17. rise of the healer villain

Yukimura’s reaction was, “Fuck you.” He turned to Hisui, who kept picking at her braid behind her back. “And fuck you too. Are those flowers part of your head now or what?” She shook her head, and he visibly relaxed. “Okay, good.” When neither Hisui nor I said anything, he added, “There was some girl in my group that got elf ears, so it’s not that uncommon. You’re not special.”

…oh, I got it. He was mad because he wasn’t the one getting these things. “Maybe,” Hisui mumbled.

“Then that’s the big deal? I thought you were hiding something actually important. Aren’t turtles reptiles? Of course he’s gonna get reptile eyes. Anyway, who cares. Let’s do the quest now so we get our equipment.”

“Turtles don’t…” Hisui trailed off as Yukimura walked back out. We exchanged glances, so I shrugged. Born to be a half-demon elf god, forced to be a fairy. Poor, poor Yukimura. He’d would’ve probably had a field day had he been the one to be assigned ‘therianthrope’, but alas. “Oh, so we just… go? Are you sure, Ishida?”

“Seishin,” I corrected.

“Uh, but you said…”

“Don’t care.”

I could all but see giant interrogation signs floating around her head. “Okay,” Hisui said. “Are you sure, Seishin?” I gave her a thumbs-up, so she continued, still a bit rattled (understandably), “So basically, after you lost consciousness, they took you to the medical wing, but Connie insisted on healing you instead. He did that, and he also taught Yukimura the basics, and then Tissu took us to this safe zone for the quest. I’m not sure what it is, though, because I stayed here while Yukimura and Kawakami went out to meet the other crews. Ah, by the way, one of the other groups apparently got a dangerous quest or something, so they asked to take Aoko along, and she said yes. It’s just the three of us for now.”

A wood fairy who didn’t know what status effects were, a self-loathing snow fairy, and a homicidal furry. What a combo. As I got off the floating mattress, heavily suspecting I’d regret my decision, I asked, “Who carried me here?”

“Me!”

I shouldn’t have asked I shouldn’t have asked I shouldn’t have asked—

Why.

WHY.

Why hadn’t I woken up earlier!?

ONE good thing, godammit. ONE. That was all I asked for. And it happened while I was— “I see. Um. How did you…”

“Wood fairies are strong,” she replied.

“No, I mean how, like… like the…”

Yukimura tossed the curtain open again. “Hurry up!”

We did, I, with my cape over my face. They’d probably naively assume that I was trying to shield the world from my very scary very bad cat eyes. But no. My face just felt hot to the ears.

Yukimura said, “Our quest is to… reach the edge of the map.”

“Map?” Asked Hisui.

“The safe zone.”

“Oh, that’s weird. Why would that be a quest?”

“It’s not weird. Isn’t that the first thing you do when unlocking a new map? Imagine being one of those losers who just moves forward without exploring first.”

That was me, thank you very much. I’d occasionally talk to random NPCs, but for the most part, I tended to just stick to the story. I didn’t play many open-world games anyway. I didn’t have the patience to.

By this point, I’d stretched the hood over my eyes in order to see the terrain below—white grass, flowing without a breeze again. No pebble or twig in sight.

In classic Hisui fashion, she replied, “That makes sense,” even though it didn’t. Now that I’d properly recuperated my oxygen intake, it was becoming more and more apparent that Yukimura’s guidance was as reliable as Hisui’s gaming “expertise”.

“We’re also supposed to pick up three mushrooms and take them to the Igasu village nearby.” That was probably the actual objective for today. Of course we’d gotten a fetch quest. I couldn’t blame him for wanting to do something else. Yukimura continued, “They’re supposed to be easy to spot because they’re blue, but other teams are looking for them. PvP is allowed, just no killing.”

Better. I pulled back the hood.

Yukimura walked ahead, with Hisui close behind, and I a comfortable distance away. Instead of mushrooms, the ‘forest’ here was composed of leafless trees in primary colors—yellow, blue, red. I had to squint due to how bright everything was, but at least I could actually see those colors. From what I understood, cats had issues seeing green and red. It would’ve sucked for the changes to be more than cosmetic.

