Step.
Heal.
Regenerate.
Step.
Heal.
Regenerate.
Haze coated the battlefield, a miasma of death. Dust, dirt, sand, metallic shavings, and a thousand other things floating through the air, making people cough now and then. Nothing particularly deadly. Maybe a minor increase in lung cancer down the line.
In the hands of a Forbidden Miasma Classer, it could be the start of a potent weapon. Even in the throes of a vicious civil war, I’d seen no widespread use of any of the Forbidden Four elements. Granted, I’d only seen one battle, but my naive understanding of the Forbidden Four is once it came into play, it was impossible to put the genie back in the bottle.
Either there was a single line people weren’t willing to cross, or anyone who started to walk that path met a swift end.
Every step moved the radius of life around me, pulling another from the fate of a slow death. My [Wheel] range was large enough that I was encompassing three to thirty new people every time I took a single step. [Cosmic Presence] had a dramatically larger radius than [Wheel of Sun and Moon], and I was going slowly, my mana constantly at 0. Going slowly let [Cosmic Presence] work for minutes on people before I showed up, and that was like getting hours of healing before I got to them. It wasn’t tons, but it stopped all but the worst cases from dying before I got to them, and made [Wheel’s] healing cheaper by the time I finally did arrive.
I was spending most of my time on the Yan side of the battlefield. The winning Chu soldiers were organizing, heading out to the battlefield in teams and picking up their wounded comrades. I noted divisions in their ranks, some soldiers stepped over or on for people to pick up a less wounded person and haul them back. From giving them an arm to lean on, to throwing them over a shoulder or placing them on a stretcher, dragging them back to the questionable safety of their side, and their own medics and healers.
Part of me was rabidly curious why some soldiers were being ignored in favor of others, but another part of me cautioned against knowing.
I was trying to keep track of everything going around me, but [The World Around Me] had a limited range, and while I could move my eyes in two different directions, I could only face one way at a time.
I kept my head on a swivel, reminding myself time after time about plausible deniability. It was pretty shot at this point - nobody at 128 could heal at the scale I was operating at - but it wasn’t entirely gone. Many of the people I passed took their sweet time getting back up, a number of Yan soldiers electing to continue playing dead. That, and the sheer radius I was operating under. A keen-eyed [Analyst] might work it out, but for the most part, I was vaguely, plausibly, not the cause. It meant I couldn’t twist my neck all the way around - I was trying to look human. I couldn’t sprint at high speeds - I shouldn’t have the speed for it. I let myself trip and fall a few times when I stumbled on blood-slicked armor.
I kept a careful eye on and ear out for Iona and Auri, my girlfriend staring down a [Great General] with weapons barred. Then to my eternal surprise, the general sheathed his sword and Iona rammed the butt of her glaive into the ground, the two of them shaking hands.
I watched with an open mouth as the general gestured, and one of his aides handed over a fat jingling pouch of coins.
I thought they were going to murder each other!? How’d Iona manage to get paid instead!?
I mean, I’d overheard the conversation, but I was utterly baffled.
Equally surprising was a series of orders were barked out, and most of the Chu troops withdrew from the field. Only the scavengers were left.
Ugh. Even the Chu soldiers hauling their friends back to the infirmary abandoned the field.
Iona wasted no time, [Frost Wyvern’s Fang] conjuring up her powerful shortbow and some arrows. She let loose at the scavengers who were flaying the metal off dead dullahans, her [Trick Shots] neatly pinning their loose clothes to the stripping frame, another pair of arrows disarming them entirely.
The message was clear. Go away, or else.
They fled, and Fenrir landed. Iona climbed onto his head, handing the pouch of coins to Nina as she passed. Iona then stood proud as Fenrir lifted his head up high, giving her a commanding view of the battlefield. Nina secured the coins in one of Fenrir’s endless saddlebags, then the [Squire] scrambled up his neck and stood next to her mentor, acting as a second pair of eyes.
Iona only needed to act once more. A looter had found resistance from one of the bodies he was trying to rob, and lifted a rock up high. Iona shot a pair of arrows through his eyes, instantly killing him.
A warning shot to people Iona disapproved of, and lethal repercussions after.
The Yan soldiers quickly realized that another had taken to the field, and they seized the opportunity, getting up and bailing off the field. I was slowed down a bit by the Chu no longer pulling bodies off, but I could still heal at the rate of a person every second or five, depending on the severity of their injuries.
I worked my way back to Iona, choosing to get almost three hundred people inside my radius so I could talk with her. Why not get two things done at once?
“Keep an eye out.” She told Nina. “Let me know if anyone’s misbehaving.” The blonde said that last part in a domineering way, her voice booming over the battlefield. Just because the frozen sentinel was no longer standing on top of the wyvern’s head, didn’t mean she wasn’t watching, waiting, and ready.
“How did you do that!?” I hissed at her. Iona shot me a cocky grin.
“Well! It was easy. I just… asked very nicely.” She said.
I tried to punch her, remembering that I needed to move slowly. It was torture, and Iona was able to snort in amusement before effortlessly side-stepping.
“For real.” I complained. “How?!”
Iona’s smirk vanished, and she got serious.
