24 This Skill Is Quite The Cheat

The next day when I told mother about my new proficiency in Umbramancy, I was almost hugged to death.

"Ahhhh!! My child!! My sweet, sweet child!! Mama is so, so proud of you!!"

"Mmmffff!!"

"We should celebrate! Mama will make some cakes today, just for my little one!"

"Mmmnnffff!!"

"Ufufufu~ As expected of my child! Already making such progress even when you're still so young!"

"Mnnnggg…"

"Now, why don't my little one go and play while Mama prepares the cakes?"

I was finally allowed to breathe after being released from her bosoms while she made her way to the kitchen with a skip in her steps.

Ugghh… Those things are dangerous…

I looked down at my own chest, patting them a little expectantly. I already knew mine would be just as impressive as mother's which actually soothed me a little.

Hopefully I get the boon to prevent backaches before it grows out.

Following mother's advice, I went outside to play with myself.

… That came out wrong, I meant play with my summons.

Standing a short distance away from the house, I brought out all the summons I have currently.

Right now, there's two summons who have half of my stats while five have ten percent, including the featureless summon too.

All of them were summoned after fighting those goblins yesterday.

I also did a little bit more reading on monsters and I found that even they had different classifications.

For the cockatrices that mother were rearing in the chicken pen, those aren't classified as monsters but instead, they're known as magic creatures instead.

The main difference is that magic creatures still reproduce normally and they're basically animals that possess mana.

Monsters on the other hand are creatures that have been formed from mana and are born in Hell. They can't reproduce, but some still possess a semblance of intelligence.

This comes from the fact that the monsters are basically copying creatures that exist in the world, like the Hell Wolves basically being formed using wolves as the template.

Goblins on the other hand, used this world's equivalent of Imps as their base, otherwise known as Yoblins.

Whichever creature the monster adapted from, they would also carry a little bit of its traits over, like the wolves having the tendency to form packs and their superior sense of smell.

That also means the monsters are susceptible to the maladies of the flesh, meaning they do have to sleep and eat too, though most of them are driven more by instinct than anything else.

Which also meant that goblins do capture and rape their victims if they were given the chance to do so because the emotion of lust is present in them too.

Oh well, putting such thoughts aside, I focused on the more important matter right now.

What would happen if I were to use a hundred percent of my mana to do my [Shadow Summon]?

I concentrated my intent into the spell and casted it, feeling the entirety of my mana reserves draining away rapidly in less than a second.

The shadow under me stretched forward until it formed a blob, bubbling up to morph into the shadow version of myself.

I quickly checked her stats and… Oh yeap… This summon has my full stats and skills minus the magic.

Right now, with my level of Mana Management, it'll take me about an hour or so before I get back my maximum amount of mana again.

But that's why I have the Mana Crystals I got from hunting those goblins last night with me right now.

I was just about to start absorbing them to summon more when a thought entered my head. Would my summons have their stats increased when my own increases? Or are they locked to the stats I summoned them with?

Hmm… Is this world kind enough to give me the former option?

…

Something tells me that my summons would remain at the level I summoned them at…

Ugh… I'll ask mother later before I commit to this. If they do not grow stronger with me, then I want to increase my stats a little more before I commit to mass summoning them.

Right now my max strength is still lower than a bears and my ten percent summon is also weaker than a goblin. I think I'll set the base where my one percent summon is at least as strong as a goblin before I start spamming them out.

Although I guess it wouldn't hurt to do a max summon from time to time, just in case. There doesn't seem to be a limit to however many I can have, after all.

For now, I don't really see a point on having featureless summons and they honestly look a little creepy. Unfortunately, I don't seem to be able to create any other kind of summon aside from the faceless one and the copy of myself either because it was not possible or I just needed to grow stronger.

For now, I decided that my time would be best spent training my unarmed proficiency in my Martial Skill, especially since I have sparring partners right here! What better way to train myself than to fight and defeat myself, am I right?

Later on, I might even use them to train my other skills too. I get sparring partners who are on the same skill level as I am all the time! How cheat is that?!

I let the rest of my summons return to my shadow while leaving the one with the same stats as me out, instructing her to spar with me.

She settled into a combat stance similar to mine and we started circling each other, our hands outstretched in a wrestling stance.

I was the first to move, stepping forward to try and make a grab for her arm in an attempt to kick her feet.

She knew what was coming so she took a step back to avoid the grab before rushing forward to attempt a lariat.

Thinking fast, I lowered myself quickly and punched my fist forward right into her abdomen, sending her skidding back.

Pressing on to my advantage, I tried to pursue her for a follow up attack but got a kick in my own abdomen that also sent me stumbling away.

And precisely because I'm fighting myself, she had the same idea for pursuing me while I'm trying to recover, so I returned the favour with the same kick she did.

Learning from my previous try, I moved towards her flank while she was distracted, aiming a kick at her shins.

She avoided that by raising her foot before kicking it out at my waist.

That was enough to unbalance me and send me toppling over onto the ground, prompting her to leap on top of me and straddle my waist. Her fist was cocked back but I punched her in the face first, sending her rolling off me.

Even though I know it was a summon, punching her in the face still caused me to wince a little. Still, I reminded myself that this was a summon and pressed on.

Now it was my turn to straddle her, except I managed to block her punch that she tried to throw at me to give her another one across her face.

Unfortunately for me, it seems like shadow summons do not get dazed since she barely reacted from that and used her other hand to grab me by the collar.

She pulled and I found myself back on the floor again with her above me and one of her hands grasping my throat.

I pushed my arms against the inside of her elbow, forcing her to lower herself because of the bent arm before giving her a headbutt.

The force was enough to send her reeling back and I managed to pry her hand away from my throat.

Using the same move she did, I grabbed her by the collar and pulled her down beside me, using the momentum to flip myself on top of her.

This time, instead of straddling her, I decided to go for a submission hold instead.

Grabbing her by her right hand, I wrapped my left leg over her neck while my right leg was pushed against her armpit, using that as a lever to lean backwards.

She held there but could not break out from the hold, though she did not tap out either so I had to instruct her to stand down, cementing this spar as my win.

Honestly, from just this fight alone, I already know my fighting style is entirely unpolished and more akin to street brawling. If I were to meet someone who is actually trained in unarmed combat, I'll most likely lose to them.

Most of my knowledge from this came from watching videos back in the other world after all, though I did take a few classes just to get a feel of it for the sake of writing fight scenes in my stories. Unfortunately, I never committed to learning it since I wasn't exactly aiming to learn it for the sake of becoming good at it after all.

Maybe I should find someone to teach me some unarmed fighting styles, just so that if I lose my weapons and I run out of mana, I wouldn't be completely helpless.

What are the odds that mother would be able to teach me?

I got up from my summon as she melted into my shadow as I instructed, giving me time to brush off the dirt on my clothes right as mother appeared at the door.

She took one look at me and smiled, "Ufufufu~ As expected of my sweet child~ Always so full of energy! Come now, Mama has made some cakes for my darling little one~"

Ohhh! Cake!! Of course there's no way I would say no to that!! This is the best!