But... they shouldn't be here yet. There was no way that this world could already support fairies being thrown in here with the little mana that existed in this world so far. It just didn't make any sense. Sure, maybe if there was a mana well here, it would make a little more sense, but there wasn't, Ashton had specifically checked that before coming here because he was worried that orc leader was some kind of boss monster again.
The Summoner had a lot of different fairy summons because they were innate to their world, and all of them stuck to Ashton like glue. That was why he knew as much about them as he did. And he knew for a fact that fairies took a while to be born. They were innate to any world with magic, much like elementals and even spirits, though the latter originated in the spirit realm, of course, but it took a while for a fairy to be actually born. It was impossible for a low-magic world like earth to birth a fairy already, and the council wouldn't place them here, at least not this early on.
'I really don't get it,' Ashton thought to himself. But his face wouldn't read as 'confused' to anyone that was looking at him right now. No, he was grinning with excitement. Fairies were useful - each kind of fairy possessed extremely useful or powerful magics. And the one that was currently being tormented by the goblins, if Ashton was right, had some of the best magic for him right now.
It was a flower pixie, capable of casting slight buffs and protective barriers. Sure, they weren't the strongest in the world, but at the point where Ashton was at right now, just a point or two extra in any of his stats would already make for a massive difference in what he could actually do. If he managed to form a contract with a fairy, it would be an absolute game-changer.
Ashton carefully snuck by the edge of the playground. His footsteps were still silenced by the shoelaces, and he knew how to move without being seen to some degree as well. Of course, usually, the Summoner would use some kind of stealth magic, so Ashton never had to worry about it too much, but he still learned a thing or two.
As Ashton got closer to the garden, he was not only able to hear the presumable pixie much better, but he could also actually see it. And it was just as Ashton thought.
A small, deeply androgynous, roughly humanoid figure with insect-like traits. Flower pixies had wings akin to butterflies, and were covered all over in almost fur-like scales. They typically wore small dresses crafted together from flowers that they naturally preserved with magic to be at their peak colour and health.
Ashton couldn't quite see what exactly this one's dress was made of, but judging from the flowers planted here, probably poppies or foxgloves. Ashton looked at the monsters and called the wisp out of his vessel.
Right now, it was far more important to make sure the fairy wasn't injured. Ashton focused on the group of goblins. There were four of them. One was clutching the fairy in its hands while it was trying to get out, while one of the others was trying to pluck at their wings.
Without hesitation, Ashton pushed his fist forward as fast as he could. The wisp shot through through the air, fast and small, and hit the goblin holding the fairy into the side of the chin. Its head spun to the side as it fell unconscious. Its grip loosened at the same time, and the fairy could flutter away while the other goblins were standing there, confused. Ashton whipped his hand to the side and had the wisp shoot at the goblin that was trying to pluck the pixie's wings, since it was the only one that could potentially still catch it while it tried to hide. That goblin had its head thrown back and stumbled a few steps away.
While that was happening, Ashton shot forward and tried to close the distance fully. By channelling the undine, he whipped water at the foot at the stumbling goblin. It fell to the ground, and while the other two were still trying to figure out what happened, Ashton slightly loosened his grip and pushed the staff forward to extend his reach.
With that momentum, he slammed his staff right in the face of a goblin that looked his way, and at the same time let the staff go with one hand, directing the wisp to grow larger and move right to the back of that goblin's head.
Its skull was practically crushed between the staff and wisp and it fell dead to the ground.
As the staff bounced back so Ashton's hand was back in its middle, he spun it around and hit the last of the goblins before it could even react. Of course, this entire process happened in just two or three seconds.
A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.
Ashton slammed his staff down onto the unconscious goblin's head to kill it and had the wisp slam down onto the head of the third to crush its face.
But by then, before Ashton could stop it or block its mouth, the last of the four goblins screamed out. It was a high-pitched, pained scream — a mix of terror, surprise, and an attempt at warning the others.
Annoyingly, that attempt seemed successful. The monsters on the playground turned toward the garden and saw him there. By now, there were around another 15 goblins left there and the two orcs. The latter were particularly annoyed, and grabbed their weapons.
One carried a large, classic wooden club, and the other was carrying a... stop sign?
