“Welcome back, and congratulations, I believe that is your best performance yet,” Minerva said.

“Thanks, that one was rough, I was protecting a kid,” I said. Despite whatever filter the system imposed on my brain, the stress of protecting a child from a swarm of hungry zombies stuck with me.

“From reviewing your performance, I can see that you managed to save her. Take pride in your efforts, had it been any other tier zero, rank one summoned being, do you think they could have done what you just accomplished.

“I don’t know, I’m the only summoned being I’ve met, how do the others compare?” I asked. As soon as I mentioned that I was the only summoned being, I remembered Linda and the dead guy in the dumpster. Linda was sort of a summoned being, despite being rejected. The other guy, well, I figured he had been a summoned being if he had a mana core inside him.

“I cannot divulge the strengths and individual capacities of the other summoned beings under my charge, but I can inform you that your performance in this particular summoning was excellent,” Minerva stated. My ears perked up at the mention of excellent as that was my rating. Was she the one that rated my performance each time?

“Does that mean better rewards?” I asked.

“Yes, but you should temper your expectations with the knowledge that rewards are based on both performance as well as your tier and rank at the time of summoning,” Minerva advised. Before I opened Rico’s Loot to check on my rewards, I needed to ask her about the mana core.

“Minerva, before I start sorting through loot, something happened to me back on Earth, and I was wondering if you could help me understand it,” I asked.

“Your experiences on your home planet are not under my jurisdiction,” Minerva replied.

“I don’t think this was a normal experience, it was sort of a summoned being kind of thing. You see, I ran into this homeless lady that started talking about being summoned and there was something left behind for me. Well, to cut a long story short, I found the body of someone in a dumpster. Hovering above his chest was a little container of mana. When I touched it, it absorbed into me, and now I have something called a mana core inside me,” I advised.

“This occurred on your planet?” Minerva asked, her voice going colder than normal, making me think it may have been a mistake to bring this up with her.

“Yes, and, as you already know, there isn’t supposed to be any mana on my world,” I replied.

“I must look into this,” Minerva blurted, disappearing before I could say anything else.

“Okay, that’s not odd or ominous in any way,” I said to myself.

With Minerva cutting out for who knew how long, I was left to my own devices. First, I checked on my summoning progress. That one summoning had raised the return home meter to almost half. Maybe performance during a summoning had something to do with how many of them you had to complete before you went home. With Minerva gone, I had nobody to ask, so instead of pondering the return home meter thingy, it was time for loot.

Rico’s Loot.

New Inventory.

1. Copper coins, 66.

2. Silver coins, 32.

3. Small gem, 1.

4. Ability slot scroll, 1.

Nice, I already had more silver than before, and I’d only completed one summoning. Another gem would also help, but what was an ability scroll. Selecting the scroll, I pulled it from the chest. It was exactly what I’d expected, an old rolled up piece of paper with a wax seal on it.

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Some advice from Minerva would be great right about now, but she was still off doing whatever it was she was doing after hearing that I had a mana core. Was this something I could open now, or was it another thing that had to wait until I reached tier zero, rank five? There were no markings on the scroll that would indicate it was restricted to a particular tier or rank. Who was I fooling, there was no way I wasn’t going to open something called an ability slot scroll.

I carefully peeled back the wax seal and wondered why we didn’t use them anymore, there was something cool about opening a letter or scroll with a wax seal on it. Unrolling the paper, I looked at my prize. It was a bust as far as I could tell. Some odd writing that I couldn’t decipher was written on the scroll, but nothing happened. Where was the cool new ability or, even better, a magic spell I could cast.

Rolling it back up and replacing the seal as best I could, I stored the scroll back in Rico’s Loot. Had I wrecked it somehow by opening it before I knew what it was? It was another thing that would have to wait until Minerva returned. Hopefully, she’ll get back before my next summoning.

Before closing Rico’s Loot, I remembered to retrieve my dagger and belt it back on. It was going to be a rather common need since if I died, the dagger would drop from my grasp. I wondered what the people that summoned me thought when the dagger I was holding just disappeared with my body. Now that I thought about it, it might not be too weird for them, it was almost like when a body de-spawns in a video game. If you were used to magic in your world, a lot of stuff that would be bizarre for me would be ordinary there.

A quick check of the dagger confirmed it was still sharp as ever. I had done a lot of work with it in the fight against the zombies, and I half expected the blade to be dulled down by now. Whatever process returned it here, fixed the blade up just like it did my body.

One thing remained for me to do, I needed to check my status and see if the system prompt that had started to appear back home was documented in my status. Opening up my status, I saw there was more information there, as well as something unexpected.

Rico Kline, Summoned Being.

Tier 0, Rank 2.

Experience/experience needed for next rank: 3/10.

Summoning points: 12.

Skills: None.

Abilities.

1. Linguistic adaptation interface.

2. Open.

Gear.

1. Simple dagger.

Mana core current mana/mana capacity. 3/10. A mana core may be used by an individual during their summoning sessions or saved for use back on their home world. Most abilities and spells can be powered by a mana core, and your current mana level as well as the number of applicable abilities and spells you can access will be affected by your summoning tier and rank.

Please be advised that while the mana core prevents the dissipation of mana when in a mana starved world, it does not protect the mana once you begin to use it. As soon as the mana is called upon, your world will begin to absorb it. Plan your ability and spell use accordingly. Timed effects, buffs, and summoned beings will all have their time on your world drastically shortened.

So, I somehow absorbed three mana since I’d been summoned. It must have absorbed naturally or something along those lines. I was also going to be able to use mana back on Earth, but that would first require me learning some ability or spells. Tier zero rank five was probably what I needed to hit to unlock spells and stuff, it seemed everything else was waiting for that as well.

There was also an open slot under my abilities tab. It seemed like the number of abilities I could have was limited, and if that was the case, finding things like the scroll I had just used was going to be critical. I wondered if you started out with one ability slot, or if I was granted one when the Linguistic Adaptation Interface was discovered?

“Well, this is kind of boring,” I said to myself. I’d checked my loot, checked my status, tried to ask my advisor some questions, checked on the return meter, and that was about all there was to do in here. At some point, I was supposed to get the chance to decorate and add things to my space, but like everything else, it seemed like that was sometime in the future.

Before I could sit there twiddling my thumbs for too long, the familiar blue portal opened next to Rico’s Loot. I checked that my dagger was ready and stood in front of the portal.

You are Summoned!

Your summoning parameters are as follows:

1. You are being summoned by the mage Davidos.

2. Summoning tier, 0.

3. Summoning rank, 2.

4. Rewards level, minuscule.

5. This summons is combat related. Prepare accordingly.

6. Forced compliance is active.

7. The armory has not been unlocked. A facsimile of your current attire and gear will suffice for the tier and rank of this summons.