The young looking nurse, probably a 12-year old helper or apprentice measures us with her eyes before answering.

"Alvus is at the workshop compounding some medicine. Is it important? I can call him if it is. Sorry, but who might you be?"

I tell her in a low voice, "I am the hero Beowulf and a friend of Alvus. Could you please let him know we are here?"

"The he-he-hero! Of course!" She blushes and goes to the back of the building.

I turn to the middle-schooler angel and ask, "Zahariel, did you sense it too?"

"Yes. There is an unusually great concentration of miasma in this people. It is like..." he pauses and whispers in my ear, "One of the curses from ancient times."

Just then Alvus comes from the back cleaning his hands on his apron. "Beowulf! How nice of you to come to visit, although the timing is bad. We got our hands full with this new malady..." He finally notices Helen. "Young lady! It is a boon to these tired eyes to see you alive and healthy. How many nights have I regretted what happened." Seeing an old man cry is not my thing. But his feelings are honest.

Helen lets go of my arm and embraces Alvus. "I am the one that must thank you. Your kindness saved me back then! Really, really you were the one that rescued me from that horrible place. I owe you my life, Alvus!"

Alvus is confused but he decides to accept Helen's feelings. I think he already knows that down-dosing the chytheria extract was what allowed Helen to use magic to escape prison.

I call out to them after a couple minutes of bonding, "Alvus, can we go to a more reserved place? I think we might be able to help with this situation."

"Come to my office, please. This way, hero Beowulf."

"Drop the title. It is not needed here, Master Apothecary Alvus. And by the way, sorry for burdening you with the mayor job."

"You did what was necessary to protect this community, and everyone here is thankful for it. Don't mind it. And anyway, now that the king's steward has arrived, I am free."

Zahariel, Helen and I we follow Alvus to his office and I take the lead. "What is this malady you speak of. There is something too strange about it. I can feel it."

"It happened at the end of fall. Some hunters came from the eastern woods with a report about a troll sighting. They collapsed a few days later, and soon after they died. But a few days later other people also fell ill and collapsed too. There are over a dozen dead and this many sick already."

"Can you put a patient in an isolated room? There is something I want to try but I need privacy."

"Yes, there are some patients in the private cloisters, I will check on them." Alvus leaves the office.

Helen reaches out for me and whispers with a concerned face, "Beowulf, troll sightings in the east woods..."

"Yes, just like when I was reborn in this world. Nobody in the eastern lands mentioned trolls around there. But that is our next destination, we will investigate it soon enough."

The nurse comes and leads us to a room in a long corridor. Alvus is inside and there is a boy about the same age as Zahariel on a bed.

"Alvus, can we start?" I send a glance at the nurse girl.

"Of course. Ruth, please go check if all patients are properly hydrated."

The girl leaves the four of us alone and I approach the boy. "{Cleanse}!" I cast my advanced healing spell. No reaction.

"We had nobody in town that could use advanced healing magic. Did it work?" Don't trigger flags.

"No. It is not an ordinary disease. I have to ask you to keep secret everything you see or hear here. Can we wake up the boy, please?"

Alvus gets some smelling salts and awakens the boy. "Hey, wake up," he says with a gentle voice, a cup of water in his hand.

The kid awakes and drinks the water. His eyes are bloodshot and devoid of life. I lean next to Zahariel, "This kid, is it as bad as I think?"

"Yes. He won't endure for much longer," the seraph whispers back.

"Kid, hello. I am going to send you a message like the status, I need you to choose yes, ok? Did you understand me? What is your name?"

The confused boy looks at Alvus and after receiving a reassuring nod he agrees. "It is Mortimer, sir."

"Good boy. Party Invite: Mortimer!"

Mortimer has joined your party! Skill Party / Job Management level 7.

I check the party status screen and cross gazes with Zahariel. Now that we can see the kid's HP, it is abysmally low and he is afflicted with a curse debuff. There is no disease as we expected. He is also with an MP Depletion debuff for some reason.

"Mortimer, don't tell anyone of anything that happens here, right? It will be our little secret. {Full Heal}!" His HP went up only 20%. It is just like that dark debuff we received from the imps. And it is draining down fast. I won't give up. "{Healing Pulse}!"

"It is not working. It is like the healing magic is being sucked by the curse." Zahariel sounds the alert. "It is almost like the dark debuff from the imps."

"Zahariel, what magic system is used to dispel curses?"

"Dark! The only way to dispel a curse using magic is in dark magic or very advanced healing magic. You could try to overpower it using holy magic, but it is like burning the forest before the fire can do it."

