I Only Summon Villainesses

Kassie frowned, grabbed me by the collar, and leaped.

It should have been daunting, being flung into the dark over and over with no idea where she meant to land, my stomach lurching every time the ground fell away beneath us. But I think she could make out the rough shape of the ground with her Enhanced Senses. Her mastery had to run far deeper than mine, after all.

The instant we lunged clear, the snakes poured down onto the spot where we’d been standing. They didn’t pursue us. Instead they swarmed the carcass of the colossal snake we’d killed and set to eating, jaws working with maddening hunger, coil folding over coil until the whole heap writhed. The wet, tearing sound of it followed us even as we pulled away.

It was actually quite revolting to watch.

On one hand, Kassie and I finally had the snakes off our backs. On the other, we were right back where we’d started, an endless darkness with nowhere to go and no idea where in it we stood.

Still, we kept moving. We explored the landscape, and at some point the ground changed under my feet. I stumbled over a knot of tree roots that knuckled up out of the dark, and when I looked up, against the liquid shimmer of the sky I could make out the shapes of leaves. Maple leaves, more or less, but dark as ink, and dead still in the windless air.

After what felt like forever, we settled at the base of one of the trees. I made fire, and we roasted the snake meat over it, the smell of it filling up the little circle of light we had. The meat came off charred on the outside and stubborn to chew, but it was hot, and out here that counted for plenty. I ate my share and handed Kassie hers, though she suggested it was safe enough for me to keep both portions and stretch my rations out longer.

I just didn’t feel right eating alone, so I forced her to take it.

Afterwards, we were supposed to rest.

But I couldn’t. Not yet. There was something I wanted too badly to sit still for.

’I can’t enter my Soul Sanctum, so the only choice is to bring her here.’

I raised my gaze to Kassie, who stood in front of me, staring up at the sky.

”Kassie, I’m about to do something risky. I don’t know what it is, but I suspect it is. Just telling you, in case...”

’Not that I’d want her to kill White Feather’s daughter.’

I inhaled and reached for Frostfang’s sheath, calling it back to life. Or that was what I meant to do. What I got was:

[Your Spirit Gear has been destroyed]

’Eh?’

I tried to summon the broken sword too, and...

[Your Spirit Gear has been destroyed]

’What?’

Now the irritation was climbing, and I could feel my jaw setting hard.

”What?”

I reached for the items I’d taken from the ice gate, the ones I hadn’t sold off to Lady Hua. Then everything else, every last thing I could remember owning. The answer never changed.

[That item has been destroyed] [That item has been destroyed] [That item has been destroyed]

’Oh no...’

There was only one thing left in my soul that I could still feel whole. Untouched.

I couldn’t stand not knowing any longer, so I reached down into my subconscious and pulled Wrei out.

The sword materialized in front of me on a spark of silver light, and the moment my eyes landed on her, they went wide and my breath caught. The Wrei I remembered slipping into my inventory was nothing like the blade hanging in the air now. Darker than I remembered. Heavier to look at, somehow.

Even Kassie glanced back at the sword settling into my hand.

Then, without warning, the blade shuddered along its whole length and lunged — driving point-first into my right chest, biting through skin and muscle. Before it could sink any deeper, I clamped my hand around it and held. The edge cut cold and slick into my palm.

Blood ran down my wrist and off my fingers while the sword fought me, grinding and shoving, straining to tear through my hand and drive on into my chest.

’Ah. You’re certainly a troublesome one, aren’t you?’

My eyes lit with white radiance, and I loosed White flames down the length of her. The blade caught, its whole edge running bright, and the fire threw our two shadows huge and shaking against the roots behind us. I felt her strength collapse all at once. I wrenched her out of my chest and let her go. She hit the ground and clattered there.

Kassie looked down at the sword, then over at me.

I glanced up. ”Damn, Kassie, thank you.”

”If I moved, I would have destroyed her... and she seems to have great potential.”

I stared at the sword. She was still shuddering against the ground, the point of her jerking and scraping at the dirt in what looked, for all the world, like agony.

’It would be nice to have a sword like that... it seems she can consume things and take on their attributes.’

A moment later I spat, my voice gone spiteful.

”What use is she when she’s trying to kill me?”

”Then all you have to do is tame her.”

Kassie said it with a nonchalant shrug and turned back to the darkness of the sky.

I looked from the sword to the ground under it. Her wriggling was slowing, winding down. The obsidian of her blade was taking on a silvery sheen now, one that matched the white flames still guttering along her length.

My eyes narrowed in disbelief.

’Even my attributes, she’s adapting to those too?’

A chuckle forced its way out of me.

’Now that is one fearsome sword.’

Only now did I understand what kind of treasure she was, and why Fairywind had been so obsessed with the Thousand Waves sword.

White Feather’s daughter was an incredibly awesome sword!

The problem now was how I was supposed to tame her when she was already devouring one of my strongest attributes and evolving to fit it.

And in this dark expanse, of all places?!