Chapter 65: Chapter 53: Emotional bliss and embarrassment.

[“Urgh, I’m feeling a bit dizzy,”] I said as I massaged my temples.

I was squatting outside the tent right now after finishing curing every single wounded in the clinic. I thought it wouldn’t be a problem, after all, there were only ten patients and I had delegated most of the work onto my parallel minds.

This definitely doesn’t feel like arcane corruption, so what could it be? Touching my head, it felt quite hot, especially around my cheeks.

[“Lady Hestia, that’s why I suggested that you must reserve yourself. It would be an actual problem if your arcane corruption overflows,”] Tasianna said as she poured water into a wooden cup, offering me once it was filled.

[“I appreciate the worry, Tasianna,”] I said with an exasperated sigh, as I had to explain it to her again. [“But using that little amount of mana isn’t worth fussing about. I’ve used far more and the one time I accumulated too much arcane corruption was after an intense fight. I know my limit by feel alone and I haven’t reached it yet.”]

As both of us took care of the wounded lizardmen, Tasianna didn't miss the chance to warn me of arcane corruption, seeing as how many healing spells I was using. Admittedly, I should have probably used [Moderate Heal] once in a while, instead of constantly casting [Major Heal], but I only had to treat ten people, not over a hundred or so.

I really appreciated she was worrying that much about me, I truly did, but she shouldn't show that much concern, bordering on annoyance. She saw me fight before, and the number of spells I could use simultaneously. I might not be immune as she was, but I was incredibly resistant to arcane corruption regardless.

Besides, showing that much effort was worth it. Similar to the first one, once the patients realized their wounds and ailments were healed, they showed genuine happiness and gratitude, crying tears of joy, knowing they would survive for one more day. It felt good.

The patients included males and females. The females’ smiles sparkled and enraptured my heart with their still cute-looking faces. While the males had intimidating reptilian heads, the heartwarming tone of their thankful voices eased my mind, easily forcing the corners of my mouth to curl up as I witnessed my patients expressing their gratefulness.

Eventually, word came out that the people in the tent started to recover and their relatives and friends. These scalekins, a term used to describe any beastmen with scales, crowded the already cramped space, crying as they held and hugged their family.

“The young scale over there helped me recover” and “I don’t understand how they did it, but the lasses over there treated everybody’s wounds” was what they said when they were asked how they recovered so fast. Some even went into detail and explained how a “white circle” materialized around their body and that “blinding warm light” suddenly appeared and basked them in a soothing veil which slowly closed up all their wounds and made the fatigue inside them vanish.

As they understood I was the one responsible for this, most of them started dashing out of the tent, only returning after a few minutes with something edible. As I was helping Apsala take off the patient’s leaf bandages, the thankful lizardmen assembled around me and fervently offered their thank-yous in the form of fish, stacks of herbs, and fruit, shouting their apologies for trying to harm me before and that they were indebted to me for this show of kindness.

Apsala let out a deep sigh, looking conflicted at their responses. “We lizardfolk show our appreciation by sharing our hard-earned food with others, priestess of the Light Goddess. Debts must be paid, otherwise we would show disrespect towards you.”

Reading between the lines, it seemed she was implying these were the last of their rations? Aksmias and Caszcur did mention how much they needed food. Knowing that, how could I accept this?

However, it seemed like humbly rejecting the gratitude wasn’t the correct thing to do, as they misunderstood me thinking the offerings weren’t enough; that I was asking them for more. Despite how aggressive this misunderstanding sounded, they just nodded to each other and went outside once again to scrounge whatever little scraps they had left. Their fervor when they came back made me feel even worse.

“Those scalekins have acknowledged that your actions deserve a reward,” Apsala emphasized that fact to me once again. "They won't stop if you don't accept their gratitude, little one. You saved our people, you deserve this sign of kindness and respect.”

Apsala simply smiled and left me to deal with the overwhelming wave of thanking lizardmen. I obviously couldn’t handle it, conflicted if I should take their food or not.