On the branches of a matte blue tree was a ball the size of an elevator with a rope hanging off of it. It said, in both Korovan (I assumed) and Japanese: SUPPLY STATION.

“Sakura,” Yukimura said. “Can you make the tree move so that thing falls down?”

“Why?”

“I’m thirsty, but I don’t wanna climb.”

“Oh. I can get something for you.”

Hisui jogged ahead, then began to climb up the rope. Yukimura and I watched her climb, because… reasons. Miniskirt. “Do you like her?” He asked.

“...huh?”

“I mean, I know you do, because it’s obvious, but I’m being nice and asking you anyway.”

“I don’t… dislike her.” Replying with something like ‘none of your business’ or ‘why do you care’ would only make things worse.

“Want help?”

“No.”

“What if I screamed ‘Sakura, Ishida loves you!’ right now?”

I shrugged.

Yukimura’s eyes narrowed. “Hmm… SAKURAAA!”

Hisui’s head poked out from the head at the entrance. “It’s an Igasu’s house! It’s full of tiny furniture. You guys should see this!”

Now Yukimura was torn between being a dipshit and a tourist; the latter won.

The problem was that he was too weak to climb.

After embarrassing himself for a few seconds, Yukimura slid off the 30 cm of rope he’d managed to conquer. “...nah, I’m fine. I’ll stand guard. I won’t tell Sakura that you like her, but now you also owe me a favor.”

It was disturbingly easy to climb up the rope. Someone else might have rejoiced at the feeling of physical strength going up by an order of magnitude, but I knew better. This was how it started. It was all fun and games until my fingernails fell off and I became a Brundlecat.

The hand Surin had broken ached a bit, so it was a good excuse to slide down. “Weak,” Yukimura said. I ignored him, which prompted him to add, “Ishida, I know you hate me because of… that, but you have to TALK. Seriously, it’s getting creepy.”

‘That’ almost certainly referred to a pre-Korova event where his friends extorted students and blamed me for it. The ringleader and school council president, Hoshimiya Tatsumi, had been benevolent enough to “protect me” from higher authorities. Just the thought of it made me want to tell Yukimura to shut up lest I’d choke him with his scarf. I looked away instead.

“Yeah, see my point? How is that remotely normal?”

I shrugged.

With aptitude he had not shown before, Yukimura summoned a rudimentary ice spear, then hurled it at the rope, cutting it in half. The former dissolved into the air. The latter fell onto the grass like a giant noodle. Then he gave me the finger.

When I laughed, I couldn’t tell which of us was more surprised. He was just so… childish.

“...dude.” He smiled. I could tell even with half of his face being obscured. “Finally, holy shit.”

What Yukimura didn’t know was that I laughed at him all the time, just in secret. Hisui’s head poked out ahead as she glanced around. “What was that noise?”

“Ishida tore the rope while trying to climb,” Yukimura replied. “What a nincompoop.”

Well, there went the five-second truce.

Hisui leaned down to see the giant noodle on the grass. She was two stories above ground level or so. Instead of screaming for help, she asked, “Did anyone get hurt?”

I shook my head.

“Good! I’ll drop the supplies now, so step away in case something flies out!” Thankfully, this didn’t literally mean pushing them down; a group of vines crept from under the supply station, wrapping themselves around what really looked like a chest from an asset flip. Slowly, the vines slid it down.

“Poor Sakura,” Yukimura said. “She’s trapped, scared, and all alone up there. If only Hoshimiya was here to rescue her.”

As if on cue, the vines slid her down, too. Upon landing, Hisui said, “Easy peasy.”

“Easy peasy,” I agreed, then gave Yukimura the finger.

Soon, we discovered that the asset flip chest was empty.

“...ah.” That was Hisui.

“...ah.” That was Yukimura.

…ah. A note made of floating letters appeared at the bottom, saying please use this box to exchange the requested items for supplies at the village’s post office.

“So… do we just carry this thing around or…” Yukimura glanced at me.

I would’ve replied ‘I won’t’, but that would mean HIsui volunteering to do so. Alright. Fine. I’d talk. So be it. No stuttering or embarrassing pauses. Easy peasy. “What if we just, um. We could just. Put it back?” Close enough.

