Week 8

  They set out for the Petalorian Archive at dawn, as tradition and narrative inevitability demanded.

  Calanthe rode at the rear of the lead party; one of five, each with its own battered standard and patched armor. Ember trotted alongside her horse.

  Callie pulled her jacket tighter and squinted at the status menu hovering, smugly, in the bottom right of her vision. It was too late to change anything but it was only thing too look at apart from the dreadful scenery.

  She’d put it off for weeks, not out of strategy but pure procrastination. There had always been an excuse: wait for a better sense of the meta, see if the skills got less useless after Level 25 (all available information suggesting the contrary), avoid breaking the narrative by min-maxing herself into a corner. Well, here she was, out of time and out of options. She had spent all of one hour last night distributing a measly fifty-three attribute points. The results were less than satisfactory:

  [Name: Calanthe]

  [Healer, Level 25]

  Strength (STR)5

  Dexterity (DEX)5

  Constitution (CON)13

  Intelligence (INT)28

  Luck (LUK)2

  Max Green Mana: 733

  Endurance (Stamina): 169

  Magic Defense: 38

  Crit Heal Chance: 4%

  XP Bonus+2%

  Level 1

  Active: Basic Wound Dressing – Clean and bandage minor cuts/scrapes. Reduces infection chance by 30%.

  Passive: Steady Hands – +10% success rate on manual medical tasks (suturing, splinting).

  Level 5

  Active: Field Suturing – Close lacerations with thread/needle. Restores 5 HP over 1 hour.

  Passive: Triage Instinct – Instantly assess severity of up to 3 nearby injuries.

  Level 10

  Active: Bone Setting – Immobilize and align broken bones. Healing time reduced by 50%.

  Passive: Iron Stomach – Immune to foodborne illness and mild environmental toxins.

  Level 15

  Active: Purify Water – Remove biological contaminants from 1 liter of water. Safe to drink.

  Passive: Vitality Sense – Detect fever, internal bleeding, or magical corruption by touch.

  Level 20

  Active: Soothe Pain – Emit a calming aura. Removes pain and grants +20% movement speed for 2 min

  Passive: Enduring Focus – Reduce stamina cost of healing actions by 15%.

  Level 25

  Active: Mend Flesh – Channel faint green mana to seal shallow wounds. Restores 15 HP instantly.

  Passive: Resilient Touch – Your healing actions grant +10% resistance to disease for 1 hour.

  Bonus!: Metabolic Flexibility – Reduces caloric requirement by 30% and reduces hunger.

  “Well, that’s going to come in handy,” she muttered, regarding the Bonus, “if someone curses me with an extra helping of mashed potatoes.” Callie glared at the screen and wondered if someone had stolen the skill tree from a post-apocalyptic RPG.

  *

  Ahead, the lead party’s banner dipped, then straightened. The group’s commander looked over her shoulder and barked, “Healer! You and the mutt keeping up?”

  Callie raised her hand in a lazy salute. “I’m good. He’s just here for the snacks.”

  The woman scoffed, then resumed scanning the treeline, her hand never far from the hilt of her sword. To her left, a man in half-plate and a perpetual sneer eyed Callie with the suspicion of someone who’d lost too many friends to not-so-divine intervention. She ignored him, turned her gaze inward.

  She was supposed to be worrying about the mission: the Petalorian Archive, a maze of stone and memory, and whatever horror had reduced last week’s expedition to a parade of trauma cases and sob stories. She was supposed to be mapping her own weaknesses, bracing for a fight she wasn’t remotely qualified to face.

  But what she really wanted to do was pick apart the narrative.

  Atair’s version of the story had holes you could drive a wagon through. For one: if the group was attacked by Plague Bearers, why weren’t any of the fallen corrupted with disease. More importantly, if the maze locked behind them and the shadow-creature consumed everything in its path, how had so many made it out to tell the tale?

  Ember howled, breaking her train of thought.

  The rest of the party gave him a wide berth, even the veterans. It was a healthy fear. Ember was now twice as large as when she bought him. His gait had smoothed out in the last few days, the limp barely visible. Only the network of white scars on his flank gave away how close he’d come to dying.

  ***

  About half a day’s ride from the Archive, they came upon an Orc encampment, at least three times as large as the Orc commune Callie had treated.

  Tents of every color and size covered the open ground for hundreds of meters.

