Heroine Creation: All My Summons Are Custom Made

Renan came bursting out from behind that enormous calcified skull like a knight hellbent on impressing the King’s daughter.

Every Middle Orc in the crater whipped their heads around at once. These beasts weren’t the scrawny runts they’d just killed back in the hills.

These bastards were built wrong. They were tall as teenagers but twice as heavy, with green muscle stacked so thick it looked like it hurt to move, and bones like rebar under the skin.

Their iron axes and spiked maces were already coming up, and the black iron of their ancient armor glinted dully in the smoky light.

Renan wrapped both hands around the grip of his longsword. He wasn’t afraid, not when he had Grace pouring into him like hot oil, lighting up every nerve.

He twisted at the hips and swung the blade from the left to right. Silver gale ripped out of the steel.

A shining crescent of light tore across the crater floor, bright enough to burn afterimages into his vision. The front line of orcs threw up their slab-thick arms and staggered back, boots scraping long ugly furrows in the dirt.

For two heartbeats the air actually cleared between him and them.

The Solar Knight didn’t wait for them to recover.

Renan charged straight at the closest pair. He snapped his sword forward in a clean thrust aimed right at the throat of the one on his left.

But right then, Renan realized these Middle Orcs weren’t dumb fodder.

The orc on the right reacted like it had been waiting for exactly that move. It smashed the shaft of its mace sideways and knocked Renan’s thrust wide.

Holy steel rang against rusted iron with a high, painful clang that vibrated all the way up his arms.

Renan dropped low the instant he felt the parry connect. Good thing too—the second orc’s bone-axe came whistling through the space where his head had just been, so close he felt the wind of it part his hair.

Renan tried to twist right and open the thing’s ribs with a rising cut, but the first orc was already stepping in close, crowding his space, forcing him to jerk his blade back up into a frantic high block.

Metal shrieked again. His boots slid backward in the loose ash, heels digging useless trenches.

These beasts were quick. Way quicker than the Lesser ones. But that was to be expected, Renan just had to up his game to take them down.

He swung his longsword and slashed at them, suddenly stuck trading heavy, ringing blows with just two of them.

From the corner of his eye he saw the rest of the pack race towards him, weapons hungry for blood.

Five were already close enough to cause considerable damage, and Renan had to choose between finishing his upper slice to finish the vulnerable orc in front of him or to backpedal and miss the opportunity.

In the end, he didn’t have to because a sharp, rising whistle cut through the roar of battle.

Before those five could close the gap, something massive and golden shot out of nowhere like judgment.

Astensia’s shield smashed square into the lead orc’s temple with a wet, skull-splitting CRACK. The thing’s head snapped sideways, brains spraying in a gray-red arc.

The shield didn’t even slow, it ricocheted off the second orc’s chest plate, sending it flying to oblivion, then it spun in a blurring, vicious circle, and battered the rest of them into the dirt like bowling pins made of meat.

Dust exploded upward in a choking cloud as all five of them fell dead.

The shield kept its momentum, curved back up through the haze, and slapped neatly into Astensia’s waiting gauntlet high atop the giant skull.

The rest of the Middle Orcs stopped to see who had killed five of their brothers in that simple move.

Astensia stood on top of the giant skull, her golden aura burning so bright it hurt the Orcs to look.

”Prepare,” she said, voice ringing clear and cold over the chaos, ”to be pulverized by my iron will.”

Lancet grinned like a fool behind the skull.

All the orcs still standing forgot Renan existed. Bloodshot eyes rolled upward. Throats opened in a ragged, furious chorus.

”GRRRRAAAAAARRR!”

Astensia jumped, her Grace shot her high above their heads and she landed at the center of the crater floor with a sound like a cannon shot.

The impact caused the earth to crack and erupt, stones flew, a wall of dirt and force picked the charging Orcs up and threw them backward like leaves in a storm.

The dust cleared and Astensia was still in the center, dropped to one knee. Four angry Middle Orcs came roaring in from four different directions at once.

Their axes and maces crashed down together to slice her into four halves. The force would have done just that to a lesser fighter.

But this was the Ironwill Knight.

Astensia’s golden shield came up at an angle and caught every single weapon at the same instant.

CLANG!!!