Managing and taking care of fans was one of the most important duties an idol and popstar had to handle, as they were the lifeblood of an entertainer’s career. I wish I could say I was prepared for this, but how was I supposed to be if I didn’t even have a single fan in my life on Earth?

Usually, the fans were kept in check and stayed at a safe distance due to their respect for the idol, or by the staff, so it rarely ever got to the point where people could fangirl their favorite star to death. Well, until a meet-and-greet, but that was a different case of fanservice.

But… I was now in a situation where I really could use some fan managing classes or somebody who could help me get out of here! Tasianna, as I ordered her not to seriously harm them, didn't know how to do it without her magic, quickly panicking in the process.

I was screaming, “Somebody please help me!” to myself as the sound of the begging and thanking lizardmen wasn’t ending anytime soon.

Fortunately, my pleading was somehow heard as Caszcur began tearing the lizardmen away with the help of the lizardmen guards. It seemed Caszcur predicted the situation to escalate, to the point he ran out and had Aksmias gather all the guards. Once the loud crowd was pushed outside through sheer brute force, I mumbled my thanks to them as I resumed tending to the patients.

With the crowd dispersed, I noticed the lizardmen surrounding Apsala also went outside. Despite how loud it was, I was still able to overhear what they said to her during this whole ordeal of mine.

Having my parallel minds remember the words, I told them to Tasianna. Translated, I understood that there were some skeptics among the lizardmen. They asked Apsala things like, “You are an alchemist. You must have been the one to heal them, right, scalekin?” and “Apsala, I heard everything from my egg-sister but why would an Aurena priestess help us?”

The distrust for [Holy Magic] practitioners was quite serious among the group. Apsala confirmed I was the one to have saved them, not her medicine, but it was still quite a huge shock for the skeptical lizardmen.

“Hey, I’ve seen those knights and priests killing us in the name of their Goddess. I hate them like most of us.” Apsala slammed her tail on the ground, seemingly furious. “However, the red-scaled lass saved them. Not like we have the luxury to drive away help. I believe we should trust her.”

The skeptics tried to reason with her and explained what happened in front of the entrance, exaggerating how terrifying I was and how I would have killed them if Aksmias and the other guards hadn't stopped me. Big fat lie! Sure, I scared them but I also gave them food as a peace offering.

Apsala called them out, as she heard everything from Caszcur who admitted they shouldn’t have angered me in the first place. That they should have taken me at face value after I announced myself as a dragonewt. It was okay for them to feel paranoid of me, but that they should let bygones-be-bygones after what I had done.

Looking crestfallen, I could remember her continuing to defend me, “You’ve seen all our injured, right? Then show your appreciation to her like the others, otherwise, you spit on the happiness and joy that she gave our once wounded.”

Quickly realizing what they were doing, they apologized to her, however, Apsala rejected it. "Show it to the young scale, the girl. Show her your kindness as I believe that she… I will later ask her for help with our problem."

After hearing her say that, the talks ended there, or, at least that was all I was able to hear from them.

Once they and the rowdier lizardmen left, Apsala, Tasianna, and I went back to cleaning and helping our patients. Time just went by then, as I silently let the experience just now cleanse my soul. All the rot that polluted my soul from living in this forest, making me act and feel like some feral animal, was starting to break off. Living and traveling with Saori and Tasianna had helped me tremendously to find that humanity I thought was slowly disappearing.

The loneliness of wandering through this scary forest, the terror of abandoning my dream by dying that drove me to get stronger and adapt to my new body, and the conflicting opinions inside me if I should outright let go of my dream or not. All of that was tearing me apart.

Saori, Tasianna, and this crowd of thankful people… this was what I truly missed — people. They say humans wouldn’t be able to live without others, that solitude would surely kill their sense of self over time. I couldn’t help but agree to it wholeheartedly.

I missed being with others, I missed talking with people, I missed sharing my pain and happiness with others. I truly missed it so very much. Was my determination to become an idol in this world just an excuse for me to be with others? I didn’t know. I still yearned to stand on a stage, where I could perform and bring a smile to people’s faces with my songs.

