The Summoner woke up with a sore back in some place she didn't recognize. Pale yellow light gleamed through rounded windows, illuminating the dew dripping from the leaves of several green plants sitting on the sill. She could hear birds chirping. It was like some nonsense out of a fairytale.
Oh. She was in Karl's house, she realized as she glimpsed at the letter he had written for her yesterday, now laid out on the table.
Oh. She was now in a completely different world, on some ambitious quest assigned to her by the god of the Gates (who she thought was kind of a tool, to be perfectly honest).
Well, at least she hadn't gotten knock-out drunk and done something she regretted.
Shrugging the blanket off of her body, she swung her bare feet onto the ground and began stretching, cringing at the crack and pop sounds her tired joints made. The most exercise she got as a normal civilian on Earthwas maybe a few laps around the track in high school, and the Egor Snowfield had easily been at least ten miles long. Not to mention, she had to dodge the aggressive tackles from slimes and mermen, and she had gotten stabbed in the side.
The aftermath of that was pretty incredible, too. Back home, with that injury, she could have died or been disabled for life. But here, a tiny green bottle was all that was needed for her flesh to repair itself like clockwork. She poked her side. The skin felt smooth and unscarred. It was a pity that she couldn't say the same for her hoodie and shirt, which now sported an attractive tear on the side.
Maybe she could sneak a few of the things in her pocket and win a Nobel Prize for the crazy medical breakthrough. That is, if she didn't die a painful death at the hands of the Four Fallen.
Considering that all of the humanoid Units she had encountered were fairly young, and the incredible healing technology that was so common, what kind of horrible wounds would they had to have sustained in order to actually die?
Ugh, thinking about such dark topics first thing in the morning would give her stomach ulcers. She shook her head, and made a mental to-do list for the day:
-Buy paper and pen in order to make physical list
-Buy backpack, fill with food
-Buy clothes (underwear was mentally underlined multiple times)
-Look Michele up in Unit Compendium
-Explore Forest and maybe Wetlands
Her stomach rumbled.
Find food.
She felt too lazy to bother with cooking, and the cleanup would have required even more effort. And she had no clue what some of the plants in Karl's fridge were for.
The Summoner thought about the places she had seen during her confused trek through town the previous day, and where she could obtain the items she needed. She stopped at the door of a nearby restaurant, so absorbed in finding the most efficient route that she didn't notice the door swinging open-
-and a person walking right into her.
They fell to the ground with a simultaneous oof, the sheaf of papers in his arms scattering all over the ground.
The first thing she noticed about him was the blue hair. If the trend was to be followed, it was safe to assume that this guy would have some significant role to play in her life, she noted with humor.
Oh wait, she had to be a polite human being.
"Sorry about that. I was busy thinking," she said, bending down and picking up some of his documents.
"Don't touch those! They're classified information," he snapped. "And who just stands in front of a business's door?"
Then, she noticed that he was much younger and shorter than her. Why were young teenagers so rude? At least that stayed the same between worlds. On the other hand, she had been standing in front of a heavy-traffic door, with the reactiveness of a potato, so it was partially her fault.
"Sorry," she said lamely. For someone who was half her height, he had all the cold scorn and authority of a surly schoolteacher, and made her feel like a grade schooler who had scribbled crayon over the walls.
Moreover, why did such a young boy have "classified information"?
He gathered his papers, and picked up-
"Oh, that's mine," she said, reaching for the cluster of pages. At one point yesterday, Kuda had let her steal the pages about him back, and she had stuffed it in her pocket. She was pretty sure that he loved her with the entirety of the lump of coal he called his heart.
Miraculously, even though she was thoroughly waterlogged and miserable at the end of the day, the pages remained pristine. That was Akras Summoners' Hall quality, huh.
The boy narrowed his eyes at the section of the text that faced outwards. Them, he drew his hand back.
"Usually, when a person drops something of theirs, you're supposed to return it," she pointed out.
"This is data that belongs to the Akras Summoner's Hall. You shouldn't have this," he said. "You're not a Summoner. I've memorized the names and faces of every person enlisted in the Army, and you're not one of them."
Did this kid… have no friends, or something? Her eyebrows furrowed, and she looked at him with pity.
"Come with me," he commanded.
Now, she knew that she was pathetically weak and had the constitution of a butterfly made out of tissue paper, but she was pretty sure that she could take this guy. He was two heads shorter than her, and his skinny legs looked like white toothpicks protruding out of his dark brown shorts.
