t so, I think hell just froze over." (Alexis) "Well so much for me being honest, laugh it up while you can." (Thomas) I kept throwing barbs at Alexis as she did the same, it was fun for me at least because I know that she didn''t mean it. If anyone had tried to say something like that to me, I doubt I would be feeling the same way. I guess this just further proves how much I like her, the only problem is I have no idea if she feels the same. If I confessed to her there would likely be two possible reactions, either we began to date due to us liking the other, or our partnership would end here. It would be far too awkward for me to continue to work with and see her if she rejected me. If I was going to do something about this, I should do it soon before we get too invested in working with each other, like buying a guild headquarters. My other sad but possible option would be to not confess and take a wait and see approach, which would probably suck. ..... Eventually, we reached a decent clearing right around dusk, and so we quickly set off to build our camp before all light was lost. Alexis was in charge of building a fire and gathering more firewood for the night. The other caravan members aside from Jerimiah set up a large canopy-like tarp near but not over the fire, which was to keep off any rain and to prevent trapping any smoke or burning the tarp. I set up near the fire pit that we had made by piling rocks around in a loose circle, any underbrush or leaves had been swept away to prevent a forest fire. I laid out a plank I had taken from one of the carriages to process the meat for tonight''s dinner. Skinning the animals was pretty easy and I made quick work of all the excess parts like guts and skin. I kept the skins since I might be able to sell them for a few credits, and now all I was left with was some creatures all processed and ready to put on a spit. I decided to work on the spit in the meantime as I waited for the fire to be ready, it was a simple contraption with two branches on either side of the fire to hold the spit pole, it just had to be turned manually since I wasn''t a fancy engineer. It was nearly night by the time the fire was roaring and I was finally able to start preparing our food. I made sure to rub them in some salt, pepper, and paprika, and stuffed their cavities with some thyme I had found while we were riding and stopped to pick up. There wasn''t much else to do for the small animals, so I got my twine and secured the bodies to the pole and hoisted them just over the fire. The turning of the spit was a pain, luckily we took shifts to give everyone a rest while we waited on dinner to arrive. The night had turned into a dark blanket blocking out most other senses, and all that I could recognize was the mouth-watering aroma of rabbit and other juicy game being roasted over a fire. The smell was pervasive and everyone seemed rather eager for dinner, bread had been taken out and doled into portions to eat alongside the meat. About 30 minutes later the meat was finally ready and sizzling could be heard from the grease of the game dropping into the fire. I barely focused on that though since the smell and sight of these roasted animals was all I could think about. I didn''t realize how hungry I was, but a snack of bread and jerky while on the move didn''t exactly fill someone up. We each got our own animal to dig into, of course, I chose the fat rabbit I had Brutus catch earlier. It was delicious, and the dark meat had a wonderfully mild yet present gaminess in the meat, which was only complimented by the spices and herbs I had cooked it with. Unfortunately, the meal had to come to an end, which had all made us tired because of how stuffed we were. Deciding to sleep, we set one person on watch, and I had Brutus out patrolling the camp. Alexis had done the same with Holly which was her harpy, all in all, we were fairly safe and could fall asleep without too much worry. ..... 3 more days passed like this, and we had finally entered into the South American territory. We were surrounded by hilly planes, and far away in the distance was the desert we would soon have to cross. That night was fairly normal, and camp had been set up just fine, which led to yet another roasting of animals and leftover bread for dinner. I was getting pretty sick of it at this point, but I was infinitely glad I had decided to bring some spices, the meals were at least bearable to us instead of bland and nearly inedible. Nothing was out of the ordinary and we had set up our normal watch rotation with Alexis and I sending out one summon each to patrol the camp. It wasn''t until a few hours later that something went wrong, it was right before dawn when I was woken up by the jingle of metal and the warning that Brutus had sent to me. I bolted awake after realizing what this probably meant, I shouted for everyone to wake up and grab a weapon. In the meantime, as I was giving directions, I was pulling on my armor and secured my sword to my hip for ready use. Deciding reinforcements couldn''t hurt even if the attackers are just bandits, I brought out Jareth who had only his mace in one hand. He looked excited at being taken out to smack someone or something down, I pointed him over towards where the bandits were coming from. From what Brutus had told me, behind the hill to the north were bandits lying in wait and a bunch of them too. Sure enough, I was proven right as around 20 bandits and a few summons charged down towards us. "Everyone, get behind us by the carriages, stay out of the way and you should be fine." (Thomas) Knowing we would be outnumbered, I had Brutus hide in the shadows near where the enemy would pass while charging and ordered him to take down as many as he could while they''re backs were turned. He slunk away and disappeared into wisps of dark smoke, presumably towards the enemy. I ran off towards Jareth who was at the edge of camp near Alexis who was out with Hemlock and Holly. Seeing that it was just us against the 28 enemies, we began to charge the bandits. We ignored any arrows shot our way since the armor wouldn''t even be scratched after being hit, and just forward rushed into the fray. Bodies went flying and almost nothing stood in our way until the bandit leader interfered in our fun with a tier 4 Sasquatch that had muscles on muscles underneath its'' brown scraggly fur. It moved in front of Jareth to prevent my ogre from killing yet another bandit and instead began engaging Jareth in a contest of brute strength. If it weren''t for his extra arms, Jareth likely would have been pushed back by the burly human-like gorilla. Disrupting the sasquatch''s sense of balance by dragging its head under and sweeping it legs with a kick, the creature was brought down for a short while. It would have been put down for good if it hadn''t recovered so quickly and put an arm in the way of Jareth''s mace. The arm was now broken, but at least its'' face wasn''t smashed in. It countered back in a fit of range and used a rock on the ground as its'' own weapon, it was obliterated upon contact with Jareth''s thick hide, but damage definitely had been done beneath the skin. At the very least there would be bruising later on if not a fractured bone or torn muscles, but knowing how strong Jareth''s constitution was I didn''t worry all that much. The fighting between our groups had stopped in lieu of watching the battle between the two bipedal behemoths. I used this moment to try and speak with the leader from across the little battlefield, "Why did you bandit''s attack us, and are you the leader of this group?" The grizzled man sneers at me through his oily black hair and replies, "Because you have money obviously and yes I am the leader of these bandits. My name is Ricardo Luz, perhaps you''ve heard of me." All anyone could hear was the sound of crickets chirping as an awkward silence descended after I didn''t recognize the guy''s name. I didn''t know how to break it to him that I had never heard of him and his group, I just let silence prevail until crashes could be heard from the fight going on near me. The four-armed ogre was systematically destroying the sasquatch despite being at the same tier and it wouldn''t be long before the fight was concluded. "Why didn''t you become a summoner with a summon like that instead of turning to banditry?" Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. I was expecting a sob story of sorts, but was pleasantly/unpleasant;y surprised when the grizzled man laughed and told me, "Why would I waste my time fighting monsters when I can kill much weaker humans and earn way more money." He finished off with an evil smile full of yellowed teeth. I actually felt reassured by how vile he was because now I wouldn''t have to waste any time regretting killing him. No more words were needed and the fights continued once again with most of the bandits and summons being occupied by Hemlock and her deadly poison. All were wary to get close to the drake and they had completely halted their charge, instead opting for a slow and cautious walk forward. By the end of the fight, none of the bandits had even touched the carriages, and there was nearly no damage to our party. Luckily they were only weak bandits aside from their leader and they relied on their own strength instead of their summons. As a result, they didn''t have the strength necessary to even get close to breaking through my armor or take any of our summons down. We took the time to pick through their belongings and take their watches for storage retrieval later at one of the Guild buildings. This was of course only between Alexis and me, since we were the only ones who fought. Jerimiah looked like he wanted to take some of the loot, but refrained from his desire after looking at our summons. Seeing that there was nothing left to do and it was a little early to begin travel, we stoked the fire and began to make and eat breakfast. We had some wild mushrooms and a few eggs to make a few scrambled eggs bowls before we got back on the road. 48 Ch. 33- Scorched Survival and a New City I guess that just goes to show how outmatched they were without strong summons. It''s one thing to be aware that I was now stronger than non-summoners and that my summons were even stronger, but it was something else to see how quickly we devastated the numerically superior bandits. Aside from the bandit leader''s tier 4 summon there wasn''t any creature or person that was able to put up a challenge. I would feel bad except they proved to me that they were undoubtedly awful people judging by the last words of the leader, just thinking about his smug yet scarred face talking about killing and stealing because he could, makes me want to throw up. We had just been traveling steadily to the South American continental city, and now we had reached what seemed to be the border of the desert biome that we would