Test Summoning: Apocalypse

I was back in the very familiar waiting room at the arena holding two bags of Alvin's roasted chestnuts. Tizek was busy pouring his into his mouth as usual while Void was quietly eating out of her bag. The coldness continued when Void politely accepted the bag and gave me thanks. There wasn't the usual upwelling of excitement when I offered one to her. I knew something was wrong since she hadn't worn the turquoise vest I bought her since the first day at the training yard.

Lia's attitude continued to be reserved. She declined the bag, claiming she was too nervous to eat. I, too, found my appetite shot. I hadn't eaten a bag of Alvin's roasted chestnuts since the last time I stood here with the others over 30 years ago and I didn't have the heart to take one. I ended up putting the two bags back.

I took a deep breath. I gave my usual speech to the four summoned humans from Earth and their parties of noble kids. That at least went like it usually did. Aurelie and Disha absorbed my words in silence and left the huddle. Damu and Carolina gave me words of gratitude. Aoto ignored me over by the exit with his desired harem.

This was my last chance. I had to convince Aoto to give up after his bout and not arrogantly challenge the next round. If the Speckled Stomper killed him again, there was no coming back. I couldn't continue to spin in circles through loops just to try to keep him alive. I'd done this thousands of times and had no success. There was no justification wiping the memories of everyone else in the universe just to maintain a futile effort.

"Aoto? I need to talk to you," I said as I approached him and his party.

The four of them turned their heads toward me. Aoto sneered in my direction. "What do you want, old man?"

"This is important. Don't fight more than the first monsters. The Exterminators I talked to tell me it's a very bad idea without an advancement. You four will die horrible deaths out there. Please, don't try to overdo it," I said in a pleading voice. I was tired, getting angry and at the end of my rope. I couldn't maintain my composure.

Aoto waved a hand dismissively. "You're a dud, of course they told you that. I'm the legendary hero with the highest rating and the greatest ability. I can heal any wounds. No mere monster can harm me."

My anger grew when I heard the dismissal. Not only was I somehow failing miserably to make my final loop perfect with Lia and Void, I was still getting the same lip as always.

"You need to pay attention. I don't want to see your head get bitten off and the others have their insides spread all over the sands," I said tersely. The three girls with him suddenly looked afraid by what I said.

Aoto continued to act arrogantly. "Begone from my sight, peasant. I have no need for your input."

My anger exploded at the words. My primal brain had remembered something, something I had forgotten since I was first summoned to this world centuries ago by my reckoning. I had spent the vast majority of my existence living in a world of magically enhanced people. My identity was one who was small and weak. I was a pathetic dud who had zero hope of ever amounting to anything. It was etched into my very being I was reliant on charisma and intellect to survive. In this world, I was grossly outclassed by practically everyone I associated myself with. I had to adapt and leverage my mind and personality. Two things which had routinely failed here and were failing with Lia and Void.

My primal brain reminded me of who I was before I came here. I was an outdoorsman. I was a Florida Man. I would pull 190cm gators out of my lawn and drag them back to the retention pond across the street. I would pack 65kg of meat from a large boar out of the swamp and back to my truck in a single go. I could pull my boat out of the water and onto the trailer with little trouble.

I was strong. Of everyone here ready to go out on the sands for their first fight, I had overwhelming power. Shit, I even overpowered Tizek each and every time I ran across him. I never once lost. Now it was time to leverage something my deep insecurity had locked away while I still could.

I gripped Aoto around the collar of his metal breastplate and slammed him into the wall. His eyes opened wide with incredulity. "You dare?" He reached down to grab the handle of his ridiculous katana. I pressed my hand against the pommel and pushed the weapon so it, too, pinned against the wall in its sheath.

"I dare, you little fucker," I snarled in his face.

"Hey!" I heard a guard shout. "No fighting in the waiting room. You'll be expelled if you don't stop."

"It's not a fight," I shouted back. "It's just a little cultural preparation ritual. Don't mind us, we won't come to blows." I knew there wouldn't be a real fight since Aoto was now impotently trying to dislodge my hand from his armor's collar. His pathetic, weak arms of someone who hadn't lifted anything heavier than a video game controller had no hope of removing my iron grip.

"Unhand me, or else I'll…" Aoto tried to growl back at me before I interrupted him with another slam.

His soft features of a teen sheltered from the hardships of the world made me laugh. "Or else what? You'll pull your stupid little ninja sword?"

"It's not a…" Aoto tried to talk again. I leaned in forward and glared, which shut him up.

"It's what I say it is. Now listen up, shithead, and listen good. You think you're some great hero? The protagonist of one of your fucking ridiculous light novels? You think these three girls are going to fawn over you in a harem while you ride out to defeat a demon lord?" I paused and stared him down. His eyes widened before shifting down and away to avoid my gaze. "Good instincts. I'm a sad, pathetic dud and I'm keeping you from pulling your stupid little curved toothpick. If I'm a weak nothing and you're entirely at my mercy, what does that make you right now? What hope do you have to fight something stronger than a hairy monster known for throwing fruit and being a minor nuisance to farmers? You're just a dumb kid who lives in a fantasy."

