Chapter 8

After I finished my training, I found myself in the tutorial Island. It was quite large, and all of the one thousand people who entered tower 199 were going to start here together.

I opened my eyes and looked around. I was in a half-destroyed city, looking like after a bombing in World War II. I picked a reasonably well-preserved building with three floors and hurried up to the third floor and barricaded myself in a room. Then I pulled out the Book of Solomon and the summoning kit and set to work drawing the complicated diagrams. I had a lot of work ahead of me. Not only did I have to summon a creature to fight for me, but I also had to prepare materials to make future summons easier and faster.

***

Garat Breg.

I found myself on the outskirts of a town, and set about exploring it. It was full of zombies! Of the very slow ones.

I grabbed my halberd, the weapon I had chosen to proceed with, and began slicing their heads off. I loved zombie movies. These turned out to be of a somewhat unusual kind. You could kill them without cutting their heads off. Just if you chopped them up enough, they stopped moving. It was a good thing they weren't oozing blood or other fluids. They were pretty clean if you ask me. I pictured killing zombies as a dirty job, full of black disgusting blood, gore, and the smell of rotten meat. And maybe stinking shoes. In a real zombie apocalypse, wearing a gas mask would be a must.

As I got further into the city, the zombies got stronger and faster. Also, they were more densely packed. Attracted by the noise, they often came in droves and I had to be quite careful. I often had to run away from groups of slow zombies. It was a tiring activity, especially with the uncomfortable pack on my back. Half an hour after I started, I was covered in sweat and hid in a room to rest.

***

Luke Garden.

It was full of zombies. At least they were slow. I started looking for how to set traps and attract zombies. I decided to pile a large amount of rocks and furniture on the 3rd floor of a building and lure a group of zombies inside, then have it fall on top of them. However, this turned out to be quite a difficult job and I gave up. To make it easier, I just started throwing heavy rocks from a tall building at one of the nearby zombies. After a few tries I managed to hit it! It helped that the stupid zombie was just looking stupidly at the fallen rocks. I'm a real genius! Ten minutes later, I managed to find and kill one more zombie, however the area started to fill up with zombies attracted by the noise. I barely managed to escape. That's when I heard the screams of a group of people running away being chased by crowds of zombies.

"This way!" I shouted to them, so they wouldn't head for the dangerous area I was coming from. I also started running towards them and soon we met.

"My name is Luke and I'm coming from the taller buildings over there" I said while waving my arms. "There's quite a few zombies there too. We need to get out of town."

As I spoke I kept running slowly and gesturing explaining where I was coming from and where to go.

The group consisted of about eight people, all panting but miraculously able to run. My combat instructor had explained to me that back on Earth, if you caught ten random representatives of our "highly developed" countries, they wouldn't be able to run for five minutes without being out of breath. "Apparently they've all been through several weeks of intense training, just like me," I decided.

"My name is Mariela." a girl my age introduced herself.

"I'm Carlos." another young man hurried over and soon we all introduced ourselves.

"I think we're less than a mile from the edge of town. "I said. "You could see pretty well from up-hire. The closer we get to the edge of town, the rarer the zombies get."

"Look, there's an archer on the roofs on the right." shouted Carlos to us.

"Hey, dude, come find us later." I yelled at the unknown archer.

"Quiet down, you'll attract more zombies!" scolded me Mariella.

***

After summoning my first creature, a huge bear, I left it guarding the entrance to the third floor and set about preparing more things for my summonings.

I was quickly inscribing symbols on various candles, making paper talismans to concentrate mana on the summoning formations I would inscribe later on, and things of that sort.

After seeing that no one was attacking me, I decided it was time to summon my first familiar. I began drawing numerous diagrams, in complex formations, and writing out the intricate symbols and runes that were needed. I had practiced this point multiple times and was feeling confident in my ability. However, I drew slowly and carefully, checking with my book each diagram again and again for errors. Familiars differ from ordinary creatures, like the bear I had summoned earlier, because they would stay with the summoner indefinitely. It was a special creature that would help its summoner in a variety of ways. My bond would be of special importance, and for that I wanted everything to be perfect. Finally, after one last thorough check, I began the elaborate ritual.

I started chanting complicated incantations and gradually the temperature in the room began to drop. A mystical fog began to rise over the summoning formation, and I could feel the mana rapidly leaving my body. I had to hurry! With trembling hands, I started making the magical signs and watching what was happening with excitement. Soon I felt my connection to the mind of my newly summoned familiar. I hurriedly opened Solomon's book and began to perform the complicated instructions.

Attracted by the mana in this world, and reassured by the psychic mysteries of the summoner magic that I had practiced for many days, the familiar finally began to slowly materialize in this world. First the mist formed into a sort of a ball at the pentagram's central core and gradually began to form the outline of a small imp: a winged creature as large as an owl, possessing a pair of paws ending in sharp talons.

These creatures hunted in groups and were good at using magic. This familiar would allow me to sense and control mana better, and I also hoped to use it as a scout as well.

When the creature appeared, I was ready with my incantations and hastened to mark it with the seal of Solomon. The little creature didn't even have time to cry out when a force detached from the formation that sealed it and allowed my will to enter it. After a brief struggle, with the help of the formation, the seal began to take permanent form.

It wasn't the best way to connect with a familiar, but it worked as a start.