“Reputation.” She said. “Reputation, and knowing what they prize. Valkyries have a reputation here, a strong one. The [Great General] knew that when I placed myself in a position, I’d have to fight for it, even if it was to the death. Even if it was entirely suicidal. In the right position, with the right cause, against the right people, I might be able to get through a third of his army before I was taken down. He knew it, I knew it. It would be terribly expensive morale-wise just to marshal his troops up and out again, and to take on a single Valkyrie? Right after a devastating battle? But he couldn’t just give up. He couldn’t just walk away. I couldn’t make demands, and expect him to follow it. I needed to give him face. I needed to give him a reason to pull his troops back, to concede the battlefield to us. That way, he didn’t lose any standing with his troops, and can declare it a victory of sorts. I knew it, he knew it.”
Iona was beaming with pride.
“I got him to hire us.” She coughed twice in the foul air. There was nothing particularly devastating, it was simply the post-battle haze.
“What.” I was coldly furious, but willing to hear her out. Iona knew that the Sixth had been hired by another faction. She knew I had to get back to them. She’d been the one complaining that she couldn’t stick with armies, that they tended to misbehave.
And now she’d sold her services as a mercenary!? That wasn’t what the conversation I’d heard sounded like! I knew there had to be a good explanation, but the phrasing and situation pissed me off.
Too many people had died, my temper was already frayed. I knew it, and tried to get a leash on it.
The Valkyrie shook her head.
“Sorry, not like that. Specifically, you’re hired to heal people and clear the battlefield, and you’re strongly invited to go through his camp as well. I’m part of the package deal to keep you safe. It’s a common arrangement. Alruna traveled like that all the time.”
Iona gave me a significant look.
“They’re not dumb though, they know you’re far stronger than you look. They’ll take a shot at you if they sense weakness, but for now, they’re happy to use and abuse you to get their troops up and fighting fit as quickly as possible.”
The Valkyrie paused, then stressed her next words.
“They will do everything they can to kidnap you, throw you in chains, and force you to be their pet healer until they can’t get away with it anymore. We both know what would happen if they succeed, so let’s not let them.”
I was calming down. That mostly made sense. One part I didn’t get though.
“Why are they alright with us healing the Yan soldiers as well? Weren’t they trying to kill them all so they couldn’t, I dunno, regroup and attack them again later?”
Iona rapped her knuckles on one of Fenrir’s armor plates.
“Because of what I said earlier. They knew a fight would be too expensive. The math doesn’t work out. They’d lose far too many troops killing us to be worth it. They had just seen me fight Pang Nuan to a standstill.”
Iona hesitated a moment, and continued.
“However, I’ve probably embarrassed the general somewhat. The odds of him trying to send assassins after me if we sleep nearby are extremely high. It’s probably best if we don’t sleep until we’re done here.”
Iona looked up at Nina and chewed her tongue.
“Nina’s clearly a vulnerable point here. They might think whisking her away would act as leverage. It wouldn’t - we have a reputation of going utterly berserk when our squires are targeted - but a reputation only matters so long as people know about it. They might not.”
Iona chewed her tongue for a few more seconds. I kept my mouth shut. It was her squire, her choice.
“She should stay and help.” Iona decided. “The risk is manageable, the rewards will be fantastic, and she’ll get to see our work up close and personal. I’ve needed to keep her out of the action too often.”
“I’ll keep a permanent eye on her.” I promised. “Auri, think you can help Nina as well?”
Iona frowned at that, but said nothing.
“Brrrpt…” A sleepy bird responded.
I looked around. Most of the people were healed well enough, eating every bit of mana as quickly as I got it. I shook my head, noting how my hair was feeling off.
Ugh. It was acting like a small dustnet, and I didn’t need to be fully present like I was in a fight or on an op. The vanity through Auri’s bond was starting to itch at me, demanding that I take care of myself, that I preen myself to magnificent heights. My tunic was soaked in blood, and there wasn’t a single white spot from the knees down. I had ichor on my elbow, grease on my hands, and I’d sweated through my torn clothes.
I was a hot mess.
I wasn’t directly representing Exterreri, but I was indirectly representing the Valkyries, and all wandering healers. If I put on a good show, if I looked my utter best, it’d nudge people a little. Make them like me, make them like Iona and her sisters more. It’d make everyone’s job a little easier. Negotiations would go smoother. It would-
I gave myself up for lost, spun off a parallel thought process, and walled it away to yammer on in its own corner. I couldn’t completely ignore it, no, it was me, they were my own thoughts. It wasn’t like I could tune them out, but I could make sure they didn’t overtake me entirely.
It took me another hour to clear the battlefield, and then it was onto the camps.
We went to the Chu’s camp first for a variety of reasons. The easiest being that they were right there and established as a camp. The Yan army was still fleeing and regrouping. It was also easier on Iona’s arrangement to go directly from one place to another.
I debated how I wanted to do this. The sun was starting to go down, occasionally obscured by clouds, and a solid portion of the army were back in their 5-man tents, taking a break instead of sitting around a cookpot with their fellows.
A disproportionate number of the people who’d chosen to rest in their tents were injured and trying to take it easy, so it wasn’t like I could ignore them.
There was no rush, and [Imbue] came with a hefty mana penalty, before how bad it looked came into play. ‘Hi yes I’m running through your camp hitting people with a strong Radiance spell I promise it’s all good’.