Which were really, really short. But she wasn't going to comment on that. The boy was underage. And moreover, she didn't like assaulting children. It seemed like such a villainous thing to do.
So she followed the boy with the white coat and horrible personality out of the food district to… well, she had no clue. If the location turned out to be suspicious she could get him in the eye with Karl's key, put up a decent fight at least.
Enjoy a lack of depth perception, bastard. But yeah, she could summon Eze to go all "liquefy the enemy's insides" on them, so she wasn't particularly wary.
Unbeknownst to her, he would subject her to horrors that she had never faced before in her life, and change it forever.
He had ushered her into a laboratory of sorts, filled with loads of complicated-looking machinery and mysterious liquids suspended in large tubes. He at a desk, lounging in a chair like it was a throne. She sat across from him, in a chair that was literally stone. There was no cushion or anything, and no matter how much she shifted, she couldn't find a comfortable position.
"So, you're from another world." He said this in a flat tone of voice, stirring a cup of coffee in one hand and writing something with the other. When she tried to take a peek, he swatted at her nose.
"Yeah. I know it sounds far-fetched, but that's why-"
"It's not 'far-fetched' at all," he interrupted, using sassy finger quotes to mock her. "Throughout history, many individuals have appeared, claiming to come from different worlds. The power of the Gate is to travel to between worlds. Don't be so arrogant as to think yourself exceptional."
He was kind of a dick.
"The thing that is exceptional," he said, "is that you can summon, even though you are not from Elgaia. You see, all humans have the innate ability to summon, but without proper training, it is impossible. The only group of people with enough resources to unlock a potential summoner's ability is the Akras Summoners' Hall." Somewhere during his spiel, he had stopped talking to her and started talking at her, spitting out ideas and facts and conjecture.
"Well, I did have a deep bonding experience with Lucius before arriving here. Maybe his involvement is related to my abilities," she quipped. "We braided each others' hair and talked about our feelings."
The kid ignored her hilarious joke and stared at his paper with enough intensity to set it ablaze.
He stood up, and then he was all up in her face. Was personal space not a thingin this world?
"Summon something," he ordered, hands on either side of her, grasping the cold stone armrests. His eyelashes were really long.
She sighed. "You know, you're rude. You've taken me to this weird facility, insulted me, and ordered me around like a lackey."
The air seemed to condense for a second, and then a Sparky appeared in her arms. She willed the Sparky to shock the hell out of the guy as she smushed it into his face.
Nothing nerve-damaging or burn-inducing, naturally. Something very painful would do.
"You haven't even told me your name," she said. The Sparky did exactly what she wanted, judging by the kid's startled yelp. He fell backwards, rubbing his cheeks vigorously.
His hair was standing up, haha. With a loving pat on the yellow mochi's head, she dismissed the summon. At her smirk, the boy scowled, and reached over and touched the exposed skin of her neck.
"Ow!" residual shock was a bitch. So was karma.
"For the record," he said after a moment, "I have no obligation to share my name with a possible criminal." One who has shown violent tendencies at that, she thought he muttered. "But my name is Noel. I'm head of the Akras Summoners' Hall's Research Lab."
"Wait, go back to the 'possible criminal' part, please," she said. She'd cover the 'prepubescent research head' topic later.
"Well, unauthorized possession of information, for one." Noel said, sticking up a single finger to emphasize his point. He lifted a second finger. "Destruction of Hall property. That's not explicitly stated, but ripping out pages from our Compendium leads to implicature that doesn't look very favorable on you. Who were you trying to give that information to?"
Welp. She was going to Summoner jail, or worse. Hopefully she wouldn't be executed in the public square and made an example of.
"And the third," a third finger came up, "unauthorized summoning ability. This has only happened once before, and the person was outside the purview of the Akras Summoners' Hall, so you're the first scenario that's relevant to us. How we handle your case will set a precedent for all other cases in the future." With his point made, he smoothed out his teal hair, walked back to his desk, and began writing so furiously that she could hear the scratch of the pen from where she was sitting.
What he was saying, then, was that she ran the risk of screwing over kids years from now. She sighed.
"Does it help if I say that I wasn't planning on doing anything nefarious with those pages?"
"Not really," Noel said, tearing down her hopes and dreams without blinking an eye. "Why did you have them, anyway?"
"Well, the Unit in question tore the pages out of the book, and I yelled at him for a little, but then we made nice, and he let me steal the pages back. I forgot I had them when I bumped into you."
The look he gave her was withering. She shrugged.
