"Are you going to let me in, or what?" Quinn asked as Lucas stood there dumbly for a moment.

The strain in the boy's voice finally pulled Lucas back to attention, and it was then that he noticed Quinn was indeed in need of healing, and this wasn't a social visit. There were many rips and tears in the boy's pants, and from their staining, it was clear that whatever caused them had gone deeper than just the apparel.

"What happened?!" Lucas practically dragged him inside.

"Rats," Quinn simply said, and that was all the explanation he gave.

Lucas moved on instead of seeking clarification. "Sit down over there," he gestured to the seat usually reserved for patients. "And if you have any hope of those pants being patched up later, then hike them up or something, otherwise I'll have to cut right through them."

As he spoke, Lucas was running around the room and grabbing everything necessary to clean the wounds. As he moved past the door that would give access to the rest of the house, he rapped on it three times to signal his mom. Lucas could tend to the wounds all he wished, but healing magic itself was not yet within his capabilities.

The sight of Quinn's pant-legs hiked up almost to his waist when he returned to his side would have been comical, except it gave Lucas clear view of the mess these 'rats' had caused. They wounds were not limited to bite marks, as someone might suspect. There were full, albeit shallow, lacerations spread out across Quinn's lower legs and reaching all thee way up to just past his knees. There wasn't any real danger at this point, but the mess forced Lucas to fight down a bit of panic nonetheless.

"Mom!" He called out as he got straight to cleaning the cuts, bites, and scratches. It was possible she hadn't heard his knocks, especially if she happened have stepped into her room before they rang out, but there was no chance of her missing his yelling. And from the scrambling he heard through the door a moment later, he was proven right.

Mary entered the clinic room at a speed only made possible by her inflated stats and was by his side in an instant. She made a quick analysis of her own and reached out to pulse her healing through Quinn. The boy visibly relaxed as his injuries started to close up before their eyes.

Lucas took note of the bites before the last of them could close up. Though they were shaped correctly for rat bites, their size was much larger. About four or five times as large, he guessed.

"Scared me there, Lu," his mom leaned back and sighed. "I thought someone was dying, from the way you yelled for me."

"Sorry, it was just a lot bloodier than most of what people come in here for." It was still quite bloody, actually. Though no more would spill out into the open now, Quinn would likely need to fully wash himself. Later, the seat would have to be cleaned as well, as it had inevitably garnered a few small stains.

"I'm not sorry," Quinn spoke up. "Thank you for rushing in, Miss Mary. I feel a lot better now."

Quinn tried to get up, but Lucas's mom gently pushed him back into the seat.

"Mind explaining what cut you up so badly?" Mary asked firmly.

"It was rats," he quickly repeated, "big ones."

Lucas's mom stared Quinn down without saying a word. For his part, Quinn maintained his composure under that stare. They all knew he wasn't telling the full truth and yet it didn't matter so long as his story didn't change. They could hardly force answers out of him. On there other hand, they also held some responsibility to find out just how Quinn received his injuries.

After an uncomfortably long time spent in silence, Lucas's mother decided how they would proceed for them.

"Ok." She relaxed both her stance and her stare. "Tomorrow morning, I want you to find a guard and tell them where these rats attacked you--they could pose a much greater danger to someone younger and weaker than you. Do you understand?"

The boy looked reluctant at first, but soon conceded an accepting nod. "I understand."

"Good. Head on home now and change your pants. Your parents might still be able to salvage them."

It seemed as if their involvement would end here, if not for the gesture Lucas's mom gave him after Quinn turned to leave. Lucas complied with her apparent intentions for him to go along as well, exiting the house just behind his occasional training partner.

Outside, the sun had already set, but several other village kids were waiting around for Quinn. A few made as if to come forward, but when they saw Lucas exit as well they not-so-subtly ran off. It was only then that Quinn noticed him.

"Why are you following me?" Quinn asked, his one borderline accusatory.

Lucas watched the other kids disappear down the unlit paths. Odds were, not all of them actually ran off and were instead lurking just out of sight. "I wanted to ask if you've made plans with Eugene yet," he eventually asked when his attention narrowed back to Quinn.

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His abrupt change in topic seemed to confuse the boy, and suddenly it was as if Quinn's obvious irritation at his presence had its legs kicked out from under it.

"I haven't yet," Quinn admitted. "I'm not sure he actually wants to train me anyway--he only really started with you because of him and your mom."

Lucas silently forgave the rude remark, taking it as a sign of the boy's insecurity on the issue. "Well, you definitely should. Eugene seemed to really like the idea last night. He was talking about making it a thing with the rest of the guards, where each of them could take on a kid to train or something."

"Really?" Quinn brightened up quite a bit at the revelation. "I'll go find him tomorrow, then. I gotta go home now though."

