The Fusionist Book 2 -- Chapter 46

Chapter 46

For some reason, Larek didn’t think about how he would explain what happened to Nedira. With his roommates, he would have enough time to come up with something before they woke up from their comas, but Norde’s sister was another story altogether.

“Nedira—”

“Where were you?!” she shouted, cutting him off. “I came back here after an insane defense of the city walls against monstrous bugs expecting to find you all safe and sound, only to hear from someone that my brother and Verne had been hauled off to the healer’s ward in some sort of coma? Then, to find your door completely gone and the frame showing signs that it was blown off its hinges, I didn’t know what to think!”

Larek dropped his things to the floor as she started sobbing and sniffling as the tears renewed themselves. He sat next to her so that he could speak to her without anyone overhearing from outside the room, but before he could say anything, the fourth-year practically threw herself at him and buried her face in his chest. Without knowing what else to do, he simply wrapped his arms around and held her; he nearly started talking a few times to explain what had happened, but fortunately she chose those times to sob even harder, preventing him from speaking unless he raised his voice.

It was fortunate not because he wanted her to cry, but because it gave him extra time to formulate what he should say.  If he had spoken immediately, he didn’t think he would’ve been able to stop from blurting out exactly what he’d done, including all of the gruesome details. Not only did he want to spare her from hearing something that still disturbed him, but he wasn’t exactly sure he should tell her about the deaths at all. It wasn’t about trust, because he absolutely trusted her and his roommates not to reveal what they knew, but because it might put them in danger if they knew some specific information.

If they were ever questioned using one of those truth-detecting spells, then it would be difficult for them to avoid revealing what they knew about him and what happened. As had already been proven, just knowing that he might be a “half-breed” – which he still doubted, despite some of the evidence to the contrary – could be a danger to them since they weren’t Nobles of the Kingdom. Then, knowing that he killed a student and two trainees and didn’t say anything to those in charge of the Academy and Fort? It would be a miracle if they weren’t punished severely for that, which could result in their deaths or being sent the Diregate, which – from what he’d heard – was essentially a death-sentence all on its own.

Of course, if Larek was ever questioned, which was inevitable since he’d already reported to the healers with Verne and Norde what had happened initially, some of that might come out anyway. He had some ideas of how to… adjust… how he answered to avoid incriminating himself, though he’d have to think about it some more.  In essence, he thought that by using a hyper-focused state he could regulate his thoughts and answers so that his body didn’t betray him, which he thought was the way the spell worked – but he’d have to ask around and see if he was correct or not. Either way, if he could at least keep his friends from being incriminated along with him if his plan didn’t work, then he would consider not sharing the full truth with Nedira and his roommates a fair trade.

When the young woman soaking his robe with tears finally slowed down, she pulled away and wiped her face on her own robe, leaving behind red-rimmed eyes that – instead of being filled with anger like he expected – only looked sad and forlorn.

“So… what happened?” she asked with a lot less heat in her tone than before.

Larek took a deep breath before he launched into the explanation, basically repeating what he had told the healers that took Verne and Norde away earlier. She winced a few times when she heard what happened to her brother, but she seemed relieved that they had been able to heal themselves, even if they were in comas now.

The biggest difference between the story he told the healers and what he told Nedira was the inclusion of what the Martial trainee had done to his legs. “I didn’t have my Healing Surge anklet on me because Shinpai had taken it from me to look at—”

“Wait—he knows?”

Larek nodded slowly, remembering all that had happened. “He… was talking about my ability to translate spells to Fusions like never before, and I foolishly showed him the Healing Surge Fusion. It was at that point that he deduced that I might have access to Martial stats and Skills because of its reliance on knowing the inner workings of the Body Regeneration Martial Skill. He was in the middle of telling me to stay away from him for a while, because it was dangerous for both of us, when the Scissions arrived; I was in such a panic at their appearance and being told that my instructor didn’t want to see me that I forgot to ask for it back.”

“What did he mean by it being dangerous? And do you know why you were targeted in the first place? It is because of your height?”

“I….” Larek hesitated for a moment before making a decision. “I do know why, and the reason is the same as why I was targeted. Unfortunately, that danger would also extend to you if you knew. For that reason… I can’t tell you.”

“You can’t? Or you won’t?”

“I… won’t. I won’t put your life in danger unnecessarily, just like I won’t be telling Verne or Norde.”

She was silent for a moment. “But why? Is it that much of a secret? You’re not some kind of wanted criminal, are you?”

He managed to restrain the wince that wanted to form on his face when she said that; instead, he answered in what he hoped was a reassuring voice, “No, nothing like that. I’m not wanted for anything other than being who I am; all I can say is that it is related to everything you already know about me, but knowing a few more specifics would be a very bad idea. It’s unfortunately already a danger that you know some of what you do about me, but we can only hope that it won’t matter in the long-run.”

Nedira didn’t relax after his explanation, but at least she didn’t appear hostile or angry at his reluctance to speak about who he may or may not be.

“Fine. I don’t like that you’re keeping something like that from us, but I guess I can understand… a little,” she finally said after a few moments of silence. “Anyway, how did you escape?”

That, at least, he could explain in detail because she already knew that much about him.

“Alright, that makes sense, I guess. But what are you going to do now? If this Mage was a student and the other two were Martial trainees, then they’re likely to come for you after discovering that you escaped their grasp.”