Nothing for it but to do it manually. I had no issues getting blood on my hands, or getting up close and personal.
The camp didn’t look super organized. There were winding paths through, and a couple of larger, muddy ‘thoroughfares’, but broadly it looked more like a wild free for all, with people pitching their tents wherever they wanted.
Auri was on my shoulder, looking like she wanted to take a snooze. I felt a pang of guilt over how I’d arranged our resources. The bulk of our food supplies - and all of our juice - was inside [Vault of Ages], with no jugs tied to Fenrir. Why would we? They spilled easily with all the turns he did, no matter how well they were sealed, and it was easier to travel like this. We’d fed her some dry snacks, but the poor bird was completely wrung out.
The gnawing hunger was starting to chew at my insides, but I put it off. Tried to ignore it. I’d rest when I was done, or when I passed out.
[Sunrise] made that last one improbable.
Nina was walking behind me, her morphic weapon shaped into a mace. She slowly slapped the end of it into the palm of her hand, doing her best to look menacing.
Young teenagers at level 60 did not look menacing, no matter what padded armor they were wearing.
Iona, on the other hand, loomed behind me, her gaze steely and her hand on her axe. Her shield and glaive were crossed against her back.
She was on my side, and I was intimidated.
The first tent had a man and a woman dullahan staring at a bubbling helmet-turned-pot with thousand-yard stares, their battered armor still on, bloody spears dropped in the mud.
A third member of their team was lying in the tent, bloody bandages already starting to soak through. With the dullahan’s unusual constitution, his head was secured in an iron lockbox with a pillow on the bottom. The tip of an arrow had been snapped off inside of him and was dangerously close to a lung.
“Hi!” I dredged up what little cheer I had left, channeling it and hoping it’d be enough. “I’m a healer. Can I help your friend?”
At first I thought maybe they hadn’t heard me, or didn’t speak Hakka. Nina tried some sort of cough-squeak-thing, and with the way she instantly reddened and stepped back, had completely fumbled what she was trying to do.
Slowly, the man turned to face us, his stare unblinking, his gaze still a thousand miles away.
“...No.” He eventually said, turning back to the cookpot. A beaten spoon was dipped in, and without ceremony or pause he took a mouthful, chewing before swallowing.
I checked over the patient again. I couldn’t tell for sure, but I’d be shocked if he didn’t end up getting a nasty infection, even under the aegis of [Cosmic Presence]. He was still bleeding slowly, and would be a cold corpse come morning.
I waited another minute to be polite - [Cosmic Presence] was working full-blast, and I was finally just getting off the 0 mana baseline - before realizing that they weren’t going to say or do anything more.
I glanced at Iona, unsure how to proceed. I could just force my way in, but that was starting a whole host of trouble that would cause me more grief in the long run. I wanted to heal everyone in the camp, not get a dozen tents in before getting chased off.
Iona got what I was asking. She took off her helmet, sat down at the fire, and pulled some dried rations out of her waistpack, tossing them into the stew.
“Cheers.” She said. “Listen, we’re going to help your friend.” Iona’s voice went from friendly to steely in an instant. “Nobody wants him to die.”
Silence met her declaration. Iona waited a heartbeat, then turned her head towards me and gave a tiny nod.
I don’t know what arcane charisma calculations were going on in her head, but I trusted them. Not daring to break the peace, softly, quietly, but without sneaking, I slipped into the tent behind them.
I adjusted my mental image slightly, going from ‘battlefield survival’ to ‘full heal’, and tapped the dullahan with my toe.
Life spread through him. A great screeching filled the tent as metal ground on metal as his skin shifted and realigned itself to its proper arrangement. The arrow dissolved like it never existed, and his breathing smoothed.
He started to stir, and I got out of there.
I wasn’t in it for the thanks. I wasn’t in it for the accolade. I was in it for life, for healing, for the art, the craft, the defiant dance against the two-faced grim reaper.
“Next tent.” I said, watching my mana shoot up with pleasure.
A bit of time here, and my mana would be high enough to actually do something by the time we made it to the triage tents.
There was going to be a murder.
Iona faced off against a dozen muscular guards, the weakest one at level 375 and the strongest with three classes. Lightning practically shot between the two sides as they faced off, neither willing to yield.
Nina was posturing next to Iona, and doing a bang-up job of it. Somewhere in the last few hours she’d found her confidence, and was willing to push people around who were many times her level. Her level was steadily rising through the trials and difficulties, and I had to mentally applaud Iona’s decision to bring her with us.
Iona barked out words in a language I didn’t know, and the guards hardened their stance.
I got the general gist of the problem.
We were at one of the major triage tents where the wounded were being attended to, and the healers were in high demand.
The [Healers] were also one of the ‘softest’ targets in an army, and one of the hardest to replace. They shared a hallowed distinction with [Strategists], [Enchanters], [Alchemists], and other related high-level support staff where the classes took years to train and level properly, could be a huge force multiplier, and were generally non-combat. It made them tasty targets for assassination, given that removing one could cripple a significant portion of an army.
No healer? Wounded troops died or were forced off the battlefield forever, doomed to go back to their burnt-out farm and spend years limping around with one leg, trying to eke a living out of the ground.
