Freddy woke up in an almost entirely dark room, disoriented. It took his sight a few moments to snap into focus, and as it did, he observed the filthy, draping tarp cloth that comprised the ceiling of what appeared to be a dingy, poorly lit tent.
A strange, startling noise came from his side, making him jolt as he tried to turn to face it, but his entire body, which he just then perceived to be wrapped in bandages from head to toe, hurt at even the mention of movement.
It didn't take long for him to identify the muffled sounds as pained groans, and once the profoundly pungent medicinal smell finally kicked in, it didn't take long to extrapolate where he was.
He would have sighed in relief if he could have drawn more than a short, pained breath. Someone had dragged him to the medic tent, and now he was recovering.
Immediately following the relaxation of safety was an intense sense of dread. He somehow doubted that this service would be free. No, he knew it wouldn't be. That wasn't the problem. What frightened him was how this scummy camp would try to extract that payment. Thoughts of that were for later, though. He needed rest for the time being.
A raking cough caught his attention a moment later. It was so violent that, for a moment, he was concerned that someone was in the process of kicking the bucket.
Surprisingly, however, the coughing came from someone who was approaching him. "These damn spores," an old man's voice said, forced through a tight throat and followed by a long gargle and the sounds of spitting. "Oh, hey," the voice continued, and a moment later, a lanky figure hung right above his face.
It was a man on the cusp of ripening into early old age. It was rare to see someone who was presumably an archhuman appear so old. Usually, such people had become archs later in life or ascended long ago.
This man was bald on the top of his head and had a rough, weathered face and an incredibly pronounced mustache, despite, as he judged by the long, stringy patchwork of an unshaven "beard," struggling to grow facial hair elsewhere.
"You're awake... right?" the man asked, waving an arm before his immobilized head.
He moved his head in an affirmative nod, a movement he struggled to make against the layers of restraints and, with all the strength he could, mustered a meek "Yeah."
"Good. Let's have you checked out." The entire world suddenly lurched as the man effortlessly picked up the bed he was lying on. A short, dizzying journey through a few tent flaps later, he was finally placed back on the ground, right about ready to throw up and die.
What followed was one of the longest half-hours of his life. The old man carefully examined his condition, and to do so, he had to peel off the numerous layers of crap that his body had been constrained in.
The air grew smellier with every piece of cloth the medic removed. The mix of stale sweat, greasy skin, blood, pus, and rot made him wonder how long he had been out.
But bandages weren't the only thing wrapped around his limbs. Wooden splints kept his entire body from moving, and his right leg, which betrayed him in the caverns, was tied up in wires, keeping an intricate construction of metallic pieces together.
His body felt quite numb for the most part. Sensation, along with his good old friend pain, was slowly returning to his limbs as he felt blood flow freely again.
Once everything was finally pulled out, including the numerous needles placed along his right leg, crotch, and right side of his lower back, he realized how bad his situation really was.
His entire torso had scabbed over, and since it was already just a massive scar, it probably wouldn't look much different. Looks weren't on his mind, however.
He could feel it. His legs were functional, for whatever that was worth, but he knew they would hurt with every step, and he wasn't sure how many of those he could take.
"Young man."
His attention was snapped away from his body as he turned to face the doctor, medic, or whatever this man was.
The man pulled a chair over from a corner of the tent and sat beside him, staring deep into his soul. "What's your name?"
He smiled guilelessly and committed to several practice coughs to test his throat before finally saying, "You should probably already know that."
"I do," the medic confirmed. "I would still like to hear you introduce yourself."
He paused for a moment, then humored the man's request. "Freddy," he responded. "My name is Freddy Stern."
"And how old are you, Freddy?"
"I'm twenty-o—no, uh... no, yeah, I'm twenty-one years old."
"You seem unsure," the old man inquired.
"Let's just say," he said with a dry laugh, "that it feels like a lot more than a year has passed since my last birthday."
The man chuckled a bit, but his expression betrayed that he probably didn't find that funny. "Well, nice to meet you, Freddy. I'm Frank."
