ISMUND

I had gone to bed the night before in pain, tired, and hadn’t felt like my usual self. I didn’t know why, it just was. Well, no I did know, it was that parasite and the debuff it had given me, [Soul Snatched]. I didn’t like the sound of it at all and the description wasn’t any help either. It said I could remove it once I regained the part of my soul that was missing. I didn’t know how to do that. It must be in the parasite, I knew that much. Drifa said that it was taking my soul’s energy, but that didn’t seem to quite line up with what the system had said. Either way, I needed to get rid of it.

After I had been patched up by Drifa I had gotten another trait, [Guarded Soul]. I hoped that would help a bit. At least acting as preventative measure or something.

I took a quick scan of my room. Everything was in order, I was packed. I walked out of my room and knocked on Drifa’s door. Before I could say anything, or even walk away, Drifa opened the door and grabbed my sleeve to hold me still.

I took a look over my shoulder down at her.

“You had your stitches removed, and they were late right? Should’ve been removed sooner?”

I shrugged.

She gave me look that looked vaguely concerned.

“Can we get rid of mine too?”

I nodded.

Can’t be compromised in a a fight.

“Where?”

I shrugged again. I wasn’t so sure.

“Should I go to the doctor to just get the stitches removed? If I’m really clear tha-”

“No.” I said Sharply.

I can’t have her lose the ability to use her magic if he decides to give her a parasite anyways. I didn’t ask for it and he gave it to me. She couldn’t even handle being in the building, she ran.

Her eyebrows furrowed, “Well what should I do instead?”

I shrugged again.

She pinched her lips together too after that and looked around thinking.

“Could you cut them?”

I’m not really sure how to do that. Now that I think about it… I should have removed the other stitches I gave myself earlier a while ago. Hopefully I’m not too late.

I nodded hesitantly.

She opened her door all the way and sat down on her bed with her back facing me. She pulled her hair out of the way and lifted the back of her shirt just high enough for me to find the very frozen bandages. They were going to be hard to break.

I pulled out my large knife and slipped it underneath the icy cloth and did my best to cut it. I only managed to cut a bit of the thick ice.

How did she freeze it so solid?

Shaking my head I tried again by pulling harder, apparently a little too hard. She yelped almost fell off of the edge of her bed onto the ground but stopped herself by clutching the messy blankets underneath her.

More sawing I guess.

It took longer but it opened the bandage. Once I cut through it I told Drifa because It didn’t really make a difference. She tugged on it and cracked the sides like a shell before dropping it beside herself.

The wound didn’t look particularly healthy, maybe better than before, however. There had been something like the outline of a square-ish connecting the holes in each corner, as well as some scratches. Since there were two teeth there were eight nasty holes. It was now all sowed off with the skin closed but everywhere where there had been broken skin was now ash looking like it would break at any moment, including the area right around the stitches.

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It might re-open.

I looked at my knife.

I don’t think this’ll be small enough to cut the stitches.

“Are you going to use anything in the mid-kit we got? Or do you think a knife is good enough?” she said flushing, looking over her shoulder.

Oh right, I forgot about that.

I placed it on the bed as a sort of make shift table and opened it. I didn’t know too much about fixing wounds but I figured I could use the tiny knife and rubbing alcohol. I took the bottle and poured a little on a bandage and used that as a cloth to dab it on-

“It’s funny how we both have stitches on our back, eh?” She interrupted

- the stitches. After that, I put the bottle away and put the bandages to the side to use later. I then tugged one of the knots up and cut the string with the tiny knife.

I wonder if you could use it in a fight.

After the string was cut I tugged the string up by the knot and the string popped right out.

Okay, good.

I went on like this for a while, wasn’t sure how long exactly, occasionally messing up and making some blood pool and freeze. Once that was finished I handed Drifa the alcohol soaked bandages, placed the medical kit in my box, and headed down the stairs.

After looking at the chalk menu for a moment I ordered some food for myself. Right before I was going to pay Drifa came rushing down the stairs.

