Chapter 48: Chapter 48: Lesson

“JOHN!”

Vetsmon, Feiden, and Tana heard Umara scream from behind.

They had been so preoccupied with the gorilla that they hadn’t had the time to look back. It was almost dead through their efforts, but they hadn’t noticed one thing.

After John emerged, they hadn’t been attacked by a single monkey. But at some point, his gunshots ceased.

They didn’t think about what that meant, and so they only realized once they took a glance behind them.

There he was, laying down while getting attacked by a single monkey.

It clawed and beat him, tearing through his skin like it was paper. His face was already coated in blood, yet he still tried to cover himself, anything to survive the attack.

They forgot just how weak he was.

Why were knights the strongest? Because when faced with those same claws, their skin would resist their cuts and their muscles would nullify those blows. Such an enemy to a person like Vetsmon was no different from an annoying, flailing child.

But to someone like John, a single wrong mistake would allow that monkey to end his life.

Behind the confidence and powerful weaponry was still just an ordinary man.

For him to even face what he did took courage far greater than theirs, because unlike them, he could have his life ended on a whim.

They couldn’t imagine being able to die so easily.

That’s when Vetsmon sensed something.

The hairs on his neck stood as he turned, seeing Feiden’s spear glowing with flowing gold Aura.

After that, he lost track of him.

His figure blurred, flying across John’s body with a flicker and ripping the monkey away.

He reappeared next to him, monkey in hand.

The little beast flailed in Feiden’s arms, waving its claws to try and cut him.

But Feiden merely reached for its neck.

And he tore its head off with his bare hands.

Vetsmon couldn’t help but feel fear. He had never seen someone so fast, but more than that, he had never seen Feiden doing anything but smiling.

He didn’t think Feiden was capable of such rage. Even the gorilla froze for a moment.

Vetsmon jumped away when he realized he was still in a battle, standing off against the gorilla. It was riddled with injuries and was definitely weaker than before. But so were they.

Now though, they were all filled with hatred for this creature. It had touched their summoner, their friend. Nothing other than death would be enough for it.

“Haahh!!”

Tana suddenly came swinging down from behind, her sword slicing through the achilles heel of the gorilla while it was distracted.

It fell to its knees, and Vetsmon took that opportunity to drive his spear forward.

The gorilla retaliated, but he entirely disregarded its attacks, pressing forward with all his strength.

And his spear went straight through its neck. At the same time, he took a blow to the chest, getting thrown away.

“Ugh…”

He groaned, but now, the gorilla’s fate was sealed as it fell, blood pouring from its neck.

As it collapsed, Vetsmon looked back toward John, running over to where Feiden and Umara had already arrived.

Feiden had the medkit, taking its contents out as Umara packed the wounds.

She had opened his shirt, revealing several stab wounds where the monkey had clawed his stomach. His face also had several lacerations across it, as did his hands which had lost a few fingers.

Umara cried as she grabbed more fabric to soak up all the blood.

“Shit! It won’t stop bleeding!”

“Wait, move.”

Vetsmon suddenly knelt down, removing the packing in John’s stomach wound.

Sure enough, after opening the wound, he found a long black claw sitting inside.

“These monkeys shed their claws inside their victims. It’s basically poison, making them bleed more. Here.”

He pulled the claw out with his fingers. Then, Umara repacked the wound.

Vetsmon went to his other wounds as well, taking out two more claws in his leg and one poking out of his ribcage.

After packing the major wounds, Umara also started cleaning up his face.

She never stopped crying, even as she checked him for any other injuries.

“Come on, John. You’re gonna be okay. Everything’s going to be fine.”

*Cough*

Right as she said that, John coughed more blood that had pooled in his mouth.

His breathing was shallow, and he was already unconscious. After turning him on his side, Umara suddenly remembered something and went through his pockets.

There were two things she found. His golden cigar case and a glass container full of red pills.

She quickly retrieved one of the pills and put it in his mouth. It dissolved instantly, melting into his system.

After that, she could only wait.

“Where’s our help?”

“It’ll take them a minute to get here. Tana, go over there and scout.”

“Right.”

With Vetsmon’s word, Tana took off into the distance, finding some high ground to search for their rescue team.

Feiden also left, not saying a word as he went to do the same. Vetsmon and Umara were left.

They both kneeled next to John, Umara continuing to sob.

“...It’s my fault… I didn’t protect him.”

“...The blame lies with us all. We knights should have been more aware. I had forgotten that he’s just an ordinary man.”

Vetsmon spoke with regret. At the same time, he wondered about exactly what John had inwardly asked himself.

How do summoners fight? Hot Summoners had beasts and companions to protect them, so even they weren’t defenseless. But Cold Summoners, who had nothing but their weapons and their wits, seemed to be incapable of engaging in any meaningful combat.

Their bodies remained ordinary, even if the weapons they summoned were powerful. But even with a powerful weapon like a legendary sword, how could you use it when a beast was too fast for you to keep up with? You would die before you knew what happened to you.

