Alice woke up that morning feeling particularly energized.

Was it still the high of having gotten her new Class, [Occult Herbalist]? Well, part of it was that, but it wasn't just that. The main reason for her excitement lay on the windowsill of her bedroom: a rose, planted in a vase, the dirt turned a shade of grey because of the preparations requied for this little rite she was about to perform.

During her and Averick's... shall we call it outing? Yes, during their outing to the Tiurna Mountains nearly a week ago, Alice had met a small coven of [Witches] and, among them, one, Witch Aria, a [Witch of Forests], had allowed her to get something from her gardens. She'd taken a rose.

But not just any rose: a Wanderer's Rose. A flower with exactly eight thorns positioned on the stalk in such a way that it looked remarcably similar to a compass' rose of winds. To anyone else, even to the Witch herself, it appeared as a flower with an interesting thorn pattern, if even that. To her, it was the perfect ingredient to finding a new way to Level up. Yes, because, like every other person in the world, she loved the idea of her numbers going up. More Levels meant more Skills, and more Skills meant more fun and impossible things for her to do.

So here she was.

She padded over to the vase and smiled at the sight.

Preparing the Rose for this had been a long, if not too hard, process. She'd just had to feed it some of her blood regularly and fertilize the earth she had replanted the flower in with some bonemeal crafted from crushed pigeon bones. The hard part, surprisingly, had been obtaining the bones. Apparently there weren't that many pigeons in this season on Eva, and she wasn't keen on waiting for them to fly over in a month or two. So she instead had to go to the local butcher and pay a premium of one gold coin to get one of the flying animals he'd stored in a cold room under an extremely costly Preservation Spell. On the bright side, she'd made some damn good tagliatelle with the meat.

She looked at the flower for a moment, admiring its blood red petals, and smiled, asking it a simple question: "Where may the winds bring me?"

For a moment, nothing happened.

Then, as if moved by a strong, invisible, wind, the rose bent on its stalk towards her, bowing.

Alice bowed back.

"Thank you," she said, her eyes alight with wonder and happiness. It had worked! It had really worked.

When she'd first found the rose, she'd been unsure what she was meant to do with it. Her grandma had explained it to her, even shown it to her once, using the Rose to find an edelweiss, near which they'd spent an entire day as they both 'passsed' some time with her grandpa's spirit, but she'd been young, and it had all happened over a decade prior.

Then, the night she'd told the tales of the Skinwalker, she'd gone to sleep, obtaining her new Class and, with it, what was probably the most useful Skill she could've asked for: [Occultism: Perfect Recall]. Now, whenever she tried to remember something about grandma's lessons, it would just pop back in her mind, clear as glass! That was how she'd remembered the recipe for this particular ritual. And, if that wasn't enough, she had also obtained another Skill that could potentially help her.

She used it then: "[Talisman: Enhance Power]."

...Nothing happened. Nothing visible at least. Did the Rose appear to be standing prouder on its stalk? Were its petals a bit redder? She couldn't tell. She wasn't even sure if the Rose itself counted as a talisman. Her grandma had never specified that detail. Still, worth a try. If it worked, it worked. If it didn't, it would still work, because she had followed the exact steps, said the right things and shown respect.

Some would say that that last part was useless during most rites, especially when they involved things that weren't sentient. That, as her grandma had very succinctly put it, was 'The dead imbecile's view'. When you walked down the old paths you came to understand that all things were, in a way, alive, that they interacted with the world and changed it in many ways, all voluntary. It didn't matter if you were a russian kaldun working with chorts (she'd always found them as some of the most interesting, because their traditions and stories allowed them to interact with them on a much more personal level. Also, they had little devils for pretty much anything. Sadly their knowledge was mostly lost, apparently because of the communists, or so her grandma had told her. Nowadays, only the Black Book contained all their secrets, and good luck getting that from the Vatican's vaults), a Louisiana Vodoo mumba worshipping jolly old gods, an egyptian who still remembered the old ways or a buddhist monk living in the mountains, you were bound to understand this. The only ones who never would were the christians (although, strangely, not the orthodox ones. Apparently they were more elastic) and the musulmans, for their Gods would never allow such things.

So she showed respect, like the wary kaldun calling upon a chort to do a job for her before sending him to count the blades of grass in a forest to keep him occupied when the work was done; like the mumba tying a lock of hair around a cloth doll, knowing that not showing the right amount of respect to it could mean driving a needle through her own heart; like the old egyptian who murmurs words in a little temple and asks his old gods for help, showing respect not because of some fear of consequences, but because his gods deserve that much for all they had done for those that came before and all they still tried to do even in their waning strenght; like the buddhist monk, walking down a stairway of his temple, showing respect to the world around him by loving it and all that it gave him and his brothers as he sounds small bells along the way to keep the devils away.

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She showed respect, bowing to the Rose, for if she didn't, it could decide to lead her astray. And, like following fox fires in the mires, that could be a death sentence.

When she was done, she took the vase in her hands, cradling it like she would a child, careful not to jostle the flower around too much.

She took a deep sniff of the Rose's pungent, sweet, scent.

And kissed the petals. A kiss like one you would give to a mother of father, a little peck on the cheek, if the Rose had had any cheeks to speak of.

Then, with all the daintiness of a princess taking her beloved prince's proferred hand at a ball, she wrapped her hand around the stalk of the Rose, letting the thorns pierce her skin, grinding her teeth and biting her lip hard, trying her hardest not to let a single sound escape her lips, because this was a trial, because she had to show the Rose that she wouldn't waver in front of anything on the road to that which she desired. Truth be told, it wasn't that painful after the initial pricks, and the knowledge that a healing potion was ready nearby to heal her injuries was enough to make it all bearable. Her granma hadn't been as lucky when she'd shown Alice how to do this and had spent an entire week with her hand wrapped with gauze, her old body taking a long time to heal the wounds.