"Let me hear it, doctor. What's my situation looking like? You can be Frank with me," he joked.
"Real funny, young man," he said with a cheeky smirk. "Maybe you're doing better than I thought."
"But seriously," he interrupted with a severe expression.
The old man sighed. "Besides the fact that your body is in a severe state of deterioration, with several ailments simply waiting to ripen, your condition is stable. For now. As you already know, you've had a life-threatening emergency, and as such, the cost of your treatment was added to what you already owe."
He couldn't stop himself from chuckling at that.
"Something funny?" the doctor asked.
"I just find it very amusing," he said honestly, "how the severity of my condition matters more in terms of money than it does in terms of actual health."
"Don't worry," the old man said, not sharing his amusement. "I'll get to that part in a moment. Your physical condition is bad. And it will probably get worse before it gets better. But you do have your limbs mostly intact, so that's a plus, and as far as I've seen, you aren't at much risk of permanently losing any critical bodily functions in the short term. Or at least you wouldn't be under normal circumstances." His face turned sour, and he could smell terrible news brewing behind the medic's stormy expression.
"Your uniquely large debt, coupled with your partially disabled body, has forced the pieces of shi—" He coughed. "I mean... the executives to vote on a one-time ban for you. You are partially barred from further emergency treatment."
"Uuh..." He stared unblinkingly. "What?"
Frank, the medic, had given many helpful recommendations. But the vast majority was directed at how to keep himself safe and healthy—except for one peculiar bit of advice that gave him hope.
And a plan.
***
After hearing of the incident that man had been involved in, Peter, the silver-haired poison master, was absolutely sure that would be the last he heard of Freddy Stern. The subsequent week he spent in a coma only reaffirmed that belief.
As one of the observers, he naturally had to work in the green zone to keep his eyes and ears out for any talks of misdemeanor by the workers.
So, naturally, he was among the first to find out when that man returned to work. Initially, he was convinced Freddy wouldn't last long with his injuries. Eventually, he would fall behind his daily quotas and get "expelled" from the expedition.
Not only did the man work to fill twice the usual daily quota, he did so consistently and with the work ethic and efficiency of a goddamn golem. Whenever he used his abilities, his swings held so much power behind them that Peter was left scratching his head for days. What the hell kind of martial art did this man have? He used Flowing Strike, which was obviously only stage zero, but its power was extraordinary.
The medical report, which stated his body weight as being 21 kg above his height and body volume, revealed the trick to be in the Abyssal Depths tempering technique.
That made this man an absolute lunatic in Peter's eyes, but for what it was worth, with his mangled body, the dangerous combo didn't seem to be taking much of a toll on the man's body. Did he also have Hundred Wet Hells, then? What a damn freak!
His idle musings were interrupted as the lecturer called his name, and he got up.
He was currently attending one of the lectures on foraging. The class was being held in one of the larger tents. The classes mostly covered elementary subjects such as locating herbs, primary extraction and storage methods, safety fundamentals, and so on...
For a highly educated nature-affinity arch with the Poison Master non-combat talent, this was on the level of returning to kindergarten and studying basic shapes. Which was precisely why he was performing the role of an "assistant." Truthfully, he was a lot more qualified to hold this class than the current lecturer, but he had his part to play as one of the observers.
Foraging was only a tiny department in this expedition, and their work was secondary to ore extraction. But delivering alchemical products was expensive and, sometimes, impossible. Supplying the expedition with the necessary resources was crucial for its success. With such a massive point of failure, his work as an observer was essential to ensuring none of the workers caused trouble.
With his finger pointed at the sizable cloth upon which the presentation was being projected, he gestured at the roots connecting two plants on a drawing and started explaining, "As you can see, this root system creates a connection between the two herbs of entirely separate species. This is an example of a quasi-parasitic relationship. The bloodula fern doesn't steal any of the crown orchid's nutrients but instead injects it with a growth-inhibiting hormone. The way the bloodula fern establishes local dominance is quite fascinating.