Healer? They were back in the fight the next day.
[Alchemists] and [Enchanters] were similarly potent, and a smart [Strategist] was the difference between a roaring victory and a massive rout. In most armies [Smiths] were just as valuable, but dullahan’s natural affinity towards Metal and their own bodies clad in ingots made [Smiths] a little less crucial here.
We weren’t dullahans.
We weren’t part of the army.
The [Guards] here absolutely did not want to risk one of their few remaining [Healers] getting bumped off, and Iona just screamed danger. Her fighting Peng Nuan to a standstill had ripped through the army like a wildfire, and she was broadly considered the [Heroine] of the day. Minds with more twists than mine, more devious than Odysseus, considered the possibility that Iona was here to assassinate one of their few remaining medics.
Nevermind that she was accompanied by another [Healer]; it was clearly just all a giant ploy. Even Iona’s honeyed tongue, capable of turning a fight into gems, wasn’t getting us inside the tent.
[Cosmic Presence] was penetrating though, so I was doing some good, much to the surprise of the numerous [Aides] inside. Not enough [Healers], but plenty of volunteers. Children of the soldiers running up and down, bringing cups of water and cold rations to the injured. Teenagers cleaning bloodied bandages with water or skill. [Apprentices] placing and replacing splints. All of them surrounded and were directed by a few senior [Healers], directing the entire fiasco with the grace of conductors, swiftly moving from patient to patient. They poured what little mana they had regenerated into them before moving onto the next crisis.
Iona and the guards were still arguing, bitter words passed back and forth, hands on weapons. A few were even drawn by the lower-leveled guards, who knew that if it came to a fight they’d need the preparation advantage to have a hope of keeping up.
They were doing their job, and frankly, doing it fairly well. When the roles were reversed, when I was trying to manage a Legion triage tent in the near future, I’d want the august members of the Sixth to be keeping out random people. Especially a ‘low level’ healer who was accompanied by a potential high-level assassin.
I completely understood where they were coming from. It didn’t mean I agreed with them.
“Love.” I plastered a pleasant smile on my face, speaking in English, sure that everyone could see right through my acting. “Don’t react too hard, and don’t get too deep into a fight. I’m going to fix this.”
Iona glanced at me out of the side of her eye, before refocusing.
“You sure? There’s a few more tents after this one, I don’t think it’ll work.” Bless the woman, she’d instantly divined what I was planning.
“Better one than none, and I’ve got a plan.”
She lifted an eyebrow and stepped back. Iona relaxed her shoulders and changed her posture, standing down. A hand on Nina’s shoulder brought her back a few steps and protected the squire behind her mentor.
“Go.” She said, and I was off like a shot.
My plausible deniability was almost completely in shambles, and with my original, natural appearance to boot. My big hope to salvage it all at this point was to never be seen again like this, and to go far, far away. Add in the fancy cosmetics I had, and I’d look like a new woman.
I was fast. I wasn’t the fastest woman alive or anything, but with how the speed stat had sharply diminishing returns - cube root - my biomancy changes multiplying my base was currently worth hundreds of thousands of points in speed. Points that, when combined with my stature and the element of surprise, had me blaze past the guards.
My speed advantage wasn’t quite enough - hard to run through people - and one of the guards managed to grab my tunic as I dodged the swinging sword of a second one. The tunic was fragile, unreinforced cloth, but instead of letting it rip and slowing me down, I just [Rapid Reshelved] it into the tent, ‘juggling’ it.
Not caring that I was half-naked, past the line of guards, I ducked into the tent and moved.
First up was a second cast of [Rapid Reshelving], instantly redressing myself.
I had the same image up still, [Persistent Casting] meaning I didn’t need to think about it anymore, and I sprinted down the aisle, tapping every foot I passed, changing the prognosis of half the patients if not more.
I did feel a little bad about freaking most of the [Healers] out though. I was a blur to their senses, looking like an assassin out for their blood. One of them was far enough down the tent that they had the time to duck and cover, while their assistants boldly arrayed themselves in front of the medic, entirely willing to sacrifice themselves to give the healer a slightly better chance of staying alive.
It was fortunate that I wasn’t after their head, just their experience. Interestingly, one of the medics was over the famed 256 threshold, painting a target on their head for other nations. He completely ignored me, continuing to operate on his patient.
I supposed, like me, when they had an entire army at their back in the middle of a vicious meatgrinder in the first place, there wasn’t exactly much more to fear. What were they going to do… send more armies after them? The Han Empire was a bloody mess.
I didn’t know if he had upgraded his second class yet or not. I didn’t know if it would do anything.
But I was Elaine, the [Mother of Modern Medicine]. My manuscripts had changed the world, had shaped the art as the world knew it today. Night and Arachne had mentioned the potency effect, where the less I did, the more impact and weight it had.
I conjured a single harmless [Kaleidoscope] butterfly and sent it his way, deftly controlling it as I flew down the path, going back and forth like I was skiing, tapping everything I could. The butterfly alit on his nose and I twisted my neck around, shaping and pitching my voice.
I didn’t know if it would do anything.
It could do nothing.
It might do everything.
“With my blessing.” I whispered.
