Chapter 19: Takes Guts

The Caretaker tilted his head.

Amelia barked another command.

“Ice Lance!”

Frostfang unleashed a barrage of razor-sharp icicles.

They tore into the Caretaker’s chest and shoulders.

He staggered.

Gene’s pencil stopped.

For the first time, he saw something important.

The Caretaker wasn’t invulnerable.

He could definitely be damaged.

Gene immediately wrote:

Weakness confirmed: concentrated elemental attacks can penetrate defenses.

The Caretaker reached down.

His knife appeared in his hand.

Frostfang backed away.

Gene watched carefully.

The wolf was faster.

Stronger.

And possessed ranged attacks.

But it was afraid.

Gene underlined something.

Opponent psychology are more important than raw statistics.

Frostfang blasted freezing mist.

Ice spread across the Caretaker’s mask.

He did not stop.

He stepped forward.

Gene’s eyes narrowed.

“Hey!! Don’t just charge in blindly you idiot, you have other skills you could use.”

Skills… I Have Skills…

The Caretaker stopped.

For half a second, he remained motionless.

He turned his head to look over at me. 

“Why do I sense that you forgot that you aren’t just a supernatural killer anymore.”

The Caretaker rubbed the back of his neck as he avoided eye contact with Gene.

The arena lights flickered.

For the briefest instant, his reflection appeared in the crystal screens at impossible angles.

Some screens showed him standing behind unsuspecting spectators.

Others showed him looming in darkened corners.

Gasps spread through the audience.

Then the arena lights went out.

Actually it was more than just the arena lights.

It was as if reality decided to blink.

Complete and total darkness.

The crowd cried out.

And vision returned although the arena lights were still off.

Amelia spun in the darkness and pointed at the Caretaker standing in the middle of the arena.

“Frostfang! Hurry up and attack him. I don’t like how he is just standing there…. Menacingly.”

The wolf growled.

A flash of glowing silver shot forward.

The lights returned.

The Caretaker was gone.

In his place stood the ice wolf inside of a fresh deep crater. 

Frostfang let out a burst of cold that froze the surrounding area. 

Amelia stared out at the battlefield.

“Where is he?”

A mirror-like patch of ice behind Frostfang shimmered.

The Caretaker stepped out of the reflection.

Gene’s eyes widened.

He immediately wrote:

Potential shown for autonomous use of environmental effects.

The Caretaker directly drove his shoulder into the wolf’s flank.

The massive beast crashed violently to the ground.

The crowd fell silent.

Gene heard one spectator whisper:

“Impossible.”

Frostfang scrambled back upright.

The Caretaker approached.

He pulled out his gleaming knife.

Gene watched the wolf’s movements.

Then he noticed something.

Its back leg was shaking.

Not from injury.

Fear.

Gene wrote:

Enemy morale seems to deteriorate as the battle commences. Caretaker seems to react and adapt to situations. 

Frostfang unleashed another freezing blast.

The Caretaker walked directly through it.

The knife came down and struck the wolf in its eye.

Frostfang howled as it tried to flee.

Amelia’s hands trembled.

“Frostfang get out of there now!”

But the command went through deaf ears.

The wolf’s eye was pierced through as the knife came crashing down.

The sharp sound of a crack rang out as the knife imbedded itself through the wolf’s upper jaw.

The wolf roared and managed to pull its face free from the knife as it finally managed to retreat. 

The Caretaker quickly slashed again as the wolf retreated, slicing it on its under side.

The wolf’s blood poured out of the wolf. 

Gene continued writing.

Caretaker attacks become more effective once Pressure Aura establishes psychological dominance.

⸻

“Stand your ground! You can do it!” Amelia shouted again.

Frostfang gathered power around itself.

A storm of snow and ice swirled around the wolf, obscuring the battlefield.

Gene narrowed his eyes.

He could no longer see the Caretaker.

The audience leaned forward.

Amelia smiled.

Hope returned to her expression.

“Now!”

The storm intensified.

Gene wrote:

Opponent attempting battlefield concealment.

He stopped.

Something was wrong.

The Caretaker wasn’t moving randomly.

Gene could hear his footsteps.

One.

Two.

Three.

Then silence.

Gene looked at the stands and Selene suddenly understood.

“He isn’t hiding.”

Selene leaned forward from the spectator section.

Gene smiled.

“He’s waiting.”

The storm parted.

The Caretaker emerged from the blizzard like a figure stepping through fog.

His coat was shredded.

His mask was cracked.

Ice covered portions of his body.

