Being a Summoner on our Evolved Earth

Bonding (19)

As the arrow impaled her shoulder she woke up to the morning sun shining on her eyes from between the trees. She felt herself laying against cold metal and almost panicked until she saw the familiar shield stuck in the ground nearby. An armor covered hand wiped clumsily at the tears she had cried in her sleep.

"Princess, are you awake now?" Aegis asked in a worried voice. Lucia still wasn't used to hearing his voice, but being half asleep she nodded in response to his question. Lucia propped herself up from Aegis lap and used the blanket to wipe at her face. Soon they heard a dragging sound approaching their location. Lucia reached for her quarterstaff and with the boost of adrenaline was able to examine the source of the sound while feeling more awake. She saw Vicki dragging a boar by its leg towards them. Vicki thought she was still asleep so she rubbed her eyes before looking again.

"Master are you feeling better now? You had one hell of a nightmare." Vicki dropped the boar and eagerly approached Lucia to check her over. Vicki was a bit bigger than last night and all of her scales had turned red now with strange white patterns covering her. Lucia then glanced at Aegis and saw similar white patterns as well that his armor seemed to be thicker and shinier. Lucia raised her hand to scratch her head and then she noticed the markings on her.

"Okay what happened while I was asleep?" Lucia asked out loud since she was too groggy to think about it.

"Well we received your oath and returned our vows to you which spawned these tattoos. Then a few hours ago you started to fidget in your sleep, followed by tears and violent movements like you were swinging a weapon. Vicki thought to get you water but neither of us have a way to carry it so she went to catch something we could skin and use to carry water.

"I..." It took Lucia a moment to process everything, "I indeed had a bad dream, I really don't want to go near humans anymore after we trade for those items we need..." Lucia grabbed out some jerky to eat. When she offered some to Vicki, Vicki declined and looked at the dead boar on the ground behind her.
"Can you help me skin it Aegis?" Vicki asked. Aegis nodded and walked over and struggled to use the sword to cut the hide. Lucia watched the whole bloody process while she ate her breakfast. For some reason she didn't feel the discomfort or disgust she expected when she thought of this as natural to do. She herself had never actually done skinning or butchering before so she was observing now to learn to do it in the future.

'Seems like I will still need to trade with humans for a proper skinning knife, bowls, bags, more blankets, another water skin...' Lucia started forming a list of things to gather at the next village they came across if they weren't a bunch of cannibals or bandits. She felt too annoyed at the previous village to return there for the stuff. 'Let's see, reports from scouts and hunters said there was a village on the other side of the river near the mountain I think?'

Soon Vicki was munching on the boar's organs while Aegis was peeling off the meat from the bones and piling it on the torn up boar hide. Lucia came out of her thoughts and started to gather more dry twigs and leaves. When she finished piling them up in the campfire spot, Vicki sent over a flame before Lucia could even ask and started the fire. Lucia was stunned for a second before she smiled and thanked Vicki. She felt happy that despite being distracted, Vicki was still paying attention to her. Lucia got some more sticks and after burning them a bit she put out the fires on the sticks, then used them to hold the pieces of raw meat to cook. Lucia cooked five slices of meat as big as a plate and put the rest into her storage tattoo.

"So we'll be looking to cross the river and heading towards the mountain range to find a human village to trade for some things I don't know how to make. Hopefully after that we can avoid them." Lucia explained the travel plans. "Are either of you tired? I can unsummon you so you can rest."

"I'm good to go!" Vicki responded energetically.

"I'm just a soul controlling armor, I don't get tired." Aegis responded factually, but for some reason it made Lucia chuckle.

"Alright once this meat finishes cooking we'll head out." Lucia said with a smile, then thought to try her daily summoning to try to find a creature with water, plant, or ice powers.

She activated her summoning circle while thinking about finding a creature with those powers and it's okay if they are injured. A similar situation as when she was summoning Vicki appeared, and the circle separated into three. The first circle held a red flower that was two feet tall and had teeth lining an open maw in the center of the petals. It looked like a carnivorous flower that preyed on more than just insects. The second circle held water and a fish that looked like a salmon missing part of its tail fin. The final circle held a small but fluffy monkey with black skin and light grey fur. Lucia's choice was almost decided the second she looked at the monkey, but she held back the impulse and went to interview the flower first.

{Hello, what is your element that you use?}

{....} The flower waved its roots as if saying, 'Isn't it obvious?'

{Are you able to move on land and if so, how fast?} Lucia felt annoyed at its first response but continued the interview.

{Yes, slowly.} The flower replied in a buzzing voice with one word replies.

{Why do you want a contract with me?} Lucia felt the urge to ask when she stared at the flower. {...} The flower hesitated, {To eat you.} Lucia watched as the magic circle didn't flash, which meant it was telling the truth. Lucia sighed and moved to the salmon. She heard the flower start slamming against the magic circle barrier and it started flashing.

When Lucia questioned the fish all she got in response was {Water, mate, eggs.} on repeat. Lucia rolled her eyes and moved to the little monkey who had been looking around with its head on a swivel.