Chapter 48: Aftermath II

Back at the academy, after all the processing was done, Leon eventually received his tournament award to take with him.

It was a fairly large golden trophy. Not something he would have expected to receive from a school tournament, but apparently the academy took the competition seriously.

A representative gave a short speech congratulating the finalists and winners.

There were also mentions of further announcements that would be given to the tournament winners later, though, Leon didn’t think much of it. He had already had enough attention for one day.

When he finally returned to his room, Dustin and Raul were already waiting.

The moment Leon opened the door, both of them rose from their beds.

"You actually did it!"

"Wow bro, three whole summons! No wonder you were so confident."

"Did you know you could do that?" Dustin asked out of excitement. "How long have you been hiding them?"

"Can we see them again?" Raul asked.

Leon looked at them. "Who discovers they have more than one summon on a random day? And No, you cannot see them."

Raul looked disappointed.

"Come onnn..." Dustin protested.

"No."

Dustin laughed. "You can’t blame us for asking."

Leon placed the golden cup on the table right at the middle of the room.

"That’s actually pretty big." Raul said as he stared at it, while Dustin reached to feel it.

"It sure is."

"You should put it somewhere."

"We don’t exactly have room for that, do we? The table might just have to do for a bit."

The three of them spent some time talking about the tournament, and their discussion went on late into the night.

Eventually, the excitement died down and Dustin and Raul went to sleep.

Leon remained awake, as one thought kept him from dozing off.

The Door.

Leon closed his eyes, and immediately, his consciousness shifted to his Inner Space, his summoner’s space.

The familiar sensation of entering his Summoner’s Space followed as the world around him changed.

The room disappeared, and he immediately stood within the strange astral space that belonged to him.

His Summoner Space was quiet for most of it.

Aside from the numerous undead around, in an inactive state like asleep, the Door stood where it always did.

It looked exactly as it had before.

Leon stared at it for a while, pondering something. He had spent enough time thinking about it already.

The strange awakening.

The Door.

The undead.

The fact that it remained inside his Summoner’s Space even when he wasn’t using it was a cause to question, and the fact that it was a door was also there. Over time, he had concluded that his actually summon was the Door and not his undead, but he couldn’t quite prove it, and perhaps that was the reason for the other abnormalities he was facing, like not feeling any special bond with his undead summons.

But he also couldn’t feel any connection to the door.

There were too many things he didn’t understand, but he wasn’t going to start experimenting soon, but not for the meantime. If something were to happen while he was inside the academy, he didn’t want someone interrupting him.

’I’ll find somewhere private.’ He thougt to himself.

Leon walked towards the Door.

The structure didn’t react to his approach even as he stopped in front of it and placed one hand against its surface.

Leon sighed. ’So it isn’t going to just explain itself.’

He almost laughed at the thought. Of course it wouldn’t.

He kept his hand against the Door while thinking about where he could go. ’I have solving mysteries and puzzle games the most.’

’I also haven’t summoned today.’ He thought to himself.

Also, 12am had passed by then, and he really wondered if it would affect it. He hadn’t tried before to know.

’I wonder what will come out this time.’ He thought to himself. He had no idea what the Door would give him this time.

Another regular Skeleton? Something stronger? He wasn’t sure. He was so happy when he got the Swordsman, but it would seem that it was just luck and wasn’t a usual occurrence.

He had barely finished the thought when his mind paused.

Leon frowned.

For just a moment, the Door felt different.

It hadn’t changed temperatures or moved, there wasn’t even any visible change when he opened his eyes.

The feeling wasn’t born physically, but he could tell within himself. It was simply... different.

Leon slowly pulled his hand away from it as he stared at the Door for a while trying to understand what had just occured.

Nothing.

Once his hand came off, the strange feeling was gone. He placed his hand again, but nothing happened. The Door was exactly as silent as before.

Leon stood there for several seconds wondering what he had just experienced.

’What was that?’ but nothing.

Staring at the door, it brought back his earlier thought to him, ’there’s definitely more to this thing than I understand.’ He said to himself.

Leon stepped back.

He looked at the Door for another moment before turning away.

He had been so focused on the summons that he had almost forgotten the Door itself was the strangest thing in his entire Summoner’s space.

’I need to find time to study this properly.’ He said to himself.

Leon opened his eyes, he had returned to his room returned.He kept pondering over the matter, later not even knowing when he fell asleep.

Across the academy, however, two other people were still awake.

Darwit sat alone in his office, looking through the information he had gathered about Leon.

-Three summons-

He wrote the words down, then beneath them, he added another question.

-How?-

He stared at it for a long time, unable to figure it out.

Elsewhere, Mason was doing much the same thing.

He had gathered what little information he could find about Leon’s awakening and early summon records, comparing them against what he had witnessed in the tournament. Getting on the phone, he made a call to someone on the matter, appearing rather serious as they discussed.

...

Meanwhile, in the headmaster’s office, Joseph sat across from the headmaster, tired from the day’s work.

"Sir." He said.

The headmaster looked up. "Yes?"

"You said you wanted to speak with Leon."

"I do." The headmaster asnwered.

"Should I bring him in tomorrow?" He asked.

"No." The headmaster shook his head before leaning back into his chair. "The winners will receive further information about the National Tournament soon, right? When that announcement is made, we’ll speak with him."

Joseph nodded.

"There’s no need to rush." The headmaster said, as he looked toward the dark academy grounds outside his window.

"Go get some sleep, Joseph. We have even more work today than we did yesterday."

"Understood, Sir."