Most of the summoners Vetsmon knew eventually became researchers because of their intellectual abilities. They were brilliant strategists and thinkers, even above warlocks. And unlike Knights, they didn’t need to fight to advance their Authorities.

Still, compared to knights and warlocks, summoners seemed to be the outliers among Magi. Some people said that all three were equal, and that summoners just had yet to find their way like knights and warlocks had.

But seeing this, Vetsmon had a hard time believing it.

It was almost a curse for John’s weapons to be as amazing as they were. They would drive him into battles like this, and perhaps someday, kill him.

Vetsmon looked over, seeing how scared Umara was. By now it was obvious the two were in a relationship, but he couldn’t help but feel that doing such a thing was irresponsible.

A soldier could die at any time, and their deaths would only hurt the ones they loved. To have a relationship was only setting oneself up for failure.

“Vetsmon!”

Suddenly, he heard Tana’s voice on his Aerial. He looked over to see her waving.

In the distance, three vehicles were barreling down a trail.

He watched as they rolled up to them, Tana and Feiden right behind. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

The Puppet Master jumped out, taking a single step and arriving by their side with instantaneous speed.

He saw John who looked half dead, frowning.

“You all let him get attacked?”

“...Yes.”

Vetsmon stood, facing the Puppet Master as if ready to be executed for a crime.

The others also stood, silent with their heads down.

The Puppet Master grit his teeth and yelled.

“Vizen! Get him out of here!”

“Already on it.”

Another man appeared. He was one of the Magisterium’s instructors and a warlock who specialized in healing.

After appearing by John’s side, he cast several spells, sealing his wounds before having some others pick him up and take him away.

Many soldiers also scouted the area, tallying the kill counts and writing up reports.

The Puppet Master yelled as if he couldn’t see anyone beside him.

“You all almost killed your squadmate! You know he’s a summoner! So what the fuck were you doing?! Answer me!”

“...We got distracted.”

“Yea, that gorilla must’ve been so hard to fight! I mean, look at you! A few bruises, even a bit of sweat! You look like you’ve faced the hardest opponent of your life! Fuck! And you!”

The Puppet Master suddenly turned his attention to Tana, who flinched at his voice.

“You’re the Scout! Your job isn’t to battle the alpha! You’re supposed to make sure that your vulnerable teammates aren’t getting ripped to fucking shreds! But you got tunnel vision thinking that the alpha was an opponent you couldn’t handle! You are the most responsible for this! Your lack of awareness is what caused this! Do you understand that?!”

“Y-Yes!”

Tana shouted in response while tears poured from her eyes.

Then, he turned to Umara.

“You! You couldn’t spare a single damned spell, could you?! I know John probably told you that you needed to focus on the alpha since I told him it was weak to magic. But who would’ve thought that he misjudged the strength of his opponent?! Someone who only awakened half a year ago didn’t manage to gauge the urgency of the situation properly, making you think that you couldn’t even spare him a glance!”

The Puppet Master turned to everyone as their eyes widened, shocked by the new information.

“That alpha was weak, and none of you saw it! You all got so caught up in the heat of the moment that you all turned into braindead rocks! Umara has a quarter of her mana left, Feiden doesn’t have so much as a single scratch, Vetsmon’s shield is still intact, and Tana isn’t heaving for air on the floor! All of you could’ve done more! You could fight a second one and come out on top! And yet, the weakest one out of all of you almost died! You couldn’t spare a single damn second of attention or strength to make sure he wasn’t getting his face eaten!

“To think he managed to kill 39 of those monkeys by himself while getting wounded and protecting you all! To think that I almost lost one of my students today because I put him with an incompetent team! And you all dare to call yourselves Elites while making mistakes like this?! No enemy is so difficult that you should disregard the safety of your team! Shit! All of you get on the fucking trucks and head back! We're not done!”

After grilling all of them on both sides, the Puppet Master left and boarded a Hummer.

The others did as well, not so much as uttering a single word the entire way back.

……

…

“Ugh… Shit.”

When I finally woke up, I was hit with a wave of hunger.

It felt like I hadn’t eaten in days. Not only that, but I couldn’t open my right eye.

So my left eye opened, taking in the sights of the hospital.

“Oh, he’s awake!”

I hear an unfamiliar voice call out, making me cringe at the loud sound.

“Hey, can we tone it down a bit?”

“John!”

“Agh, son of a bitch!”

I held my throbbing head when the Puppet Master yelled.

But I didn’t get any reprieve when he started his rant.

“You dumbass! What the hell were you doing putting yourself in the position to get hurt like that? Are you trying to die? You know very well where your limits lay and you went out there anyway!”

“Yea, well, I was just trying to contribute.”

I refuted as my headache faded, feeling a bit of indignation as I thought about the battle.

“I’m not as strong as the others. As soon as we were faced with a real enemy, I found myself useless. So I did what I could and made sure that everyone could fight without fear that they would be attacked from behind. I was doing my job, and I messed up, getting hurt in the process.”

