Summoned by Monster Girls

“Fascinating. Tell me that you haven’t experimented to see what would happen if you shifted back while still having one of the pearls in your body?” Cariad’s question came from her spot perched on the railing as I was getting my ass handed to me by her boss later that night.

“Nope,” I grunted, swaying back from the sword-strike and firing off a counter with my shifted right arm.

The swaying, bladed tail gave me the reach of a longsword and the flexibility of a whip, but the extra articulations also made it vulnerable to a bladed weapon.

This was something that Cerebaton capitalized on immediately when he noticed it, catching the tail just one articulation down from the head with a counter-strike that would have sheared it off if we had been using real weapons.

“Smart,” Cerebaton grunted as we stepped back to reset. “Unless you consciously thought of ejecting it, then it likely would have just remained in your body and caused discomfort, if not injury, depending on where it ended up.”

“I’d figured it was something like that. The idea came up before, I’d been thinking about was in relation to removing an arrow injury or something. I could probably shift my body to make removing the arrow easier, but worried that it might cut me worse while the body changed around it.” I shifted my stance slightly while shaking away the shift in my right arm, returning it to normal and grabbing the dull wooden practice sword from where it leaned on a rail.

For all my Shape-Shifting gave me a bunch of utility, it was hard to beat a weapon when fighting another weapon. I’d started to transition away from using one since I got creative with the shifting. Cerebaton was hammering on me now, reminding me that I’d only been practicing for the last two months or so and while I was making great strides, I couldn’t just walk away from it.

Also, my greatly increased Wisdom score was telling me that by learning to fight with the weapons, I’d know how to fight against them when the time came.

I’d thought to surprise Cerebaton by sprouting the additional spike-tails I’d used on the kobolds, but he’d easily disabled them when I showed them off earlier during our sparring matches. It hadn’t even caught Cerebaton off guard. He’d dealt with them using the same stunning level of skill that he’d exhibited in the past. After that, the blond-haired daemon had proceeded to whip me seven ways to Sunday.

Cerebaton, unlike his subordinate Cariad, had access to Shape-Shifting as a power. He’d gained access to it during his time as a field agent for the DSR early on in his career, but hadn’t developed it beyond the basics, as he was more focused on other skill sets. What he could do was use the power to disguise himself as a human. Which was fortunate, as his natural form looked like a cross between the Jolly Green Giant, and some kind of harvest god from a pagan religion.

The antlers were a cool addition, but I’d seen firsthand how he struggled to get through doorways.

So instead of sparring with Cernunnos in the middle of a city park after dark, I was instead facing off against someone who looked an awful lot like Dolph Lundgren during his time as a villain in Rocky. Not as eye-catching, but sticking out in a crowd.

Thankfully, Cariad could ward the gazebo we used to practice so as to keep folks away, despite her not being able to hide herself. It wasn’t perfect, as someone from far enough away could see her anyway, but combining it with the darkness of the night helped quite a bit.

“I still want to see how you managed to destroy the entropic predator,” Cerebaton assumed his ready position and I matched him, presenting a narrowed profile with my sword hand held before me, at just a slight angle to be ready to parry.

“Mr. Cerebaton!” Cariad protested, exasperation thick in her voice.

“It’s fine, he’s got a point, Cari,” I interrupted, waving my empty hand behind me but not taking my eyes off Cerebaton. “How I beat it was by cribbing an idea off of one of the fastest critters native to this world.”

Cerebaton’s eyes narrowed slightly. His sharp jaw tightening was the only other clue I got before he lunged forward.

Our practice swords met and deflected several times, clunking dully as the wood absorbed the blows and sent the impact reverberating down my arm before we separated again. I’d managed to avoid the encounter without getting hit and Cerebaton nodded.

“Good to see you aren’t letting yourself get rusty with the sword.”

“A lot transfers over between weapons. It culminates in ‘hit the bad guy with a specific part of the weapon’,” I said with a shrug before resuming my ready position.

“And this… ‘fastest critter’ you talked about?” Cerebaton also resumed his ready position, more of a fencer's pose with the weapon held out in front of him, point aimed at my gut.