Step.
Heal.
Regenerate.
Step.
Heal.
Regenerate.
Haze coated the battlefield, a miasma of death. Dust, dirt, sand, metallic shavings, and a thousand other things floating through the air, making people cough now and then. Nothing particularly deadly. Maybe a minor increase in lung cancer down the line.
In the hands of a Forbidden Miasma Classer, it could be the start of a potent weapon. Even in the throes of a vicious civil war, I’d seen no widespread use of any of the Forbidden Four elements. Granted, I’d only seen one battle, but my naive understanding of the Forbidden Four is once it came into play, it was impossible to put the genie back in the bottle.
Either there was a single line people weren’t willing to cross, or anyone who started to walk that path met a swift end.
Every step moved the radius of life around me, pulling another from the fate of a slow death. My [Wheel] range was large enough that I was encompassing three to thirty new people every time I took a single step. [Cosmic Presence] had a dramatically larger radius than [Wheel of Sun and Moon], and I was going slowly, my mana constantly at 0. Going slowly let [Cosmic Presence] work for minutes on people before I showed up, and that was like getting hours of healing before I got to them. It wasn’t tons, but it stopped all but the worst cases from dying before I got to them, and made [Wheel’s] healing cheaper by the time I finally did arrive.
I was spending most of my time on the Yan side of the battlefield. The winning Chu soldiers were organizing, heading out to the battlefield in teams and picking up their wounded comrades. I noted divisions in their ranks, some soldiers stepped over or on for people to pick up a less wounded person and haul them back. From giving them an arm to lean on, to throwing them over a shoulder or placing them on a stretcher, dragging them back to the questionable safety of their side, and their own medics and healers.
Part of me was rabidly curious why some soldiers were being ignored in favor of others, but another part of me cautioned against knowing.
I was trying to keep track of everything going around me, but [The World Around Me] had a limited range, and while I could move my eyes in two different directions, I could only face one way at a time.
I kept my head on a swivel, reminding myself time after time about plausible deniability. It was pretty shot at this point - nobody at 128 could heal at the scale I was operating at - but it wasn’t entirely gone. Many of the people I passed took their sweet time getting back up, a number of Yan soldiers electing to continue playing dead. That, and the sheer radius I was operating under. A keen-eyed [Analyst] might work it out, but for the most part, I was vaguely, plausibly, not the cause. It meant I couldn’t twist my neck all the way around - I was trying to look human. I couldn’t sprint at high speeds - I shouldn’t have the speed for it. I let myself trip and fall a few times when I stumbled on blood-slicked armor.
I kept a careful eye on and ear out for Iona and Auri, my girlfriend staring down a [Great General] with weapons barred. Then to my eternal surprise, the general sheathed his sword and Iona rammed the butt of her glaive into the ground, the two of them shaking hands.
I watched with an open mouth as the general gestured, and one of his aides handed over a fat jingling pouch of coins.
I thought they were going to murder each other!? How’d Iona manage to get paid instead!?
I mean, I’d overheard the conversation, but I was utterly baffled.
Equally surprising was a series of orders were barked out, and most of the Chu troops withdrew from the field. Only the scavengers were left.
Ugh. Even the Chu soldiers hauling their friends back to the infirmary abandoned the field.
Iona wasted no time, [Frost Wyvern’s Fang] conjuring up her powerful shortbow and some arrows. She let loose at the scavengers who were flaying the metal off dead dullahans, her [Trick Shots] neatly pinning their loose clothes to the stripping frame, another pair of arrows disarming them entirely.
The message was clear. Go away, or else.
They fled, and Fenrir landed. Iona climbed onto his head, handing the pouch of coins to Nina as she passed. Iona then stood proud as Fenrir lifted his head up high, giving her a commanding view of the battlefield. Nina secured the coins in one of Fenrir’s endless saddlebags, then the [Squire] scrambled up his neck and stood next to her mentor, acting as a second pair of eyes.
Iona only needed to act once more. A looter had found resistance from one of the bodies he was trying to rob, and lifted a rock up high. Iona shot a pair of arrows through his eyes, instantly killing him.
A warning shot to people Iona disapproved of, and lethal repercussions after.
The Yan soldiers quickly realized that another had taken to the field, and they seized the opportunity, getting up and bailing off the field. I was slowed down a bit by the Chu no longer pulling bodies off, but I could still heal at the rate of a person every second or five, depending on the severity of their injuries.
I worked my way back to Iona, choosing to get almost three hundred people inside my radius so I could talk with her. Why not get two things done at once?
“Keep an eye out.” She told Nina. “Let me know if anyone’s misbehaving.” The blonde said that last part in a domineering way, her voice booming over the battlefield. Just because the frozen sentinel was no longer standing on top of the wyvern’s head, didn’t mean she wasn’t watching, waiting, and ready.
“How did you do that!?” I hissed at her. Iona shot me a cocky grin.
“Well! It was easy. I just… asked very nicely.” She said.
I tried to punch her, remembering that I needed to move slowly. It was torture, and Iona was able to snort in amusement before effortlessly side-stepping.
“For real.” I complained. “How?!”
Iona’s smirk vanished, and she got serious.