"I'm not lying. He took them because he didn't want information about him circulated but that didn't make sense, because these books are mass produced, so I think he just wanted the pictures of himself. He's kinda vain and these drawings are pretty cool."
The sound of writing stopped. In her explanation, she had let her eyes wander the gargantuan machinery of the lab, the wires and glass apparatuses of undiscernible nature, but at the silence, she turned to face her captor.
He looked up from his notes, eyes wide. "Could you repeat that again? Please," he added as an afterthought.
"Um, the illustrations in the Unit Compendium were really well-done, so Kuda wanted to steal his own." Probably. Kuda was hard to understand most of the time. All of the time, to be perfectly honest. Moreover, what was with this sudden change in atmosphere?
Noel looked back at his notes, manner sedate. "I see."
Then, silence. But this time, it was way less tense than before. Sure, Noel still looked like an angry little boy as he flipped through pages on his notepad and added to the cramped writing, but there was an extra overtone of contentment.
She felt like she was missing out on something.
"Your ability is quite high," Noel noted, "If you were able to control a Unit as high-ranked as Kuda."
Well, haha. Define control. Could anyone really control Kuda? She smiled sheepishly. "Well, the gems are the ones that do all the hard work, right?"
"That's a possibility," he agreed, "but you were also able to convey your will through the Sparky using only a mental connection. That type of synchronization only happens between an experienced Summoner and a Unit they have a particularly strong bond with. Most commands are given orally. While a Sparky is hardly a high-level Unit, your feat is impressive."
"Um, then how can summoners control Units that don't obey them? Isn't that kind of a mental connection?" Kuda had said as much during their Real Talk yesterday.
"It is usually done by using spoken word as a focusing point, too," Noel said. "It also takes vigorous training. First, the trainee learns to suppress any violent or disobedient traits in the Unit's personality, which leads to fewer accidents. It isn't foolproof by any means, however. This is why trainees study some form of weapon training, to protect themselves from monsters and their own Units equally. Summoners are assigned to squads, so they always have some form of backup. And even so, many Summoner squads have been wiped out by a single wayward Unit."
…Yup, those "dystopian horror" alarms were ringing pretty loudly now. The Units were pretty much turned into zombies, mutable to the Summoner's will, and in the worst-case scenario, some idiot children were slaughtered for their silly mistakes, and who knows what happened to the Unit.
"…so as a result, there is a rating system based on rank that dissuades rookie summoners from trying to control individuals who would kill them with little hesitation." Noel sighed. "Despite that, Elza still remains a desirable summon. It's baffling."
"I see. Thanks for the information," she said. "You're awfully forthcoming with it."
"Of course. I've no qualms with giving away sensitive information to a girl who will be executed in a few hours."
What? Her heart leapt to her throat, and she felt the urge to spring out of her chair and start running, no matter how stupid of an idea that sounded. She looked at Noel again, and…
"I didn't realize you were one to make jokes with a 'possible criminal,' she said, scowling and curling in on her chair. Noel's smile was brilliant and maybe it could have been cute, if Noel was not the devil incarnate.
"Well, now that I've gotten to speak with you, it seems implausible that you'd have the stones to defy the law," he said. That was an insult. Or was it a compliment? It was probably both.
She threw her shoe at him. With a slight tilt of his hips, he dodged with ease.
"So, judging by that pitiful attempt, you've not had any combat training." He tapped his chin. "That's worrisome, considering that your mysterious abilities have the capacity to place you in real peril."
"I've been okay so far," she protested. "Kuda tried to cut my throat when I first summoned him, but our relationship has progressed in spades since then. Look," and here, she gestured to her unblemished neck; the potion yesterday had healed every wound on her body, but Noel didn't need to know that, "throat in one piece."
"One day, you'll inadvertently call over some Unit with less self-control and less sanity than Kuda, and then we'll have to waste resources in cleaning your innards off the Rare Summon Gate, and assemble a team to wrangle your wayward Unit." Noel sighed, and gave her a look like she was a huge nuisance. "I've got to fix this. Be quiet for a few minutes, will you?"
When Noel had told her to "be quiet for a few minutes," he was lying like the filthy liar he was. He gave her an annoyed look and a flick to the forehead whenever she tried to engage/pester him, and refused to answer any of her questions.
She was pretty sure that Hell was sitting in a room, hungry, bored, and miserable while a boy barely five feet tall sat a few feet away, apathetic towards her withering.
So she started poking around the machines and supply closets. She didn't touch anything; this was scary science stuff. She liked having arms, thank you very much. The closets were neatly stocked with office supplies and were boring.
