Chapter IV.XVIII (4.18) - Feral Summons

  Kizu’s vision slowly came back into focus. The courtyard solidified from a massive red blur into more concrete images. Conjured sticks faded into black flakes as students fled all around him.

  It didn’t make much sense to him at first. Why would they all leave class early? Why wasn’t Professor Oasaji stopping them? Kizu wondered if he’d blacked out from blood loss and missed the end of class bell toll. But….what was the scarlet light coming from?

  Then he saw a student collapse to the ground nearby. She clutched at her leg. Or rather…something wrapped around her leg. It looked like a wooden anklet. She cried out in pain.

  Then Kizu saw the wooden anklet squirm. It was digging itself into her flesh.

  He jumped forward and dug his fingers under the wood, prying it from her skin. Splinters dug into his fingers, scraping him and mixing his blood with the girl’s, but he ignored the pain and jumped again. This time he took the wooden thing with him.

  Before it had time to wrap itself around his hand, Kizu hurled the thing with enhanced strength, smashing it into the courtyard’s wall. It fell to the grass. Then slowly dissolved into red flakes.

  Kizu turned his attention over to the patch of concrete where he’d sketched out his circle earlier. Coincidentally, that also happened to be where the red lighting was coming from. And…light wasn’t the only thing that his circle was spitting out.

  Even as he watched, more of the wooden strips squirmed out of the scarlet summoning circle. They flung themselves forward, attacking the few remaining students too stupefied or slow to have already escaped.

  Or, at least, they were trying to. Every time they leaped forward, they were incinerated by spontaneous blasts of fire or swallowed by a grasping hand of earth.

  Despite the dazzling display of magic, both of the casters creating the effects barely gave the spells any attention. Instead, Professor Oasaji and Sene faced the circle itself.

  Kizu jumped to their side, nearly falling over with wooziness.

  “What…what happened?” he asked. “What can I do to help?”

  “Nothing,” Oasaji barked. He slammed his talons into the soil and another wave of dirt took out three more of the wooden creatures. “Get to safety. I’ll destroy the link.”

  Kizu’s hand lit up with his fire fist spell and he snatched one of the creatures from the air as it launched itself from the summoning circle. It squirmed and fought against him as he cremated it in his grip. But it didn’t dig into him or try to hurt him. Only then did Kizu realize that none of the blood thirsty creatures were interested in him. Sene blasted them to smithereens as they approached and Oasaji efficiently picked off the ones foolish enough to get close to him. But Kizu was safe.

  “Are these….”

  “They’re your summons,” Sene confirmed, a grim look on her face as she created a circle of fire and slowly started bringing it in around them. “Now move as the professor commanded before I burn you.”

  Kizu stepped away, about to jump over to the other side of the fire as she had suggested. Then he had an idea. He let the crispy remains of the summon in his hand flake away into nothing and then he snatched up another, freshly created one. This time he created an orb of antimatic in his hand and shrunk it down to close in on his prisoner.

  The stick creature dissipated the moment the antimagic touched it.

  “Boy!” Oasaji shouted. At first Kizu thought he was going to reprimand him for not getting out of there faster. “I saw that. Get over here, now!”

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  This time Kizu did as he was told immediately. He crouched down next to the turkey professor.

  “What do you-”

  “You have some measure of control over antimagic? Good. Sene is killing those currently destroying the ferals slipping out. You need to channel that antimagic into your circle.”

  “I only ever create barriers with-”

  “Now! This method works most effectively by the original summoner!”

  Not fully understanding, Kizu pressed his hand against the glowing chalk markings. He closed his eyes and focused.

  It was different from creating a barrier of antimagic. That interacted with space and, while still not really physical, connected to the world directly. This was instead going into an already established spell. It was like channeling into the circle, but it felt wrong. Like filling a body with sugar water instead of blood. Still, he shouldered on with the spell. Pushing the antimagic forward.

  When he opened his eyes, the courtyard had dimmed down to only the natural light. Gone was the scarlet light of his summoning circle. Even Sene had dismissed her wall of fire, now instead chasing after the stragglers and blasting them apart with electricity with every snap of her fingers.

  “What…” Kizu paused and licked his chapped lips. “What was that?”

  “A feral summon,” Sene answered, not even looking over her shoulder as she caught another of the creatures with a bolt of lightning.

  “That is what happens when a summoner attempts to create something beyond their capacity,” Professor Oasaji clarified. “Feral summons are uncommon. I’ve only seen a half a dozen in my last couple years of teaching here. Each occasion of their creation is entirely unique.”

  “So…because I was conjuring a stick, these guys look…stickish?” Kizu asked.

  “Percicely. We’re lucky that you didn’t try summoning an actual creature.”

  Kizu looked over to Sene to see if she had anything to add, but the model student had her eyes facing away from them as she continued to decimate the last couple stick summons.

  “I’m sorry about all of this,” he said.

  “The fault lies in me. Do not worry about the damages. I should have seen you struggling over to the side and foreseen what would happen. Especially based off your dangerous approach to pursuing magic last semester.”

  “Dangerous approach?”

  “What is your current rank on the leaderboard for elemental magic?”

  “Um…low 200’s, I think.”

  “You were the lowest in the school at the start of last semester.”

  “Second lowest,” Sene mumbled as she finished destroying the last feral summon.

  Professor Oasaji ignored her comment. “That sort of dogged pursuit lends itself to danger. I know you missed several lectures due to blood loss.”

  “Oh. Yeah.” Kizu blinked. With all that had happened to him in his life, he barely thought fainting a few times warranted being labeled as ‘dangerous’ but he didn’t argue.

  “And so, I should have known that you would push yourself to a breaking point. You aren’t the first to do so.”

  At that statement, Sene looked up, scared.

  “Yes, Miss Kajima. I am referring to you. At least at first glance, you and Mister Kaga appear to have a similar lack of control in the art of conjuring.”

  “That’s…it was only once,” Sene pointed out. “He’s not like I am.” Her protest was different from when she insisted she was actually the top potions student to him or the top history student to Faible. No. Those statements were filled with arrogance. This time, her protest sounded…fearful. Her eyes flicked over to him and he saw worry there.

  Professor Oasaji waddled by. He pointed his beak skyward, clearly lost in thought for a minute.

  “You may be correct. Any further testing must be done extremely carefully. I will consult Professor Knoff about the predicament.”

  “His soul is fine!” Sene stated, this time with more authority. “He even has a familiar. You can’t form a contract with one with a splintered soul.”

  Kizu bit his lip. His soul. It certainly was not fine. He wondered if he should say something and clarify. Maybe that would be the smart thing to do. Explain that somehow he’d lost a part of his soul and he now had a parasitical sliver in its place. He opened his mouth to say as much. Nothing. He wasn’t certain if it was he naturally struggling to get the words out, or the other soul held them at bay. He hated that uncertainty. Eventually, he gave up and closed his mouth.

  “Enough of this discussion for now,” Professor Oasaji said, cheering up. “Perhaps I should thank you, Kaga Kizu. Today’s demonstration will be an excellent teaching moment for the rest of the class. I doubt any of them will forget this experience. It will encourage them to be cautious about conjuring powerful objects or summons. Far more effective than any simple lecture on feral summons.”

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