“Reputation.” She said. “Reputation, and knowing what they prize. Valkyries have a reputation here, a strong one. The [Great General] knew that when I placed myself in a position, I’d have to fight for it, even if it was to the death. Even if it was entirely suicidal. In the right position, with the right cause, against the right people, I might be able to get through a third of his army before I was taken down. He knew it, I knew it. It would be terribly expensive morale-wise just to marshal his troops up and out again, and to take on a single Valkyrie? Right after a devastating battle? But he couldn’t just give up. He couldn’t just walk away. I couldn’t make demands, and expect him to follow it. I needed to give him face. I needed to give him a reason to pull his troops back, to concede the battlefield to us. That way, he didn’t lose any standing with his troops, and can declare it a victory of sorts. I knew it, he knew it.”
Iona was beaming with pride.
“I got him to hire us.” She coughed twice in the foul air. There was nothing particularly devastating, it was simply the post-battle haze.
“What.” I was coldly furious, but willing to hear her out. Iona knew that the Sixth had been hired by another faction. She knew I had to get back to them. She’d been the one complaining that she couldn’t stick with armies, that they tended to misbehave.
And now she’d sold her services as a mercenary!? That wasn’t what the conversation I’d heard sounded like! I knew there had to be a good explanation, but the phrasing and situation pissed me off.
Too many people had died, my temper was already frayed. I knew it, and tried to get a leash on it.
The Valkyrie shook her head.
“Sorry, not like that. Specifically, you’re hired to heal people and clear the battlefield, and you’re strongly invited to go through his camp as well. I’m part of the package deal to keep you safe. It’s a common arrangement. Alruna traveled like that all the time.”
Iona gave me a significant look.
“They’re not dumb though, they know you’re far stronger than you look. They’ll take a shot at you if they sense weakness, but for now, they’re happy to use and abuse you to get their troops up and fighting fit as quickly as possible.”
The Valkyrie paused, then stressed her next words.
“They will do everything they can to kidnap you, throw you in chains, and force you to be their pet healer until they can’t get away with it anymore. We both know what would happen if they succeed, so let’s not let them.”
I was calming down. That mostly made sense. One part I didn’t get though.
“Why are they alright with us healing the Yan soldiers as well? Weren’t they trying to kill them all so they couldn’t, I dunno, regroup and attack them again later?”
Iona rapped her knuckles on one of Fenrir’s armor plates.
“Because of what I said earlier. They knew a fight would be too expensive. The math doesn’t work out. They’d lose far too many troops killing us to be worth it. They had just seen me fight Pang Nuan to a standstill.”
Iona hesitated a moment, and continued.
“However, I’ve probably embarrassed the general somewhat. The odds of him trying to send assassins after me if we sleep nearby are extremely high. It’s probably best if we don’t sleep until we’re done here.”
Iona looked up at Nina and chewed her tongue.
“Nina’s clearly a vulnerable point here. They might think whisking her away would act as leverage. It wouldn’t - we have a reputation of going utterly berserk when our squires are targeted - but a reputation only matters so long as people know about it. They might not.”
Iona chewed her tongue for a few more seconds. I kept my mouth shut. It was her squire, her choice.
“She should stay and help.” Iona decided. “The risk is manageable, the rewards will be fantastic, and she’ll get to see our work up close and personal. I’ve needed to keep her out of the action too often.”
“I’ll keep a permanent eye on her.” I promised. “Auri, think you can help Nina as well?”
Iona frowned at that, but said nothing.
“Brrrpt…” A sleepy bird responded.
I looked around. Most of the people were healed well enough, eating every bit of mana as quickly as I got it. I shook my head, noting how my hair was feeling off.
Ugh. It was acting like a small dustnet, and I didn’t need to be fully present like I was in a fight or on an op. The vanity through Auri’s bond was starting to itch at me, demanding that I take care of myself, that I preen myself to magnificent heights. My tunic was soaked in blood, and there wasn’t a single white spot from the knees down. I had ichor on my elbow, grease on my hands, and I’d sweated through my torn clothes.
I was a hot mess.
I wasn’t directly representing Exterreri, but I was indirectly representing the Valkyries, and all wandering healers. If I put on a good show, if I looked my utter best, it’d nudge people a little. Make them like me, make them like Iona and her sisters more. It’d make everyone’s job a little easier. Negotiations would go smoother. It would-
I gave myself up for lost, spun off a parallel thought process, and walled it away to yammer on in its own corner. I couldn’t completely ignore it, no, it was me, they were my own thoughts. It wasn’t like I could tune them out, but I could make sure they didn’t overtake me entirely.
It took me another hour to clear the battlefield, and then it was onto the camps.
We went to the Chu’s camp first for a variety of reasons. The easiest being that they were right there and established as a camp. The Yan army was still fleeing and regrouping. It was also easier on Iona’s arrangement to go directly from one place to another.
I debated how I wanted to do this. The sun was starting to go down, occasionally obscured by clouds, and a solid portion of the army were back in their 5-man tents, taking a break instead of sitting around a cookpot with their fellows.
A disproportionate number of the people who’d chosen to rest in their tents were injured and trying to take it easy, so it wasn’t like I could ignore them.
There was no rush, and [Imbue] came with a hefty mana penalty, before how bad it looked came into play. ‘Hi yes I’m running through your camp hitting people with a strong Radiance spell I promise it’s all good’.
