Nightmare Realm Summoner

Alex's eyes snapped open in the town hall. There was a painful knot in his back and an ache in both of his knees. He shifted with a groan, pushing himself upright. The complaints his body was sending him made it clear that he'd been sitting for a fair bit longer than 4 hours.

His monsters still stood around him and stood watch. There wasn't anyone else in the building, nor could he hear sounds of fighting or people calling to get his attention. That probably meant that nothing had gone too badly wrong in the time he'd been meditating.

He stretched his arms over his head, letting out a satisfied groan as pops rang all throughout them. It felt like he hadn't moved in years. Every breath he took felt fresh. The sensation was akin to taking the first breath through an unblocked nose after being sick for weeks.

I feel incredible. Should I try activating my domain now?

It was tempting. It also seemed like a poor idea. There was no fun activating his domain when he wasn't fighting something. Unfortunately, the town wasn't under attack anymore.

Eh. That's fine. I'll just spar with Claire. There's no way I'm just going to sit around and not test this new thing out after all the work I spent getting it. Claire is way stronger than she lets on. She'll probably want to see what I can do now as well.

Alex summoned his monsters back to their spots within his Spatial Mirrors with a thought and strode out from the Town Hall. Gentle warmth prickled against his skin as he stepped into the daylight. He raised a hand to block the sun streaming down from his eyes.

Townsfolks were still busy all around him. They'd made good progress on repairing the damaged barricades and dismantling the destroyed buildings. Large swathes of the town had been cleared up and were now just patches of scorched earth.

As it turned out, magically empowered beings could clear up the aftermath of a battle a whole lot quicker than normal humans would have been able to. The enhanced endurance and strength that came with a class went a very long ways in speeding cleaning efforts up.

Alex spotted Aaron helping some of the Outworlders carry a splintered log away from the camp. There was no signs of May anywhere, but that didn't fool him. Aaron rarely let her out of his sight. He definitely wouldn't have been so calm if anything had gone wrong.

I wonder if May's gotten the Visualization from Mite yet. I'll have to hunt him down and ask later. He should be finished gutting the Region Boss at this point. I'll deal with that later, though. Mite will come looking for me well before I need him.

Now, where is Claire?

"Rhyss?" Alex tried.

The air beside him buckled. In an instant, the gray-skinned Advisor floated beside Alex as if he'd always been there. Rhyss' lone eye affixed on Alex as he inclined his head in greeting.

"I see you've finished your meditation," Rhyss said. "Is there something you would like my assistance with?"

"A lot of things. I want to make sure the town keeps improving and isn't getting hindered in any way, but from what I can tell, we're already doing a pretty good job at that."

"I suggested that extra focus be given to cleaning up the central spaces of town and finalizing emergency defenses while we wait to create new buildings and more proper walls. The town is in a very vulnerable state right now. It will only remain Enshrined for around 5 more days. We will need to find a solution to stabilize the Dual Reality Obelisk and then improve our defenses against outside threats."

Alex nodded in agreement. "Yeah. Fixing the Obelisk is task number 1. We'll get on that immediately. I'm hoping Mite might have a few ideas as to what we can do since buildings are kind of his thing. Maybe you could give him some guidance?"

"I will continue to compile possible solutions. There are a number of them. But that number is considerably lower when considering the state of this world. It is so young." Rhyss' eye narrowed. "That makes things difficult. Many of the powerful monsters have not yet awakened… but there is always another method. The boons that the town earned from defeating the Region Boss may be very helpful."

"We'll figure something out," Alex said. He was somewhat surprised to find that he fully believed his own words. They weren't just false bravado. Perhaps it was arrogance, but after everything else the System had thrown their way, fixing up the town so it wouldn't self-destruct felt somewhat trivial. "But I did want to ask… what exactly does being Enshrined mean? I didn't get time to ask."

"Certain achievements can grant your town immunity to abilities and events," Rhyss replied.

Alex blinked. "Really? That's awful… kind of the System. Unnaturally so. Why would it do something like that?"

Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.

"It is not from kindness. It is a natural effect of increased magical energy in an area that comes with a significant accomplishment… such as the first naturally created town on a newly initialized world," Rhyss said dryly. "The magic is thick enough that scrying and spatial abilities are unable to pierce through the surrounding area. The System hasn't gone out of its way to help you. Being Enshrined is just a beneficial byproduct. But it is still a needed one. As soon as the energy dissipates, people will come looking. Making a town is great, but stealing or looting one is far easier."

Alex's eyes narrowed. "Yeah. I can imagine. We'll be ready for them. Five days is a hell of a lot of time when you use it well."

"So it is," Rhyss agreed.