"Damn! I won't have the image to use dark magic. There must be another way. This is the same as when you were afflicted, but this time at least you can talk. Think, there must be a way to solve it."

"No! Curses are terrible exactly because there are only three ways to break it! Either fulfill the condition, make the caster dismiss the curse or break it with a more powerful magical power. The kid won't endure a forced removal. Not that I think I am strong enough."

The boy coughs and his condition takes a dive for worse. It seems the healing pulse is doing the inverse... "Dismiss Healing pulse!" At this rate, I doubt even blood bond could do something. There is one thing I can try.

"Zahariel, Helen, Alvus get out of this room. Block the door with a damp cloth too. It is going to stink in here. Leave me alone with Mortimer."

They leave and I take out a repellent potion from storage. One of the mid-grade ones I stole from the guild. Also one of the several shields I bought but never used. Turning the shield upside down to work as a tray, I pour the potion and the catalyst in it. The potion activates and I set the shield over a sitting stool.

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"Firebolt!" The potion in the shield immediately boils and evaporates when exposed to the flaming projectile. The pink-purple cloud envelops the whole room.

It affects both of us. My MP is drained even faster than when the merchants hit me back on the road. The mana concentration in town is way lower than a road. The kid coughs and wheezes but the high concentrated tainted mana, or miasma, around the room soon vanishes. The curse status also disappears but a [Bleeding] status comes in its place. It is like the curse ripped off at its flesh as it was dispelled.

"Helen! Come in here and heal him fast! I have no MP!"

Helen bursts into the room but she flinches and screams as the potion mist violently sucks out all of her MP too. The mist seeps out and I can hear Zahariel and Alvus being affected too. One of them takes the initiative to slam the door shut.

"Cough! Heali... A cough!" She converts her HP into MP and attempts to cast but the mist sucks the magical power in the split second the spell finishes. Dizzy by the sudden mental drain, she collapses.

Party member Mortimer has passed away. Skill MP Depletion Resistance level 3.

The kid dies. Flatline. There is no save point, this is hardcore mode. My legs give in.

I punch the floor, "It is my fault for using a repellent too powerful. DAMN! DAMN! DAMN!"

Helen crawls next to me and tells me between coughs, "You tried your best, Beowulf. The boy was almost dead. It is not your fault. You had to act."

I lie on my back, drag Helen next to me and pat her head. "It hurts a lot to lose anyone."

"I know. I love you for your kindness."

And like that, embraced on the floor we remained until the mist had its fill with our MP.

Skill MP Depletion Resistance level 4. Skill Max MP Increase level 4. Skill MP Recovery level 5.

An eternity later the door opens and both Zahariel and Alvus enter. Alvus runs to the window and opens it to disperse the remaining repellent mist. I help Helen get up and raise myself up from the floor too.

"I'm sorry Alvus. I lost him."

The senior apothecary comes to me and places a warm hand on my shoulder. "It is good to cry, Beowulf. Remember this pain after you lose someone. It will happen again several times. The memory of this pain will make you work harder not to lose anyone. It is our burden as healers."

Zahariel leans next to the boy and examines the body. "The curse vanished before he died," He states in a neutral voice. The angel then stands up and tells me, "He was cleansed before passing away. His condition was too advanced."

"But what you did you do here and what is this supposed to be?" Alvus picks up the scorched shield.

"Mortimer allowed me to find the way to lift this curse. But I need to make another series of tests."

"What do you have in mind?"

"I am willing to pay one gold coins each for two afflicted people to volunteer for this test. They might die too, so I want volunteers."

"I understand. It is an emergency." Life in this world is cheap. A gold coin can buy meager supplies for a peasant family of five for almost a year, taxes included.

We move to the reception. People that heard all the noise we did look at us with scared eyes. Alvus takes the lead.

"We are trying to find a cure for this malady. Hero Beowulf here wants to know if there are two brave volunteers among you that would risk their lives to help the community. We need two people. He is offering a compensation of two gold coins to each one."

I yell over the commotion, "Adults over 17 years old only, please!" Some people were already giving greedy glances to their own children. I bet they would gladly gut their kids if I offered them this much gold.

Alvus selects two strong men, they look like adventurers. It makes sense, it is a profession where you put your own life in the line for coin. "These two men are E-rank adventurers, Growald and Brunn from our community and are trustworthy." He tells me.

"Gentlemen, thank you for your cooperation. I am Beowulf, C-rank adventurer. Pleased to meet you." I shake their hands and put some pressure. They respond in kind with unwavering eyes.

"Helen, I want you to stay out here and help with the nursing. Zahariel, I need you to fly out there and bring Marcy here. Take the pack out and go." I turn to Alvus and tell him, "Zahariel is a rare bird-kin tribe member."