Maybe… she could summon someone to talk to? But then again, she felt guilty bothering Eze, and while she didn't feel any guilt over bothering Kuda, he could tolerate her for only about five minutes at a time.
Huh. Now that she thought about it, what exactly did Units do when they weren't being summoned by someone? Furthermore, could two of the same Unit be summoned at the same time? What stopped someone from summoning, like, a thousand of a single Unit and smothering the enemy?
Now, if only there was someone who was knowledgeable who could provide her with answers.
"Hey, Noel-"
"I need more data," he interrupted.
"Pardon?" He crumpled up the piece of paper he had been writing on, crumpled it up, and tossed it into the wastebasket across the room. It landed perfectly, like it was thrown by someone who had done it a thousand times before.
"I'd like to see you in combat," Noel said. "You can battle one of my experiments." He stood up, and with a billow of his coat, stalked to some machinery. With a dexterous strum of his fingers, the console came to life.
A single white door to his right slid open with a whoosh.
"Before we start, you should-" She stopped listening to him, because through the door, she saw someone she did not expect to see in Noel's laboratory, where he probably tortured small animals in for sport. She ran through the door.
The floor was cold concrete. She felt it through her sock. Bright light cast sharp shadows across the circular room, leaving nothing hidden. There was another door opposite the one she entered through, but that was sealed. She paid that no mind, though, her attention focused on the figure standing in the room's center.
Karl blinked. "Hello."
What.
"You're supposed to be on a mission," she said slowly, walking up to him. Upon closer scrutiny, it really was him. Not like she spent that much time staring at Karl's face or anything, but the gentle eyes and the soft cut of his features felt pretty accurate.
"Ah," he said, rubbing the back of his neck, "I'm not the real Karl. Rather, I'm a mock-Unit created by Noel. I'm sorry to confuse you." He smiled, and yup, that smile was absolutely Karl.
On the other hand, this was really creepy. In hindsight, most of the disturbing yet passable observations she had made about Noel before seemed much more sinister if she considered the possibility that he was insane and had a fixation on Karl to the point where he built a clone of him.
As a friend, she had the obligation to let him know about his creepy stalker. But if Noel had resources to this extent, and such a twisted mind, he could probably do horrible things to her. She shuddered.
"Oh, are you cold?" Not-Karl asked. He closed the distance between them, and wrapped his arms around her.
It wasn't that helpful – his skin was cool to touch, but physical contact calmed her down. Even when Karl's raw data was placed in Noel's probably-insane hands, the kindness stayed, huh?
An object flew from across the room and hit her in the back of the head.
"Your thoughts are projected perfectly on your face," Noel remarked, irritation perfectly projected on his face. He folded his arms and leaned on the doorframe. "You should have listened to my explanation before walking in here without guidance, and before drawing ridiculous conclusions about my interests."
"…What did you do to my shoe?" she demanded, distraught. Half of her favorite pair of Converse, that she spent an hour drawing patterns on in marker when she first bought, was mutilated. It couldn't be called a shoe in this state.
"Well, upon picking it up, I noticed that some of the material of your footwear was unlike anything indexed by the Summoners' Hall before, so I sequestered it. Consider it payment for the annoyance tax in this lab."
He didn't even wait for her to ask before delivering his punch line:
"The annoyance tax is something placed on excessively annoying people, but I'm sure you've surmised that already."
Not-Karl tightened his grip on her, which was good, because she was about to jump across the room and rip Noel's face off.
"It wouldn't do to injure the head of the Research Department," he said pleasantly. "You'd set back technological development in Elgaia for years."
"That's right," Noel said in a smug tone, hands in his pockets like the tiny, prepubescent tool that he was. He shifted his gaze to not-Karl. "You can let her go now. I'd like to proceed with Trial 001."
"Trial?" Noel gave her a dry look.
"If you'd taken the time to listen to me, we wouldn't be having this conversation." She was released from her blue prison, and Noel tossed her a pair of brown leather boots.
Rest in peace, Converse. She slipped them on, and was surprised at how comfortable they were.
"My most significant project involves the synthesis and testing of powerful Mock Units," Noel said, puffing up in pride like a bird. "Due to the instabilities and possible liabilities of using souls and relying on the gods, I've decided to put our precious soldiers' lives in the hands of technology, which is much easier to control." His face hardened. "That way, I can help protect the people who protect the citizens. Humanity in the hand of humans."