“What if someone else steals it?”

“They won’t. Because it’s empty?”

“And?”

“And it’s empty?”

As Yukimura gave me a blank look, Hisui translated, “No one’s gonna carry this thing around if it has nothing of value.” I nodded. Content with her ability to speak Ishidaseishinese, she continued, “But! We might not remember where it was once we have the mushrooms, or it might be a hassle to go through this again, so I’ll just—” She stopped when I raised a hand. “Oh? You’re gonna do it?”

“Yukimura will.”

“Hah—why would I?”

“Make yourself useful.”

“Make yourself useful.”

“I can,” Hisui said.

“Ah, I get it,” Yukimura said. “You two get reptile eyes and the status effect elements while I’m stuck with this trash. Got it.”

“I can,” Hisui said.

“No, it’s fine. It’s fine! I’ll do it. See what happens when you piss off the healer.”

“I…” Hisui trailed off as Yukimura lifted the box from one end, then the other, then used the tree next to us to push it up. By the time he held it between his noodly arms, he was shaking like a chihuahua.

“Go on!” He wheezed. “Move, w-worthless… maggots…”

I bit back the smirk as soon as Hisui glanced at me. Without breaking eye contact, she shook her head slowly, then began to walk. It was the closest thing to anger I’d seen from her, and it should’ve made me realize the error of my ways, probably, but instead I was thinking of tripping Yukimura if we had to walk up a hill.

For better or worse, it didn’t take long before we came across the first mushroom. It was right there, in the middle of a clearing, baby blue and sparkling.

None of us moved.

Why?

Because it seemed a bit too easy.

“I’ll ask Tama to help,” Hisui said. Before anyone asked the obvious question (Who?) a mushroom burst from the ground right next to the blue one, then exploded on contact. “TAMA! NO!”

Tama was no more; only the murderous, blue mushroom remained. Hisui fell to her knees as the remains of her friend plopped on the grass. After giving it a moment of silence, I walked back to one of the trees, tore a branch, then walked to the quest item until I was close enough to poke it. Nothing happened, so I skewered the mushroom, then uprooted it.

Right below it were the half-dissolved remains of the dark fairy who kept interrogating people about their power levels. Needless to say, I flinched, then had to duck a fireball zooming my way. As it exploded a short distance away, my shadow tried to choke me—literally—, but I stabbed it with the skewer until the mushroom touched it, making it explode on contact as well. Not too far away, somebody screamed.

Yukimura all but wobbled towards me. “Quickly,” he wheezed. “Box… put…” but he was too weak to open the box on his own, and Hisui was paralyzed with grief. I wasn’t even being facetious—she was actually crying. Maybe her dead dog had also been named Tama or something.

As I tried to open the box with one hand and hold the hazardous mushroom skewer with the other one, a beam of sacred light tried to vaporize us, so I had to shove Yukimura to the side, then skid back.

I pieced the situation together as follows: the intrusive dark fairy must’ve seen the mushroom and said, ‘Quest item! Yay!’, then tried to touch the thing and died a horrible death. While the rest thought of a way to save her, we showed up, so they decided to use us as test subjects to see if we also violently perished while attempting to retrieve the mushroom. Since we didn’t, her team was now trying to steal the item, and… save her… maybe…?

Yukimura stumbled under the weight of the stolen asset chest, then collapsed. As it tumbled to the side, though, it opened. The hard part was running back to it while dodging magic beams. Everything was so bright.

“Tama…”

Yes, Hisui. Tama is no more. Please help.

Tama’s remains began to shine. Slowly, it began to reassemble itself. The next fireball bounced off of its newly-regrown top as it grew large enough to cover us. It was no Aoko shield, but it’d do.

With the ground rattling, Yukimura was barely able to keep the chest open, but we managed; Hisui spawned an army of Tamas to defend us, even if they were scorched into cinders a second later.

The moment I stabbed the box with the skewer, Yukimura used his entire body to slam it shut. Disturbingly, the branch dissolved into the air.

“They got it!” Someone called from the shadows. “And the delinquent killed Crystalmoon44!”

Oh, no, not Crystalmoon44…

…wait.

Killed?