Metal grinded on metal and sparks showered like dying fireworks. Astensia held back their weapons as they kept trying to force it down.

Then, still on one knee, she ripped her Blessed Blade free of its sheath. Then she spun in a full circle with the greatsword pointed forward.

The sword carved through the Orcs’ stomach like they were made of warm butter. Four torsos separated from four pelvises in perfect unison.

Top halves toppled backward. Bottom halves stood stupidly upright for a stupid half-second before blue pixels burst outward in a slow, fading shower.

Behind the safety of the skull’s giant eye socket, Lancet’s interface lit up like a goddamn casino.

⸢ +9 Middle Orcs killed by Heroine, Astensia ⸥

⸢ Astensia has gained +450 EXP ⸥

⸢ You have gained +900 EXP ⸥

⸢ You have gained 180 CP ⸥

Lancet clenched his fist so hard his knuckles popped. ’Yes. More. Moreeeeee.’

Down in the crater Astensia didn’t pause to admire her work. Her legs coiled again and she launched straight up into the dreary sky, flipped her grip on the greatsword so the point aimed down, and fell like a golden meteor with murder in its heart.

”Heavenly Sword Cannonbolt!”

The moment her sword met the earth, it detonated.

A starburst of cracks raced outward. Five more Middle Orcs were flung skyward—bones snapping audibly while they were still airborne—before they crashed back down in ruined heaps.

A few yards away Renan was still locked in the battle with the Orcs. He’d managed to take down one, but another had joined so he was back to two again.

He slapped an axe chop aside, stepped inside the orc’s reach, rammed his silver sword up through its jaw and out the top of its skull.

Hot blood sprayed across his gauntlets. He yanked the blade free with a wet sucky sound, spun on his heel, and took the second one’s spine clean through with a horizontal cut that parted vertebrae like string.

After the blue slash, that orc was dead too.

Renan half-turned, catching Astensia’s Cannonbolt skill with wide eyes. Gosh, just how powerful is she?

When he saw more orcs spilling over the ridge, he spun his blade and prepared for more bloodshed.

The fight turned into something primal, something that lived in the blood and the breath.

Renan sprinted at a charging brute, dropped into a sudden low slide under a club swing that would have caved his chest in.

As he shot past he angled his blade upward and sliced the orc’s Achilles tendon clean through. Wet pop, wet snap.

The monster bellowed and crashed to its knees. Renan popped up behind it and drove the heavy pommel of his sword straight into the base of its skull with every ounce of strength he had left.

Bone gave way. Blue flash. Then dust.

Astensia was on another level.

A two-handed battleaxe came whistling toward her ribs. She stepped straight into the swing instead of away, caught the thick green wrist in her gauntleted hand and squeezed. Bones cracked and popped like dry branches. The orc’s eyes bulged in shock and pain.

Her other hand drove the bladed rim of her shield upward, crushing the windpipe, larynx, everything in between.

She ripped the shield free in a spray of black blood, spun on her heel to meet the spear coming from behind, used the turn’s momentum, and cleaved the spear-wielder from collarbone to hip in one long, glowing stroke.

Behind the skull Lancet was grinning so wide it hurt.

The golden screens were stacking on top of each other now, numbers climbing faster than he could read them. EXP pouring in. CP flooding like a busted dam.

Farming at this rate, he should own the whole goddamn dungeon. If things went on like this, then that Orc King’s loot was definitely coming back with him.

”Grrrrrr...”

Lancet’s grin froze solid. He had just heard something. A growl, unmistakenly, low and wet rumbling right against the back of his neck.

The smell hit him next, like rotten meat, blood, and the stench of a wild animal.

Every hair on his arms stood straight up. He turned his head one slow, terrified inch at a time.

A massive Middle Orc stood directly behind him. It was huge, almost as huge as a High Orc. Thick ropes of drool hung from yellowed tusks and its bloodshot eyes were locked on Lancet—the soft, unarmored boy crouched in the shadow of the bone.

Lancet looked down and saw the giant bone-axe in its scarred green fists. His heart slammed so hard he tasted blood in the back of his throat.

Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck—

”GRRRAAAAARRR!”

The Orc slammed the axe down.

Fuckkkkkkk!