"On that note… can you tell me where Claire is?" Alex asked. He paused for a moment. Then his eyes narrowed slightly. There was one more thing he had to handle before he started going around and doing whatever he wanted to. "And Orchid too."

"They were together last I was aware of them," Rhyss replied. He raised a finger to point toward the forest surrounding the town. "Both went in that direction. I believe they are waiting in the forest."

That isn't ominous at all. There's no way that Claire confronted Orchid and started a fight without me, right? I sure hope not. It would suck if they started without me.

"Thanks," Alex said. "Keep an eye on things here and make sure everything keeps running, would you? And make sure Mite doesn't do anything too crazy. I'm going to go find them."

"I will continue with my duties," Rhyss confirmed.

Alex set off at a brisk pace, all too aware of the Advisor's lone eye boring into his back as he left. His hair stood on end despite his best efforts to reassure his body that nothing was wrong. Rhyss might have been an ally, but it was impossible to forget what he'd once been. What he'd been made into.

He still had Aubrey's soul flame in his Spatial Mirrors. She'd been stolen from her home world, warped by the System to be used as a part of his Trial — and the very brief conversation Alex had with Rhyss before that Trial had begun strongly implied that he had undergone a similar fate.

I'm glad Rhyss is on our side. Advisor or not, he's not somebody I would ever want to fuck with a second time. Something tells me he would be considerably less amiable if the System didn't enforce its requirements upon him.

Alex's thoughts accompanied him as he stepped through the barricades around the town and continued on to the forest in the direction that his Advisor had indicated.

After passing stepping into the trees, it didn't take him long to find what he was looking for. There was a small clearing just a short distance into the woods. It looked to have been made when one of the explosions from the Region Boss had destroyed a large patch of trees, shattering their trunks and leaving them charred husks littering scorched dirt.

Orchid and Claire stood silently on either side of the clearing. Neither of them were making any moves toward each other. They just stood there in silence, as if battling with their eyes.

"Am I interrupting something?" Alex asked.

Both of them turned toward him.

"Alex. I was wondering how long you were going to take meditating. I was starting to get impatient," Orchid said. She drummed her fingers against the twisted white staff she'd gotten from a tree in the Mirrorlands. "I trust Claire has already told you about the conversation we had."

Alex didn't have to ask what Orchid was talking about.

"She has."

Orchid arched an eyebrow. "And? You aren't going to deny it?"

The lack of response from Claire told Alex that she didn't particularly care how he answered the question. She knew that they couldn't pull the wool over Orchid's eyes anymore. If it had been possible, Claire probably would have already done it.

"What would the point be?" Alex asked. "We're not with the Starfallen Family. For that matter, we're not with any family at all. We're Nativeworlders."

Orchid's lips thinned. "Yes. I am aware. I suppose I've known that for some time. If anything, I was just ignoring the truth. But it is beyond me how you managed to pull all of this off without the resources of one of the Great Families. By all rights, everyone here should be dead."

"I've really never liked following the rules," Alex said.

"I gathered that much," Orchid said with a shake of her head. "Do you have any idea what your actions have done? What they will do?"

"No," Alex answered honestly. "Not in the slightest."

"You might have killed my entire family," Orchid snarled. "I might have killed my entire family. I was granted passage to this world by the Starfallen family with a single mission. A mission that — because of you and my own blind idiocy — I averted."

"A mission?" Claire asked. "You didn't mention anything about that."

"The Starfallen Family's requirements for passage here were simple. I was to kill Absolution," Orchid said.

"The creepy guy with the whole in his chest?" Alex blinked. "But he helped us save you!"

"Yes," Orchid said. Her eyes thinned. "He is at odds with almost every single Great Family. And he helped you save me because I am working for him."

Alex stared at her in confusion. He snuck a glance at Claire, but she looked just as confused as he did.

"You were working for the guy you were meant to kill?" Alex asked.

"Because I already tried to kill him," Orchid said grimly. "And I failed. Miserably. He spared my life in exchange for a favor. I agreed — not because I am a coward — but because I had no other option. The only way I saw myself getting strong enough to kill him and complete my task for the Starfallen was to agree to Absolution's demands and obey him. That was up until I met you. I thought you were a chance for me to escape this. To save my family. But now I have done neither. When the Starfallen and Absolution figure out what has happened, and they will, then I am done for."

Alex winced.

That's unfortunate.

"What was Absolution's demand?" Alex asked. "Maybe you could still do it. Then you'd be able to pretend like you were just playing the long game and you can get a chance to kill him later."

Orchid's gaze bore into Alex's skull as her fingers tightened around her staff.

"You already know the answer that. And now that I do as well, I can't get around following it any more. My orders were to kill you."