I returned to my personal space, rather glad to find that my reconstructed body was no longer sunburned and dehydrated. It had felt like a long summoning, but I could probably attribute a lot of that to the drudgery of the task and the uncomfortable working conditions. It had been nowhere near bad enough for me to pop a notice of cessation, even if I felt a bit guilty at having helped a contractor cheat someone. I suppose there were crooked contractors on worlds containing mana just like there were on mana-free Earth.

Well, I didn’t get to choose the summonings, I just had to live through them. After getting my bearings, I headed to the rewards chest to see what I’d received. My rating had been average, but it wasn’t really a summoning that you could over or under perform that much on. Setting the chest to display only new items, I took a look.

Rico’s Loot.

New Inventory.

1. Copper coins, 67.

2. Silver coins, 8.

About what I’d expected, but I’d done really well with the contracted summoning, so I wasn’t too disappointed. My summoning gauge was at 84%, which told me I had one more good summoning before returning home. If I somehow choked on the next summoning run, I might have to do another, but I was feeling pretty good about my progress so far.

After checking on my rewards, I made a circuit of my personal space, keeping an eye out for Melvin to see where he’d squelched off to. I found him in the training center, sliding up the wall near where the figurines for training were stored. The gelatinous cube sent me a greeting via our link.

“Howdy Melvin, are you getting some training in today?” I joked with the cube. Oddly enough, I got a feeling though our link, Melvin was like a kid wanting to play with a toy. A system prompt appeared shortly after.

A bonded companion inside your personal space has requested the use of your training center. Do you wish to allow the entity known as Melvin to have access to this feature of your personal space? Y/N.

“Woah, what’s going on there Melvin? Can you actually train here?” I asked, though the system prompt seemed to indicate that it was indeed a possibility. Concentrating on the system request, I tried to decide how I wanted to proceed. As if registering my hesitation, the system offered me some options.

Since this training center utilizes a finite resource, mana, and that resource can take considerable time before replenishment, you may designate the permissions for your companion to operate under. You may choose one of the following.

1. Complete access. Melvin will be able to activate and use the training center any time he wishes. If one of you is using the training center, the other can only observe the activity and not participate.

2. Limited access. Melvin must seek permission each time he wishes to use the training center.

3. Situational access. You may set specific parameters of Melvin’s use of this facility.

4. No access. This choice will prevent Melvin from activating the training center under all circumstances.

I didn’t want to cut off Melvin completely from the training center, but I also didn’t want to have my own time limited if his training siphoned off too much of the mana that the place held. After all, I only had a short time between summonings to make use of the place. Maybe the situational access could be tailored to a viable compromise. I worked out the details in my head, confirming them after the system approved my situational offer.

You have offered the entity known as Melvin to have situational access to your training center. Access will be granted with the following guidelines.

1. When you are away from the personal space, Melvin may have full access to the training center.

2. If you are present, he may only access the training center with your express permission.

3. At any time that Melvin is accessing the training center, he must terminate his session when the ambient mana is below 50% of its normal capacity.

That should be fair for both of us. Melvin would have something to do while I was gone, but I’d be in control when I was here in the personal space. By restricting Melvin to only using up half the ambient mana, it would guarantee I wouldn’t return to a tapped-out training center after a summoning.

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“What do you think Melvin, fair enough for both of us? I don’t want you to be bored here, but I do need to use this place as much as I can if I want to survive,” I asked.

The entity known as Melvin has approved of your offer. All access to the training center will now follow the guidelines of the agreement.

“Glad that works for you, buddy,” I said, only to have another system prompt appear.

The entity known as Melvin has requested access to the training center. Do you wish to allow access at this time? Y/N.

“Wow, that was quick. I was planning to work out some of the kinks with my new team composition, but I have to say, I’m curious what you’ll actually do in here, so have at it.

The entity known as Melvin has been granted access to the training center. You may remain as an observer, but you will not be able to interact with any of the summoned challengers, or Melvin, during this time.

I dragged my rocking chair into the training center to get my first look at how a pet gelatinous cube might train. Melvin started his training session by absorbing several of the training figurines into his body. All the figures were from the first row where the easier challenges were found. I was a bit worried that he might try to eat them or something, but they seemed to be just fine even after floating around in his goop for a minute or two.

Melvin dropped to the floor with a plop before slowly sliding toward the center of the room. He made it maybe five feet before the first summoning occurred. A goblin in tattered clothing stood there with a wooden spear. On some unknown command from Melvin, the goblin charged forward.

While goblins weren’t known for their great intelligence, this one was at least smart enough to know that he shouldn’t let a gelatinous cube get ahold of him. The goblin stabbed ineffectively at Melvin with his spear, but given my pet’s slow speed, and the goblin’s caution, not much was happening.

The standoff and ineffectual stabbing continued for a time, but eventually, Melvin unsummoned the challenger and conjured up another from one of the figurines he had gathered. This time, it was wolf, and as soon as Melvin gave it the signal, the wolf leaped forward, nipping and biting at the cube.

Melvin was patient, and the wolf was not. The wolf eventually tried to take a big bite out of the cube. In response, Melvin grabbed onto the wolf and began to slighter down its throat. Thankfully, these were training summons and not real animals, because the sight of Melvin dissolving the wolf from the inside out was one that might haunt my nightmares.

“Wow Melvin, that wasn’t pretty, but you won the fight,” I told him, trying to be supportive just in case he felt bad over the obvious look of disgust on my face. Did gelatinous cubes have the ability to read facial expressions? Probably not, but he might have felt my emotions through our link, and at least he’d know that I was trying to support him, even if it grossed me out.

A glutton for punishment, I stayed for the next fight. This was a challenge for Melvin. Sort of like when I chose the dragon, just to see what it was like, Melvin chose an opponent he had no chance against, a minor fire elemental. The elemental was only a foot and a half high and showed in my interface as a simple Tier 0, Rank 4 creature.

The elemental resembled a lizard and it immediately scrambled forward to attack, his feet leaving little smoky footprints behind it as it ran. Melvin did what he did in every encounter, sat there barely moving. Once it got a foot or so away, the lizard began to spit small puffs of fire at Melvin. It looked to me like nothing was happening to Melvin as the damage was all being calculated by the system; it wasn’t really happening.

After a solid minute of fire spitting, the lizard finally had enough and charged directly into Melvin, who finally had a chance to retaliate. The two squirmed around a bit, and I couldn’t make heads or lizard tails of who was winning. A few moments later, the lizard disappeared, having been unsummoned after defeating poor Melvin.

“That’s probably one of the toughest types of foes you can go up against, Melvin. Don’t feel bad, you gave it a good try and if you keep practicing, I’m sure that you’ll learn how to beat them,” I offered.

Melvin didn’t respond, he seemed happy enough to go right back to summoning opponents. He chose the lizard again, and rather than watch a similar battle play out, I decided to drag my chair back into the main room and spend some time planning out my next moves when I returned home.

After only a few minutes of rocking in my chair, my thoughts were interrupted by another system prompt.

You are Summoned.