When scribing seals, the line thickness matters, but it also matters when engraving them. A three-dimensional seal’s line has to be a half-cylinder, half as deep as it is wide. While not mandatory, doing it this way yields the best result.

  — Excerpt from Comprehensive Introduction to Scribing and Seals

  Day 117, 8:30 AM

  After setting the skinny young lady on a chair, I led the stonemason to the small nook reserved for examinations.

  “What do you think about the quality of this ceiling?”

  He looked up and screamed when I pulled his bone back into place. Tears escaped him, but I ignored them as I cleaned and bandaged the wound, before immobilizing his arm with a splint.

  A level up notice appeared, and I mechanically picked Initial Emergent Care over Initial Empathy. I tried the latter in one loop, but the skill unnerved me. Possibly because of my higher attributes, I resonated with the feelings not just of my patients, but of anyone I spoke with. A hellish experience I didn’t need to repeat.

  “You need to rest, and don’t strain your arm for at least two moons, three if you have the luxury of not working that long.”

  The man deadpanned at me, saying without words that he needed to start working now, not in twelve weeks.

  “Your job is really tough to do one-armed, and if your arm heals the wrong way and you get really unlucky, it might never work properly. If you suffer a permanent deformity, at best you would have to come here again, find someone to break your arm skillfully and set it again properly. And after all that pain, you would have to be still for at least four moons for the bone to hopefully heal properly.”

  He very nearly glowered at me, but a no-nonsense frown doused his anger, and he nodded, averting his gaze.

  “Fine.”

  I dismissed the stonemason, hoping he would take care of himself, before going to check on my nurse, who was still passed out in the rickety chair. I covered her with a blanket, then went to find her little brother to take him to the surgery room, which really didn’t deserve the name. It was another nook with barely enough room for a polished wooden table, a doctor, and an assistant, but still much better than doing the deed in a normal bed in the common room.

  Sunlight flooded the chamber through an unbroken window, and the place was isolated from the rest of the patients, relatively clean too. Not ideal, but not horrible either. What was horrible was the lack of sedatives.

  “Here, drink this.” I gave the kid a tonic I brewed, and he passed out immediately.

  “Lord Knight,” his sister shouted at the door some forty-five minutes later.

  “I am in the middle of treating your little brother.”

  The doorknob moved.

  “You will faint again if you enter.”

  Thankfully, that stopped her.

  “If you need any help, let me know,” she said, trying to sound brave.

  “I will,” I said. “You take care of the patients as best as you can. I’ll be done in an hour and a half.”

  Soon enough, I was pushing the needle through the boy’s foot for the last stitch, and a level up notice appeared. I pushed my healing to expert, then fed the boy the potion I brewed for him last night.

  Another level up notification appeared because I cured his incurable illness, and I was left with two excellent skills. Initial Sedation granted the ability to put people to sleep by touching them. It was weak at the initial tier, but at a higher tier, it should provide a lot of combat utility, assuming I could improve it.

  The alternative was Initial Lingering Injury Detection. While sedation was fun to play with, spotting and using old injuries against your enemies was countless times more useful in life-and-death scenarios, and I could play a wise old healer outside said life-and-death situations.

  Reluctantly, I picked the better skill and checked my status, more out of habit than because I held realistic expectations that my level up condition had suddenly changed. It hadn’t, and curing someone with mana was currently beyond me.

  Again, a rational man or a machine would walk out as soon as he had achieved his goal, but I couldn’t. Not when I knew Honey would come tomorrow morning sobbing with her boy burning up with fever, a boy who would die if left in Fivesnake’s competent, but powerless hands.

  It was hypocritical, caring about one child when so many others perished, but if everyone resolved the problems which appeared before them, perhaps we wouldn’t solve all problems, but the world would certainly be a better place.

  A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  So, I finished my shift, then went to the alchemists’ guild to brew a potion for the little Potato. Heavens, did that family have a poor taste in names.

  The elixir was simple and mostly mundane, with a trickle of mana to accelerate the healing. That trickle made the potion expensive, but without it, the feverish boy would die before the day’s end.

  My focus slipped while infusing the potion with mana, and the baker started fuming. I grit my teeth and poured it into the sewage disposal. Three hours wasted.

  It’s fine. I still have time.

  I pushed all other thoughts from my mind and focused on the task at hand. While I had successfully brewed the potion in the previous loop and healed the little Potato, the success wasn’t guaranteed in alchemy. Especially if you’re half-hearted about it.

  I left the laboratory three hours later, cursing the morning light shining in through the window. My fatigue was slowly accumulating, and I couldn’t remember the last time I slept — too many loops, too much I wanted to do in a short time-frame.

  Maybe I need another leisure loop. Massages and floating in warm water would do wonders for my mental state. If I fail the hunter part of the loop, I’ll redo, letting my successes stick.

