3 Ch. 2- Coming of Age

I open my eyes slowly as I emerge from the land of sleep. it takes a while for my mind to catch up as I shake the last remaining bit of sleep out of my eyes. They quickly shoot open as I fully wake and realize what today is. Today is the start of my new life, I've been eagerly awaiting ever since the start of this new era. That's right, today is the day I turn 16 and I couldn't be more excited as my dream of becoming a summoner starts now.

Thinking for a second, I realize becoming a summoner also means I have a summon and it is waiting in my storage watch. With a reaction speed that would make pesky house flies jealous, I dig into the storage space within my watch and quickly find my summon's core. It's nestled in with the few pairs of clothes I possess, a random half-broken pencil, half a pack of gum from a year ago, and few other pieces of junk that I should really clear out. (I don't own much due to me and Mira being relatively poor).

With a bit of thought after receiving the mental image of objects in storage, I summon the core into my hand. I take a long look at what will hopefully become the first of many companions on my journey of becoming a strong and hopefully wealthy monster summoner.

The crystal fits in the palm of my hand and is a greyish green color with an engraving of a small humanoid creature with a club on one of the faces that I presume to be the front. It doesn't look like much at first, but looks can be deceiving because when I take a closer look I recognize it to be a goblin.

Humanoid monsters are coveted amongst summoners for their intelligence and transferrable combat skills, the more intelligent they are the more valuable they are. Studying the oddly colored crystal for a few seconds, I come to the realization that the greyish color of the crystal rather than the regular goblin green means that it is some sort of variant.

"Hell yeah!!!" I can't help but scream out in joy. I can't believe my luck that I would start out with a variant humanoid summon.

The chances of such a thing happening for a starting summon is about 1 in 500, with variants appearing in the wild around 1 in every 25 monsters. Variants have the potential to be strong, but as we already knew about mutations holds true that they can be as detrimental as they are helpful, so having a variant doesn't mean instant strength.

*Ughhh* (I can feel my head starting to hurt at just the thought of the droning and monotone lectures my introductory teacher at the academy would give on subjects like these).

After calming down a bit I realize that I haven't bonded yet to my soon-to-be summon. Without hesitation, I grab a penknife from my tiny wooden study desk in the far corner of my rather spartan room and prick my finger.

After a moment of berating myself for mistakes being made I focus back on the bonding ritual that's about to be occurring with the crystal in front of me. Holding my dripping finger over the core, I let a few drops of blood splatter over it before sucking on my still bleeding finger to prevent any blood from spilling on the stone floors.

Blood is nearly impossible to scrub out blood from the floors, it manages to sneak into all sorts of pockets and crevices and is eye-catchingly obvious for anyone looking at the floor. Looking back at it now, I really should have done this in the bathroom, I guess I was just caught up in the excitement of getting a summon.

To avoid having to deal with the hassle of hand scrubbing the floor, which would've put a serious damper on my day, I keep my finger in my mouth until I manage to find a tissue to staunch the bleeding with.

The core greedily sucked up all of the blood that had landed on it, and when the vampiric chunk of rock had finished absorbing the blood, it began to glow slightly. That light began growing and eventually started spreading over to me, with each mote of light I could feel a mental connection establish itself between myself and the goblin core.

All of a sudden I instinctively knew that the summon inside was a tier 2 iron-skinned goblin, the information rushed into my head at the same moment the bond was established. Impatient to see if my newfound knowledge was correct, I summoned out the goblin inside the core by infusing mental energy into it and tossing it on the ground just like I was taught in school and had seen many summoners do before.

As the core made contact with the ground, it instantaneously morphed into a childlike monster with thick-looking greyish skin that also happened to be holding a mottled and brown wooden club. Its face was rather ugly with a large hooked nose, sharp and spaced out teeth, cauliflower-like ears, and beady black eyes reminiscent of a predator.

His only clothing was a tattered burlap piece of cloth tied around its waist, which did little to hide its' disproportionately large genitals that were very obviously male.

