“Jesus. What happened?” I asked, eyebrows raising.
Silas glanced up, going back to reading for a moment. A few seconds passed, and he reached out, setting the book face-down on the stand next to him.
“After you collapsed in a puddle of your own blood, Valentine de Notos appeared personally to try and retrieve you. I managed to hold him off for a long time with Jerald and the President’s help. When he realized he wouldn’t win before you killed yourself healing others, he and his army of undead retreated,” Silas explained.
Well that’s not what I asked. Good to know, I guess.
I nodded, ignoring everything he said, “Okay, interesting, but I meant the injury. Were you crushed?”
“… Yes.”
“Oh! Okay. So, uh…” I slowly explained everything I knew about the human body again, repeating a lot of facts I’d told others, “Nocta! Can you come over here and assist? Anyone who still has magic come here.”
“Won’t our magic conflict in his body?” Someone asked.
My eyebrows screwed up. Where did that idea come from? Did magic typically do that? That was weird.
“What? No. Just only think of what I taught you about the human body, and disregard anything you were taught before. So long as he’s purely human, it should work out just fine.”
Surgeons’ tools didn’t conflict during surgery, though. I was certain magic—just another tool—wouldn’t conflict so long as the people didn’t.
“I am fully human,” Silas confirmed.
“Great! Is everyone ready?”
I stared at the nine people standing around, willing to help. Okay, this was a pretty big healing event. To make it easier for no potential conflicts, and to make it easier on their minds and magic, I would separate them. Have each group focus on one individual area.
“You, you, and you,” I gestured at three people, “Focus on keeping his heart beating and his lungs breathing. You, you, and you,” I gestured at three others, “Heal his skeletal structure. Nocta will focus on healing the blood vessels and the last two need to focus on healing muscles, sinew, and everything else I told you guys about. You three, just focus on healing the heart and lungs and letting them do its thing, don’t try using your magic to force it to beat or anything. He will definitely scream and probably thrash around, though he needs to try and not do that. Just ignore that. Take a step back if you think you’ll get hit.”
Everyone nodded, looking determined. Soon, Nocta started healing him, everyone following suit. As I expected, Silas screamed. His limbs thrashed as magic kept him alive and breathing.
Slowly, person after person tapped out, their magic drained. I tapped someone who looked the least tired next to Nocta, seeing them glance over, “Shift your magic to keeping his heart and lungs functioning.”
Nodding, he did as asked just in time, the last of the ones doing that tapping out.
Soon, Silas calmed down. Tears streamed down his face still, and he was gasping for air. Blood ran down his chin from where he’d bitten his tongue off.
“The moment you feel comfortable doing so, help the others heal you, Silas,” I called.
Silas closed his eyes for a moment in agreement, looking up at the ceiling. He breathed, recovering. His eyes were bloodshot, tears running down his face as he looked up.
More and more individuals dropped out as their magic ran dry. Soon, his own magic joined theirs. After a long moment, he spoke shifting his limbs around.
“I’m healed.” Silas’s voice was relieved.
Nocta and the person I’d told to keep his heart and lungs going stopped, both soaked in sweat and gasping for air. They were the last two still healing him.
“Ayyy! Everyone’s mostly healed!” I cheered, one arm punching up into the air.
The action caused me to choke. I coughed violently. The coughing wasn’t stopping. Would I die again? I fell to my hands and knees as I choked. Air wasn’t forthcoming.
Fuck. I didn’t want to prove Valentine right.
I was fine!
…
The coughing didn’t magically stop at my insistence. Annoyance filled me.
I was FINE!
“Everyone except you,” Nocta said irately, interrupting my attempt to stop coughing.
I continued dying, holding up a hand for him to wait to scold me. Several long moments later, I dragged myself to my feet using the bed Silas had been on, gasping for air. Shit, man.
“I’m fine,” I dismissed, hands on my knees, head hanging down, “I’m the reason everyone was injured in the first place. It only makes sense I should be healed last. Besides, I was injured before. I just aggravated my already there injury, I didn’t actually get injured.”
At least I don’t think so.
“Professor Silas,” Pelias said as he walked up, “Is it true she swore on her magic that she had nothing to do with Persephone’s death? That she had no intentions to become or replace Persephone?”
“I can make the same oath again, if you’d like, Pelias,” I gasped out.
“There’s no need for that,” Silas sighed out, “Yes. Fiona Lily Martin swore she had nothing to do with her placement in Persephone Esmer-Gold’s body. She did so after I tried killing her.”
