45. Who Knew Armor Actually Worked Against Goblin Spears? (No relation to Britney)

With the help of my Slime King’s Servant’s Nephew’s Neighbour's Necklace, I zipped off to Floor 2 in record time. Before I could psyche myself out, I stepped through the portal and appeared amidst innumerable slobbering goblins. I stepped out from inside of Slimey and waited around eight minutes for the necklace to regenerate before eating my first of two crêpes. A headache that I hadn’t realized I had washed away, leaving me thinking clearer and sharpening my perception. I flexed my hands, relishing in the lack of fatigue and feeling ready to take on the entire Tower.

I pressed my back against the dark stone of the portal archway, closing my eyes to help me concentrate. In a move that I hoped wouldn’t backfire, I called forth my Bestiary, reaching inside and summoning Sunder while keeping Slimey still up. Mana gushed from my core as I summoned my demonic companion. The world spun, but I held onto the portal archway, careful not to touch the portal itself. My mana regeneration, bolstered by the crêpe’s buff, fought the intense drain of both of my summons. I held my breath for a moment, concentrating on feeling out my mana levels. But, there it was. It was minute, but my mana was creeping ever so slightly upwards. I let out a relieved laugh as I opened my eyes. Slimey and Sunder were sizing each other up, seeing each other for the first time. Slimey burbled happily as Sunder smirked back at him.

“Alright,” I announced, clapping my hands together. “We’ve got a short window of time where we can all be here at once. Sunder, here’s some gear. It’s runescribed, meaning some really weird nerds used some pretty sketchy skills to enhance it. Slimey and I will do our best to keep you from being overwhelmed. Your goal is to raise your soul strength as much as possible. Drains over outright kills. Slimey, you’re with me. Sorry if this is going to hurt. We go until my buff wears off or we take too much damage.”

After my summon was decked out in her new armor, I handed her a shortsword and slipped on my necklace, activating its enchantment. We nodded to each other once before I sheathed myself in armor in the form of dark green goo. I faced the legions of goblin spearmen, trying to decide on a path. There didn’t seem to be a good spot to start, so I simply dove in. I crashed into the wall of spearmen, making sure to leave a thick layer of Slimey between myself and the oncoming spears. We rolled over the first few goblins before hooking back and forming a dome over Sunder and her chosen prey. The entire floor seemed to explode into action. Spears flew as goblins rushed forwards, biting, tearing and clawing their way towards us. Slimey held fast, tanking hundreds of spears and dissolving any goblins that dared get into melee range or were pushed in by their brethren.

Sunder easily cut goblin spears into pieces before ignoring their struggles while she drained the four goblins that we had cordoned off. Her armor glowed a malicious black, obscuring her form slightly as she fought. Within seconds, she was looking for more. I lifted a portion of Slimey slightly, letting a few ambitious goblins slip underneath as more waves of spears crashed down upon us. I cringed as we took more spears than I felt comfortable with, Slimey steadily shrinking as he lost mass due to the constant goblin onslaught.

“I need to move!” I shouted to Sunder.

“‘More than fine,” she said back calmly, twirling her sword so fast that I lost track of it for a moment.

I swung out and away from Sunder, decimating the incensed spearmen, now staying low in order to minimize the amount of spears that hit us. We swept around the floor, doing our best to avoid damage while building Slimey back up. As long as we kept moving, we were absorbing enough goblin matter to net a positive increase in power. We just needed to keep going. I angled us towards a group of particularly spiteful goblins who had massacred themselves while trying to get to the action. The brief respite let me peek over at Sunder as I let Slimey take over piloting.

My jaw dropped as I saw Sunder in action. She leaned back, easily dodging two spears while her hand snaked out, grabbing a goblin by the leg. The goblin instantly shriveled as its life force was siphoned out. Sunder had to backflip away as more spears flew at her. She landed on a goblin, squishing him under her weight as she sucked life force from him, as well. She launched from atop his corpse and into the crowd, spinning in a cyclone of deadly iron as her sword flashed out. Her armor obscured her movements, making her hard to pinpoint among the crowd. More than once, goblins stopped in their tracks and looked around in confusion as the demon slipped away in a blur. Even when she stayed still a little too long while draining a goblin, spears flew wide, missing her by a few inches on either side.

I refocused on my own situation, retaking control of Slimey. I launched us backwards, picking up two white loot orbs that we missed before scooping up three goblins and using them as a shield to block a dozen thrown spears, greatly reducing the damage Slimey took upon impact. I looked around, noting the advancing goblin swordsmen. I backed us up, circling closer and closer to the portal and away from the swordsmen to buy us some time.

