That’s how I spent the next week and a half before the Hero led us to another town, Marro, around noon, of course by exclusively traveling through the woods.
“We are going to stay here for the next few days. You are free to do as you wish in the meantime." The Hero states after he led us to an inn, before heading off on his own. I still don’t understand him. I did figure out that it is his name that he finds entertaining though, so either his parents had a very similar sense of humor, or he gave us a fake name, possibly doubling as a joke. Well, that doesn't really matter anyway.
In the inn, Rapunzel decided to pull out a map and trace where we had traveled.
Huh, that doesn’t look normal. It looks like the path a kid would plan. It all but completely ignored the roads, instead deciding to just draw an almost straight line across the map to our target destinations. We had even just recently traveled through a mostly uncharted forest to reach a town that has no direct roads towards it. With the roads that connect to other towns and cities, the roads basically formed a ‘square’ around the forest, that we just directly crossed through.
“That’s odd, right?” I ask, not experienced enough to know for sure.
“To be able to travel at an almost straight line from one place to another, without any landmarks, proper scouting, or previously traveling along that path, is almost impossible. We ended up traveling so accurately, we even ended up directly in line with the gate. The only deviation we had was to our various camping spots. Ones, I might add, we also headed to perfectly.” Rapunzel states, too shocked to even react.
“I see, did you ask the Hero about this?”
“Yes.”
“Let me guess, the Gods told him.”
“Yes.”
“Same as usual for the Hero, then.” I comment. This is adding fuel to my theory about the Hero. “Well, there’s not much we can do about that, so I guess we just need to prepare for whatever awaits us.” I shrug.
“Yes.” Yeah, Rapunzel broke. I’ll just leave her be while I head off on my own.
I should start looking for a library, church, spell store, etc, really anywhere that might have some old healing and support spells. I need to increase my spell repertoire in order to properly start my journey into spell creation.
As I went to leave the inn, I realized that I could just actually ask where some spells might be instead of just mindlessly wandering around.
So, I decided to ask the innkeeper, or whoever it was near the entrance. “Excuse me, do you happen to know of any places that sell healing or support spells?”
“I take it you’re the healer then. Yeah, there’s a general spell store three streets down. The sign is a massive book, you can’t miss it.”
“Thank you.” I bowed. I then headed to the store.
Well, he was right, it’s pretty hard to miss the massive book sign. After looking around for a bit, I can’t find any of the type of spell I’m looking for, which makes sense, so I decide to ask the shopkeeper.
“Excuse me, do you happen to sell any preMilo support spells?”
“And why would you need one of those? Do you even know what you’re asking for?”
“Yes, I need some for the research I’m doing.” I started to explain.
“What you’re doing with them isn’t the main issue, it’s whether you are qualified to even use them. So, who are you?”
“Ah, right.” I pull out my ID and hand it to them. “So, I am the newly appointed saintess, and.” I start, before being interrupted.
“I am so sorry for my rude behavior.” He says while bowing. “If I knew you were the Saintess, I would not have questioned your qualifications. I apologize, but our store only caters to the general populace, so we don’t have any preMilo spells.” He hurriedly explains.
“Ah, t-that’s fine.” I stutter in surprise. “Do you happen to know someplace that does?”
“Yes! I recommend Pepper’s store. She happens to stock some older spells, even if they don’t sell.”
“That sounds good, could you tell me how to get there?” I ask.
“Yes, you just need to …”
After he tells me how to get there, I bow and say. “Thank you for your assistance.”
He starts to panic in response. “No no, I didn’t do anything. I should be thanking you instead. I wish you luck.”
Okay then. That’s odd. Well, off to Pepper’s then.
After entering the store, I head straight to the front desk. I had forgotten that you can’t just buy those spells. Well, more like I never thought about it. I never had to buy spells before, as I’d always just been given them.
“Excuse me, I heard that you have some preMilo support spells, may I buy some?”