Why did he have to add that last part?
“Fiona Martin,” I corrected.
“Pardon?”
“My given name is Fiona and my family name is Martin. This world doesn’t use middle names like my world does,” I explained, staring at the stone brick ground of the infirmary.
“World?” Mercury asked.
“Yeah, sorry, realm,” I corrected myself, “I come from the mundane realm. This is the magic realm. The world I come from has a bit of knowledge about this one, but not much. I know about various prominent people. That’s about it, though.”
“So you’re realm-fallen. Were you a princess in your last world? You act like one, and you were extremely used to extravagant things, for having never experienced them,” Pelias wondered.
I chuckled, standing straight after a moment. I met Pelias’s eyes.
“My country fought in a war to get rid of their king. We created our own form of government. Not like Life’s, though. Princesses didn’t exist in my country. I would say I was in the top 10% of the world, when it came to wealth.”
America was an extremely wealthy country. Being in the top 10% of 8 billion was a pretty good guess for where I laid on the scale. What was that, in the top 800 million richest people? Sounded about right for me.
“Percent? What is that?” Someone else asked. I glanced up, seeing it was the student with the impressive amount of magic.
“Oh, it means… 10 out of 100,” I explained, “So 1% would be 1 for every 100 people there were. But like multiplied by the global population. Like 1% of 1000 is 10. 2% of 20 is 1. Stuff like that.”
“I see…” The student said, eyes unfocused as he thought about what I said.
“Yeah. So I lived a wealthy life above a great majority of the population. With how many conveniences and lifestyle improvements my world made, living the life of a princess here is kind of a downgrade to living the life I had there. The food is much better, though,” I explained, looking at Pelias, “Not tasting. Food in my world tastes way better due to this thing called MSG—uh, anyway. I meant the food here is, like, healthy.”
Pelias stared at me for a long time. Then he nodded.
“Good. I would have hated it if it were a peasant who stole my sister’s body.”
I pulled my lips into my mouth as I watched him turn stiffly on his heel and stalk away. I sighed.
“A downgrade?” Nocta asked curiously.
I nodded as I stared after Pelias. Mercury was waiting for him by the door, and they left together.
“Yeah,” I agreed, “This world has jack shit and fuck all. The toilets suck, the hygiene is fucking horrible, even nobility is in danger from literally anything, the education levels suck, and the methods of transport are shit. Even the clothing is much worse, and the world seems wholly unexplored. That’s okay, though,” I turned to look at Nocta, eyes slightly unfocused, “This world has magic, and living in a world where everything is easy sucks ass, because revolution and wars against whoever is the bigger mass of people are practically impossible to win. Here skill matters, but there the only thing that matters is numbers, so no one has any real importance.”
My world was just the endgame of a society. Everything had been conquered, we got all of the achievements we could get on Earth except for deep ocean exploration and eliminating greedy assholes, so there wasn’t much more to do.
It felt like everyone was just a cog in the machine, there to continue the current path, no one there to continue advancing society beyond the point we were at. Everything was slowly being made easier and easier, less jobs being created as more were taken over by our own inventions.
The moment farming was automated, we’d have to hard-pivot to a non-capitalistic society quickly or all the jobs outside of serving others, transporting goods, fixing stuff, and entertaining the masses would be gone. That was practically every job already minus farming, space facilities, and continuing to make the hardships in life more and more convenient and easy to get over.
Or, well. I blinked out of my doom and gloom thoughts. I didn’t have to worry about that. I was now here, where I could hide away in a forest somewhere and never have to pay for stuff like property taxes or water bills.
“Sounds miserable,” Nocta realized.
“Sounds great,” A student disagreed, “Everything is easy? Sign me up to live there.”
I hummed, tilting my head, “Every day to day action is easy,” I corrected, looking up at the student. I explained basic stuff to the student, as well as what my world was like.
Nocta cackled, ending my explanation. The student that looked like he longed to go to the mundane realm looked a lot less wanting.
“Welp, that sounds about right. Glad I’m not there. Anyway, everyone needs to get back to their dorm rooms now until further notice. Fiona, Silas and I gotta go meet up with the other professors. We weren’t told what to do with you, yet. Wanna come with?”
“Sure,” I agreed, glancing at the sleeping individuals who’d run out of magic.
My first day at the Academy seemed to be going well. I accidentally removed everyone’s schedule for the day and replaced it with a lethal game of protect the princess, and also happened to get a professor fired.
Great.
