Invincible Army

"Alleeen, it's almost time for lunch!"

"Yes, mother!"

Allen had been so engrossed with his analyzing that he had failed to notice how much time had passed. When he stepped back into his house, he found Theresia waiting in the earthen-floored area. Mash and Myulla were hanging out in the main room further in.

The moment Myulla caught sight of Allen, she started babbling happily. She had brown hair and green eyes and, at a year and three months old, had become capable of crawling all around inside the house.

Back when Allen had turned one, Theresia had returned to the fields to help Rodin out during the times of the day when Allen was asleep. Now that Myulla was the same age, Theresia had planned on doing the same thing, but Allen had stopped her, saying that he would do the field work instead.

Nowadays, Allen also helped Theresia out with making lunch. The family's fare was light, but five portions together was still a good deal of food.

Soon enough, Rodin returned home, loudly declaring, "I'm back!" Allen had been out in the fields with him until around 10 a.m., when he had come back first to do the laundry.

The scene around the dinner table was the same as always. As he dug into his potato, Rodin suddenly said, "With how big our family's gotten, I'm thinking it might be time to expand our house. You'd want a room of your own, right, Allen?"

Allen looked up in surprise. "Huh? Uh...not really? I'm fine with how things are. We don't even have money for expansions, father."

"What are you saying? We have a pretty tidy sum now thanks to you. It's more than enough to cover the materials we'd need."

'What?! I'm gathering it to buy our freedom! Please don't use it for something like this!'

Allen had earned a total of 342 silver coins last year by selling the meat from all the albaherons he caught. Of course, he had then given all the money to his father. All possessions belonged to Rodin, as he was the family head.

A total of five thousand silver coins would be needed to lift five people from serfdom. That goal was still very far off, and there was no leeway for any splurging. However, Allen had yet to tell his family this goal of his.

"We really should save it for now. Just in case something happens and we really need money, like someone getting badly hurt again or Myulla getting sick. I really don't mind sleeping in the nursery with Mash and Myulla."

"Are you sure?"

Apparently, Rodin was not going to press the issue. He probably thought Allen might change his mind once he grew a bit older.

"Speaking of expansions, father, I heard that the village moat is done?"

"The moat? Oh, yeah, it's done. You helped out too, didn't you?"

'I knew it. Gah, that's a problem.'

This village was encircled by a wall made of wooden logs. However, there were gaps in between, and every once in a while, weak monsters like horned rabbits would slip through. Although they were of the lowest rank, they could still pose a threat to young children. In order to prevent the monsters from entering, the villagers—more specifically, the serfs—had started digging a moat outside the wall starting a few years back. They only could work on it between January and March during the few months with no farm work.

This year even Allen and Rodin had chipped in. And now, the moat was complete. In other words, the horned rabbits with their Rank E magic stones would no longer be wandering into the village.

'Would Krena's place happen to have magic stones?' Allen pondered as he racked his brains for alternate ways to gather magic stones.

***

"Seriously?" Allen muttered to himself from the middle of his family's fallow field. After trying for three whole days, he had just discovered his final Rank E Summon. Part of what had made the process take so long was running around gathering all the magic stones he could.

Magic stones could only be found inside the bodies of monsters.

According to Pelomas, it was usually close to their hearts. Unlike Allen, he was well-read and was knowledgeable in a wide variety of subjects.

According to him, magic stones were often used as a power source for magic tools. An example of a magic tool would be the street lights in the feudal lord's city.

However, there were no magic tools in this village, which meant there was absolutely zero demand for magic stones. Rank D and Rank C magic stones would be delivered to the feudal lord's town, of course, but Rank E magic stones were basically treated as trash. It was valued below even one copper coin.

Because of this, when the villagers caught horned rabbits, some would simply throw the magic stones out. Gerda belonged to this group—he would haphazardly throw his Rank E magic stones into his front yard. Allen had been able to spot a few and pick them up.

As it turned out, the magic stones in the front yard of Allen's and Krena's houses were still insufficient for Allen to Create and Synthesize all the Rank E Summons. It was only after he asked around at the well while drawing in the morning that he finally gathered the number he needed. Because the perceived value of the magic stones was so low, those who had helped Allen out with butchering albaherons last year very readily agreed to share.

Allen had now come to hide in his family's fallow plot because there was something that he absolutely had to confirm. The problem was that the Summon currently before him towered above the verdant grass all around and was entirely visible to anyone who might cast a glance in his direction.

However, his mind was so overwhelmed at the moment that this fact did not occur to him.

"So this...this was the developers' intention," he murmured, touching his Summon.

Game elements are carefully and particularly crafted for specific purposes.

For example, the developers might want players to use certain builds for respective classes or want them to adopt specific roles in party battles; the way they designed the game would hint at this. The Swordsman class might be given higher Attack and Endurance, making it more viable for fighting up close and drawing the monsters' attention.

There were those who would intentionally go against these suggestions and play directly opposite to how the developers intended. This was called "memebuilding." A player could select the Mage class but rely on a mace to deal physical damage. When comparing normal and meme builds it was blatantly obvious which was more viable. Following along with the developer's intent was crucial to performing well in any game.

If this was a normal game, then it would have walkthrough sites and online forums. However, this was a proper flesh-and-blood world, not a game. Allen had to figure everything out on his own.

For the past seven years, the same question had continued to rattle around in his brain: What is a Summoner? It was his class, but how was he supposed to play it? What was his fighting style supposed to be? What should he do to better align himself with the intentions of the gods and make the most of his class?

It had been clear pretty early on that simply calling forth Summons and making them fight on his behalf was not everything there was to it—the Rank F and H Summons' Abilities were just too varied. So, what was it then?