Lucas waved him off and watched as he went straight to his house. He stayed outside a few minutes after Quinn disappeared and watched the nearby paths a bit more. A few times, he may have heard movement from one direction or another, but it could have just as easily been the wind.

His mom was waiting in the front room when he eventually went back inside.

"Well?"

"There were some other kids waiting outside, but they ran off when I went out. Quinn and I talked for a minute, then he went right home," Lucas reported.

"Did you recognize any of the kids?" Mary asked.

"Sure, none that I really knew, but they were familiar enough." Lucas chose one of the chairs and sat down before continuing. "None of them were old enough to have unlocked, though one was close."

"Hmm, okay."

As he thought, there was no way they were going to just drop the issue of Quinn showing up at their door with his legs all torn up. Lucas sat in silence and let his mom think over what to do next. He didn't have to wait long, as she soon turned back to him.

"We'll cut the healing lessons short tomorrow. After we get done in the morning, I want you to go track him down and play around the village for a while--see if he meets up with those kids."

"What are you going to do?"

"I'll speak to Penelope, but it will be easier for you to find out what is going on than it would be for me. That's enough of that for now, though. Dinner will get cold if we wait any longer."

The two of them ended up getting an early night's rest shortly after that, the better to prepare for the sleuthing the next day would bring. As he was lying in bed, Lucas reviewed his leveling progress for the day.

[Lucas]

[Free Stats: 50]

[HP: 130/130]

[MP: 200/200]

[STR: 12]

[DEX: 15]

[VIT: 13]

[WIS: 20]

[INT: 18]

[Class: Child of Mana]

[Level: 10]

[Skills:

*

*

*

*

*

*

*

*

*

*

[General Skills:

* [Identify: 3]

* [Healing Arts: 5]

* [Basic Combat Training: 10]

* [Vigilance: 1]

* [Stealth: 1]

* [Cooking: 4]

* [Fitness: 10]

* [Learning: 9]

* [Regeneration: 5]

* [----------]

It was only eight levels total--a lot less than what he'd earned from Eugene's brutal training session, but that was only to be expected. Despite going at it for most of the day, Lucas hadn't needed to work nearly as hard today.

The singular level in [Identify] reinforced that the Skill would be the slowest of his to max out. Conversely, he'd already gotten halfway to the [Healing Arts]'s max. Transcribing his mother's tome was extremely effective for these initial levels, and he didn't see it taking much longer than one or two more days.

There was, of course, the level in [Cooking] Lucas had earned. He would probably work on that Skill at leisure till most of his others were maxed, then he'd make plans to spend a day helping out Belinda. The real highlight of his progress today was the additional two levels in [Learning]. At the Skill's current level, its boost was fairly negligible, but it still technically made all the others progress faster. It was almost maxed out, too.

Altogether, Lucas was not upset with his progress.

While looking over his General Skills, it really hit him how much of a distraction the rest of his status was at the moment. Until he was ready to evolve his Class, Lucas really didn't need to see the rest of it. With that in mind, he set his focus to the task of filtering out what the System showed him, flexing his mind the same way he summoned his status in the first place. For a moment, it seemed as if his focus caught on something and his experiment would work. Unfortunately, he made no further progress.

Hmm, so it should be possible to change what pops up, just not yet. Maybe it is tied to one of the magic stats.

He abandoned the whim for now, and probably till after he changed his Class as well. It might be worth it to ask his mom or an Elder if they could achieve this feat, as there was a chance it wasn't tied to any stat and he just hadn't found the trick. It was also possible that whatever stat needed to be unreasonably inflated. Thoughts for later.

Once Lucas was done, he closed his status and truly went to bed. Sleep took him a short while later.

----------------------------------------

The next morning started much as the last did--unfortunately without the level up in [Cooking]. Lucas chose one of the recipes he commonly enjoyed for breakfast to see if the Skill noticeably improved the dish's quality. It turned out well, but he couldn't tell if it was any better than usual in the end.

After that, it was back to the clinic for him and his mother. Though it was objectively a boring activity, they shared some tea and found ways to make it interesting. Nobody came in for healing before his mom decided it was time for Lucas to go track down Quinn.

"Just wait a few minutes before you leave," she told him, "I'll wrap up a couple sandwiches for you two to share around lunchtime."

"Ok, thank you," Lucas smiled and continued to copy down a few more sentences while she went into the other room. He'd made a lot of progress on the transcription already, but it was nothing compared to all the work that still lay before him. A little more time spent on the task wouldn't accomplish much, but it would add up in the end. Lucas fell back into the activity and lost all perception of time. It seemed as if only an instant later he was being handed a cloth-wrapped bundle and ushered out the door, when in reality it was probably around fifteen minutes later.

Outside, he took a deep inhale of the crisp late-morning air. The weather was nicer today, not overcast at all. A good day to investigate 'the mystery of the reckless children'. Now he just had to find out where to start.