MAZE - The Endless Quest

Once Elistrae arrived, everyone else left the hospital room, including Leo. According to Alex, she needed peace and quiet to work, in addition to that, anyone who was close could cause some interference with her skill. When dealing with one of the victims from the labs, that problem could be more or less ignored since it was only one bundle of spells and effects she had to remove. But with Marco, things were wildly different. Even without using her skills, the Purifying Light already could tell that the sheer number of things she would have to remove were on a completely different level. Instead of eight or nine intertwined effects, Alex was clearly staring at over a hundred. At least, some were not as complex, and there were a couple of spells that felt very similar. Those were likely variations of the same effect, only with some improvements. However, that didn’t make things easier. According to Ley, the herald for the Purification legacy, at some point whoever did this to Marco started to run out of space to tattoo his body. Instead of stopping, they would remove the tattoo and make a new one over the scared skin, but the underlying spell was still active. Just broken. Which made things even more confusing.

Still, Alex pushed through and thanks to her [Steps of Purity] she was able to start working on cleansing Marco. Even better, she managed to spend a full half an hour working before being unable to remember the correct strand of magic to continue her job. During all that time, Elistrae and Neria had to heal Marco nonstop. The man needed the help of medical equipment to stay alive by himself. With Alex removing the tattoos and spells, his already unstable situation became even worse. But that was the only chance he had. A few different doctors took a look at the human, and they all agree there wasn’t much they could do. Unless they knew the actual spells and potential drugs he got, anything they tried would be a risk. At most, they could make him comfortable, and even that could cause issues. Since they had Alex, it was safer to let her work instead of putting Marco through the necessary invasive exams that could allow them to help him.

Once that was over, the two healers continued for another 15 minutes, slowly reducing the amount of spells they were casting to be sure nothing was going to go wrong. Only when both of them felt it was safe to leave, they called Leo back to explain the situation.

“So, what is the diagnosis, doc?” Leo tried to joke and lighten the mood as he returned, but that didn’t work. He was too worried to be playing around.

Alex was drinking some water, the mental strain of the skill still making her sweat, “Good news first. I was able to start. One of the tattoos on his chest is gone. And not everything is bundled together, so some parts will be easier. Now, for the bad part. First, his connection with the Spirit is significantly stronger than the one the other test subjects have. That makes what I’m doing a lot harder. There is more resistance against my skill. Second, there is… something covering his entire body. It’s not a single spell, I’m not even sure if it is a spell or something else. That thing is connecting some of the other spells and making it harder to remove them. Because it’s making one thing be affected by another, as if they were linked. So, without the [Steps of Purity] I can’t actually try to continue.”

“That’s ok. I really appreciate all the help,” Leo turned to his uncle, now seeing an misshaped square of empty skin, without any ink or tattoos near his left shoulder, “Really, thank you.”

“No worries, and the 10 day break between sessions might be good. It gives him time to recover since this is hard on him, too.”

Alex, along with Neria and Elistrae, left the hospital room, leaving Leo behind. With the exception of the hunter’s crew, everyone also decided to give the man space. The situation was, though, and it would take a long time for any significant progress.

Hera and Neria talked with Bonnie and Alex a bit more before splitting off and going to their hotel rooms. They’ve been moving for days without stopping and really needed some rest. The Empress also made a point of letting Vulcan walk around, even if he was still near her. During most of the journey from the Verdant Labyrinth to here, Forge was kept inside the legacy. Being in that proximity to a Daemon would surely spell trouble and they couldn’t risk that interaction. Said Daemon was in the hospital too, but on a floor away from Marco. As they traveled, they discovered that if the two got too far from each other, things would go south. The former spirit would start to wake up and enter a frenzy while the spirit bound human had minor convulsions. However, getting too close wasn’t good either. If they did that, the Daemon would start to mutate, more limbs and faces would appear around his body while Marco’s temperature would rise. Thankfully, the ideal distance wasn’t a single number, but a range. This allowed them to prepare a separate room for the Daemon where people could study it and try to find a way to bring the creature back to its natural state without interfering too much with Marco.

For the next two days, the Harmony Guardians rested and went sightseeing in Carnation, that was the name of the city in the Pink Coast Forest room. Milla was aware of their situation and had told the Alliance about their availability for other missions, but even they told the group to rest. Apparently, there were a few things going on and they might be called soon, but for now, staying close to the Astral Light, the name of Alex and Bonnie’s duo, was the mission they had. Since the assassin was the only person who managed to save those bound to Daemons through their tattoos, the Alliance wanted her safe. According to Milla, bodyguards were not a necessity when Alex was in a city, that was something for when she would travel. Even so, having powerful teams in the same place as her put people’s mind at ease.

During their third day, Hera woke up late. She took the chance to have small parties with her court, especially since Vulcan never had a chance to do something like that. They ate, played some games, ate junk food and kept watching movies through the night. During moments like this, the blacksmithing kangaroo didn’t seem to struggle with his emotions. Even when he was getting his ass beaten in a racing game. That lessened the Empress’ worries. If small things like that could increase the Daemonic Influence, she would have to be constantly looking out for Vulcan to stop him from going berserk. Thankfully, he could have a normal life without a worry. At least as normal as one of her titled blades could be.