“Could I have a chicken sandwich please?” She said.

The bar tender looked at me to see if I was paying and gave a small nod.

“We don’t have any chic-”, before the man with the curly moustache could finish Drifa was talking again, “Thank you!”, and headed for a table.”

Wincing a little I gestured for the man to continue.

He looked to the side a little irritated before continuing, “We don’t have a chicken sandwich available that would be a… strange thing to eat.”

I nodded and looked at the menu.

“Could you get her a ham sandwich instead?”

“Sure thing.”

Taking another glance at the menu I did some quick math and handed the man the money he was owed.

I walked over to where Drifa was and sat myself down.

“Thanks.”

I looked up a little confused.

“… for helping me get rid of those stitches.” she said.

“Mmmm.”

I looked out the window and zoned out as I waited for the food chewing on a toothpick.

“Here we are!”

There was a kid with curly black hair and almond eyes delivering our food instead of the man at the bar. He handed me my eggs and bacon and Drifa her sandwich.

Do people still tip?

I wasn’t sure… it’d be fine if I didn’t.

He gave me an awkward smile, dropped his open hand and left. Drifa inspected her sandwich muttering to herself. She took a pinch off of the meat from the side and ate it before half standing up and looking over to the kitchen uncertainly and sitting down all the way.

“I think they got the wrong order, it’s supposed to be chicken, this is sausage.” she whispered.

I shrugged noncommittally, “Nope,” and took a bite out of my food. It tasted pretty good.

“Should I tell them?” She hooked a thumb at the bar.

“It’s right.” I said after swallowing.

“What do you mean?” she looked about ready to head over, half standing.

“There was no chicken sandwich on the menu so I got you this instead.”, I took another bit of my eggs.

She looked up at the menu behind her and strained her eyes a bit from her twisted position and sat down.

“Of course you chose the cheapest one.” She frowned and took a bite. There was a touch of a smile to the corner of her mouth before she seemed to remember something and her lips instantly thinned.

“Didn’t we just buy a lot of pork.”

I nodded.

“This is pork to.”

I nodded.

“I’m going to eat this for like a month.”

I nodded once more.

she slumped dragged her free hand over her face and I took a bite of my bacon.

I don’t see the problem. We have food, protein too, so it’s hearty. We want that. We also have more than enough to last the whole time, however long that is.

A while later Abs walked through the front door, I was just cleaning up the last bit of my food. He looked around and once he spotted us he stomped right over, stopping in front of us with his fists on his hips.

“Alright! Are you ready my cara, carto,… cartographers! Ahah, that’s right!” He gave me a wink and elbowed my ribs. Drifa didn’t have any idea he was here I didn’t think, she was just munching while looking at her plate defeated.

I glanced at her, “I’m ready to go.”

Drifa looked up at me, then at my eyes, then to who I was looking at. Her eyes went wide.

“Are we leaving? Already!”

I nodded.

“Shoot!”

Grabbing a napkin she ruffled it in her hands while she sprinted upstairs.

Abs pointed at the left over sandwhich and met my eyes.

“She gonna eat that?”

“…”

Taking that as a go ahead he shoved the courner that was left in his mouth after pushing his mask up for a second.

He squinted his eyes at me and waved his sweaty hand infront of me.

“You there? Helloooooooo! Did you lose some of your brains?,” He said loudly. Squinting his glazed over eyes at me for a moment he mumbled, “Soulll~ snatched…”

His eyes focuesed again and looked at me with an exaggurated squint.

“So you did lose your brains…”

How can he read that? Also, I didn’t lose my brains.

“No.”

He pointed in a random direction, “look over there.”

I did, there wasn’t anything of note.

“See, you did lose your brains!”, he smacked the back of my head and laughed, but it felt like I’d been hit with a hammer, “You should know that, you can read it!”

Drifa came down the stares with my brothers cloak around her shoulders allong with her butterknife.

What took so long?