Chapter 60 – Research and Departure

“There’s no need for that!”

Miria suddenly moved to Ast’s side and hugged his arm tightly. She squinted her eyes at Professor Grea, who was leaning onto his chest, surprising the woman a little. The initial rush quickly faded down and she blushed a bit.

“I… We already confirmed it…” she spoke quietly. “Master can share more of his mana and essence with a kiss than through normal means…”

Grea chuckled. “Thanks for letting me know, dear, but it’s not all about theory, you know? A true scholar is not scared of conducting various tests on their own body. Besides, there’s more than just saliva to check...”

She moved her hand lower and lower over Ast’s chest while showing a grin to Miria. The panthergirl quickly grabbed the professor’s wrist.

“It works too! And it’s even stronger!” 

Miria shouted and almost instantly turned completely red after Grea raised an eyebrow at her. Asterios sighed and used one of his hands to brush through her hair while glancing at his former teacher.

“That’s enough, professor.”

“Bleh, you two are no fun…” Grea showed a hurt expression but quickly changed it back to her usual, energetic smile. “Don’t worry so much, kitty. I’m just fucking with you a little. Well, I wasn’t joking about wanting to test it myself but I’m no girl who steals another’s man. You know I know you are already an item. Believe me, if I wanted him for myself, I’d have made my move long ago.”

With still slightly flushed cheeks, Miria nodded timidly while stealing glances at the crimson-skinned woman. Asterios then helped Grea get to the nearby sofa and they plopped down together. Selene sat down on the opposite side of the trio.

Grea poked some more fun at Miria for a while longer and they started discussing everything connected to Asterios and his girls, in-depth this time. When the women were talking, he stood up to make everyone a cup of tea. He was well-accustomed to the lab, knowing where pretty much everything was.

They went from the oldest events and thoughts any of them had, to the most recent experiences, trying not to omit anything. During the whole exchange, Grea asked Asterios to bring various tomes and notebooks for her to check on some things. It took them around two hours to fill the scholar on everything.

“Alright.” Grea took a deep breath. “First of all, I’ve never come across anything so fucked up. I’m afraid I don’t have a clear answer for you, Ast. This shit is just weird. We still need to run some tests to check on you and the ladies but I can already tell this is not normal. Be it dual sources or your summons.”

“Trust me, professor, I’m well aware of that.”

“Oh, and drop that. You are no longer a student. I always hated that respectful part of you, you know?” She laughed openly and hit his shoulder. “We are just friends now. As we always were.”

“Guess I can’t say no anymore.” Asterios smiled back at Grea.

“One thing I can share with you and what I’m fairly certain about is… why you weren’t and still aren’t able to summon the same familiars as others.”

“Oh?” 

Ast’s curiosity suddenly peaked. It was one of the aspects he was wondering about since forever. He stared at Grea in anticipation, hoping to finally learn the reason for his multiple failures.

“It’s pretty simple, actually. You know how weak monsters avoid stronger predators by instinct? The same principle applies here with your second, scorching hot energy. It’s way more potent than your, I’d say inborn mana, but I have no idea if you were born with both, and I’m pretty sure it was leaking through the barrier during your summoning attempts, showing your true colors, metaphorically speaking.”

Asterios nodded. It certainly was a possibility he at least once considered.

“You know well that during the summoning you are pretty much laid bare in front of the eyes of potential candidates. The issue is, you shine too brightly. Literally. You said that during the summoning when this white-haired lady appeared, you tried to use your basic mana, but still, nothing came to answer your calls, and she mentioned sensing the other energy. All the normal beasts that usually glance towards the summoner must be being scared off with that overwhelming power, leaving only these strong enough to turn their eyes to you.”

“That may be so. I never aimed for a specific entity during my normal summons, sending my calls into the void. I was unaware my power had been scaring the audience away. Then, my first time using Evanescent Summoning, it succeeded with a perfect result,” Asterios pondered out loud.

“Then… Master was not so weak he was unable to summon anything, but he was actually so strong many beasts instinctively avoided him?” Miria asked.

“In simple words, yes,” Grea answered. “There’s more to that, but there’s no need to go as deep. Nothing changes unless we can seal his second source with quite immense magic, even stronger than what was there in the first place.”

“Honestly, it’s so hard to believe. No one was able to notice anything with this barrier, but it had to so happen that the summoning ritual bypassed it to some extent.” Asterios shook his head.

“Yeah. And since it was just a shadow of this energy looming over the potential familiars, it wasn’t clear enough for many strong ones to actually show interest in it. You know how rare it is for anything stronger than a Griffon to willingly look your way. But, there’s one more part,” Grea added.

“Which is?”