Aoto quit squirming and went still. His eyes showed a sense of terror. It tugged at me. Old Earth instincts came back and told me it was wrong to lay hands on a child. I was a teacher and he should be a student, even though he wasn't in college. I pushed those down. I was just too angry to care. "Well? What do you have to say for yourself?"

"I apologize for my disrespect, Stewart-sensei," Aoto said with a formal, stilted tone in his voice.

I released him and he wobbled a little before finding his balance. "Good. What are you going to do when you go out there?"

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"We are going to fight the match and stop, sensei," Aoto replied with his head still down in shame.

"Are you going to take this world seriously and not try to show off?"

"Yes, sensei."

I suddenly felt my anger vanish. It was replaced by my own sense of shame and muscle tremors from my draining adrenaline. I fought to control my jellied limbs to avoid ruining the effect. I put a hand on each of Aoto's shoulders gently, causing him to flinch. "Son? I'm not doing this to be cruel. I want you to live. I want you to thrive. This is our new life now. You have the potential to do great things and I can't stand the thought of you throwing it away. That's why I got mad at you. I care too much to see any of you fail."

I could see tears starting to flow from Aoto's eyes. I didn't have to ask him to know he was feeling the same sense of fear and confusion the others are now. It was a scary situation, one which I knew not from looping endlessly but in my very soul Aoto was trying to cover up with bravado. After his initial emotional high from being summoned, my instincts screamed he became terrified of what had happened.

I drew him in for an embrace. His sobs came more freely as his emotional dam broke. I let him release his fear and insecurity into my shoulder. After a few minutes, the weeping subsided. I offered him the sleeve of my leather armor to wipe away his remaining tears and snot from his nose. I could always wash it off in the showers later.

"Alright. I know you'll do well if you follow your training. Trust your allies, they won't let you down," I said after we released. Aoto nodded quietly. I looked over at his three companions, worried that seeing their summoned hero emotionally break down would harm their opinion of him. In that moment, I had forgotten about the culture of Leoren. People here didn't see men weeping as a sign of weakness and they almost seemed relieved the hero was mortal and not some perfect otherworldly being.

"Will the first contestants please enter the arena?" an attendant at the door said.

Aoto remained still. I gave him a gentle push. "Go on, show us how it's done."

Aoto took a few steps toward the door and was followed by the three girls in his party. After three steps, he stopped, turned and bowed deeply. "Thank you for your instruction, sensei." The then turned back around and left through the door.

I wasn't well-versed in Japanese culture. If I did know anything, it was forgotten in the centuries of life I've lived. While I may have kept my memories from loop to loop, I didn't have an infinite capacity to remember it all. I had no idea if what I did worked. Did their teachers ever care about students one-on-one? Was the crying a good sign? Or the sudden deference? I had no idea if I just made an enemy of Aoto or if it was all an act. It was another thing I had no experience with.

I turned away from the door after Aoto and his party passed through and saw a group of stunned people staring back at me. The other summoned humans and their parties in particular looked borderline terrified by what I had just done. The guards and other functionaries looked on with shocked silence. "Sorry, all. I was just giving the kid a pep talk."

I had to sit down. My adrenaline dump was hitting me hard and I felt like I was about to collapse. When I sat, I looked up at my own party. My mood deflated along with my waning high when I saw their expressions. Tizek wasn't the issue. He actually looked at me with deep respect. I must have conducted myself like a true lord in his eyes.

It was Lia and Void I was worried about. Void's expression was a mask. All I could tell was my instincts didn't drive a feeling of unease in my stomach from looking at it.

Lia, though, bothered me. She looked terrified of me. I gave her a small smile. "I'm sorry you had to see that." She didn't respond to my words and looked away. Her gaze turning away hurt me deep in my soul. I'm screwing this up with her and I need to do better, yet I don't know what I'm doing wrong.

Void's mouth twitched in another indecipherable moment. "What just happened?"

My eyes turned down. "I'm sorry. I've tried thousands of times to keep him alive today. Knowing that was my final attempt? I lost my composure. I might have screwed up."

"We'll see," Void said cryptically. I couldn't tell if she was upset with me from her tone. I looked up and she had a neutral expression on her face as she watched the viewscreen.

Aoto and his party entered the sands and the announcer introduced them. I was waiting for Aoto's bravado to come through with his usual dramatic draw of his sword and pumping it in the air. My mood became hopeful when it didn't come. He patiently waited for the announcement, drew his sword and his party indicated they were ready.

Like always, the six albatwitches streamed out of the other end of the arena. Aoto and his group had set themselves up 20 meters from the opposite end of the arena from the monsters they faced. Like usual, the otter-clan girl fired arrows and managed to only kill one opponent this time around.

