I woke, not having remembered falling asleep, or passing out at all. To my surprise, a somewhat familiar face was leaning over me. The face of a young woman, wearing university robes, with a symbol of Effervesce hanging around her neck. Last time I had seen her, she’d been marked as a true fourth circle caster, but now, she was marked as a true fifth, capable of stretching to sixth. Her hands were hovering over my heart, and a mixture of gold and white light cascaded from them and into my chest.

  “We’ve got to stop meeting like this,” I said, my voice hoarse. “I have a boyfriend, you know.”

  The woman didn’t even crack a smile at my joke, merely shaking her head.

  “We wouldn’t if you didn’t keep doing stupid things,” she said. “What happened? The Erudite brought you and a bunch of others in. Were you directly fighting one of those aberrants during the mass breakout?”

  “Something like that,” I said, grimacing. “We killed the one who got them in. One escaped, but the rest are dead. Also fought something sent by one of the dark gods. Was wrapped up in all this.”

  It wasn’t technically a lie, but it kept enough of the truth away from the healer that I didn’t feel guilty for putting her in danger.

  “Hmm. That’s a fair excuse, I suppose,” she said. “If you can testify to it under truth spell and with witnesses, you’ll have a good bit of coin coming your way.”

  I slumped my head against the pillow. I’d honestly forgotten that there was a reward for killing the dark sect members. It was a small consolation for Yushin losing her family, but it was something.

  “You said that Henry brought in more people?” I asked. “How are they doing? Yushin, Jackson, Salem, Shé Rui, and Martha, right?”

  “Yes, that’s right. I’m guessing they were your companions? They’re doing alright.”

  “Can you be more specific?”

  “Do you want the truth? Or do you just want to wait and see for yourself?”

  “Give it to me straight,” I said.

  “Salem and Jackson both sustained lots of internal organ damage and some external damage. Both are being healed, and they’ll be fine. Their mental condition is also surprisingly good, considering how the rest of them are.”

  I nodded along as the doctor moved to one of my arms, her healing magic seeping into it.

  “Martha will probably need to learn the force prosthesis ritual, or else get one made by an artificer. There are few people in the city I know of who are capable of re-growing a limb. She’s also on watch for her depressive state, though that’s common with limb loss. Rui is fine physically, but his spirit is in bad shape. His Dao was put under massive stress, and it fractured his core. If he was still young, he’d be able to heal in a few months or a year, but these things tend to worsen with age. He’s likely to be limited in how much chi he can use for at least five years. At least his Dao wasn’t broken. If it had been, his core would have shattered.”

  “That makes sense. He was betrayed by his family, and with that as his Dao…”

  The woman winced, but nodded, then moved onto someone I didn’t expect – me.

  “You’re physically mostly fine, but your ether pool is in terrible shape. I’ve never seen anything like it, personally. You’re to do strictly no casting for at least six weeks. Maybe up to twelve, if things go poorly. Even after that, you’re likely to have some minor to moderate pain for a month or so while casting. And the permanent damage... we will have to see.”

  “Can I do one or–”

  “No,” she said, cutting me off. “No casting. Not even a cantrip. Do you understand?”

  “I understand,” I said, letting out a sigh.

  “If you can afford it, we’d also recommend a potion regimen, twice daily, for the next month, and you’re lucky that you’re young – the potion’s magic leans on the suppleness of youth, rather than the rigid density of age. We’re not keen on asking for payment for simple healing, but the potions are hard to make, and require rare ingredients. We’re actually taking a loss by selling them to you at this price. They take about four hundred silver worth of components, but we sell them for two hundred and fifty. If you can’t do the full course, I’d still recommend getting as many as you can.”

  If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

  She said it so firmly and sincerely that I actually believed her.

  “What if I don’t do it? That’s fifteen thousand silver total,” I said. “Does it just speed my recovery, or what?”

  “No, it helps ensure recovery. The damage you did is… severe. Think of it like a broken bone. Sometimes, a break can be left alone and it will heal fine. Other times, it needs a cast. But spirits are a lot more unruly than the body, and are harder to predict. Especially since it’s hard for neophyte wizards to actually damage their ether pool.”

  “The price isn’t a concern, Ellie,” a familiar voice said. “Put it on my tab. Full price, not the discounted one for the public.”

  Henry strode into the room, looking in far better shape than when we’d met under similar circumstances the year before. The healer – Ellie, I assumed – nodded to the Erudite, and continued her work.

  “I’ll leave as soon as I’m finished,” she said firmly, her voice brooking no room for debate. Henry nodded and leaned against a wall, closing his eyes. As he did, I looked at Ellie.

  “And Yushin?”

  “She is… well, her spirit is in worse shape than yours. Did the dark sect use some weird version of consume bloodline on her?”

