The Accidental Warlock

Training Development

The next morning we were woken up by a knock at the door. I used the implant to check the time and found it was only 6 AM. I thought that I left behind early morning wakeups when I got down here, but it seems that training still counts as school. When I got up, I found it was one of the inn staff letting us know that Tabby would be by in thirty minutes so if we wanted to eat we would need to come down soon.

We both went down and ordered some breakfast and waited for Tabby to arrive. When she did, she provided us with our instructions for the day. "Xiantha you need to go to the training course. They will give you objectives and how you go about accomplishing them will tell us a lot about what type of fighter you are and help decide what training would suit you both. If you are up in your face rip them apart, then it would be best for Alex to learn to keep you healed and provide you with various buffs that would help you do more damage, or cause enemies to take damage when they hit you. On the other hand, if you like to sneak up on things and quickly knock them out, then Alex would be better off learning things to increase his own sturdiness like spell shields and life draining attacks. Eventually, you can learn to do it all, I mean you have a long life ahead of you, but when young it's better to specialize and know your strengths and weaknesses. The other reason is that with a willing bond, instead of a forced one, Xiantha will be able to evolve based on her what she does the most. This is a specialized form so unlike staying imp, she could not say go from a front-line fighter such a fiend, to deceptive succubus."

Then Tabby turned to me, "For you, we will start off learning the summoning ritual. Once we find out what your partner does best, starting tomorrow, we will start teaching you the spells that will work best with her while she learns how to fight while wearing armor and using weapons instead of skin and claw."

I started to turn down Tabby on learning the ritual, but Xiantha spoke in my mind "Stop, I have an idea that might work. Thousands of my kind die daily while hunting and just living. Instead of targeting a demon that is thriving and removing them against their will, maybe we can find one that is about to die and save it. Then you offer the choice of bonding or allowing them to die as they would have if we didn't intervene. If it works, maybe we can get other warlocks to do the same thing, instead of the slavery that is currently happening."

I thought about it for a minute and decided that maybe she was right. Not only would it actually save demons, but it would also help to stop the slavery going on now. I told Tabby that we agreed, and she had Xiantha go to the training course waypoint, while I followed her back to the academy building.

We went into a classroom in the basement, and she told me that normally summoning rituals are conducted in this room, what I had run across was actually against the rules and considered torture. It was not in any way condoned, and as a result, David had been ejected from the community, and his backups could no longer connect to the core. Essentially a death sentence for him the next time he got killed.

Tabby then asked me "You were going to turn down the summoning training weren't you?"

I nodded and said "They are sentient beings and it feels too much like slavery. We steal them from their homes and force them to call us master."

She gave a rueful smile and said "In a way, I agree with you, but we need their help. They are some of the best fighters around. Their world is so rough that, violence is all they know. Demons dominate each other all the time, it's really the same thing here. Regardless, I guess your demon talked you into doing it, what did she say?"

I responded "She told me that thousands of her kind die each day. What if I can target a demon that for some reason is about to die, be it from a hunt gone bad or some other reason? If I can summon that demon that would have died anyway, I would be saving them, not abducting them. She also said that I give them a choice, I can allow them to die like they would have, or they can bond with me and live. With saving them and giving them a choice they may agree to the partnership. If that is the case and it works for me, then she thinks that others may come to my thinking of getting willing partners instead of binding them like currently is done."