Hmm. Maybe Noel wasn't so bad, now that she learned about his motivation. His personality could almost be tolerated. Heck, by the end of the day, she might even like him.
"We've taken data from some of the strongest summoners in the Hall and replicated them into mock Units," he explained, nodding his head at not-Karl. "I wasn't aware that you knew him personally, though. But now that I take a look at you, you're wearing his old training clothes, correct?"
Since her hoodie was in pieces, she took some of the smallest clothes she could find in Karl's wardrobe. Hopefully it was something he hadn't worn in a while, so as to avoid cause him any inconvenience.
Noel squinted his eyes at her, as if concentrating. He smirked.
"Heh, I didn't think that guy was capable of being devious. So those pages were from his copy of the Compendium?"
Karl, devious? That sounded as likely as Michele being a pacifist. She nodded and gave him a questioning look, but Noel moved on.
"Currently, you're not even close to being strong enough to be collected for mock-Unit data." Wow, those were some pretty hardcore shots he had just fired. And they hit their mark, right in her feelings. "But you can help my research by facing my mock-Units in battle. I want them to be as strong as possible, so the number of people who can test my Units decreases as they become stronger. And if you beat my Units, I'll give you a nice reward, and you can keep the Unit, too."
She tilted her head. "You'd just give away hours of work and probably loads of money, just like that?"
Noel crinkled his nose. "I don't have use for a project that can be defeated."
Ouch. Mock-Karl was standing right there, Noel.
"Anyways, it gives me the chance to observe Unit strengthening under a summoner, and outside of laboratory conditions, so it's mutually beneficial."
Hm. That all seemed acceptable, so she nodded. Noel gave the clipboard in his hands a look-over, his gaze all-business. "Okay, let's start testing."
He took a single step backwards, and the door slid shut, sealing her in with the mock-Unit.
She fell to the floor, soaked to the bone and shivering. The forms of Eze, Kuda, and Michele (who had been oddly cooperative when placed directly in a battle situation) disappeared with a burst of white light.
"I don't really know what I was expecting," Noel said as he stepped in.
Mock-Karl gave her a hand up. "I hope we can fight again, when you've improved." Gosh, even Karl thought that she was pathetically weak. It had been a warm day, and the air-conditioning in the laboratory made her feel like she was standing in a deep freezer.
"Oh, don't be like that, now. While you were defeated spectacularly, it's not the worse I've seen people do against him. You were even able to take a few hits."
"How do you do that, Noel? The reading my mind thing."
"You're very transparent, Miss…" He trailed off.
He absolutely didn't know her name, but was too prideful to admit it. That was adorable. Noel reminded her of a really mean, spoiled cat. She pinched his cheek, and he smacked her arm away.
"Cut that out. You're dripping all over the floor," he snapped, cheeks red from her assault. "There's shower stalls at the end of the hall over there." He grabbed her wrist and guided her to a door.
"Bye!" she shouted over her shoulder, following a miffed Noel as he dragged her away. Mock-Karl responded a genial wave before the door to the battle room slid shut.
Upon exiting the lab, she was stricken by how different the rest of the building was. The cold tile floors became green carpet, and the black matte walls shifted to a pleasant yellow.
"The shelves should be stocked to your needs. I'll send someone to bring you clothes," Noel said as he stopped in front of a door.
He turned back to his lab, leaving her to her own devices.
That seemed tactically unwise. Or maybe Noel had just completely dismissed her as a threat at this point. She turned and entered the restroom, which was dimly lit and decorated with warm-colored tiles. A vanilla-scented candle burnt on the black marble sinktop.
She stripped, happy to remove the heavy, cold clothing from her body. Grabbing some random products from a shelf, she hopped into the shower. The hot water felt heavenly on her body.
So, day two of adventures in Grand Gaia had been pretty wild, too. It wasn't "other universes exist"-wild, but learning about things like mock Units and stuff was mind-blowing.
It was insane – Karl's mock Unit felt so similar to the real thing. She didn't think that she could distinguish between the two if they were placed side-by-side. And the fact that this living, breathing person was created from… well, she wasn't sure what mock-Karl was made out of. Did he have a soul? Was it synthetic? How did Noel manage to create something like that?
She'd have to visit him sometime. Being exposed to Noel for so many hours in a day had to suck. Or, she could get good and win him.
But there were three things wrong with that:
The weirdness of owning a Unit who was the perfect likeness of a friend.
The weirdness of owning a Unit. The Units she had met so far were their own people. Mock-Karl kind of sounded like he was created only for his summoner to use him in battle.