“Please, you talk as if you aren’t a part of the team. I already gave the others a lesson on what they did wrong, because this should never have happened. But you’re not blameless either. We both know that you’re not useless, so stop spitting bullshit. You putting yourself out there like that jeopardizes the integrity of your team. If you had taken even a single measure to keep yourself protected, you could have turned that quick battle into a protracted one, even if it was at the expense of more energy. And if you hadn’t been injured, you could’ve done the same job even better than you did while also being able to help after all the small fry had been eliminated.”

“We didn’t have that kind of time though. Vetsmon was getting thrashed and even Feiden had a hard time cutting that beast. It needed the full focus of our team or we would’ve been overwhelmed.”

“And there’s the problem.”

The Puppet Master smirked.

“That gorilla was powerful, yes. It’s a mutated variant of those monkeys and stands at the peak of Authority 5. It only needed a bit more time to evolve again and grow its purple hair, becoming an Authority 6 beast you couldn’t so much as scratch. But it was by no means overwhelming for your group. You didn’t properly understand the power of your team nor the beast, leading you to believe that it was a life or death battle. Well it wasn’t, and with you basically being the leader, your team moved according to your sense of urgency. The heat of the moment clouded the judgment of you and your entire group and almost led to your death.”

“...”

I didn’t respond. If that was true, then I really had made a serious miscalculation.

But I didn’t have enough experience. I didn’t even know what the beast was until the car had been flipped. And with everything that had been said over that call, I was led to believe that it was a beast nearly impervious to everything that we could throw at it besides magic.

I thought Vetsmon and Feiden would only be able to distract it while Umara dealt the damage. And since I couldn’t do anything to it, I took up a supportive role. But there was nobody to help me, and I got tackled so fast that I couldn’t even call for help.

Feiden reacting as fast as he did was a godsend. Still, just a few seconds of attacks had left me devastated.

I knew I was in the wrong, but I didn’t feel like my judgments were entirely incorrect either. I simply did what I could with the information I had on hand.

And it seemed like the Puppet Master knew that as well, because the next moment, he sighed.

“Ultimately, you’re not completely at fault. You just don’t have as much experience. As a summoner, learning to gauge the strength of those around you is vital. You’ll naturally get better at it as you get stronger and develop your Aura. Sometimes I forget that you’re still just an Authority 3. Your squad seems to have forgotten too, but something like that won’t happen again.”

The Puppet Master’s face turned stern.

“Tana is being transferred to a new squad.”

“What? Why?”

“The greatest fault lies with her. Her responsibility is to keep track of the flow of battle, ensuring that all the parts of her squad’s formation are operating smoothly. While it could be said that Vetsmon and Umara are also at fault for not maintaining awareness, she failed entirely. Because of her, we almost lost you. So she’s moving.”

“...”

I went silent. I technically didn't disagree with his judgment. But I also didn’t feel it was right.

“Can I ask something?”

“Go on.”

“I’m sure she took your lesson pretty hard since she knows exactly what she did wrong. I’d be devastated to lose a friend because I failed to do my job, and I’m sure she can’t even imagine losing a friend in the first place. Her desperation to never make a mistake again is probably overwhelming, right?”

“I would agree, yes.”

“So keeping her in the squad and letting her live up to it would make her far better than downgrading where she’ll never be able to reconcile her mistake, correct?”

“Correct. But that comes at the risk to her squad’s lives, especially yours since you’re the most vulnerable.”

“And if I’m willing to take that risk? Would you let her stay?”

“...”

The Puppet Master’s placid faced stared at mine, as if not entirely convinced.

So I gave him a bit more bait.

“I’d rather have someone desperate to protect me than someone who gets complacent when they get put into the best Elite squad in the school.”

“...Fine. She’ll stay.”

He finally agreed, making me smile a bit.

Tana did in fact make a mistake. We all did. But I knew her well enough to know it wouldn’t happen again. She was too desperate to let a second chance go to waste, and she would grow as a person because of it.

And it wasn’t like she was incompetent. She was diligent and wanted to become stronger. We were also friends, so I felt like my squad shouldn’t be split up just because of one setback.

“By the way, I talked to Maxwell.”

“Huh?”

The Puppet Master suddenly dropped that bombshell, catching my attention.

“In his own special way, he said he’s glad you’re not dead.”

“Okay. What did he really say?”

“That if you had died it would’ve been a major loss in his investment.”

“Yea, sounds about right.”

I laughed a bit. Maxwell was always a bit sparing with the care and compliments.

“Anyway, I’m giving you time off once we get back to the Magisterium. You should be close to advancing, so don’t come back to training until you do.”

“Alright.”

I readily agreed. I really was close to advancing. In fact, I had completed the formation.

My comprehensions only compounded as my Spark got stronger, resulting in me completing it even faster than I thought I would.

Now, I was just accumulating power with the White Crystal. I was basically just a battery that needed to completely charge before finally breaking through the last barrier to Authority 4.

I was eager to see what awaited me at the next level.

With that, the Puppet Master let me be. I then called my squad.