Jack coughed up blood as he stumbled over to Meredith, still chuckling to himself. He flopped to his stomach beside Ty. Arrow landed on the collapsed Spade and pecked the back of his head, receiving a muffled groan in response.

“Better luck next time?” Allen said, kicking Jack lightly in the side and laughing sarcastically.

Meredith stood over the heavily injured Ranger and shook her head, “Tsk tsk… men sometimes. I’m healing you last so that maybe you’ll learn your lesson.”

Jack groaned into the stone floor again.

The white robed woman was promptly joined by a stocky, muscular man holding a long gnarled staff of wood. He was dressed simply in a cloak colored in various shades of green and brown. His sturdy and rather hairy feet were bare, and his eyes were a piercing orange beneath his thick and disheveled shoulder length hair.

Name: Meredith Cambridge

Human – Healer – Level [hidden]

Name: Kläus

Fellman – Healer – Level 784

Kläus eyed Jack and shook his head. His lips pulled into a smile, showing pointed triangular teeth behind his beard.

Meredith turned to the beastman Healer and pointed down at Ty before gesturing vaguely at Allen. “You can heal Jerr’s guests,” she began, “I’ll start helping these poor children.”

Kläus nodded as Meredith hurried over to the rows of slaves, approaching the trembling Lucas first. The Fellman glanced down at Ty and smiled, causing the Defender to shuffle backwards just a bit.

“Um, I can help, if you need anything,” Amelia said, jogging after Meredith with a bright look in her eyes despite the blood covering most of her body.

The woman looked over Amelia once before smiling lightly. “Ah, that’s quite alright sweety, save you mana.” Her smile twisted as Amelia’s pleading eyes looked back at her from a face crusted over in blood. “Ah… Well, I can show you a few things, but I’ve removed tens of thousands of these damned thorns… Why don’t I clean you all up first,” she continued.

Magic surged around the healer followed by a powerful sphere of miasma expanding around her. Blood and grime alike were blasted away under a rather aggressive purifying light light.

“Much better,” Meredith said, turning back to Lucas with a soft smile.

Allen quickly switched his soiled clothes out after being cleansed. Even his bowels had been emptied in less than an instant. Healers that could purify were an absolute must in his opinion.

“Yo, what are you doing?” Ty started, squirming around on the floor with his stumps. He was looking up at the bestial Kläus as the Healer held out his offhand which began to glow with a deep red light. “I know what blood magic looks like,” the Defender continued accusatorily.

“Relax, he’s a blood Healer,” Allen said. “Don’t you have any of those in the Empire? Oh wait, they kill blood mages there, I forgot.”

Ty glared over at the Assassin, giving Kläus the moment he needed to extend a tendril of dark red blood from his wrist. The blood shot towards the Defender and split into three streams, each going for one of his stumps.

Ty whipped his head around and watched hesitantly as blood surrounded his three severed limbs while also flowing around his whole body in a thin web. All the bruises and scabbed over cuts on his body disappeared almost instantly while Ty sucked in a gulp of air. The blood around his stumps took the shape of his missing limbs before solidifying and revealing new muscle and skin below as the tendrils withdrew.

Ty flexed his regenerated limbs and nodded up at the Healer with a stony expression. He tentatively stood up and switched his demolished armor for simple linen clothes.

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“That was surprisingly potent blood healing,” Christopher muttered to himself. “It must have a Soul aspect component to it.”

The Healer turned to Allen and Camila and Christopher, focusing on the latter. “It is soul enhancing blood magic,” Kläus said in his raspy voice. The three tendrils quickly extended to the three and spread out into thin webbing again, covering their whole bodies. Allen breathed in as he felt the blood target specific spots, especially the partially healed wound in his chest. He felt his own heat and blood rush to those spots as they tingled while his flesh reformed at the guidance of Kläus’s Soul aspect blood magic.

It took the healer barely an instant to fully heal all three of them. He nodded curtly as his blood flowed back into his wrist, leaving nothing behind.

“Just stand still and bow your head a bit… yes just like that honey,” Meredith’s kind voice came to Allen’s ear. He turned to see the older woman standing with Amelia. Lucas was on his knees in front of her with his head inclined forwards.

