Heroine Creation: All My Summons Are Custom Made

Everyone returned to the lodges. The sprawling courtyard had transformed into a sea of recruits loudly comparing assignments. Operation crests flashed everywhere in the evening light.

There were gold fortresses for those bound for Citadel, and silver shields for the defenders remaining with Aegis.

It was pretty funny how the Barracks authorities claimed there was no hierarchy between both assignments yet they made one crest from a more valuable stone than the other.

Some Awakeners wore their assignments proudly on their jackets before they had even reached their rooms, while others stood in quiet circles, turning the metal pins over in their palms as if a second glance might magically change the military’s decision.

Tavrik walked confidently beside Lancet, having already pinned his silver Aegis crest dangerously close to his shoulder.

It was noticeably crooked, and Selli kept glaring at it with mounting irritation as she adjusted her own perfectly centered shield. When she finally snapped that he had pinned it upside down, Tavrik merely shrugged, arguing that a shield worked in every direction.

Lancet tuned out her sharp reminder that shields absolutely did not work like that, his focus dropping to the heavy gold crest resting in his own palm.

In a few months, he would be going to Malachar, the Pit of Teeth. He had known Operation Citadel was coming eventually, but holding the physical proof that he would actually be marching into Gehenna made the reality settle heavy in his chest.

And he had only two weeks to prepare.

They navigated the busy courtyard between the three towering lodge buildings and found the rest of their group gathered near the eastern entrance.

Renan stood beside Nereus and Valeria, their respective assignments already pinned to their coats. Both Renan and Nereus wore the gold fortress of Citadel, while Valeria bore the silver shield of Aegis.

Vernon seemed to have vanished.

When Lancet asked Valeria if she was disappointed, she confessed she had wanted to see Gehenna, waving off his reminder that she would see plenty of Demons on Earth.

”That is not the same thing,” she murmured, only for Tavrik to step cheerfully into the circle, tapping his own crest and welcoming her to the Aegis club. One sharp look from Valeria abruptly ended the tapping.

Selli smoothly shifted the conversation, asking where everyone intended to spend their two-week holiday. The answers came quickly as the lingering tension of the assignments bled away into relief.

Nereus had specific people to visit before returning to the Barracks, while Valeria needed to handle family matters and retrieve several specialized pieces of equipment from her estate.

Renan intended to travel back just long enough to see his family before dedicating the rest of the break to physical preparation, and Tavrik had already launched into a detailed monologue about the food he planned to eat before anyone even asked him.

Lancet stood quietly, listening to the casual exchange of lives outside the military, until Selli turned her expectant gaze directly on him.

When he casually shrugged and said he had nowhere particular to go, she pushed further, asking why he wasn’t visiting anyone.

”No,” Lancet replied, the answer coming naturally to his lips. ”My parents are dead. I’m an orphan.”

The words should have ended there, a simple, factual truth he had spoken before. Yet, the moment the sentence left his mouth, a strange, hollow sensation bloomed in his chest.

It didn’t feel false, but it felt jarringly incomplete. For half a second, an intense pressure built behind his eyes, as if a profound thought or a specific face hovered just out of reach, tethered directly to the word orphan.

He frowned slightly, waiting for the memory to surface but the phantom sensation slipped away like water before he could catch it. It felt like he was forgetting something for some reason. Or someone.

Oh well.

Selli was already talking again, oblivious to his brief disorientation, and Lancet glanced at her, returning to the conversation. When Tavrik asked if he planned to simply stay in the Barracks, Lancet answered automatically that he wouldn’t, which was enough to seamlessly move the conversation along.

Within a few minutes, the group naturally broke apart as people remembered they had bags to pack, transports to arrange, and two weeks of absolute freedom to either waste or utilize.

Lancet returned alone to his room, finding the sterile quiet of the space suddenly deafening after the roaring energy of the War Hall.

He placed the Citadel crest squarely on the desk before dropping onto the edge of the large bed, his eyes drifting toward the crystal communicator mounted on the wall.

Two weeks was a massive advantage. It was more than enough time to push several crucial plans forward before the Barracks called them back to the grind.

Thor should already have the Terrible Three completely secured, and Espel needed to be present when Lancet finally decided what to do with them.

Reaching out, he punched in Espel’s room number and waited. The crystal panel flared to life, chiming softly twice before her calm, level voice came through the speaker.

”It’s me,” Lancet said, leaning back against the cool wall.

When she dryly replied that she knew, Lancet got straight to business. ”Thor should have the Terrible Three in place by now. I want us to go there tomorrow.”

Espel paused briefly on the other end of the line, clarifying that he explicitly wanted her there. When Lancet confirmed it, she asked for his reasoning.

Lancet wanted to say the truth, which was that he just wanted her to be there. But of course, Espel only accepted logical answers, so he went with;

”Because you know considerably more about the Society than I do, and they’re part of the reason we’re moving against it now. I want you to hear exactly whatever they have to say.”

Acknowledging the logic, Espel agreed to the meeting. Lancet looked through his window, watching recruits already rushing across the courtyard below reclaiming things they had borrowed their neighbors.

He asked if she was going anywhere for the holiday, but Espel simply stated she had nowhere she needed to visit. When he pressed her about Oden, she admitted they had already said their goodbyes before she ever boarded the royal ship.

Lancet nodded to himself; it fit the complicated, fractured nature of her relationship with the only family she had left.

”You should go somewhere nice,” Lancet suggested quietly into the speaker. ”Somewhere with butterflies.”

Another pause stretched across the line, heavy with the oddly specific recommendation, before Espel said she would consider it.

Lancet smiled faintly. ”But first,” he promised, ”we go see Thor and decide exactly what happens to the Terribles.”

Espel agreed with a soft affirmative, and Lancet reached over to sever the connection. As the crystal communicator dimmed back to dormant grey, the room plunged into silence once more.

Lancet remained seated on the edge of the mattress, his gaze locking onto the gold Citadel crest glinting under the overhead lights.

’And then... I go find Spectra’s catalyst.’