Chapter 13: The Cavern of Death
FIGURES shifted in the shadows—men and women, young and old, all covered in blisters. Iris was intimidated at first, but…the more scabs she could get, the better.
“I’m collecting soilpox scabs. Would any of you be willing to cooperate?” Iris called into the darkness.
“What for?” a gruff voice called back.
“To make a preventative treatment called a vaccine,” Iris explained.
Murmurs rose up from the shadows—some dubious, others angry.
“Preventative? It’s a little too late now, don’t you think? If you’re going to make medicine, make a cure!”
“How much more are you going to take from us? We’ve already lost our jobs, our families…and now, when we’re on the cusp of losing our lives, you want our damn scabs?”
“Yes, you’re right. I wasn’t fast enough to save you,” Iris snapped. “But if I can make a vaccine, I can save your families! And if all goes well, I might even be able to save people still in the early stages!”
Iris held up her scarred left arm. The glowing fairies all danced around it.
“Your arm…!”
“I’m a soilpox survivor. Just like every one of you.”
Silence fell. Then a man stepped forward—a brutish-looking man with a scar on his face. Evidently, sheer brawn wasn’t enough to fight off a virus.
“If you want my scabs, you can have ’em.”
“Thank you very much.”
Without missing a beat, Iris took his arm, which was covered not only in blisters but in cuts, too. She gently guided her sterilized blade along the edges of his scabs to scrape them off. Once she’d collected all of them, she applied some camellia seed oil as a token of her gratitude, just as she’d done for the young child.
“Ahhh. That feels a lot better,” the man sighed.
This was what prompted the other soilpox patients to step forward. Iris collected scabs from those in the late stages, then asked those still in the early stages to ingest the powder. She remembered the history books from her past life claiming this was an effective technique for the smallpox vaccine, so if it worked for these people, she could be sure that her vaccine was medically sound.
After she’d collected all the scabs she possibly could, Iris handed out the water and fruit she’d brought with her as a form of payment.
“If only these people had access to clean water at the very least,” she murmured.
“They do,” Sauge replied offhandedly.
“What?”
“Come with me.”
She led Iris out of the cavern to a rock wall a few steps away. There, water trickled out from a crack in the wall.
“What are they supposed to do, lick it from the rock? They need a solid stream to drink from.”
“Then what you require is some sort of long, firm pipe.”
Iris paused to think for a moment.
“Oh, I know! What if we use my sheath?” Iris took out her dagger and handed it to Sauge. Her family’s iris emblem gleamed gold in the light.
“Are you sure? You’ll never get it back, you know,” Sauge warned her with a half-smirk.
“Oh, that’s all right. I never needed this thing in the first place,” Iris replied without batting an eye.
“You’re a fascinating girl, you know that? Very well, then. Make your wish, just as you did the last time.”
As Sauge held Iris’s dagger, Iris placed her hand upon it and prayed: Please, turn into a spout for a big stream of water!
With a smile, Sauge broke the paper seal and pulled the dagger out of its sheath. Then she plunged the sheath into the crack in the rock, where it began to glow gold. She finished the job by using the dagger to slice a hole in the other end of the sheath. Lo and behold, water streamed out from it.
“Oh, my!”
Can all Fairy Leaders just...DO that? They’re so overpowered! Why weren’t they in the game?!
As Iris stared in astonishment, Sauge smirked smugly. “Now then, what shall we do about the blade?”
“I’ll wrap it up in a cloth for now.”
“In that case, use this.” She took off her long purple stole—the one with the sage plants embroidered on it—and handed it to Iris.
“Wait, but…won’t that be invisible to the human eye?”
If so, then Iris didn’t see much point in using it to conceal her dagger. Nevertheless, she reached out to take the stole—and the moment her fingers touched it, it suddenly gained a palpable weight of its own. Iris flinched in surprise.
“Did it just materialize?!”
Sauge laughed. “Fairies are not ghosts, you know. I have a corporeal form.”
“I get that, but…”
I swear, I’ll never get used to this fantasy world, Iris thought as she set about wrapping up the dagger. The stole was so long that by the time she was done, the blade was nigh-indistinguishable. The sight made Sauge laugh even harder.
“It seems this fabric is a bit too long,” Iris remarked.
“Indeed. Let’s trim it down,” Sauge declared. And with that, she promptly cut the stole in half. As the excess fluttered down to the ground, Iris hastily caught it midair and put it back around Sauge’s neck. She chuckled.
“You’re simply full of giggles tonight, aren’t you, Lady Sauge?” Iris grumbled.
“Go and tell them about the water. The sun will soon rise.”
And so, Iris dashed back to the cavern to let the soilpox victims know about the water spout. Meanwhile, the unusually chilly summer sky began to lighten…
✦ ✦ ✦
❀❀❀
AFTER that night, Iris periodically asked Sauge to take her back to the cavern in the Dark Forest. Under the cover of darkness, she would check up on her would-be patients, collect any newly formed scabs, and deliver any necessities.
The patients who’d ingested the powder appeared to be on the path to recovery, which meant her vaccine was a success. In fact, the mother and daughter had recovered enough that they were able to go back to town! Additionally, Camille’s Camellia seemed to help prevent the formation of scars.
As more and more of the infected managed to recover, they decided to “pay it forward” by bringing food and camellia seed oil back to the cavern for the sick. This was a concerted effort led by none other than the man with the scar on his face. With his help, the conditions in the cavern improved dramatically.
In truth, he was inspired after seeing Iris risk her life to visit them over and over again, but this was one little fact she would never learn.