All I knew was that if I hadn’t met Saori and Tasianna, then my sanity would have probably broken sometime after the fight with the garm matriarch. My unease of being so much weaker than her, my concerns there would be even larger monsters out there, and my own emotions crushing me underneath the fleeting dream of my old life.

I knew that ‘cause I still had them. Everything turned out well, now that I had my companions.

Also, seeing all of those crying lizardmen, overjoyed their lives were saved. Not to mention, their thankful friends and family, sincerely offering me something they absolutely needed for themselves. I thought my chest would have burst open from all that overflowing emotions.

At that moment, I wanted to stop helping Apsala and just jump around, full of vivacity, to dance and sing in a hyper-emotional state. Instead, I kept all of it inside… although, my mouth wasn't as compliant as I embarrassingly remembered how I hummed the whole way through.

… Ah, which meant the reason for my steaming head and my flushed face was that. Tasianna did tell me I also began singing hyperactive songs, filled with vigor and power as I wasn’t able to hold back my volume. Probably went wild with them.

Did I just unload all those anime openings?! I did, didn’t I?

“Everything sounded strange to me but the energy you expressed reenergized me,  ridding me of the small amount of fatigue I had after helping everybody,” Tasianna said, confirming they were the same anime songs that I would sing under the shower.

…OMG, ahhhhh, aaaaaaaah! No! Ahhhh, I can’t believe that I just dropped all those song covers! Ahhhhhh, how embarrassing, how stupid of me. Dummkopf! I’m a real Dummkopf! Idiot me! Aaaaaaaaaah!

[“Lady Hestia!”] Tasianna suddenly yelped, shaking my shoulders as I was spawning about. [“Is your headache getting worse?! Why is your face even redder now?! P-Please, drink! You must drink some water!”]

… Kill me, I want to crawl under a blanket now…

Finally realizing why I was like this, I repeatedly hit my head with my hands, reprimanding myself for showing that much emotion. Why didn’t I temper myself with ballads or a few calmer songs!

As I hid my face with my arms in a fetal position, I was fully able to feel my boiling face. A non-fire dragon would probably be scalded if they touched me, so I stopped Tasianna from coming any closer, saying it was simply me being me and that I needed some space right now.

“Ey… il kournyli guzha?” somebody just said. (“Hey… is something wrong?”)

"Ahh, Apsala!" Noticing the female lizardman, Tasianna resumed her duties as a translator. "Lady Hestia seems to be… uh, contemplating something… otherwise, we are alright."

“Oh, is that so, Tasianna?” Apsala said with a confused voice, moving her face closer to mine. “Rest is good, little one. Don’t think too much about what just happened and just let your mind take a break. You’ve earned it.”

“Is there something that you need?” Tasianna asked.

“Yes,” Apsala confirmed. “The patients are sleeping right now, recovering from their fatigue, so I wanted to talk with you now that you are free, as I said before.”

She did say she wanted to speak with me about something after entrusting me with her patients. As I eavesdropped on what she said to the skeptical lizardmen, I already knew she was here for a favor.

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She then continued, “Are you ready?”

Heaving a loud sigh, I jumped onto my feet, clapped my face to reset my mindset before nodding, agreeing to listen to what she wanted to say.

“Good, thank you, but before we go… young scales, show yourselves!” Apsala shouted.

As she said that, the group of lizardmen I noticed following us, appeared before us, nervously fidgeting their fingers. There were four females, only one among them was male. As I stared at them, besides being a bit shorter, they all looked almost exactly like the adult lizardmen.

“Let me guess… it was you five who told everybody in the camp that this young scale healed everybody, correct?” Apsala demanded them to answer with a stern face. “Why did you not think before doing that, huh? You overcrowded my clinic, annoyed my patients when they needed rest, and caused our benefactors major distress. What do you have to say for your actions, young scales?”

“We-we just wanted… to tell everybody of what she could do,” one of the females said, who had a red crest on her head.

