Ah… the world is so cruel to me… Out of seven children, two died at birth, three during war and one… completely vanished, without a trace. Now I am left with only one who shows great promise and loyalty to me and our God…
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Kai’s coarse voice reverberated through the air, yet faint and out of strength. However, that little proved to be enough to wake Onyx, whose ears twitched, and his eyes opened with a happy yet resigned look. His tail wagged weakly, but he didn’t even attempt to stand up. He knew he couldn’t. Kai looked at his companion with an expression full of despair. His arms trembled as he reached out, the Obborik’s wet fluff kissing the tip of his fingers, and tears gathered at the corner of his eye. “Onyx…” His voice cracked upon feeling Onyx’s cold, shivering body. “You’ll be ok…” He sniffed and looked toward the cliff.
With a flick of his hand, the wand appeared in his hand, and, mustering every little bit of mana left in his core, he waved it at the wall. It caved in, creating a small hole for them to sit and hide, as well as a hole at the top for ventilation.
Kneeling, he picked up Onyx’s almost limp body and dragged both himself and Onx into the cave. Heavy breaths of air left his body as he set the Obborik down, then quickly walked outside and gathered a few pieces of wood. They were damp and clearly unusable for any sort of fire, however, that was all he could grab without downright chopping a tree, not that he had the strength to do so.
Luckily, his ring held quite a few fire crystals he could use to start a fire, despite the less-than-acceptable wood quality. Placing the branches in a tent formation, he took out a decently sized fire crystal and shoved it underneath. Then, as he waited, he took the dirty clothes off his body and threw them on the fire, not even storing them in his ring. He couldn’t, not after last night, and they were beyond saving anyway.
As he waited for the fire to start, he crawled over to Onyx and did his best not to hurt him too much as he turned him over, inspecting his damaged chest. It’s getting infected… He thought with a grim expression on his face. Pair that with the rain and cold… fuck, it’s looking bad! Onyx… oh what have I done?
However, he knew full well that standing around and mopping about the situation would do little to help, but he couldn’t help but think that it was all his fault. If only Aina were here, she’d be able to treat him, she could save him… Me, I… what can I do? I’m so… fuck… I’m so useless!
He tried to pull out some herbs from the mana ring Aina gave him, however his expression darkened upon finding out that he couldn’t access it. No mana at all?! He asked himself and didn’t bother to check his mana core as he quickly sat cross-legged and forced himself to absorb mana.
Kai lacked any mana-rich plants to absorb their energy from, as they were all stored in his ring, however, he still had the technique he put together. Although its pros barely outweighed the cons, having some mana is better than having none. So he sat down and took a deep breath. The minutes passed as the mana from his surroundings slowly gathered toward his core through his veins. The slow process filled him with anxiety as he thought about Onyx’s sorry state, and what he could do to treat him.
First I need to stop the infection from spreading, and also remove it. I don’t have any good tools for that so my… claws will have to do. Then I need to give him the help he needs to regenerate naturally. I cannot perform any sort of surgery, not that I knew how to, so I can only hope that he is strong enough to bear through the pain and heal.
For that, I will need several plants filled with life essence, similar to those that Aina used in the pills. I don’t have any with that strong of a potency though, and consuming them raw will lead to problems. I need to separate the waste from the good parts and then smash them down to bits and make some sort of paste or drink. I could make a paste to cover his wound and then a medicine to drink.
The best way to extract their medicinal properties for such a thing would be to boil them, that’s for sure, but the ointment would be fine just for the outside wound. It’s the inside I’m worried about, I can’t see but his lungs are probably damaged in some way.
Besides him my body… a broken legs and several wounds, I can deal with those. They will heal, I know they will… I just want Onyx to be safe.
“Arf…”
Onyx’s soft yelps awoke Kai from his meditation, which lasted for enough time for the damp wood to crackle into flames. He sighed and checked his mana reserves. Just enough I suppose… Then he pulled out everything he needed to make the medicine for Onyx, alongside a few mana plants he planned to absorb later. Besides the plants, he also pulled out a few kitchen utensils that mysteriously disappeared from Aina’s kitchen shortly before he left.
A quick lineup of a few objects such as a mortar and pestle, a bowling pan and a normal pan, a decently sized water container, and cutlery. She can’t blame me… I can’t afford those, life on the run is expensive! He thought trying to make light of the situation, however, that didn’t help his nerves much.
Picking up a mana plant, he quickly used the technique Barhm created to absorb it. It was the same type of plant he used for experimenting, so the yield was approximately the same at about thirty percent total mana absorbed. Kai repeated the process a few times in quick succession, then, after feeling that he had enough, wasted no time to being preparation for the medicine making.
To the side, Onyx’s breath slowed down even more, his chest barely heaving and the pain in his eyes slowly fading as he closed them shut. Brower… it hwurts… His cries rang inside Kai’s mind, sending a cold shiver down his spine. Biting his lower lip, he threw the boiling pan on the fire, then picked up his wand and quickly created a small water bubble which then splashed inside of it.
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As he waited for the water to boil, he quickly took a set of plants that he knew worked well without being boiled, especially as an ointment. Luvira Magica, Rainbow Seed, Flaming Leaves… However, he needed to carefully separate the useful parts from the dregs, which wasn’t as easy as one would initially think.
The process of doing that called for control from both mana and body, as, after severing it, it was necessary to plug the newly created hole. Doing that for such a small surface without damaging the plant, however…
Fuck! Kai cursed inwardly as the red leaf within his hand dried up in less than a second, all of its life force escaping through the gap. I knew this wouldn’t be easy but… shit, but I wish I had practiced with Aina more.