The difficulty of the task. Mock-Karl had been ridiculously powerful.
She wondered how he compared to the strength of the Four Fallen Gods. Considering that Lucius went outside of Elgaia for assistance, it meant that they had to be way stronger. And that meant that she had a really long way to go.
Moreover, why did Lucius pick her when there were myriad summoners who were more experienced than her? When Karl existed? It didn't make any sense.
Ugh. All of a sudden, she didn't want to step out of the shower and face her responsibilities anymore. She rinsed the shampoo out of her hair and thought about how she would have to apologize to her Units for getting their asses kicked. Michele said that she'd give her a single chance, and she used it up on this.
To top it all off, she still hadn't had any breakfast yet.
She turned the shower off, and stepped barefoot onto the tile, idly hoping that there wasn't some kind of fungal disease on the tiles. Dripping all over the floor, she grabbed a towel from the rack and wrapped it around her.
Noel said that there would be someone to send her clothes, but nobody-
"Oh, you're out already!" a chipper voice called out. A girl, perhaps a few years older than her, walked into the bathroom. "Noel rushed to have these made for you. Sorry for the wait! My name's Lin, by the way."
"Uh, hi there, Lin," the Summoner said, giving the green-haired girl her own name. Lin nodded vigorously, the expensive-looking headset she was wearing bobbing up and down with the motion, and handed the Summoner an opaque plastic bag.
"Here's your clothes! It's some of his better work, I think! He definitely takes care of new recruits pretty well," she said, giggling. "Anyways, I have some assignments, so I'll probably see you later!" Lin left with the same suddenness of her arrival.
How much coffee did she have to drink to be that energetic? She had called the Summoner a "new recruit," too. What did that mean?
Shrugging the questions away, she opened the bag, taking a look at what Noel had selected for her.
"Noel," she cried as she barged into the familiar laboratory/dungeon. "I love you."
"Stay at least five meters away from me," Noel warned, brandishing a menacingly sharp pen at her. Hah, as if a puny instrument of death could stop her from expressing her emotions. She launched herself at him, and she liked to think that it was because he loved her back that he didn't dodge.
"This is really cool! Thanks a lot!" she said, rubbing her cheek against his. Noel had set her up with some of the nicest clothes she had ever seen. A soft black turtleneck, a white vest, black shorts, and black high socks. Not to mention the awesome white armor-plated arm warmers and boots. And the utility belt. And the cape. Noel freaking gave her a cape.
She took back everything negative she said about him. A cape! She felt like an actual superhero when she wore it.
"Let go of me already-! You shouldn't wear that at your level anyway, you'll just trip over it-"
"Ahem." They turned to meet the steely-blue gaze of a small girl with neatly-trimmed black hair, holding a sheaf of papers in one hand arm. She looked vaguely amused at the scene. "I apologize for the wait. I'm ready to take the new recruit through orientation now."
Noel shoved her hard, and she landed on her butt with an oof.
"I regret even bringing you here in the first place," Noel muttered, face bright red.
"Wait, 'new recruit'? What does that mean?"
Noel ran a hand through his hair. "Well, your crime was the possession of information restricted to the Summoners' Hall. As a member of the army, I have no choice but to punish you for your crime. However, there's an easy way to nullify your infraction."
"…By recruiting me," she finished. Noel nodded.
"That way, the friend who lent you the book won't get in trouble, either. It's an ingenious solution."
Well, it sounded pretty faulty. She still committed the crime as a civilian, so she should be punished for the crime whether she was in the army or not. She chose not to point this out.
She also picked up on the fact that he was flagrantly blackmailing her by threatening to involve Karl.
"Of course, it'll help me keep records of you, too. Despite your insufferableness, you're still an anomaly," he said, "and anomalies must be investigated." He said this with an odd undertone to it, like he was holding a scalpel to one of her vital organs, and it made her hair stand on one end.
"Noel has explained your situation to us," the mysterious girl said, "and based on his evaluation, you've been accepted into the Akras Summoners' Hall. My name is Sera Starride of the Akras Administration Office, and you have my congratulations." She bowed.
The Summoner scratched her cheek. "Uh, thanks. I guess." What had Noel said about her that made the Hall accept her with such short notice?
"However, there are medical evaluations and forms that must be filled out," Sera said. "This is the first time where we've had an applicant with literally no pre-existing documents, so please forgive me if I make an error in the process. If you'll follow me, please."