have to go through in order to reach the city. The weather had begun to get hotter and so we switched into our newly purchased cloaks to keep the sun and heat off of us. The hot weather was making me wish for the marsh, believe it or not. Despite the muggy conditions and mud everywhere, it was at least cool and we didn''t have to worry about water. Now we were going to have to get water wherever we could in case we don''t find a source anytime soon, I would say the aside from the tundra, the desert would have to be the harshest climate in existence. I mean cold nights and scorching days along with a lack of water and vegetation doesn''t exactly make for a safe or welcoming environment. The only reason that the tundra would be even worse is the bitter cold that would only be made better with fire, unfortunately, there isn''t exactly a lot of fuel to use in that biome. Luckily our storage watches would take care of any resource issues, and each of us had filled our watch up a bit with extra bottles of water and enough firewood for a few nights. We likely wouldn''t be in too dire a need of them, but it was better to have it and not need it than need it and not have it. Since we were in the human plane, there were only animals around us, but most didn''t bother us during the journey so far, probably because we had at least one tier 3 if not tier 4 summons out at any given time. Just because they were only animals didn''t mean they weren''t predators, and they could absolutely pose a threat to any of the merchants with the caravan who only had regular human level strength. Fortunately for us, most monsters wouldn''t be a challenge for us much less normal animals, so they kept their distance and neither of us bothered the other. I was just fine with respecting that, and aside from occasionally sending out Brutus to hunt for some easy game for our meals, I didn''t have much to do with them. ..... "It''s soo hot out!!" Alexis couldn''t help but scream out to the wide-open sky with not a cloud in sight. This would usually be a great sun, however, in the desert you desired as little sun exposure as possible and clouds went a long way to making it bearable. Unfortunately for my ears, the lack of shade was making Alexis irritable and I couldn''t help but secretly agree with her. Not that I would ever tell her, I had a reputation to maintain after all and whining wouldn''t exactly do me much good. The desert we were now traveling on continued into the distance with only large mounds of sand being able to be seen. On the plus side, the scenery was beautiful with many various shades of red and yellow sand dotted throughout the landscape, it almost felt like we were walking on a large picture that was meant to be looked down on from the sky. The going was slower due to the sand massively slowing the carriages due to their tendency to act like water and how uneven the ground was. We were honestly just grateful that we hadn''t fallen through a pit or off a ledge, which could absolutely happen in such a treacherous environment. We were all tired of eating meat, sweaty, dirty, and about done with warm weather for quite a while. Normally we could take a bath, but we had to conserve every drop we had, so bathing was out of the question. As a result, our hair was all greasy and wild, only some deep scrubbing and efficient soap would cut through the oil slick on our heads. ..... Luckily the desert wasn''t encompassing the entire region, and after a few grueling days we had made it through. The first thing we did after finding a stream was taking long baths in the refreshing water, it did wonders for making us feel human again. A shower would have been better, but there was just something about starting your day off clean that made you feel better for whatever reason. What was between us and the city was a large field full of small trees, shrubbery, and lots of flowers and grass. It looked like paradise, and my words wouldn''t be able to capture how beautiful it looked. If there were more apple trees I would have thought it was the garden of Eden. It took a solid three hours to make it to the imposing gates, and all of us were grateful at what that represented. Despite us riding the carriages most of the way we were exhausted physically and emotionally, and the only consoling thought was that now I would get to rest and explore the city later. I hadn''t ever really traveled that much when I was young and especially not as an orphan, so this was a new and exciting experience for me. I had no idea what to expect and couldn''t help but make wild theories. I wasn''t such a bumpkin that I thought they would be aliens or anything, but a lot of their culture and society would likely be very different, just thinking about it excited me and was the motivation needed to continue on foot towards the gate while the merchants were waiting in line to bring in their goods after inspection. 49 Sorry for the Long Hiatus Thank you all for your support and understanding. I''ve moved back with my parents during this corona crisis and am helping to take care of my sick grandfather while doing online classes, so I''m understandably busy. Luckily for you guys, I no longer have a physical social life, which means more time for me to write. On top of that, my study abroad trip to Europe got canceled for obvious reasons, so there''s no worry about having to take a break during then. In fact, I''ll likely be writing a lot more as soon as this school semester ends. I''ve been relaxing by reading some stories and sifting through the stock market, which has been a hell of a stressor after I buy in right before the crash. My luck sucks, but I''ve got in heavy on a stock or two that is only expected to rise during this crisis. Hopefully, I don''t end up bankrupt, but luckily I''m getting refunds for my canceled trips, so I still have a bit in savings, or at least will when I get the money back whenever that will be. I hope you all are safe and doing well during this trying time. Thanks again for putting up with my absence as necessary as it might have been. 50 Ch. 33.5 Pt. 1- Exploring the New City The inn was kind of dingy, but it suited our immediate needs and it had a room with two beds, so it worked just fine for me. Breaking out of my morning stupor, I took a second to assess myself before recoiling at the stench coming from me. I hadn''t really had the chance to bathe while traveling, and I was too tired to bathe before falling asleep. I looked over to Alexis, who was dead to the world while still in her respective bed. She was sleeping in a loose tank-top and some shorts due to the heat, while I was still just in my boxers since almost all of my other clothes were covered in dirt, dust, and sweat. Deciding to go ahead and remedy the funk that had clung to me for the past few days, I head over to the bathroom on the other side of the room. Inside the door was a simple and plain but clean tub, toilet, and sink along with all the other hotel type amenities like soap and towels. I turned the faucet on and felt the temperature of the water until I got the heat just right, all that was left was to wait. In that window of time, I went about brushing my teeth quickly and not 2 minutes later there was enough water for me to start bathing. The water was refreshing after having not been near a source for these past few days, that I felt like I was in a luxurious resort rather than a decent at the best inn for travelers. The soap was nothing special, but it did the job well enough and 30 minutes later I felt like a new man. Deciding that since I had spent enough time in the tub, I got out and dried off quickly before putting on my last pair of clean clothes which was a loose pair of lightweight grey pants and a white t-shirt. The only thing that was still drying was my hair, which had grown long over these past few weeks since I had been too busy to even bother with it. It now clung to my head and blocked my vision until I swept it all back and let it rest there with a small black band to keep it there. Deciding that this was as good as I was going to get, I entered the room again and woke Alexis up from her deep sleep. The laundry was luckily covered in the cost for the room since this seemed to be a regular occurrence with travelers coming to the inn. The pile of clothes filled the washing machine and no I was just waiting around till it had finished. With nothing better to do, I brought out one of the novels I had picked up before our journey to pass the time and read until the load was done after 20 minutes. It took another 40 minutes for the load to fully dry, and without much care, I threw them all back into storage and went back up to our room to see whether Alexis was done with her morning routine. Aside from her still wet hair that was bunched up in a thin white towel, Alexis was all dressed up and ready for the day. She was in a bright blue blouse and tan cargo shorts that would be more than effective in the heat of this new climate. Her eyes really popped out from her face with the blouse she was wearing, so much so, that I was staring up until she started laughing at me. Find authorized novels in Webnovel£¬faster updates, better experience£¬Please click www.webnovel.com for visiting. "See something you like? Take a picture it might last longer." Alexis couldn''t help but say in a smug tone. I couldn''t let her have the last word, so I shot back with a, "I was just wondering if you were going to be able to handle all of this *gesturing to myself* and the weather at the same time, after all, I''m already hot enough without having to worry about the temperature." It came out in what I hoped was a confident and teasing tone. Judging by the guffaw that she let out, I''d say that it came out just as I intended. "Alright Casanova, let''s go out and get some breakfast before exploring the city. Don''t let me forget that when we get into the center of the city, we need to turn in our certificate of completion for the guard duty request. Might as well go ahead and get paid for the trip." -Alexis "Whatever you say, Laura Croft" I ran out of the room before she could punch me for my last remark and continue to taunt her until we got out of the inn. 51 Ch. 33.5 Pt. 2- Exploring the City We followed our nose about a block down from the inn where we had decided to set up temporary residence. What we came across was a small stall with boiling vats of oil and the distinct smell of cinnamon and sugar. "Sopapillas, get your sopapillas here!" The vendor was yelling, which I could gather from his shouting was the food being made in front of us. I spotted shakers of sugar and cinnamon along with a large crate of what looked like tortillas I had before the new era. "We''ll take 2 each please." I kindly requested the stout and mustached elderly man, he had a rather kind smile on his face and his skin seemed to have been tanned