“Mantis shrimp. Can punch fast enough under water that it can boil water in passing with the friction. Little buggers are super colorful and super dangerous, if you are about the size of a quarter.”

“But you are much bigger than they are?” Cerebaton asked while quirking one eyebrow, not approaching me yet.

“Yup. That sack monster was too fast for me otherwise, and it was the first thing I thought of that was fast enough to fight back.”

“Show me.”

Cerebaton’s flat statement preceded his lunge, but I was ready.

I shifted the blade of my sword to catch his incoming thrust and push it away while I turned. My left arm was already flowing as I stepped forward, the elbow reversing and my hand fusing into the same hardened lump of bone I had used to beat the monster into submission.

No sooner had the shift completed than I fired off a strike with it, the intricate dance of effects working together to power the attack.

A mantis shrimp could snap off a punch at around fifty miles per hour, which was faster than the world’s fastest boxer. But a mantis shrimp’s punch only had to travel an inch at most.

My punch cleared the two feet of distance between me and Cerebaton a bit slower than the shrimp’s might have. It was still fast enough that, if I hadn’t been aiming for the hilt of his practice sword, I wasn’t sure if my trainer would have been able to react to defend himself. Which is why I aimed into his block.

The crunch of breaking wood met my ears half a second before Cerebaton’s boot slammed into my chest and launched me backwards through the air to land on the splintery ground of the gazebo with an ‘oof’.

My head was ringing and spinning, but I retained enough intelligence to roll with the blow and slide to my feet. I rose in time to parry the flying, broken hilt of the sword thrown at my head while the big man stomped towards me.

“Stop!”

Cariad’s sharp tone froze both of us in our tracks, me with my practice sword out and shifted left arm folded to strike again, Cerebaton with his skin flowing and turning green and horns sprouting from his head. Fury made his eyes glitter as they flowed into the sunflower-yellow that was their normal color.

“What the hell was that, Mr. Cerebaton? You asked him to show you, and you react like that?!” Cariad was already on her feet and — don’t ask me how she did it in heels, but she managed it — stomped towards us.

“That wasn’t a demonstration! That was an attack with deadly force during a training bout!” Cerebaton protested, but the anger that had been twisting his features was draining away, his skin shifting back to the human-pink of his disguise while his subordinate’s words melted the anger.

“Be that as it may, you have been hammering on him all night. Every other time he’s demonstrated a shift to you, you’ve been able to handle it. You are the instructor, Mr. Cerebaton! You should have said something if you had any question of being able to handle the attack,” Cariad insisted, coming to a stop between us.

The daemon’s red hair bounced still from the emphatic hammering of her stride, and damn me if she didn’t look adorable with how intensely she was glaring up at her boss.

“Cari—” I started to say, not wanting to let her continue to rip into her boss, when she whirled at me.

“And you! Liam, that was extremely reckless. If you had hit Mr. Cerebaton, the blow might have hurt or killed him. I sit here watching you two beat on each other without even helmets to protect yourselves. Then you go and do something like this? I swear by the System, I’ll find a way to thump some sense into the both of you if you do not find some way to avoid giving me a heart attack!”

“Sorry Cari,” I mumbled, feeling for all the world like a chastised grade-schooler right now. From the embarrassed look on Cerebaton’s face, he wasn’t doing much better.

“My apologies, Ms. Davies. I got carried away there. You have made your point to both of us,” Cerebaton said evenly after a moment of silence.

Cariad whirled to stare questioningly up at him. Apparently, she found what she was looking for before she nodded once sharply.

“Are you okay, Mr. Cerebaton?” she asked a moment later, the fire in her tone dimming, but not going away.

“I am, Ms. Davies.”

“And you, Liam?”

“Bruised, but that’s normal training with the big guy,” I said with a smile, getting a roll of the eyes from Cariad and a snicker from Cerebaton.

“Can I trust you two to act maturely now? With just a bit more common sense?”

Cariad’s last question had just the right tone to it that I had to bite back the ‘yes mom’ that was begging to come out. Kassandra was really rubbing off on me it seemed.

Instead, Cerebaton and I just nodded.

Satisfied with that, Cariad returned to her spot on the railing. Though she continued to watch us like a hawk as Cerebaton gathered up the broken halves of his wooden sword.

