Bonded Summoner

Book 4. Chapter 34: Epilogue

Ophelia blocked the large tunneling wurm with her floating shield, as she chopped powerfully with her halberd’s axe into the creature, decapitating it. Its body continued to writhe in its death throes, but she continued on to the next target.

Bloodberri spun her tail in a dangerous weave of death as she swayed side to side, smashing into one wurm with her maul, as her tail cut into others attempting to latch on their star-like mouths onto her armor.

Tanda fired her bow next to Jake, targeting giant hornets and ants with tangling thornwood vines. The battlefield was hectic, and she took to reducing the enemies' mobility to keep them from being surrounded.

She had created a thick, tall ring of vines with a space cut out of it, that Jake and her operated out of. It limited both the ant and hornet’s approach, many opting to come into the somewhat small opening to attack Jake and her rather than coming from any direction.

Fhesiah danced outside the ring of vines with her fan, her waves of flames covering the horde of ants. Her dragon claw reaped the foes too fast and aggressive to wait for her flames to kill them, but she danced out of the way of dozens as her flames burned them down. She drew in the flames from those killed, only to send them out once more.

Bree the Heroic Boar stomped over the creatures near Jake, her flaming vines twisting and grabbing onto any creature that made it through the gap Tanda had left open. Bree grabbed hornets right out of the air, or spewed flames in front of her to destroy large waves of ants.

Jake shivered thinking how many lives this massive army had reaped. Dozens of small Rifts had gone unchallenged for far too long, spewing out these creatures for days or weeks until they reached a critical mass. Three or four of them had been pushed to become larger rifts, and bosses spawned to lead the lesser creatures to take out everything in the surrounding area.

When the storms ended, they left Life’s Haven. After less than a day of travel, they arrived East to where they saw the largest cluster of Rifts. There, they found much devastation. Two large cities the size of Cascadia were destroyed, but Jake was hopeful of people managing to flee.

There were few signs of conflict within the city’s walls, and no corpses of the insects or the beastkin. He supposed insects would be likely to consume the remains of either, but he believed the people had warning.

The creatures were all capable of tunneling, except for the hornets, but those clearly spawned above ground. Jake could see how they would be mobile on Highlands, though they were not overly strong on their own.

Jake completed his Summon, the Garuda appearing in motes of light. Its large wing blade immediately cleaved four ants in two with a horizontal swing, and it blurred through the battlefield as it made short work of the level 20 creatures. Bree left their protective barrier, moving to join the unique creature on its assault.

He had summoned it a few times over the last few days, and he was satisfied with its effectiveness. It took more mana than the mere reserves the girls took, but Jake had a hard time being more efficient with his mana to defeat or defend against enemies, other than his Aura powering his girls or his army.

The big expenditure from having the creature out, was its cyclonic slash that it did. It took a fair percentage of Jake’s mana each time it did it, and he would have a hard time allowing it to accomplish what it did when fighting the death dragon; it would drain him completely dry to use the three attacks in quick succession.

Unlike the Heroic Beasts, it had no problems being called for anything. Ophelia had dueled the creature many times at this point now, and Jake was quite happy for it. It pushed her to new heights, facing a foe that was just as mobile as her in many ways.

Its reach was longer than hers, the creature taking a form about the size of Bloodberri, so she had difficulty besting it.

The creature was at least as fast as Ophelia, cutting through creatures rapidly. Its wing-blade cleaved through creatures with ease, using wind to enhance its swings. Each swing took some mana from Jake, but he could keep up with the effect. Bree stomped alongside the creature, slicing through enemies and blowing out flames.

It even gathered Jake’s Heavenly Aura around its blade, somehow managing to send flames in waves. A lesser attack, it dealt with the horde of enemies efficiently.

Ophelia sent out a wave of flames with [Consecration], an echo of the attack coming out of Jake as well, covering dozens of the wurms and insect creatures even outside Jake and Tanda’s barrier of vines.

Ophelia’s shield filled with her [Hearth of Hestia] inside blocked the massive Elite Hornet that dove at her, as Bloodberri slammed into the Elite Wurm’s mouth with her [Maul of Hestia-Echidna].

Its jaws shattered and a large portion of its head went missing as light and dark were sent out in waves, then Bloodberri wrapped her snake body around the wurm. She crushed and shredded the creature’s body at the same time, her armor, and strength cutting through the creature’s flesh.

Ophelia cut through the Elite Hornet’s wing, sending it careening toward the ground. She dove with her lance head covered in auril and infused with her powerful runes, piercing deep into the large creature’s skull. It shook in its death throes, the boss monster dead.

Jake’s powerful Summons cut through the numerous ants, fighting toward a giant Ant Queen. Its massive body would spawn more ants by the moment, thankfully, the creatures forming in motes of light as if summoned.

