Strange thoughts and healing (part 1)

Ugh... I should have worn a tighter shirt; these bouncing breasts are a nightmare when sprinting. I still love them, logically, but they're not exactly combat-friendly.

I skid to a halt, my black-tipped ears twitching as I assess the soundscape. The panicked cries of pain have faded, replaced by guttural war cries. I should switch to ranged attacks. Might as well take this opportunity to test out my new skills.

Let's see... what exactly can you do with darkness? Let's experiment.

Oh, I see a group climbing a nearby building for some reason. Perfect.

Drowning them by shrouding their heads? It seems much easier to manifest the magic directly from my palm than to manipulate the shadows already around them. Cool, but... eh, nothing happens. They don't seem to breathe normal air. Piercing their heads? Instant death. Piercing their torsos? They die, but it takes a few seconds. Crushing them? It takes a ridiculous amount of effort, though they eventually pop. Decapitation? Instant death.

Let's try something a little more creative. I narrow my eyes, focusing on a new group of three creatures scaling the tower of a small temple... Why so much climbing? Maybe someone is hiding at the top? Let's start by severing their claws, then the rest of their limbs.

With a flex of my will and a few wretched screeches from them, they plummet to the ground.

Let's keep going! I latch onto the darkness inside one of the falling beasts and yank it violently toward the earth. Its descent accelerates unnaturally, ending in a loud crunch that leaves a crater and a massive splatter of dark blood behind.

Wait, it's not acid... Why did I think their blood would be acid? What a weird thought. I definitely need to visit a temple to get my head checked after this. The corpse looks relatively intact, though. Now—

'Oh, someone stole my prey...'

I freeze, my tail fluffing up in sudden alarm. Wait, wait, wait. Prey?

A cold chill washes over me. Why am I playing with them? I should be using this time to help people, not running sadistic tests with my new magic!

Sure, I've helped a lot by thinning their numbers, but at some point, my instincts took the wheel. I stopped paying attention to the emergency and started treating it like a hunt. How terrifying. I definitely need to unpack that later; I'll ask Nicole.

For now, back to the purge. This time, I head toward the thickest concentration of noise.

Focus, Seina... Alright. They're more fragile than I originally thought, so how are the guards holding up? I flick my ears, scanning the area until I catch the sharp clang of steel. Over there.

Run, run; don't look back or get distracted by nonsense like you always do, me. I also have to dodge and ignore, let's say, dirty floors. Five minutes of sprinting leads me to a small square.

W-wow... I can't ignore it after all.

Corpses. Everywhere. So that's why the screaming stopped. I'd been so hyper-focused on my magic that I'd subconsciously dialed back my senses; a habit of mine in crowded places. But now that I'm here, the overwhelming, metallic stench of fresh blood violently assaults my nose. My stomach churns.

Before I can even pinch my nose shut, a deafening, all-too-familiar roar yanks me out of my thoughts.

HHSSSSSS!!!

This one sounds like a snake. They all sound similar when they're whining in pain, but their battle cries vary; they can sound like snakes, cats, birds of prey, lions, or just very loud, random, guttural, terrifying sounds.

On the other side of the square, several knights are desperately fending off a monstrosity. It easily doubles the size of the regular beasts, which are already twice as tall as the square's decorative statues, which in turn are twice as tall as me.

So... my math might be terrible right now, but the point is, it is painfully huge.

It looms over the paved grounds, a towering mass of armor and muscle that casually snaps marble monuments into dust as it moves. Its heavy body drags across the fountain's stone rim, shattering the masonry with every shift of its weight. Instead of an elongated dome, its head is crowned with a jagged wreath of antlers, blacker than coal...

SNAP!

Just like before, my body moves faster than my brain. One of the beast's tails shatters a knight's heavy shield, followed immediately by the sickening crunch of snapping arm bones. The monster raises a giant claw to finish the job, but I'm already there.

I must be more mentally drained than I realized. Instead of using a lethal spell, I just slam my magic-enhanced shoulder into the creature's flank.

"Mmmgh!"

It's enough to shove the beast back a few feet, giving the injured knight's comrades a split second to drag him away.

But as my momentum stops, a terrifying reality sets in. It is a terrible idea to get into melee range of a massive, multi-limbed monster covered in teeth and claws. This thing is all of that and more!

And I am standing right next to it!

Two bladed tails whip toward me. I barely manage to summon a shield of compressed darkness to deflect the lethal stabs, but the sheer kinetic force sends me flying backward into the street.

"AAAAAAAHHHH!" I'm flying!? It hurts!

A blinding, agonizing crack echoes in my chest as I hit the cobblestones, the pain flaring hotter with every agonizing roll.

'THIS IS NO TIME TO TEST HAND-TO-HAND COMBAT, YOU IDIOT!'

The shock of the impact, the searing pain in my chest, and the overwhelming barrage of sounds and smells force my survival instincts into overdrive. My mind suddenly snaps into crystal-clear focus. With a swipe of my hand, dozens of pitch-black spears erupt from the ground, violently impaling the creature from every angle.

