“Gah, Spiders!” I woke up and jumped out of my blanket. Slapping my hands against my body, it took a moment for me to realise there were no spiders and I just a bad dream. I sat down on the nearest log and got my breathing under control.

I gave a shudder as I leaned down to pick up my blanket to place in my storage.

It looked to be just after sunrise, with long shadows being cast into the sky. The others had yet to wake up and were still in their tents.

“Bad dream?” A familiar voice said from next to me.

I spun my head to see Jace sitting on the log opposite the campfire stone. Was he there the whole time? It concerned me that I did not notice him. Must be the difference in levels. Another reason why I needed to regain what I lost.

“Terrible.” I gave Jace a look over. He appeared much better than yesterday. His face no longer appeared tired, and he seemed happier from the way he held himself. He looked more like the first day I met him.

“Sleep well?” I asked.

He glanced to Miko’s tent and smiled. “Yes. I was in a bit of a panic after hearing what happened. I ran to this floor and couldn’t rest until I found her.” He turned to me. “I want to apologise for yesterday. I thought the worst even though you did everything to keep her safe.”

I gave a chuckle and waved him off. “She is strong. At some point during the fight, I was hit with a blast that rattled my brain a bit. She kept us moving and paved the way forward. It was only afterwards when we were safe that she needed some support.”

Jace nodded and smiled. “She was born inside the tower and grew up on our farm. She learned to be tough early on. She sure did love running around the fields.” He looked wistfully at the camp stone as he continued. “We had clear boundaries to keep tower creatures away but one day a critter made it through. Even though it was just a low level rabbit, it was much stronger than any non-adventurer.”

Jace plucked some grass by his feet and threw it against the camp stone, watching it burn up. “She was five and was trying to keep the rabbit away from our prized melon patch. Fortunately, the rabbit only knocked her on her rump as it past her to munch on the fruit. Kirina, my wife, was keeping an eye on her and only looked away for a moment. When she saw our baby on the ground next to the rabbit, she thought the worst.” He gave a chuckle “She kicked that rabbit so hard it looked like a fluffy rocket took to the sky. Anyway, after that we knew we got lucky and decided to bring her outside the tower until she was strong enough to survive on her own.”

People living and raising children inside a tower was something I would have never thought possible.

“Why did you choose to live in the tower of all places?”

“Back on earth I was an accountant. God, I hated sitting in a cubicle and got so tired of being surrounded by tall buildings. When I arrived, I explored many different towers and outside the limits of the cities. Thats where I met Kirina. She saved me from walking into some powerful creature’s den. Apparently, her tribe worshiped the creature and would often offer living sacrifices as tribute. When I found out she was to be the next sacrifice I knew I had to do something… We escaped together and decided to live in the tower. The guild owns a lot of territory on floor 30 and I always wanted to try my hand at farming. Once you are over a floors level there is very little to worry about.”

I gave a chuckle. “Farming. Nothing sounds more boring to me.”

“Hey, don’t knock it. It can be quite rewarding. Plus, there are so many spells and skills involved it’s like a real life video game.”

“Nice try but I’m not buying it. I never thought about living inside the tower before. Maybe if I find a floor that appeals to me, I might spend a little time there, but I don’t see myself settling down when there is so much to explore.”

Jace smiled towards me. “Let’s see if you feel the same in a couple of decades.”

The camp fire stone rock… I really need a better name for it. I’ll just call it a campstone. The campstone vanished, making it 10 hours since we made camp last night. I summoned another in the same location just as Miko stumbled out of her tent.

She walked over to her father and sat down next to him while resting her head against his arm. Jace smiled fondly at his daughter and wrapped his arm around her. Miko looked over to me and held her hand towards me, palm up.

“Bacon.” Was all she said.

Rustling noises could be heard from my own tent, which was positioned next to hers, and a dwarf rushed out and sat on the log next to me.

“Aye. Bacon if you would be so kind, Master Reigner.”

I am definitely not going to miss these two for a while. Sighing I summoned breakfast and coffee for everyone.

+1 to Summon Food’s Spell rank.

+1 to Summon Drink’s Spell rank.

Grinning, I conjured myself a coffee and took time to look over my spell list.

Spells:

Identify (7)

Mana Marble (2)

Sparkle (0) +

Summon Armour (1)

Summon Campfire (6)

Summon Drink (3) +

Summon Food (3) +

Summon Weapon (4)

That’s odd. I gained sparkle but I don’t see any new class spell. I read through my list of spells carefully, but it looked like the only new spell I gained was sparkle.