And so, she was led through the winding halls of the Administration Building and subjected to one of the most painful, bloody tortures of her life:
Paperwork.
Remember when she said that Noel wasn't that bad and she retracted all the negative things she said about him?
Well, she retracted her retraction. This was completely his fault.
"You've finished. Thank you for being patient with me," Sera said, collecting the last bundle of papers and stuffing them into a black leather folder. The Summoner was slumped over a wooden desk, half-dead. She would say something sarcastic, but… she was way too tired. And Sera was so polite that she would feel bad being rude to the other girl.
"Ugh. What time is it now? Am I dead? Is time merely a construct of our own imaginations, meant to give our own futile existences meaning?"
Sera gave her a confused look. "Miss, it's currently seventeen hundred hours." She gestured to an open window, where bright sunlight flowed through.
"Oh. Thanks," she replied. "Can I go now?"
Sera nodded. "Yes, you can. Here is the standard package given to our applicants. This is one copy of The Akras Summoners' Hall Unit Compendium, one standard communicator for use on missions, one arena pass, one adventurer's backpack, one mailbox key, one metal god, three gems, and one summon ticket." All of the items were neatly arranged in the backpack, which the Summoner accepted with grace.
"I would give you our standard armor, but it seems that Noel has gifted you a custom set."
Sera then went behind the ornate white counter where she sat at, rummaged for something, and returned holding a silver key.
"This is a metal key, which I am responsible for distributing. We restrict passage into certain areas of the Vortex Gate to avoid overhunting of the energy-rich Units that live there, and this key will allow you access to the areas for an hour. You are entitled to one key a day, so please come by daily to pick them up." She bowed again.
The Summoner nodded in agreement, not really listening to Sera's words.
"This summon ticket is a coveted item that is rarely distributed by the Summoners' Hall. There are several machines standing by the Rare Summon gate, and when this ticket is fed to one of them, five gems will be dispensed to you, and you can summon a Unit at the expense of the Hall," Sera explained, handing the golden piece of paper to the Summoner.
"Thanks. I'll come back to you if I have any questions." It was an answer that she usually gave to teachers when she wanted them to leave her alone, and it worked well on Sera. The bespectacled girl nodded, and wished her a good day.
The Summoner left the building with the weariness of a war veteran. Stumbling like a zombie, she desperately searched for the one item that would save her from certain death.
Caffeine...
Maybe she had screeched like a banshee when she approached a café, and maybe that wasn't the proudest moment of her life. But she was caffeinated now, and color returned to her vision again. After a quick fifteen minute nap in the park, she was revitalized and ready to go. Thanks, lifehacks subreddit.
So, thanks to her hijinks, she had a backpack and proper clothes. She also had food now. All that left was a bit more shopping and research. She decided to cancel the adventuring plans for the day, considering how severely her squad had been beaten down by Mock-Karl. Hopefully, Tilith wouldn't be too mad at her, or accuse her of slacking off.
She would cook them a "sorry for losing we don't suck that horribly" dinner. And maybe grovel at Michele for a few minutes and beg for her mercy.
After wandering aimlessly for an hour, she finally found buildings that looked familiar. Holding bags full of crockery (Karl didn't have many plates in his house) and food ingredients (especially meat, and something that resembled a potato but was blue?) she had purchased at ridiculously low prices (around two thousand zel), she opened the door to Karl's house. Placing the bags on the floor, she figuratively rolled up her sleeves and began working.
"…What is this?" Kuda asked, staring down at his plate.
"It's poached octopus with pomegranate," she replied. Well, it was a tentacle creature strongly resembling an octopus, and a fruit that she was pretty sure was a pomegranate. The taste turned out to be sufficient. The slimes under the table seemed to enjoy the makeshift blue potato salad she made, anyway.
All the produce and ingredients here were slightly off. She hadn't made a major faux pas yet, but one day she would put a pink carrot in a soup and end up killing her whole squad, or something.
Eze shoveled his entire portion down his throat, and asked/demanded for a second portion. She obliged.
Kuda gave the swordsman a sidelong glance, condescending sneer apparent. Luckily, Eze was so engrossed in eating that he didn't notice. Which was good.
Fights at the dinner table would not be tolerated.
"If you want something less weird, I can prepare you another dish." She had friends who had quailed from her signature poached octopus during their first encounter, but they had all been converted to the dark side over time. "Like gruel."
She turned to Michele, who had been picking at her food. "I can make something for you too, Michele, and not gruel. Anything you want," the Summoner said, voice rising in nervousness.