Despite the unappealing appearance of the summon, I felt a distinct fondness for him, and any inhibitions that I may have had about him crumbled when he gave a crooked smile and quickly hurried up to me and gave my legs a deceivingly strong hug. I pat him on the head a few times consolingly as if he were a dog, and realize that he needs a name since calling him goblin just seems callous and lazy.

"Hey little guy, I'm Thomas nice to meet you"

He just looked up at me with an expression that indicated that he had no idea what was going on and that he was just happy to be here, I guess that's understandable considering he is only a few seconds old as far as I now. I mean we don't really know if our starter summons existed before they came to us or were made specifically for humanity to gain upon becoming an adult. I'm not much of a scientist so I didn't really bother to think further on it and began to pay attention to my new little companion.

Continuing to pat his head as if he was a pet to pamper I coo at him "What should your name be little guy? Hmm, maybe Herald, no definitely not, that makes him sound like he's an accountant. I need a strong name, maybe something to do with goblins from books or movies."

Thinking hard about what name would suit him, I eventually decided on the name Jareth, which was the name of a goblin king in one of my favorite movies.

"I've decided, your new name from now on will be Jareth." I inform the newly dubbed Jareth in an attempt at an authoritative tone, which is met by ecstatic jumping and running around with him saying his own name repeatedly as if to ingrain it in his mind. It's entirely possible, despite him having some obvious intelligence it was more on the level of a human infant than someone my age.

This wasn't meant to be derogatory, but considering he is just a few minutes old it is perfectly natural for him to be childlike, not to mention that since he was a lower-tier summon it was perfectly natural for things like intelligence to be fairly low but present.

It was only the really strong or special summons that were able to talk or think for themselves rather than only taking orders or simply acting on instinct like monsters. Teaching him things like language and manners amongst other necessary things would be interesting to say the least.

After a few minutes of playing with Jareth and further bonding with him, I feel the drain to my energy and decide that I should wrap it up before I run out of the strength to keep him summoned. I bring Jareth over and inform him, "It's time to go back to the crystal Jareth, but I'll bring you out soon and I'll have a core ready for you to eat".

He seemed disappointed but eventually came to accept my decision after the promise of food, which I managed to get him to understand through gestures. Smiling at the curious creature, I withdraw my energy from the bond and once more he is transformed back into a crystal. I can instantly feel the draw on my mental concentration and energy stop as soon as Jareth reverted into a core.

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He was instantly transported into my storage through some type of mystic mechanism that is too foreign and unfamiliar for me to even attempt to explain. It is commonly thought that this function was created by the deity that has so far saved and tested humanity, and that it was made so that no summons would get lost never to be found again, which is a depressing thing to even think about.

The thought of Jareth resting in some bush in his crystal form waiting an eternity for me brings a distinct feeling of sorrow to my chest, this surprises me as it seems that I already consider the little bugger family alongside my only sister Mira. Mira would always be first in my heart, after all, I needed to be the one to protect and keep her happy, I wouldn't let myself fail this time.

Finished with my musings, I realize that I have no food to feed Jareth and so I head off to the core exchange center to purchase some cores to feed him as I had promised. Most summoners only give their summons cores when they are trying to make them evolve, but I figure it's only fair that I feed him since I had already made him a promise.

It wouldn't hurt to pick up a few more while I'm at it so that I don't have to constantly waste my time going and buying cores every day, hopefully, I have enough credits for them all. I don't have all that much saved up since I only receive enough money to buy bare necessities and a little extra for some minor luxury items. I've always been pretty practical with my purchases and consider myself a frugal person, so I had managed to save up a decent amount over time with what I had leftover from buying necessities. It wouldn't come remotely close to matching up with a summoner's salary, but that wouldn't be a problem for long hopefully.

........

Exiting Mira and I's cramped adobe-style apartment building, I begin heading to the center of the city to buy some food. It's a long walk to get there, and most people use summons as their transport.

That is of course if they have one that can be used as such, after all, it makes much more sense that someone would have a summon like a dog or a horse to ride into town rather than something ridiculous like a spiny urchin. Unfortunately for me, I fall into the mountless category currently since Jareth is far too small to ride.