“Due to that weird energy, your affinity is kind of different. You know all summoners have some affinity with a kind or type of entity to some extent. Somehow, yours seems to be so weird it links to these… almost humanoid beings. At least by our known definitions. I’m not saying you girls aren’t humanoids or such.”

“No need to worry. Many things are perceived differently across the realms,” Selene commented with a soft smile.

“Anyway, when the barrier broke and the sealed energy got unleashed, that affinity came forth, capturing the attention of Miria. And then Selene’s later. And to add to that, they both are way stronger than the aforementioned Griffons, so it’s not that surprising they were lured in instead of scared away by that aura.”

“How strong in our terms are they?” Ast asked.

“Hmmm… After checking them out with my Third Eye, basing only on that information, I’d say Miria is 5th tier while Selene is at the peak of 4th tier.”

Asterios whistled as he glanced at his companions.

“Is that good?” Miria tilted her head, not knowing how that ranking system worked.

“Plenty,” Asterios answered and patted her head. ”Summoned beasts are ranked from 1st to 10th tier. The lower the number the more powerful the entity. There’s also the Transcended tier above 1st, but it’s for insane, mythical creatures.”

“Don’t forget I didn’t account for your actual abilities, just all the spiritual thingies about each of you. And the rankings are just to give Summoners some idea of their familiars' strength. Or to let them boast comparing dick sizes in public,” Grea scoffed.

“It’s just so the academy and other institutions can categorize them somehow,” he added. “Anyway, I always knew you girls were strong. Is there anything more you can tell us about this, Grea?”

“Nah. Not much more I got from all this theory. Let’s move onto some actual experiments. They might reveal something.”

Miria pulled Asterios more towards herself and hugged his arm tighter. Grea chuckled and waved a hand at her.

“Not that kind of experiments. Although, I could gather some valuable data if you could try it over a few runic circles and formations while I watch. What do you say?”

The panthergirl’s face flushed crimson and she hid behind Asterios, making Grea laugh even more. They then moved back to the main section of the lab to focus on conducting some research.

One by one, the eccentric woman led the party through many different rooms and small chambers where she asked them to do various, sometimes completely random things. Every place was filled with a myriad of circuits and weird sigils only Asterios recognized. At least part of them.

They were able to confirm that what he used was in fact Summoning Magic instead of some mysterious one they expected for him to operate for a moment. All bonds were constructed properly and Ast’s abilities also activated as expected, but with much better efficiency and higher power.

Grea saw his deep mana pool with her Third Eye, but she was still surprised how small was the amount consumed by most of the techniques she made him use. They of course tested them with both of his energies and confirmed that the efficiency didn’t change, and was most likely affected by his pure spiritual circuits, but the amount of raw power was different.

As for the girls, everything seemed in order too, besides their unique spiritual circuits she never came across in her academic life. It was obvious they came from realms either no one reached before or it happened so rarely there were almost no traces of it left by those Summoners.

For the remaining time after the usual tests, they focused on examining Ast’s fiery source as much as it was possible. Grea wasn’t an expert in them, but those were a crucial part of any magic, especially Summoning, so she had the means to peek into it.

She didn’t find any connection between it and his main source. They weren’t exactly opposing forces but also did not completely synchronize with each other as they should in the case of one giving birth to another, as extremely rare as it was.

It was surprising that sometimes it affected his emotions, enhancing some of the negative ones. For humanoid races, it didn’t really happen. Not much was known about such things, but Grea was aware that some beasts’ psyche or temperament was affected by the nature of their essence and energy, making them more ferocious or enter a berserk state when they drew on their latent powers.

In the end, everyone agreed that this particular source must have had some connection to a beast-like entity or something, and also could be the reason why Asterios was able to summon two humanoid-like beasts as his familiars. But, it was just an assumption. Only spiritual researchers could dive in for more and perhaps hold more detailed records of things like that.

As for the unexpected connection between Grea and Asterios which appeared after the failed attempt to form a contract, the research didn’t bear much fruit. They could communicate mentally now and she could also speak with his partners, but there was not much more than that. 

The whole thing was extremely weird and she needed more time to look for any possible hints on the topic. Thanks to that connection, Grea was able to inform Asterios about her findings whenever she wanted.

They wrapped everything up when it started getting dark outside. Asterios didn’t want to risk getting in trouble with the academy again. He and the girls helped Grea tidy the place up just a little bit since it wouldn’t be possible to properly clean it all. As vibrant as the professor’s personality, her lab was as much in chaos.

“Well then, thanks for the help. Hope I was of use too. We didn’t get much out of this,” she spoke after they finished.

“It’s always something. We’ll let you know if we learn of anything useful.”

“Right. Same here.” She moved her gaze onto Selene. “Glad to know my little wand served you properly too. I would have never thought you would summon such a powerful, and beautiful, individual with it.”