“I can see how that would have worked. I didn’t even see the blow coming, just felt it hit and then the crunch. After that, I reacted instinctively,” the big man explained while studying the deep dent in the hard wood that deformed it before the weapon broke.

“Apparently, the shrimp I stole the idea from swings as fast as a small-caliber bullet flies. Hard to spot those coming, unless you have truly ridiculous reflexes.” I winced while rubbing at the bruise forming on my chest.

The injury from the kick would have been worse, but I’d taken to reinforcing my skin and bones while drilling with Cerebaton to practice the Shape-Shifting ability with armor. It’d saved me from a few bruises until Cerebaton figured out what I was doing and started using more force. The git.

“Yes, that is true. An interesting option to use on one arm. Fight with the sword to force an opening, then strike into it as fast as a snake.” Cerebaton walked over to set the broken shards of his practice sword by Cariad, who huffed through her nose at him, still clearly irritated at her boss.

“Faster. Two or three times faster depending on the breed. Problem is the shorter range,” I said with a shrug.

I’d gotten curious when I got back and researched it. A striking snake could strike at anywhere from seven to eighteen miles per hour, depending on breed.

When Cerebaton did not walk back out into the open space of the gazebo, I walked over to join him by Cariad.

“Work on extending the range if you can, then. Just be aware that the longer the lever, the more stress you will put on its length.”

“I’ve got the girls for range. And my earth magic when I start expanding it. Should work on that, actually. It’s still just in the minor class.”

Cerebaton gestured as I spoke, clearly wanting to look at my still-shifted left arm. He was wearing long gloves like Cariad did to keep his touch from harming me, so I turned to hold the limb out for him to study.

“That is an option, especially with the System gifting you with the larger Mana Reservoir.” Cariad’s voice was a bit more subdued now as she watched Cerebaton shift and move the bizarre bone-club arm I had. “How is your Shape-Shifting developing?”

“Locked in the mid seven-hundreds of the mastery,” I said with a sigh. “I figured that coming up with the pearl thing would count for being creative, but hasn’t budged at all.”

“It might gain some ground as you repeat the feat. Clever idea, by the way, especially by using a creature not native to your world. Make sure you don’t end up burning out your body’s nutrients creating them though,” Cerebaton said distractedly while extending the limb to check the range.

“I won’t. I’ve made sure to research it to ensure I know what I need to eat. Part of why pearls work so well. Mostly made up of calcium carbonate, which is basically antacids. As long as I don’t try to pour out hundreds of pearls, I’ll be fine. The only real challenge is going to be finding a way to sell them. Hoping that a CPA will help me figure out if I need to set up a business, or if I can just sell them independently.”

“Go for the business. It means you’ll make a bit less, but you have better protection. Provenance is going to be an issue though, isn’t it?” Cerebaton released my arm to study his own. The limb flowed and changed to match mine, just on a larger scale, while he talked.

“As far as I can tell? They don’t care so much about that. The pearl will go through testing and the like to see how valuable it is and what type it falls under. The only worry I have is that, since the shimmer nest conch is not native to this world, the pearl won’t be considered ‘real’.” I held my arm up again so that Cerebaton could study it to make sure his matched, before shifting it back to my regular left arm.

“Sounds like you should make a few and send them off for appraisal. Say you found them and want to know if they are real or not. Ms. Davies gave you the bounty payment, right?”

“Yup, deposited the check earlier today. Had to actually go into the location since they wouldn’t let me deposit something like that through the ATM. I guess I don’t look like the type to have that kind of cashier’s check on hand, because the manager had to come out and sign off on it. Had to tell them it was from a private collection sale.”

“Well, if you make it a habit to get bounty payouts from the DSR, then we can set up direct funding to your account. That will avoid the pesky questions. The higher-ups wouldn’t approve it for a single transaction like this, but three or more should be no issue.” Cerebaton shook his arm and his shift flowed away as well before he turned his full attention back to me.

“As for your abilities, it is up to you. You might want to hold off on spending the SP you have left after your big boost the other day.”