Our faux-birdkin goes outside and removes his backpack to reveal his pearly white wings. He stretches them out with a pleasant groan and takes to the skies. While he is out to fetch Marcy I take the two adventurers to the last room in the clinic along with Alvus.

"Alvus, I will renovate this room. If you want, I'll compensate you later. Gentlemen, the stuff I am going to show you here is secret. Even under threat of torture, you should not reveal any of the things here to anyone. Or I will hunt you down."

I take out of the item box a cauldron and fill it with beeswax. Maybe a third of my storage is apiculture products.

Some firebolts later and the wax is melted. The two adventurers plaster the joints and knots of the wood boards with the wax. While they are at it I change the door to open to the outside. It is upside down now, but don't mind it. The door frame is also entirely covered in beeswax to form a seal when the door is closed. The window was boarded up and sealed with wax.

I store the cauldron to keep the molten wax inside remains warm and we let the room dry. For ventilation, I cut a hole in the ceiling. The potion mist is dense, it doesn't rise that much. I need to prepare two sturdy beds with leather straps to bind the guinea... compensated experiment volunteers. "I will later submit a proper nominated request at the adventurers guild so you guys can earn some ranking points. I'll front the fees." I had to soothe them when they figured out what the leather bands will be used to.

We walk past the main lobby and Marcy and Zahariel already arrived. It is not that big a town. Urgh, Cloude is with them too.

She comes to me and asks with worried eyes, "Beowulf, what is the matter? What were those system messages?"

"Hi, Marcy. I bet you heard, but there is a malady that is killing the townspeople. I am with Alvus trying to find a cure but I had to make sure you knew. We had a terrible episode back then."

"I saw it. Who is... was Mortimer?" She asks in a low voice.

I look at the floor, "He was... the boy we failed to save."

She hugs me, "Are you hurt?" I nod. It is so good to receive her affection. "Then fight for him. Defeat this malady in his name. We will be right here if you need a shoulder to cry on."

"Thank you." Inappropriate though it was to kiss in a clinic full of dying people, we still sought each other for a moment.

"Now, go and fight! Show us that heroic light that will give everyone here hope!" She shoves me away. There are cheers and complaints also from the audience, but I can't mind them now.

Using the item box we move the beds to the wax-sealed room. In the middle, I set the scorched shield over a wood block.

"Gentlemen, please lay down on the beds. It will hurt a bit but I need you to endure it." I usher the two men into the beds and tie them down. "In the remote case we fail here, do you have any message you want to be conveyed? Alvus will deliver it for you."

"Stop joking, hero! Get over with this, I want to spend my gold!"

"Sure." I put two gold coins in their pockets and turn to Alvus, "The curse is a magical effect. If you boil a repellent potion, it will burst this mist that eats the magic around it, including spells and the curse, effectively dispelling them. Along with any and all magic in the room, including the MP of the exposed people."

"I see. So that is what the pink mist was."

"But there is one problem. I don't know why but Mortimer was afflicted with a bleeding status after the curse ended."

"Hold, nobody said anything about bleeding!"

"Too late! Please endure, you are way healthier than an infirm boy."

Next step, set out the health monitor. "Disband Party!"

Your party was disbanded!

Create a Party! Party Invite: Alvus, Growald, and Brunn!"

Party Created! Alvus has joined your party! Growald has joined your party! Brunn has joined your party!

"Party status!" I had to disband our party to protect the privacy of the other members. Especially because there was a certain flame gorilla in it.

I take out a minor repellent potion and set it with the catalyst over the shield-turned-bowl before retreating to the door.

"Bye! Firebolt!" SLAM!

Before the mist has a chance of thinking where to go the door was already sealed shut. The two patients are soon afflicted with MP depletion and after a minute the curse vanishes, leaving the bleeding status behind.

"Alvus, on my signal open the door for a while then close it again after I finish chanting!"

"Understood!"

I start to do a long chant to get an extra power to the next spell and their HP begin to vanish. They also are grunting and screaming. When the chant is ready I give the signal. Alvus opens the door giving me a line of sight to my dying party members.

"Area Heal! Healing Pulse! Healing Pulse! Close the door!"

The mist that escaped cancels my remaining MP but soon after it begins to recover from zero. Anyway, even at this minor grade, the healing pulses were dispelled quickly.

When I am ready we repeat the procedure, and I cast antoher area heal in the room. Rinse repeat. The bleeding ended before the mist finished eating magic.

I open the door and still lose some MP to the lingering mist, but the two patients are worse for the wear but alive.

I think that we can treat more people at once just using a lowest grade potion.

This requires further investigation.