Sparks of arcane magic came to Meredith’s fingertips as she raised her hand above Lucas’s head, causing the man to shiver. Then, within the span of a second, the Healer’s magic swarmed Lucas’s neck from every direction; the man’s head effortlessly floated off his shoulders while his neck unraveled into ribbons of Arcane and Life miasma. The thorn fell straight to the floor with a clank while Meredith caught Lucas’s head and pushed it back onto his shoulders while his neck reformed from the swirling miasma around him.

Lucas let out a whimper and grabbed his head, looking confused and sick in equal measure. Amelia’s eyes had gone wide as well, though she quickly composed herself.

Allen absently glanced down at the thorn between Lucas’s knees while Camila muttered a curse behind him. The part of the thorn that had been embedded in the former slave’s neck was a thin needle with backwards facing barbs along its length. Then there were half a dozen black strands that were meant to tap into the wearer’s nervous system.

Meredith smiled at Amelia and guided her to the first bound and unconscious slave. Christopher and the others, including the healed and redressed Ty, continued to watch as the process of dethorning continued.

However, Allen didn’t miss Christopher’s inquisitive, and perhaps somewhat uncomfortable, look as he wandered towards the group of Spades standing in a line in front of where the recruits were sparing with each other.

Allen had taken only a few steps before a sudden chill washed over him. He looked to his side and found a youthful woman in a thin, ice-blue gown approaching with Maráuh by her side. Her dress was simple, though the high-cut slits on either side were a bit much. Mobility, supposedly. The woman was someone Allen easily recognized as the feared Blizzard Witch and destroyer of the Anillis Kingdom. She was much much older than she appeared, and even more powerful than her level would suggest. Like some, Allen included, she chose to keep the number visible for the purpose of intimidation and dissuading conflict.

Name: Iana White

Human – Mage – Level 1374

“Oh my! Jerr, why do you look so young?” Iana said, cupping his cheek like somebody’s grandma. Although Iana at was old enough to be Allen’s great grandmother’s grandmother twice over.

“It’s a curse or something,” Allen said, shifting away from the witch’s frigid hands.

“A curse?” Iana laughed, her breath coming out in a fog. “Well maybe I should find this curse and bottle it for later.”

Allen hummed noncommittally as he walked over to the group of Spades. “If you can find a mystic two headed basilisk and not die like I did,” he murmured. “She could probably handle that thing, but she’ll end up disappointed when it doesn’t give her another ten years she doesn’t even need.”

“Ah, well maybe I can take a weekend off.”

Allen just huffed in response to her sarcasm. He stopped next to Shoam with the rest of the high ranking members. He suppressed a shiver as he set his eyes on the two pairs of dueling recruits and instantly picked his favorite.

They were all just over level one hundred, the minimum to even be considered for membership in pretty much any order. Only one of the four potential recruits stood out to Allen: A Rogue girl who floated on her feet with a relaxed expression and elegant movements. Her attacks and feints were very controlled and precise, if not a little predictable. Still, she showed not even a hint of the typical arrogance and anger that the others did.

“Hey Jerr,” someone said from the group of observers. Allen recognized her as Clara, the Spades’ best spy by just a narrow margin ahead of Jack and himself.

“Welcome back, it has been awhile.” The second smooth voice belonged to an old Smith named Chthollus, another elf and the only person Allen went to for armor and weapons when it mattered.

They all watched the recruits fight for a few minutes, none of them really gaining the upper hand. The girl Allen had been watching had good form as a Rogue, but not enough power to overcome the heavy DPS Warrior she was facing.

Amon, the older Mage clapped twice just when Allen was starting to feel bored. “Alright, you may stop,” he began. The recruits stopped, all of them sweating and roughed up a bit. “I think we should try something else,” Amon continued, getting murmurs of agreement from the other Spades, Allen included.

“How about a one on one,” Shoam suggested with an unsettling grin.

The group was silent for a few seconds. “Uh, we’ve been doing that already,” said yet another Spade Allen hadn’t seen around yet. His strong voice was unmistakable though, he was Glaedyr, Doc’s right hand man and a powerful Warrior on the level of Iana and Amon.

“Ah, I know that,” Shoam replied curtly, “but I was thinking that our dear friend Jerr might want to go at it for a round or four.”

To Allen’s discomfort, the Rogue elf’s suggestion had drawn a few chuckles from his friends and fellows in the Order. He groaned softly as the four recruits looked around in confusion.

“Oh boy. How about no.” He buried his face in his hands with a sigh.