from constant exposure to the sun and so had taken on the consistency of tanned leather. This only seemed to add to his charm and gave him the feeling of a distant but well-liked grandfather. "Coming right up." With that, the vendor who I had learned was named Rico threw 4 tortillas into the boiling oil and quickly rose up into giant pillows. After a few seconds, he turned them over to reveal a nice brown and crisp outside, and not long after the starch disks were done cooking. With practiced efficiency, Rico used his tongs to throw two a piece onto a plate before sprinkling a hefty amount of sugar and cinnamon onto the sweet concoctions. The sopapillas had deflated once they were taken from the oil, but the crunchy exterior remained and had us salivating just looking at it. Without any prompting, I paid Rico 2 credits for the delicious-looking food and then left a few more credits as a nice tip for the kind man. Alexis couldn''t seem to help herself anymore and began to dig into the sweet treats. I followed along and was not disappointed with our choice of food. Even that didn''t last long as Alexis took it upon herself to like the paper plate clean as if she was starving, I was beginning to suspect she had an even bigger sweet tooth than Mira. That was saying something too because my sister seriously had a secret chocolate stash that she fiercely protected. I once made the mistake of taking a chocolate bar from it and she chased after me with a frying pan once she discovered one was missing *shudder*. I wouldn''t be making that same mistake again, and I was also smart enough to realize that commenting on her propensity for sugar would do nothing for my immediate health if I angered her. They were both like dragons that hoarded candy and sugar of all sorts rather than gold, and I''m not sure which is deadlier, aside from tier 5''s I''d probably rather face a dragonkin than face the ire of either woman protecting their confectionary stash. Seeing as I was starting to actually fall for the girl standing in front of me, I silently made a mental note to purchase a large amount of candy to either bribe her or get on her good side. I''d have to ask one of the vendors when we get to the city where a candy store would be, I''d need to buy a lot too, it just might save my life someday. "What are you staring at me for?" Alexis snapped defensively at me for staring at her for too long. "Nothing, I was just wondering what stalls we should try next, or if we want to head towards the inner city to do some shopping." There wasn''t really much of a choice in the matter for me, not that I was complaining, but we ended up trying three other stalls before deciding to start walking and exploring the new city. It was both similar and very different from the North American Continental city in many ways. The layout and designs of the buildings, roads, and walls were all the same, apparently, the omnipotent god was lazy and used the same blueprint to make all of the cities. That was about where the similarities ended though, from the people and visible culture to food and clothing, it was as if we were in a new world. Honestly, from what I had seen so far made me almost wish I lived here rather than up North. The people were friendly and inviting, and the food was magnificent from what I had tasted so far. People from my city were more out for themselves and were more wearily cautious of strangers, it was a survival of the fittest situation. Not that everyone in my city were evil or anything like that, but there definitely weren''t as many smiles to be seen as there were down here. These were just observations that I had made based on what I had witnessed, which was a small fraction of what made up the entire city, so I would withhold judgment until I had seen a significant enough portion. Alexis seemed to be enjoying the new city as much as I was, and I couldn''t help but chuckle seeing the seemingly permanent smile on the usually surly and sarcastic girl''s face. .... Not only was the food here amazing, but the buildings and art seen around the city brought another sense of culture and flair to the city. There were many scenes of flowers, skeletons, and crops of all sorts as sort of murals on many barren walls around the residential districts. Not only was there a ton of art, but nearly all the apartments and houses were painted vibrant shades of any color imaginable. Even the individual apartments in a complex were colored differently. Together the effect was of a rainbow collage of a various assortment of colors, I thought it was fairly interesting, but didn''t put much more thought into it other than that it was pretty. There were many more summons out around town working in tandem with their summoners. Many ox or horse-like summons were being used for manual labor to haul cargo and carriages, and it seemed to be a sort of manual taxi service for the area, which was honestly a great idea considering how long it took to travel around the giant cities. The conditions for the town might not have been as modern as the North American city, but it gave off a rustic and homely feeling where people seemed to be social and happy. There was a strong sense of family amongst the many residents, and even obvious travelers such as us were accepted by the people. Around an hour and a half after leaving the breakfast stalls, we had come to the end of our leisurely stroll and came upon the inner city. In contrast to the rustic and old fashioned outer residential districts, the center plaza was incredibly modern and advanced, looking even more futuristic than that of our city. I was incredibly curious about this and decided to ask the next person we talked to in order to better understand the city. One thing that seemed out of place was the large outdoor market and bazaar with many goods and food that were displayed to be purchased. It smelled rather amazing too, and since we had worked off any food we had eaten for breakfast, we decided to head that way and see what we could find to eat or buy for later cooking. I knew we would need to go to the Summoner''s Guild, but our stomachs took priority for now. 52 Ch. 33.5 Pt. 3- Exploring the City Some More If I remembered right, the payment was 4,000 credits, which was confirmed by the nice receptionist who was helping us fill out the quest completion paperwork. Her name was Juanita judging by the name badge on her white top. She was pretty from what I could see, but I didn''t spend much time looking at her out of fear that Alexis would sick Violet on me in my sleep. We hadn''t started dating or anything, but logic didn''t really matter in situations like these, not to mention that I was far more interested in Alexis than some stranger I had just met. She was very friendly despite us being foreigners and quickly helped settle our payment along with the registration and payment for the bandits we took out. I couldn''t wait to look and see what they had stored, but this wasn''t the place or time, so I would wait until we got back to the inn before looking. With a much larger number in our accounts than before, we decided to do some long-awaited shopping and pick up some local specialties if we came across any. We started at the produce section and started buying in bulk. My first choice was to buy heaps of fresh and dried peppers along with bags of different and vibrant spices that smelled like they would go great in a stew or on some meat. Alexis seemed to prefer vegetables and fruit, so I left that to her as I would eat just about anything. I mostly cared for how something tasted, and I refuse to ever be stuck eating plain roasted meat no matter how far in the wild I was. Everything was relatively cheap as well, and since I wasn''t hurting for inventory space I bought quite a load. Even if I couldn''t use all the spices and herbs, I''m sure I could sell them back home or give them to Mira either to cook or use in some experiments. I heard that before the New Era, many American and Asian countries used traditional medicine involving herbs and the like, so I wonder how those would work with modern alchemy. It couldn''t hurt to try, but I would leave the thinking and experimenting for her to figure out. Wanting to surprise her, I asked the nice elderly market ladies for any strange herbs or medicinal plants from around here. They even showed me a plant with coagulating properties, I bought a couple of bushels of those for a small price of a few credits. They could be extremely handy and can even be applied during a fight unlike most potions and salves that I had which would take a while to open and use. Apparently all that was needed was to chew the leaf up and place it on a bleeding wound. I guess them seeing that I was a summoner was more than enough to reassure them that I was in fact not insane for cutting myself. As an apology, I tipped a few more credits to the nice ladies and paid for 10 more bundles of the useful herb, which was nearly their entire stock. I had an idea to make this into a fast-acting paste for heavy wounds, that would cut out the chewing process and allow for a more concentrated amount to act on deeper cuts. I didn''t really know much about alchemy other than what Mira had told me about during dinner, but I could imagine that she could make something quite useful out of them. This would be able to make us a decent sum at the auction or sold to the Summoner''s Association, I would have to visit Jeremiah again and set up a deal to bring a steady supply of the herb back to Mira. We could probably outsource some help from some of Mira''s Alchemy contacts once she had devised a recipe. Since we would be supplying the recipe and supplies, we could probably work out a deal for 70% of the profit with 30% going to the alchemists. It wasn''t a bad deal, especially since all they had to do was put in the manual labor to make them. I couldn''t expect Mira to work on this all the time, so I think this is the best compromise and could make us a fair sum. I''d give Mira 65% of the profit we earned for ourselves since she made the recipe and we were using her contacts, the 35% for myself would go towards my and Alexis''s guild house in the future. We didn''t really need it right now, but it would definitely be useful in the future when we attracted more members. The amount of funds we were trying to earn wasn''t just for location either, we wanted to make it a fully functional training and lab facility with dorms on another floor. This was so we could spar and train our summons in relative safety, and so Mira would have everything she would need when she moved in with us. I didn''t want to be away from her, so this was the perfect compromise, not to mention that it would cut down on the amount spent for potions and the like with her on our side. After purchasing a bunch of herbs and strange roots, I caught up with Alexis and found her buying