Lola:

I am Lola Springfield, a dark elf, a beekeeper, and a lesser-known rank adventurer with a guild called Cofin’s-Reach.

I feel like I might have gone too far. I used Chika as bait, allowing her to get kidnapped by a group of rogues so that they would lead us to their hideout and we could flush them off. But… Something went wrong, and instead of getting the hideout location, we were only given a general area. It took us weeks to finally track them down.

After finding it, we staked it out and planned for a raid, but every passing moment made me more anxious, then, the sound of battle finally rang out. We took the camp by storm, capturing six bandits and taking control of the mechanism that opened the gate.

Every fiber of my being was itching to get in there and break out my friend. I just hoped nothing too bad had happened to her while she was held captive.

When the gate opened… I froze… I wasn’t sure if I should be relieved, or even more concerned. There she was, towering over all of us atop a pile of bloody corpses, holding a sword that was larger than life with a splatter of red tinge staining its blade and covering her whole body.

Just as the gate opened she kicked a body and it came slowly rolling down the mound, as if she was asking “Who’s next?” It was the first thing that had given me chills since my first encounter with a dungeon lord.

“Chika?”

“Perfect timing…”

She had no way of knowing I betrayed her, or that I was even there the night she got taken hostage and watched, but… That only made me feel more guilty.

While I was lost in my own thoughts, somehow one thing led to another, and a fight broke out. It took everything I had to stop everyone from killing each other as I tried to restrain them with magic.

When things finally calmed down I tried to find her again, but I only heard a scream, followed by a sudden burst of vines wrapping around two girls in the middle of the crowd.

‘Chika… What the heck is going on? Is she having an attack? But the fights over, aren't they brought on by stress?’’

Not long after a flash of light blinded everyone in the area, and it was several minutes before we regained our bearings. When we finally did we noticed Chika and the girl were missing…

I hated to say it, but it wasn’t really that much of a concern. She was covered in blood but seemed fine for the most part... We had to deal with the thugs. Make sure none of them died before the trial or got away, and there may have been other prisoners inside as well that were captives like Chika was.

I was in charge of the operation… So I orchestrated the capture of all the thugs, tying them up, and gathering them all to be transported back to Rothet, where they would be tried and processed properly.

Just when we were about to head out though, I started to feel the air pressure change, and the winds started to swirl unnaturally.

‘Chika… Just what have you gotten yourself into now…’ I looked back “Arther…” I said coldly.

He grabbed his sword and followed me, sensing the same energy. When we got to the scene it was already too late.

Chika was lying in a pool of her blood, and a few yards back was the other girl, sitting on her knees and crying her eyes out… My first guess was it was somehow her doing, but after seeing her like that… I had my doubts.

I used my magic to rush to Chika’s side in an instant, ‘her heart is still faintly beating, but it’s slowly drowning… there’s no breath in her lungs…’ Even though I was an adventurer, I wasn’t exactly the most religious… My divine energy was laughable, the most I could do was a minor buff that repaired minor wear and tear on equipment, but with the fact that her wounds were already mostly closed from the outside, it was obvious that wouldn’t be enough, she had already received healing magic.

“Arthur I need your magic!”

He rushed over to her side lagging behind, sliding across the ground through the dirt while he rubbed his hands together. The moment he reached us he placed one over her heart and another over her stomach. His blue and gold light burst out around us and a warm glow enveloped her.

“This is going to be a bit rough, I can't use resurrection yet.”

“W-what does that mean?”

The golden light turned to spiraling lines of thread that spun around us like a giant ball of yarn and then changed again to lines of text spinning around her torso, a third spell created brilliant white feathers that gently covered her like snow before being absorbed into her skin and soaking up the blood, purifying her.

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“Arther…” I said again, starting to grow more nervous.

“She still isn’t breathing, her heartbeat is getting weaker, her lungs must have filled with blood.”

“Ok, so what do we do?”

“I’ve already done everything! I’m not a freaking healer you know!”

“That can’t be true, can it… There has to be something What if we… We open her up. Open up her lungs and drain the blood.”

He looked down at her, considering it for a moment, “No, we wouldn’t be able to heal her a second time, and I don’t have the experience to do that kind of surgery.”

“Well there has to be some–”

He waved a hand. “SHUT UP I’M THINKING!” His eyes fixed on her like glue as I counted the seconds.

‘Come on… I know you’ve got something turning in that head of yours…’

“Do you still use water magic?”

“Yeah.”

“Tier 5 or higher without looking?”

“Yeah, but blood isn’t–”

“Just shut up alright? Make a water bubble, send it down her airways, and use a whirlpool to mix it with the blood and then pull it back out like a vacuum.”

It was ridiculous, and for sure would have been torture if she was conscious… But I never second-guessed an order from Arther. I did exactly what he said without a second thought, and sure enough, the water was blood red as it came out of her lungs.

“She still isn’t moving… Why isn’t she breathing.”

“Her heart stopped…” He swayed his head back and forth for a moment as he let out a long groan, ripping what was left of her shirt open and taking off his heavy gauntlet on his left arm leaving him bare-handed. “Stand back.” After sending a breath of air into her lungs with wind magic he began compressing her chest to mimic a heartbeat while the ground and sky began to crackle and spit out short bursts of lightning around him.