All Larek said was, very clearly and without detail, “We don’t have to worry about them.”

“What? What do you mean? How are they not something to worry about? If they were Nobles like you suspected, then they have a power that transcends the Academy—”

“We don’t have to worry about them,” he repeated, a little more firmly this time.

“That doesn’t make any sense—  Oh. Does this have anything to do with why you weren’t here when I got back?”

“We don’t have to worry about them.”

“Did you—?

“We don’t have to worry about them.”

Searching his eyes as if she could detect the truth in their depths, she shook her head and looked away. “Sure.  I didn’t want to know anyway, I suppose. We don’t have to worry about them.”

“Exactly.”

“I just hope you taught them a lesson for hurting my little brother.”

He didn’t respond to that, knowing that anything he said might be construed as admitting to something she didn’t need to know. As long as she didn’t know for sure that he did something to those that abducted him, she wouldn’t be lying if she was asked if she knew what had happened to them.

Changing the subject, he asked, “How was the defense on the wall? Tell me a little more about what kind of Scissions they were.”

Nedira jumped at the chance to move away from dangerous territory as she explained in detail the Category 5 Scissions, including descriptions of the different bug monsters that emerged in large waves. Larek shivered a few times as he pictured the different giant insects and the spiders that could jump all the way to the top of the wall; he wasn’t exactly scared of bugs, but monstrous versions of them creeped him out more than the undead did back in Barrowford.

“Most of the time, I used my Binding Roots to entangle some of the bugs down below the wall so that they could be taken out by others, because Naturalist spells drain my Mana far slower than other elements.”

Her talking about using that particular spell reminded him that he wanted to ask her to demonstrate some of the spells she could cast, which would add to his repertoire. “I’ve been meaning to ask you for a while now, but something keeps coming up. I believe that at least some of them could be incorporated into my Fusions.”

“Is it really a good idea to keep making those kinds of Fusions right now? Considering what just happened?”

Larek hadn’t thought about his Fusion creation like that, but he supposed that she had a point. His presence in the Advanced Fusions class was likely something that made him stand out to Ricardo and convinced him that he was a half-breed; he’d already done his best to keep the nature of his Fusions a secret to anyone other than his friends and his instructor, but if anyone else learned of them, then that might lead to another Noble or twenty learning about it and deducing that he was a half-breed, as well.

“You could be right. I’d still like to learn more spells, however. I just won’t necessarily incorporate them into my Fusions… at least, not right now.”

“Well then, I think I can do that,” she said.  “But right now I want to go and visit the healer’s ward and check up on my brother and Verne. Let’s go.”

Larek was exhausted after everything that he’d done that day, which was slowly turning into a big blur as his mind attempted to comprehend it all. Regardless, he nodded and followed Nedira out of his un-doored room.

The park and the hallways around the building were as much of a mess as it was when he walked through them before, but fortunately he didn’t have to hide his presence this time. He was going to visit his roommates in the healer’s ward, which was something he could easily explain since he wasn’t carrying a travel bag or an axe by his side. Having to leave it his room made him feel a little underprepared, nonetheless; after being attacked and abducted earlier in the day made him desire to be armed with some sort of weapon at all times.

It took them about 15 minutes to finally arrive at the ward, which was swarming with healers and wounded students and trainees. There were at least 5 times more Martial trainees than Mage students, which he supposed made sense because they were more likely to be on the front lines against monsters. That fact made him grateful for being identified as a Mage instead of a Martial all the way back at Barrowford by Inquisitor Carl, because he had no desire to be on the front lines. Though, with all the fighting he’d done with his axe in the past, it was probably hard to tell that from his actions. Regardless, it was the truth, and while he’d rather not be attacked by any monsters, he’d rather be as far away from them as possible if it came about.

Nedira handled the process of locating her brother and Norde, which made him glad because the healers rushing around were looking at him in irritation. Not necessarily in a height-biased way, but because his size was blocking their way through the hallways as they rushed around to heal their patients.

It only took another minute or so before they were pointed in the right direction, and they found both Verne and Norde seemingly asleep nearby, their beds next to each other, though there were 6 other beds in the room – all occupied by Martial trainees. Looking at their wounds, Larek could see that a pair of them appeared to have lost their lower arms, while the other 4 had been severely wounded with cuts and deep gouges along their legs and torso – though they weren’t missing any appendages. With Body Regeneration and no other healing, the latter would likely recover within a day or two on their own, especially as they’d been bandaged to help stop the bleeding.

As for the ones missing their lower arms… he’d heard about some healing spells being able to regrow them, which is something he’d like to see in person. His Healing Surge was able to repair his legs even though they had been smashed to pieces; that was only possible because the pieces were all technically still there. If his legs had been detached entirely, the Fusion would’ve just sealed over the wounds and healed everything else without growing new legs.

Just as he’d seen outside when they were being carried, both Verne and Norde appeared fine, if a little gaunt because they’d used their body’s resources to heal the damage done to it. Aside from being in a temporary coma, they were essentially unharmed.

They weren’t there but a few minutes, with Larek sitting on Verne’s bedside and Nedira on her brother’s, when a familiar voice called out to him.

“Oh, good, you’re here; saves us the trouble of tracking you down. If you’d come with me, young man, I have some people that would like to ask you some questions.”

Book 2 Chapter 47: https://www.patreon.com/posts/fusionist-book-2-84215568