  Strictly speaking, there was no objective reason to reset my realm under Newstar’s watchful eye. But having him there would imply deep trust on my part and alleviate the remaining doubts he harbored about me.

  “Could you sell these for me, Anise?” I gave the five vials to the receptionist, keeping one.

  Having another in reserve wouldn’t have been bad, but the regular vials were fragile, while the reinforced ones were expensive. Besides, the potion was only useful to non-awakened, and took up space in my rather limited inventory.

  The clerk fluttered her eyelashes. “Sure thing, Dandelion.”

  She opened her mouth to say something, but I was already running late. A hot Potato was waiting. “I apologize, I need to handle something. We can talk tonight.”

  She bit her lip and nodded, doing a poor job at hiding her disappointment. Anise was a first realm mage in her early twenties, and she already hit on me in the previous loops, but she didn’t take my nos kindly, and I’ve been avoiding her in the successful runs.

  “Got to run.” With that, I hurried out and arrived at the slum clinic in time to hear the elderly healer’s tired voice.

  “I’m sorry madam, there’s nothing we can do for him, other than try to keep him cool and hope his fever passes.”

  I knew that approach would kill him by the end of the day, so I stepped in.

  “I have a potion we could try.”

  Fivesnake looked at me, almost shaking his head that the boy wasn’t worth the potion, but Potato was six years old, and I couldn’t bear to let him die, even if a wagon would run him over the next day without me knowing.

  Before the elderly healer could say a word, Honey jumped on her knees and grabbed my legs.

  “Please, Sir, help my boy.”

  “I will.” She let go, and I walked into the room full of people, approaching a tiny child with a damp white cloth on his forehead.

  I opened Potato’s mouth and fed him the potion. There wasn’t an immediate effect. The potion wasn’t really magical, but it would keep the boy alive for several days, long enough for his fever to pass and for his mother to nurse him back to health.

  I left Honey with her son and walked over to Fivesnake.

  “It’s a waste,” he whispered. “A potion which can heal him costs more than medicine for ten people.”

  I shrugged. “You cannot put a price tag on a person’s life.”

  He was about to retort, probably that you can in a society with criminal slaves, which you were allowed to murder, but I didn’t want to hear him say anything like that.

  “I wish to finance an organization which would feed the starving citizens.” He drew another breath to speak, but I kept talking. “Feeding people would keep them healthier and out of your infirmary, saving lives and money at the same time. Do you have any suggestions about how I should do this?”

  “Well, first you need a place where you can serve food. People would need to bring their own bowls and utensils, for obvious reasons…” Fivesnake had a lot to say. So much, in fact, that I believed he had at some point entertained the idea and given it more thoughts than I did.

  [Name - Dandelion Blackfist

  Class - healer level 6

  Health 25/25, Strength - 25, Agility - 25, Physique - 25, Wisdom - 25, Intellect - 25, Willpower - 25, Presence - 25, Charisma - 25, Composure - 25

  Abilities - See Abilities for more information.

  Attribute points remaining - 29

  To level up, cure a patient relying solely on mana.

  Statuses - none]

  [Abilities - Expert Appraisal, Initial Forest Ambush, Advanced Looting, Literate, Flawless Heartcore, Initial Mana Gathering, Initial Mana Circulation, Initial Black Fist Arts, Advanced Body Reinforcement, Master Rider, Initial Fast Reader, Initial Reference Checker, Master Calligraphy, Initial Arithmetics, Initial Persuasion, Initial Photographic Memory, Initial Time Optimization, Initial Logical Deduction, Advanced Steady Hand, Initial Eye For Detail, Initial Seal Deconstruction, Initial Seal Prototyping, Expert Staffmanship, Expert Swordsmanship, Expert Spearmanship, Initial Clubmanship, Initial Flailmanship, Advanced Knifemanship, Initial Axmanship, Initial Macemanship, Initial Slingmanship, Advanced Bowmanship, Piercing Weapons Master, Battlefield Mastery, Always Ready, Initial Sense of Danger, Initial Hammer Proficiency, Initial Find Structural Weakness, Initial Rhythm, Initial Endurance, Advanced Herbalism, Expert Healing, Initial Focus, Initial Woodland Sense, Initial Poison Lore, Initial Precise Hand, Advanced Poison Tolerance, Initial Infer Recipe, Initial Infuse Admixture, Initial Quick Brewer, Initial Bedside Manner, Initial First Aid, Initial Bloodletting, Initial Emergent Care, Initial Lingering Injury Detection]

  [Anarchist Level 7

  Abilities - Rage, Redo, Blunt, Heavy Handed, Direct, Insightful, Precise, Amicable, Visionary, Godly ??, Gate Sealer ??, Vengeful ?, Grandmaster Rider ?

  To level up, force the authorities to impose justice upon a party they had previously ignored.]