Yet he continued to walk in a non hurried manner.

Almost as if he were taking a stroll in the park. 

A collective shudder of unease passed through the arena.

Even the announcer had fallen silent.

The Caretaker tilted his head to look at the shivering wolf.

Frostfang whimpered.

The crowd noticed.

The once majestic frost wolf took a step backward.

Its foot cracking on the now frozen puddle of its own blood.

Whimpering, the wolf looked backward worryingly at its summoner.

Fear was contagious.

Gene quickly wrote:

Key mechanic: Pressure Aura + endurance creates psychological collapse.

The secret skill: Grim Reality is working as intended.

He underlined it.

Then he closed the notebook.

“Alright! Now I know more about your defensive  abilities.”

He motioned towards the Caretaker.

“Thanks for the information buddy! With this we can level up the right way. Caretaker you can end it however you want to now!”

People seemed to forget that Gene wasn’t a normal summoner.

He was the Summoner of Nightmares.

There was absolutely no way his summons were that weak.

Before the match, Gene told the Caretaker that since it was a semi immortal being, they could test how durable he was. 

Gene allowed the Caretaker to fight only using one half of his abilities.

Last night, Gene discovered something as he read what was technically a tutorial book for summoners. 

It stated that some summoners have hidden stats unique to their main ability.

For the first time he realized he could scroll the screen.

“Oop looks like there’s more to discover about this thing.”, Gene rubbed his chin.

He found a small right facing arrow on the bottom of the screen.

Pressing it caused the screen to shudder and turn red. 

Hidden Screen

Warning: 

This also contains your hidden stash

Only you can see this screen.

Any passive abilities can be placed inside.

Current hidden skills: 3

[_] Grim Reality 

[_] Speed of Myers

[X] Late Bloomer—>

Sorry we forgot to summon you earlier! 

4x Extra points

4x gold 

(Locked) 2 Legendary Growing Summons

5x Free Companion slots 

“Well, it wouldn’t be an isekai without giving hacked abilities right!”

Gene realized that had a secret weapon.

Gene laughed and immediately choked on a stray sunflower kernel shrapnel that he thought he chewed enough. 

As he violently started to choke he knew that this menu would be his salvation. 

He grabbed his throat and ran to his bedroom door. 

He turned the handle only to feel the lock in place that he had added as extra protection.

It was voice activated. 

He looked around to see that the buildings master key was on the desk. 

He grabbed the key as he told himself that he needed to put a key copy into his hidden stash. 

He stumbled over his shoe and fell face first into the door. 

Ignoring the pain he quickly unlocked the door. 

That’s when he remembered his room was on the top floor. 

With a ding Gene slowly rode the elevator downwards. 

The elevator music played whimsically as he continued to lose seconds on his till death meter that had been added to his status screen. 

Finally reaching the first floor he saw that his summons were waiting for him. 

“I told you that master was going to make it all the way down the elevator.”

“Don’t worry I’ll let you use my composite station, but first, we need to save him from dying.”

“Did you forget that with us here he couldn’t die even if he wanted to!”

The couple approached quickly to help clear Gene’s throat. 

Back to the present Gene clutched the master key in his top pocket.

When using,Grim Reality, his effect on the immediate surroundings around him and his summons were effected.

Normal summons of this world seemed to posses a more fantastical sense of reality.

Things like blood, gore, torture, and sex were almost certainly censored. 

He learned, with shock, that pleasuring himself could only occur when his parts were covered.

He found that he couldn’t even remove his underwear.

Most summons turned into pixels, or faded out of existence after they died.

They dropped their ‘loot’ in neat piles.

In front of Gene he could make a dead creature a corpse to dissect and had to gather resources by actually processing it

The couple reveled in the experiments once they realized what they could do with the Grim Reality activated.

Blood, gore, limb damage; the type of battling was almost if not completely unknown to this world. 

Gene had technically been summoned on ultra hard mode.

The only problem was that he had been living like that all his life. 

The only difference was that he didn’t need to eat ,drink, or use the bathroom. 

The Caretaker wiped his knife across his chest , leaving a trail of  blood and half of the wolf’s cornea.

Even with a mask on, the Caretaker seemed to smile.

The Caretaker surged forward.

For the first time, he moved on actual purpose.

He no longer had to hold back.

His burst of speed was so sudden that Amelia could only gasp.

He looked as if he were a glitch as he shot forward towards the wolf. 

Each step he made had him move equally to twenty steps. 

He flashed to the side of the wolf and struck quickly at its side.

