Chapter 33

King Fenard was very good at convincing others to do his bidding, but in this instance the boy barely put up any resistance. Simply volunteering the necessary funds to get the newly summoned person on his or her feet was sufficient to convince him to use his Summon ability once more. Fenard had been expecting some resistance from someone, perhaps Antoine or even Jessica, but everyone seemed fine with his suggestion that they bring another person through the veil between worlds.

“They might be upset when they arrive,” Jessica pointed out, which was as much objection that anyone brought up. “If Summon only brings through people who have died, then it would make sense that some of them would be traumatized and very confused. I mean, I wasn’t traumatized since I knew I was dying, but I was very, very confused when I woke up.”

“Even if they emerged from a life-and-death struggle and respond with violence, it should be of little concern to restrain them,” the king argued. “They will, after all, emerge from the portal at level one. Even if they are Heroes with powerful abilities, I sincerely doubt that they will know how to use them against us until they’ve had time to adjust to their new bodies.”

“Also pretty sure they’ll be naked,” Jessica said. “So, yeah, we’ll want to have clothes ready for them.”

They spent the latter half of their dinner planning the summoning ceremony. There wasn’t terribly much to it, however. The king ordered the servants to have a few sets of different sized clothes set out, and a set of robes and blankets were carried out to the Alpha Core where it stood next to the pond, at the new entrance to its Dungeon.

“I’ve never seen a Controller use this ability before,” Fenard admitted.

“It’s not very exciting,” Sevin said. “I mean, there’s some lights and then a weird twisting light and then a naked person shows up. That’s it.”

Fenard snorted. “I think there is somewhat more to the process than that.”

Tom stood before the monolith that he had turned Alpha Core into, holding out a hand to commune with it. He sensed the dungeon beneath, which he had just finished setting up a few hours ago, and he sent a sort of contentment from the stone.

“I’m going to do it,” Tom warned. “Last chance to tell me to stop.”

“I’m quite convinced that I want you to do this, Tom,” Fenard assured him. “It sounds like Earth has swung significantly ahead of Welsius in terms of technology, and while I realize that chances are slim that I will gain one of their scientists or experts in any field, even an unskilled summonee from Earth will likely possess the powers of a Hero. I vow that whoever arrives will be the responsibility of the crown, so there is no reason for you to hesitate at this precipice.”

“If you’re certain,” Tom said.

He pressed a hand against the stone and activated his Skill. Once again symbols began flashing in the air, some of which hurt just to look at. A circle appeared hovering over the ground filled with geometric shapes and arcane sigils.

Hundreds of the miles to the north, Gamma and Beta Cores also activated. They sent their aid to the primary core of their developing network as it cast out a net into the spaces between worlds, seeking suitable souls to bring into this one.

Three cores to power the ritual. Three souls were captured.

Fortunately, although the ritual was overcharged by the Linked cores, the ritual to give them flesh was located in a safe zone of the Weaver estate, rather than in the core rooms of monster inhabited dungeons.

A bright flash of light, and within the ritual circle, three people appeared. They were without clothes, two men and a woman. While they were summoned on their feet, they promptly collapsed as the ritual finalized and they were given flesh.

Fenard himself gave in to a moment of shock at the unexpected direction that the Summoning had taken before barking instructions to the servants to cover the newest arrivals into his kingdom. Fortunately the servants had brought enough blankets for all three of them.

“Why,” Fenard asked once things were beginning to calm down, “Are there three?”