“That’s right. But miss, why should I sell them to you? You know that these spells are unusable, right? If not, don’t bother trying to buy them. Besides, I’ve never seen you before.”
“Yeah, that’s because I just arrived in town earlier today.”
“What, you an adventurer or something? Why you buying useless spells?”
“In a sense. I just want to use the spells to further my understanding of support magic.” I explained.
‘Pepper’ just stared at me after my response. “Are you an idiot? What could you possibly learn from them, how to cripple your comrades? Who do you think you are, the next Milo?”
“Ah, I forgot. I need to actually introduce myself to buy these spells, my apologies.” I say, getting a look of disdain from ‘Pepper,’ or whoever she is. I pulled out my ID. “I am the newly appointed saintess, and I obviously don’t think I’m even close to the same level as Milo.” I say before pausing, contemplating how I’m going to continue my explanation. I really should have prepared a speech or something first.
As I’m thinking, I happen to look over at ‘Pepper’ and notice that she’s frozen in shock, her expression slowly turning into one of fear and regret. Well that’s odd.
“Are you okay?” I ask with concern. “Do you need a healing spell or something?”
She quickly shakes her head. “I-I d-didn’t k-know t-that y-you w-were t-the S-Saintess.” She stutters, struggling with every word. She starts taking deep breaths to calm herself down. “I’ll quickly fetch all of my spell books!” She shouts before running upstairs.
“Okay.” I mutter as she runs off. I guess I don’t need a speech? Ah, I’m the Saintess! Of course I would be qualified to learn these spells, I’m all but guaranteed to reach the top. I should have just started with that instead of trying to explain myself.
After a few minutes, she returns with a stack of books. “I’m sorry for the wait, I was making sure that I brought everything.” She says as she sets them down on the counter. “I apologize for the shallow selection. I only have any in the first place because I was curious how spells were cast before Milo.” She explains.
“Yeah, I understand. I only learned a few initially for the same reason.”
“I see. S-So, what do you think? Do you want any of them?” She says, almost sounding like she’s pleading.
I look through the small booklets, seeing if there’s somehow a repeat of one of the handful of spells I already know. After seeing no repeats, I responded. “I’m fine with all of them, how much do they cost?”
“Haa” She sighs. “Don’t worry too much about that, just pay for the cost of the books themselves. It’s not like the spells themselves have any real value.” She responds.
“That makes sense.” I say as I pay with the money given to me from the church. I should really count it, huh. Still, it’s nice that paper isn’t that expensive nowadays.
“By the way.” I ask. “Do you know of anywhere else that might have some more?”
“There shouldn’t be any other stores with them. The only place that would have any would be the church. The library might have a couple, but I can’t be certain.”
“Oh yeah. I forgot that the church should have a bunch, thanks for reminding me.”
She gives me a confused look, before quickly stopping. “Yes, the church collects such spells to record their history.” she says oddly.
“Could you please tell me where the church is?” I asked, receiving another odd look as she told me.
I guess having the saintess ask where a church is is a bit strange.
After thanking her for her help, I head to the church.
The church itself was fairly cute. It’s exactly the same as the twelve smaller, town level churches that dot the capital, capable of holding a little over a hundred people in its main hall at once. After entering the main gate, I passed by the main hall, instead heading towards where the library should be. Most churches do follow the same general layout after all. Makes using them easier.
On the way, I noticed a few kids playing with a ball in a field. They are probably some of the orphans living here, judging by their similar outfits.
They quickly notice me as one of the older kids, only around fourteen, oddly enough, comes over. “Hello there, are you lost? People don’t usually come this way.” She asks.
“I shouldn’t be lost, this is the way to the library, right?” I ask.
“Yeah, that’s the library.” She says, pointing at a building a bit away. “But you aren’t allowed to enter.”
“I think I am allowed to, but I was going to ask first anyway.” I was told before I left that if I ever needed anything, I should head to a church, as they would help me with anything. So using the library shouldn’t be an issue.
“Okay then.” She responds, giving me a strange look.