“S-She used something to heal elder Caszcur and then healed everybody else,” another with a similar crest pointed out. “We just wanted the other elders to not treat her badly… She is strong so we thought if everybody liked her… that she would help us.”

“Naïve young scales, that's not how you gain favor!" Apsala scolded them. "You've caused the camp enough trouble, but you've caused the most trouble to her. Quickly apologize to Hestia!”

"""""A-As our tails are our witnesses, we apologize to Hestia for our mistake,""""" the five apologized with their tails tucked between their legs.

“Il ko,” (Is ok) I said in broken Common tongue, as I couldn’t remember how to say “It’s ok.”

“Now go, Caszcur and I have much to talk about with her.” Apsala snapped her arm up, telling them to run off.

However, defiantly, they didn’t listen to the older lizard woman, turned to me and clenched my hands with theirs.

“Please, help us get revenge!” one desperately pleaded to me. “Please come with us and help us get our revenge!”

“All our friends and all the elder scales are being trapped by those monsters, so please, please, help us,” another cried out, tears flowing down her rage-filled eyes.

“We five siblings wanted to do it ourselves, but the rest of the elders here are cravens, telling us that it was impossible!” a third shouted from the top of her lungs. “They are scared of your power, but they don’t realize that you are the only one who can help us. Help our friends and scalekins, please!”

"You can use all that white stuff like those vicious priests, right? Please, rain down the light attacks on those monsters!” the fourth blurted out before imitating throwing out something.

“I offer my tail,” the male shouted as he began intertwining his tail with mine. “You can use it however you want, so please help us. Help us get our revenge and save our lost friends, please!”

“Hissssssssss, KRIIIIIIIEEEEH! Enough now, you krill eaters!” snapping out of her own astonishment, she pushed the five away from me. “What have we told you about controlling your anger, huh?! By Kargryxmor, get your tails out of here, all of you now! And you, boy! Don’t you dare twist your tail with another female, besides your egg sisters, if you know what’s good for you!”

Intimidated by the older lizard’s scowl, the five siblings flinched back. Before they ran away, they shouted in unison, “Please, help us!”

“I apologize…” Once they were gone, Apsala bowed her head with her tail tucked in between her tail, seemingly the way scalekin aplogize to others. “Those young scales have caused you even more trouble… especially that idiotic boy.”

[“Ahahaha… It’s okay. Their outburst at least helped me understand what is going on. Lead on, getting the full picture would be good.”] Apsala nodded to my statement before inviting us to follow her.

As we walked, I left Apsala to cool down first before asking Tasianna if she could translate a question for me, asking how old those "young scales" were.

“They all hatched at the same time, I heard, so all five must be five years old now,” Apsala answered.

Five years old? Wow, I thought they acted a bit like children, but five years old? They honestly looked a bit older with how they were around my size. Lizardmen grow fast, huh? Then again, my current dragonewt form wasn’t close to 15 yet.

"I apologize for their rude behavior. The young scales usually behave well but it seems the recent events have caused everybody, especially the young ones, to tense up, making them act on their emotions too much.” Apsala sighed in exasperation.

I still remembered how antagonistic Caszcur was and how Apsala literally broke down in tears after learning we weren’t exactly here to help them get out of this forest. People were acting very suspicious of me, only warming up after I did something good for them. Honestly, cautiousness was normal in this place, so I didn’t think too deeply why they were this paranoid.

“The young scales recently lost their parents,” Apsala dropped a bombshell, causing me to stare at her with widened eyes. “The same accident ended up separating us from the rest of our group. Our other young scales, their friends, were among that group, so their hot-headedness is affecting them. Grief and anger are a terrible mixture, able to kill even the most experienced of hunters.”

That would explain the anxiety and distress they showed me. They were pleading with me to help them get revenge and rescue their acquaintances. My parents hadn’t died yet, so I couldn’t truly imagine their pain, but I could sympathize with the tragedy of such a situation.

I knew the feeling well of never being able to see your parents again. The loneliness of them not being around for you anymore. I honestly felt like my life ended up at rock bottom when my reincarnation happened, and it got only worse when I couldn’t confide my sorrow to anybody.