The foxkin bowed her head towards Grea. “And I must thank you for letting me meet my Lord through the sacrifice of your precious artifact.”

The woman waved her hand. “No, no, no. That piece of wood was nothing special. I mean, it did keep me company on some lonely nights, but that’s all. I’ve already replaced it with a bigger one. It even has bumps, look!” She flashed them a grin as she brought her current wand, carved out of a quite thick branch in an uneven shape.

Asterios sighed while Miria tilted her head in confusion. Selene chuckled to herself softly.

“Does size and shape matter?” Miria asked.

“Obviously! Don’t let them tell you otherwise! It’s all about the feeling when—”

“Alright. Time to go. We have to wake up early.”

Asterios threw his arm over Miria’s shoulder and started walking towards the door, much to her confusion, followed by Selene whose face was painted with a mischievous smile.

“Hey! Tsch. Looks like nothing has changed even after you finally got yourself a girlfriend.”

“I just don’t want Mr. Wandy Wavington to get jealous.”

“Wha—?! How did you—?!”

“You should stop forgetting to lock the lab while conducting your physiological experiments. Also, none of the doors here are soundproof. I’d suggest using Alcove of Serenity.”

He waved at her without looking back and finally walked outside with his companions, leaving Grea alone in her lab, blushing for the very first time in many years. But, it wasn’t like many would notice with her dark crimson skin. He definitely would, but Asterios was already sure his last comment caught his scholarly friend by surprise.

Miria and Selene jumped back to their realm and Asterios got outside of the academy’s premises without any issues. He headed straight home afterward and met up with his mom for late dinner. After they cleaned the dishes together, both of them went to sleep. 

Early in the morning, everyone checked the house one more time and they verified if everything was ready. Kindra already made sure to talk about the transit with the store’s branch in Rosewind and delegate a temporary manager until a new one arrived, but she went to the place once more to say her goodbyes to her coworkers.

In the meantime, Asterios got to the stables to rent a horse for her and headed towards the meeting point. Roalt was already sitting by the south gate and sharpening the tips of his arrows. He noticed him coming and raised his gaze.

“Only one horse? What about the client?”

“It’s for her. My ride's here.”

A dark crimson portal arose from the ground and Miria jumped out of it in her panther form, stopping by Ast’s side and letting him scratch her head.

“Oh. Is that…?”

Black mist surrounded her body and she shifted in front of their eyes.

“Yep. It’s me,” she announced with a wide smile.

“That’s new. How often do we have to rest if you want to go like that?” Roalt asked.

“I’m pretty sure the horses would drop before she’d need a break, so let’s just go with the usual pace. We are without cargo, so it’s already pretty fast.”

“Guess I’ll have to trust you on that one, kid. When are we departing?”

“As soon as my mom arrives. She shouldn’t take long. Let’s get everything ready.”

As he suggested, they started making final preparations before the trip. Not even fifteen minutes passed and they heard a woman shout from the road leading further into the town.

“Astiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii! I’m cooooooooomingggg~!”

Asterios turned around and saw his mother running towards them with a big smile while waving her hand. Nothing was special about that quite common sight. At least until he noticed who she had in tow in her other hand.

“Is that Tina?” Miria asked, slightly surprised.

It in fact was Tina. From the expression on her face, Asterios was sure she didn’t plan on meeting them again. They waited until the two women arrived closer.

He crossed his arms over his chest and looked down at his mom. “Care to explain?”

She flashed him a wide grin. “I ran into her on the way here!”

Asterios sighed and moved his eyes onto his friend. Tina was very slightly blushing and visibly uncomfortable with the whole situation. Before he could say anything though, his mother stepped behind her, whispered something to her ear, and pushed Tina forward.

She stopped in front of Asterios and looked up at him, which was quite necessary with their slight height difference.

“Here. It’s a good luck charm.”

Tina handed him a small azure stone with his Summoner’s Brand carved into it and filled with silvery coating. Above the crown, an additional shape was added. It resembled some kind of a bird mid-flight. Asterios figured out it was Tina’s familiar.

“Thank y—”

A light peck on the cheek interrupted his words. He raised his gaze just in time to see Tina turn around. She peeked over her shoulder at him.

“Stay safe. I’ll do my best here until we meet again.”

She ran away without waiting for an answer. He smiled to himself and moved his eyes onto his mother, who was gingerly hiding her own smile behind her hands.

“You roped her into this, didn’t you?”

“Whatever could you mean, fufufu~ Come on. Let’s not make Mr. Roalt wait too long!”

Giggling to herself, she passed him to get onto the horse with the help of the adventurer. Asterios sighed and joined them, jumping onto Miria after she transformed. He took one more glance at the town and they departed soon after.