“Do you happen to know where a priest I could talk to is at?” I ask.
Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.
“One should show up to check on us eventually.” I take it that she doesn’t really like me. Whatever, I’m not in a hurry anyway.
“Okay, I guess I’ll just wait here then.” I say.
“Suit yourself.” She says with a shrug.
After watching everyone play for a bit to know what they were actually playing, I asked. “Can I join in?”
I got a few confused looks from everyone. “Why? Do you even know how to play?” The girl questioned.
“Yeah, I played that at my church as well, though not all that often.”
“Wait, are you an?” She hesitates.
“Orphan? Yeah. I just left my church like a month ago.”
“I see. There shouldn’t be any problem then.” She responds, far less guarded than before.
I ended up playing with the kids for a while, making sure to hold back and properly guide the game to make sure everyone was having fun. While I may not have been an adored big sister, I did have plenty of experience keeping the younger kids entertained. I only stopped when one of the kids tripped and happened to cut his leg on a rock.
“How did that happen?” I say in annoyance, to which a few of the kids flinch, trying to avoid my gaze. I quickly ran over to the hurt kid, way faster than when I was playing. “Hold still.” I say as I cast a healing spell.
“I’m sorry for getting hurt.” The kid apologizes.
“Haa.” I sigh, finally realizing why everyone’s so tense. “I’m not angry at you getting hurt. I’m annoyed that there are still rocks in your play area.” I explained.
“What?” The girl asked in confusion.
“Back at my church, we made absolutely sure that there were no dangerous rocks where the kids played. The last time someone got hurt from a rock there was when I was five. The older kids ended up closing the play area for an entire week afterwards, while they combed the entire field for any other rocks.”
“Why? What’s so wrong with some rocks? Kids rarely even get hurt by them.” She asks.
“Apparently some kid before I was even born lost an eye or something, so the girl crushing on him declared war on rocks or something. While a bit stupid, the older kids claimed that the field was more fun afterwards.” I say. “Ah! I’m sorry, I was too used to how things were back… back at my church.”
“So you’re not angry about Jim hurting himself?” she asks.
“Nah, being able to get free healing after hurting yourself is a privilege only church kids get.” I say. “As long as you don’t abuse it.”
“Really!?” The kids ask with sparkly eyes. “The priests here always scold us when we get hurt.”
“That’s why you go to the kids practicing healing magic.” I begin to explain. “You won’t get scolded as often, and the kid gets new test subj- I mean, more opportunities to practice.” I say with a smile, before turning serious. “Just don’t push them too much, or you will experience some of the worst scolding I’ve ever seen. I was only dragged into a small part of that brat’s scolding, and even just that was worse than the scolding I received when I didn’t return to the church one time. I never healed them again after that.” I said as I got shivers. “Remember, respect your healers, It will make your life far easier.” I advised.
I then bent over while covering my mouth like I’m telling a secret. “And, if they really like you, they might be willing to secretly give you a buff before your bet with one of the other kids, but you didn’t hear that from me.” I say before standing up. “Offering to do their chores tends to earn you their favor pretty well.” I say with a wink.
“Wow! How’d you figure that out?” One kid asked in excitement.
“Who’d you think almost never had to do any chores for the past few years.” I say smugly. “So, let’s keep on playing, I’ll make sure to heal any injuries secretly.”
We then continued playing while the kids asked me various questions, having fully opened up to me. I ended up having a lot of fun. Haa, I didn’t realize how much I’d already missed my church, though.
By the time a priest came over to check on everyone, I was completely covered in dirt, having gotten far more invested into play than I had expected. “Excuse me, what’s going on? Who is this?” The priest angrily questioned. Fair, you don’t exactly want to leave a bunch of kids all alone with some stranger.
“She’s an orphan.” One of the kids defended. I’m glad that you’re sticking up for me, but that’s not exactly an answer.
“I doubt that, I would have recognized her if she was.” He denied.