“Swords!” I called out to Sunder as they closed in. Unphased, the demon spun around and parried a blow, then punched the swordsman in the face. The goblin reeled back, stumbling into his fellow swordsmen. The other goblins growled and slashed at him, shoving him forward once more. Sunder palmed the swordsman’s face, leeching his life force and causing him to drop his sword.

My heart leapt into my throat as a blue loot orb dropped from the swordsman’s corpse. I rushed forward, but was cut off by swarming swordsmen. I tried darting around them, but their swords met me at every turn. Sunder was a black and red blur, dancing amidst swords, killing, absorbing and maiming as she went. There were too many of them, though. For the first time, swords found their mark, skidding off of armor and peeling off scales.

I panicked, trying to brute force my way through. As one, five swordsmen spun on me and slashed out. I tried avoiding their strikes, but three of them connected hard with Slimey, parting slime and carving huge chunks from his body. I backed off some more, mopping up the rest of the spearmen to regain some mass. I looked between Sunder, the loot orb and the portal. I didn’t think I could break through the swordsmen, but I didn’t want to leave without the blue loot orb. Blue meant rare and rare meant… Well, rare. My Slime King’s Servant’s Nephew’s Neighbour's Necklace was, technically speaking, rare. Resolved not to leave the floor without the orb, my only question left was how to get to it. Sunder slew another two goblins, using one as a shield to tie up a goblin’s sword while she plunged her own sword in its neck.

“Can you grab it?” I called out to Sunder. I had to speed up my retreat towards the portal as swordsmen crept closer. I was almost at the stone circle when she responded by poking the loot orb while evading another flurry of blows. It flashed blue, but I couldn’t see what appeared. I clenched as I watched her scoop something up and jump over a line of swordsmen just to be confronted with another line of swords. She parried a sword to her left with one of her weapons, and another sword to her right with a second sword. Wait, second sword?

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

I didn’t have time to inspect the weapon before Sunder took a sword to the gut.

“Sunder!” I yelled out, feigning a dash to keep some of the swordsmen’s attention on me. A deep growl rumbled out from my summon, making the goblins near her actually take a step back. She exploded forward in a whirling deathball of blades.

“That’s…” A goblin’s head flew off.

“Not…” A goblin was shorn in half while another’s arms fell to the ground.

“My…” Both of her swords came down at the same time, shattering a swordsman’s weapon.

“Name!” Sunder spun in a circle, extending her swords out to either side. Eight goblin bodies squelched to the floor in chunks. By that point, she was within arms reach from me. I picked my jaw up off the floor long enough to rush through the portal.

Appearing on Floor 1, I quickly sent out Slimey to recoup some body mass through attempted slime genocide. I hastily installed myself next to my summon, but twiddled my thumbs instead of initiating the necessary conversation. I probably would have sat in awkward silence for the rest of the day if I didn’t have my crêpe buff slowly ticking down. Alas, time was growing short and I didn’t want to dismiss Sunder without talking to her first. Well, I could just… No. No, I had to talk to her.

“So… Uh… I’m Théo, what’s your name?” I asked, not looking my demon in the eyes. Contrary to my intentions, my question just amplified the awkward silence instead of breaking the ice. After an excruciatingly long few minutes, I looked over to Sunder. She was staring back at me, tears running down her face. I couldn’t tell if they were tears of rage or sadness, however. There was a complicated look on her face, as if she were a fully functioning human that was able to be conflicted and feel complex emotions. I was sure that the real answer must be much simpler, though. Maybe she was sad. Yeah, she was sad. I’d probably be sad, too, if someone didn’t bother to ask my name and called me Tsundere instead. When she finally spoke, it was in a low monotone.

“Rella,” she said. “My name is Rella.”

“Did you have a choice to become a summon, Rella?” I asked. She nodded slowly. “Why did you accept?”

“It was either...” She took a shaky breath before continuing. “It was either accept becoming a summon or accept death. I wasn’t ready to die. I had been captured, tied up and tortured for months. I fed on stale blood in a basement and I just didn’t want my life to end like that. I wanted the chance to… This way, I get to grow in power again. I get to have my revenge. And if one of us decides that things aren’t working out, then we part ways.” I cringed slightly at the thought of how horrible the last year of her life must have been.

“Revenge against who?” I couldn’t fathom what kind of experiences I’d want to have to feel alive once more after being held in captivity for so long.