I scratched my head in frustration and looked over my status.

Name: Reigner

Race: Human

level: 5

Class: Summoner

Health: 1320/1320

HP Regen: 1.6/minute

Stamina: 2370/2370

SP Regen: 82/minute

Mana: 565/565

MP Regen: 28/minute

Strength: 96

Constitution: 74

Dexterity: 89

Intelligence: 16

Wisdom: 17

Skills:

Appraise Item (9) +

Axe One-handed (5)

Axe Two-handed (5)

Blunt One-handed (12)

Counter (22)

Dodge (11)

Materialise Shadow (0) +

Parry (10)

Polearms (5)

Shield (19)

Small Blades (5)

Spear (8) +

Sword One-handed (27)

Sword two-handed (5)

Unarmed (12)

Weapon Throwing (17)

Spells:

Identify (7)

Mana Marble (2)

Sparkle (0)

Summon Armour (1)

Summon Campfire (6)

Summon Drink (3)

Summon Food (3)

Summon Weapon (4)

I did not gain a new spell but instead a new skill. I focused on the skill and brought up its information.

Materialise Shadow

Rank: 0

Cost: 50% of maximum health, stamina, and mana

Effect: Summon Shadow Companion

Description:

Call forth your shadow into physical form. Your shadow is an extension of yourself that contains all your knowledge, experience, stats, skills, and spells. You are mentally connected and can either give orders or allow the shadow to act independently. Your shadow is unable to move further than 20 metres from you.

If your shadow dies your maximum health mana and staminal will be reduced by 50% for 10 hours and you will be unable to materialise your shadow until recovered.

Each rank reduces cost of skill by 1%.

I read the first sentence and let out a laugh and cheer of triumph. Finally, I have a summon. I did a little dance around the campstone and sat back down. I ignored the looks the others gave me and checked over the description more closely.

I felt a feral grin form on my face. My memories, my experiences? This is completely broken. I could see it being powerful for anyone else, but for me this is just insane. I felt an urge to dance around again but stopped myself. I wanted to test this out right away but not with the others around. I want to see for myself what this meant for me without the distraction of others.

“Reigner!” I felt Burin squeeze my shoulder. “Ye need to stop grinning like a madman whenever you look at your status.”

“yeah, sorry about that. I was just looking over what I gained.”

“Oh! Can you summon a house this time?” Miko excitedly asked.

Oh, that would be cool. “Nope. Even better. I have my first summon creature spell. Looks like it takes a lot to cast so I’ll try it out later.”

Miko pouted “Come on, I want to see!”

“Kitten, you know it’s rude to pry into an adventurer’s abilities.” Jace said as he rumpled Miko’s hair.

“Humpf, fine. What about the spellbooks? Can you make things… sparkle?” The way she said sparkle sounded like she was making fun of me. Curious about the spell myself I pointed towards her and cast the spell.

Miko’s whole body started to sparkle like she was sprinkled with glitter. The sparkles were bright and very eye catching. After 10 seconds the effect stopped. Miko had a huge grin on her face.

She pointed to campstone. “Do that next.”

Grinning myself, I focused on the campstone and cast the spell. I started to focus on as many things as I could, and chain cast the spell. The logs, the tents, Jace, myself, Burin, Miko, everything I could cast the spell on was sparking all around us.

+1 to Sparkle’s Spell rank.

+1 to Sparkle’s Spell rank.

+1 to Intelligence.

Because the spell costed so little, I could cast it almost nonstop without ever having to worry about running out of mana. This might be a great way to level up intelligence.

Laughing Miko turned to Burin. “Your turn!”

Burin grinned and raised his arms up dramatically. A moment later and it started to rain lightly.

“Not bad.” I held out a hand, feeling the drops of water land on my skin. “Can you cast it again to make it rain heavier?”

“Nay. The spell has a cooldown but will provide better results with rank.” Burin said with a pleased smile.

“Um Reigner.” Miko walked over and sat next to me. “Will you be okay by yourself?”

I gave her a reassuring smile. “I will be fine. Next time you see me, I might be higher level than yourself.”

She giggled at that. “Wait for us on floor five. She leaned over and hugged me. I felt her furry ears on the top of her head tickle my cheek. A moment later I felt Burin join in on the hug. “I’m coming back Reigner, mark my words. I’ll not leave ye alone out here.”

Something changed in the hug, and I couldn’t quite work out what had happened.

“Um, Reiner… I need clothes.”

