"Hello underclassmen Roland, I am Milly Grove, a 3rd Circle Air Summoner, and best friends with Rebeca here, hehe."
The short Loli girl with a bubbly personality squinted her pink eyes, and stuck her tongue out. But I noticed her look at my tall ass friend.
My eyes looked strange, as I looked at the 5' foot 3" inch Loli, and imagined her hugging Nevin. Then when my eyes met Rebeca's. she grins silently acknowledging my inner guess.
Rebeca did not forget her purpose of stopping me, and said with a tone of finality.
"Milly and I are going to follow the two of you into the Beast Forest, in case you need any healing or support. I am coming no matter what, because you have not unlocked your Magic Core yet. You are also not yet a 1st Circle Knight like my dense Brother."
I smile seeing she is not dressed for an outing in the Forest, and I asked.
"Rebeca, you do not look prepared for an overnight trip into the Beast Forest?"
The older girl smiled smugly and patted the satchel on her arm, like a woman's purse on Earth, and said.
"I won a space-bag last year during the 2nd year battle competition, and all of our camping supplies are here, including... 4 bedrolls, a tent, a portable grill, and lots of tasty ingredients, hehe. I am awesome, right Sam?"
I am speechless at her shameless solicitation of me cooking for her again. I said to the smiling foodie.
"Since you can even burn water (boiling it to evaporation, burning the pot bottom), and you brought a grill and ingredients, you planned on me acting as your personal cook, right?"
She shamelessly grins and nodded, then said it plainly.
"You got it, I will heal you for free, and at night you feed the healer... I love your cooking, yummy~!"
Nevin, nodded to the Gate Portal Station, and said.
"Sam, face it, you're the party cook, let us go, we are burning sunlight..."
I sigh, and Nevin and I take the lead, while the ladies follow behind, gossiping endlessly.
So why is a space bag like a satchel and not a cool ring like in those Chinese Novels of my past life? Because it is women who make Magic products, the designs go in the fashion direction.
And as far as why the Glen siblings and my parents love my cooking? Well, it seemed in my past life, I had a strong hobby for what they called Western Style Cooking, and I have a good working knowledge of temperature, spicing, and presentation.
On the bright side, the butchering techniques for cooking and breaking down monster bodies have synergy.
-
In this massive Capital City, we all live in the south-west in the residential area for the middlemost commoners. In order to travel to the south, about 1,000 miles away, we need to take the Public Gate Portal that connects to the border town of the Beast Forest.
This Beast Forest separates the Northern and Southern Kingdom's borders, and is a Hazard Zone. The safest way to travel without Magic, is to travel by sea in the east coast of the two nations and forest.
The reason we need to leave the City walls, to the Portal Gate Station, is in case Demons or foreign enemies capture the border town, and use the Portal as an invasion point. Plus it is easier to find spies sneaking in and out of our Capital City.
As our Party of 4 arrived, we cued in line, and paid the fee to enter. The Time and Space Gate looks like one of those large Star-gates from my Earth memories. It is a large circular ring that has a black with silver twinkling-starlight Magical Door you step into...
-
As we stepped in the Space door, it felt like an invisible hand grabbed your intestines, and yanked you like a rubber-band, and boom, we walked out of the other portal.
Unlike the Capital City, this Portal Station ends up inside the border town, that is only ¼ the size of the Capital. It is still this large with over a million people, because this is a major hub for Mercenary, Adventurers, and the Army to invade the Beast Forest. The natural resources, like Magic Cores, Beast Meat, and the precious Aura body altering ingredients from the Demonic Beasts, Magical Monsters, and Demons, though the latter is a very rare site, as they are hunted down vigorously over any other foe.
What is a Demonic Beast? Simple, they are normal animals that have grown a Magic Core in their body, and have become ferial and aggressive.
Magical Monsters are things like Dragons, Gryphons, and Demons. They do not have Magical Cores and use Aura, but their bodies are full of power.
