Chapter 5: Unusual healing

After walking for about six hours we reach the top of a hill and a small town comes into view.

Instead of a wall the town is protected by a field of blue dandelions, a flower known to repel monsters, I guess they are not worried about non-monster attackers since this area is rather peaceful.

"Finally civilization! I was getting sick of the forest"

"You only been there for two days... and you don't like forests? I have been thinking this for a long time, but you really are not elf-like at all."

"Why, thank you" It's nice to get complimented from time to time.

"But are you sure that it's a good idea for me to go there? What if someone recognizes me?"

Just imagine if someone sees the 'queen of darkness' casually wandering around their town, that could be awkward.

"So you want me to go alone? Don't be mean" Would she get lonely if I don't go with her?

"The only people who could have seen the prophecy are either nobles or scholars... I don't think anyone we could run into in such a small town will know your face"

"But it's not impossible right?"

I just don't want to take any risks...

"If it would make you feel better, in that backpack I gave you there's a cloak with a hood, you can use it to hide your face"

"Oh, that should work"

I put on a large dark purple cloak that fits me perfectly, did she make it for me? If I pull down the hood nobody should be able to identify me.

"Perfect, now you are just a normal, more than two meters tall woman hiding her face with a hood, nobody will find you suspicious at all"

Does she need to be sarcastic? She's the one who had the idea in the first place.

"I'm not over two meters tall, I'm two meters exactly"

I don't need her making me even taller than I already am...

We are now wandering around the streets of Kelna, that's apparently this town's name, a lot of people keep glancing my way but they all quickly turn their heads away when they notice me looking back.

"Here it is, a general store for travelers"

We get inside a building with a rather low ceiling... I have to bend down slightly to fit inside. There's a wide variety of items for sale, all of it stuff that can be useful for travelers.

There are all kinds of non-perishable food such as dried fruits or jerky, many different types of bags, backpacks, and canteens, maps and compasses and even healing potions, they don't seem to be selling weapons here unless you count those knives.

However, the clerk is nowhere to be seen.

"Excuse me! Is anyone here?" Arana tries to call them out.

Then a small boy around 4 years olds peeks at us from behind a half-opened door.

"Are your parents here?"

I ask him and he thinks for a few seconds before answering.

"Mom is sick, her tummy hurts"

Eh? Did she fall ill while she was working?

"Is she in that room?" I ask while pulling back my hood.

The boy nods and goes back inside the room. I guess I'll go take a look.

Inside the room, there's a woman sleeping on a sofa with a pained expression.

"Are you going to try to heal her?"

For some reason, Arana seems to be under the impression that I can just casually heal any sick person I come across, being a high-level mage does not mean that I can fix everything you know, but it's true that I've been researching many forms of healing.

"I don't even know what illness she has, so I don't know if I can do anything"

Well, at least I'll try.

"Corpse puppet"

I use a spell that most people mistakenly believe to belong to the field of necromancy. There's a good reason why necromancy is a forbidden form of magic, it's spells are not only very nasty, they also tend to cause a lot of unintended consequences that cause even more harm.

I learned those spells for the sake of having more knowledge but I don't intend to ever use them, however, corpse puppet is different, it has nothing to do with attempting to revive the dead, instead, all it does is let the caster's mana enter a dead body and manipulate it to their will. Since this spell has no effect at all on living people (at least not by itself), it became known as a spell that 'makes dead bodies move' and nothing else, so it was categorized as a form of necromancy and banned with the rest, since it could not be studied they all missed the most interesting and useful aspect of this spell, the fact that it lets one's mana enter someone else's body while still allowing the caster to feel and manipulate it.

Normally, when your mana enters a living being's body you can no longer do anything with it, it will fulfill the effect of whatever spell you originally used and that's it, but because of 'corpse puppet', I can still use this mana to cast additional spells.

"Mana sense"

Now I can use my mana to look inside of the woman's body, something that would not be possible with other means.

I was expecting to have to take some time to discover the illness, but the problem is incredibly obvious, there's a monster inside of her body, some kind of parasite.

The difference between animals and monsters is the way they are born, monsters are created when a high concentration of mana takes on a form of its own, wild mana likes to copy living beings, but it never gets them quite right, so races of monsters can be almost anything, such as mouses the size of lions, lions the size of mouses or combinations of different animals. After the monsters are done forming their bodies, there's no practical difference between them a normal creature, their bodies become flesh and blood just like everybody else's.

But this parasite, perhaps because it's a more simple creature, didn't transform fully into a living being, I can still feel the water mana its made off, it would be more accurate to call it a living spell, which is convenient because it makes it vulnerable to another spell of my own.

"Mana corrosion"

The parasite gets killed instantly, and since mana corrosion only attacks magic and not living beings there's no way for me to accidentally hurt the woman.

"Alright, I'm done"

I'm overcome by an intense feeling of happiness, after all those years researching magic this is the first time I've been able to put my techniques into practice, to see how all my efforts are of help to someone feels great, I should have done something like this sooner, I could even get addicted to this feeling.

"Wow, that was fast, you are better than I thought" Arana is praising me.

The boy is looking at me with doubt.

"Your mom will be alright now," I say giving him a gentle smile.

"Sniff" Huh? Why does he look like he's about to cry?

"Bwaaaaaah!"

"Heh? Why are you crying? I said your mom was alright!"

"Of course he's crying, even I feel goosebumps every time I see that 'gentle smile' of yours, it's just more than what such a small child can handle.

What? So all the practice I did to make my smile less scary was for nothing?

"Ara! Tell him that he does not need to be afraid"

Arana places a hand on the boy's head and gives him a soft smile.

"You don't need to be afraid, I'll protect you from the scary lady"

"That's not what I meant!!!"

"Bwaaaaaah!!!"

I should not have yelled, now the child is crying even louder than before.

"Please calm down..."

I think I've read somewhere that children calm down when someone picks them up, I try grabbing him and lifting him in the air, but that only seems to make it worse.

He's panicking and flailing around wildly, I need to be careful that he does not fall, I'm starting to think that I'm bad at dealing with children...

"What's going on?"

Oh, the mother just woke up! Good, now she should be able to calm down her...

"What are you doing to my son!?"

She's looking at me with a terrified expression, I'm not doing anything! See? I'm handing him out to you. She seems to calm down as she hugs her son tightly, but then we stare at each for a moment and she gets nervous again.

"Please don't hurt us!"

Eh? Did she recognize me after all?

"I don't know who you are but you can take anything you want, just leave us alone!"

Oh, she doesn't know, in a way, that makes it even worse...

"Really? Anything we want?"

"Ara! Not now!"

We should just leave before someone comes to check on the commotion.

After getting away from the shop I let out a heavy sigh.

"I'm glad that she got better, and helping people feels great, but I wish she had known what I did"

After all, if I want my magic to become legal I need to prove that it can be used for benign purposes, this would have been a good place to start.

But then I see a man grimacing while holding his stomach. I exchange a look with Arana and she goes to talk to him, then she comes back to me.

"It seems like there's been a lot of people getting ill lately on this town, most of them feeling severe pain in their stomach"

Is this the same parasite? So that woman was not the only one?

"So a lot of people have that same illness then? That's great!"

"You're happy that people are getting ill? You really are evil after all!" Arana seems to be misunderstanding me.

"No, no, that's a bad thing, but this gives me another chance to prove the worth of my magic!" Maybe I'm being a bit selfish but I'm starting to get desperate.

Well, I guess if at first, you don't succeed...

forli