After a while, a lightning bolt struck him straight from the clear sky and he screamed in pain. It circulated through him for an unnatural amount of time until it became so fine-tuned he could write letters with it. Finally, he placed his hands on her bare skin and I could see his body jolt as his eyes glowed bright blue and her muscles all contracted at once.

In a flash, it all ended and his blond hair turned smoked brown, his skin charing with black lightning marks. Finally, I started to hear a staggered wheezing coming from Chika. ‘He did it…’ Her muscles continued to spasm for a moment, but then she started to breathe more easily, and with the multitude of blessings Arther had used, there was no doubt in my mind she would end up making it through at that point. The healing effects were so strong around her that they even bled through onto him and began to cure his burns… Even if they didn’t fix his hair…

“I-is she going to be alright?” A soft mumbling voice reached out from behind me.

‘That girl...’ “Yeah… she’ll pull through.” ‘How exactly is she related to all this?’

“It's my fault… It’s all my fault…”

She broke down in tears again. I didn’t know whether I should be trying to comfort the girl, or arrest her for nearly killing my friend… She didn’t seem like a threat though. I turned back to Chika. ‘I guess that’s not important right now.’ “Arthur, it’s safe to move her now right?”

He slowly stood up nearly falling over, his arms staying limp as he caught himself looking down at her for a moment. “Eh… If you have something to cover her up with…”

“She should be healed though right? Why would we need bandages…” I paused, going over his words again in my head. I was so frazzled I wasn’t thinking straight. “R-right I understand.” I grabbed his cloak from off his shoulders and wrapped it around her. “What about this chain around her neck, can we take it off?”

“You’re the dark elf, can’t you pick the lock?”

I just rolled my eyes. “Ha ha…” Looking at it closer, it was magic suppressing, which explained why Arther had to use so much power with his lightning to ensure control. ‘I’ve never been good with picking them… But its enchantment isn’t that strong, so maybe I could…’

First I filled the metal with water, and then I froze it over with ice. The metal was already bent out of shape, so it just needed one final push to snap. ‘Nice.’

“Told you you could do it.”

I let out a growl. “Not all dark elves are good with locks alright!”

He squatted down again, fully regaining control of his own breathing and muscles. “Nope, just all the ones I know.” he grinned, slowly moving his arms under her to pick her up.

“Hey!” I swat his hands away. “What are you doing?”

He froze. “We aren't just leaving her here, right? Half naked… in the middle of a field? I’m not sure she’d necessarily be in that much danger in this country but I mean… She is staying at White Light right, we should probably take her there. They can double-check my work too.”

I smacked him again with another growl. “I’ll carry her, you get her stuff, you’ve touched her enough already.”

He rolled his eyes, gently moving away from her again as he stood up, and went to do as I said. “Yeah, I did, while I was SAVING HER LIFE!”

“Don’t you dare lie, I know she’s your type, it was hard for you to look away wasn’t it, after you ripped her shirt off.”

He picked up all the broken weapons scattered around and flung them in his storage. “Of course not, although it certainly would have been for a man with less self-control than I. Oh, I do admit though, it took me a moment to figure out how exactly I was supposed to do CPD without those things getting in the way. That might have more to do with how big my hands are though. I do have some giant and dwarf blood in me. It was also fairly awkward because I’ve never had to do that to a girl before, but hey it worked.” He looked down at one of his hands slowly rubbing his fingertips, probably waiting for the feeling to come back after he fried all his nerves with lightning.

“Those things?” I felt a sharp chill run down my arms. “You… Pervert! You never change!”

“Now you know that’s not true. If I was a pervert I wouldn’t have nearly this much divine power!”

I bit my tongue, technically speaking he was right, I was one part just teasing him and two parts mad that Chika had to go through another man seeing her half naked so soon, knowing how much stuff like that bothered her… Although… If I was really being honest I was just mad she was hurt so badly… And that it was all my fault…

If I wasn’t yelling, I probably would have been crying… And there was no way I was letting anyone see that… Forcing myself to stop the tears before they came out I wiped my eyes. “You’re right…” I said with a sigh. “I’m not going to apologize though… And even if you’re thoughts aren’t dirty you should still keep them to yourself sometimes…”

“Why, are you jealous? It makes sense, elves may be tall, but–”

His voice stopped as I chopped his head, flattening down some of his electrocuted hair. “That’s another thought you should keep to yourself… And for the record, elves don’t judge physical appearance by human standards.”

Before he could respond I was already walking away, several steps ahead of him. ‘The others will be able to take that girl in… And she should be able to tell us what happened.’

By the time we made it to white light and laid her in a bed her entire body had changed again. Whatever magic was affecting her body vanished, but it never properly reverted. Or I suppose it would be more appropriate to say all the divine energy changed it in a different way.

I often wondered what it would look like, if her body hadn’t been malnourished, her growth stunted and her bones broken from harsh fights. I felt like that was the girl I was staring at now. Even her hair, which was probably the least affected thing about her had become more full, and a softer color, and almost all of her scars either faded, smoothed, or just vanished altogether. Although, they all seemed like good things at a glance… I honestly wasn’t sure how she was going to take it.

‘Get better soon alright…’