It appeared its pace was ramped up by being in combat, likely only spawning a few per hour outside of it. Otherwise, it wouldn’t take long until a valley was filled with ants. There were many here, but it was more reasonable than what would be present from a dozen spawned per minute.

Fhesiah dragged her large amount of flames across the battlefield, dipping into her reserves heavily. Bree blew a large gout of flames into it, adding onto the attack. Fhesiah drew up a large orb of flame, combining it from the many dying creatures, and raised it into the air. Jake’s Garuda swung its wing blade behind it, sending a large cyclonic strike into her flame.

Flames combined into the cyclone, widening it and empowering the flames with the wind. It became more like a horizontal fiery tornado, and it raged through the mass of ants and crashed into the Ant Queen, shredding and burning it and everything leading up to it to cinders.

Tanda’s vines had been lit aflame by Jake’s consecration echo, and she used her new skill, [Plant Control], to unravel and roll her vines into the many enemies. She lost control as the vines died, but had been able to capture and kill many ants. She fired her bow in rapid succession, targeting the stragglers as they approached her and Jake’s fortified location.

The bosses killed, the insects and remaining wurms went into disarray. Jake and his girls along with the Garuda cleared out the hundreds of enemies, and Jake and Ophelia finally reached level 23 as a result. Once completed, he allowed the Garuda to disperse into motes of light, keeping the creature out too taxing.

[Spell Learned: Reverse Summon]

[Transport self to nearby Summons, distance limited by bond strength. Has no distance limit for Hearth-bonded Summons, but time and mana cost increases over distance.]

Ophelia cheered, bounding into Jake. “This changes everything! We’ll easily be able to make two efforts now. Fhesiah, Tanda and I can travel in one direction, and you can travel with Bloodberri and Ira in the other. We can hit Rifts with four out of five of us, like we were doing before without Fhesiah.”

The mobility problem for Clan Hart was now solved. Jake’s party would now be able to fight all day long, crushing Rifts faster than they could be formed. He could even send girls home to the HQ easily using his Refuge portal, making it easy for them to defend Cascadia, Life’s Haven and Harmony Peaks if it came down to it.

Unlike [Call Summon], the spell was much slower. He could sort-of use it in combat, but it wasn’t an emergency movement spell. Perhaps with Ira’s assistance it could be sped up, but he doubted using it for anything other than traversing a large portion of the battlefield.

It would have been useful in the Nature’s Crossroads assault to move between armies. The cost was low enough for doing so that he knew he would make use of it.

Currently, even transporting him across a typical battlefield for them took him nearly ten seconds. He would travel over the void in a near instant, but the cast time would take longer depending on the distance. Traveling across the continent would take him several minutes, but that was a massive advantage for him.

Fhesiah smiled. “Ah, yes, this is cause for celebration, husband. Let’s hurry over to Lakemere, so we can have some fun. To be clear, the kind with much less clothing.”

Tanda frowned as she stilled her breathing to resonate with the song of the world. She paused a moment, then sighed. “I’m excited to celebrate too, but things aren’t looking good.”

Blood nodded. “That’s right. You can’t have two cities destroyed and not have thousands of refugees. I’m sure the Alliance Nodes help with disaster relief, but there are limits.”

Jake grimaced. This was hardly the first time they would be aiding people that had their homes destroyed.

Ophelia said, “I’ll start heading there with Ira, and Jake can try out his new spell? There’s a lot of cleanup left here, after all.”

“Go ahead. We’ll meet up with you. Stay safe.”

Ophelia blazed off in a hurry, Ira traveling through the void with her. Jake knew her pace was close to two hundred miles per hour when she was by herself, and not carrying Jake or a HQ Node.

Fhesiah groaned as she looked at all the bugs. “It’s good that I have [Looting] now too, but this is a little much. This is an army’s worth of materials, and an army’s worth of work. It was bad enough we had to slay them, but now we have to clean them up, too?”

Despite her complaints, she was the first to trigger her skill on a nearby bug. Bree the Heroic Boar remained, looking on in amusement. Jake narrowed his eyes on her.

“How about you help? If you gather and arrange the bodies for us, this will go a lot quicker.”

Bree raised her snout, giving a look of derision. Jake could feel how angry this made Blood; for the creature to look down on her lord like this. Of course, Jake wasn’t happy about this either.

Jake took on a stern tone, and pushed his [Presence] to the maximum.

“I don’t know what you are, or how you hijacked that creature you now inhabit. But you are my Summon, and you will obey my commands.”

Jake imposed his will on the summon, as he would often direct creatures–enhanced by his desire for control. His force of will slammed into the creature, and to his shock, Bree fought back. He was reminded of when he captured the Naga and how the creature railed against his will as he attempted to capture it.