“Hello, I’m Elizabeth.” I start to greet, casting some cleansing spells in a very mana intensive and inefficient way of cleaning myself. That does get me a surprised look, as he starts to take me more seriously.
“She’s looking for the library.” The girl, Jesica, adds.
“And why are you looking for the library?” He questions.
“I want to learn some preMilo support spells.” I answer.
“What?” He looks at me in confusion. “Why would you want any of those?”
“I’m studying them.”
“Haa, okay then. Regardless of the reason, we can’t just let you enter the library. You require a permit to enter, and no permits have been given out in months, so you are going to need to apply for one.”
“Yeah, that’s usually the case, but I was wondering if I could use this instead.” I say as I pull out my ID.
“I don’t see how… WHAT!” He shouts, scaring the kids.
“Hey! You’re scaring everyone.” I reprimanded.
“I’m sorry. It won’t happen again, Miss Saintess.” He says with a bow.
“Wow! Mr. Kollen bowed to Elizabeth!” The kids started cheering in excitement.
“What’s going on!” I soon hear an old man shout, quieting the kids.
I turn towards the voice to see an old man coming over, followed by a man and women, who were both similar in age to the old man. “Hello.” I wave. “I’m trying to get permission to enter the library.” I say, to which the kids start shouting again. I hear a few mention the head priest, so I presume that’s him.
“Then why are you here instead of requesting a permit at the office?” He demands.
Before I can say anything, the priest, Mr. Kollen, says. “She’s the Saintess!” While handing the man my ID.
The head priest goes wide eyed, before grabbing my ID to check. He then coughs before saying. “My apologies for our rude behavior, Saintess. You said that you wanted to enter the library? I’ll lead you there right now. If you want, we shall help you find whatever it is that you are looking for.” He offers.
“If it’s not too much of an issue, that would be very helpful. I’m looking for preMilo support spells to study.” I answer.
“Understood.” He answers. I’m sad that he wasn’t even a little surprised.
“You’re leaving?” Some of the kids pout.
“Be respectful to the Saintess!” The woman scolds.
“It’s fine.” I say to stop her. “I need to complete the task I showed up here to do.” I say as I pat some of the kids’ heads. “Remember to keep what I told you a secret.” I say as I hold a finger in front of my mouth, before waving as I follow the head priest.
Jesica follows as she grabs onto my robes. “You are the Saintess?” She asks.
“Jesica!” Mr. Kollen shouts. “I’m sorry for her behavior, I’ll stop her right now.”
“It’s fine, it’s fine. She’s not bothering me.” I say before turning to her. “That’s right. Aren’t I amazing.” I jokingly brag.
“Not really.” She answers flatly.
“Pfft!” I laughed, as the priests went pale. “That’s only because you haven’t seen how powerful my new buffs are.” I argue. “Besides, who was it that asked me the most questions?” I ask smugly.
“Kevin.” She says, not even hesitating to sell out one of her friends, causing me to laugh again.
“If you say so.” I shrug. “You’re pretty interesting, for a brat.” I smirk.
“I know.” She says, getting another laugh out of me.
“You won’t be so arrogant after you hear about my fight with a troll.”
“You fought a troll!” She shouts in excitement, her eyes sparking. Would you look at that, I was right.
“Yeah, maybe I’ll tell you guys about it tomorrow, if you behave.” I respond, as we’ve reached the library.
“You mean it?” She asks, clearly skeptical. She’s probably seen that trick before.
“Of course.” I relent.
“Promise?”
“I promise.” I say, holding out my pinky.
She squeals in excitement as she links her pinky with mine. “That’s a promise.” She shouts as she leaves. “Don’t you dare forget!”
Well, looks like I know what I’m doing tomorrow.
After making my promise with Jesica, I entered the library. Well, it’s not really a library, everyone just calls it that. It was actually just a book repository. The layout of the room has half of it set up for maximal book storage, while the other half contains a ‘help’ desk and a few tables and chairs, as you usually aren’t allowed to take any books out.