"How the fuck did they tear that out of the ground?" Ashton narrowed his eyes and stared at the sign, swinging his staff to bash in the skull of the last goblin that was directly around him.
He turned his head toward the small pixie hiding out between the flowers and veggies, "Don't worry, I'll take care of them. Hide here, and if you see any of them coming closer, just fly up high into the sky, okay?"
The pixie tried their best to hide from even Ashton, not sure what exactly was going on. He didn't mind, obviously. Ashton was just happy that they were okay.
He looked back at the monsters and walked forward, stepping out of the garden before calling the salamander out of his vessel. Before the elemental could even properly settle in the lantern, Ashton shot a compressed ball of flames forward into the sand of the playground.
As the explosion of sand covered a good half of the goblins, causing them to spit out and rub the sand out of their eyes. Ashton gathered the flames together again and spread them out in front of the monsters. He could deal with the goblins, but the orcs? Ashton had to do something to hold them off, take care of the goblins, and then focus on the two orcs.
And the first thing that came to his mind was another attempt at 'fusing' two elementals. But this time, it didn't involve the wisp, but rather the undine and salamander.
Ashton brought the spheres of water and flames together, trying to force them into one mass. Obviously, they didn't 'combine', but that wasn't what Ashton wanted to do. He just had to boil the water and heat it up, and it happened incredibly, incredibly fast. Since the flames couldn't be snuffed out for as long as Ashton controlled them, he could practically place the heat directly into the water.
"Backpacker! Honey!" Ashton yelled out, using one of his hands to control both the water and fire and keep forcing them together, while he used the other to make the wisp fly around, taking out a goblin here and there while focusing on distracting them all.
Immediately, the Backpacker appeared and gave Ashton the honey that he took with him and used to make the ink to summon these two elementals. Ashton tore open the squeeze-bottle's lid with his teeth and pushed the honey into the boiling, floating water. He then manipulated said water to mix it all in. It was actually a little hard to manipulate it now that it was like this, but it should be fine for his purposes.
The orcs, standing at the back of the group, were coming closer to Ashton, but he quickly shot forward the boiling honey-water and splashed it right onto the faces of the two orcs. The boiling hot, sticky honey clung to their faces, and their screams were muffled by the fact that they threw their hands onto their faces to try and tear away whatever it was that was sticking to them. But of course, that wouldn't work.
Ashton quickly moved forward, focusing on manipulating the wisp. He had it shoot around and crush the skulls of goblins while he did the same with his staff. One down, two, four, seven, ten, twelve, fourteen, and sixteen. All the goblins that were approaching Ashton were taken down relatively fast. Because of course — the orcs, these monsters that were naturally much, much stronger than the goblins, were screaming in pain. The goblins were distracted, and a moment of distraction was enough to be killed.
The moment the last of the goblins fell to the ground, Ashton focused on the orcs. One of them, the one with the club, had practically started trying to tear off its skin to get rid of the boiled honey. Its claw-like fingernails dug into its skin, and the blood that poured out of its wounds seemed to cool the honey down.
The other one had thick blisters forming on its face almost immediately as its skin was burnt. What Ashton was now dealing with wasn't just a pair of orcs set on killing him for fun, but because they fully despised him.
"Come and get it, pig boys," Ashton grinned as he started spinning around his staff and the two orcs ran at him. The first swung its club at him furiously, sputtering blood around as it did.
Ashton jumped back and hit the back of the club, adding onto its force to make the orc vastly overswing. He then hit the monster's elbow. The orc's arm twitched in a way that told Ashton that he managed to break its elbow. He continued spinning the staff around to rebuild some momentum and built some distance to stay safe against the second orc.
It was already swinging the stop sign at him, like one would swing a large axe. The stop-sign got stuck in the ground for a moment, and Ashton used that time to reform a new bubble of water that he pressed onto the orc's face like he had with the goblins, this time covering its mouth and nose together. He had to use a bit more water like this, but it was worth it.
This was going to be a slightly more prolonged fight if Ashton wanted to be safe, so the orc's extra panic and recklessness was useful. The two monsters continued swinging their weapons at Ashton, but he skilfully dodged them and counterattacked whenever he could. He hit the orcs with flames and explosions, with the wisp, with his staff, and just kept whittling down on them.
And just a few minutes later... one of them collapsed, drowning due to the bubble of water Ashton was pressing against its face.
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