The Empress gave all the titled blades a Royal Quest to just do whatever they wanted for the day. They could come with her, stay inside, or explore the city. The only restriction was not to leave Carnation or go inside any dungeons, or go close to the hospital without her. Hera had even asked the Alliance to give her some extra debit cards, so the titled blades could spend some money on their own if they wanted. In the end, everyone stayed behind in the hotel room. Just as the Ophidianite reached the elevator, the doors opened and Neria was about to step out.

“Hera! Just who I was looking for.”

“Hey, did something happen?”

“No, no. I just had an idea and wanted to run by you.”

“Sure, do you want to stop by a place and talk, or can we do it while I go get some food?” Hera hold the elevator door open, waiting for Neria’s decision.

“We can walk and talk. It’s nothing secretive, just complicated,” Neria stepped back into the elevator.

“Ok then. BY the way, do you know any place here with some good curry? We were watching a movie yesterday and man, I got a craving,” the Ophidianite used her tail to press the button for the ground floor.

“I read about one in the north district,” Neria quickly pulled her tablet and sent a link to Hera, “That’s the location.”

“Thanks, so what do you want to talk about?”

“Would it be ok if I tried to heal Vulcan?”

Hera tilted her head, “I mean, you have healed him before. Haven’t you? We know that healing spells work on the court, but they are not as strong as we expect them to be.”

“No, no. I mean healing him from the Daemonic Influence.”

“You… you want to get rid of the influence? Neria, I appreciate the intention, but that is part of him. It’s not something you can just heal. It’s like saying you want to heal me from being an Ophidianite.”

Neria’s eyes went wide, “What? No! I don’t mean to get rid of it. I mean, heal him in order to lower the influence. You mentioned it was percentage based. So like turning it down from 10 to 9%.”

“Oh! My bad,” Hera thought for a second, “Do you think you can do that?”

“Maybe. I had an idea, and it might work,” Neria said as the elevator doors opened and the two walked off.

“Do you mind sharing? The decision will be Vulcan’s, but I’m not going to even put the offer on the table without knowing what might happen to him.”

“You know how that Strength Daemon that we found with Marco is sleeping all the time, right?”

“Yeah, because of the liquid strength mana in the glass box they put him in.”

“Exactly. Ever since we figured that out, I’ve been working on a strength heal. A spell to heal someone’s strength. Yesterday I managed to make it work, but… it doesn’t do anything. It doesn’t actually make someone stronger, or less tired, or anything. But the spell is complete and by all metrics, it works. It’s a spell that does nothing.”

Hera stared at the triton, “Which is not possible. A spell has to do something. If it doesn’t, the spell doesn’t work. It fizzles out. But you are saying the spell worked?”

“I knew you would understand. Yeah, it did. I think I made a spell that heals Strength Spirits.”

“Do you think that would be able to turn a Daemon back into a Spirit?” Hera asked.

“In an ideal world. Yeah. But I doubt it. The one I made was too simple. It’s the equivalent of a basic heal that you would teach to new healers. Still, if it works on Vulcan, it’s a step in the right direction.”

They turned the corner, leaving the hotel, “That is… amazing, Neria. Really. We need to ask Vulcan, but if he is ok with that, I think it’s fine. If it works, I’m even going to ask you to teach me that one. But he is just the test subject, isn’t he?”

The triton nodded, “Yeah. I will tell him that, of course. But we know that the Daemon Marco is bound to is making him worse. So I thought that if I was able to heal the Daemon, then it would be easier to do the same with Marco. Also… remember that prophecy? Maybe it was talking about this. Maybe if I can complete this spell, the version that changes a Daemon back into a Spirit, then I will save everyone instead of letting so many people die.”

Hera sighed, “Look. You know I don’t believe in that prophecy. But I do think this is a good idea. If we were able to find where the Daemons are located and change them all back into Spirits, maybe the all the Soldier of Strengths will stop working like they should.”

“Do you think so? Don’t you think that doing that might just mess everything up and make them stronger? Like without having to worry about breaking down.”

“I don’t know, but I do think it’s worth to test that. If we have the chance. But one way or another, if Vulcan accepts that, it would be better to test inside a dungeon. Just in case he goes wild.”

“I agree. We can go to the vampire one. Alex and Bonnie made it sound like a fun one.”

Hera thought for a moment, “Or… we could try the Goldmoon Manor instead. They did say that they didn’t try that one since it requiters a large team.”

“And any team with you turns into a large one,” Neria chuckled.

“Oh jeez. Thank’s for calling me fat,” Hera rolled her eyes in a joke. Then again, since her court was part of her, her weight was technically the weight of all her court members plus her own combined.

“I’m sending a text to everyone to see who wants to join. Alex and Bonnie were dying to check that dungeon, and maybe even Leo’s crew wants to join. It would be good for him to get his mind off his uncle for a while.”

Hera nodded, “I agree. But tell them we are going in a couple of hours. I want my lunch first.”