Bonded Summoner

Having said goodbye to his kids, wives, and Bree, Jake headed to the coliseum. He shifted his Champion Vestments to match that of Hestia’s desired clothing, wearing a toga with a shoulder and chest or heart guard, with the gem attached in the center.

Following the theme of video game characters, Jake was now able to wear a special skin for his armor. Even if he had his armored faceplate down, he could still look as if he were not wearing them at all. It provided no real advantage, as he could still feel the equipment on him, and Tartarus enemies would see him as his equipment truly was. Really, it just made him feel a little less awkward speaking with people when he wore his full kit.

Jake took the portal to the Life’s Haven, and then flew through over the buildings and streets, covering himself in his telekinetic hearth flames. Having spent time here and there on it, he now had several means of generating flight.

The spellform was the simplest and most efficient, as it was like creating a dozen points around him and shoving himself evenly through the air. The flames of his hearth would only slowly be expended, allowing him to return much of what remained of the spellforms back to the flames in his core when he was done. To onlookers, he looked like a man cloaked in flames, flying through the air. He mostly kept himself upright as he did this through the city, as speed wasn’t really all that important.

He arrived at the coliseum, and the place was busy with people all over. The stands had numerous people, primarily parents watching over their children and enjoying the prepared food. Warriors dueled and trained throughout the massive arena, and the children from many races and spriggons practiced their baseball and martial arts.

The other main arena held the battle simulator, and it was usually just as busy, if not more so. People of all ages would join there to watch their warriors challenge themselves, whether facing mana constructs or duels between warriors for glory.

That was where Bree and Ruby spent much of their time, it seemed. The two both loved to challenge themselves and others, and against the many constructs.

The air was laced with mana and auril both, now that Highland’s energy levels had risen. They were still not quite at their maximum, but Ava’s proclamation about the dungeon entrances solidifying showed they had long since surpassed the second Tier by a large margin.

Bloodberri was here, the two girls driving their training of the many young of Highlands. The numerous teens built their bodies and trained as groups, from passing medicine balls around and helping each other stretch, to practice fights and playing pick-up games. A few Eternum flew around and helped along with the spriggons, the unliving servants aiding with the children’s training and practice.

These many kids might end up being the cornerstone of the first Tier guilds Jake had built in the future, as they came of age and finished their training and preparation. They would then head off to the many worlds of Sector 87, saving lives and occasionally claiming them in the name of Hearthtribe.

And if not Hearthtribe, they had a few arms or subguilds focused on different levels of focus and commitment. They even had a sort of engineering or crafting guild, who’s entire goal was to rebuild cities and homes across worlds. Hearthtribe members would do it all as Jake saw it as important, but there were those that could dedicate their efforts to these things.

Jake had mostly stopped here just to visit. He gave his lovely echidna wives a kiss, and played some catch with the kids. Since he often came here, the few he had spent time with in the past came over and showed off their gains. Their practice in the many skills and efforts in training their bodies had had results and he congratulated them, before he headed over to another arena.

Morwen the undead priestess of Arawn was there, along with many of the Eternum and Emberborn, Elysian casters, and even some beastkin clergy. Some Warrior Brotherhood talismancers and battle maidens were there, everyone training their spells and magic.

There were even some Mass Migration new arrivals among them. The banshees and harpies were selected, the latter being powerful wind or storm-based elemental casters. There was even a race of djinns that now lived in the southern deserts, which varied significantly in their types of magic, but many focused on fire magic and were compatible with Hestia and Brigid.

The most substantial was that they migrated more Elysians or Fey. A large cadre of elves arrived, along with more treants, dryads, faun, naiads, and even some species not present on The Elysian Glade. Their Origins were less based on Gaia, but more Celtic in nature, which made them even more fitting here on Highlands.

And of course, all of these Mass Migrations were fitting of Fhesiah’s criteria, these races having a higher female to male ratio as a natural part of their species.

In truth, the numbers of each of these entries were rather small in the big scheme of things–less than the Elysians individually. However, this was meant to prepare for the future, to place more potential candidates for Hearthtribe into the funnel, so to speak.

Only a scant number of these were in the second Tier at all, and it might be even beyond their imposed vacation before they were strong enough to join Hearthtribe in their Conquest. The beastkin had rocketed ahead in this past year, fighting inside the dungeon, doing incursions, and more.