up a bunch of brownish/blackish beans. The scent coming from them was distinct but toned down compared to their processed counterparts. After asking her I came to find out that she had bought a giant load of fresh coffee and cocoa beans from the stall. Along with the fresh beans, she had gotten plenty of exotic fruits and vegetables. The one I was looking forward to the most was the ripe mangoes that just smelled amazing. There really wasn''t anything like fresh and ripe mangoes. I had only had them once before when I was a kid, and couldn''t wait to try them again. Since the entire world was at war with each other, it was very difficult to get any foreign goods even from allied countries. Even now after the war, it wasn''t extremely common to get foreign goods since everyone was focused on more survival-oriented matters and didn''t want to waste money on expensive food. There were also many others who just couldn''t afford them with the minimum allowance they were given. Seeing that Alexis had finished up with her giant purchase of various aromatic beans, we went on to look at the goods that they were selling further down. We had a blast trying on different clothes like sombrero''s and poncho''s, which we each bought one of for ourselves as a souvenir, I even got Mira one with some grey snakes on it that kind of looked like Lyra her smokescreen python. I imagine we''ll actually end up using the ponchos while in the desert though, which is why I got a nice tan brown one to blend with the desert more and reflect some of the heat. Alexis'' was similar to mine since she cared about functionality more than anything. With these, we could probably go out hunting in the desert tomorrow and see if we could find any summons to bond with. We needed some diversity in our lineup, and there were a few picks I had in mind if we came across any. There wasn''t much else we were interested in buying since we didn''t have much use for most of them. I did end up getting a nice looking and hand-carved guitar that I had thought about learning to play for a while. Alexis wasn''t really interested in learning to play an instrument, but she did end up getting a nice hand-carved wooden chess set from one of the vendors nearby, and from the same vendor, she got some wooden figurines of some higher tier monsters. They weren''t painted but were very detailed and life-like, it seemed like she wanted to finish them judging by the paints she bought to go with them. I suppose we each needed our own peaceful hobby to distract us from all the fighting and dangerous activities we were doing regularly. ... With our shopping done for the day and a decent amount of the market looked through, we decided to head to dinner to end the day. There was plenty more shopping to be done since we hadn''t even touched the stores yet, but the night was drawing close and our stomachs were growling. We asked the wood carving merchant where a good restaurant to eat dinner would be and were quickly on our way. It was a decent walk from the market, but he had assured us it would be worth the walk. To ease the growling from hunger, we split one of the mangoes she had bought and had started carving chunks out with a knife to eat as we walked in the direction that was pointed out to us. Eventually, we came across a run-down but vibrant shack with a pepper carved on the sign out front. This seemed to be the place, and the smells coming from it certainly weren''t disappointing. We entered the small building and got a corner booth near a band of men in fancy black outfits with various instruments in their hands. They started playing as we waited for our food, and even though we couldn''t understand whatever they were saying in Spanish, the tune was catchy and the music playing was quite impressive. Eventually, our food came in large platters with sizzling grilled meat and enchiladas covered in a brown mole sauce that I was told would taste amazing. I was skeptical of the taste judging by the brown-colored sauce, but one bite was more than enough to convince me. We shoveled down chicken enchiladas and rice smothered in the mole sauce and barely had any room left in our stomachs after finishing off the hearty meals. Despite being nearly full, we still wanted to try a dessert from this city, and so we ended up splitting a flan. The custard dessert was rich and sweet, and the caramel sauce it was covered in completed the dish and made us happily stuffed to the gills. It was already dark out by the time we left the restaurant we had learned was called The Poblano, and left towards our inn. With an eventful and exhausting day behind us, it was no surprise that all we had left in us was flopping on our beds and falling right asleep despite still being completely clothed. Our day tomorrow would involve going out and looking for monsters to fight in the desert, so plenty of rest was warranted despite the night still being young. I didn''t even get a chance to look at what the bandits'' had stored, I guess I would leave those for another time. 53 Ch. 34 Pt. 1- Enter the Oasis Most of the early summoners made the mistake of only contracting more advanced summons, as well as narrowing their summon types. They essentially became specialists that exceeded in a specific environment or form of combat. But they are restricted to those environments to ensure victory, whereas I can go nearly anywhere and have the same relative strength. I''m still working on gaining summons for specific things like aquatic and aerial combat, or just transportation types. I''ll likely focus on combat summons, but it doesn''t hurt to diversify and give yourself a leg up. Now that I''m working with Alexis, we can divide our summon picks to allow for a greater range of summons while keeping our limit in mind. We essentially have 20 summon slots since we are partners that I don''t ever see getting into any major sort of conflict, this is the advantage that partners give summoners. Ideally, we would be able to pick and choose the perfect summons to fill up specific categories, but reality doesn''t work like that. We''ll take what we can get while keeping in mind our ideal summons and either contract with or just kill the summons we come across. We are hoping to come across an exotic desert summon when we go exploring, but we''ll have to be picky about what we select since we have to keep our limited number of slots in mind. Speaking of slots, I''ve used up 4 of mine already. I have Jareth; my tier 4 4-armed platinum ogre, Brutus; my tier 3 Grim, Jotun; my tier 3 freezing wyrm, and Emett; my tier 2 earth golem. Alexis has also caught up to me with summons, now possessing 4 of her own. Holly; her tier 3 harpy, Musashi; her tier 3 bladed mantis, Hemlock; her tier 4 poison wyvern, and last but not least Violet; her infant bydra. Violet was still growing and is essentially at the high tier 1 level, but would be stuck like that until she grew into an adolescent, teenager, and finally adult. Each stage in growth would correlate to a tier with adult reaching peak tier 4, this was different from the other summons since she was hatched from an egg. Her growth wouldn''t be determined only by time, but it certainly would be a factor, greater strength would speed up the time required to advance. ... Aside from an extra look at Alexis and I from the guard doing ID checks, there was nothing to differentiate us in treatment from the locals, although I''m sure we were more monitored or at least investigated upon entering the city. The organization might be worldwide, but that didn''t mean there weren''t separate powers within the organization and even more within each city, so it made sense to check on those who didn''t belong to make sure there weren''t ulterior motives. Not to mention that criminals would often attempt to escape to another city should they have a warrant for their arrest within one city. It didn''t work very well, but a few always managed to slip through the cracks by sticking to the seedier areas and avoiding any watch scans at all costs. Some of the even crazier ones stayed within the summoning realm to avoid persecution, and if they managed to survive, they were usually left alone as long as their crime wasn''t too heinous since they weren''t worth the effort and they would help reduce monster numbers. We were all garbed up in our sand-colored ponchos and were riding on our mounts towards the desert within the summon realm. I was riding Brutus, while Alexis was on Musashi and we had managed to set a fast but steady pace and within an hour we were touching the sand of the desert north of the city. I would have ridden Jotun normally since he was bigger, but he wouldn''t fare as well in the heat since he was a summon with an ice element. The ponchos turned out to be a fortunate purchase ass they kept the sand and heat off our bodies while keeping us cool underneath. I don''t think it would be possible for us to get sunburns at this point with our greater resistance and healing, but that didn''t mean we were impervious to the heat and dehydration. Not much had messed with us on the outer edges of the desert, but as we traveled further more and more monsters charged towards us. Not much was required to defeat these monster, but we did have to summon additional summons to battle them. We didn''t want to tire our mounts any more than necessary, so we left the combat to other summons. Emett was at home in the desert and mowed through any opponents, while Holly used the sky to her advantage and rained death from above. Our pace slowed for a while after that since we had more summons traveling with us, mostly as a result of Emett being slow due to his small size and heavy body. He seemed to be rather happy in the sand and played around with it for a while as we traveled until he discovered an ingenious use of his power to control the earth. He had made a board of sand that moved him through it much faster, almost like he was surfing through the earth. I imagine that it was only possible while in the sand since it acted like water in many ways, but for the time being it was rather convenient. I even amused Alexis by getting Emett to pretend like he was hanging ten on a surfboard made of compressed sand. With his amusing discovery, we managed to pick up the pace and travel further through the desert where stronger monsters resided. We more frequently began to come across tier 3 monsters, which indicated to us that we were definitely within the middle zone now. Most of the monster we saw were either insects or other desert-based creatures, as well as some mobile cactus monsters known as quill cacti that could shoot out their needles like green porcupines. We were especially careful of those despite the comical picture it made since a needle in the eye would definitely not be enjoyable. We made sure to stop often for water breaks when the opportunity arose or cool off