Bree was clearly more powerful than the Naga, and in a way he couldn’t truly understand. Her will towered over him like a mountain, his command washing over her easily. Jake nearly gave in at the insurmountable task, but he redoubled his will as Blood inspired him with her respect, her desire to see him stand above all else as her lord and husband.

His resonance and covenant for Runebound took on that of a Monarch, him quickly finding it thanks to Blood. His armor glimmered gold, the runes brightening. Jake’s will grew sharply, and now the mountain didn’t seem impossible to beat.

But it was now like an arm wrestling match, where Bree was still clearly stronger. His loss was almost inevitable, her strong will of…whatever she was, unrelenting. He could feel a sort of nobility, a pride that was nearly ancient.

From her, he felt she would not bow down to this child, him only barely begun down the path of power. How he understood this feeling, he was not sure.

So Jake gathered the Hearthflames of his family, Fhesiah’s Qi and Tanda’s auril energy, and even some of his Divine Essence into his soul where he felt his link to her was, and pushed back. Jake might be young and inexperienced in the greater scheme of things, but he was a Champion of a Goddess he had great respect for.

He empowered his wives, as they empowered him to accomplish feats that he knew were rare even on a cosmic scale. Jake had every reason to be proud of his strength, and if this creature was going to piggyback on his ally and friend’s, the Celtic Gods gift, it would bend to his will.josei

Now it was like his mountain slammed into hers, his will pressing against her with righteous might. He added his resolve and conviction, his desire to command this ancient creature. Jake had respect for beasts and nature, and the want for such a special monster to do his bidding increased.

Now his will was pushing hers back, the proverbial arm-wrestling match now in his favor. He pushed against her as she railed against his might, but her will crumbled. Jake’s will overwhelmed hers, and covered her soul. Something shifted, and he thought it was a good idea to use his [Bind Summon] ritual.

He reached through the connection, his Hearthflames filled with all their unique energies entering and binding Bree, the Heroic Boar. Jake had no idea why he needed to, but he wasn’t about to question his gut feeling.

His binding layered itself over Bree’s soul, him feeling the connection to the–now even stranger being than he imagined. His impression was more like, rather than his binding encompassing her soul, it was like he stamped a small mark or brand on her foot.

The petals and leaves all over Bree lit up, the creature seemingly blushing, before she dispersed into motes of light.

“What–After all that, she left anyway?” Jake searched his connection, finding that it was somewhat cut off for the moment.

Blood and Fhesiah laughed, the two really enjoying what just happened.

Fhesiah shook her head. “That was exciting! What a strange situation. I wanted to help, but I thought it would be a bad idea. That has me a bit hot and bothered, seeing you impose your will like that on that special creature, husband. I can see why the boar had trouble with that.”

Blood beamed. “That was wonderful, Milord. You were so…commanding. I wish we had some time to…”

Tanda laughed. “Y-Yeah. I think I like that a lot too…”

Jake looked over at his girls. Completely decked out in armor, their equipment covered with monster guts and the blood of their enemies. They dominated their enemies on the battlefield, yet in the bedroom…all except Ophelia, anyway.

He shook it off. Tracing his connection once more, he felt an odd desire that he wasn’t sure what to make of, and mirth. He followed it, and realized it was the heroic hound. His fight against Bree’s will was strange, and took a lot out of him. Should he risk it? He could summon another creature to help them with clean up.

But summoning the creature was not a waste, as it would join their next fight, at least. He went ahead and summoned the hound. Appearing in motes of light, the noble hound appeared.

Jake now had a strange connection to the hound, he could tell much more easily now that she was here. It was bizarre, as he could tell that this entity was in fact different from Bree in some way, yet connected.

He stared at her for a long moment, trying to get a feel for the creature. He hadn’t named it yet due to the haste in which it was originally summoned–to help with stopping the Naga’s river attack in Life’s Haven.

The hound somehow knew the situation, and Jake could tell that if he tried his feat again, things probably wouldn’t go too well. She wouldn’t want to clean up the monster corpses.

Groaning, he almost thought that this was a waste, but then he realized something as he searched her feelings.

“You don’t want to clean up the mess, since you didn’t make it–or didn’t enjoy the battle. So how about… You’ll get to take part of the next one.” He supposed that was kind of fair? Summoning an ancient being to merely clean up a mess someone else made would feel like he didn’t respect them.

She sniffed, and shook her head. It appeared his offer was not good enough. He thought for a moment, then smiled.

He pulled out a rack of ribs of cooked Heroic Boar. Already glazed in sauce, the meat was dripping in vitality and life energies–and even mana. Jake had captured the essence of the creature and enhanced it using various auril herbs and spices, and even used a fruit much like blueberries from Highlands to create it. These pork ribs with his special glaze were absolutely delicious.