When, finally, enough time had passed, she let go of the stalk, the thorns cutting through her skin clinging to the flesh of her palm until the very end, drinking in as much of her blood as they could, for the Rose had accepted her request, and now she needed her blood not to feed and grow and become greater, but to know what it was that the girl desired.

When She found out the answer to that question she was delighted: the girl wanted to Grow, to become greater than she was, stronger, just like Her, just like the blood of her blood had once desired to do. She was a seedling carried by the wind who had found a place to put roots and now desired to know in which way the soil contained more water, more nutrients, for she wanted to become More. Just like she'd allowed the Rose to do.

Then Alice spoke: "Oh Rose of Roses, greatest and most knowledgeable among your kin, please, heed my request, and bring where I may become greater."

The blood on the Rose's spines slowly dripped down the stalk, feeding into the off gray earth underneath.

Nothing happened for a moment.

And then, out of the blue, the beautiful Rose bloomed, red petals opening up, revealing even more petals inside, these ones red as her blood. The old ones began to wilt, their hue darknening and blackening, but they didn't fall off. No, not exactly. One of them fell to the ground, an invisible wind moving it away from her and down, showing her the way to go.

Alice began walking.

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It took her two hours to reach the place the Rose wanted her to get to. Every so often a whithered petal would fall away from the flower, carried in a direction by an invisible wind, and she would go that way, making sure to never stray from the path the Rose marked for her.

Initially, it had led her to the woods behind her house, away from Gunsee, into a dark place that she had seldom visited. Oh, she had walked under the boughs of these trees, watched the leaves move under the force of the wind, heard the concerts of the crickets and taken from the ground's endless bounties, from beautiful flowers to useful plants she knew from home and many others she had never seen, completely new and made for this world. Or taken from others, maybe.

But she'd never walked this deep inside. And, in any other circumstances, she would've never come this deep alone. But she knew the Rose wouldn't bring her to harm, and turning back now would destroy everything she had worked for. No, she had to be brave! Ok, that sounded so cheesy.

Finally, after walking for hours in the refreshing darkness of the forest, she reached the clearing.

All at once, the withered petals of the Rose fell to the ground, carried by that same invisible wind towards a figure on the ground in the very center of the small valley.

Alice, smiling, craddled the Rose, thanking her for her help, and walked towards the figure.

It was a man, his short brown hair plastered with sweat to his face, his hands clawing at his stomach, his complexion pale, his eyes, what little she could see when he opened them for a moment, dilated from pain and stress and fear.

"Well well, lookie lookie where the Rose tookie me."

She stopped for a moment, chuckling, before shaking her head: "Ok, that was awful Alice, never do it again."

She fell down on her knees beside the man, her hands going for a little knife on her hip, using it to break the vase where the Rose was being held, placing Her and the dirt she was planted in gently on the ground, all while she looked at the man with curiosity. Clearly, he wasn't feeling well, if his sweating and paleness and, oh, right, the fact he was clawing at his guts as if he were attempting to rip them off, were a sign.

Was he poisoned?

She looked down at the Rose, an eyebrow raised, and then chuckled: as if the flower could actually answer her.

But yes, there was a good chance he was poisoned, seeing how she had asked the Rose to bring her somewhere she could grow in Levels. And what better way for an [Occult Herbalist] to grow than to find a way to heal someone who's been poisoned?

"Hello? Who are you? I'm Alice. Pronounced with a C, not an S. And actually, I don't think you're in any state to answer me. Hmmm... how about I get you home and help you out? You're gonna owe me one."

The man on the ground grunted, she didn't know if in agreement or if it was because of the pain.

"I'll take that as a yes. Now... oh, I didn't bring anything with me. This is going to take some time. But don't worry, all's gonna be well."

Then the man lost consciousness.

"Well, fuck. Alright, Alice. Remember! First examine him, then see what you can do!"

She began by removing the belt around his middle and opening up the robes he was wearing, letting him breath more easily. She checked his pulse and found out that, unsurprisingly, it was greatly accelerated. He was also sweating buckets and his stomach seemed to be rumbling ominously.

"Please don't shit yourse -"

Promptly the sounds coming from his stomach worsened, until the man burped and started vomiting. Luckily for him, she had already turned his head to the side, preventing him from choking.

"Well, alright, that side is better than the other. Get it out and why am I talking to you you're not even awake."

She sighed and took a deep breath, calming her racing heart. This was bad, very bad, because she had no solid idea on what poison had been used on the man: vomiting, sweating and racing heartbeat were common among dozens of them: she needed something more.

And she got it a moment later as she observed the man's trembling body, in particular his hands: a rash was forming, the skin red and irritated, beginning to crack here and there.

Alright, that's another symptom. Fucking hell what I wouldn't give for a way to check his blood pressure.

Sadly this world didn't have those. Most [Doctors], which were surprisingly rare to find all over the world, eventually gained a Skill to check it and had never bothered with trying to create even a basic manometer.

Whatever, she could work with this.

"Alright champ, let's get you up. I have some things at home I can use to keep you among the living."

That said, she lifted the man with a grunt (he was surprisingly light) and began carrying him in a fireman's carry.

Nearly one and a half hours later, she got back home and found Averick there waiting for her.

"Av, I need some help here."