“I want to crush the gangs underfoot. To make them pay for trying to use me for my power.” She balled her fists, raising her voice bit by bit as she spoke. “To make them pay for seeing me as another tool in their arsenal. As a piece of meat. As a shortcut. And I want to find my so-called friends that betrayed me and sold me off like livestock.” She took deep breaths, visibly restraining her anger. I thought on what she said, tried to force myself to see things from her perspective. To accept that she had, indeed, a perspective.

“What do you mean when you say that we can part ways?” I hadn’t thought that my summons could just decide to not be available.

Rella shrugged. “When I was prompted, the first time, I could feel that our goals aligned. If I ever feel like they don’t, I don’t have to come back. I can request… A transfer. Not death, but to be moved to another summoner who has the same type of summon. Then, either you get someone else who is a better fit, or you get a blank slate that you get to teach from the beginning. At a certain power threshold, I get to decide if I’ve got enough power or not and can split from the summoner and live independently. Of course, there’s the drawback that I lose access to that summoner’s skills, but I also regain control of what plane of existence I stay in. My body and spirit re-anchor themselves to the Tower and no longer need external mana to survive. But that’s a long way off and contingent on me wanting to get to that point.”

“Is there…” I hesitated. “Is there anything I can do to, well… To help?” She sat there, thinking for a long moment. She picked at her black and red scales with her sharp fingernails pensively. The serious moment was interrupted by the gurgling of my stomach.

“I don’t mean to rush you, but I’m suddenly feeling a whole lot of mana drain and not a whole lot of mana regen,” I said. Indeed, my mana pool was plummeting as I sustained both summons without the wonderful crêpe buff. I thought back at the goblin fight and the moments since. It certainly hadn’t been an hour. Maybe half of that.

“I want unsupervised access to the Slums,” Rella blurted.

“Unsupervised… Access?” I knew what both words meant, but I just couldn’t process… “Why?” It was kind of a ridiculous thing to ask for.

“Unsupervised. Summon me and let me go. Unsummon me when the debuff wears off. No questions. Please, if you’re seriously wanting to help, this is what I want.” She was still balling her fists, but she seemed a lot calmer. Determined. I shrugged awkwardly.

“I mean, I guess? Not sure how long the buff will last, but we can go-” Sunder… No, Rella, disappeared in a puff of smoke as my mana bottomed out. I grew woozy, feeling my connection to Slimey sever as well. I clamped my head with both hands to try and steady the spinning of the world around me. It didn’t work, as expected.

I… Well, I fucked up. I was at the portal to Floor 2 and couldn’t summon Slimey until my mana regenerated. I had planned on eating the second crêpe, but I had vastly underestimated the mana drain of having two summons out without my regeneration buff. Suddenly, the spinning was too much. I leaned over and blew chunks all over the stone circle. My eyes forced themselves closed against my will as I sent several food-group projectiles scattering about. I opened my eyes between bouts, but the world was a blur of tears. After the seventh chunky death beam or so, I was assaulted yet again. This time, though, it wasn’t by my own body.

As I raised my hands to wipe at my mouth, around twenty pounds of squish slammed into me, sending my hands smashing into my own face. I grunted in pain as I essentially punched myself in the jaw, biting down hard on my lip. I tumbled to the side, trying to roll away and assess the situation. A blurry green blob hurtled towards me again. I quickly rolled to my left to avoid it, but instantly found my surroundings had changed. Taking a moment, I shakily wiped my eyes, looking around while heaving in deep breaths. An uncountable number of goblins stared back at me. I didn’t know whether to laugh or to cry at the absurdity of my situation. Had I just been attacked by a slime? I was almost glad to be on Floor 2, but the snarling made me jittery. I waited about thirty seconds, but couldn’t take the stares anymore. I slapped the portal again and reappeared on Floor 1.

I shakily got to my feet, looking around carefully at the mess around me. There were streaks of vomit where I had been sitting earlier, one of which was extending across the safety of the stone and into the packed slimes. I slapped a hand to my forehead. I had aggroed a slime with a power puke.

With no other choice, I simply sat down on the other end of the portal archway, away from my embarrassing mess. Leaning my head against the dark stone, I tried my best to keep my eyes open. I’d figure something out. My eyes grew heavy. I considered getting up, walking around to stay awake, but I was just so tired. I probably wouldn’t roll over into the monsters that were waiting to eat me. Probably. Hesitantly, I let the day’s exhaustion drag me off into an uneasy sleep.