Tanda’s mouth watered, and she looked on in envy–if Ophelia was here, she just might fight the Hound for it. Jake smiled. “Later, my mate. So how about it, Isolyn? Help us clean up, and you can enjoy this now.”

Jake resorted to bribing. He wasn’t sure what the result would be, but he could see the hound was sniffing the air, more than interested. She didn’t salivate or drool, but her ears were more at attention and her tail’s movements were almost more like a cat’s.

Jake could tell that she liked her new name, a twist on the name of Isolde. He had learned it meant ice ruler, or beautiful. Isolyn put her paw in front of her as if to offer for a shake–an acceptance of the deal. He was happy to give the large paw a shake.

To his surprise, he could tell Isolyn wanted him to heat it up for her. He created a flame, quickly warming the meat to what he considered the appropriate temperature.

She grabbed the meat with her vines, taking a bite of the offering. Finding it acceptable, she then quickly chewed through the offering; bone and all. Licking her face of any extra sauce, he could tell she was more than pleased with her meal.

Vines grew out from her more rapidly, and she began dragging the corpses together for use of the Looting skill. Jake sighed, it would only save them a little bit of time, being able to sit and rest while using Looting. When objects were close enough and with their skill having increased, they could spend more energy to loot them.

It didn’t cost much mana, but it did add up. Jake had to recover from the fight and prepare for the next one anyway.

Fhesiah, Blood and Berri dutifully triggered their skill on the many corpses, Jake and Tanda following suit. They killed hundreds of the creatures, and each one was worth hundreds, to the low thousands of T1 Credits.

They worked through their chore, maintaining their resources for when they got called. After having worked through over half of the corpses, Jake felt alarm over their bond, Ira picking up some fleeing beastkin.

It was more than just a few. Ophelia confirmed that thousands were crossing the mountains, climbing the mountain with children to head both away and to Lakemere from different areas. People were both heading towards and fleeing the city in question, perhaps not knowing the situation.

They were extremely lucky that Jake and his party wiped out this large army, as the hornets likely would have attacked them in short order.

While Jake and his party could help these people, it was important for them to reach Lakemere, so Ophelia continued as they finished their cleanup.

Tanda said, “It looks like it’s a good thing Mysticus picked this way, huh? Between East and West, East had the most good fortune.”

Jake shook his head. “It was a close thing. It’s more that West was too chaotic. By heading to Lakemere, it was clear the outcome was good. We just have to trust that Morwen and Yiming are making out well to the West. The divinations and calculations seemed to show us heading here first was best. Whether it’s a timing thing or some sort of butterfly effect thing is anyone’s guess.”

Fhesiah was still processing some of her kill energy, her too reaching level 23.

She said, “Divinations can be like that. The enemy may be making predictions too. They can move as a result of our movement, picking a course of action as a result of ours. Tartarus is a complicated enemy, and the best we can do is never show weakness, and hit them with overwhelming strength.”

Blood and Berri smiled, as Berri tapped the haft of her maul against her palm repeatedly, a motion that Jake didn’t think normal for such a large weapon. “I can do it! I’ll smash them all! Only 30% until the Raid and we make babies!”

Tanda laughed. “Is that all? With Berri that energetic, I bet we’ll have Tartarus beat in no time.”

Jake felt a bit of alarm at that, the time now feeling a little too near. As much as he thought he was ready to be a parent, he still worried. Being a Champion was hard enough already. Still, looking at Berri’s eager smile, he would just have to push down his worry. There was no way he wasn’t going to make her happy.

Fhesiah wrapped her armored body around Jake. “Aw, husband, do not worry. With four, five mommies, depending on how you look at it, being a dad will be a breeze. If it’s too much work, we can always get some servants. It’s unfortunate Rhia wouldn’t make a good nanny.”

Berri said, “She might! When she’s full from living on Highlands, accidents are difficult to happen, their control over eating the living much higher. Then, she could wear some baseball– er, soft gloves!”

Blood sighed. “She definitely just imagined Rhia wearing baseball mitts carrying our daughter first, by the way. Still, I doubt our children will be nearly as fragile and as much work as a human child, Milord. A Dark Lamia child could win against a human adult from Earth shortly after birth. Echidna said her race would be even more powerful.”

Jake wasn’t sure how to feel about that, and that detail seemed to increase his feelings of worry instead. However, his thoughts were interrupted by Ophelia arriving at Lakemere.

[It looks like Lakemere is actually under siege, several undead Necromancers leading a fairly large army. It should be no problem for us, but we should hurry. It looks like many are in need of resurrection.]

Jake prepared his [Reverse Summon] spell to quickly join Ophelia. The fight on Highlands was entering the final stages. They had various paths of advancement remaining, and they would push the invaders off of this world after clearing the two Greater Rifts and the Raid.

Highlands would be forever changed, and Hearthtribe would be borne as a powerful fighting force that would shock the Sector.