Demons? They offer nothing but death, and their bodies are useless for anything good. Not even Demonic Beasts will eat a Demon body. The only good use of a Demon, is if you contract one as a Summons, it is the only Demon you can trust, because its life is tied to the Summoner's life.
-
I look at the City Map, and point south, and tell my 3 party members.
"Alright, we will rent a carriage to take us to the south gate, then we can enter the forest."
Milly pointed to the map and asked me.
"Don't you want to go to the Mercenary Guild to pick up some material requests?"
I shook my head and said.
"No, I plan on just giving all the Bone tempering materials to Neven, and we can sell the rest back home for more, hehe, we have a rich girl with a storage bag to carry our gains, right Rebeca?"
Instead of getting irritated with me, Rebeca said like a proud wife or something.
"Sam is the big boss, so I will listen to you, haha."
Then the group of us followed my idea...
-
After the carriage with the 4 young adventurers departed, a group of people walked out of a tea shop, and the leader of the group was a young woman with a cold atmosphere.
She exuded nobility and poise, standing at, 5' feet 7'' inches,wearing a black and blue battle-dress. Her emotionless blue eyes, watched the carriage go out of sight, and then after the wind blew her straight long white hair, she brushed it from her eyes as she asked the armored Knight behind her.
"Are you sure that is the boy my father is watching? He does not even have any Aura or Magic?"
Behind the young 20 year old Vanguard Knight, a 3rd year student at the Royal Knight Academy, stood 4 strong Knights who are at least 6th Circle in strength, and one maid.
"Yes, I can absolutely confirm that that man was who you are looking for, because that black-haired woman is a 3rd year Rosecrans student who used to follow me around till the summer break, so I would not forget them. The large man is her brother, Sam Roland's best friend."
The young woman said to her group.
"All of you remove your identifying markings, and just call me Miss Ann. You George Lion can just keep your normal identity, since that black-haired girl knows you already, let's follow their group into the forest..."
""""""Yes Miss Ann.""""""
The girl held her palm up, and created her Gravity Bolt, and watched its near invisible ripples fluctuate, she then mumbled.
"Sam Roland, I will beat you in the Academy Competition, and force my father. I will show you which one of us is stronger, more talented, and has fate, a man or woman."
-
"Achoo~!"
Hum~! After I sneezed in the carriage, a black shadowy magic covered my chest, as Rebeca cast her [Diagnose] spell to see if I was sick. Her Dark powered healing magic always makes me shiver with a cold-oily feeling, as her shadow covers my body.
"You're very healthy, Sam, must be dust, or a beautiful woman is thinking about you, hehe."
Rebeca was right, but it was not herself that was the one with bad-thoughts. I smiled at her spell retracting and said.
"Being healed with Dark Magic always feels funny, I wish you had Life or Water for healing, sigh."
Rebeca held up her silky deep black hair and said.
"Growing up, you always said you loved my hair, and it is because of my Dark Magic Core. If I had Life, it would be a green, or blue like yours for Water. I like the Shadows, haha."
Yeah, the Aura or Magic in your body makes either your hair, eyes, or both that color... The only exceptions are for people like Milly with Air, or those with Gravity, that do not have colors in their power. For example, with my navy blue hair and gold eyes, an outsider might deduce I am a Water or Electricity user, unless I fall into the group of Air or Gravity...
The color of power looks like this... [Fire (red)] [Water (blue)] [Air (clear)] [Electricity (yellow)] [Earth-metal (brown)] [Dark-shadow (black)] [Light (white)] [Ice-Cold (pale-blue)] [Time and Space (silver)] [Gravity (clear-ripples)] [Life-Plant (green)] [Death-Undead (grey)]
This is also why Nevin has brown eyes and not green like Rebeca's eyes, but he could have been born with brown hair with green eyes or both brown for eyes and hair, phew...
Rebeca kicks my boot and asks again with a smile.
"Do you think my hair is still pretty?"
I rolled my eyes and said.
"Narcissist, just ask if you are pretty instead, but I guess if I have to suffer under your Dark Healing, it is worth the hair color."
And after we reached the outside of the City, we walked south...