in the shade when we could find some. The terrain was rather rocky and full of plant life the farther in we got, which was convenient for us since we could finally stop for lunch. After spotting a tall outcropping of rocks next to a rather large rock hill we were able to unpack and dig into some pre-made sandwiches we had bought on the way out in preparation for being out here with little to eat. We wouldn''t be relying on sandwiches for long, but we didn''t need to start a fire until we had settled in for the night. By that point we could cook up some of the meat from monsters we had killed today, I wasn''t exactly looking forward to tasting desert monster meat, but food was food at the end of the day. From what I had heard the monster had adapted themselves to effectively store and conserve water due to its'' scarcity, which in turn made their meat rather tough and gamey. The sandwiches and some fruit from the market we had bought yesterday were quickly gobbled up and had restored some of our energy in preparation for further traveling and fighting. Which is exactly what we did. The scene we saw was spontaneous rocky outcroppings with vibrant colors of red, yellow, and orange with tan/brown sand all along the ground, only to be broken up by small shrubs full of thorns or dense branches with a few small leaves. It was breathtaking for the first 10 minutes, but after that, it all blended together and became quite dull. Travel continued on for another few hours until finally as the sun was getting closer to setting, we came across as good a site as we would find for camping. It was a vibrant oasis with many large and vibrant trees and bushes blooming with green leaves. In the middle was a clear blue pond of delicious-looking freshwater, and on the outside were croppings of large boulders that seemed to lead on for a while until they met a large rocky hill. We were still within the middle zone, so our summons should be capable of defending us while we rested, but there was no reason to get lazy and risk our lives, so we would take shifts on watch duty tonight. We set up camp closer to the boulders to put a barrier at our backs, not to mention that we had no idea what kind of monsters might be lurking within the deceptively deep pond. Setting up camp was relatively easy, Alexis started to set up our sleeping area and place down our bedrolls and sleeping bags for when we decided to sleep. While she was doing that, I was taking firewood from my storage and stacking them up like a teepee starting with the smallest twigs and stacking increasingly larger sticks from there. Some pocket lint served as decent tender to light the fire, and with a kiss of flame from my lighter, the fire began to rapidly catch. I placed some rocks from nearby in a pit formation around the fire and then took out some stakes to roast our dinner on. I had let Emett remain on watch while sitting on top of the boulders behind the camp, and had Brutus resting for now while chomping on a well-deserved core for his dinner. Our meal ended up being some hyena looking monster that I sprinkled some salt, pepper, chili, cayenne, and cumin to make it more palatable. Desert was some fresh and ripe mango to pair with the spicy roasted meat. Once our stomachs were full and the sun had set, I turned in for the night while Alexis and the summons were on watch. Before I closed my eyes for the night, I looked up and just admire a beautiful expanse of the starry sky that seemed to be enhanced by the emptiness of the desert landscape. After taking in the sight, I eventually slipped into slumber while I could in preparation for my shift in the coming hours. 54 Ch. 34 Pt. 2- Standoff at the Oasis Corral The only thing I needed to equip was my khopesh since I had slept in my armor, and readied myself while surveying the area for any signs of danger. The night vision I gained from Brutus came in handy for searching farther than the campfire light reached, but I couldn''t see anything yet. But all I could see was the brush and trees around the oasis pond, with the rest of the landscape being sand and rocks until they went out of my line of sight. There was still no sign of any monster or any movement for that matter aside from the occasional swaying of leaves under small gusts of wind that passed by. Alexis was on guard duty when Brutus sounded the alarm, so she was already awake and ready for combat along with her summons Holly and Hemlock who she had traded out Musashi for. Brutus and Emett were beside me and ready for anything coming to threaten us, but we remained still and quiet in order to search for any signs of our unwelcome guest. We had all of our backs turned to Alexis so we could cover each other''s backs, which minimized our chance of being caught by an ambush. \"What do you think is out there? Normally we could handle anything in the area, but the night is putting some of us at a disadvantage, with only the minimum amount of light from the campfire to guide us.\" - Alexis \"No clue, but it''s definitely something with night vision or the like if it''s attacking at this time with this many summons out. Maybe a coyote or some type of nocturnal insect, those seem to be the most likely predators around here. I doubt any of the quill cactuses move much when the sun isn''t out.\" - Thomas \"Are you seeing anything out there? I can''t see past the glow of the campfire.\" - Alexis \"Nothing, but Brutus definitely smelled something, we''ll just have to be patient and wait for the monster to strike. It''s just a battle of patience at this point, either it charges out after becoming impatient or we let our guard down after a while which allows them to strike. Speaking of, I''ve got an idea.\" - Thomas \"Alright, let''s hear your brilliant plan\" - Alexis \"I''ll pretend to lower my guard to draw out the monster, I bet it thinks I can''t see much farther than you so it''ll be more likely to strike when I''m ''vulnerable''.\" - Thomas \"What about Brutus and Emett, won''t they scare off any ambush while you drop your guard?\" -Alexis \"I didn''t really think of that, I guess I''ll have them spread out to draw the monster in. We would have heard or seen something by now if there was a pack of something, so it should be relatively safe for me to be apart from them.\" - Thomas A few minutes passed and nothing had fallen for the bait, and I was about ready to give in and go back to waiting near Alexis and my summons. This wouldn''t be great for us in the long term since we were bound to make mistakes or become exhausted from being vigilant for hours. Luckily, I didn''t need to test my patience further as I make out the faint silhouette of a black creature fairly low to the ground quickly scuttling towards me. No noise was made, and if I blinked I doubt I would be able to immediately spot the monster, but the displaced sand and the rapid movement in the dark helped me keep track of where it was. I drew it in while Having Emett ready to charge forward and shield me while Brutus attacks. While still retaining my relaxed image. I cycled through the best way I could avoid being killed by the monster. From what I could see on the camouflaged monster was that it appeared to be a rather large insect of some type, and had fairly large claws on it. Deducting the possibility of anything other than an insect and considering the claws, there was no other viable option other than the mystery stalker being a scorpion. I couldn''t make out its'' tail, but I''m sure it''s somewhere on the carapaced monster. It got within a few meters of me and sprinted forward with a leap towards me, but I managed to narrowly escape it using my teleportation skill to emerge from behind it while yelling out, \"Now!\" to let Alexis and the summons know to attack. This had the dual advantage of getting me out of it''s immediate attack range and also getting the scorpion into the firelight so we could properly see it. Upon closer inspection, as our team steadily came closer to the monster, I was able to see its'' distinct features and even identify what creature it was. The golden crown above its'' eyes easily identified it as an emperor scorpion, which only became visible after the ambush had begun. Other distinct features of the scorpion were it''s pitch black coloring that spanned around the size of a large dog. The tail was folded and tucked alongside its'' back ready to whip out at a moments notice while keeping the range of it a mystery, his other combat tools were the one claw built like long scissors that looked like it could cut through anything, and the other claw was bigger and bulkier in the shape of a pentagon with jagged edges around it. This monster from what I could see and remember reading about was an ambush/combat type monster that mainly relied on its'' claws to fight, but the tail was also useful although not deadly, it was a strong paralytic that could turn the tide of battle if an opponent was stung. There was something else that was mentioned about this specific variety of scorpion, but I couldn''t quite remember what it was. It''s on the tip of my tongue, but I couldn''t for the life of me remember what exactly was mentioned, I didn''t spend much time on that though since I had more pressing matters to take care of. Emett and Brutus rushed towards the scorpion while I closed back in to analyze the insect and help if needed, not that I thought my sword would be able to do much against that tough shell. Alexis was on the other side of the fire and was watching to see if any intervention was necessary, her summons were on the lookout for any other monsters trying to ambush us since it seemed my summons could handle this one just fine. It was a strong tier 3 monster, but against two of my more experienced and unique summons, it would be taken down just fine since its'' element of surprise was ruined. I''d have to make sure and give Brutus an extra treat or two for catching the intruder with his nose. The battle had quickly started soon after the emperor scorpion''s leap, with Brutus leading the charge. He had dove through one of the shadows trailing from the campfire and emerged directly behind the large insect. His first move without any prompting was to grab the tail with his jaws to prevent it from lashing out since it had still been folded up there wasn''t much danger of getting stung. He was holding the tail just fine, but the shell was so hard to damage, only minute cracks were forming from Brutus''s bite. With the monster held in place, the slower of my two summons caught up to the fight and used his earth shaping powers quite creatively as he made to smash on the head of the insect. Sand burst up from under the ground and coated both of its'' claws and then drug them to the ground. To cement the advantage, the ground hardened around the weaponized claws and the monster was having a rather hard time removing them from the earth''s hold. But that wouldn''t last long as bigger and bigger chips were breaking off as the scorpion gained more room to move its appendages. Despite the control my pair of summons had over the scorpion, not much was being done to damage the thing, it was after all a high tier 3 monster with a shell that was pseudo tier 4. Seeing as the stalemate might end not so favorably for my team if things continued as they were I brought out Jareth to beat the monster into submission. He was the perfect counter for the monster as long as he could avoid the stinger, his skin was extremely durable, and his tier 4 strength would crack through the shell with a few good blows from his mace.