Maybe meeting Doom Herald here when previously there was no mention of him being a chancellor should have made me wary.
Well.
Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel.
Nah. No way would just meeting him be considered foreshadowing, right? I planned to be around him a lot. Surely he wasn’t actually a walking sign of things to come.
I coughed, distracted from my thoughts as blood came out of my mouth. Glancing around, I picked up an unused string of bandages and put it to my mouth, covering it as I tried dying a little quieter.
Jesus. Did I always have to play the part of a weak bitch? I was never the damsel in distress sort, don’t make me one now, body dearest.
Nocta and Silas were already walking toward the exit. I hurried to follow them.
The room we walked into was quiet. No one had been speaking. More professors were there, the room pretty packed. The tired—the immortal fallen angel, Raphael—had stolen my corner spot.
Unluckily for him, there seemed to be an open space directly next to him on the wall, and no other wall space full of people I wanted to be near. Like sure, Lockheed, Silas, and Uran had spaces open next to them where they stood, but all of them hated me. And Nocta was standing not against the wall.
So yeah. Tired professor it was.
Raphael glanced at me as I carefully leaned against the wall next to him. He’d lost his ability to read minds casually, but he was still able to through touch and dedicated prayer, right? I thought too much to want someone reading my thoughts.
My shoulders shook as I coughed. I was trying to be as quiet as I could, but in the silence it sounded really loud.
“The burden is playing up her injury, I see,” A chocolate man with thick forearms and muscles everywhere said.
Another man with a pale thin face and black greasy hair scoffed, nasally voice demeaning as he glared at me, “I would have voted to sacrifice her. The casualties were too great to be wasted on a body-snatching first year.”
I remained quiet, continuing to try and suppress my coughing.
“She’s realm-fallen, not a body-snatcher,” Silas corrected coldly.
Raphael reached out, hand resting on my shoulder. A light warmth infused me. I wiped at my mouth.
“Thank you,” I said quietly, looking up at the everywhere angel.
Raphael nodded, looking even more tired, “Sorry I can’t do more.”
My shoulders shook with mirth. Sorry I can’t do more, says the guy who did more than anyone else had been able to. What he did was more than enough. What a great guy.
I looked back to the room at large, finally able to remove the cloth from my face, wiping the blood from my lips.
Breathing again was beautiful, and wonderful, and amazing. I owed this guy my every breath spent cursing these assholes out.
“Kmf—“ Raphael’s hand left as he covered his mouth. He feigned coughing for a moment.
Oh, right. He heard that.
I cleared my throat awkwardly, “Sorry, professors. I don’t know your names.”
“Tch, I’m Professor Avatrez,” The one with lanky black hair and the thin pale face said.
“I’m Professor Jon,” The muscle-heavy professor introduced, leaning back in his chair.
“Okay,” I agreed.
I doubted what they said was the worst of the comments I’d get, so I didn’t say anything. I just stared at them. Why were they sitting down but the ones who just got back from being injured were forced to remain standing?
After a long moment, the Lich appeared in the room. With him was Story, my shirt still being used as a blindfold.
The old man with twinkling eyes and a long white beard sat down, Story standing faithfully behind him.
“Excellent, everyone is here. How many casualties?” The Lich asked wearily.
The room was silent. I shifted awkwardly. The Lich’s gaze flicked to several people, none of them seeming to have an answer.
“How many deaths?” The Lich asked.
Silas shifted, speaking up, “None.”
“How many people in the infirmary?” He continued, eyes focusing on Silas.
“The six healers as well as three other students are resting, however none need to be attended to, as it is just magical exhaustion,” Silas mentioned.
The Lich hesitated, leaning back, “What? No deaths, no casualties?”
“None,” Silas confirmed.
“What?” Avatrez asked, eyes widening.
“Ya,” Nocta said, voice having a dangerous edge to it as he stared at Jon and Avatrez, “Our resident realm-fallen burden healed them all.”
I shifted, expression twisting. I didn’t heal them all. They mostly healed themselves, I just taught them how. I didn’t have nearly enough magic to heal anyone.
“Fiona,” The Lich said after a long moment, purple gaze turning to me, “Why don’t you explain what happened?”
I hummed, “Starting where?”
“From when you finished healing Nocta of his ailments,” The Lich said, “When we last saw each other.”
I nodded, “Oh, okay. I followed Nocta to the water-front—“
“I told you to stay away from the front-lines,” The Lich immediately scolded.