“I wanted to experiment with the Empower Reservoir ability that showed up,” I interjected. “The girl’s biggest limitation is the cost of summoning me. If I can defray that cost by charging their mana imbued coins, then that’ll mean more summons for me. And more SP in the long run.”

“Yes, but you know the flaw of that ability, right?” Cerebaton leaned back against the railing before crossing his arms over his thick chest, making the shirt he was wearing tighten even further.

“The slower regeneration rate, right?”

“Yes. It doesn’t directly spell it out, but the native regeneration rate drops precipitously. Usually, to about ten or twenty percent of what it was.”

I winced at that thought. If it had taken around thirty minutes to regenerate a single point of mana, it would now take two and a half hours to do so. Not horrible if I wasn’t using it, but not a universal answer.

“But what about areas of higher mana concentration? I noticed that I was regenerating a lot faster here on Earth...” I did my best to keep the whine out of my tone and was only partially successful.

“It’ll still regenerate at that slower rate, just won’t be as catastrophically slow. Remember that the ambient mana will eventually run out and take time to come back. So staying in one position is not the best option for letting your mana recover.” Cariad spoke up before Cerebaton could. “It might be better to boost your stats some more, as they aren’t something that will run out on you. Just make sure to do it slowly.” The last word she growled, and I made sure to nod quickly in agreement with her demand.

“I know. I’ll make sure to take it easy, okay?”

“Good,” she snorted cutely through her nose before smirking up at me. “You do learn without having to get beaten up.”

“I’d have to be able to learn that way if the girls were going to teach me anything. Both of them are as small if not smaller than you, Cari.” I gave her one of my best, winning smiles, which earned me a small laugh from her.

“All right, that’s enough flirting between you two,” Cerebaton grumbled, making a blush race across Cariad’s cheeks. “She’s right though, Liam. Your stats are going to be the most solid thing to focus on. The Empower Reservoir power is useful, but the utility is relatively small at the moment. If I remember right, the delay on regeneration is smaller when the mastery rises. Just have to find proper receptacles here. Mana doesn’t normally crystalize on this world, so it might be hard. Once you get your Dimensional Pocket ability– don’t give me that look! You’ll get it, eventually.”

I was scowling at him when he mentioned the elusive power, but I had to admit that hearing someone of Cerebaton’s knowledge stating that I would get it eventually helped.

“Anyway, when you get the power, you’ll be able to bring over discharged metals to refill in your spare time. That will be a useful way to utilize the power.”

Silence fell between us for several long moments. Distantly, I could hear cars moving on the highway, and the hollow thunk of a basketball on the cracked asphalt of the courts on the other side of the park.

“The girls were talking about having another classmate bond with me for a contracted companion too.” I broke the silence after a few minutes of thinking.

“Good, you should open yourself to more contracts. You’ve been lucky so far that your two contracted have been summoning you so often. Most of the time, young Travelers have to build up their reputation with smaller, interspersed contracts, or by using their family contacts. Several more would be even better, since it will let you grow multiple power sets at once,” Cerebaton added, a small smile splitting the handsome mask he was wearing.

“Yeah. I will have to see how it goes. I don’t want to ever end up busy with something if one of the girls needs me, though. Part of why I’m so against getting a regular job now that I’m free of the old one.”

“Good point. The restriction of working hours is a heavy chain,” Cerebaton sighed, glancing over at Cariad, who nodded while tapping her left wrist.

“Time to head out?” I asked, recognizing the gesture.

“Yes. We are at time for our lesson. I’ll see you in two days for the second one of the week. Keep practicing with your abilities and working on expanding them. Make the most of the fast growth period.”

“Can do.” A shout from the basketball court drew my attention for a moment, and a muffled cheer followed it, as someone must have scored a point. “Hey, sorry about breaking that practice sword earli—” I turned back to check on my companions to find they had vanished.

The spot where both had leaned against the railing was as empty as if they’d never been there. The broken practice sword was gone as well, leaving behind just mine.

Rolling my eyes, I collected the bit of shaped wood from where it had been lying on the ground and set it on my shoulder for the walk back to my apartment.

“At least Cerebaton is more caped crusader than the terror that flaps in the night,” I mumbled while I walked, snickering a bit at that thought while clattering down the rickety gazebo stairs.