The Summoner's Rebirth: Awaken, Milady

Aria's figure was no longer in sight.

The four who were left behind had mixed emotions to each of their own.

"Strange, isn't she?" Reina asked, nudging on Elgin.

Elgin had a hand positioned right below his chin, entering a thinking position.

"Her movements are clean. Her fighting sense is great. Her balance in skills, instincts, agility, dexterity.. everything is great," Elgin summarized. "Only, her power is a bit lacking. She should be lower than Yan in terms of strength, but Yan heavily leans towards brute force. His other departments falls short, but he would be a great asset in battle because of his sturdiness and stoic reactions... he doesn't falter,"

"I think similar things," Reina nodded in acknowledgement. "What are you going to do about her decision? Wait it off here and follow?"

"I'll just watch her from far away," Elgin started walking towards the path Aria went to, disappearing into the dark corridors of the dungeon.

"Reina-ssi.. They.." Ha-young questioned, wondering whether it was time for another fight again.

"We're following them, but we won't fight. Aria will do everything," Reina picked up her pace and walked farther inside the dungeon as well.

Hearing Reina's instructions, Yan instantly stood up from his sitting spot and started walking.

Ha-young gripped her staff tightly, not wanting to be left behind. She picked up her pace and followed the rest of the team.

Her heart was slightly anxious because this was only her second time entering a B-ranked dungeon, and the first one was accompanied by twenty B-rankers and more. This was her first time entering with so little members.

When her supervisor announced that she would be participating in a B-ranked subjugation, Ha-young thought that it was a miracle. A blessing. But little did she know that the trip was going to consist of only five members.

She felt like it was strange. Why would the leader and his trusted confidant, Reina, organize such an event for just a woman like Aria?

Although Aria was indeed skilled, she was ultimately just a rookie B-ranker. She wasn't someone that deserved this kind of special treatment.

She thought that it was unfair. After all, she had worked hard to get into the position she was in right now. She trained and trained harder than her peers because she had a weak body. She forced herself to get used to battle.

Compared to that, Aria seemed like a reckless person who just charges everywhere. Clearly, the better decision here would be to push forward without inciting a lot of monsters and conserve their energy until the dungeon was cleared.

She had never heard of Aria and her origins, so naturally she had doubts towards the woman.

Of course, if Ha-young learned that Aria actually fought against White Fox and managed to survive a harsh blow from the talented Hunter, and many other gimmicks that Aria possessed, Ha-young's perception of the woman would change.

However, as of now, Ha-young was quite dissatisfied with Aria.

She was grumpy, but still followed closely behind the others' tracks.

______

"Dianthe, take care of the east. Rallaka, shield my west. I will charge in through the middle," Aria's voice rang out, filling the hollow cave and triggering the monsters' movements even more.

[<Lesser Undead> 0/113.]

Within the array of undeads, Aria's divided the horde into three sections for each member to take care of.

Aria would charge forth through the middle and eradicate them with large swings and magic. The defense and what Aria would be overwhelmed by was taken care of through the other two spirits' cooperation.

Rallaka would hurl down stones at the undead monsters' heads. Of course, his firepower was nowhere near perfect. His strength was heavily cut down at his current form.

He needed life force to grow stronger.

Aria conserved her magic in a strategic manner. She would move in an elusive way to gather all the monsters to a great spot and bash them to their deaths with specific means. Be it using her sword, her own body, or anything that could be of use.

The process was relatively simple, as these undead monsters posed little to no threat to the current Aria.

It just took time.

With one gathering, Aria could take down ten beings at once. Dianthe could eradicate more than ten depending on the situation. Rellaka focused more on defense and disrupting the undead for the other two to take care of.

After a few rounds of switching back and forth between attacks, they were successfully able to pulverize all the creatures.

Looking at the nasty pile of corpses, Aria beckoned for her Earthen spirit to come.

"Rallaka, absorb the corpse," Aria said, in which the spirit responded by following her orders.