Luckily for him, he had enough low-level life force plants to practice with, as he picked up a good bunch while out doing tasks and training. Now, all he needed to do was to hurry up making both medicines at the same time.
The water on the makeshift fireplace already began to boil, but Kai ignored it as he slowly picked out the useful parts and threw away the bad ones onto the fire. Whilst that had no positive effect, it did feed the flame a little more, so he couldn’t complain.
After a few minutes, he had a handful of life essence plants he could throw inside the boiling pan, which he then swiftly covered before going back to separating them. According to Aina, for a pan of that size, I need at least 500 grams of Luvira Magica and 300 grams of Flaming Leaves to create a good enough medicine. On top of that it needs to boil for at least one hour. He sighed as he repeated the same process over and over again, his failure rate slowly decreasing to almost zero as he got the hang of it.
After around thirty minutes he had everything he needed, and he quickly threw them inside the pan whilst also adding more water, then covered them back up. Alright, now on to the ointment…
With the same precision as before, he picked up a white flower in the middle of which countless, small, and frail multi-colored seeds shone with a faint light. Of this plant, the seeds are really useful for healing, while the flower is good for mana. ‘The stem is mostly useless if not in a salad.’ He sighed, remembering the joke written in the book by its author, which took down its scientific rating by a few notches.
So, he carefully inserted his finger into the plant, however, much to his dismay, all of the advanced seeds fell off and died before he could even collect them. What the… Sighing, he quickly retracted his finger, with a few more filling out. In total, about thirty percent of the seeds fell down, and he wasn’t able to successfully extract one. Is using mana the only solution… I don’t think my control is that good. He grit his teeth as he thought about it, however, knew that there wasn’t any other choice.
So, placing the mana plant down, a mana bubble formed around it, much like the one that appeared when he extracted mana from other plants. However, this time he didn’t do so, but instead he - very gently and carefully - controlled whisks of mana to wrap around the seeds, then slowly extracted them with precision.
He failed the first couple of times, of course, but the result proved to be less disastrous than if he did it manually. Unfortunately, he didn’t have any sort of true telekinesis, like the old man that crafted his wand. The only way he had to do this was by creating a mana bubble, which proved to be quite taxing to maintain, on top of having to use an extreme amount of control to pull out the seeds.
However, he managed to extract about fifty percent of the seeds without damaging them, which he then gently placed into the pestle and mortar before beginning the process again.
As time passed, a faint medicinal fragrance escaped the boiling pan. Kai took a whiff of it, and quickly finished extracting the last of the seeds within the flower, then threw it into the pastel and mortar, which now had a good amount of rainbow-colored seeds. Putting them to the side, he took off the lid and allowed a large amount of steam to float out, revealing a green, boiling liquid. Within it, shriveled-up plants floated on the surface, which Kai took out and threw away with a spoon.
Then he placed it on the cold ground, letting it cool off as he turned his attention back to the seeds. Picking up the pastel, and adding a bit of the medicinal water within the mortar, he carefully began smashing the seeds.
After about ten minutes of constant grinding, they turned into a fine, darkish-colored paste. He grabbed it along with the boiling pan and scooted over to Onyx. The sore pain in his muscles, broken leg, and wounds proved ineffective at stopping him from doing whatever he could to save his companion.
Shaking him awake, he helped him get up and lean against the wall as he brought the pan of medicine to his nose. Onyx took a whiff of it, and grimaced, but began slowly drinking it. “I know it’s bitter, but you need to drink all of it, alright? I’ll make another batch after.”
The Obborik didn’t say anything in response to Kai’s words, however, he drank the concoction even faster. Within minutes, he finished a large amount of medicine and some light seemed to have returned to his beady eyes. However, it clearly wasn’t enough as he still had a hard time breathing.
Kai gently lay him on the ground and took a closer look at his festering wound. Cringing upon seeing it get even worse, and noticing some dead skin beginning to rot, he gulped. Decisively, he released his sharp claws and approached the Obborik’s wound. Onyx flinched slightly, however, he didn’t protest his companion’s actions. The boy’s claw brushed against Onyx’s skin, shaving off the dead skin the best he could. However, not being used to using his claws in such a refined manner, and lacking any sort of surgical skills proved to be a big problem.
“Awro!”
Onyx cried out as Kai touched his skin, and some blood dripped out of the fresh wound. His heart dropped, and he quickly pulled away his hand. “Shh, I’m sorry, it’s going to be okay, alright?” He said softly, patting Onyx’s soft fur and calming him down. The Obborik licked his snout and lay his head down, then he closed his eyes and did his best to relax his body.
Alright… Kai thought and re-began the process of cutting off the dead skin. This time he worked to be more careful, and he heaved a sigh of relief after a couple of minutes. Wiping off the sweat that gathered on his forehead, he quickly took the cool ointment and carefully rubbed it on Onyx’s skin. His blazing skin trembled slightly upon contact with the cream, but he didn’t protest and simply endured it.
“Phew…” Kai groaned as he finished, leaning back and staring at the slightly dark ceiling. “You stay put now, alright. I’ll prepare more medicine for you.” He said and noticed the dwindling of the crackling fire. Taking a look outside, he quickly searched for branches and twigs nearby, then dropped them on the fire crystal and rekindled the fire. He then hurried and separated another two sets of medicinal plants for two more medicines, then threw one inside the boiling pan which he once again filled with water.
Just as he got a good amount of focus though, his concentration got disturbed by a low, pained cry from Onyx. He dropped whatever he was doing and hurried on over to his companion’s side, however he couldn’t see anything immediately wrong. Touching his fur, he noticed his body began to heat up like boiling water, and his heart instantly dropped.
Onyx!