"What does it say?!" Marcus asked with a grave look on his face.
Mrazivý just continued to stare blankly at her status for a few moments, before Marcus once again prompted her to respond more forcefully. She was having difficulty making sense of what she was seeing.
"It seems I have been afflicted with a condition called Wendigo Psychosis. But it also appears to be dormant at the moment from what my status displays. I have never heard of a condition being inactive like this before though, nor anything about this particular affliction. I wonder what a wendigo is?" Mrazivý said, a befuddled and concerned look on her face.
However, unlike Mrazivý, Marcus knew what a wendigo was and how truly vicious they were.
If this monster was anything like the ones he had read about in fiction and folklore during his first life, then all of them were in grave danger.
"Okay, first we need to get rid of this status effect. I can assure you that it is more deadly than you can possibly realize, and the fact that it managed to effect you even with all of your high resistance speaks to how powerful this monster is."
With the wave of his hand Marcus cast the tier eight healing magic spell true restoration.
This spell was meant to dispel high level status conditions and it could normally be used as a means of getting rid of any and all afflictions a person had incurred.
Yet, when Marcus asked Mrazivý to check if the Wendigo Psychosis was still present, she nodded her head.
'I cannot even get rid of it with such a high tier healing magic spell! Why did the administrator even allow something like this to exist!'
After a few seconds of internal turmoil, Marcus regained his calm and moved on. He was going to have to have to bring out his best, but he knew he had a definite fix for the Wendigo Psychosis.
A silver ball of energy appeared in Marcus' hand, and he directed it towards Mrazivý.
For a moment her entire body was enveloped in a bright light, leaving her with a warm feeling that left her revitalized.
Marcus was now certain that Mrazivý was cured thanks to his Ultimate Refresh Supreme Skill, but he had her check again just to make sure.
"Yep, it is gone now." Mrazivý said with a relived smile. "Now, would you tell me what this was all about? You clearly seem to know what sort of creature hit me with this status condition."
Nodding his head, Marcus gave her the rundown of what he knew about wendigos from their lore on Earth.
From what he remembered they were most often described as having the head of a feral elk with a mouth full of sharp and jagged teeth. Their torsos resembled a human to a degree and their long gangly arms ended with hands that possessed long, sharp claws. Finally, their legs ended in blackened, burnt stumps.
"Of course, this is all just from legends and fiction from Earth. Their descriptions are not always the same. This is just the one I know from stories I read."
"They sound like formidable monsters. Do you think we can beat it?" Mrazivý asked.
"If it came out and started attacking us openly, then we would almost certainly win. Unfortunately, this particular monster is not going to brazenly charge at us like the emperor blood worms did on the beach. Its plan is to whittle down our strength and psyches over a period of time before finishing us off. It kept its distance when it let out that howl and judging by how there is no commotion in the camp, no one else registered it as a threat. I only caught it because of a nagging feeling in the back of my mind and because I was able to check my log and see that I resisted the effect."
"We alert the rest of the camp to this threat. I know you wanted to keep certain things like your Ultimate Refresh Skill a secret. Still, this is too dangerous a situation for us to hold back on."
Marcus nodded his head in agreement. He had not explained to Mrazivý yet what sort of maddens was brought on by Wendigo Psychosis, but if others had been affected, letting it go untreated would come back to bite him and Mrazivý. Most likely literally as it was stated in the legends on Earth that when a wendigo wanted to create another of its kind, it would drive a person insane until they ultimately gave into cannibalism and ate the flesh of whoever they might be with at the time.
Frankly, wendigos were one of the most unsettling monsters Marcus knew about from Earth's legends, and having to actually deal with one was beyond unsettling. In the worst-case scenario, the entire expedition squad could go insane, and he might be forced to kill everyone else other than Mrazivý before the two of them escaped from the island.
Nevertheless, he did not expect it to come down to such a grisly scenario. He may have had a limited number of uses of his Supreme Skill, but he could cure anyone that was afflicted with Wendigo Psychosis just like he had done for Mrazivý.
"Though, before we tell the others. I want to inform Miguel of what we have found first and consult him." Marcus said.
"What for? I doubt he is going to be able to offer anything." Mrazivý said, a look of confusion on her face. n0Velusb.c0M
"Maybe, maybe not. Miguel came from Earth just like me, and while he was a lot younger when he died, that does not mean he knows less about this subject. At the very least, I do not want him to be the only one to react with a knowing expression when I bring this up in front of everyone. Judging by how you have never heard of them before, I imagine wendigos are either very rare on this world, or perhaps they did not even exist on Mirrion until this island appeared."