\\ Jareth having caught up on what was going on through our link charged the pitch-black monster right as it had managed to free its claws and blow Emett away. Poor Emett was only a tier 2 monster, so there wasn''t much chance of him being able to face off against the monster, luckily all I needed him to do was stall for a moment or two. Seeing that his job had been done wonderfully, I retrieved my golem summon and watch as Jareth started to wail on the enraged monster. The first few blows landed on the shield claw of the monster which began forming bigger and bigger cracks after every strike. Eventually, the force became too much and the shield was shattered. The scorpion continued to put up a fight, but with its tail restricted and only a sharp claw left to fend off my titanium ogre, there didn''t seem to be much hope. Seeing that this was well in hand I relaxed slightly and waited for the fight to finish with a few more well-placed blows. Unfortunately for me, this seemed to be my downfall this night as I felt a sharp pain in my ankle and then the sensation of fire spreading from that point. \"OW!!!!!\" - Thomas \"What is it?\" - Alexis I didn''t know what had happened aside from being stung, and when I looked towards the injured area I could make out the faint silhouette of a small scorpion skittering away. Feeling the poison progressing, I knew I had to act fast before it spread to the rest of my body. \"Another scorpion stung me, I think there''s more of them,\" I say while using my belt as a makeshift tourniquet just below my knee to help slow the spread. That only held it off for a moment, as I was too slow to prevent this especially virulent poison spread past the belt. Deciding that I would be incapacitated soon at this rate, I made my way as quickly to Alexis as I could without disturbing my stung leg. By the time I made it there, my nerves were on fire and my blood vessels had turned fluorescent green. I had no energy and dropped right in front of her, with the last of my strength I stopped myself from hitting my face into the ground, but lay helpless after that. All I could sense was unending pain as the poison aggressively spread, my consciousness started going out at that point. The last thing I could recall was the taste of something on my lips before drifting off into darkness not knowing if I would still be alive come morning. 55 Ch. 34 Pt. 3- Scorpion Venom vs Hemlocks Poison The noise was definitely not a good sign, especially since we were already facing off against a monster known for powerful venom in its'' stinger. But I couldn''t find anything that could have stung Thomas, granted I was only able to see within the limit of the campfire light since I didn''t have night vision like Thomas did. A few moments later and I could tell things weren''t going well despite the timely tourniquet he had applied on his leg, his actions after were even more alarming as he slowly lurched towards me looking deathly ill. The last thing he did was drop right in front of me with bulging toxic green veins and a purple complexion from the presumed venom or poison. For a substance to act that quickly on someone of Thomas''s constitution was alarming, luckily Mira had supplied us with experimental antidotes for most venoms and poisons. With Thomas dropping as he did, I understood there wasn''t any time to waste, and so I withdrew a vial of the restorative and attempted to administer it to him. It didn''t seem to be making it past his throat since it had already swelled up, so I was stuck with dumping the violet liquid into his mouth and then massaging his throat muscles to work its way through his throat and into his stomach. The effect was as sudden as the venom itself was, and there was a noticeable reduction in the coloration of his face and veins the moment he swallowed. As this was going on, Jareth had managed to demolish the emperor scorpion with a final bash with his mace being wielded with two hands for maximum power. Not a moment too soon either, since as soon as Thomas became unconscious, his summons were forcibly dispelled back to him. Now it was just me and my summons to fight off this mysterious enemy. I wasn''t going to slack now, and so I withdrew Musashi and brought out Hemlock, all the while keeping holly in the air and Violet staying safe on my shoulder as added protection and to gain experience for the young dragon-kin. This proved to be a wise decision as a horde of black scorpions skittered towards us with the sounds of armor clashing against one another. The only upside to this was that the swarm was made up of tier 2 monsters, and the one leading the group was a small tier 3 Empress scorpion on a larger scorpion acting as her guard and transport. My scarlet drake waited till the foremost scorpions were near and then let loose a large burst of noxiously purple mist that caught a decent chunk of the group within. Within seconds the poison ran through them and dropped them like puppets with their strings cut off. It was quite the sight to see dozens of scorpions drop at once, and have the rest halt in place. Unfortunately, this poison barrier could only be used sparingly since she would have to build up her reserves before using it again. Seeing that the immediate threat was dealt with, I sent her to rampage through the rest of the swarm and cut their numbers. I kept Violet and Holly back with me for protection, but we were as safe as we could be behind the barrier until it dissipated, my best guess would give us about a minute before they could start trying to move through it. It was quite the spectacle as a purple dragon-kin ripped through a mass of black carapace with many monsters being sent flying or just flat out crushed. There wasn''t anything they could do to retaliate either as their stingers and claws were unable to breach Hemlock''s defenses. Holly and Violet weren''t holding back either as they shot projectiles through the mist at soldier scorpions near the Empress scorpion. It wasn''t nearly as impressive or damaging, but they did have some effect and served as good target practice and experience with fighting. The scorpions were stuck as a result of their numbers and any tactics were ineffective as there was nothing they could damage, with the only damageable targets behind a deadly barrier. Unfortunately, all good things come to an end, and so the mist dissipated until there was barely a tinge in the air. This seemed to cheer up the severely diminished swarm, and they all charged as one with what was left of their numbers. I had noticed the barrier depleting and so I called Hemlock back from her rampage in order to guard us. At this point, there were about 50 scorpions left from what was likely around 250 in total. We were both at a disadvantage in certain respects, but our overwhelming strength should see us through this. Both sides were cautiously approaching each other until streams of acidic venom sprayed towards us, which Hemlock positioned her body to block. Nothing was able to break through her tough skin and scales, but any of the droplets that fell quickly ate away through the dirt revealing how corrosive they were. It seemed to be a last-ditch attempt at causing some harm, and quickly the little insects scurried away as fast as they could. Unfortunately for the Empress, she was near the back of the retreating group and was quickly apprehended by Hemlock, who thoroughly thrashed the assassin type monster. It wasn''t that the queen scorpion was weak, it''s just that she was built for covert assassinations and not straight combat. She had a deadly poison as could be seen by how Thomas reacted, but it didn''t matter much if the stinger couldn''t break through the skin. I left the rest of the retreating horde in favor of securing the corpse of the empress and binding her to me. She would make a fine addition to my collection of summons, she would be the perfect spy due to her small size and even better would be her assassin type abilities with her volatile venom. Looking closer the pink crown on her head gave me the perfect idea for her new name. I said to the body of my new summon as I was binding her to me, \"For now on, your new name is Queenie.\" With that, I now had a new summon which would only widen my repertoire of summons and abilities. After that, I started to collect the bodies of the regular scorpions with Holly and Violet to sell later. Hemlock was guarding Thomas as he recovered from Queenie''s poison, but I didn''t know how long that would take. The good news is he already looked significantly better within an hour of administering the antidote, so it seemed to be effective. As a surprise for Thomas, I was preserving the Emperor scorpion for him to bond with if he wanted to, but I didn''t see him refusing such a thing. It was, after all, a highly valued and powerful summon, and it was his kill in the first place. All that was left was to wait for him to recover and the sun to rise to we could begin returning to the city. We had gotten what we had desired at a high risk, so now it was time to return and recover. There were too many close calls tonight for my comfort, not to mention having to deal with a weakened partner was not desirable in such a dangerous area. 56 Ch. 35- Finishing the Antidote Mira POV I''ll never resort to asking Eric to name something after I learned he named a healing salve he made "healing salve", it has no flare to it, although it is undoubtedly accurate. He''s lucky he''s so good at alchemy since he would be a terrible businessman or marketer, his only claim to fame is the quality of his work. I love the man dearly, but anything outside of science and alchemy and he was as helpless as a 2-year-old. Although that was honestly part of his charm, after all who wouldn''t want to be able to take care of their significant other. Most men were too stubborn about things like that, not to mention he is one of the few men who has always treated me kindly and as an equal. I can''t say I hate all men since Tommy and Eric belong in that category, but the vast majority see me as just another pretty face and nothing else. Past experiences aside, men as a whole in this world or at least this city seem to have reverted to