  The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

  Callie’s party rode in under the suspicious stares of several dozen orcs, each sporting tattoos, braids, or jewelry that marked their clan or cult. The orcs were bigger than she remembered from the forest, and healthier—no signs of the lung rot that had ravaged the earlier commune.

  There were human faces in the crowd, too: traders, porters, and the occasional hard-looking mercenary, all absorbed in the machinery of the market. She presumed that these were all refugees from the failed expedition.

  At the far end of the main clearing, a ring of tents had been cordoned off, marked by sticks with red rags and a battered sign that read “Hospital” in three languages. Outside, a queue had formed; wounded men, women, and orcs, some standing, some slumped or carried, all waiting with a patience Callie recognized from a dozen disaster wards.

  Also, a familiar face at last, Ashrend, the leader of the Petalorian pilgrims. She dismounted and was immediately ignored, except by Ashrend, who had little to convey apart from the fact that the wounded had started pouring in four days ago and the Orcs were delaying the Oracular consult till the refugees left.

  She took the opportunity to look over the wounded: most were field bandaged, some well, others haphazardly. There were burns, cuts, arrow wounds, even a few obvious magical injuries—flesh puckered and shiny, the trademark of necrotic touch or failed healing.

  Callie ducked into the nearest tent, where a young orc was struggling to tie a poultice onto the arm of a groaning human. The poultice was good but the technique left room for improvement.

  “Here,” Callie said, and took the bandage from her. She wound it tight, then checked the fingers for circulation. “Don’t want to lose the hand, yeah?”

  The orc blinked, then gave a wary nod. She didn’t speak, just watched as Callie checked the rest of the patient, then cleaned and re-dressed the wound with a practiced efficiency. When she finished, the orc grunted approval, then hurried out for the next case.

  The tent filled quickly: a child with a fever, a woman with a dislocated shoulder, a man whose leg had been splinted with what looked like an entire tree branch. Callie set bones, stitched gashes, and dispensed bitter tea for pain. For each patient, a faint gold “+10 XP” blipped in her periphery, like a distant clock ticking toward something she could not see.

  The orcs watched her work, first with skepticism, then with something like respect. Several brought their own remedies—pouches of dried fungi, resinous sap, roots so pungent they made Callie’s eyes water. She cataloged them, noted which helped and which only made things worse.

  Ember sat just outside the tent, a silent bouncer, keeping away the curious or the bored. The children adored him, sometimes sneaking him strips of meat, which he accepted with the dignity of royalty.

  It was hours before Callie saw any of her party again.

  ***

  The commander of the expedition found her just as dusk set in.

  She ducked into the tent, motioned Callie aside, and said in a low voice, “They’re not going to the Archive tomorrow. None of them. Not after what they saw back in town and certainly not after this.”

  Callie wiped her hands on a rag, checked the line outside. “So the plan is to wait and hope?”

  “It’s reasonable to assume that everyone not here is already dead,” the leader said. “They’re scared, and frankly, I don’t blame them.” She hesitated. “Are you?”

  “Of course, who wouldn’t be. But someone has to see if the story holds up... right?” Callie met the commander's gaze, hoping for an answer in the affirmative.

  The leader frowned and shook her head. “You’re going alone?”

  “Just to look at the grounds,” Callie said. “I’m not planning heroics. If you could see my stats, you’ll know exactly what I mean.”

  Callie thought about Rule #1 in her notebook—Don’t be a busy body. “The mission was to find survivors, wasn’t it?”

  The leader looked tired. “Not anymore. Now the mission is to keep as many alive as possible.”

  Ember padded in, tail up, and the leader took a step back. “That thing really trusts you, doesn’t it?”

  “We made a deal,” Callie said. “He doesn’t eat anyone unless I say it’s necessary.”

  The woman laughed, then sobered. “Good luck, Healer.”

  Callie nodded. The leader left, and Ember took her place at Callie’s side, head resting on her knee.

  Back at her tent, Callie sorted her kit, checked every vial and needle, then arranged them in the order she’d want if she had to use them while running. It was a pointless exercise, but it steadied her hands.

  Ember curled up at the threshold, a wall of muscle and intent.

  Callie lay on her cot and let the world fade to a muffled hum. Tomorrow she would see what the Archive really held. And if she didn’t come back, at least the system would have to work hard to spin a satisfying ending.

  ***

  Dawn brought a fog so thick it blurred the line between waking and dream. Ember rose without being called, stretched with a yawn that snapped the silence, then pressed his head to her hip until she relented and scratched behind his ear.