I hesitated, “Uh, yeah, anyway, I—“
Jon scoffed, “We were getting our asses killed and you weren’t even able—“
“Oh shut the fuck up Jon,” I snapped, giving him an irritated look, “The only people here who had injuries that almost killed them before I could heal them was Nocta, Silas, and me. Nocta’s heart stopped for a few seconds. I had to give him CPR. Where the fuck were your injuries?”
Jon glowered, standing up, hands planted on the table. His voice was a roar, “You will respect me!”
“I’ll fucking respect those who deserve to be respected!” I yelled back, “Oh! Speaking of, Silas, Nocta, Indigo, Dawn, and Lockheed are all people who just came from the infirmary with serious injuries! Why the fuck are you sitting when the exhausted and only recently healed are forced to stand?”
Immediately several people hurriedly stood up, some looking ashamed as they gave the ones I listed a seat. Lockheed slumped into a seat, relieved. Nocta did so as well. Jerald shifted, standing and giving his chair to Silas.
After a moment of shuffling, Jon dumb with fury, the Lich spoke.
“Continue your report, Fiona,” He requested.
I stared at the old man, his fingers interlaced and holding up his chin.
“Yes, of course. Because you vanished, I didn’t know where to go, or what to do. So I followed Nocta. I apologize for going against your orders, I didn’t know,” I shrugged.
Jon scoffed. Before he could speak, the President glared at him. Story hissed at the same time. Jon looked ashamed, sinking into his seat.
“So the waterfront had me and other students, as well as Indigo and Nocta. We fought off the skeletons, but I was running out of mana—“
“Magic,” The Lich corrected.
“Er, right, magic. Anyway, due to my injury, I couldn’t keep going even with one of the man—the magic regen potions. Or whatever they are. So I hard pivoted to healing people after trying to clear the waters of skeletons via lightning. Eventually, I collapsed for a bit, and the skeletons hoarded up. Nocta and Indigo told us students to retreat, someone carrying me to the area Silas was fighting at.”
I shifted awkwardly, thinking. What happened next?
“Then Lazarus tried healing me, but I refused him, telling him to heal others. I eventually managed to make it to my feet after drinking more of the potion, and started healing people, I think? Or, wait, no, I heard the sound of explosions, and I looked around to find Indigo.”
I corrected myself, glancing around awkwardly.
“Not seeing Nocta, I looked around until I saw his body on the ground. The skeletons were sprinting toward the walls, and I saw I’d probably make it faster than the skeletons did. I ran to get Nocta—“
“That was a dumb move,” Silas interrupted.
I laughed incredulously, baring my teeth at him.
“Where I come from, there’s a simple, easy term. No man left behind,” I snapped out, glaring at Silas, “It’s something I will forever follow in my heart, because I’m not a fucking bastard. Nocta would be fucking dead if I didn’t. He already almost was. His heart wasn’t beating, and he wasn’t breathing.”
The room went into an uproar, “Necromancy!”
“Kill her!”
“Get him!”
“SILENCE!” Herald ordered, looking at me, “Explain, Fiona.”
I hesitated, sighing heavily, “So how the human body works—“
“We know how the human body works,” Avatrez sneered.
I stared at Avatrez for a long moment, “Are you done? Not just Avatrez, but everyone. Are you done? I’m not wasting my breath on you guys. I’ll happily walk out of this room and explain everything to the President where none of you can hear or interrupt.”
I looked around. Various professors stared at me, some in clean uniforms and others still covered in blood with skin showing through various cuts and tears in their blue blazers and white pants.
The room was full of about thirty or forty people, maybe more. I looked everyone in their rainbow plethora of eyes.
Herald hummed, gaining my attention, “If anyone interrupts you, I’ll personally silence them, and they will have their pay docked.”
I nodded, “Okay, cool. So how the human body works, is that the brain controls everything. Everything. So until the brain itself is destroyed or otherwise dies, a human is not considered dead. This takes, oh, about three minutes? I didn’t have much time. So I gave him CPR. That’s chest compressions and mouth-to-mouth.”
Several professors shifted awkwardly, many having their faces twisted up.
I sighed, “As in I pushed air into his lungs using mine through the only way I was taught, and chest compressions manually beat the heart. To stay alive, the brain needs blood to deliver it oxygen. I was giving myself more time to heal him. As I did that, I used magic to heal him. I kept up the CPR until his heart and lungs worked on their own. Then I healed him, and used his cane—”
“He allowed you to use his cane?”