-
A few hours later, after we had a small snack, we stood in front of the large Beast Forest main entrance...
Massive trees standing anywhere from 50-200 feet tall, blanketed the sky, making the inside look gloomy and scary.
Milly, the Summoner looked to me, who is here for the first time, and said...
"The outskirts and within around 50 miles of the edge, we will only find normal and 1st Circle Monsters. Very rarely will the 2nd Circle beasts come close to our hunting area. Plus many farming groups canvas this zone, so no real danger will fall on us... "I call you, Ave my Air Elemental~!"
And from a faint glow on the ground, a small Air Elemental of 3 feet in height appeared and then hugged Milly's leg affectionately.
-
It cannot speak, but the two have a wordless mental bond, exchanging emotions. This Summoner bond lets the Summons understand its owners commands in its mind.
Even though Milly is a 3rd Circle Summoner, her Air Elemental Ave is only a 2nd Circle Monster, and has been that level ever since Milly was at 1st Circle. But Ave benefits from all of these 3rd Circle Powers...
[Call Summon], No matter where Ave is, it can be summoned to Milly's side...
[Share Master's Skills], If Milly has any skills, such as [Cooking] [Unarmed Combat] [Weapon Skills] or [Crafting skill], along with many more, then Ave can also use them as though it learned it itself, assuming it has the body to perform it. The skills are always at the Master's skill level...
[Strong-Heal Summons], this is identical to the Healer's 3rd Circle ability of [Large Heal] but only works on the Summons.
[Summons Space], if the Summoned Monster does not run off on its own, it can hide and live in a comfortable dimensional pocket ideal for its race, with plenty of food and drink, for its species.
[Swap Positions], A great power to exchange positions with a simultaneous line of sight teleport.
[Buff Summons], this is a 5 Minute Buff that brings your Summons abilities up by one Circle level, so Ave can for a short while be considered a 3rd Circle Monster.
Milly is not screwed forever with her lower level Summons, because at levels 4 and 7, She will be able to bind an additional Summon to herself, for a grand total of 3.
Sadly, if her luck is bad, she could end up with a 1st Circle Goblin and another weak monster, then her career would surely end.
But there is good news, when you summon equal level or lower monsters, they are obedient to you, but if you are unlucky at 1st Circle and summon a 9th Circle Monster, you cannot get it to obey you... The only good thing is it won't betray or kill you, but those around you are not protected.
All Summoners want to summon a high-level Monster on day one, but buyers have to beware, because the larger the level gap between the two, the more unruly the Summoned Monster will act.
The reason for this, is the fact that when the Summoner dies of anything but old age, the Summoned creature also dies, with no chance of resurrection.
-
After Milly was done playing with Ave, she said to me and Nevin.
"Alright, so Ave, Rebeca, and I will only follow the two of you, and assist if things look dangerous, so good luck boys, haha."
Nevin held up his Tower Shield, and gripped his Heavy Mace, while I drew out my high quality Rapier, and the two of us just walked right in to kill stuff!
"Sam, make sure to be reckless a bit, so I can heal you, mkay?"
And I almost tripped over a tree-root, hearing the Dark Healer's curse...
-
(Milly being here for the Summoner low level info-dump, was because it pertains to Sam in a while.)
MONSTER CIRCLES
9: Divine Monster (Immortal Beings, Tiamat, Demon Kings)
8: Legendary Monster (Phoenix, True Dragon, Archangels)
7: Elder-Ancestor Monster (Leviathans, Land Dragons, Angels)
6: Leader Level Monster (Lich, Strong Demons, Storm Giants)
5: Town Disaster Monster (Vampire, Stone Giants, Hydra)
4: Enhanced Monster (Wraiths, Griffins, Giants)
3: Strong Monster (Death Knights, Ogres, Large Demonic Beasts)
2: Normal Monster (Zombies, Small Elementals, Orcs)
1: Weak Monster (Goblins, Skeletons, Weak Demonic Beasts)
0: Normal... Animals,or Humans. No Magic Cores-Materials to be found.