43 – Hope and conflict

Lisette limped ahead, pale as snow, holding herself up with her two blades sliding on the ground. The sound they made when they grated against the stone floor was unbearable but Melina, behind her, paid it no mind. She dragged the stretcher as she moved like a mindless zombie, eyes staring ahead, fixated on the singular point of light that was the passageway leading to the 5th floor.

She checked herself, from time to time, listening to the faint sensations that came from a body that didn’t feel like hers anymore. She was bruised, bleeding, and her head felt itchy. When she scratched the itch, she would find hair and blood on her hands, so she did all she could to resist the itch and ignore it. Her feet were on fire. Her chest was cold like ice. The last meal she ate hadn’t agreed with her, as did the previous one, and the previous one, and…

She needed to vomit. She collapsed to the ground on her knees, and ahead of her she could faintly make out Lisette’s shape as a shadow against the light come to her air, putting a hand on her shoulder and keeping her from falling on the ground face first.

“Are you okay?” Lisette asked her when she got up.

Melina nodded. “We can keep going.”

Lisette smiled. It was strange, seeing her smile. “We are strong.” She paused, coughing. “We will make it.”

***

When Ishrin woke up, he found the two girls curled up in two corners of a makeshift shelter, sleeping an uneasy sleep. He cast a spell, which came easier to him that it should have, and saw their magic signatures and vital signs. Their auras were weak and small, with ripples of disruption spreading through their magic and destabilizing it. Their bodies were emaciated and pale, with large bruises and scars running across their arms and legs. Their heads were almost completely bald.

He took a deep breath. His mind thought about the radiation sickness victims he saw on Ober III during a visit to an underground research facility, about how much they suffered and how impotent the healers there had been until he finally managed to find a ritual to help them. By that time, however, it was too late. When he came out of his research room everyone was dead, even the scientists and the technicians. It turned out that another radiation leak from the reactor had melted the brains of everyone in the facility except for his own, for back then he was too powerful to be affected. He ended up learning a lot about the world that day, about the powerful and scary forces in motion in the universe and about how insignificant everyone was in the face of death. True, his power protected him, but the same couldn’t be said about the technicians or the general overseer of the base, so full of power and yet just as powerless as anyone else in the face of calamity. He discovered on that day that there was a hierarchy of power in the universe, true power as opposed to fake power. Albert had been able to pluck him out of his world with no effort, after all.

After that revelation came the ritual which he eventually named Touch from Afar, a misleading name that hinted at a mere power of telekinesis. It was much more than that, but some secrets were better kept close, and the misleading name had been part of the strategy. To think he had yapped all about it to Melina and Lisette, Ishrin almost felt embarrassment. But then he remembered that he was a reborn man, who had sworn to do things differently. He might not have said it out loud, but it was how he had been acting, and his new behavior had been the one thing keeping him alive this time.

Alone, he would have died. He looked around, finding no trace of his pixie. For a moment he wondered where she was, but then his gaze fell upon the unconscious bodies of his friends—the word tasted strange in his mouth—and he had to shift priorities for the time being.

He hoped that it was not too late to save the girls and immediately set to work. In the far corner of the room, he saw something twinkle and, struggling because his head hurt like it had been hit with a sledgehammer, he spotted there a tall stash of monster cores, neatly stacked and organized by tier, all the way up to a lone Tier 7 core that shone more powerfully than the others. His eyes lit up. Not wasting a single moment, he called for Liù and—

“Oh.”

With quick movements, he grabbed all the crystals and opened his inventory. He struggled a bit to make the window to his storage open properly but he forced it, and eventually it yielded, and he took out a bunch of ingredients in great hurry and began to draw. He placed the two unconscious bodies in the center of the ritual circle and began to perform, wasting no time, using all of the crystal cores without caring about wasting them. The girls were on the verge of death, and if he wanted to bring them back, he needed to spare no expenses.

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The ritual came to life in record time, and Ishrin was casting heals again and again, empowering his Tier 5 magic with the ritual he had just drawn. The essence of the cores was funneled and converted by the constructed spells, turned into coherent magic that suffused the two bodies on the ground. He guided the energies, lightly touching upon the damaged cells in the girls’ bodies, washing away the radiation, destroying the cancerous growths, purifying their auras, removing the toxins. It was work of several hours, but his concentration did not falter, and his body turned out to be a surprising ally—never demanding attention once he started focusing.