She then asked Dianthe to wash the grime off of her and [Halvargg].

Aria looked at the time, which she measured using her phone and discovered that a total of ten minutes had passed.

She slayed over one hundred monsters, and yet her level still didn't rise.

It seemed like these <Lesser Undeads> no longer gave her any noticeable EXP. It meant that these folks were now considered too weak for her by the System.

It happened before with the even weaker monsters.

Understandably, Aria was ticked off.

At this rate, even B-ranked dungeons wouldn't be able to make her gain power. What was she supposed to do when she reaches the stage where only A-ranked dungeons could satisfy her System's thirst?

She sighed, looking at her sad status. She conserved as much energy as possible but started going harsher when she saw that the experience bar was rising at a considerable speed.

Sadly, it wasn't enough for a level up.

Feeling defeated, Aria turned around to see the other team members patiently waiting for her fight to be over.

All four of them had different sets of expressions on their faces.

Reina had a proud look, Elgin was amused, Yan was emotionless and cold, while Ha-young displayed an aghast look.

She was surprised at how well Aria sustained her energy during the fight. Not once did she rest or flinch due to the outburst of monsters.

For someone like Aria, who she has never heard of before, it was the unthinkable.

Silence ensued. No one said anything, everyone just stood at their own posts.

"Are you done with the absorption?" Aria looked over to Rallaka and questioned.

Upon receiving a positive answer, Aria pursed her lips. She scanned the surroundings and confirmed with her System that there was really nothing left to do.

It was time to move on to the next stage.

"..Let's go?" Aria tilted her head, looking at the other four with an innocent look.

Instead of receiving a reply, Elgin went ahead and walked past her. He started climbing the steps that led to the next stage.

In dungeons like this, the truth was very simple. You could technically walk past all these monsters and bypass the stages by running off to the steps and reaching the next stage.

The monsters were locked to each stage, so they wouldn't be able to reach the Hunters if they ran ahead.

However, in Aria's case, she wanted to kill them all. To gain levels and life force. She actually hadn't tried the theory of whether her System would allow her to leave monsters behind and escape forward.

Thinking that this was a good time to test that out, Aria prepared herself for the battle.

She swung her hand around and stretched to throw away all the remaining fatigue and regain mobility.

Aria followed Elgin's steps. Reina and the other two then followed behind.

_____

-Next Stage

It was another pack of undead. However, instead of the non-armed monsters on the first stage, these ones had simple weapons ranging from daggers to swords.

[<Undead Soldiers> 0/107.]

This time, the name changed. From Lesser to Soldier.

Aria's determination burned up. She saw the monsters as experience.

"Let's do this, you two," Aria gestured for her two spirits to go ahead and initiate the start.

She then followed closely and began attacking.

Her adrenaline was built up with each kill, as Aria's eyes saw nothing but corpses and corpses.

Her blade slashed through all of the undeads' bodies, ending their lives efficiently.

Ha-young and Yan also did their bests. Since the area was larger than the previous one, the two were able to perform better feats. Their combat abilities were ones that suited being showed off at open spaces.

Ha-young casted large flames over a pack of monsters, but it didn't completely take them out.

The reason being, Aria's battlefield was something she dominated on her own.

She had perfect teamwork with the two spirits she was able to communicate with. It was because the delay needed for understanding each other was no longer there. The connection between a Summoner and their summoned creature was phenomenal.

Thanks to the efficiency, they moved through the large horde with ease.

Within just a few minutes, the crowd was completely eradicated.

This time, Reina did not interfere because she judged that the situation did not need her help. Aria took care of the battle flow excellently, and the first showcase was practically just to give a tester to Aria, who had never seen her in action.

Aria looked at her level and saw that she was nearing the end of her EXP bar. She concluded that she needed to eradicate just a little bit more in order to finish her goal.

Sighing, she felt drained mentally because she hadn't received a refresh from the System.