It also didn’t help how I faulted myself for possibly giving my parents grief. I died before them. Parents shouldn’t outlive their children, and this pain was something I inflicted on them. I vented that frustration through self-deprecation, so it made sense to me how those kids wanted revenge for their deaths

“Their foolhardiness would have cost them their lives, wasting their parent’s memories, so we had to stop them,” Apsala heaved a heavy sigh while explaining it to me. “Now they curse us. Naïve young scales, believing they can do everything by themselves. Truly reckless idiots.”

“Does that mean that they were asking us to help them avenge their family?” Tasianna prodded her for more information.

“Yes… us elder scales contemplated it before your party arrived.” Apsala turned silent for a moment, looking pensive as she thought her next words over. “… Enough. We will talk about it in a moment anyways. Let us leave all of that for later.”

I nodded. It honestly felt like I had to start forming an argument to persuade Saori.

Tasianna also nodded but a question suddenly popped up for her. “…Oh, that’s right. I wish to understand what all that talk about tails has to do about it. First, ‘tail polisher’ and now when the boy intertwined his tail with Lady Hestia’s. What is the meaning of all these tail idioms supposed to mean?”

I couldn’t help but agree. I wanted to know about them too, considering I had a tail and needed to educate myself on a whole new set of idioms and wordplays. Might as well do it now.

“Ahhh, the word ‘tail polisher’ is an insult towards females,” Apsala said while stroking her chin. “It literally means somebody who continuously comforts males when it’s dusk, enjoying a different partner every night for benefits.”

““Oh…”” Tasianna and I let out.

In other words, it’s a word for a prostitute…noted.

“Oh?” Apsala, noticing my surprise, moved her long neck so our eyes met. “Don’t tell me that our little one here didn’t know? Ohhh, my, my. So strong and mature despite how intense your hatchling scent is still lingering around you. I thought my nose was failing me, but it actually was correct. How precious you are. Dragonewts also grow fast it seems.”

Urgh, same as Caszcur… do I really smell like a newborn? What does a hatchling even smell like? Egg?

Sniffing myself, I could 100% say I had no idea.

Patting my head, Apsala continued, “Oh my, now I would feel bad for explaining to you about the whole tail thing, instead of having your egg mother do it. This is usually something a mother would share with her daughter to help her mature… I couldn't possibly steal that away now, could I?”

Well, I don’t know where my dragon mother was or if she was alive at all. If you don’t explain it to me, then it will take ages for me to learn, ha ha.

“Ahhhh, who cares, Tasianna asked me, not the little one.” With a smirk, Apsala just waved her concerns away. “Intertwining tails is to show your affection towards one another. When men talk about ‘offering their tail,’ they mean they wish for you to carry their eggs. Doing it with your egg siblings and parents usually has no romantic implications, but that boy back there was an idiot, so don’t take it too seriously.”

Wow, did I just learn a lizardman pick-up line? Woah, he might not have meant it, but I just got flirted on. Damn. I’m not even a year old.

“…That savage… how dare he say such nonsense to my mistress, tainting her innocence like that!” Learning the truth, Tasianna was squirming around as she flew beside us. “That’s it! I need to teach that boy a lesson on treating others!”

As I was holding Tasianna back so she wouldn’t bore another hole into another lizard, Apsala was merrily laughing while messing up my hair.

Forgetting about the sour topic we just talked about, Apsala continued treating me like a kid until we finally reached the meeting location. I guessed, my hatchling smell triggered her maternal instincts now that we got to know each other?

In any case, I was once again led back to the campfire, in the middle of the camp, however, now there were only a few people here. The majority of the lizardmen from before were gone, having left to fulfil whatever task they were doing.

The people sitting there were Caszcur, Aksmias, and lastly, Saori with the virigress family. Like it was before, Saori, Rajah, and his family were on one side, while the lizardmen kept a respectful distance by sitting directly opposite of them.

“You’re finally here, little lady,” Caszcur spoke. “Make yourself comfortable, there is a lot we need to tell you about.”