"It achieves this through several means. First, it distributes toxins, temporarily paralyzing the surrounding plants' reproductive systems. Then, it inhibits their growth. But, interestingly enough, it actually doesn't aim to kill competition; quite the contrary. It uses the surrounding flora as a..." His words trailed off as the entrance flaps were suddenly pushed open, and a familiar figure stepped into the room.
Several people turned around, and whispers soon spread through the confined space.
Freddy Stern walked a few steps forward and paused as he scouted the inside of the tent. The seating area comprised rows of wooden chairs organized into neat lines. The crowd was considerably denser to the back of the room, and the only place one could find seating was in the two front rows.
With little hesitation, he limped forward to the first row, the one right before the presentation, found a seat smack dab in the center, and plopped down, staring daggers at Peter as he waited for him to continue his explanation.
"Uh... Where was I?" He scrambled to regain himself. "Right, bloodula fern."
***
At first, Freddy was quite confused for several reasons. This class seemed to be a lot more advanced than what he was expecting to find. However, as the lecture continued, he eventually realized what was happening.
Once it was done, he was the first to step up and approach the ginger-haired lecturer. "Hello!" He tried his best to seem cheerful, but if anything, his forced energy made him sound somewhat insane.
"Hi! You are new to this class, right? Welcome aboard!" the man said, shaking his hand. If anything about Freddy made the man uncomfortable, he wasn't showing it.
"Thank you," he responded, infusing his words with much less forced cheer this time. "I was just wondering, is there any material I can read up on? It seems that I have some catching up to do."
The man briefly nodded. "Don't worry about that," he said as he turned around, walked over to a nearby closet, and pulled out a large stack of concise books. At the bottom of the pile was a relatively normal-sized guide, and the rest seemed to be editions of weekly reports.
Without demanding anything in return, the man simply handed over the collection of reading material. "The guide at the bottom is the bulk of the basics, and the rest are the reports we've made about any new and unusual plants we haven't encountered before. If you encounter anything new, you could one day add to this knowledge yourself."
There was a naive joy to the man's explanation that betrayed the excitement of a scholar in his natural element. This dude was the happiest person he'd come across here so far. Naturally, that could only mean that he was fucked in the head.
Without further questions and with no intention of involving himself with this man further, he simply accepted the stack of books and left the tent.
***
As he quickly learned by trying to attend all of them, there were many classes on foraging. There were three to seven a day, and the content ranged from repeats of basics to cutting-edge news regarding the discoveries of entirely new properties in never-before-seen species only found in these caves.
For a while, his schedule effectively came down to working in the yellow zone, just out of range of the streamlined section, until he earned his daily quota and then returned to his tent to study.
As he quickly learned, foraging was a rather unpopular activity. There were several reasons for this. It was difficult, time-consuming, dangerous, and had a steep initial learning curve that most weren't willing to push through. But the main reason was that it wasn't particularly profitable.
This expedition was located in an area wealthy in ore deposits. Regarding alchemical ingredients, however, it was nothing special.
The classes had many students who weren't foragers, including him for the time being. Anyone who attended all or at least most of the scheduled lectures was frequently rewarded with samples of alchemical products.
Even though the caves weren't especially rich in potent plants, foraging was essential to the expedition. Resources were hard to supply and all that. So, the camp administration set up some incentives for those who wished to be foragers.
The samples they were provided were subpar at best and outright failures at worst, but they still held considerable value to those with no alternative. He had little interest in stinky creams and potions that caused acne outbursts.
He wanted the good shit. The real shit. The type of stuff they awarded to the most significant contributors. Sure, even if he acquired a ton of healing treasures, it would take God knew how long for him to fully repair his body. But he didn't need to do that.
He only needed to heal his skin and fix his teeth, and 1% Lifesteal would take care of the rest.
The supply crisis that the camp was under only reinforced his resolve to keep the specifics of his talent hidden. If anyone needed an infinite supply of body parts, it was a place like this, one where people were constantly losing them.
For the time being, he had something to work toward. He had found a plausible excuse.
He just needed more power.