Nothing for it but to do it manually. I had no issues getting blood on my hands, or getting up close and personal.
The camp didn’t look super organized. There were winding paths through, and a couple of larger, muddy ‘thoroughfares’, but broadly it looked more like a wild free for all, with people pitching their tents wherever they wanted.
Auri was on my shoulder, looking like she wanted to take a snooze. I felt a pang of guilt over how I’d arranged our resources. The bulk of our food supplies - and all of our juice - was inside [Vault of Ages], with no jugs tied to Fenrir. Why would we? They spilled easily with all the turns he did, no matter how well they were sealed, and it was easier to travel like this. We’d fed her some dry snacks, but the poor bird was completely wrung out.
The gnawing hunger was starting to chew at my insides, but I put it off. Tried to ignore it. I’d rest when I was done, or when I passed out.
[Sunrise] made that last one improbable.
Nina was walking behind me, her morphic weapon shaped into a mace. She slowly slapped the end of it into the palm of her hand, doing her best to look menacing.
Young teenagers at level 60 did not look menacing, no matter what padded armor they were wearing.
Iona, on the other hand, loomed behind me, her gaze steely and her hand on her axe. Her shield and glaive were crossed against her back.
She was on my side, and I was intimidated.
The first tent had a man and a woman dullahan staring at a bubbling helmet-turned-pot with thousand-yard stares, their battered armor still on, bloody spears dropped in the mud.
A third member of their team was lying in the tent, bloody bandages already starting to soak through. With the dullahan’s unusual constitution, his head was secured in an iron lockbox with a pillow on the bottom. The tip of an arrow had been snapped off inside of him and was dangerously close to a lung.
“Hi!” I dredged up what little cheer I had left, channeling it and hoping it’d be enough. “I’m a healer. Can I help your friend?”
At first I thought maybe they hadn’t heard me, or didn’t speak Hakka. Nina tried some sort of cough-squeak-thing, and with the way she instantly reddened and stepped back, had completely fumbled what she was trying to do.
Slowly, the man turned to face us, his stare unblinking, his gaze still a thousand miles away.
“...No.” He eventually said, turning back to the cookpot. A beaten spoon was dipped in, and without ceremony or pause he took a mouthful, chewing before swallowing.
I checked over the patient again. I couldn’t tell for sure, but I’d be shocked if he didn’t end up getting a nasty infection, even under the aegis of [Cosmic Presence]. He was still bleeding slowly, and would be a cold corpse come morning.
I waited another minute to be polite - [Cosmic Presence] was working full-blast, and I was finally just getting off the 0 mana baseline - before realizing that they weren’t going to say or do anything more.
I glanced at Iona, unsure how to proceed. I could just force my way in, but that was starting a whole host of trouble that would cause me more grief in the long run. I wanted to heal everyone in the camp, not get a dozen tents in before getting chased off.
Iona got what I was asking. She took off her helmet, sat down at the fire, and pulled some dried rations out of her waistpack, tossing them into the stew.
“Cheers.” She said. “Listen, we’re going to help your friend.” Iona’s voice went from friendly to steely in an instant. “Nobody wants him to die.”
Silence met her declaration. Iona waited a heartbeat, then turned her head towards me and gave a tiny nod.
I don’t know what arcane charisma calculations were going on in her head, but I trusted them. Not daring to break the peace, softly, quietly, but without sneaking, I slipped into the tent behind them.
I adjusted my mental image slightly, going from ‘battlefield survival’ to ‘full heal’, and tapped the dullahan with my toe.
Life spread through him. A great screeching filled the tent as metal ground on metal as his skin shifted and realigned itself to its proper arrangement. The arrow dissolved like it never existed, and his breathing smoothed.
He started to stir, and I got out of there.
I wasn’t in it for the thanks. I wasn’t in it for the accolade. I was in it for life, for healing, for the art, the craft, the defiant dance against the two-faced grim reaper.
“Next tent.” I said, watching my mana shoot up with pleasure.
A bit of time here, and my mana would be high enough to actually do something by the time we made it to the triage tents.
There was going to be a murder.
Iona faced off against a dozen muscular guards, the weakest one at level 375 and the strongest with three classes. Lightning practically shot between the two sides as they faced off, neither willing to yield.
Nina was posturing next to Iona, and doing a bang-up job of it. Somewhere in the last few hours she’d found her confidence, and was willing to push people around who were many times her level. Her level was steadily rising through the trials and difficulties, and I had to mentally applaud Iona’s decision to bring her with us.
Iona barked out words in a language I didn’t know, and the guards hardened their stance.
I got the general gist of the problem.
We were at one of the major triage tents where the wounded were being attended to, and the healers were in high demand.
The [Healers] were also one of the ‘softest’ targets in an army, and one of the hardest to replace. They shared a hallowed distinction with [Strategists], [Enchanters], [Alchemists], and other related high-level support staff where the classes took years to train and level properly, could be a huge force multiplier, and were generally non-combat. It made them tasty targets for assassination, given that removing one could cripple a significant portion of an army.
No healer? Wounded troops died or were forced off the battlefield forever, doomed to go back to their burnt-out farm and spend years limping around with one leg, trying to eke a living out of the ground.
