“Sylvie? We’re coming in,” said Crumb as she knocked on the door. She received no response. Her sister must have been terribly weak...
Crumb didn’t wait for an answer before slowly pushing open the door. It almost seemed like she had expected silence.
But the moment the door flew open, a heavy aura overwhelmed me. The mana trapped inside the room had escaped as soon as the door swung open. Even just breathing it in was enough to make me feel sick, and Crumb seemed slightly uncomfortable too. Had it been a random person in town who rarely got to interact with magic, they’d likely feel more than just malaise. It couldn’t be easy finding someone to care for Sylvie.
“That’s her,” said Crumb, pointing to a bed beside the window. Atop it was a silver-haired, gaunt young woman—Crumb’s little sister, Sylvie. The two of us approached the bed.
“I’m going to lift the covers,” said Crumb. She received no answer, and I could tell just from watching that she hadn’t expected to. She gently moved the blankets.
“So this is how she’s crystallized...” Sylvie’s arms and legs had morphed into purple magic stones that resembled amethysts, which emitted a dull, unsettling glow. Magic stones came in a variety of colors, and this was the color that resulted when high concentrations of mana condensed. Typically, magic stones were instead blue. “So only her limbs have crystallized...”
“It started with her fingertips and toes and gradually spread from there. I had capable healers take a look at her, but they didn’t know what caused it either...”
Healers? Monks were the only class more skilled at healing magic than white mages. Above even them were holy maidens, but the only one in town was attached at Allen’s hip, so it seemed safe to assume she wasn’t the one who had taken a look at Sylvie. She wasn’t the type to let money drive her to action either.
White mages could also use healing magic, but their forte was more support magic they could cast from the back lines. They weren’t really a healer class, while monks were capable of high-level healing magic. However...
“Yeah, that makes sense...”
“Huh?” Crumb looked dumbfounded.
I ignored her and outstretched my hand toward Sylvie.
“What are you planning, Lloyd?” she asked, glaring at me. Likely, her real question was, What’s a white mage going to do that a skilled healer couldn’t? Or perhaps, it was, You’re not gonna do anything weird to my sister, are you?
But after seeing her current condition, I was now certain—I could heal her. “Crumb, could you leave her to me?”
“B-But...” She clearly didn’t know how to respond. “C-Can you really cure her...?” she asked with doubt in her eyes.
“Just leave it to me,” I said before placing my hand on Sylvie’s forehead and activating mana transfer—or really, activating reverse mana transfer.
I groaned. Immediately, an inordinate amount of mana came rushing into my body. Just how many mana potions’ worth was this? You typically couldn’t feel mana absorption, but this was quite painful...
“A-Are you okay?” asked Crumb. She watched me with worried eyes.
I managed to croak out a “yeah,” but I was having a hard time keeping things in check. Since mana transfer was possible, I thought absorption had to be too, so I gave it a try. But unlike handing over your own MP, there wasn’t a way to really control how much you were absorbing from someone else. If I let my guard down, all her mana could come rushing into me at once. At the same time, I had to control the mana within her body too, and naturally, I couldn’t afford to make a single mistake.
Sylvie let out a groan. Thankfully, she was still asleep. But if she awoke, she’d immediately wail from the excruciating pain.
When it came to mana transfers, the burden was heavier on the transferrer than the receiver. In other words, it was harder on the person losing MP than absorbing it. If possible, I wanted her to stay asleep until this was over. That was the thought on my mind as I continued to cautiously absorb her mana, praying that this would be as easy on her as possible.
“Almost there...” I couldn’t absorb any more mana. If I did, then I’d start to crystallize. Now, I needed to segue from absorbing MP to expending it, so I cast the spell Heal. This version was crazy inefficient, and one of my failures in my attempts to improve the spell. Who’d have thought I’d actually get the chance to use it, much less at a time like this?
But thanks to the spell, I could expend MP faster than I was absorbing it and continuously heal Sylvie while doing so. But to be honest, I wasn’t sure how much it was helping.
I continued to absorb Sylvia’s MP via mana transfer and expend it by casting Heal, gradually depleting Sylvie’s mana. Fragments of mana crystal began to break off her skin, and after a few dozen minutes, I was nearing the ending of her mana reserves. The unpleasant air was subsiding.
It’d only be a little longer, now. Once Sylvie’s mana was controlled and stabilized, then...
“Hmm?” But just as I was about to focus on controlling her mana, I noticed something strange within her body. It had been concealed by her rampaging mana, but now that it had subsided, I was picking up on something that slightly emitted mana itself. Just what was it?
“Is this where Sylvie was injured, Crumb?” I asked, pointing at Sylvie’s right side.
“Yeah, I think so. But how’d you know that, Lloyd? Was it a function of your healing spell?” asked Crumb.
I shook my head. Obviously, Sylvie was clothed, so I couldn’t see any scars or injuries. I also didn’t know any healing spells that could discover wounds. In other words, even had a mark been left behind, you’d have to undress Sylvie to see it.
So why had I asked that question? Because I had picked up on something strange right where I had been pointing—a foreign object that seemed to have been buried in her skin by accident when she was injured. I concluded it’d be best to remove it. From what I could tell, that couldn’t pose any issue.