The knife flashed red.

Frostfang tried to retreat.

But it was now too late.

The Caretaker shoved his hand through the sliced open wound on the side of the wolf.

He grab onto the wolf’s hanging ribs cracking and splintering several of them.

Blood squirted out as he crushed more ribs and viscera in his hand as he got a good grip on the wolf.

The Caretaker drove his knife deep into the wolf’s neck. 

The wolf finally had time to cry out. 

The arena paused in shock.

The Caretaker lifted the wolf and slammed it roughly into the arena shield.

Frostfang struggled.

The Caretaker struck it again.

The magical barrier flashed.

Again.

Then again.

Gene watched silently.

There was no hesitation in the Caretaker now.

No wasted motion.

No anger.

Just execution of a decision.

Gene immediately opened his notebook again.

He wrote:

Combat behavior resembles adaptive algorithm.

The Caretaker pulled his hand out of the wolf sill holding on to it’s obliterated insides.

He chucked the wolf off of his knife and onto the floor. 

Gene tapped his pen on his tablet, then he wrote:

Possible future upgrades:

1. Better armor.

2. Fire resistance.

3. Elemental resistance.

4. Improved ranged options.

5. Environmental awareness.

6. Disarm priority.

7. Target analysis.

8. Combat memory….

Frostfang attempted one final biting attack.

The Caretaker moved.

The wolf’s attack missed.

The Caretaker delivered one final decisive blow. 

A hard kick onto the back of the wolf’s head.

The wolf’s mouth split horizontally as the head  was crushed into the ground. 

Its skull fractured and cracked before completely collapsing. 

Gray matter sprayed onto his boots.

Frostfang’s body spasmed violently for a few seconds 

Frostfang went still.

Silver particles began rising from its body.

The arena became silent.

Then the announcer spoke.

“Summon… defeated.”

The silver particles vanished.

Amelia stared at the empty battlefield.

Her summon was gone.

Not unconscious.

Not waiting in reserve.

Dead and Gone.

Gene slowly lowered his notebook.

The reality of the tournament’s rules settled over him.

This was not an arena where defeated monsters simply disappeared until the next round.

Some of these creatures would never return.

The referee raised his hand.

“Victory—Gene Gingerline!”

⸻

Silence, Then Thunder

For one heartbeat, the arena was utterly silent.

Then the crowd exploded.

Not with polite applause.

With genuine astonished uproar.

Spectators leapt to their feet.

Some cheered.

Some shouted in disbelief.

Others looked unsettled, as though they were applauding something they hoped never to meet in a dark hallway.

Gene exhaled shakily.

He had done it.

The Caretaker returned to his side.

Bloodied.

Damaged.

But standing.

Gene placed a hand on his summon’s arm.

“Nicely done.”

The emotional link pulsed with quiet satisfaction.

Across the arena, Amelia lowered her head respectfully.

Gene returned the gesture.

Then he looked toward the stands.

Selene was on her feet, cheering with both hands in the air.

Her smile was radiant.

Moira stood beside her, composed as ever, but Gene caught the subtle nod she offered him.

In the noble section, Prince Cassian watched with narrowed eyes.

His expression suggested that, for the first time, he was taking Gene seriously.

Gene smiled.

Good.

⸻

The First Lesson

Back inside the contestant hall, Gene sat on a bench.

The Caretaker stood nearby.

Gene’s notebook was open across his knees.

He stared at the pages.

The first fight had already changed his understanding of the Caretaker.

He had assumed the creature’s greatest strength was physical.

He had been wrong.

Gene wrote:

Caretaker Combat Assessment — Round One

Strength: Extremely High

Durability: Extremely High

Speed: Moderate, but capable of sudden bursts

Fear effect: Significant

Weapon skill: High

Adaptability: Unknown

Environmental interaction: Promising

Elemental resistance: Needs improvement

Then Gene added:

Primary weakness: insufficient specialized weapon.

He stared at that sentence.

Then smiled.

“You’re not finished.”

The Caretaker tilted his head.

Gene turned the page.

To Do list

Future Combat System

Passive Skills

— Pressure Aura

— Fear Resistance

— Pain Suppression

— Threat Detection

Active Skills

— Shadow Step

— Environmental Manipulation

— Grapple

— Disarm

— Counterattack

Gene paused.

Then wrote:

Adaptive Combat AI

He looked at the Caretaker.

“If you can learn from every battle, then every opponent we fight makes you stronger.”

The Caretaker remained silent.

But his head tilted slightly.

Almost as if he understood