Healer? They were back in the fight the next day.
[Alchemists] and [Enchanters] were similarly potent, and a smart [Strategist] was the difference between a roaring victory and a massive rout. In most armies [Smiths] were just as valuable, but dullahan’s natural affinity towards Metal and their own bodies clad in ingots made [Smiths] a little less crucial here.
We weren’t dullahans.
We weren’t part of the army.
The [Guards] here absolutely did not want to risk one of their few remaining [Healers] getting bumped off, and Iona just screamed danger. Her fighting Peng Nuan to a standstill had ripped through the army like a wildfire, and she was broadly considered the [Heroine] of the day. Minds with more twists than mine, more devious than Odysseus, considered the possibility that Iona was here to assassinate one of their few remaining medics.
Nevermind that she was accompanied by another [Healer]; it was clearly just all a giant ploy. Even Iona’s honeyed tongue, capable of turning a fight into gems, wasn’t getting us inside the tent.
[Cosmic Presence] was penetrating though, so I was doing some good, much to the surprise of the numerous [Aides] inside. Not enough [Healers], but plenty of volunteers. Children of the soldiers running up and down, bringing cups of water and cold rations to the injured. Teenagers cleaning bloodied bandages with water or skill. [Apprentices] placing and replacing splints. All of them surrounded and were directed by a few senior [Healers], directing the entire fiasco with the grace of conductors, swiftly moving from patient to patient. They poured what little mana they had regenerated into them before moving onto the next crisis.
Iona and the guards were still arguing, bitter words passed back and forth, hands on weapons. A few were even drawn by the lower-leveled guards, who knew that if it came to a fight they’d need the preparation advantage to have a hope of keeping up.
They were doing their job, and frankly, doing it fairly well. When the roles were reversed, when I was trying to manage a Legion triage tent in the near future, I’d want the august members of the Sixth to be keeping out random people. Especially a ‘low level’ healer who was accompanied by a potential high-level assassin.
I completely understood where they were coming from. It didn’t mean I agreed with them.
“Love.” I plastered a pleasant smile on my face, speaking in English, sure that everyone could see right through my acting. “Don’t react too hard, and don’t get too deep into a fight. I’m going to fix this.”
Iona glanced at me out of the side of her eye, before refocusing.
“You sure? There’s a few more tents after this one, I don’t think it’ll work.” Bless the woman, she’d instantly divined what I was planning.
“Better one than none, and I’ve got a plan.”
She lifted an eyebrow and stepped back. Iona relaxed her shoulders and changed her posture, standing down. A hand on Nina’s shoulder brought her back a few steps and protected the squire behind her mentor.
“Go.” She said, and I was off like a shot.
My plausible deniability was almost completely in shambles, and with my original, natural appearance to boot. My big hope to salvage it all at this point was to never be seen again like this, and to go far, far away. Add in the fancy cosmetics I had, and I’d look like a new woman.
I was fast. I wasn’t the fastest woman alive or anything, but with how the speed stat had sharply diminishing returns - cube root - my biomancy changes multiplying my base was currently worth hundreds of thousands of points in speed. Points that, when combined with my stature and the element of surprise, had me blaze past the guards.
My speed advantage wasn’t quite enough - hard to run through people - and one of the guards managed to grab my tunic as I dodged the swinging sword of a second one. The tunic was fragile, unreinforced cloth, but instead of letting it rip and slowing me down, I just [Rapid Reshelved] it into the tent, ‘juggling’ it.
Not caring that I was half-naked, past the line of guards, I ducked into the tent and moved.
First up was a second cast of [Rapid Reshelving], instantly redressing myself.
I had the same image up still, [Persistent Casting] meaning I didn’t need to think about it anymore, and I sprinted down the aisle, tapping every foot I passed, changing the prognosis of half the patients if not more.
I did feel a little bad about freaking most of the [Healers] out though. I was a blur to their senses, looking like an assassin out for their blood. One of them was far enough down the tent that they had the time to duck and cover, while their assistants boldly arrayed themselves in front of the medic, entirely willing to sacrifice themselves to give the healer a slightly better chance of staying alive.
It was fortunate that I wasn’t after their head, just their experience. Interestingly, one of the medics was over the famed 256 threshold, painting a target on their head for other nations. He completely ignored me, continuing to operate on his patient.
I supposed, like me, when they had an entire army at their back in the middle of a vicious meatgrinder in the first place, there wasn’t exactly much more to fear. What were they going to do… send more armies after them? The Han Empire was a bloody mess.
I didn’t know if he had upgraded his second class yet or not. I didn’t know if it would do anything.
But I was Elaine, the [Mother of Modern Medicine]. My manuscripts had changed the world, had shaped the art as the world knew it today. Night and Arachne had mentioned the potency effect, where the less I did, the more impact and weight it had.
I conjured a single harmless [Kaleidoscope] butterfly and sent it his way, deftly controlling it as I flew down the path, going back and forth like I was skiing, tapping everything I could. The butterfly alit on his nose and I twisted my neck around, shaping and pitching my voice.
I didn’t know if it would do anything.
It could do nothing.
It might do everything.
“With my blessing.” I whispered.
