Assassin Crow Evolution

Summoning Circles were used for everything unholy.

Lesser Summoners especially depended on it.

From what Gundor explained, he had seen plenty of humans summon demons, bind with the demons, and have them serve the summoners.

Greater Summoners didn’t rely on Summoning Circles, because they did not summon demons most of the time. They preferred other, horrid creatures, which usually were greater beasts that had passed away. Be it from heaven, or from hell.

However, there was a less-practiced form of summoning, one that most were not aware of.

Souls, specifically lost souls, could be summoned directly from the void.

Jimmy was several steps ahead in this process, so ahead in fact that he didn’t have to summon Gundor’s soul from the void.

His equation was different, as had snatched a Soul Core from the void. Gundor’s very essence was in his claws.

Approaching the circle, he noticed that someone had used it recently. Blood, bones, guts, and a whole goat head were scattered across it.

"Maybe the summoning arts haven’t been abandoned after all?" He said, and pretended that he was a generally displeased elder, just for the fun of it. "Maybe there is hope in the younger generations?"

The scene was gut-wrenching. It would disturb humans with a weak stomach, but in his case, he went far past being disturbed after he swallowed his fifth hundred bug. Not many things bothered him in this crow form.

The Summoning Circle appeared less demonic than he expected it to. He expected to see a star drawn out across the mossy, stone architecture, which he considered to be Demonics 101, but this wasn’t the case.

The six-foot wide circle only featured a thick, curling snake. Or it could be a Wyrm, which were the same beasts he was trying to avoid right now.

There was a large head at the outer side of the circle, amplifying the precisely carved beauty of the circle, but he couldn’t tell if the head belonged to a snake, or a Wyrm. Either way, he didn’t care enough to know.

Jimmy walked towards the aforementioned stone head, and placed the claw-sized orb in its mouth.

The ground shook.

"Is this normal?" Virena panicked.

"I wouldn’t know," He said, "But I know what we’re supposed to do next."

With Virena on his back, Jimmy flew towards one of the five, ruined buildings. The biggest one, several meters wide.

Within the biggest one, there was an opening at the bottom. It was small, easy to miss, and yet, it was big enough to fit a human.

Carved into the stone of the opening was a ladder, designed to serve humans, though not birds.

Jimmy floated near the opening, and then hopped in it.

After a short second, he spread his wings, flapped them a couple of times, and landed safely several feet below.

"We’re gonna have to be sneaky," He said, "So don’t light any torches. I can see in the dark now anyway."

Jimmy spoke freely, despite the fact that he had to sneak to succeed. He figured that whatever lay ahead, wouldn’t care about mantis sounds.

Despite what he just claimed, he couldn’t see in the dark, but he quickly browsed through the Assassin Branch in his Evolution Tree, and got to the fifth sub-branch, otherwise known as Phantoma.

This sub-branch featured purchases having to do with sneak, camouflage, and others. The value of those ’others’ was heavily under-estimated.

There were a few useful options to choose from.

A purchase and a short burn in his head later, he gained the upper advantage within this great darkness in seconds!

[-3,000 system points]

[Remaining points: 11,455]

[Enlightened Eyes skill implemented.]

Jimmy had seen this option before, and he specifically did not buy it because it was expensive, but now that he had plenty of points to spend, he wished that he got this upgrade sooner!

It was a one-time purchase, he didn’t have to upgrade it, as it was already cranked to the max in terms of usefulness!

’Nice,’ He thought.

The Enlightened Eyes skill was not a mere night-vision tool, it went far beyond that. He could see in the dark very well, as the darkness around him was suddenly replaced with a freakishly green hue, but this was not why he bought it.

Jimmy started moving forward, following a six foot wide tunnel, careful with every step he took. He avoided stones, debris, and had to go through quite a bit of weeds, but minutes later, he sensed something ten meters, or over thirty feet ahead.

He saw a magnetic field, a small one.

’Hell yeah,’ He celebrated silently, ’This has to be the coolest shit I own!’

One careful step after the other, he got closer to his target, which was a human. Likely a summoner.

As per Gundor’s instructions, he knew that a human had to be down here below the rubble.

The magnetic field he saw, which helped him tell the human apart in the great green hue which engulfed his vision, was actually the human’s brain.

Brains had magnetic fields around them. They were small, but an upgraded pair of eyes such as Jimmy’s could see it.

He could see it through the weeds, rocks, and whatever else stood in his path.

At some point, he figured that it wasn’t a good idea to approach the human any closer.

The man was moving around, and working in the dark. It was unnerving, it was weird, and in hindsight, he was glad that the man had his back turned on him, because if the man could see in the dark as well, then they would’ve started fighting a while ago.

With that considered, Jimmy climbed on top of the biggest rock he could find instead. It was more of a large piece of carved stone, really, which had fallen from the ceiling.

Within a blink, he raised his left claw forward, and whispered, "Blue Fireball..."

[-150 mana points]

[Remaining pool: 1,050 points]

Although blue, the epitome of hellfire he shot towards his target, was anything but dimly lit. The fact that it looked less menacing, didn’t make it any less dangerous. In fact, this was the hottest, most dangerous fireball he could muster!

Despite using this fireball before, in this case, he thought that the sun exploded. He could see too much, and yet too little of it thanks to his Enlightened Eyes skill.

Anyway, the fireball darted forward in the blink of an eye, and hit the target.

Jimmy expected the battle to be over right then and there, however, he grew concerned when he didn’t hear a single peep from the target.

The man didn’t even budge!

"What the?" He grunted.

Jimmy wanted to attack again, but he was fresh out of ideas. The Blue Fireball was his ultimate move.

The man turned around, faced him, and mustered a large, yellowish fireball in his hands.

Jimmy chuckled, and said, "How can you be that strong, and that stupid at the same time? A fucking crow shot a fireball at you, and you think a weaker fireball will do the trick?"

The man didn’t understand him. He only heard an agitated crow.

From the looks of it, he also saw the agitated crow within the depths of the darkness. The man launched the fireball he mustered.

Four square feet of flames raged towards Jimmy in a split second, but his natural reaction was faster.

His Elemental Shield popped up naturally.

It slowed down the flames for a fraction of a second, which was very valuable in situations like this.

As the flames broke through his V-shaped shield, a second Elemental Shield popped up, absorbing the rest of the blow.

"My fuck this was a good investment," He shook his head.

Afterwards, he charged forward, and chased the man. He had a new plan in mind, he could think a little bit ahead.

Since his prior, well-calculated plan fell in the water so quickly, he had to rely on more brute measures.

Two seconds into his forward thrust, he took a great swing with his right claw, and hit the man in the knee with his hammer.

The man bent over, and finally yelped. This was the sound Jimmy was looking for.

"You know what they say? If magic doesn’t work, you can always hit ’em in the knee." He joked, "I don’t think anyone says that."

Jimmy backed away tactfully. He figured that the man had a concealed dagger at least. Despite the fact that he mocked the man, he knew that humans had a tendency to be more prepared.

He waited for a couple of seconds, just to see what the man would do next.

In the meantime, Virena mustered a great hot Fire Sphere at the top of her head. Her sickle whistled a great, sharp melody as he swung it around.

A moment later, she launched the sphere. She figured that Jimmy was far past being sneaky right now.

The sphere hit the man, and unsurprisingly, tore through his chest.

"Well, that settles it," Jimmy smiled, "Your spheres burn hotter than whatever I can come up with. This motherfucker ate my hottest fireball like an apple."