Tom shifted. “I didn’t know that was going to happen either,” he said, “But I think I know why. I’ll explain it when we get back inside.”

~~~~~~~

Grant finished dressing himself, examining his appearance in the mirror. He was still uncertain what was happening. Awakening naked and disoriented in a room with a pile of clothes which would more or less fit him, he had taken the necessary steps which modesty demanded. He was not alone; a man named Antoine, younger than Grant, was there, although the stranger had said little more than a friendly greeting, an encouragement to get dressed and make himself comfortable, and a promise that things would be explained soon.

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At least Antoine was younger than Grant had been, Grant thought, examining himself in the mirror. It was very clear that something extraordinary was going on. His final memories before awakening here were of the hospital. He had taken his oxygen mask off to kiss his wife goodbye, then fallen asleep as the drugs that the doctor had given him for the pain in his chest had kicked in. It had been his third heart attack, and, he suspected, his last.

“So then,” Grant said, “There is an afterlife, after all. That is a relief.”

“This world isn’t exactly a paradise, if that’s what you’re expecting,” Antoine informed him from the other side of the modesty partition. “May I ask how you died?”

“Only if I may ask how it is that I came back to life,” Grant answered.

“This is a world of magic and skills,” Antoine explained. “One young man has the power to summon Heroes from beyond the pale. He used that ability, and you are what came through this time. There is more to it, but that’s the general gist of things.”

“I see,” Grant said, although his mind was reeling. “Well, there is plenty of time to discuss the nuances, I suppose. To your question, I passed away from heart disease. It seems that my new body is rather younger than my old one. It appears that I have reverted to my early twenties, while I died a man just into his eighties.”

“May I ask what you did on Earth?” Antoine inquired.

“I was retired,” Grant answered. “Before that, I was a mayor in a small rural town. That itself was a sort of retirement. I served four terms as a congressman before that, and one as a senator.”

“American?”

“Yes. How about you, my friend? Who are you and what can you tell me about this world? And you said that I was brought here by a young man? I would very much like to meet him and shake his hand.”

“That can probably be arranged,” Antoine agreed. “Let’s go back down to the dining hall. The others you arrived with will probably be dressed shortly, and it will be easier to explain things all at once.”

Across the hall, Aisha was having rather less success in dealing with her new circumstances. Jill and Jessica were with her, and although they were helping her to dress, she kept expecting to wake up back in her old body, shivering and shaking as the malaria wracked her system.

“This is a hallucination,” she informed her companions clinically. “I am not really here. I am in a hut in Nandi county. The fever will break soon, and I will awaken.”

Her hands were shaking as she buttoned up the dress she had been given; just because she was hallucinating did not mean that she was the sort who would run around naked. Not when the hallucination gave her the opportunity to do something about it.

“I thought so too at first,” Jessica informed her. “I’m from Earth as well. May I ask where you’re from? I’m American, but given that we’re speaking a language that doesn’t exist on Earth, it’s hard to place your accent.”

Aisha frowned. Because there was something to that statement that was strange. She was speaking in a language that she’d never studied. She spoke four already. Luo, Swahili, English, and a bit of French. She had been working on that last one yet when the sickness had hit her, but the other three she spoke fluently.

Except now she spoke five languages instead of four.

“It’s just part of the fever-dream,” she assured herself calmly. “There is nothing here that will harm me. I must not be frightened. I will endure and awaken when the fever has passed and the antimalarials have done their job.”

“Malaria? I’m sorry,” Jessica said. “I had leukemia. That’s what killed me. But you have a second chance now, Aisha. It’s really pretty awesome. We have to get you back out to the stone to see what sort of class you unlocked, but its--”

Aisha wasn’t listening. There was no point. However real this hallucination felt, it was not real, and she would awaken soon.

In another room down the hall, Emil was patting his chest. He had put on pants, but remained shirtless as he touched the place where the mugger had stabbed him.

“One hundred and fifty euro,” he said, shaking his head. “I died for one hundred and fifty euro.”

Sighing, he put on the shirt that Nigel handed him and began buttoning it. He had not processed that he was dying while he lay in the gutter after being stabbed, but he processed it now. He analyzed the encounter with the mugger, thinking of what he could have done differently; how he could have fought back, run away, done something other than simply allow the man to stab him in the chest and take his wallet.

“One hundred and fifty euro,” he said again. “I should never have gone to Germany. Why did I take that vacation? I died for one hundred and fifty euro, and some credit cards.”

In yet another room, the king was waiting for an explanation. He was patiently tapping his foot while Tom looked out the window to where the Alpha Core was glittering in the setting sun.

“I didn’t know that three would come through until I was halfway through using the skill,” Tom explained at last. “But I know why.”

“I’m listening,” Fenard said. “I assure you I’m not upset, if that’s a concern. If anything it’s the opposite. It is simply that I’ve never heard of a Summoning in which more than one person arrived.”

Tom exhaled. “I’ve already selected a subclass.”

Fenard abruptly stopped tapping his foot. “I would be very pleased if your next words were ‘I’m an inheritor,’ but I understand that--”

“I was given three options,” Tom continued. “Inheritor, Conqueror, and Progenitor. I chose the last one.”

King Fenard froze. “I’ve never heard of that subclass before.”

“Neither has Antoine or … anyone else I guess,” Tom said. “That I know of at least. But then I didn’t know what a Controller was before I was one. Shortly after I got the subclass, I unlocked a skill for it. At least I think it’s a Progenitor Skill. It’s called Link, and I think that’s the reason why three people were summoned instead of one. When I conquered the three dungeons on the way here, I also Linked them together.”

Fenard’s mind raced as he processed this information. He could think of a thousand questions, but he couldn’t expect that the boy would know the answers to any of them.

“Well, I don’t think that you’ve done anything wrong,” Fenard said at last. “It sounds like Progenitor is a rare subclass of an already rare Class. I will have my researchers dredge through the tomes once again and search for any mention of it. Unfortunately, I suppose this means that the standard practices for leveling your Class will be less than ideal. I know how to turn out an Inheritor or Conqueror with the most useful set of skills, Tom, but I know nothing about Progenitors. We’ll have to work closely together to figure out how to make your selection as powerful and useful as possible.”

“Yeah,” Tom said, then under his breath “useful, right.”