Before I could start my search, the head priest said. “Why don’t you relax in one of the chairs while we fetch the books for you?” He offered as he got the ‘librarian’ to start combing through the books. If it’s like back ho- at my church, the books should be stored by date instead of in any actually useful order. It was a pain to look through, with the only advantages being that it helps you know when everything in history happened relative to each other, and that it increased your patience. At least that’s what I was told, but I know the priests secretly complained about it as well. Why did you need to include things like spells and building plans in that?
Haa, I don’t really want to look through the library, but asking others to is also bad. “Are you sure? I don’t mind assisting in the search, I used to do it all the time.” I did it so much, I even remembered where most of the books were, for only the last century or so, but it was still impressive!
“You don’t have to worry about anything. We couldn’t possibly have the Saintess look through the repertoire yourself. It would be our honor to be of assistance.” He says with a smile.
“I’ll just relax over here then. Thank you.” I say, giving up. I didn’t think I could persuade him to change his mind. Besides, I didn’t really want to persuade him anyway.
“Then I shall go find anyone else that is free and bring them here to help.” He says before leaving.
As I wait, I notice that there aren’t any kids here. Back at my church, other than during events or bed time, you could usually see at least one kid in the library studying. I also spent most of my time in one, having effectively sold off all of my chores. Kids would often head to the library when they were hurt, since usually the people studying there were usually the wannabe healers, like me!
I guess it makes sense though, there aren’t nearly as many kids here, only having a few dozen at most.
It wasn’t long before I was brought the first spell book. I figure I should at least skim through it while I wait. I will say, while preMilo buffs feel off, a closer analysis makes them seem, well, normal. I didn’t notice the last time I studied these buffs, but now I can really tell how much of a genius Milo really was. While I don’t really know the structure of spells in other branches, I’m pretty sure Milo’s spells are unique in the way they work.
As I was thinking, the head priest arrived with three more priests and probably the oldest kid here. Noticing me look over, he says. “I’ve brought a few more people to help with your task.”
“Thank you for your assistance, everyone.” I thanked with a bow.
“It’s our honor to be of assistance. Now, we shall leave you to your studies.”
So, that’s what I did for the next few hours. I didn’t actually learn any of the spells yet, as I’d do that during our travels. I only skimmed them for now in an attempt to find out which spells might be useful.
As I was reading, the head priest came over to tell me. “That should be all of the preMilo spells in this church.” He said, gesturing at the stack of over a hundred books. “May I ask what you wish to do with them?”
“While I’d like to take them with me, I know that even taking books to your room requires special permission. So, I’d like to ask you if you could wait to put them away for a few days. My party is only staying here for a bit, so I’d like to be able to study as much as I can before then.” I ask.
“Would you like us to make you copies so that you could bring them with you?” He suggests.
“That would be amazing! But, wouldn’t that be a lot of work for you? I know that copying books is a lot easier now that we don’t have to write every word by hand, but it still takes quite a while for copies to be made.” I say in worry.
“You do not need to worry, Saintess, it is of no issue for us. As long as we can be of assistance, we shall gladly help you in any way we can.”
“If you’re sure then. Just don’t push yourselves, if you don’t think you can finish, just give me what you can. I originally only planned on having around twenty or so anyway.” I responded.
“Understood. I thank you for caring about our wellbeing.”
After talking a bit more, I eventually left the church and went back to the inn.
Today went pretty well overall, I started thinking as I walked. I was able to buy a few books and the church even offered to make some copies for me to take.
Though, while I was able to get what I wanted in the end, it definitely could have been done so much smoother. If I had just introduced myself as the saintess first, everything probably would have gone a lot better. I’m still surprised by how respectful and helpful everyone became after I did.
Wait. Wow, I’m amazed at how… dense I can be. Of course people would be respectful and would help me, I’m the Saintess! Haa, I guess it still hasn’t really clicked for me yet. I mean, I didn’t even realize that I had been chosen until someone else told me, so I guess I’m a little slow on the uptake.