  They waited at the edge of the tents until Ashrend appeared, a silhouette among the low fires. He regarded Ember with a grunt, then turned to Callie.

  “We go east,” he said, voice pitched for secrecy. “It’s not far.”

  She fell in beside him, Ember at her side. They moved through the ranks of tents, past sleeping orcs, past the first sentries who nodded without question, past the perimeter to the wilds beyond.

  Ashrend led with the precision of a man who’d mapped every root and stone.

  At the top of a gentle rise, the mist parted. There, across a shallow valley, sat the Petalorian Archive.

  It looked nothing like a fortress. The Archive was a white stone rectangle, three stories, with a slate roof and a portico of columns. Neatly clipped grass surrounded it, broken only by rows of topiary and flower beds that glowed with the last stubborn color of the season. There were no walls, no defensive works, no evidence of siege. The air above was calm, untouched by smoke or the stink of death.

  Even more off-putting, the approach was immaculate. Not a footprint, not a scrap of torn clothing, not a bloodstain. The marble steps up to the main entrance gleamed.

  Ashrend stopped at the treeline, just out of sight of the building. “This is as far as I go,” he said, gesturing with one massive hand. “The Oracle knows her faithful.”

  Callie nodded. She surveyed the meadow, then the Archive, then back to Ashrend. “I’ll be careful,” she said.

  “I’ll be waiting nearby for when you return,” he said, then turned and vanished into the mist, leaving only the memory of his bulk behind.

  Callie gave Ember a final pat, then started down the slope, keeping to the edge where the grass was highest.

  She half expected to find a string of traps, or at least a tripwire, but there was nothing—no hint of magic, no hum of ambient violence. She reached the bottom and found herself at the edge of a formal garden. The beds were freshly turned, the roses pruned to within an inch of their lives. Ember sniffed, then sneezed, then picked his way down the gravel path with regal caution.

  Callie followed, heart thudding. She circled the building, keeping to the shadows, looking for any sign of what Atair had described. There was none. No sign of massed kobolds, no army of liches, not even a bored groundskeeper.

  She reached the front steps and paused, listening. The only sound was Ember’s breathing, and the distant whistle of a bird that, in another world, would have been reassuring.

  She crept up the steps, one by one, hand on the balustrade, expecting a shock or a curse. Nothing.

  At the doors, she paused again. They were slightly ajar, enough to let out a wedge of lamplight. She peeked through, eyes adjusting. There were no guards, no noise apart from the faint creak of a door hinge in need of some oiling.

  She pushed the door a tad wider for one final check before she left.

  No sooner had she put the tip of her foot on the threshold, did a voice call out, “Halt!” It was thin, nasal, and distinctly unimpressed.

  Callie blinked. At the far end of the hall, half hidden by a pillar, was a kobold. He wore a sleeveless vest and a metal badge that looked suspiciously like a security pass.

  He hefted a spear and pointed it at her. “State your business at the Archive.”

  Callie glanced at Ember, who looked back at her, then at the kobold, then yawned.

  “I’m here to see the Oracle,” Callie said, playing up the innocent traveler. “The orcs said the faithful are allowed at this time of year.”

  The kobold regarded her, then shrugged. “True. But only those with clearance.” He eyed Ember, then Callie, then Ember again. The kobold was clearly bored with protocol but making a good show of working hard.

  “The Oracle is open year-round, but it’s been a hectic week. What do you want with it?”

  “I’m a healer,” Callie said. “I heard the Archive holds records of forgotten medicine. I’d like to consult them, if possible. With the Oracle’s help and permission of course.”

  “Yeah, that sounds a bit sus if you ask me?” He approached, sniffed the air around Callie’s head, then frowned and glared at her with a hint of displeasure.

  “Alright, you can go in. Don’t touch anything which looks like it might bite, and stay out of the lower stacks.”

  Callie inclined her head. “Thank you.”

  The kobold stepped aside, then leaned in to Ember and gave him a scratch on the snout. “Don’t cause trouble, doggy.”

  Ember wagged his tail, then resumed his post at Callie’s side.

  As they passed through the next set of doors, Callie heard the kobold mutter to himself, “If you have a pass, then say so. I’m only a Level Three Door Man. I could get in real trouble for not letting in guests. What’s with the whole mystery shopper thing?”

  Callie didn’t bother to reply. She kept walking, eyes straight ahead, into the lamplit corridors of the Archive.

  If Atair’s story was even half true, the real fun would start soon.