cavemen after strength became most people''s greatest concern. Speaking of my wayward lab partner, he was studying the heart of a wood nymph under a makeshift microscope and introducing slivers of other material to see how it would react. Nymphs of any type left only a heart and their core when killed since they were technically spirits, and they seemed to have great potential with either alchemy or as enchanting material. We had received a few hearts from Tommy when he had gone hunting in the marsh, and he figured we might be able to find out a few uses for them as they weren''t currently very valuable in alchemy. Eric had discovered this method of experimentation to be the most useful for discovering reactions between ingredients while minimizing any waste. He didn''t seem to be having any luck currently, but that wasn''t uncommon since the wood nymph heart wasn''t an especially reactive material. I didn''t have much hope for them to have any real use in our work, but Eric thought it would be interesting to try, so I was leaving him to it. Anyways, back to the potion that I''m still trying to perfect, hopefully I wouldn''t have to experiment on many more lab mice to get a finished product. I was running low after most had died under various unfortunate circumstances, but the antidote was getting better as I continued to experiment. Luckily my supply of manticore venom was sufficient for quite a while considering that I only required 2 drops of it for each experimental batch. The poison ratio seemed to be sufficient so what I believed was wrong was either the timing of the potion ingredients being put in or the processing of the current ingredients and perhaps even an additional herb or flower was needed. Deciding to test out part of my theory, this time I decided to crush the fire-red fragrant pods with the flat of a knife before adding them to the potion. This seemed to enhance the color of the potion currently which was a good sign, but the ice lotus petals didn''t seem sufficient to suppress the reaction of the pods. It seemed like I would need to enhance the ice lotus petals or add an additional ice type ingredient. Throwing out the batch of failed antidote, I started a new batch of potion after cleaning out the cauldron and decided to try cutting the ice lotus leaves into thin and equal strips before adding them to the fragrant pod enhanced elixir. The mixture sizzled little red and blue bubbles until a few seconds later the ingredients seemed to merge and settle into a purple color that was just above room temperature. The moment of truth came as I selected one of the more virulent venoms from my selection that came from a particularly nasty Arachne if the shop I had purchased the vial from was to be believed. I dipped a disposable pin into the vial and then gently poked one of the fresh lab mice to test out the antidote. The poor creature immediately began showing symptoms of lethal poisonings, it''s veins bulged as anticoagulant properties from the sample made its'' blood rush increasingly fast, and it began sweating from its'' internal temperature being cranked up to fight off the venom. I immediately administered a dropper full of antidote into the lab mice''s mouth and waited to see its reaction. I didn''t have to wait long as the symptoms quickly began to fade from the subject''s body. It seemed like the sample was a success for an extremely deadly venom. I would need to test stronger poisons and venoms on a few fresh mice to see just how well it worked, but it looked to be promising. It seems that by de-structuring the final ingredients, they were able to integrate with each other and cancel out any reactions quickly enough that the potion settled without ruining the potion or breaking the glass it was settled in due to extreme temperature changes in a short amount of time. The other experiments with stronger venoms and poisons were successful as well, and the only thing they weren''t able to cure relatively well was manticore venom since the potion was made from the stuff. The other ingredients must have diluted the effectiveness a bit but were necessary to turn the mixture into a cure rather than an even deadlier mixture. I still felt like something was missing from the formula as the stronger venoms and poisons were only mostly negated and took quite a while to properly work, which would leave most dead unless they immediately took the antidote after being injected. "Back to the drawing board I guess." ...... It has been two days since the mostly successful formula, and I still needed to figure out just what was missing in order to perfect the solution. I was aimlessly looking through my stored ingredients to see if anything sparked a solution, so far nothing seemed to pop out as helpful. That was true until I came across a bezoar left in a cupboard near my work station in case of accidental poisoning. "That''s got to be it. Why didn''t I think of this sooner? Obviously a bezoar whose express purpose was to cure poisonings would be the perfect thing to add to an antidote mixture." I thought about what part of the process I should add the stone-like ingredient, and just how much of it I should add. It wasn''t particularly large, about the size of a decent rock that would fit within the palm. Taking the ingredient from its place in the lab cupboard, I cut the ingredient with a special alloy knife I had for difficult to cut ingredients, and cut it up into eighths. With that finished, I decided to coarsely grind the ingredient to help it mix better with one of my steel mortars until it had a sand-like consistency to it. With that portion taken care of, I started a new batch of antidote and decided that the hard ingredient would need to be added right before the pods and petals so that the reaction would break it down. Low and behold, my idea worked and the potion finally settled into a gold color that just screamed vitality. Eager to try it out, I gathered the last of my previously untested lab mice and administer the venoms and poisons while swiftly giving them the antidote and then waiting to see how they turned out. I couldn''t help but yell in delight as I saw the toxic substances be quickly wiped out with no side-effects, and even the manticore venom was at least slowed down, which was a major achievement as it was one of the deadliest substances known to man. "Whooo! Eric, I did it!" I exclaim as I swooped up the spindly man in an oversized labcoat that used to be white in a bear hug. "That''s great Mira, you''ve officially become a master alchemist. Now we just need to register the recipe and provide proof of its'' efficacy." - Eric "Yep, and now that I''m no longer your apprentice, how about we go on a date." - Mira "Mira, I''m not sure-" - Eric "Nope, you said if I became a master alchemist like you said I needed to before we would go on a date." - Mira "I didn''t expect you to become one so soon, that''s not really what I intended when I agreed to the bet. Plus I''m too old for you." - Eric "Too bad, a bet is a bet. You have to go on one dinner date with me, and if you don''t want to continue after that then fine, but you have to at least give me a chance. Plus you''re like 6 years older than me, in this world that barely seems to matter when you risk dying from monsters every other month." - Mira *Sigh* "Fine, you win. A deal is a deal, and you certainly earned it. It''s not that I don''t like you, I''m just worried about how it might affect our work." - Eric "Don''t worry, I''m a big girl and can deal if the date doesn''t pan out. You can pick me up at my new apartment on Saturday at 6 PM sharp, I expect you to dress up for the occasion as well, and no, your lab coat doesn''t count." - Mira "Now I just need to bottle a few vials to give to Tommy and Alexis before they go out hunting again, this could very well save their life. Knowing Tommy, I bet he has to use one within this monster break cycle, reckless brat." I can''t help but say with some frustration and fondness in equal measure. Looking at the small golden vial in my hand I try and think up something to call it, but after wracking my brain and turning up nothing, I decide to leave the naming for Tommy to decide. 57 Ch. 36- The Great Survival "Glad to see you''re awake, you gave me quite a scare. Luckily for you, Mira gave us a few doses of her new antidote before we left or you would have been a goner. Not many can say they got stung by an Empress scorpion and survived." - Alexis "I sure don''t feel lucky." I say with a light chuckle "Well lucky or not, you still have something to take care of before we head back to the city." - Alexis "And what would that be?" - Thomas "Your luck seemed to hold out for a while since Jareth managed to smash in the Emperor Scorpion''s head before you passed out and he disappeared. Now you just need to make it your summon." - Alexis "Oh right, totally forgot about that with all the acid burning through my veins. Guess I''ll get to it a second, give me a little while before we start heading out. - Thomas "Nope, you''ve rested enough, now get off your butt and sign the contract so we can leave." - Alexis All I could muster was a groan because I really did not feel like moving at all with my head feeling like it got stuffed with Jello. I put my hands over my ears in hopes of ignoring her, unfortunately that seemed to backfire on me. I felt something around the weight of a pug with 6 legs start crawling from my legs towards my chest. That was not a good sign, so I opened my eyes and came face to face with a small scorpion with a pink crown on its'' head. I didn''t dare move in fear of antagonizing the monster/summon. "Alexis, please get this thing off of me, I''ve had enough of being stung for the rest of my life, I promise I''ll get up." - Thomas That seemed to assure her, and the scorpion skittered off of me. With a sigh, I pushed myself off the sandy ground and made my way past the dead campfire and came up to the mangled body of the Emperor Scorpion. I couldn''t really complain since I just felt a little sore all over, and I finally had another summon to add to my roster. This was one of the kings of the insect type monsters and was a powerhouse in close combat, its'' shell turned it into a tank as well, and only Jareth''s overwhelming might broke through his armor. Having gone through the ritual a few times by now, I cut my palm with the knife on my belt and let the blood drip down on the core exposed through the now open cavity within the scorpions head. It didn''t take long before the bond took hold and the scorpion reverted into a core that drifted into my storage. Wanting to get to know my new ally, I summoned the Emperor scorpion and started patting his head roughly so he could feel it through his exoskeleton. He seemed to enjoy it and I didn''t mind either as I got to admire the lethal potential of this impressive summon. I also knew