However, now that he had seen what his Rank E Summons could do, Allen believed he may have begun to see a faint outline of the gods' designs. He was getting closer to the truth. And the truth shocked him.

The following were the details of the Rank E Summons:

___

Status of Insect E (Butterfly)

Type: Insect

Rank: E

Name: Ageha

HP: 25

MP: 0

Attack: 20

Endurance: 50

Agility: 50

Intelligence: 24

Luck: 28

Buffs: Endurance 10, Agility 10

Ability: Scale Powder

_

Status of Beast E (Saber-toothed Tiger)

Type: Beast

Rank: E

Name: Tama

HP: 50

MP: 0

Attack: 50

Endurance: 20

Agility: 35

Intelligence: 28

Luck: 21

Buffs: HP 10, Attack 10

Ability: Claw

_

Status of Bird E (Hawk)

Type: Bird

Rank: E

Name: Hawkins

HP: 23

MP: 0

Attack: 22

Endurance: 24

Agility: 50

Intelligence: 50

Luck: 27

Buffs: Agility 10, Intelligence 10

Ability: Hawk Eye

_

Status of Grass E (Edamame)

Type: Grass

Rank: E

Name: Mametaro

HP: 21

MP: 50

Attack: 20

Endurance: 22

Agility: 20

Intelligence: 13

Luck: 50

Buffs: MP 10, Luck 10

Ability: Leaf of Life

_

Status of Stone E (Dirt Wall)

Type: Stone

Rank: E

Name: Wally

HP: 50

MP: 20

Attack: 33

Endurance: 50

Agility: 20

Intelligence: 23

Luck: 28

Buffs: HP 10, Endurance 10

Ability: Harden

___

Allen was so startled that his mind went blank for a short while. When he returned to his senses, he quickly reverted Stone E to card form. Then he took a closer look at the page on his grimoire where the Statuses of all his new Summons were listed out.

'If I'm reading this right...there is a specific role that's being assigned to each type of Summon, right?'

Without futher ado, Allen applied himself to sorting through his observations and writing them all down.

___

Insect Type (Abilities: Provoke, Suction, Scale Powder)

Provoke robs enemies of their ability to think straight, and Suction lowers enemies' Attack. Based on this, it seems likely that the Insect type is specialized for casting debuffs. Judging by its name, Scale Powder probably inflicts a status debuff on enemies like confusion, paralysis, or sleep.

_

Beast Type (Abilities: Dig, Chomp, Claw)

Possessing high HP and Attack, this is the only type properly specced for attacking. This type will be the main source of damage when fighting against monsters.

Will probably only ever be using the highest-ranked Summon from this type.

_

Bird Type (Abilities: Voice Mimic, Transmission, Hawk Eye)

Voice Mimic is capable of mimicking other people's voices and using them to say anything. Should be useful when infiltrating enemy camps. Transmission makes it possible to convey information to someone faraway. Hawk Eye is likely for scouting. Based on all this, the Bird type seems specialized for intelligence and information gathering.

_

Grass Type (Abilities: Aroma, Leaf of Life)

This type is specialized for recovery. Leaf of Life is, based on the name, likely something that helps restore HP. It seems likely future additions to this type will be offering recovery in other areas.

_

Stone Type (Abilities: Harden)

The Stone E Summon seems perfect for ducking behind in order to evade incoming attacks. This is likely a type specialized for defense and tanking.

___

Although Allen had not yet started experimenting with the Rank E Summons, there was a lot that he could glean from just the names of their Abilities. It was becoming clear how each type of Summon had its own role.

This was further substantiated by how the Summons had the two stats most relevant to their respective roles bumped up higher than all the rest.

'So...a Summoner is someone who is able to handle all roles in a fight, be it attacking, defending, debuffing, healing, and scouting. I imagine later additions will continue expanding the range of what I can do.'

In other words, the single class of Summoner was equipped to fulfill the roles of multiple classes. Just to list a few, it had means to attack like a Swordsman, heal like a Cleric, and scout like a Thief. Unlocking other kinds of Summons would probably enable Allen to do even more things in the future that he currently could not.

Allen took this to be the intention of the developers, or the gods, behind the Summoner class. He opened up his grimoire and turned to stare at the Storage page. It was connected to a hyperdimensional pocket that was, in all likelihood, completely infinite in volume and could store anything and everything that fit through its thirty-by-thirty-centimeter entrance.

'I am going to need so many magic stones going forward.'

Allen had also written down in his notes how many magic stones he would need for each type of Summon.

___

Insect: 1

Beast: 1

Bird: 3

Grass: 5

Stone: 9

___

According to this pattern, the types that show up later on down the road would require even greater numbers of magic stones. Even now, if Allen intended on filling all forty slots in his holder with Stone E, he would need a total of 360 magic stones.

'So, the reason why I was given the Storage skill was so I wouldn't have to walk around constantly lugging tens to hundreds of magic stones all the time.

After all, the physical size of the magic stones also goes up with rank.'

As Allen continued mulling over his epiphany, a scene unfolded within his mind. He saw himself in his ultimate form as a Summoner.

Surrounding him was an endless horde of Summons, an invincible army capable of dealing with any situation and triumphing over all who stood in its way. The Summons would take care of everything. All enemies would be ground to dust before the might of this legendary host.

"An invincible army, huh... So this is the power of a Summoner, the class that surpasses even the Demon Lord."

Allen was so overwhelmed that he ended up blurting his thoughts out loud.

Now, he was even more motivated to take his class as far as it could go.

Allen...had just had a glimpse of the gods' will.