The awkwardness only increased a moment later as I suddenly felt Miko’s bare skin against my own. It took incredible willpower to not focus on how good her naked body felt against my chest. It helped that there was a stout dwarf also clinging on to me. I couldn’t tell if he was laughing or sobbing.

Letting out a small chuckle I said. “I’m going to miss you two. Travel safe and set things straight outside so we can climb the tower together.”

I summoned a long gown and slipped it over Miko as she started pulling away from me.

We said our goodbyes and at Burin’s request, summoned them some lunch they could take with them. I sat on the log and watched as they walked into the tree line towards to the tower exit.

Thinking about what my plans for the day were, I stored my tent and bedroll. Looking around at the empty campsite made me feel a little lonely.

Well, who better to accompany me than myself? I grinned and focused on my new skill. I wondered what spending 50% of all my resources would feel like. Turns out, not pleasant. I felt like I was bleeding from somewhere while also feeling drained of energy. After about a minute the feeling stopped, and I just felt less than what I was a moment ago. I checked my stats and sure enough had lost 50% of my heath, stamina, and mana.

I slowly turned around and when I looked behind me, saw myself. It was like looking into a mirror, albeit a slightly darker mirror. While the shadow looked like an exact copy of myself, it was like I was, or it was, standing in shadow.

“What a handsome summon.” I said aloud.

“Why thank you. I’m glad to have such a handsome summoner.” The shadow replied.

“You can talk.”

“Seems that way.”

We stood there just looking at each other for a moment.

“So uh, what else can you do?”

The shadow shrugged “I can do this” and pointed. The log he was pointing at started to sparkle and I let out a laugh. I pointed to one of the other logs and made that sparkle. My shadow laughed.

We spent the next minute pointing and making as many things sparkle as we could all the while laughing out loud.

Once we got bored of that I asked. “So, what else can you do?”

“I can do this.” My twin walked around me until he stood in my own shadow. He gave me a smile and dropped like he fell into a hole. I looked down but could only see my shadow stretching before me. A moment passed and he ascended from my shadow. I looked down and could still see my shadow before me.

“I thought you were my shadow.”

“I am your shadow.”

Pointing to him and then my shadow on the ground I asked. “But I still have a shadow.”

“No. stop. You are going to make us both confused. I am your shadow but not a shadow. You still cast a shadow but it’s not me.”

“Okay then.” Not wanting to think about it anymore I chose to leave it at that.

“Well since you are me does tha-“

“Hold on. I never said I was you.”

“But you hold all my experience, knowledge, etcetera etcetera…”

“Yes, that’s true but I am not you. I am your shadow.”

“I feel like this is another topic that is going to get weird so lets just leave that for later.”

“Good plan.” My shadow gave me a thumbs up.

“Can you fight?”

He gave me a sly grin. “Better than you.”

Letting out a sigh I mumbled “Figures, you have been summoned for less than ten minutes and you are already challenging me.”

“Hey now, I never challenged you.”

“But you say you can fight better than me? Or do you mean that because I choose not to engage in melee you could best me?”

“I cannot harm you in any way.” As if to prove himself the shadow moved towards me faster than I could react and slapped me. Only I did not feel the impact of his hand, it just seemed to flow through me.

“How?” I asked. If he had the same experiences, knowledge, and abilities as myself, how was he able to move faster than me? Is it because I am out of practice? It’s only been a few days since I became a mage. I can’t be that uncoordinated… Maybe I have not fully accustomed myself to the loss of stats and levels. I should exercise my body more.

“If I had to put a figure on it. Let’s say I could fight better than you by about twenty five percent.” He gave me a smug smile.

His words finally registered. Of course. Everything I summon was 25% stronger from my class trait.

“Oh.”

I could not believe it possible, but he managed to look even more smug. “Oh indeed. Shall we get some levels?”

“Before that. Don’t move a movement” I took a step forward and punched him square in the mouth. The shadow fell backwards before falling into a backwards summersault and coming back up to stand on his feet.

I gave a grin. “Okay, let’s go.”

“You punched me, your own summon.”

“Needed to be done.”

“Why?”

I didn’t like the smug look on his face. I was going to say just that before realizing I was talking about my own face.

“Well, you can’t harm me. I wanted to see if I couldn’t harm you.”

“Oh. Well now you know, Prick.”

“Damn, my shadow is such an asshat.”

“I’m you, doofus.”

“Just a moment ago you said you were my shadow. Make up your mind, fool.”

We continued to trade insults while we made our way into the forest.