I would need a name for the big guy and started brainstorming for something unique but fitting. "Alright bud, I''ve decided that I''m going to name you Saber on account of all your weapon-like appendages." - Thomas He didn''t seem to mind and just pushed up against my leg like a dog for more pats. Deciding to humor my new summon, I gave him head pats until it was time for us to leave with the rising of the sun. .... Coming back to the city was something else, it was unrecognizable as crowds of people in bright outfits wandered all over with mariachi bands and other native musicians adding to the atmosphere of the city-wide party. Not just the sights and sound were amazing, but the smells from all of the vendors selling fragrant and hearty snacks to the festival-goers. We had no idea what was going on, so I decided to ask a small but stout Hispanic man with an impressive mustache who was off to the side of the party in the streets. Trying to talk over the din of the music and yelling from the festival, "Excuse me sir, would you mind telling me what''s going on with this festival?" - Thomas He replied in a heavy accent, "You must not be from here, this is the festival of La Gran Supervivevencia or in the common tongue, The Great Survival. It is a festival commemorating the survival and recovery from the first monster break, everyone from the city goes out and enjoys life with their neighbors in commemoration of those who sacrificed themselves and for all of us who have survived. It is half a celebration of life and half a remembrance of the dead during this new era." "It''s quite something, we don''t have anything like that in the North American city. My name is Thomas, and this is Alex." - Thomas "Hello, Thomas and Alex, my name is Marco Espinoza. Since you seem so interested in the festival, why don''t you join me and my family so we can show you around and help you experience the festival? It is after all, all about celebrating friendship and bonds, so why not make some new ones in the spirit of the festival." - Marco "We''d love to as long as we aren''t imposing on you and your family." Alexis chimed in from my side. "Nonsense, we''d love to have you, let me introduce you to my family before we go see the parade." - Marco He enthusiastically waves over a tall and dark-haired woman with three children around her. After they get to us, he starts introducing him. "Mi Amor, this is Thomas and Alexis, they are travelers who want to experience the festival so I thought I would have them come with us. Alexis and Thomas, this is the love of my life Esmerelda, and my three children; Julio, Jesus, and Maria." -Marco We smile and wave to them all, and with the introductions out of the way, we follow the family through the streets lined with color and streamers everywhere. It is quite the sight to see and makes everything seem more lively, but I''m quite curious about the colors so I ask Marco about them. "The colors are meant to represent celebrating that we are still alive, and the skeletons and skulls that are dotted around or you see people dressed as are meant to represent those who have died protecting us. There are many traditions and symbolism within the festival, but it is mostly meant to be a celebration so people try to do everything they enjoy to celebrate another year of surviving." - Marco "That''s quite unique, would you mind telling me some of what is done for the festival?" Chimes Alexis who seems to want to know everything about the festival since we have nothing close to it at home. "No problem" he jovially says. "Most of what is done is people wearing or painting bright colors everywhere or dressing in some sort of costume. There are parades that go around featuring summoners and summons as well as some paper mache models of some of the more well-known monsters. We also eat all sorts of cultural foods and sweets, and after the sun goes down everyone gathers in their respective neighborhoods to hold a feast and drink while reminiscing." -Marco "That''s beautiful, I''m looking forward to the parade and feast later. Tommy and I love to try new and delicious food, so thank you for letting us join you and your family on this special occasion. Is there anything we should bring or buy for the feast later, we wouldn''t want to just take when you''ve been so generous already." - Alexis "Don''t worry about it, we are happy to share some of our culture with people who are interested. If you feel the need to bring something, maybe buy a bottle or two of liquor, it''s the only thing we can''t have enough of." - Marco "That works fine for us. If you don''t mind, why don''t Alexis and I stop at a stall to buy some festival appropriate clothes?" - Thomas They assured us that there was no hurry, and so we went up to a large stall featuring all sorts of clothing for the festival. I quickly picked out an orange t-shirt with cyan jeans and a royal purple zip-up jacket. Alexis decided to dress up a bit and chose out a dark pink skirt with bright green leggings and a red blouse to complete her colorful look. We quickly went into the changing area behind the stall and came out in proper festival colors. It would have been a weird look if everyone else wasn''t dressed in various bright colors like we were. We caught up quickly with Marco and his family and went on our way to one of the parades that were happening near his home. We eventually worked our way up to the front of the street and witnessed all sorts of summons with their summoners working their way down the street. In between these summoners were well-known tier 4 and 5 monsters that such as dragons and chimera''s along with plenty of monsters from Latin American culture. We were as delighted as Marco''s kids to see this event and were a bit disappointed when it was over, and so we continued with the festivities by making it to a vendor and band area on the corner. Guitars were being strung and many folk songs sung in Spanish were serenading the crowd. Alexis and I were more focused on the food from the vendors lining the sidewalk and so we made our way over to snack on some food and fill our empty bellies. The kids seemed to want these long doughy sticks with cinnamon and sugar on them from one vendor which I learned were called churros. They were quite large and so we got one for the kids plus Alexis and I, what made them even better were the chocolate and caramel drizzled on top before being served to us. The kids dug in and devoured the tasty treats, but Alexis and I savored the unique tasting dessert stick before moving on to other foods. We didn''t eat too much as there was the feast to look forward to later, but we snacked on several items from vendors even including fried bugs. We had strong stomachs from everything we had already seen and done and so we tried them without reservation. They were mostly just crunchy with a hint of spice that was liberally sprinkled on the bug kabobs. The scorpions were my favorite, mostly because I got revenge on the insects that had almost done me in. I couldn''t forget to bring my contribution to the feast, so I picked up a yellowish and a clear bottle of tequila, that the stall owner assured would be plenty for the festivities. ..... We enjoyed the atmosphere and listened to music until it started to get dark. When that happened, we made our way back to Marco''s neighborhood for the feast. Groups of families were already set up around plenty of bench-style tables laden with food all gathered around a large campfire. The children were swinging around at monster-themed pinatas and playing around with their parent''s summons, mostly the friendly and low tiered ones since the stronger ones were occasionally accidentally lethal. The adults were drinking and eating with leisure while talking and sharing stories. Marco and his family were well received by everyone and as a result, Alexis and I were accepted as well. Seeing that the children all seemed to be having fun with summons, Alexis and I brought out some of our less intimidating summons for the children to play with. I brought out Brutus and Emett for the children to play around with and instructed them to be friendly and entertain the children, and for motivation, I promised an extra core if they did a good job. Alexis brought out her bydra Violet since she was still basically an infant as well as Holly the Harpy. The children seemed to love them and had a fun time petting them or getting rides from Brutus. Violet seemed to be soaking up the attention and enjoyed getting pampered by the small children. Brutus looked to be having fun giving the children rides and shadow traveling with them every now and then. Holly looked to be putting up with the attention but entertained them in her own way by flying around and using fancy flying maneuvers. Seeing that the festivities were already going and many had already had a few drinks, we decided to catch up and I brought out the two bottles of tequila to share. Everyone flocked around to have a drink and we were soon becoming friends and sharing stories with many of them. They seemed shocked when we told them about how we managed to get Violet and even more impressed that we got out alive with minimal injury against something so deadly. By this point, we had each had a couple of drinks and I was definitely starting to feel the effects. My constitution seemed to give me a higher tolerance for alcohol, so I wasn''t wasted, but I was definitely comfortably drunk. We had settled in and were just enjoying the atmosphere while listening to some of the older adults share their stories about some of the monster breaks. One thing I did notice was that some seemed to reluctant to share some of their obviously haunting memories but after a few drinks and some encouragement they were able to share and seemed to feel better after that. It was apparent that this event was a catharsis for many and a point of hope for others, it seemed to remind them that even when things get hard or dangerous there are still things to fight for. Eventually, the night wore on and my two bottles were finished. At this point in the night, I had already recalled my summons as I could barely focus, and many were already passed out or had gone home to sleep it off. With the bonfire burning low, Marco got our attention and gestured for us to follow him and his wife as they carried their sleeping children. We managed to make it to their small but cozy home, but at that point, I was done as it was my first time drinking and had already had so much. I passed out on their couch fully clothed, and I''m pretty sure Esmerelda brought Alexis to a small guest room for her to sleep in. I would figure everything out in the morning, for now, I was intent on sleeping through the rest of my drunkenness. Hopefully in the morning, I wouldn''t wake up with a hangover like I had heard Mira complain about a few times over the years.