Chapter 31: Forced Adaptation

I awoke, lying on a very soft seat.

Surge.

Sitting up in a flash, I glanced around my surroundings.

I was in some sort of box. The carriage?

Did Surge put me in here?

Standing up, I had to brace myself with Blaze's staff. The mana exhaustion had taken its toll, although my mana seems to be fine, as I don't have a trace of a shiver, my body is worse for wear.

My legs don't want to listen to me, and even bracing myself causes immense pain to shoot through my hands.

Flooding my hands with healing magic only made the pain worse, forcing me to cancel it and look down.

That's when I noticed, from my forearms down to my fingers was nearly stark white. It was as if I had somehow gained vitiligo, erasing my previously somewhat tanned and swarthy skin now white as paper.

I could still cast weaker magic it seems, but as soon as I put too much magic into them, the pain starts up again.

Am I going to be like this forever?

As I was inspecting myself, the door to the carriage swung open.

Acting on pure instinct, I grabbed the staff and swung at the door as hard as possible. Not that I wanted to hurt anyone, I was just startled.

Weaving my extremely clumsy swing, was Teresa, the blue-skinned royal that the guard and I had fought to protect.

"When I heard the carriage stirring I knew you had awoken." As her eyes landed on my arms and hands, she audibly gasped, cutting herself off.

"What?" I asked out of genuine fear.

"Just how much mana do you have at your disposal? And how much of it did you use?" She asked, reaching down to grab my hands. Reflexively, I moved them away.

"Enough, and all of it. Where is Surge." I say, bringing my hands back to my chest along with my staff.

"Dead, I thought that much was obvious. You can't heal a corpse, you even saw me try and fail." Teresa said without missing a beat as if it was an open and shut case.

What?

"What?" I say as I could feel the strength leaving both my arms and legs. Collapsing to the floor, I couldn't even bear to move.

"I thought you would have realized it, apologies. I do admit that may have been a bit rude, but do keep in mind that we need to get a move on. We don't have the time to mourn my retainer nor your sister, if we stay put, we will die." Teresa said, in a serious tone as she tried to help me to my feet.

Only I didn't move. More accurately, I couldn't.

I failed.

I failed to protect people, for the third time. I didn't kill them this time at least, but by making that hole I let Surge die.

"Come on now, we can grieve when we get into town," Teresa said, her voice beginning to quake.

"Teresa, how old are you?" I muttered, barely able to put any strength into my legs. How was a royal this strong? The Teresa I saw before was a scared noblewoman, not this composed figure before me.

"Sixteen." She said calmly, forcing me to stand with her as a brace.

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What? Sixteen?

Could I have reacted to this calmly at sixteen? No, if my close friend were to die fighting for me to live, even without then having to look over a brat little kid, I would have broken down and sobbed.

Why was she so calm?

Good god, I'm pathetic. I'm letting someone three years younger than me consol and help me, instead of me helping this obviously struggling child.

Detaching myself from Teresa, I funneled mana into my legs to fix the damage I didn't realize I had internally.

Stretching my arms and legs, a strange sense of clarity and calmness came over me. That's right.

I'm the adult here, I need to take responsibility and help Teresa.

What was that bullshit my brother would always spew?

'You'll get it one day. A man's sense of pride comes when he helps those in need.' He would babble on. I always thought he was just making excuses for his shitty career as an EMT. Well, shitty is the wrong word, he was actually very successful. I think I just had a grudge against him.

More successful than I ended up being at least.

I wonder how he's doing now?

Ahhh whatever, if I dwell on it, it'll bring up some bad memories.

But hey, I think I get it now Marco.

Turning to face Teresa, who was still in the carriage, her face was a mixture of shock and confusion. I guess if I saw a person randomly get better after I answered a question, I'd be pretty confused too.

"Don't worry, I'm better now. Is Surge's body at least intact?" I ask calmly, trying my best to put on a smile. If it was, I could hold a proper funeral for her, or at least bury her in a grave somewhere.

Or maybe I would incinerate her body, and spread her ashes around the world? She always wanted to be an adventurer, so I guess that could be our adventure.

"No, I had to burn it with Lord Darius's, I've kept their ashes in two urns since I didn't know if Tiamat's had a similar ritual to the Jeralik." She said, her voice remaining calm, yet her posture shifting.

Well, at least I could do that ladder idea. I'm sure that's good enough, besides, once we reach town I'll have plenty of time to mourn.

"Could you give me Surge's urn? We do have a tradition for adventurers, and I'm sure Surge would want nothing more than to be remembered like one." A little white lie couldn't help. I may not know any Tiamat rituals around the dead, but neither did she!

"Absolutely," Teresa said, turning on her heel and walking back into the carriage. I guess I must have missed them when I was looking around in there.

Either way, we were stuck in a precarious situation. I could barely use any spells above Dominus tier due to my arms and hands, and based on everything I've seen, Teresa is at most a healer.

We have well over a week's journey to town now, since I'm weakened and have new baggage, and I have no idea how long it'll take me as a solo party to get to the capital.

After about a minute, Teresa returned with a quaint-looking jar, the contents of which I can assume are Surge's ashes.

"We better set camp here, we only have about an hour's worth of daylight, and the carriage will make a fine shelter for our first night," I say, trying and failing to manipulate the surrounding earth. I guess my hope of unearthing the trees is dead in the water.

"That would be wise, since all of the corpses are burnt, there shouldn't be anything to attract monsters. Also, I wouldn't put too much strain on your mana system right now. What you're suffering from is known as Release Syndrome, it's what happens when a mage uses a spell or mana amount too intense for their mana network. In a few days, you should be back to full power, but that does make me question what spell you used to cause such a backlash." She says, having drawn closer to me without me noticing. By the time I had realized, she had already started inspecting my arms and hands.

"Do you know why they've turned white?" I ask, pulling my hands back and canceling all the mana circulating within my body. I guess training would have to be put on the back burner for now.

"No clue," Teresa said flatly, obviously not happy that she couldn't keep poking and prodding my arms and hands.

At least for now we're moderately safe.. As long as another random pack of assassins doesn't attack, we should be fine until I've healed.

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