  “Something of the sort,” I agreed. “It looked bad.”

  “It was,” Ellie agreed. “She’s taken severe damage to the parts of the spirit where life enforcement and a bloodline used to be. Her ether pool is fine, but even factoring in her youth, a more intensive potion regimen, and the fact cultivation is far more likely to damage the spirit and thus far more healing remedies exist for it, I’m not sure she’s ever going to be able to cultivate again. Certainly not if she can’t gain a new bloodline.”

  “I see,” I said, squirming to sit up some. “And her mental state? You’ve avoided that.”

  Ellie visibly winced at my question and lowered her hands.

  “It’s not good. Not the Creep, but normal loss and depression could be just as dangerous to her. She’s being watched.”

  “I’ve already spoken to her, as well as to the healer with her,” Henry said, cracking an eye open. “I’ve paid for treatment, and I believe she will recover, mentally speaking.”

  “Well, that’s good,” Ellie said, though she sounded dubious. “I’m just about wrapped with this healing, and then you two can talk.”

  True to her word, after only a few more minutes, she cleaned her hands off, nodded to me, bowed to Henry, and then left the room. Henry stretched and stood, nodding to me.

  “Well, kid. I admit, when I felt you use the disintegrate I left you, I almost didn’t check on you. Still hunting the packs of imps in the city, you see. If I’d been tangled up with the aberrant, I definitely would have ignored it. Glad I didn’t though. Imagine my surprise when I check to see how you used it, though, and find that you killed the Avatar of the Traitor Wyrm.”

  “So you know about that?”

  “I pieced it together after the fact,” Henry said. “The dark sect was working for the Divine King, trying to kill his niece before she could be turned into an avatar. Since Tywyll’s potion got them thinking it couldn’t be Yushin, they needed a city-wide attack to force the person to use their bloodline without having the time for protection spells, and without them being behind my wards on campus.”

  “Quite a convenient time to attack,” I said. “Are you sure it was an accident?”

  “What? Of course it wasn’t. We’re still doing a thorough investigation, but it seems like right after exam period was chosen on purpose. For one, the reason your little ritual was today was because it was the day the Traitor Wyrm reached his status as a divine. They had to do it before sunset. They’d also been taking some third years that were re-doing third year and putting pressure on them, trying to force them to snap. Increasing loan shark pressure, worsening illnesses, putting familial pressures, all that sort of thing. Exams were the pressure on top. They intercepted some results, and then made the failing students think they failed, added some debtors looking for money, and some familial pressure…”

  “That’s rough. But why were they all in debt?”

  “It’s hard to maintain a scholarship if you’re failing an entire year's worth of courses,” the Erudite said, and I flushed, feeling a bit foolish.

  “I should thank you. For teleporting us back, and for paying for the healing courses.”

  “Oh, don’t be,” the Erudite said, waving his hand. “The High King is really the one paying for it. He’s been able to wring the Divine King’s arm over this incident. He still refuses to admit that he sent them, but even as a rogue faction? Well, if a group of mages did this in Shen Long, he’d be demanding recompense. Not to mention, with only a few hundred casualties, he and Cendel come out looking the next best thing to invincible.”

  A frown crossed Henry’s face, and he sighed.

  “I wish I’d focused more on statesmanship than stealth this year,” he said. “He’s going to want to meet you all eventually.”

  “What? Why?”

  “Well, let’s see,” Henry said, rolling his eyes as if I was thick. “You’ve been involved in the death of the Dreki Matriarch. You defeated Gerhard, the new Dreki leader, in front of everyone. You and your group were involved in killing the dark sect members. You summoned the saint who put down one of the aberrants in the city. You were the primary caster for a curse spell that sealed the power of a god, or at least forced him to take an actual, permanent wound to break. Then you and your group killed the Avatar of that god.”

  “There are a lot of circumstances surrounding those events,” I pointed out. “All of them took months of preparation, and often the backing of people far more powerful than I was.”

  “True. But unless my course has taught you less than I’d hoped, you should know that the best friend of a wizard is preparation. Do you know the last time someone in Cendel managed feats like you and your group?”

  “When you were rising?” I asked, and Henry shrugged.

  “No, I’m a bit too old for that. But it was about forty years ago, when a young woman named Olivine was making a splash. Do you know what Olivine is doing now?”

  The name struck a bell in my mind, and after a second or two, I placed it, snapping my fingers.

  “She’s Cendel’s second Erudite! One with an ether affinity, if I recall correctly.”

  “Exactly. Her friends went on to become a top professor, a planeswalker, and a member of the High King’s court. You and your friends seem poised to do the same. Which brings me to my next points: your summer plans, and your rewards.”

  Patreon Here!

  Discord Here!