My hopes continued to rise when Aoto didn't rush in. He didn't scream out move names or recklessly charge into the coming enemy line. Instead, he patiently waited and allowed the deer-clan and cougar-clan girls in his party to protect his flanks with their spears.

What followed was, well, not a masterclass. It was sloppy, Aoto and his allies took a few blows and they didn't look great when dispatching the albatwitches. They did, however, show composure, control and teamwork. Aoto took the fore to draw the attention of the monsters while the two spearwomen covered his sides.

Before the line of monsters finally reached Aoto, the otter-clan girl managed to kill a second albatwitch, leaving four remaining to fight. Aoto struck out first when the lead albatwitch reached him. His strike was far better than I'd ever seen. It wasn't pretty by any stretch of the imagination since he only had a few days of practice with a very complex weapon.

Aoto's strike was mechanical like he was performing a drill. It sliced through the chest of the albatwitch, wounding it as opposed to dispatching the enemy. Gone was his sloppy chopping and whirlwind style where he put himself at unnecessary risk to defeat the opponent. He followed up his slash with a quick jab which pierced the monster and killed it.

He took a few hits from the other three when they set upon him. The two spearwomen were not comfortable stabbing out so close to an ally and only hit their opponents with glancing blows. Still, it was enough to disrupt their attack on Aoto long enough to give him room to slice and slash at the final monster. He pulled gravel from the ground with his magic and slung it in the albatwitch's eyes, blinding it. He used the opportunity to cut deeply in to the monster's neck. It wasn't strong enough to sever the head completely and the metal blade caught on the spinal column. It was, however enough to fell his opponent.

The other two continued to stab out with their spears while the otter-clan bowwoman waited in the rear since she couldn't contribute further. The pressing jabs and stabs from the spears kept the albatwitches off-balance until both went down to the continued pressure of little attacks draining the monsters' health pools.

Then it was over. The girls cut out the mana cores, releasing the corpses back to the world. Aoto stood silently as he peered at the ground, his sword limp in his hand.

The crowd didn't let out a thundering cheer like they did after Aoto's previous displays. They clapped politely since all they saw was a fairly typical, if sloppy, rookie's first battle.

"Not bad. The kid has an unusual weapon."

"Eh, I was expecting more from a summoned hero."

"Oh, like you were any better the first time you held a sword."

"They have potential. I liked their composure."

Aoto looked at his bruises fading and cuts closing on the exposed parts of his arms not covered by his metal bracers. This was the moment of truth. Was he going to let his Regeneration ability get the better of him? Would it rekindle his arrogance and make him want to challenge the next round?

"What a show!" the arena announcer belted out, his words at odds with the reaction of the crowd. "Now, for our next bout, we have another summoned hero. That is, unless you four wish to challenge the next round."

My hopes rose further when the announcer was able to complete his sentence without being interrupted. My leg bounced on the floor in my seat while my eyes were fixated on the screen. Right now, nothing else in the world existed.

My relief was palpable when I saw Aoto bow respectfully to the audience. "Thank you for coming today. We will retire from the field and train further." His bow was mimicked by his three companions. The crowd gave them another round of gentle applause as the four left the arena.

I could feel my body shaking from relief. Tears began to flow from my eyes as I sat in the chair. I could hear upbeat conversations from the other contestants in the room. My eyes remained glued to the viewscreen. Instead of a four quadrant shot of a headless Aoto and the mangled bodies of the girls, all I saw was the arena crew raking the sand to smooth out the places Aoto and his party roughed up. When the attendant asked for the next party, instead of Void, Lia, Tizek and I going out to show the others this wasn't an impossible task, Damu called to be next.

I had done it. I couldn't believe it. I had done it. I sat there in that seat weeping in silence as I watched each of the parties partake in their bouts. I saw Damu show his budding dodge ability as his party defeated their foes. I watched Disha slow a single albatwitch with a shadow trap spell in her victory. Aurelie used a couple of flaring flash spells before she had a mild panic attack and needed her party to finish the kills. Carolina waited for her party's frontline fighter to get all the attention before she circled behind and killed a pair of albatwitches with backstabs.

Everything went right. All five of them survived. Most importantly, Aoto was sitting in the exit room right now waiting for an escort back to the castle. I did it. I finally did it.

"Hero Oliver?" I heard a shout. I snapped out of my stupor and turned toward the door. I saw the attendant standing there. "I've been calling you. Is your party ready? We can't delay forever."

I looked back at my party. Tizek had a look of concern on his face and so did Void. The latter brought me happiness. Lia, however, still looked mildly afraid. I knew Void and Tizek were ready, but Lia? I wasn't so sure. "Are you ready, Lia?"

She looked down at the ground and nodded in silence. It didn't feel like she was being honest with me.

"Are you sure? I don't want you thinking you have to do this to make me happy," I pressed.

Lia nodded in affirmation again. Once more, it felt forced.

"Alright, let's see if we can give the audience a decent finale," I said. I stood and the four of us walked out onto the sands. At least one thing went my way today.