He wouldn't have made much of a mount either considering that he's bipedal, at that point I would be traveling at the same speed and doing none of the work, that doesn't really sit right with me. Not many other summoners seem to care too much about stuff like taking advantage of their summons like that, although I might be a bit of a hypocrite since I plan on making him fight monsters for me, which is way more unsafe and painful than acting as a ride.

To house the enormous population in one large city, the only direction to build is up, and so the city is crammed with giant skyscrapers that act as large-scale apartments. The further from the center of the city the cheaper the rent is, but along with that is less space and lower class building materials. This can be seen from my adobe-style apartment, which is the most basic and cheapest apartment available, and as such is on the outermost edge of the city.

After an hour of intermittent jogging and running, I finally make it to the core exchange right next to the monster gate and head inside after catching my breath from the continuous exercise. I would be a lot more winded if not for the physical conditioning everyone is put through at the academy.

The core exchange is a futuristic building with all sorts of screens within the building, spaced out are counters where one can deposit cores or buy them. The only reason the tech in this building is allowed is that it was created by God himself or whoever the creator of this new era is because they likely figured it would make things far more efficient to use something that most are familiar with to process transactions.

I can't imagine the deity would find tons of paperwork amusing when they could have had it all automated for him. As a benefit, the devices would be familiar to most humans, so it would be even easier to implement in the new world. I suppose it doesn't really matter how powerful you are, paperwork is something we all want to avoid.

I line up to a kiosk and begin searching through the selection of cores. There are 5 tiers to choose from, with each tier costing more than the last. I select the tier 1 core section and find some low-class goblin cores to buy, I select 6 for purchase and then move on to the tier 2 section where I find an advanced stage normal goblin core which hopefully might help evolve Jareth.

Evolution requires genes similar to the monster in order to evolve, and having a stronger core to pass on more and stronger genes is the key to quickly evolving summons. I figure going for goblins would suit my purposes just fine since they are closely related, not to mention that the cores I chose are about all I can afford right now.

After selecting it, I find and purchase two other cores that I came across for bolstering some specific characteristics taken on during evolution. The cores I find are a stone crab core as well as an iron-winged hawk core, both of which are perfect for guiding Jareth's towards a defensive type evolutionary form.

I select the checkout option with my 9 cores listed, along each of their prices and the total cost all being displayed. Each tier 1 core is a credit each, the tier 2 cores are 10 credits each, and so my total ends up being 36 credits which I begrudgingly pay with my storage watch that also acts as a mobile wallet/bank.

*sigh* I look at my account balance which tells me that I have 3 credits left to my name, and grumble at how quickly my life savings have diminished. I manage to cheer myself up after a little while with the thought that you have to spend money to make money, and that I would easily gain that amount back with a bit of monster hunting.

Seeing that I still have to register at the Monster Summoner Association I head next door to the Association building. It is a large building made of large wood trunks stacked together like a giant Lincoln logs house.

The décor is on the fantasy side, while the receptionists and their desks look like something seen in a fortune 500 company. There are people of all types milling about, with many summoners wearing some sort of armor, while in contrast, the guild workers all wear smart looking suits to distinguish themselves as guild workers. The noise level was quite loud with everyone on the main floor speaking to attendants at the counters or with other summoners at the tables lining the back area.

I approach one of the open desks and try to gain the attention of the attendant there. *Ahem* The attendant is a tall man in a business suit with a serious face and short dark hair. He asks in a coldly formal tone, "What can I help you with today?".

"Well, I just became a summoner today and would like to register at the association and register my summon"(Thomas)

"Ok, just fill out this form here and bring out your summon so I can register it in the system."

I do as the man said and bring out Jareth and then get around to filling out the basic summoner application form. Jareth's appearance apparently causes a minor shock to the man judging by his gasp. I look over to see him showing a look of surprise at my apparent luck by managing to get a variant monster to start out with, but quickly adopts a clearly practiced and professional poker face.

I go through the form fairly fast and fill all of the pertinent parts like name, address, birthdate, relatives, along with my summon's name and type. About two minutes later, I finish filling out the form and hand it back to the attendant whose name I now know is Max, because that's what was written on the form I filled out.