But there's no time to observe my victory. The beast is dead, but its massive corpse is still carrying its original momentum. And it's crashing down directly toward me!

I throw myself sideways just in time, yet the violent twist wrenches my broken torso.

"AAAHH, DAMN IT! AAaah—! Ugh..."

I collapse onto my knees, gasping for air that refuses to come. Every shallow breath is torture. I force myself to stay perfectly still, clutching my chest, as heavy footsteps rush up beside me.

Endure, endure for now... I-I'll think of something... It's not the first time I've broken a bone.

"Miss, are you alright? Let me take a look!" a knight shouts. He grabs my shoulder, trying to turn me around. The rough movement sends a fresh wave of agony through my chest.

"Argh...! I think it broke my sternum! I can heal it, just don't touch me!" I snap.

"Ster— what? Never mind, do you need help?" the knight stammers, hastily pulling his armored hand back.

The guilt hits me instantly. His metal gauntlets look incredibly thick and heavy; he probably couldn't help being so rough.

'Wait... Can I heal myself? Why did I just say that?'

My emerald eyes widen in surprise. But just like when I first awakened this darkness, a strange, absolute confidence washes over me.

I press my palm against my chest and channel the magic inward. I picture the shadows seeping into my flesh, numbing the screaming nerves and gathering the shattered bone fragments. I feel the cracked, sunken pieces of my breastbone knitting back together, tying themselves to my ribs with threads of pure darkness. Muscles, veins, and torn tissue mend under my command, weaving together denser and stronger than they ever could have been.

'Wow,' I think, unable to find better words while looking down at my chest

"Wow," the knight echoes out loud.

I glance up. He's staring blankly at my chest. Or rather, he's staring a little too much at my chest. Hey, buddy, I know I just pulled off a medical miracle here, but stop staring at my breasts.

"Ahem," I cough pointedly, slowly pushing myself to my feet and checking for any lingering pain. The knight jolts out of his daze, his face flushing as he quickly averts his gaze from my slightly torn clothes.

A groan from a dying soldier nearby violently reminds him where we are.

"Miss!" he pleads, suddenly falling to his knees and bowing his head. "Please help my wounded comrades! At least enough to get them out of danger. I beg you!"

Eh...

'I've never been very interested in social ranks, but I'm pretty sure a knight is at least one or two steps above a commoner like me. Sometimes they're even nobles themselves.'

While I would normally freeze up at someone like that dropping to one knee, I don't even answer him. Instead, I rush over to the rest of the group. The coppery scent of fresh blood hits my nose before I even see the worst of it. Two knights are holding down a man with a severed arm while another presses hard on the stump. Several others are inspecting the fallen, while the guy with the broken arm sits on the sidelines, biting his lip to hold back his groans.

'Mmm... I feel like I could make it grow back, but I shouldn't experiment too much right now. And I guess there will be a lot of injured people out there. Sorry, sir, but I'll save my strength and do the minimum.'

"Let me see!" I push my way into the circle so I can get a proper look.

There's a clean cut on the forearm near the elbow, pulsing with an alarming amount of blood. Good... well, I mean, not good at all, but not as fatal as his screams make it sound. I shove the knight trying to apply pressure completely out of the way, guiding my darkness directly into the wounded man's arm.

They must have heard me yelling earlier or seen me fight, because none of them try to stop me; they just watch me work in absolute silence.

Huh. It's just like before. My body moves on its own, not like I'm possessed, but as if my mind is merely directing the magic through an old, forgotten habit.

'For the thousandth time today, this is no time to get distracted, Seina.'

Since I need a quick fix and the rest of his arm isn't in sight, it might be best to cleanly sever a tiny bit more bone at the elbow joint, leaving enough excess skin to seal the wound shut. I repeat the same process as my own ribs: moving nerves, vessels, and tissue. Then glue. Then strengthen.

Phew... I let out a heavy breath when I finish.

It's incredibly stressful, but so satisfying at the same time! Seeing that he's no longer bleeding or screaming brings me immense relief, even if he still looks deeply traumatized. I wish I had regular healing magic; they say you just cast a preset spell and it heals automatically... but something inside me insists that my method is more accurate, versatile, and useful overall.

Mh? Weird thought.

"Um, sorry," I murmur, avoiding his eyes.

"H-huh?"

"Oh, I think you could have had it reattached, but there's no time to look for the rest of it. I hear Mara's church can regrow limbs if you can afford it," I trail off, my ears swiveling as I scan the plaza for any other major injuries.

"That is more than enough. You have my deepest thanks," a deep voice says from behind me.

It's the knight from before. He seems to have finished inspecting the giant beast's corpse. I assume the guy I just treated isn't quite in the mood for conversation yet, so I walk over to the knight with the broken arms and quickly mend his bones the same way I did mine.