Target dummies lined the large area, and numerous constructs were available to test out spells and effects. Then, there were several small fenced off areas for magical duels, and the stone-tiled ground had many breaks and rents in them from various spell effects.

There were also a handful of elves and other casters, as not everyone in Life’s Haven was Hearthtribe. This was part of a weekly event that allowed the general public to join, both in an attempt to recruit more people, but also to collaborate and share some of their gains with allies and friends.

The four coliseums were still Hearthtribe property, but they also had training rooms within the Alliance HQ with additional features and privacy.

The final coliseum was for the many tamers of Highlands beasts, the larger creatures taking up a lot of space for their training. Bree and Ruby also spent some time there, facing off against and helping out with the many trainers using their beastly intuition. Jasmina too spent time there, as her songs helped heal and soothe the many beasts.

Jake neared the arena areas in his flight, and set himself down, as he had found his targets. Sati, the living flame, floated a few feet off the ground in her meditative pose, facing off against Nadessa, the dryad Arch Druid within one of the many fenced off areas.

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

As a result of her second successful Raid, Nadessa had entered the second Tier. And she grew, both in height, and in apparent age to look like that of an adult, like many of the Elysians did, to Jake’s surprise, and Fhesiah’s delight.

Nadessa raised her staff above her head, clouds and winds swirling around her. Lightning crackled within the dark clouds, like a localized thunderstorm. Having built winds and electricity around herself, she then sent the storm of lightning at Sati, like launching an angry dark cloud at her.

A small smile touched Sati’s lips as she spotted or felt Jake nearby, and she raised one of her clasped hands and pointed at the oncoming cloud. A small orb of flame was shot out, and it exploded at the center of the storm cloud. To Jake’s surprise, the cloud rippled, before dispersing completely like a popped balloon.

Nadessa was breathing heavy from casting her powerful spell, where she ran over to Sati. “It’s no fair. You’re too tough!”

Sati shook her head. Her words came out slowly, and quietly–yet through her Qi, it seemed her small voice carried far. “Your storm…is getting better–stronger. But…” She paused, as if searching for the words. “A summer storm is powerful and wild. Unpredictable and cannot be contained. You try…to contain it. It is…not good.”

Nadessa snorted. “Well, yeah. I can’t exactly create a massive storm in the middle of battle–my allies will be struck with unpredictable lightning too! But I take your point. I will…think on this some more, and work on it.”

Jake surprised the two of them when he spoke behind them, “I think we can prepare the battlefield for you to use it, you just gather your storm far away from our army.”

Sati turned to Jake, while floating, and inclined her head in a bow. “Greetings, Lord Jake. Will you be joining us for some practice again?”

“Oh! It’s the Chief. How goes it?” Nadessa spun around, and smiled as she leaned on her staff.

“Things are going well. I did want to practice with some of you for a bit.”

Nadessa smiled. “That’d be great! Let me just…recover a little first.”

Nadessa caught her breath for a time and recovered her mana, then the two oriented themselves in the distance from him, and he stood on the edge of the area. Using the fixture that would keep them from expiring, they started their magical duel.

Sati was the first to kick it off with a spell. Several dark flames lit up behind her, like candles lit in the air–reminiscent of Fhesiah’s kitsune flames. They shot at him like arrows, and he rapidly coalesced a series of runes in response, manifesting a large barrier of ice in front of him.

The wall rose from the ground in an explosion of cold and frost, and only barely held up to the flaming missiles Sati had shot. The tiny bursts of flame formed cracks throughout the wall, and it looked like it wouldn’t hold up for long, as the flames were alive, and weren’t put out even though they had struck the solid wall.

Jake was happy with allowing it to crumble, as he formed the runes of wind this time. With a blast of wind, his barrier shattered and was sent outward from him, sending jagged chunks of snow and ice at the two girls like a blast from a shotgun.

But Nadessa had been preparing her spell, a weave of vines exploding in front of the pair, taking on the incoming frost. Sati created a sphere of flame above their heads, preparing a powerful attack behind their defenses.

An array worth of runes rose above Jake’s head as he created his own orb of flame, using Blood and Berri’s flame. His ball of flames resembled an eclipse as Sati’s sphere shot towards his. The light was sucked out of the area of the arena, and only shifting beams of flaming white light shot out from behind the shifting orb, targeting Nadessa’s vines and setting them aflame.