Had he paid attention, which was a lucky thing that he did not, he would have seen that he was no longer Tier 2. Not anymore weak in the flesh and in the mind, he was beyond that, but it had to wait until the ritual was over for him to find out the changes. When it happened, he spared such changes only a moment of thought, flexing his muscles and testing the capabilities of his once again expanded mind, and finding that they exceeded his best expectations for his step into the Tier 3 realm.

But he did not have much time to contemplate the changes, a contemplation that had only happened to distract himself from worrying about his companions, because a groan reached his ears.

“You have Tiered up,” a weak voice said.

Ishrin turned around with a smile. “So have you. Congratulations for your double breakthrough.”

Lisette pushed herself up. “I have you to thank for the insights. They were invaluable.”

Ishrin’s eyes glimmered with playful mirth. “Lots of words. Are you sure you’re okay? You don’t usually talk much.”

She glared at him. “Your Tier 3 feels strange. Your aura is too dense.”

“Changing topics? Well, you’re correct in that. I don’t know how she did, but when Liù sacrificed herself to save me, her energies started to mingle with mine. They reforged my body, bathing each and every cell in pure elemental light. Only possible due to the damage I had sustained, so I don’t recommend trying it. But the results?” He jumped in place, “miraculous.”

***

Melina slowly opened her eyes, struggling against her heavy eyelids that felt like they had been glued shut. A pang of hunger struck her, and the sweet scent of food tickled her nostrils. Her eyes took a moment to adapt to the light level of her surroundings, but soon the green and white and blue blotches that she saw became trees and clouds, and sky. Not far from her she saw Ishrin and Lisette cooking something over a campfire, sitting on two wooden logs and chatting among themselves.

She got up from the surprisingly comfortable bed she was resting in. Her steps were unsure, like those of a newborn animal only now learning how to walk, but with every step she regained her strength and balance, and by the time she reached the others she felt completely fine. Just very, very hungry. Ishrin greeted her with a warm smile and offered her a bowl of soup, which she gingerly accepted. Seeing that she was eyeing it with a hint of fear in her gaze, Ishrin chuckled. She felt something inside of her, as if her own mind was reacting to his emotions.

“You should be able to keep it in your stomach, this time.” He said.

Beside him Lisette glared at her. Melina tried her best to ignore her.

“You saved us?” She said, half-asked, almost refusing to believe it. “I thought…”

Ishrin smiled. “Shhh… it’s fine. Eat.”

Melina grabbed a spoon and ate a small sip of soup. The flavor and heat immediately spread through her body, invigorating her and giving her strength.

“Where’s Liù?” She asked.

Ishrin frowned, and Melina felt her own heart break as if she was the one who lost her summon. Behind him she also saw Lisette give her a death stare.

“I think she’s gone.” Ishrin said. “I tried summoning her again, but I got no responses from the elemental plane of Light.”

“But—” Melina stopped eating, the soup all but forgotten. “She’s an elemental. She can’t die!”

Ishrin shook his head. “Lisette told me what happened. I think she sacrificed herself to heal me.”

Melina protested, refusing to accept the reality of the situation. She repeated herself many times, but each time her voice was weaker than the last, and the solid thread that sustained her words unspooled like it was dissolving in acid. In the end, she was muttering. “Maybe she went somewhere. Lisette, didn’t you see her light go somewhere after she healed him? I am sure I did!”

Lisette’s face was stone. “Melina, please stop.”

“I’m serious!” Had her voice not been barely a whisper, she would have yelled. “Ishrin, she is still out there. She is still out there!” She broke down in tears, all her the anger in her voice dissipating like an illusion and leaving her a sobbing mess. “She is still out there,” she repeated in a small voice.

Ishrin closed his eyes. “Melina, please. Let’s put this behind us.”

“I’m sorry!” the girl cried. “I’m so sorry, Ishrin.”

“I know.” He said.

***

Although they knew it was probably not a good idea, nobody opposed him when Ishrin suggested they discreetly return to Noctis. They were tired, and even though they were not hungry thanks to his cooking, and they had tents to sleep in, no person in the party seemed to want to sleep one more night in the open than they needed to. Perhaps Noctis was going to be a bad idea, but at least it offered a sense of end to the current chapter of their adventure, after which they could consider what to do next. At least, walking towards Noctis—a trip that would take several hours—would allow them to sort their thoughts.

Melina and Lisette were under guild protection and had not, at least to their knowledge, done anything that would allow Syrma to lay a hand on them. Granted, he might rough them up a bit, but there were rules in place to avoid abuse. The same couldn’t be said for Ishrin, but he had no intention of even setting foot in Noctis, instead planning to change course and head for the forest once he was sure the girls were fine.