The blonde looked startled that the Summoner had initiated conversation. "…It's fine," she said, averting her gaze.
Okay, that was horrifyingly out-of-character for her. Did Michele catch a cold from their battle, or something? Fire-types were weak to water-types, right?
Kuda raised an eyebrow. "This isn't a problem," he said.
He picked up a fork and reached for his food. She watched with trepidation. How did Kuda eat? Would he Kakashi Hatake his meal? Put on another mask, maybe?
He raised a hand-
-and pulled down his mask, and started eating.
Oh.
"This isn't bad," he commented, chewing on the octopus. "I didn't expect someone like you to be a decent cook." After a beat: "…Why are you giving me that look?"
"It's nothing," she said, surprised that he ate in such pedestrian ways. Fiction had made her think that all mask-wearers were sociopathically averse to showing their faces.
"Heh, are you stunned by my face? Most people who see it don't live to tell the tale." He winked.
Eze snorted. "More like she was stunned by your hideousness."
"I'm surprised that you know a word with that many syllables, moron."
"What did you-"
The Summoner sighed, rubbing her temples. This was only the appetizer; how was she going to get through her other courses?
Of course, there was the oddly sullen Michele that she had to worry about, too.
"-And then noodles went flying everywhere and Eze knocked over a row of Karl's potted plants, so I got mad at him and left the house. I guess he felt bad, cleaned up, and dismissed himself?" She wondered if Kuda had helped. Probably not. "So when I left, I decided to use that Summon Ticket that Sera gave me. And now I have you."
"I see," Zephyr replied. He hadn't expected such a lengthy, profanity-riddled reply, but it had been both informative and interesting, so he couldn't complain.
She nodded. "I guess I have to do something to show Eze that I'm not really angry with him. Tomorrow," she said, tilting her head. "Anyways, would you like some food? Sorry that they're leftovers."
It was interesting. By all accounts, the Units used in summoning did not require any sustenance aside from the summoners' power. This was a widely-known fact, except by the girl who was bouncing around the small house like a child, apparently.
He wondered why the Units she had offered food hadn't told her. At that level, dining was only a symbolic act, one of communion-
-ah. He understood now.
"I'd like that," he said. The Summoner beamed and unstrapped the pot from her stomach, placing it in the pantry.
"Alright, then! I think Kuda ate all the octopus, but there's still noodles and I'll heat them up-"
An opening of a door stopped her sentence. Zephyr's hand flew to his waist. He hadn't anticipated a third element in the house.
"M-Michele?" the Summoner said, incredulous. "Have you been here this entire time?"
The aristocrat ignored the other girl's query. Her sharp candy-apple gaze swept over him momentarily, eyes glimmering with recognition. Then they turned to the Summoner.
"I need to speak with you," Michele said to her, voice terse.
Noel is the head of R&D for the Akras Summoners' Hall. A genius, and knows it. Values his research above all else.
Lin is an upbeat worker from the Survey Office. Her job is to communicate with summoners in the field, manage explorations into unknown territories, and manage the various seasons of Frontier Hunter.
Sera is a guide from the Administration Office. She is responsible for maintaining information on all Summoners and distributing Metal and Jewel Keys. Serious and strait-laced.
And now the anachronism is over, and we are back in regular time.
Here's a longer chapter for taking forever, again. I'm kind of brain-dead right now, so I'll send my (severely overdue) responses to messages in the morning. I think I write more when school is in session, oddly enough.
Apologies if this chapter was dry to read – I've got to do that world-building thing! I honestly have no idea currently how to explain duplicate Units and bringing a friend's Unit into a dungeon. I might throw in an OC or two to make the process less painful, so sorry in advance if you have a horrible aversion to OCs.
I love writing rude, snippy, smartass characters, which is why Kuda's always a joy to write, and I had a blast with Noel. It's hard to imagine being that caliber of prodigy in the military and not being an arrogant tool. I have a secret theory that he is a huge geek who's made a mock-Unit of himself, and the Unit is ridiculously OP.
I know that each trial is 50 stamina and the Summoner wouldn't be able to even attempt it at her level, but I've got to mix it up somehow. Linearly progressing through each quest region would kill me. Groans I can't believe we're still only at the Forest of Beasts
…Imagine facing Karl with only a 2* Eze, 4*Kuda, and 4*Michele, though. Scary.
In other news, I've posted a variety of story ideas on my profile page, and I'd be happy if you'd check them out and vote for what you think is most interesting. Thanks for doing that, if you do.
And thanks for reading.
-eris