“Genki, you idiot!” Jaro barked, “next time you’re risking your life to save some measly NPC,” he said pointing at the bloodied cat-girl Holder dumped on the inn’s cafeteria bench, “don’t risk ours too!”
Holder gently let me down. His fur was quite course and spiky, to my surprise, though beneath that rough exterior was a softness like nothing else. Would make a great place to take a nap. Oh, how I would really like to take a nap right now. So sleepy… It was probably the blood loss. The giant laceration from my hip to my breast was partially closed but that didn’t stop the inferno of heat rising from it every time I took a breath.
“Heal I,” I said with difficulty, but nothing happened.
“Genki, that wound doesn’t look so good,” said Holder, “maybe we should get you a doctor.”
We looked at each other with the same realisation, there isn’t any doctors or hospitals in this world, or at least not what we’re used to.
But why wouldn’t my magic be working?
Health 0/18, Mana 0/0
Mana, zero of zero? It didn’t make sense I was a Holy Mage, the class by default has mana.
“Try your two-hour ability,” Holder suggested, concerned.
That won’t work, if I can’t use spells, my ultimate won’t work either, right? “By the Grace of Gods,” I said, fully expecting nothing to happen.
But then, I was dragged up into the air and light embraced us from the ceiling. My clothes and hair whipped up from a mysterious gale of wind. It was a Marilyn Monroe moment. Though blushing, it felt kind of good to be in the spotlight. There was something uplifting about it, every worry and concern that was plaguing me before was all but gone.
The holy light faded, and I slowly floated back down to the ground.
“Whatever that was…” Mykaru said, as he rose blinking the life back into his eyes, “do it again.” He smiled and stretched, looking completely reinvigourated.
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
“Genki, your wound!” Holder said, surprised.
It was completely gone! I touched the soft supple skin. There wasn’t even a scar. Unfortunately, my clothes weren’t repaired too and were utterly rag like, and I had a serious case of exposed-under-boob. What about the Stallholder?
She was still laying on the cafeteria bench, her wound open like a fissure in the earth, and every time she breathed, she groaned, and fresh blood would ooze out. It was too much to even look at.
Why didn’t it heal her too? “She’s an NPC,” Rista said, as she casually strolled into the inn.
Typical patronising comment. It would feel so good to thump her arse! “So?!”
She raised a brow like I was some kind of idiot. “So… unless you specifically target her, which you can’t with your Two-Hour ability, beneficial spells will only target allies, or rather party members.”
“Just use the ability again,” Jaro barked.
Rista rolled her bunny eyes. “Its. A. Two-Hour ability.”
Rista was technically right, that’s what the game text said, but. “Actually, it’s a forty-eight-hour ability.”
She looked at me like I just skulled a whole bucket of stupid. “I have the timer up in my vision, and I’m pretty sure it says forty-seven-hours and umpteen minutes are left,” I said with a dash of shut-the-hell-up.
She just muttered some incoherent slander to herself. None of this was helping though. This poor girl was molested in the open street, before being assaulted and knocked unconscious, left to die. We had to do something, no, I had to do something.
“Holder, what’s your Super do?”
“Sorry Genki. It just makes us all invincible for a few seconds.”
That sounded ridiculously awesome, but not helpful right now. What we really needed right now were—
“Potions!” Mykaru exclaimed, jumping up and down like a lightbulb-pogo-stick.
Holder stroked his snout in thought. “I read in a walkthrough that there are some in Camilla’s Potions, a shop in the southern district.”
If he had read a walkthrough then why’d we start in the harder East Fleugal Plains when we started, rather than the easier West Fleugal Plains. He does love a good challenge.
Rista plonked her button-tailed butt down with a bright-yellow drink she got from who-knows-where. “I wouldn’t bother,” she said, her nose attempting to tower over us like some alien ship poised above the city.
“Yeah, that’s super helpful right now!” I wanted to slap her, right up side the head. She opened her mouth, and I prepared for the usual chaotic barrage of verbal mudslinging.
Holder prostrated himself between us. “Hold on! We don’t have time for you two to go at it, yet again. Rista, what’s the problem? Why can’t we get to the shop?”
She scoffed and took a swig, taking her sweet time. “It’s anarchy,” she finally said, but upon noticing our puzzled looks added, “What did you think was going to happen? Cat-girl parties and lols? It’s dog-eat-dog out there. Excuse the pun,” she said looking at Jaro, with a wink. She looked down her nose at the wounded girl. “You saw a bit of it already, but you should see it now.”
How much time had passed since we got to the inn? A few minutes. How much could possibly have changed?
My teeth were grinding, and blood seeped from where one of my fangs caught my lip. I opened the doors out of the inn, because how bad could it really be?
The yelling, screaming and fighting fit me like a freight train. Characters were ganging up on town-guards, hacking at them from all sides. Completely outnumbering them. They were also looting market stall and breaking into resident housing. A nearby meat cleaving sound drew my attention to my left, just in time for blood to spray me from head to toe. A butcher of a man was repeatedly hacking at the head of a guard, determined to see it free of its shoulders. His face was dripping with blood not his own, and there was a feverish look to his eyes when he turned to look at me.
“Nope-nope-nope,” I stammered as I slammed the door shut.
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