He looks it over briefly, sees everything is filled out properly and motions for me to hold out my wrist, I do as he indicates and raise my left arm that has my storage watch attached to it. He takes my arm and brings it towards a scanner and after running my watch under it, he says, "With that done, you are now a registered summoner at the association, with your registration you can now sell monster corpses here, which would be bought for a fair price."

Seeing as the registering process has been completed, I ask Max, "Do you have a map of the continent, and where do you recommend summoners start hunting, they never really covered that at the academy."

He brings out a simple map from underneath his desk that outlines the continents, the continental cities, and the locations of various environments, and handed it over to me. Apparently that version was complementary if someone asked for one since he didn't charge me for it. He seemed pretty nice for someone who looked and sounded so cold and didn't seem to be one to talk all that much.

He also is kind enough to inform me, "You should go North from the monster gate, there's a forest with lower-tier monsters there. The further you go into the forest, the stronger the monsters, so you should stay at the edge of the forest until you're stronger."

"Thanks for the help and advice Max," I tell him before I walk out of the association building and head towards the nearby monster gate next door.

There is a quickly moving line full of summoners waiting to register at the entrance of the gate and get into the monster plane. I quickly move to the line and not 2 minutes later it is my turn to scan through, and just like at the guild I place my watch under the scanner and it quickly registers me and I am waved through by the guard in front of my gate.

Stepping through the gate, I'm left in a grassy field with other summoners milling about in various states of dress. Some are in full plate armor of some sort, and others in a simple shirt and pair of pants with no apparent armor on them. I look around briefly to get my bearings and check the map while using my watch to find which way is North. Once I find North and match it up to the map legend to make sure I'm going to the right area, I begin to head in that direction.

As I'm walking, I decide to bring Jareth out and toss his core in front of me. He emerges in a quick shift of light and gets into step with me as if understanding my intentions. With that little thing done, we continue walking and quickly enter a copse of trees which I assume to be the beginner forest.

We walk around the forest looking for monsters to fight while staying to the outer edges, and eventually after about 5 minutes of walking we come across a tier 1 wolf. It has grey shaggy fur and begins to snarl at us as it senses our presence.

"Go attack him Jareth, but watch out for its' claws and teeth!" I shout like a concerned mom watching their kid go off to school, just with a bit more bloodshed *chuckle*.

Jareth walks excitedly towards the wolf with his wooden club clutched in his hand, which is being waved around as if he was at a concert. The wolf charges and Jareth sets himself into a solid crouched stance with his club raised in wait for the wolf.

As the wolf pounces, I inform Jareth through our bond, "Dodge the wolf first, and then follow up with an attack". He receives my message and quickly puts it into action as he moves to the left while swinging the club and bashing the wolf hard on the snout. This dazes the wolf and shakes its brain around a bit, taking advantage of the opening provided by its' stunned state, Jareth continues to bash the immobilized wolf on the head until it dies.

I am shocked at how well the fight went, and come to realize just how much of a boon it is to be able to coordinate with Jareth while he fights. I quickly store the corpse in my storage and we continue searching around for monsters to fight. By the end of the day, we managed to defeat 10 more Tier 1 monsters before running out of space in my watch to store the valuable monster corpses.

As a reward for his efforts, I take out one of the tier 1 goblin cores as well as a stone crab core to help influence the growth of his evolution towards defense. Jareth managed to come out of all his battles today with only a few faint scratches on his arms and chest due to his thick defensive skin that was effective against the weak tier 1 monsters that we fought today.

Before returning to the city I remember to remove the cores from each of the monsters while still preserving the corpse, just like I was taught in summoner school. While I am partially dismantling the monsters I go ahead and remove the hide from the first wolf that we killed to make a jacket out of its hide in commemoration of our first kill.

I unsummon Jareth near the edge of the forest before all of my energy runs out, and begin walking towards the gate to enter the city. I immediately head towards the core exchange building next to the gate. Once I enter the building I head towards one of the empty booths closest to the door.