As Sati’s orb of flame neared, it was slowed, giving Jake time to finish his next spell: a large spear of vajrafire flames, with magical runes lining its haft and spearhead. It pierced through Sati’s weakened sun, and she and Nadessa were once again rushed on the defensive, sending flames and a blast of lightning of their own in response.

Nearly all the spells Jake used just now were either empowered Tier 1 spells, or true Tier 2 spells. The three mages went back and forth, trying new spells to counter and attack one another.

Having reached the second level of Hearth Runic Magic and Mana Control equivalent, Jake could now easily cast Tier 2 runic spells all on his own. When Jake had received his Mythic Hearth Staff, he had bemoaned the loss of the runic prisms–but Hestia had said something about wondering whether he would still need it or not.

As usual, Hestia’s words were prophetic, as Jake now saw very little value in his spell rods and similar for himself personally. Because now he did not truly have a rune limit. Where the mana was thick enough, he could draw enough mana from the surrounding area to manifest the runes into the spells he desired, nearly no matter how many he wanted to establish.

Thanks to the denser mana and his superior control, the constructs would be more stable, making it all the easier to create, infuse, and link as many together as he wished. The difficulty in research and spell-casting came from not the cost in mana or the making of the runes, but finding a balance within the giant Sudoku-like puzzle of the linked runes. The more of the hexagons that he linked together, the more complicated the puzzle got, but also how powerful or varied the spell could actually be.

He had wondered why he couldn’t just buy a rune cheat sheet that would include all known spells, or things like this. Guilds desired to hoard the results of this magical research for their own benefit, and the Framework and Tartarus both supported this. Often, because his guild had researched the spells themselves, it would be better off than if they had learned the spell from someone or somewhere else.

One could see it like a research tree within a 4X Strategy Game. Often, by unlocking a researched technology, it would not simply just provide the ability to cast a spell or build a special structure. Small, marginal benefits would be added as a result of the research as well, and the Framework was the same.

The spells his people researched would have the magical outcome improved slightly, and this was part of why Nordic Runes just felt more powerful compared to the investment, to Jake. The rules for casting and the difficulty in researching and establishing a working spell just made them better. It was weird to Jake, but it was just one more way that his life and the war was fought like a game.

Jake continued his practice, alternating through his many new functions he had worked out, and testing them against his other magical opponents. Whether it be large spheres or smaller balls, darts, arrows, spears, walls, novas, waves or cones, Jake now had tons of options for each element and how to attack or defend against enemies, plus his wives’ more varied special flames.

Now that the mana was dense enough, even wind-based attacks that he avoided before could be effective, giving him even more options for different types of attacks. Combined with having numerous spells of each element that were focused on demonic runes, Jake was starting to become a master of runes in truth now.

Nadessa was panting once again, as they paused their practice. “That was…great practice, Chief. Both of us could hardly keep up with you. I’d need a whole team of druids to keep up if not for Sati here.”

As Jake expected, Sati eventually, while blushing by how her cheeks took on a fiery-pink hue, asked him for some of his flames as she often did.

“My lord…may I? …You know. Please?”

The fiery woman was a bit addicted to his hearth flames. With a smile, he compressed his flames down, as if he were casting his Scorching Ray spell, making sure to add all the flames of his family together. Then, just before it reached the critical point, he brought it out of his chest and sent it over to her–a dense ball of flame.

Releasing his intent, she wrapped it in her Qi and brought it to her mouth, where it was like she drank it. She covered her mouth with her hand, as if wanting to hide her lips as she did this. The flames within her entire body brightened, and she shivered for a moment.

Sati smiled. “Thank you, milord. It…somehow is even tastier now. More like Highlands, our home.”

Jake couldn’t help but wryly smile at that. He had done some tempering with Avalara’s true avatar last night, and it was like Sati knew this in a roundabout way. He was just about to say goodbye when Fhesiah’s voice reached his mind.

[It looks like we have a request for a meeting–the leader of the guild, Love and Justice? She’s been working with our guild quite a bit in the last year, and it seems like she needs our help.]

He was about to head over to see Valtor anyway. He would go see what was going on.