“Are you going to silence yourself as well, Doom Herald?” I asked dryly.
Herald’s face twisted, but he went silent.
“I used his cane to get around, because I couldn’t stand on my own. I managed just fine for a bit, but eventually I stopped being able to move. I don’t know what happened after that.”
“Ope! I can take it from here,” Nocta offered, raising his hand.
The Lich nodded, “Go ahead.”
“After that, she asked the student she just healed to bring the injured to her.”
Someone scoffed. I looked at them. They were old, with gray hair around a big bald dome and pale blue eyes.
Uran spoke, eyes focused on me, “Making the injured come to you just because you were a bit too tired to stand?”
“Yeah, it wasn’t ideal,” I agreed, shrugging, “Maybe I should have had them take me to the injur—“
Crash!
I flinched. Silas’ chair slammed to the ground. Everyone turned, looking at Silas after he stood up abruptly. His silver eyes were fierce, his expression mostly stoic, though it was obvious his jaw was clenched.
“If I may speak?” Silas interjected.
Nocta looked just as furious, nodding. His knuckles were white around his cane.
“Fiona could not move due to her soul injury.”
Someone I hadn’t seen before, a female professor with blond hair and lilac eyes, sighed, resting her head on delicately polished nails.
“Wasn’t that just an excuse to get out of having you proctor her exams, Silas? What a pathetic excuse,” The woman purred.
I shifted uneasily on my feet, frowning.
“Um… A-anyway, what happened next, Nocta?”
“It’s Professor Nocta,” The woman corrected, eyes focused on me, “Why don’t you tell us?”
I kept moving weight between my legs, uncomfortable, “Tell you what?”
“Tell us how “injured” you were, that you had to have someone bring the actually injured to you?”
“O-Oh, okay,” I agreed, hesitating, “Um, well, at that point I had lost a lot of blood—“
“You never mentioned being hit by the skeletons,” The woman drawled.
Her voice was light and airy, but casual. Like her every word was meant to seduce someone.
“I wasn’t,” I agreed, shifting again, “Um, I was throwing up blood that whole time. Like I started coughing when I first ran out of magic, then I started throwing up blood when I fell off the hill that Indigo and the other long-range defense was. When Lazarus healed me, I stopped throwing up, but I had still lost a lot. I used water to refill my blood, but it made me really dizzy, because, um, that’s not a very good thing to do. Like it thins the blood. So I stopped being able to stand because I’d lost too much blood and thinned what I had left so I wouldn’t, you know, run out.”
The woman hummed, not sounding like she believed me, “You said you “hard pivoted” to healing.”
I nodded, “Yeah. After I fell, I didn’t have any magic left, so I guided someone else’s magic. Until I couldn’t move. Then Lazarus healed me a bit and gave me a mana potion, so I could move again.”
Then I hesitated, sighing, “Do-do you guys want like a play-by-play of everything that happened? Because that’s a lot of work for a report that should already be finished. We defended the lake. We had to retreat. We defended the wall. I healed people. Then it was over. I woke up in the infirmary. Then I healed more people. Or, well, I didn’t actually heal them. Nocta said I couldn’t, so I instead started dressing their wounds, but then I realized I could just teach them how to heal themselves, so I did.”
The woman made a derisive noise, “First making the injured come to you, and then forcing them to heal themselves when they had no prior healing experience?”
“Well I taught them how, and gave them detailed instructions. Everyone seemed fine. No one gave themselves an embolism or clot or anything.”
“An embolism?” Raphael asked curiously from next to me.
I glanced up, “Oh, yeah. Like, um, adding stuff to the blood stream that shouldn’t be there.”
“Can I see what happened?” Raphael asked. His hand reached up, hesitating before it touched my skin.
“Uhh—“
“Yes,” The woman agreed, grinning, “Show Raphael what happened. He can use illusion magic to show us.”
“Oh! Why didn’t you say that earlier?” I asked incredulously, shaking my head with a sigh, “Yeah, sure. Nocta, do you want to come over and show him the parts I missed?”
Nocta nodded, hopping off of his chair. Raphael’s fingers brushed against my cheek.
Jesus, what was the point of this repetitive and stupid meeting if someone who can literally show what happened was right there? Unless it hurt him or something, in which case that would suck and we shouldn’t do that, but—.
“Please begin thinking of your memories,” Raphael interrupted, “It does not hurt me to use my powers, unlike you.”
My face burned. Unlike me? That wasn’t a fair assessment. My powers don’t hurt to use.