When I am in front of the screen it comes on and informs me that to deposit cores I need to just place them on the counter. It also says that all cores will be bought at a fixed price of credits with tier 1 cores selling for a credit each, so any valuable cores should be sold elsewhere. With that in mind, I decide to deposit 10 of the 11 cores that I managed to get today as none of them were especially valuable, keeping only the wolf core as a memento of my first hunt as a summoner.

As soon as I placed the cores on the counter they disappeared in a flash of light particles as if dissolving into thin air, and once all 10 cores were sold I placed my watch under the scanner which added 10 credits to my credit account on my watch. With the cores deposited I decide to head over to the Summoner Association building to exchange the corpses of the monsters.

I head over to the counter that Max is working at and greet him with a drawn-out, "I'm baaack". He doesn't really bother to respond to my words, but starts marking down the first 10 of my 11 monster corpses. Due to their relatively preserved quality, I receive 3 credits for each corpse. In addition to those, I also turn in the wolf corpse minus the hide and receive 2 credits for that one and run out of corpses to sell, all 11 have been taken care of now.

With a total of 42 credits earned today, I leave the building in high spirits and head towards the commercial district to talk to a leatherworker to turn the wolf hide into a jacket for some basic defense and as a commemoration of my first-day hunting.

After finding a relatively decent quality store in the middle of the district I go in and talk to the leatherworker who is manning the desk. After informing him of my request I provide the hide and pay 3 credits for a jacket to be made out of the pelt. I leave after being informed that it will be ready for pick up in 2 days.

*Rumble* Hearing my stomach groan in complaint at being hungry, I decide to treat myself to a hearty meal and head towards the restaurant district nearby. I enter a small building with a sign of a roasted boar out front and decide to splurge on a 3 credit meal of roasted giant boar with a creamy mushroom soup and a glass of mead made from the honey of bee monsters.

I can afford meals like this thanks to my new source of income and am once again glad that I no longer have to ration my meals just to ensure I have enough to eat for the week not to mention not being able to afford much else aside from food.

With 36 credits left in my account, I decide to pay the 25 credits to expand my storage space by a cubic meter in order to store even more monster bodies and then set aside the remaining 11 credits for rent and food at least until I earn more.

With my belly full and my legs tired I decide to head home to show Mira my new summon before falling asleep to recover fully from the grueling day only to hunt once again tomorrow.

Finding my way back on the dark streets, I eventually make it to our apartment door and enter while calling for Mira, "Mira, are you home?".

"I'm over in the living room", I hear in her soft voice, and head there after leaving my shoes at the door so I don't track mud and dirt in.

I see Mira with her long silky brown hair tied up in a lazy ponytail on our only couch watching tv after an apparently long day at work and drop down to hug her before recounting my eventful day.

I catch her attention away from the tv before pulling out Jareth's core and tossing it to the ground only for him to pop up with his club in hand but no apparent intention to use it.

She looks him over before realizing that he is different from normal goblins due to his grey skin, she looks questioningly at me and I tell her about Jareth being an iron-skinned goblin variant at the behest of her curious gaze.

She instantly breaks out into a smile and begins vigorously congratulating me, "I'm so glad you managed to get such a special summon starting out, now you can be a summoner like you've been dreaming about. Just stay safe, I don't want you to get hurt out there, you're much more important than some stupid credits"

Jareth seems to recognize that we are talking about him since he gets a wide grin on his face and starts doing a funny little jig in front of Mira, he's not especially good at it, but it's certainly entertaining.

After we stop laughing at Jareth, I start telling her about the rest of my day in the beginner forest and my many fights in there, all the while censoring any close calls. (What Mira doesn't know won't hurt her.) At the end of my story, she seems rather shocked at all of the monsters I fought and the money I got for them, but is also happy for me and congratulates me by saying as much.

*Gasp* "I almost forgot it was your birthday since we got so focused on you becoming a summoner. Wait just a second I have your present in here somewhere.", she begins to frantically search through her watch before bringing out a small box with a small red ribbon wrapped around it.

She quickly hands it to me and motions for me to unwrap it, needing no further prompting I tear into my gift to find a silver-colored necklace and on the chain is a pendant shaped in the outline of a snake in reference to Mira's snake summon Lyra with my Initials TV for Thomas Vaughn on the back.